If Bhagat Singh Were Alive Today: How Might He Respond to India’s Social, Economic, Political, Religious and Communal Scenario?

 

If Bhagat Singh Were Alive Today: How Might He Respond to India’s Social, Economic, Political, Religious and Communal Scenario?

SR Darapuri National President, All India Peoples Front

(A special feature on the birth anniversary of Shaheed-e-Azam Bhagat Singh today)

“Bhagat Singh would likely respond as a consistent rationalist socialist and internationalist: fiercely critical of inequality, communal polarization, and the mixing of religion with politics, while demanding systemic transformation toward a classless society rather than mere political independence or majoritarian nationalism.”

His actual writings and organizational practice provide the grounding. By the late 1920s he had moved from romantic nationalism and anarchism toward Marxism (influenced by Marx, Lenin, and others). In ‘To Young Political Workers’ (1931) he defined revolution as “the complete overthrow of the existing social order and its replacement with the socialist order,” with the state as a weapon of the ruling class to be seized for reconstruction on a Marxist basis. He was an explicit atheist (‘Why I Am an Atheist’), viewed organized religion as a “mountain” obstructing progress and unity, and insisted religion remain a private matter kept out of politics. Through the Naujawan Bharat Sabha and HSRA he prioritized secularism, class consciousness, opposition to communal bodies, and struggle against untouchability and exploitation.

 Political

He would treat formal democracy and independence as incomplete. Political power still largely serving capital, landlords, or elite interests would be seen as continuity of the old order under new managers—echoing his critique that independence alone would not end exploitation by “British capitalists or mixed British and Indian, or even purely Indian.” He would support mass organization of workers and peasants, free speech, and critical thinking, while rejecting personality cults, blind faith in leaders, or authoritarian suppression of dissent. Narrow, slogan-driven nationalism that elevates religious or cultural majoritarianism over class and human equality would clash with his insistence that people first see themselves as human beings and then as Indians, not primarily as Hindus, Muslims, or Sikhs.

 Economic

Inequality, unemployment, agrarian distress, and concentration of wealth would be central targets. His program included abolition of landlordism, nationalization of land and key industries, collective farming, security of housing, and ending peasant indebtedness. Rising private monopolies, privatization that intensifies exploitation, or growth that leaves large sections in precarity would be condemned as the “exploitation of man by man” he sought to end. He would urge class-based organizing of workers and peasants rather than reliance on charity, reformist palliatives, or identity politics.

 Social

Caste discrimination and untouchability drew sharp criticism in essays such as “Achoot ka Sawaal.” He rejected the idea that birth or occupation justified hierarchy, called for upper castes to treat Dalits as equals (including sharing food and water without conversion rituals), and saw the oppressed as a potential revolutionary force. Persistent caste violence, exclusion, and hierarchical attitudes would be denounced as incompatible with any genuine freedom. He would also push scientific temper, education free of superstition, and rational inquiry against fatalism or inherited privilege.

 Religious and Communal

This is where his response would be most uncompromising. Religion as a public or political force was, for him, a barrier: it fosters fatalism, divides the oppressed, and is exploited by elites. In “Religion and Our Freedom Struggle” and pieces on communal riots he argued that class consciousness is the real antidote—poor workers and peasants of every faith share the same enemies (capitalists and exploiters) and the same interest in unity. He praised the Ghadar martyrs for separating religion from politics and hoped youth would reject mutual hatred in the name of faith.

Contemporary religious polarization, majoritarian mobilization, communal riots or lynchings, and the instrumental use of faith by politicians would be met with the same diagnosis he offered in the 1920s: these are tools that keep the masses divided and distracted from economic exploitation. He would reject both Hindu majoritarianism and competing communalisms equally, insist on strict separation of religion from state and politics, and promote rationalism and atheism (or at least private belief) as liberating. Appropriation of his image by religious nationalists would be rejected as a distortion of his explicit atheism and anti-communal practice.

 Overall Stance and Limitations of the Hypothetical

Bhagat Singh was not a parliamentary gradualist; he believed in revolutionary transformation. In today’s parliamentary democracy he might still prioritize building independent working-class and peasant organization, using agitation, education, and struggle rather than electoral opportunism alone. He would celebrate genuine advances in literacy, science, or reduced formal colonial rule, yet judge the system by whether exploitation, caste hierarchy, and communal division had been uprooted.

Any claim that he would simply endorse one contemporary party or ideology is anachronistic projection. His record is clear on the axes that still matter: socialism over capitalism, reason and class unity over faith and communal identity, and thorough social reconstruction over symbolic or majoritarian nationalism. Reading his prison writings and ‘Kirti’ articles remains the best guide; the questions he posed about power, inequality, and the role of religion have not become obsolete.