FREEDOM STRUGGLE

First edition August 15, 1972 ( Sravana 24, 1894)

Second reprint edition 1975 ( Saka 1896)
Third reprint edition 1977 ( Saka 1898 )
Fourth reprint edition 1980 (Saka 1902)
Fifth reprint edition 1982 (Saka 1903)
Sixth reprint edition 1983 ( Saka 1905)
Seventh reprint edition 1985 (Saka 1907)
Eighth reprint edition 1987 (Saka 1908)

© Bipan Chandra, Amales Tripathi and Barun De, 1972

Rs mm

Published by the Director, National Book Trust, India, A-5 Green Park,
New Delhi-110016 and printed at juoiter Offset Press, B-10/3. Jhilmil
Industrial Area Delhi-110032.
 FOREWORD

This year we celebrate the twenty-fifth anniversary of Indian

Independence. It is an appropriate occasion for reviewing the
history of the struggle waged by the people of India to achieve
this freedom which we cherish. We who live in free India,
should know that toil and blood went into its making. This
book has been planned as a respectful tribute to the millions of
the Indian people and their leaders who sacrificed and suffered
in the cause of our Independence.
The task, however, was not an easy one. Though the outline
of our freedom movement is well-known, much care, knowledge
and skill is required to portray in a concise form the history of
this struggle in some depth and with all its nuances, and to
give an accurate picture of the diverse forces which contributed
to it. What increased the difficulty of the task was the need to
make the book not a research work for the scholar but
a readable account for the general public, especially the younger
generation.
I, therefore, invited some of our well-known historians to plan
and produce this book. Dr S. Gopal was the Chairman of this
panel, and its members were Dr Satish Chandra, Dr Amales
Tripathi, Dr Bipan Chandra, Dr Barun De, Dr Sheikh Ali, and
Dr S. R. Mehrotra. These scholars agreed on the framework
of the book, and requested Dr Bipan Chandra to write
chapters I and II, Dr Tripathi chapters III and IV and
Dr Barun De chapters V and VI. The drafts prepared by them
were considered by the panel and Shri K. P. Rungachary of the
National Book Trust has edited the whole in the light of the
various comments and suggestions made by the panel. I am most
VI FOREWORD

grateful to all of them for so readily consenting to undertake

this work.
The final text has been approved by the panel. The book,
therefore, though short, is authoritative and will, I am sure, be
widely read. The National Book Trust is bringing out transla¬
tions in all the important Indian languages simultaneously.. It
should be particularly of use to teachers in primary and middle
schools, and to students in our higher secondary schools and
pre-university classes.

New Delhi S. NURUL HASAN

2 August 1972 Minister of Education,
Social Welfare and Culture

-snji.'en.

' 'bi!.-.
’% •To TK,

o' Liba. . . r . -
bn a •' Li. ,i, -,

rnsi-U w ^ - i>-.,
'! lo lo,
) i • n

% <na :
 CONTENTS

Page

Foreword ... v

Chapter

I The Impact of British Rule ... 1

II The Early Phase ... 41

III Thb Era of Militant Nationalism ... 81

IV The Struggle for Swaraj ... 121

j V Intimations of Freedom ... 154

VI Thb Achievement of Freedom ... 193

 %

'

...

• . • . . : - •

'

• ’ • •• ••

• ••

• V r »;

% V • %
 I THE IMPACT OF BRITISH RULE

Long years ago we made a tryst with destiny and now the time
comes when we shall redeem our pledge , not wholly or in full
measure , but very substantially. At the stroke of the mid¬
night hour , when the world sleeps , India will awake to life and
freedom.

Jawaharlal Nehru addressing the Constituent Assembly and

the Indian nation on 15 August 1947. Nehru was speaking as
the Prime Minister of a free India. The struggle was over.
India was independent.
But what was this ‘tryst with destiny’ Nehru was speaking
about ?
On another midnight hour seventeen years before India be¬
came free, on 31 December 1929, as the chimes of the clock
heralded the New Year, Nehru as President of the Indian National
Congress had unfurled the tri-colour on the banks of the Ravi in
Lahore and, in the presence of a vast multitude, announced that
the goal of the freedom movement would be ‘Purna Swaraj’, full
and total independence. A Pledge was drawn up and adopted and
it was decided that the people of India should take this pledge at
public meetings on 26 January 1930 to proclaim their will to
fight for their independence. That day was declared Indepen¬
dence Day and it was because of the historic importance of that
day that later in 1950 when the new Republican Constitution of
India was ready, it was introduced on 26 January. Ever since
then each year this day is celebrated in India as Republic Day.
2 FREEDOM^ STRUOOLB

