February 11, 2026
Ritabrata Banerjee’s Zero Hour mention on setting up the busts of freedom fighters in the Andaman and Nicobar Islands
Sir, I thank you for giving me this opportunity. Twelve Bengali speaking lionhearts were deported to the Andaman Cellular Jail convicted in the ‘Emperor versus Barindra Kumar Ghosh and Others’ case popularly known as the Alipore Conspiracy Case. Revolutionaries Barindra Kumar Ghosh, Ullaskar Dutta and Hemchandra Kanungoe along with nine other Bengali bravehearts were deported to the Andamans in 1909. Barin, Ullas and Hemachandra were pivotal figures of the uncompromising struggles against the British colonial yoke and the nerves of the Jugantar Dal and Anushilan Samiti revolutionary networks. Barindra Kumar Ghosh, a revolutionary ideologue, poet and journalist was one of the chief organizers of the Jugantar group in Bengal. He set up bomb-making units and underground cells in Calcutta and throughout the State. He was strongly influenced by Irish revolutionary thought. He spent long years under torture in the Andaman Cellular Jail and was released only in 1920. Ullaskar Dutta was one of the earliest Indian bomb-makers. Initially sentenced to death, later commuted to life imprisonment, Ullaskar was deported to Andaman. He was subjected to extreme torture and prolonged solitary confinement. He suffered severe mental breakdown and even British historical records cites him as one of the most tragic cases of colonial prison brutality. Sir, there was no electricity in the Andamans and batteries were sent from Calcutta to the Andaman Cellular Jail to lit up the quarters of the jailers. Those batteries were used on Ullaskar Dutta for torturing him. Such was the extent of torture. Sir, Hemchandra Kanungoe was a senior revolutionary strategist and technologist. He was also the mentor and trainer of young revolutionaries. A famous painter, Hemchandra sold all his property and travelled to Paris and trained under exiled Russian revolutionaries in explosives and arms. He introduced modern bomb-making techniques to Indian revolutionaries. He, along with revolutionary, Bhupendra Nath Dutta, who happens to be the younger brother of Swami Vivekananda, were the two most pivotal characters in bomb-making in India and bringing the art of bomb-making in India. Hemchandra provided technical and ideological bridge between the European radicalism and Indian nationalism. All three of these, Barin, Ullas and Hemchandra were central to the Jugantar-Anushilan Samiti network. Sir, you go to the Andaman Cellular Jail, they are conveniently forgotten. They need to be given their due respect. These three revolutionaries, Barin, Ullas and Hemchandra Kanungoe, need to be celebrated. I, through you, demand the Central Government that busts of these three revolutionaries must be set up in Andaman because these revolutionaries never ever wrote mercy petitions, and they are conveniently forgotten.
