but he could never live in his beloved gurkhathum gorkha bastion another name for darjeeling occasionally used by the british after his former protg and gorkha janmukti morcha chief bimal gurung resumed the gorkhaland agitation in the spring of 2007 but reason and peace deserted darjeeling for good its campaign got a big boost when hundreds of nepali families were expelled from meghalaya in march 1986 in its initial years gnlf confined its agitation to election boycotts and street corner meetings he lived in forced exile in the plains for years and could not even take his wife dhanmaya to darjeeling for her last rites his ideas and methods of struggle remained controversial till the end he studied history used it in his campaign and sometimes even misinterpreted it to suit his argument he even sought help from the us the uk france nepal and the un just as there will be no morning until the stars are gone there will be no gorkhaland until we do not become martyrs he would often say as he plunged the picturesque darjeeling hills and the dooars into turmoil for some time he flirted with the labour congress and after emergency he joined jagjivan rams congress for democracy state terrorism under the garb of tada added more to bloodletting he himself suffered serious injuries in an assassination bid on february 10 2001 it was in 1980 that ghisingh a buddhist who worshipped shiva more than any other deity turned radical what pushed the former bantamweight boxer from the indian army into the political arena was the fear of being called a foreigner in a country for which he and his forefathers had given their blood and sweat normalcy returned after 28 months on august 22 1988 when gnlf the bengal government and the centre signed a pact on the formation of darjeeling gorkha hill council he despised the word gorkha as a symbol of slavery like most nepalis ghisingh loved and revered darjeeling as a war medal won by his brave forefathers on april 5 that year he founded gorkha national liberation front gnlf with the slogan we can forgive a snake but not a person who opposes gorkhaland for almost 20 years since he quit the army in 1966 ghisingh moved from door to door explaining the need for a homeland and an indian identity he banned the use of nepali as the name of the community saying it would blur their distinction from nepali nationals in the late sixties he floated a party named neelo jhanda blue flag that exhorted people to identify themselves as nepali coinciding with nepali new year april 13 ghisingh launched an armed struggle to end the genocide of the nepalis born into a family of tea garden workers at manju near the nepal border on june 22 1936 ghisingh was an accomplished novelist and painter for subash ghisingh life was an endless struggle for the rights of his fellow nepalispeaking indians in their adopted homeland this