It was to the events of 1929^30 that Nehru was referring when

he spoke about our ‘tryst with destiny’. The pledge that was
taken on that day was redeemed on 15 August 1947 when India
became free.
But India’s fight for freedom did not begin in 1929. This struggle
had started many decades earlier. And this book tells you the
story of India’s historic struggle for freedom and independence.
Indian history goes back to many centuries before the
Christian era. Not surprisingly, the course of this long history
was not even and uniform. For a long time India was not even
one country but was made up of many kingdoms; there were
times when vast portions of this sub-continent came under the
rule of one empire; the country was invaded many times by
foreigners; some of them settled down here, became Indians, and
ruled as Kings and Emperors; some of them, on the other hand,
plundered and looted the country and went back with the riches
they were able to collect; there were periods of great achievement;
there were times of stagnation and misery. But when we speak
of India’s freedom struggle we refer to the most recent period of
Indian history, when Britain was ruling over India and the
people of India were fighting to overthrow that foreign domina¬
tion and become free.
British rule in India may be said to have started in 1757 when
at the Battle of Plassey forces of the English East India Company
defeated Siraj-ud-Daula, the Nawab of Bengal. But a powerful
national struggle against British imperialism developed in India
during the second haif of the 19th century and the first half of
the 20th century. This struggle was the result of a clash of
interests between those of the Indian people and those of the
British rulers. To understand this clash of interests it is
necessary to study the basic character of British rule in India
and its impact on Indian society. The very nature of the
foreign rule resulted in nationalistic sentiments arising among
 THE IMPACT OF BRITISH RULB 3

the Indian people and produced the material, moral, intellectual

and political conditions for the rise and development of a
powerful national movement.

STAGES OF BRITISH RULE IN INDIA

From 1757 the British had used their control over India to
promote their own interests. But it would be wrong to think that
the basic character of their rule remained the same throughout.
It passed through several stages in its long history of nearly
200 years. The nature of British rule and imperialism, as also
its policies and impact, changed with the changing pattern of
Britain’s own social, economic and political development.
To begin with, that is, even before 1757, the English East
India Company was interested only in making money. It wanted
a monopoly of the trade with India and the East, so that there
would be no other English or European merchants or trading
companies to compete with it. The Company also did not
want the Indian merchants to compete with it for the purchase
in India or sale abroad of Indian products. In other words,
the Company wanted to sell its products at as high a price
as possible and buy Indian products as cheaply as possible
so that it could make the maximum profits. This would not be
possible if there was ordinary trade in which various com¬
panies and persons competed. It was easy enough to keep out
its English competitors by using bribery and various other
economic and political means to persuade the British Govern¬
ment to grant the East India Company a monopoly of the right
to trade with India and the East. But the British laws could
not keep out the merchants and the trading companies of other
European nations. The East India Company had, therefore, to
wage long and fierce wars to achieve their aim. Since the
 4 FREEDOM STRUGGLE

trading areas were far away, across many seas, the Company
had to maintain a powerful navy.
It was also not easy to prevent competition from the Indian
merchants since they were protected by the powerful Mughal
empire. In fact, in the 17th century and the early part of
the 18th century the very right to trade inside India had to
be secured by humbly petitioning the Mughal emperors and
their provincial Governors. But as the Mughal empire became
weak in the early 18th century, and the far-flung coastal areas
began to get out of control, the Company increasingly used
its superior naval power to maintain its trading presence along
the Indian coast and to drive out the Indian merchants from
coastal and foreign trade.
There was another very importantconsideration. The Company
required large amounts of money to wage wars both in India
and on the high seas and to maintain naval forces and armies
and forts and trading posts in India. Neither the British
Government nor the East India Company possessed such large
financial resources. At least a part of the money, therefore, had
to be raised in India. The Company did this through local
taxation in its coastal fortified towns such as Calcutta, Madras
and Bombay. Gradually it became necessary to expand its
territories in India in order to be able to levy more taxes over
larger areas and increase their financial resources.
About this time British capitalism was also beginning to enter
its most vigorous phase of development. To develop more and
more, it needed immense capital for investment in industries,
trade and agriculture. As the resources for such investments
were limited in Britain at that time the capitalists began to look
to the plundering of foreign countries for finding the necessary
capital for the development of British capitalism. India was
reputed to be rich and was, therefore, seen as capable of playing
an important role in this respect.
 THB IMPACT OP BRITISH BULB 5

