The day Gandhiji was assassinated

Shouts rent the air, ‘Bapu, what has happened to our Bapu?’

Ever since Mahatmaji began his evening prayer meetings at Birla House on Delhi’s Albuquerque Road (now Tees January Marg), my mother, two sisters and my 3-year-old daughter used to attend them every day. Mahatmaji would appear punctually at 5 pm from his room there, his arms around granddaughters, Abha and Manu.

On the evening of Friday, January 30, 1948, I was sitting in the garden of my home at 23 Prithviraj Road, busy sewing for my expected baby. Mother came around half past four and told me it was getting late for Mahatmaji’s prayer meeting. I told her to go ahead. Soon after my mother left, I heard loud shouts. Puzzled, I prepared to leave for Birla House, when mother came running, breathless, ‘Zalimaan nae goli nal mar ditta.’ (The cruel murderers have shot Mahatmaji.) I shook her, “What are you saying?” Ma mumbled, “Just as Mahatmaji was walking down the pathway, a man stepped out in front of him and shot him.” The whole family ran to Albuquerque Road where a huge crowd had already surrounded Birla House, which had been cordoned off. Shouts rent the air, “Bapu, what has happened to our Bapu?” The IG of police told me to come at night when the body would be laid out for public darshan. At night we first went to the adjoining house: 12 Aurangzeb Road (now Claridges Hotel), and climbed to its roof. Seven months pregnant, I tried to hop on to the parapet to get a better view.

At 9 pm, Mahatmaji’s body was laid on a plain bier and carried to the terrace of Birla House. It was placed at one end, propped up in a slanting position with floodlights on it to make it visible to the crowds below. Then we descended and had his darshan. Cries of ‘Mahatma Gandhi ki jai’ rent the air. People wept, but quietly. After their darshan, they left in an orderly file. People wondered who could have done such a dastardly act. My husband feared that things could get bad for us Punjabis since “it is probable that a Punjabi refugee did this”. When news came that it was a Maharashtrian Hindu who was responsible, there was widespread relief. The next morning we gathered at Birla House along with lakhs of others. At 11.30 am, the cortege was brought out on a gun carriage decorated with flowers and the national and Congress flags. Mahatmaji’s granddaughters, Manu and Abha; Devdas, his son; Gandhiji’s close companions, Sushila Nayar and Sucheta Kirpalani sat by their Bapu, singing his favourite bhajans.

We also sang as we walked behind the cortege pulled by army personnel. Through Queensway, Kingsway, up to the Memorial Arch we went; but we were too tired to continue to the Yamuna Ghat, where Gandhiji was cremated at 4 pm. It was a day of mourning for the world. The following day, we returned to Birla House to see the spot where Gandhiji had fallen to the assassin’s bullets. It had become hallowed ground. My sister collected some of the earth, tying it carefully in her handkerchief. For 13 days we continued to visit Birla House every day for prayers. Mahatmaji was not there, but we could feel his spirit, especially when the congregation sang ‘Ishwar Allah tere Naam, sab ko sanmati de Bhagwan…’

The writer is now 88 years old