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April 10, 2026
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"Each morning the children had to pass the place of graves on their way to buy the day’s water and only last week another baby in the village had died. It was always scary seeing the little graves, but especially this fresh one now."
"The children finally find their mother, but their troubles are not yet over. Things are not as simple as they thought they would be. They have to stay with their new friend for the night, then travel back with their mother the next day."
"It isn’t until they reach the city that they come to understand the dangers of their country, and the painful struggle for freedom and dignity that is taking place all around them."
"A lie has seven winding paths, the truth one straight road."
"Where the water rules, the land submits."
"Allow bullies a stranglehold, they’ll have you by the throat!"
Young though he was, his radiant energy produced such an impression of absolute reliability that Hedgewar made him the first sarkaryavah, or general secretary, of the RSS.
- Gopal Mukund Huddar
Largely because of the influence of communists in London, Huddar's conversion into an enthusiastic supporter of the fight against fascism was quick and smooth. The ease with which he crossed from one worldview to another betrays the fact that he had not properly understood the world he had grown in.
Huddar would have been 101 now had he been alive. But then centenaries are not celebrated only to register how old so and so would have been and when. They are usually celebrated to explore how much poorer our lives are without them. Maharashtrian public life is poorer without him. It is poorer for not having made the effort to recall an extraordinary life.
I regret I was not there to listen to Balaji Huddar's speech [...] No matter how many times you listen to him, his speeches are so delightful that you feel like listening to them again and again.
By the time he came out of Franco's prison, Huddar had relinquished many of his old ideas. He displayed a worldview completely different from that of the RSS, even though he continued to remain deferential to Hedgewar and maintained a personal relationship with him.