Both the objectives— the monopoly of trade and control over

financial resources —were rapidly fulfilled, and beyond the imagi¬
nation of the Directors of the East India Company when Bengal
and South India rapidly came under the Company’s political
control during the 1750’s and 1760’s.
The East India Company now acquired direct control over the
State revenues of the conquered areas and was in a position to
grab the accummulated wealth of the local rulers, nobles and
zamindars. It appropriated large parts of this wealth and State
revenues entirely for its own benefit and for that of its employees
and for financing its further expansion in India. For example,
from 1765 to 1770 the Company sent out of Bengal nearly 33 per
cent of its net revenue in the form of goods. Moreover, the
officials of the Company sent out large sums out of their illegal
incomes extorted from Indian merchants, officials and zamindars.
The wealth drained out of India played an important part in
financing Britain’s capitalist development. It has been estimated
that it constituted nearly two per cent of Britain’s national
income at the time.
At the same time the Company used its political power to
acquire monopolistic control over Indian trade and production.
The Indian merchants were gradually squeezed out, while the
weavers and other craftsmen were compelled either to sell their
products at uneconomic rates or to hire themselves out to the
Company at low wages. An important feature of British rule
in this first stage was that no basic changes were introduced in
the administration, the judicial system, transport and commu¬
nication, the methods of agricultural or industrial production
and business management, or in the educational and intellectual
fields. At this stage British rule was not very different from
the traditional empires which collected agricultural surplus
from its territories, though it was much more efficient in
doing so.
6 FREEDOM STRUGGLE

Following in the footsteps of their predecessors, the British

felt no need to penetrate to the villages so long as their( eco¬
nomic surplus was successfully sucked out through the tradi¬
tional machinery of revenue collection. Consequently, whatever
administrative changes were made applied to the top of the
structure of revenue collection and were geared to the single aim
of making the collection of revenue more efficient.
In the intellectual Held no attempt was made to spread modern
ideas which were changing the entire way of life in the West. Only
two new educational institutions were started during the second
half of the 18th century, one at Calcutta and the other at
Benares. Both were centres for traditional Persian and Sanskritic
learning. Even the Christian missionaries were kept out of the
Company’s dominions.
It should also be remembered that India was conquered by
the East India Company at a, time when the era of the great
mercantilist trading corporations was already over in Britain.
Within British society, the Company represented the dying,
and not the rising, social forces.

THB ERA OF INDUSTRIAL CAPITALISM AND FREE TRADE

Immediately after the East India Company became a terri¬

torial power in India, an intense struggle broke out in Britain
as to whose interests the newly-acquired empire would serve.
Year after year the Company was made to yield ground to the
other commercial and industrial interests in Britain. By 1813 it
was left with a mere shadow of economic and political power in
India; the real power was now wielded by the British Govern¬
ment in the interests of the British capitalist class as a whole.
Britain had in the meantime undergone the Industrial Revo¬
lution. This made her the leading manufacturing and exporting
 1HB IMPACT OF BRITISH RULE

country of the world. The Industrial Revolution was also

responsible for a major change inside Britain itself. The
industrial capitalists became in course of time the dominant
elements in the British economy with powerful political influence.
The colonial administration and policy in India were now to be
necessarily directed to their interests. Their interest in the
empire was, however, very different from that of the East India
Company, which was only a trading corporation. Consequently,
British rule in India entered its second stage.
The British industrialists did not gain much from the mono¬
polisation of the export of Indian handicrafts or the direct
appropriation of Indian revenues. On the other hand, they
needed foreign outlets for their ever-increasing output of manu¬
factured goods. A vast and highly populated country such as
India was a standing temptation. At the same time British
industries needed raw materials and the British working men
needed food-stuffs, which had to be imported. In other words,
Britain now wanted India as a subordinate trading partner, as
a market to be exploited and as a dependent colony to produce
and supply the raw materials and food-stuffs Britain needed.
But there was one problem. India had to pay for the goods
imported. She also had to export a good deal of wealth to
pay dividends to the Company’s shareholders and pensions for
British civil and military officials* These officials would also
have to be permitted to take their savings back home with them.
The profits of British merchants and planters would also have to
be drained out of India. India would also have to pay interest
and dividends on British capital invested in this country. For all
this it was necessary that India must export some products to
Britain and other countries. But India’s traditional handicraft
exports had come to a virtual standstill owing to the Company’s
exploitative policies and, what was more important, the British
did not want to allow India to export goods that would compete
8 FREEDOM STRUGGLE

