Bhagat Singh’s transition to Marxism was inspired by the factors that were the high points of those years. There was the massive labour upsurge when all white Simon Commission came to India. The Commission was received with acute negativity everywhere.

It was 1928, and Bombay workers had unleashed a massive demonstration. At Lahore, people’s anger had set the city aflame. The reaction of the police was barbaric as they charged at the protesters with lathis. In broad daylight, amidst a crowd of thousands, Lala Lajpat Rai, respected by the entire country, was beaten mercilessly and was seriously wounded. People watched the scene helplessly. Few days later, he succumbed to his injuries. Anger gripped the masses. Lahore was swallowed by gloom. The Party Bhagat Singh belonged to, decided to avenge the killing. Towards the end of the year, Bhagat Singh and Rajguru shot Saunders, mistaking him for James Scott, the police officer and the leader of the police party that had rained the blows. It was one of the first actions HSRA had planned to issue a wake up call to the masses in the country.

Gloom was getting lighter as a possibility gleamed at the margins. People were unleashing agitations. Youth leagues were coming up and working class was busy to initiate a massive unrest. They knew that struggle was getting wider and Bhagat Singh along with his comrades was preparing to face the challenge. Soon came the arrest warrants, for communists and also trade union leaders. PC Joshi, student in Allahabad university and Youth League leader, was arrested and as a result, students rose as one in a massive protest all over the country.

Bhagat Singh and his comrades had realized that they could work together with communists, forging a working alliance with them. Communists were to organize the masses, and lead the struggle, while the HSRA was to look after the armed section. But soon they realized that communists did not believe in armed action. They kept away from individual actions and considered them harmful for the movement. HSRA believed in armed action.

Despite the differences, they were aware of similarities. Communists were opposed to imperialism, so were HSRA people. Both were forging strategies to move to socialism. The arrest of communists was considered by these revolutionary sections a threat to them too. They resolved to launch a protest, not only against these arrests but also against the imperialist policy of suppressive actions against the entire people. The passing of Trade Dispute Bill was one of them.

Around that time only, there was the accidental discovery of bomb making factory set by HSRA in Lahore, leading to arrest of several important comrades like Sukhdev and others. Most of the important comrades went underground in various states. Ajoy Ghosh, a close friend of Bhagat Singh who later became general secretary of the CPI (1951-1962), was also with them and was arrested. The most painful aspect of the entire episode was all of them were tortured horribly by police.

The great Lahore Conspiracy case began in 1929. By then, police had used all torture methods on the prisoners, especially Bhagat Singh. He had become the shadow of his former self. Weak and emaciated, he was carried to court on a stretcher. For months he and Batukeshwar Dutt had been tortured when they were in jail in 1929.Bhagat Singh told his comrades that they would have to get rid of the idea that everything was over and nothing could be done now. Taking the leading part, reclined in an easy chair, as he could not in any other posture, Bhagat Singh spoke with a determination that the case for them had a definite political purpose.

It was not a defense in a legal sense of the word. Every effort would have to be made for those who could be saved. The trial must be used for the cause of the revolution. Every time, whenever such possibility arose, the British government must be exposed. It must also be used to demonstrate the revolutionary unconquerable will of the revolutionaries. “By our statements, but also by our action inside the court and outside, we have to fight the cause of political prisoners, “he said, adding: “We will continue our work inside and outside both, and keep on rousing people by our actions.”

It was time when they believed that their generation was setting example that would create the basis for rise of the new leadership. Socialism for them was an ideal, the principle to guide them, to rebuild the society after they captured power.

Bhagat Singh was an avid reader, especially socialist literature, and perhaps the first among the group to be attracted towards socialism. He was aware of all important events that were taking place outside the jail, like Sholapur uprising, Peshawar upheaval, the heroic stance of Garhwali soldiers that were led by Chandra Singh Garhwali. He began to stress the need for armed action only with coordination with and as an integral part of the mass movement, subordinated to the needs of the masses and their requirements. He told the court in his trial that their struggle was not based on pistol and bombs, but on the transition of society where each one had enough to meet their basic needs, in short, towards socialism.

Studies helped them to expand their vision especially in prison. They always cherished the Soviet Union and on the occasion of the anniversary of November Revolution (as they called the October Revolution) in 1930, they sent greetings to the Soviet Union, hailing its victories, and also pledged support to the Soviet Union against all enemies.

On March 23, 1931, just on the eve of Karachi session of the Congress, death sentence of Bhagat Singh was carried out. Bhagat Singh was hardly 24 at the time. (IPA Service)