The Columbia Encyclopedia, Sixth Edition. 2001-07.
Savarkar, Vinayak Damodar
(vnä´yk dä´mdär svär´kr) (KEY) , 1883–1966, Indian nationalist. Educated in Pune, he was militantly anti-British and anti-Muslim. He founded a terrorist organization in London while ostensibly studying for a law degree and was later arrested when a plot on the life of Lord Curzon and the assassination (1909) of a British government official were traced to the group. In 1911 he was sentenced to life imprisonment on the Andaman Islands but was released in 1924. He was legally restricted from taking part in public life, but he was, nevertheless, elected president of the Hindu Mahasabha, an extremist Hindu party, for seven consecutive years. In 1948 he was implicated in the assassination of Gandhi and arrested. He was later acquitted for lack of evidence.
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