with Britain’s home industries, as, for example, textiles. The*

fore, only agricultural raw materials and other non-manufactured
goods could be exported. Apart from opium, whose production
and export to China was now further developed in spite of the
Chinese ban on its import, the Government of India now
promoted the export of raw cotton, jute and silk, oil-seeds,
wheat, hides and skins, and indigo and tea. Thus India’s
pattern of foreign trade underwent a dramatic change, but not
for the better. For centuries an exporter of cotton textiles and
other handicraft products, India became during the 19th century
an importer of cotton textiles and an exporter of cotton and
other raw materials.
India could not perform its new functions within the economic,
political and cultural setting that was then existing. It had to be
changed and transformed to be able to play its new role in the
development of British economy. Its traditional economic
structure had to be changed. The British Indian Government
set out after 1813 to transform Indian administration, economy
and society to achieve exactly these ends.
In the economic field, British capitalists were given free entry
into India and were permitted to carry on their economic activities
as they pleased. Above all, free trade was introduced and India’s
ports and markets were thrown wide open to British manufactures.
India had to admit British goods free or at nominal tariff rates.
Administration was made more detailed and comprehensive and
included a large variety of activities, not only tax-collection and
maintenance of law and order to keep the trade channels safe.
Administration also became wider in compass reaching down
to the villages so that British goods could penetrate to the small
towns and villages in the interior and to draw out the agricul¬
tural products for export. Thus British administration of India
changed vastly and quickly during the 19th century.
Moreover, the entire legal structure of Indian society had to
 THE IMPACT OF BRITISH RULE 9

be overhauled if it was to be based on capitalist commercial

relations. The sanctity of contract, for example, must become
the basic law and ethic of the land, if the millions of economic
transactions needed to promote imports and exports were to
become viable. Thus came up a new judicial system based on
a new corpus of laws and legal codes, such as the Indian Penal
Code and the Civil Procedure Code.
To man the new and vast administrative and judicial machi¬
nery of the State and also the lower rungs of British business
concerns, a veritable army of educated employees was needed.
Britain did not possess enough manpower for the purpose;
nor could the Government of India or British businessmen
afford to employ for all these jobs Englishmen at the high
wages that had to be offered to attract them to the distant Indian
colony and its inhospitable climate. Hence modern education
that had been introduced after 1813 was expanded after 1833.
The large-scale imports and the even more large-scale exports
of the bulky raw materials required a cheap and easy system
of transport. The Government, therefore, encouraged the intro¬
duction of steamships on the rivers and improved the roads.
Above all, it helped in financing the building, after 1853, of a
large netwprk of railways linking the major cities and markets of
the country to its ports. Nearly 28,000 miles of railways had
been built by 1905 at a cost of nearly 350 crores of rupees.
Similarly, a modern postal and telegraph system was introduced,
which greatly facilitated business transactions.
This period also saw the emergence of a liberal imperialist
political ideology among British statesmen and British Indian
administrators. Relying on Britain’s virtual world-wide mono¬
poly of manufacturing— Britain was the only fully industrialised
country during the first half of the 19th century and was conse¬
quently known jas the workshop of the world— and its control
of the seas m^ny of them believed that Britain could carry
/
 10 PEE EDOM STRUGGLE

on its economic exploitation of India and other countries equally

well through indirect or informal domination so long as free
trade prevailed. They, therefore, talked of training Indians in
the art of self-government and eventually transferring political
power to their hands. These pronouncements were to be later
used freely by Indian nationalists in the course of their political
agitation.
The introduction of a new pattern of economic exploitation
during the second stage of British rule did not, of course,
mean that the earlier forms of exploitation came to an end.
Indian revenues were still needed to conquer the rest of India
and to consolidate British rule; to pay for the employment of
thousands of Englishmen in superior administrative and military
positions at salaries that were fabulous by contemporary stand¬
ards; and to meet the cost of economic and administrative
changes needed to enable colonialism to fully penetrate to the
Indian hinterland. Consequently the new phase of British rule
resulted in a steep rise in the burden of taxation on the Indian
peasant.
At the same time, some of the sectors of Indian production
that did not enter into competition with British manufactures —
mdigo, opium and tea, for example— were developed but kept
under the strict control of the Government or British capitalists
in India. Moreover, the Free Trade imposed on India was
one-sided. Indian products that could still compete with the
technologically superior British or British-controlled colonial
products were subjected to heavy import duties in Britain. For
example, in 1824, Indian textiles paid duties ranging from 30
to 70 per cent. Indian sugar paid a duty that was three times
its cost price. In some cases duties in Britain were as high
as 400 per cent. Import duties on such products were removed
only after their export to Britain ceased altogether. Moreover,
the Indian producers were prevented from taking advantage

)
 THE IMPACT OF BRITISH RULE 11

of the emergence of an all-India market by the Government’s

decision to erect and maintain a vast structure of internal
customs duties. India was thus placed in the paradoxical posi¬
tion of taxing the movement of its own products, while letting
foreign goods move free. These internal duties were abolished
only in the 1840’s by which time the British manufactures had
acquired a decisive edge over Indian handicrafts even within
the Indian market.

