Jai-Hind Slogan Was Coined by Chempakaraman Pillai

 

Ask any Indian on the street who gave us our national cry, ‘Jai Hind!’, & 9 out of 10 will say Subhash Chandra Bose. But decades before Netaji marched with the INA, 2 simple, electrifying words were uttered in the cold streets of Berlin by a teenage fugitive from Kerala. A man who fled British spies, forged an alliance with the German Kaiser, commanded a warship that set colonial Madras ablaze & stood up to Adolf Hitler himself. Born in 1891 in Trivandrum, Chempakaraman Pillai grew up under the heavy shadow of the British Raj. While other children played, young Pillai was already organizing schoolboys, printing anti colonial pamphlets & leading secret meetings under the banner of the Dharma Poshani Assembly. By 1908, he was just 17 yrs old & his name was circled in red on British Intelligence watchlists. Colonial officers were closing in to arrest the young rebel. In a plot straight out of an espionage thriller, a friendly foreign traveler named Sir Walter Strickland smuggled Pillai out of India disguised as a servant. Pursued across international waters, Pillai made it to Europe, eventually settling in Zurich & later Berlin. He enrolled at the ETH Zurich in Switzerland, studied engineering, chemistry & economics, all while running an underground anti-imperial network. When World War I broke out in 1914, Pillai saw his window. He established the International Pro-India Committee in Berlin & walked straight into the offices of the German High Command. He convinced Kaiser Wilhelm II that Britain’s weakness lay in its colonies & that Germany should back an Indian revolution. On the night of 22nd Sep, 1914, a sleek German light cruiser, the SMS Emden, stealthed through the pitch-black waters of the Bay of Bengal, creeping within range of the Madras coast. In a lightning naval strike, the Emden opened fire on the massive fuel reserves of the Burmah Oil Company. Towering walls of orange flame roared into the night sky, destroying 340000+ gallons of oil & sending shockwaves of panic through the British administration. It was the only time during World War I that enemy fire struck the mainland of British India & an Indian revolutionary was at the helm. During those intense years in Berlin, coordinating b/w Indian activists, German military officers & global revolutionaries, Pillai grew tired of formal, colonial greetings. He needed a battle cry that transcended regional languages and religious lines. In 1907, he had already coined 2 words: "Jai Hind" (Victory to India). It became the official greeting of his Berlin committee. Decades later, when Netaji Subhash Chandra Bose visited Germany to form the Indian Legion, he heard Pillai's battle cry, embraced it & made it the formal salute of the Indian National Army. Pillai’s fierce independence did not end with the British. In the late 1920s & early 1930s, as Adolf Hitler rose to power in Germany, Hitler made derogatory remarks about Indians in a public speech, claiming Indians were meant to be ruled by superior races. Pillai did not flinch. He wrote a sharp, uncompromising letter directly to Hitler, demanding a written apology. Shockingly, the pressure worked, Hitler was forced to issue a written apology to Pillai. Standing up to the Nazi regime came at a deadly cost. Soon after the confrontation, Pillai fell mysteriously, violently ill, symptoms consistent with slow poison. On 26th May, 1934, far away from the homeland he fought his entire life to liberate, Chempakaraman Pillai closed his eyes forever at the age of 42. Before he died, he left behind 1 final wish: that his ashes be brought back to a free India & scattered over the fields of his native Kerala. It took 30+ yrs after his death, in 1966, for his widow, Lakshmi Bai, to finally bring his ashes home on an Indian Navy warship, fulfilling the final promise to a ghost hero. The Next Time You Say "Jai Hind"...Remember that those 2 words were not written by a comfortable politician in a quiet office.. They were forged in the fires of World War I, carried on the decks of warships & spoken by a fearless Indian rebel who made emperors and dictators bow.