Chandra Shekhar was born on July 23, 1906 in Bhavra village, Jhabua district, Madhya Pradesh to Pandit Sita Ram Tiwari and Jagrani Devi. He received his early schooling in Bhavra. He went to the Sanskrit Pathashala at Varanasi for higher studies. Young Chandra Shekhar was fascinated by and drawn to the great national upsurge of the non-violent, non-cooperation movement of 1920-21 under the leadership of Mahatma Gandhi. When arrested and produced before the magistrate, he gave his name as 'Azad', his father's name as 'Swatantra' and his residence as 'prison'. The magistrate sentenced him to 15 lashes of flogging. The title of Azad stuck thereafter. After withdrawal of the non-cooperation movement, Azad was attracted towards revolutionary activities. He thereafter joined the Hindustan Socialist Republican Army (HSRA). He was involved in the Kakori Conspiracy (1926), the attempt to blow up the Viceroy's train (1926), the Assembly bomb incident, the Delhi Conspiracy, the shooting of Saunders at Lahore (1928) and the Second Lahore conspiracy. On February 27, 1931, in the Alfred Park, Allahabad, when an associate betrayed him, well-armed police circled Azad. For quite sometime he held them at bay, single-handedly with a small pistol and few cartridges. Left with only one bullet, he fired it at his own temple and lived up to his resolve that he would never be arrested and dragged to gallows to be hanged. Alfred Park has been renamed as Chandrasekhar Azad Park. He used to fondly recite a Hindustani couplet, his only poetic composition: 'Dushman ki goliyon ka hum samna karenge, Azad hee rahein hain, azad hee rahenge'