THE ERA OF FOREIGN INVESTMENT AND

INTERNATIONAL COMPETITION FOR COLONIES

The third stage of British rule in India can be said to have

begun in the 1860’s and was the result of three major changes
in the world economic situation. Gradually other countries of
Western Europe and North America underwent industrialisation
and the manufacturing and financial supremacy of Britain
came to an end. France, Belgium, Germany, the United States,
Russia, and later, Japan, developed powerful industries and
began to search for foreign markets for their products. Intense
world-wide competition for markets now began.
Secondly, several major technological developments occurred
during the last quarter of the 19th century as a result of the
application of scientific knowledge to industry. Modern steel
industry is a product of this period. In 1850 world output of
steel was only 80,000 tons. Even in 1870 it was less than
700,000 tons. In 1900 it had reached 28 million tons. Modern
chemical industries developed during this period as also the use
of petroleum as fuel for the internal combustion engine and the
use of electricity for industrial purposes. This meant that, on
the one hand, the pace of industrial development was speeded
up and, on the other, the new industries consumed immense
12 FREEDOM STRUGGLE

quantities of raw materials without which the entire industrial

structure would be jeopardised. Rapid industrial development
also led to the continuous expansion of urban populations need¬
ing more and more food. An extensive search for new and secure
sources of raw materials and food-stuffs now began and covered
the entire world. States vied with one another to acquire exclu¬
sive control over the actual or potential sources of agricultural
and mineral raw materials in the countries of Africa, Asia and
Latin America.
Thirdly, the development of trade and industry and the
extended exploitation of colonies and colonial markets began to
produce an unlimited accummulation of capital in the developed
capitalist countries. This capital was, moreover, increasingly
concentrated in fewer and fewer banks and corporations and
trusts and cartels. Outlets had to be found for the investment
of this capital. There was, of course, a great deal of room for
investment in the countries concerned, for the majority of
people there were still living in poverty. But the working class
in these countries was beginning to be organised and any
large-scale investment and consequent expansion would improve
its bargaining power leading to lower profits even in the existing
industries. On the other hand, if this capital was invested
abroad to produce mineral and agricultural raw materials,
several objectives could be obtained. An outlet for the surplus
capital would have been found and, since wages in these
undeveloped countries were very low, high profits would follow.
At the same time, the home industries would be kept supplied
with their life-blood— the raw materials. Once again the
developed capitalist countries began a simultaneous search for
areas where they could invest their surplus capital.
Imperialism and expansion also served at this sfage an import¬
ant ideological and political purpose in the imperialist coun¬
tries. The second half of the 19th century witnessed a powerful
 THB IMPACT OF BRITISH RULE 13

upsurge of democratic sentiments among the masses and the

right to vote was extended to them in nearly all the West
European countries and the U.S.A. The ruling upper-classes of
these countries were worried that the workers and peasants
would use this right to promote their own class interests and
that the days of the political and economic domination of
society by the upper-classes were drawing to an end. Imperial¬
ism provided a way out. It could be used to deflect popular
attention towards external glory, to spread extreme nationalist,
patriotic and self-glorifying sentiments among the people, and
thus to cement their societies once again round capitalism.
The British raised the slogan that ‘the Sun never sets on the
British empire’ to spread pride and a sense of contentment
among workers on whose slum dwellings the sun seldom shone in
real life. The Germans rallied round the demand for ‘a place
under the Sun’. The French had their own faith in a ‘Civilising
Mission’. Japan soon claimed to be the saviour of Asia, and
Russia of the Slavs. The North Americans claimed Latin
America to be under their trusteeship where they had a ‘Manifest
Destiny’. They were soon to start believing that the 20th
century was the ‘American Century’. Ideologies of expansion,
imperialism, and national greatness led people to put the same
types of governments in power through their popular vote as had
been ruling them before they got the right to vote. All thes^
new factors and forces led towards the same result— a hOnt foi
exclusive colonies and semi-colonies, where the imperialist
country concerned could exercise exclusive domination over
markets, raw materials and investments. The competition for
colonies and semi-colonies became increasingly intense and bitter
as areas open to fresh colonial domination became scarce.
The struggle for division of the world into colonies was now
transformed into a struggle for the redivision of the colonial
world.
 14 FREEDOM STRUGGLE

This entire period was one of stress and strain for Britain,
because the newcomers among the developed capitalist countries
assailed its prominent position in the fields of trade and invest¬
ment. It now began a vigorous effort to consolidate its control
over its existing empire and to extend it further.
In India, the third stage of British rule was marked by a
renewed upsurge of imperialist control which was reflected in the
reactionary policies associated with the viceroyalties of Lytton,
Dufferin, Lansdowne and, above all, Curzon. Faced with intense
competition the world over, the British looked upon India as a
place where British capital could hope to maintain a haven.
v After 1850, a very large amount of British capital was invested
in railways, loans to the Indian Government, and to a smaller
extent in tea plantations, coal mining, jute mills, shipping, trade
and banking.. It was necessary that to render this capital secure
from economic and political dangers, British rule over India be
clamped down even more firmly. This was frankly recognised
by contemporary British officials and statesmen. Thus, Richard
Temple, civil servant and Governor of Bombay, wrote in 1880
that England “must keep India. ..because a vast amount of
British capital has been sunk in the country, on the assurance
of British rule being, humanly speaking, perpetual’’.
India also performed another important function in the
British scheme for empire. The Indian army was the chief
instrument for the expansion and consolidation of British power
in Africa and Asia. It also served along with the British navy
as the chief instrument for the defence of the British empire
on a global scale. The result was a costly standing army that
absorbed nearly 52 per cent of the Indian revenues in 1904.
All talk of educating Indians for self-government died out
during this period, till it was revived in 1918 under the impact
of the Indian national movement. Instead, the aim of British
rule was declared to be permanent ‘trusteeship’ or ‘benevolent
 THE IMPACT OF BRITISH RULE 15

