What can it be that makes the mind of the revolutionary tick?

What would it be like to walk a few yards in the shoes of a revolutionary? What kind of song would he hum? What pace would his pulse race, his heart beat? What would it take to sacrifice one’s youth for nation’s sake? What would it be to bristle with patriotism at the utterance of aazaadi, the Indian revolutionary’s clarion call for liberty?  What would it be like to leave home, and near and dear ones, and go and live in hiding, waiting for a day when there arrives enough strength in the will and enough force in the flesh to rise and take on the oppressor, and break the shackles of debilitating serfdom?

The answers aren’t easy. But some things are certain. If his cause is big enough, the revolutionary is willing to pay the ultimate price with his life. He will give up the material life to seek freedom for his people. Freedom from oppression and tyranny. Freedom from injustice. Freedom from penury. No matter how great the peril, how difficult the goal, he’ll strive tirelessly.

The true revolutionary will usually stake his all to break the shackles of tyranny and oppression, injustice and penury, and breathe that air of freedom. In the words of Jamaican legend Bob Marley, “better to die fighting for freedom then be a prisoner all the days of your life.”

Oh, if only there were such patriotic heroes today!