The British government had taken the Kakori Train Robbery as a direct challenge to it just as Ashfaq had predicted. The police and the secret police at once sprang into action. A wide dragnet was spread. Entire administration had swung into alert mood. It had become a prestige issue. The loss of treasury hurt bad. After all the British basically were traders and they were in India to make money.
The police and C.I.D. was also challenged to prove its efficiency.
The government appointed special ‘Probe Committee’ under Mr. Hurton to investigate the matter. The evidences from the scene of the crime and the statements of the railway staff helped police quickly assume that it was no ordinary crime committed by professional dacoits. The conclusion was that it was an act of the militants. The police began to sniff out revolutionary outfits and the people connected to it.
The sleuths zeroed in on the revolutionaries connected with the robbery. Some new faces appeared in Shahjahanpur too and the members of the special investigation team paid a visit to Ramprasad Bismil too.
The train dacoity had become a sensational news. Everyone was wondering about the gang that had pulled the job. Then, the police traced out a couple of notes that were part of the looted treasury in Shahjahanpur market. The friends had warned Bismil that he could be arrested.
Bismil didn’t run away. He stayed put in the belief that even if he was arrested the police would find no evidence connecting him to the crime.
That was a mistake.
He trusted his cleverness. But the police was cleverer when it came to digging evidence. Bismil had underestimated the police brain. He did not mind going to jail for the sake of testing the patriotism of the countrymen. The people could rise up enmasse in his defence. Here again he was wrong. The people were too selfish to care for the revolutionaries.
Somehow Bismil had got mentally very tired. The selfishness of the others frustrated him. He wanted no more killing anyone. He did not try to escape.
On that night he reached home at 11 p.m. from a friend’s house. On the way he met some members of the secret police. They were on guard for him perhaps. He ignored them and went to sleep. Bismil woke up at 4 a.m. After visiting toilet and bathroom he had just stepped out when the main door was rapped hard with rifle butts. He knew that the law had come for him.
He opened the door to find a police party outside. An officer moved forward and he grabbed the wrist of Bismil. Bismil was under arrest. He was in his langot only and showed no fear. The police asked if he had some objectionable things in his house.
Bismil said, “No”. The police nevertheless searched his house. A letter was found in his kurta pocket. He had forgotten to post it or wanted to post it before the next clearance time. The letter proved lethal which amounted almost to the confession to the crime of Kakori robbery.
Under the formal arrest he was taken to the police station. During interrogation the police officer revealed such an information that was known to Bismil and one of his friends. And no one else could know it. Bismil trusted that friend as his own soul. But he had betrayed Bismil.
It came as a paralysing shock.
Could anyone be trusted? He wanted to cry. More arrests followed. The people arrested were a matter of another shock for Bismil because the connection of those people to the revolutionary organisation was a guarded secret. Only a few inner circle members of the revolutionary council knew about it. Bismil could guess the traitor. Bismil had little knowledge of what happened at other places and towns. He feared that his associates had been arrested. The arrests spread panic among the friends.
The next day the newspapers reported:
all the main culprits involved in kakori train robbery in the police custody. chandrashekhar azad absconding
Dateline—The arrested include Ramprasad Bismil, Ashfaq Ullah Khan, Roshan Singh, Rajendra Lahiri, Manmathnath Gupt, Yogesh Chandra Chatterji, Bhupendranath Sanyal, Vishnusharan Dublis and ten others. The accused are charged with looting the public treasure and an attempt to overthrow the government.
According to our correspondent, the robbery was committed at the night of 9th August, 1925. The police sources say that Saharanpur-Lucknow Passenger train suddenly stopped at a spot between Kakori and Alamnagar at pole No. 52. Suddenly ten robbers poured out of the train and surrounded it on the both sides firing arms madly. A passenger who tried to alight was shot dead. That paralysed the rest of the passengers. No one dared to disembark.
The guard was forced to lie down at gun point. Meanwhile the treasure chest was dragged out and broken open with sledge hammers. An iron cutter was also used when the chest did not open up fully. This exercise continued for half an hour. Then, the dacoits ran away with the loot. It was a huge sum.
The police and the C.I.D. acted fast and cleverly to unravel the robbery plot and most of the culprits are in the police custody.
Late news
It is announced that the Chief of the C.I.D. may be specially honoured for this achievement by the British Government.
The police fail to trace Chandrashekhar Azad.
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