despotism’ over India. It was said that because of geographical,

racial, historical, social and cultural factors the Indian people
had become permanently unfit for self-government. The British
had, therefore, to provide them with ‘civilised’ and ‘benevolent’
rule for centuries to come.
The transformation of India, begun during the preceding
period, continued during the third stage. It became even more
important that British administration should reach out to every
nook and corner of India and the Indian society, and that
every port and every town and village be linked with the world
economy for Britain’s profit. But, as before, this transformation
remained severely limited or partial. This was so for reasons
inherent in the nature of British colonialism in India.
Firstly, the cost of administrative, economic and cultural
changes had to be met from the Indian revenues, just as earlier the
cost of British conquest had been met from Indian revenues.
But India was a poor country and colonialism impoverished it
further. While an economically developing country could easily
provide increasing revenues, in India such an increase involved a
higher level of taxation. There were, however, obvious political
limits to this process. Growing taxation in a stagnant economy
invariably carries with it the penalty of popular revolt. More¬
over, India could not simultaneously pay for the costly admini¬
strative and military structure and the development of education,
irrigation, the transport system, and modern industries. This was,
in fact, one of the central contradictions of colonialism in India.
While further extension of colonial exploitation required some
internal development, the very process of this exploitation made
further extension impossible by keeping India backward.
Secondly, the colonial authorities were led to put checks on the
process of modernisation in India when they observed its conse¬
quences. Even a limited amount of change produced social
group forces that began to oppose imperialism and the mechanism
16 PRE3!DO*S STRUGGLE

of its exploitation of India. The colonial authorities were, there¬

fore, caught on the horns of another dilemma : the very trans¬
formation needed to make India a paying colony endangered
colonial rule by producing at the same time the social forces of
nationalism that organised a struggle against colonialism.

BASIC FEATURES OF COLONIALISM IN INDIA

As a result of British rule, India was transformed by the end

of the 19th century into a classic colony. It was a major
market for British manufactures, a big source of raw materials
and food-stuffs, and an important field for the investment of
British capital. Its agriculture was highly taxed for the benefit
of imperial interests. The bulk of the transport system, modern
mines and industries, foreign trade, coastal and international
shipping, and banks and insurance companies were all under
foreign control. India provided employment to thousands of
middle-class Englishmen and nearly one-third of its revenues was
spent in paying salaries to Englishmen. The Indian army acted
as the chief instrument for maintaining the far-flung British
empire and protecting and promoting British imperial interests
in East, South-East, Central and West Asia and North, East and
South Africa.
Above all, Indian economy and social development were
completely subordinated to British economy and social develop¬
ment. Indian economy was integrated into the world capitalist
economy in a subordinate position and with a peculiar
international division of labour. During the very years after
1760 when Britain was developing into the leading developed,
capitalist country of the world, India was being underdeveloped
into becoming the ‘leading’ backward, colonial country of the
world. In fact, the two processes were interdependent in terms
 THE IMPACT OF BRITISH RULE 17

of cause and effect. The entire structure of economic relations

between Britain and India involving trade, finance and techno¬
logy continuously developed India’s colonial dependence and
underdevelopment.

IMPACT ON AGRICULTURE

British rule and its impact on India created conditions for the
rise of a powerful anti-imperialist movement and for unification
of the Indian people into a nation. The selfish policies followed
by the British rulers in India affected most India’s agriculture
and her agrarian classes and her trade and industries. The
impact of the policies in the cultural and social fields was also
very powerful.
The British brought about a most important transformation
in India’s agricultural economy but this was not with a view
to improving Indian agriculture to increase production and
ensure the welfare and prosperity of the Indians involved in
agriculture, but to obtain for themselves in the form of land
revenue all surplus available in agriculture and to force Indian
agriculture to play its assigned role in a colonial economy. Old
relationships and institutions were destroyed and new ones were
born. But these new features did not represent a change towards
modernisation or in the right direction.
The British introduced two major land revenue and tenurial
systems. One was the Zamindari system. (Later, a modified
version of the same Zamindari system was introduced in North
India under the name of the Mahalwari system.) The other was
the Ryotwari system.
Under the Zamindari system, old tax farmers, revenue
collectors, and zamindars were turned into private landlords
possessing some, but not all, of the rights of private property in
18 FREEDOM STRUGGLE

