The battle of Writers' Building
The association targeted Col NS Simpson, the Inspector General of Prisons, who was infamous for the brutal oppression on the prisoners in the jails. The revolutionaries decided not only to murder him, but also to strike a terror in the British official circles by launching an attack on the Secretariat Building - the Writers' Building in the Dalhousie Square inKolkata.
On 8 December 1930, Dinesh along with Benoy Basu and Badal Gupta, dressed in European costume, entered the Writers' Building and shot dead Simpson.
British police started firing. What ensued was a brief gunfight between the 3 young revolutionaries and the police.Some other officers like Twynam, Prentice and Nelson suffered injuries during the shooting.
Soon police overpowered them. However, the three did not wish to be arrested. Badal Gupta took Potassium cyanide, while Benoy and Dinesh shot themselves with their own revolvers. Benoy was taken to the hospital where he died on 13 December 1930.
The trial and hanging
However, Dinesh survived the near-fatal injury. He was convicted and the verdict of the trial was death by hanging for anti-government activities and murder. While awaiting execution, Dinesh wrote a number of letters from his prison cell on the heroism of the revolutionaries and his belief in the greatness of self-sacrifice.
Dinesh Chandra Gupta was 19 when he was hanged on 7 July 1931 at Alipore Jail.
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