Bolangir: While everyone knows that Nathuram Godse had killed Mahatma Gandhi, very few of them know that the murder of the Father of the Nation was meticulously planned and executed.
Giving details to OTV today, Hemant Panda, a social activist of Bolangir, who obtained a copy of this vital document through Right to Information (RTI) Act, said since Gandhiji was a thorn in the ideology of the Hindu Mahasabha, five members of the Mahasabha—Madan Lal Pahwa, Narayan Apte, Shankar Badge, Nathuram Godse and his brother Gopal Godse—had planned to eliminate him.
The first threat had come at a meeting at Valmiki Colony in Delhi where Nathuram, dressed in the attire of a sadhu, had presented a flag to eminent Gandhian Sucheta Kripalini in which a Shiv Ling was painted with blood. Assuming him a lunatic, Kripalini had handed over the flag to an organiser of the event.
“Few days later, leaflets in the name of Adesh Lokyug were circulated in Delhi in which open threat to the lives of Gandhiji and Jawaharlal Nehru was given”, Panda said.
He said the rehearsal for the murder of Gandhiji had started a month before the day of his assassination.
“The Hindu Mahasabha members had a firing practice inside a forest behind the Birla House on January 20, 1948 while Nathuram had joined the training ten days after on January 30. After the death of the Mahatma, police had later seized empty cartridges and the bullets that had hit the truck of a Babul tree”, Panda informed.
He said to ease their tension, Nathuram, Gopal and Narayan had watched a Hindi movie ‘Milan’ in Delhi two days before the killing of Gandhiji.
Narayan Apte, who was staying at Marina Hotel in Delhi by changing his surname to Deshpande, had four of his associates including Nathuram in his room.
“On the day of the assassination on January 30, 1948, the five members had hired a taxi from near Regal Cinema Hall and went to the Birla House where as per the plan, Nathuram shot Gandhiji dead from point blank range”, Panda said.
He said the reasons of the killing of Gandhi by the Hindu Mahasabha were also spine chilling. “The document that I have with me has the statement of several witnesses”, he pointed out.