land. JFor one, the bulk of the rent they derived from the
tenants was to be turned over to the Government. At the same
time, they were made complete masters of the village communi¬
ties. The peasant cultivators were transformed into tenants-
at-will.
Under the Ryotwari system the Government collected the
revenues direct from the individual cultivators, who were
recognised in law as the owners of the land they cultivated. But
their right of ownership too was limited by the temporary nature
of the land revenue settlements, and by the high rate of revenue
demanded, which often they could not pay.
Whatever the name of the system, it was the peasant
cultivators who suffered. They were forced to pay very high rents
and for all practical purposes functioned as tenants-at-will.
They were compelled to pay many illegal dues and cesses and
were often required to perform forced labour or begar. What is
more important, whatever the name or nature of the revenue
system, in effect the Government came to occupy the position of
the landlord. Much later, especially after 1901, revenue rates
were gradually reduced but by then the agrarian economy had
been ruined to such an extent and the landlords, moneylenders,
and merchants had made such deep inroads into the village that
it was of no practical use to the peasant cultivators themselves.
The greatest evil that arose out of the British policies with
regard to Indian agricultural economy was the emergence of
the moneylender as an influential economic and political force in
the country. Because of the high revenue rates demanded and
the rigid manner of collection, the peasant cultivator had
often to borrow money to pay taxes. In addition to paying
exorbitant interest, when his crops were ready he was invariably
forced to sell his produce cheap. The chronic poverty of the
peasant compelled him to take recourse to the moneylender
especially in times of droughts, floods and famines. The
 THE IMPACT OF BRITISH RULE 19

moneylender, on the other hand, could manipulate the new judi¬

cial system and the administrative machinery to his advantage.
In this regard the Government, in fact, actually helped him,
because without him the land revenue could not be collected
in time, nor could the agricultural, produce be. brought to the
ports for export. Even to get the commercial crops for export
produced in the first instance, the Government depended on
the moneylender to persuade the cultivator by offering to finance
him through loans. It is not surprising, therefore, that in course
of time the moneylender began to occupy a dominant position
in the rural economy. In both the Zamindari and the Ryotwari
areas there occurred a large-scale transfer of land from the
hands of the actual cultivators to the hands of moneylenders,
merchants, officials and rich peasants. This led to landlordism
becoming the dominant feature of land relationships all over
the country.
Intermediate rent receivers also grew. This process is referred
to as sub-infeudation. The new landlords and zamindars had
even less of a link with land than the old zamindars. Instead
of taking the trouble to organise a machinery for rent col¬
lection, they merely sublet their rights to intermediate rent
receivers.
The impact of British rule thus led to the evolution of a new
structure of agrarian relations that was extremely regressive. The
new system did not at all permit the development of agriculture.
New social classes appeared at the top as well as at the bottom
of the social scale. There arose landlords, intermediaries and
moneylenders at the top and tenants-at-will, share-croppers
and agricultural labourers at the bottom. The new pattern was
neither capitalism nor feudalism, nor was it a continuation
of the old Mughal arrangement. It was a new structure that
colonialism evolved. It was semi-feudal and semi-colonial in
character.
20 FREEDOM STRUGGLE

The most unfortunate result of all this was that absolutely

no effort was made either to improve agricultural practices
or develop them along modem lines for increased production.
Agricultural practices remained unchanged. Better types of
implements, good seeds and various types of manures and
fertilizers were not introduced at all. The poverty-stricken
peasant cultivators did not have the resources to improve agri¬
culture, the landlords had no incentive to do so, and the colonial
Government behaved like a typical landlord; it was interested
only in extracting high revenues and did not take any steps
to modernise and improve and develop Indian agriculture.
The result was prolonged stagnation in agricultural production.
Agricultural statistics are available only for the 20th century;
and here the picture was quite dismal. While overall agri¬
cultural production per head fell by 14 per cent between 1901
and 1939, the fall in the per capita production of food grains
was over 24 per cent. Most of this decline occurred after 1918.

