Redefining Revolution

Revolution was no longer equated with militancy and violence. Its objective was to be national liberation—imperialism was to be overthrown but beyond that a new socialist order was to be achieved, ending “exploitation of man by man”. As Bhagat Singh said in the court, “Revolution does not necessarily involve sanguinary strife, nor is there a place in it for personal vendetta. It is not the cult of bomb and pistol. By revolution we mean the present order of things, which is based on manifest injustice, must change.”

Bhagat fully accepted Marxism and the class approach to society—”Peasants have to free themselves not only from the foreign yoke, but also from the yoke of landlords and capitalists.” He also said, “The struggle in India will continue, so long as a handful of exploiters continue to exploit labour of common people to further their own interests. It matters little whether these exploiters are British capitalists, British and Indian capitalists in alliance, or even purely Indians.” He defined socialism scientifically as abolition of capitalism and class domination.

Bhagat was fully and consciously secular—two of the six rules drafted by Bhagat for the Punjab Naujawan Bharat Sabha were that its members would have nothing to do with communal bodies and that they would propagate a general feeling of tolerance among people, considering religion to be a matter of personal belief. Bhagat Singh also saw the importance of freeing people from the mental bondage of religion and superstition—”to be a revolutionary, one required immense moral strength, but one also required criticism and independent thinking”.