Bhagat Singh himself said he was terrorist: Habib

NEW DELHI: Eminent historian Irfan Habib has come to the defence of Bipan Chandra and other historians who together authored India’s Struggle for Independence in 1988. The book which has been part of Delhi University’s history curriculum and refers to fredom fighter Bhagat Singh as a “revolutionary terrorist” has been at the centre of controversy recently.
Speaking to TOI, Habib said, “I did not agree with many points in the book but calling Bhagat Singh revolutionary terrorist was not wrong.” He said Hindustan Republican Socialist Association to which Bhagat Singh belonged had itself in its resolution of 1929 had used the word terrorist.“In fact, HRSA’s manifesto of 1929 distributed during the Lahore session of the Congress said ‘we are being criticised for our terrorist policies but we are resorting to terror in response to British terror’,” Habib said.
He also pointed to Bhagat Singh’s rejoinder to Mahatma Gandhi’s criticism of terror activity in which he had said that terrorism in itself is not revolution but no revolution is complete without terror.
Habib said that in later stage of his life, Bhagat Singh had admitted that he was terrorist for some time in the beginning.
Terrorist and terror have become pejorative words now because innocent people are being killed by them, he pointed out.