It’s hard to fathom, why the very city of Mumbai that 84 years ago witnessed several scenes of mob violence when a humble freedom movement volunteer Baburao Genu was run over by the ruling British administration truck, reacts with faint recollection of the same man’s supreme sacrifice, decades later.

Who was Babu Genu

   Baburao Genu was a 22- year old mill hand who lived at the Phoenix mills chawl (tenement), which is today an up market commercial area in Mumbai. He came to the city from his village in Mahalunge in district Pune, Maharashtra. He was not highly educated but harboured a burning love for his country in his heart.

    In 1930, he participated in the Civil Disobedience Movement and laid blockade at shops selling foreign cloth. On December 12, 1930 while protesting against a consignment of foreign cloth being shifted from a store house, he was mowed down by a truck loaded with bales of foreign....