IMPACT ON TRADE AND INDUSTRY

As with agriculture, the British Indian Government controlled

trade and industry purely with a view to foster British interests.
India, no doubt, underwent under the impact of colonialism
a commercial revolution, which integrated it with the world
market, but she was forced to occupy a subordinate position.
Foreign trade took big strides forward especially after 1858,
increasing from Rs. 15 crores in 1834 to Rs. 60 crores in 1858
and Rs. 213 crores in 1899. It reached a peak of Rs. 758 crores
in 1924. But this growth did not represent a positive feature
in Indian economy nor did it contribute to the welfare of the
Indian people, because it was used as the chief instrument
through which the Indian economy was made colonial and
 THE IMPACT OP BRITISH RULE 21-

dependent on world capitalism. The growth of the Indian foreign

trade was neither natural nor normal; it was artificially fostered
to serve imperialism. The composition and character of the
foreign trade was unbalanced. The country was flooded with
manufactured goods from Britain and forced to produce and ex¬
port the raw materials Britain and other foreign countries needed.
Last but not least, the foreign trade affected the internal distri¬
bution of income adversely. The British policy only helped
to transfer resources from peasants and craftsmen to merchants,
moneylenders and foreign capitalists.
A significant feature of India’s foreign trade during this period
was the constant excess of exports over imports. We should
not, however, imagine that it was to India’s advantage. These
exports did not represent the future claims of India on foreign
countries, but the drain of India’s wealth and resources. We
must also remember that the bulk of foreign trade was in foreign
hands and that almost all of it wras carried on through foreign
ships.
One of the most important consequences of British rule was
the progressive decline and destruction of urban and rural
handicraft industries. Not only did India lose its foreign markets
in Asia and Europe, but even the Indian market was flooded
with cheap machine-made goods produced on a mass scale.
The collapse of indigenous handicrafts followed.
The ruin of the indigenous industries and the absence of other
avenues of employment forced millions of craftsmen to crowd into
agriculture. Thus, the pressure of population on land increased.

DEVELOPMENT OF MODERN INDUSTRIES

l

British rule created conditions for the rise of a modern capi¬

talist industry. It created a wider all-India market by build-
/

22 FREEDOM STRUGGLE

ing a country-wide transport system. In India a long-standing

union had existed between rural industries and agriculture. But
because the domestic rural production pattern including the
handicraft industries had been destroyed or seriously disrupt¬
ed, the relationship between rural industries and agriculture
snapped. Millions of craftsmen had been thrown out of
employment. The new revenue system had deprived millions of
cultivators of their land. Both these led to the creation of
\

a free labour force. These labourers had no other way of

making a living except by hiring out their services for daily
wages. Thus two of the basic requirements for the rise of a
modern capitalist industry, namely, an all-India market and
an abundance of cheap labour, were met. The establishment
of modern industries followed during the second half of the
19th century.
Industrial development in India until the beginning of the 20th
century was mainly confined to four industries, namely, cotton and
jute textiles, coal mining and tea plantations. A few other minor
industries such as cotton gins and presses, rice, flour and timber
mills, leather tanneries, woollen textiles, paper and sugar mills,
and salt, mica, saltpetre, petroleum and iron mines were deve¬
loped. A few engineering and railway workshops and iron and
brass foundries also came into existence.
From these facts we must not imagine that the foundations for
an industrial revolution were being laid. Far from it. First of
all, most of the modern industries that did develop were control¬
led by foreign capitalists. Second, though the industrial
progress during this phase was steady and continuous, it was
extremely slow. Compared to the vastness of the country and
its population then, the efforts at industrialisation were so
marginal that even the term industrialisation appears to be in-*
appropriate. Even by 1913 the total number of workers covered
by the Factory Act was less than one million.
 THE IMPACT OF BRITISH RULE 23

The First World War and the depression during the 1930s
provided the Indian capitalist class the opportunity to make
its first tentative spurts forward. There was no competition
from foreign imports and the Government was also compelled to
place large orders with Indian industrialists, merchants and con¬
tractors. But though the Indian capitalist made phenomenal
profits during this period, the industries soon entered a period
of stagnation as the war came to an end and foreign competition
was resumed.
Thus, it will be seen that industrial development in India till
1947 was slow and stunted and did not at all represent an indus¬
trial revolution or even the initiation of one. What was more
important, even the limited development was not independent
but was under the control of foreign capital. Secondly, the
structure of industry was such as to make its further development
dependent on Britain. There was almost a complete absence of
heavy capital goods and chemical industries without which rapid
and autonomous industrial development could hardly occur.
Machine-tool, engineering and metallurgical industries were virtu¬
ally non-existent. Moreover, India was entirely dependent on
the imperialist world in the field of technology. No technologi¬
cal research was carried on in the country.
To sum up, India underwent a commercial transformation and
not an industrial revolution. The trend was not towards an in¬
dependent industrial capitalist economy but towards a dependent
and underdeveloped colonial economy. There was another
negative aspect to India’s industrial progress under British rule.
The distribution of industries was extremely lop-sided and
concentrated in a few regions and cities of the country. Even
irrigation arid electrical power facilities were very unevenly
distributed. This gave rise to wide regional disparities in income
patterns, of economic development, and social stratification.
A major consequence of British rule in India was the pre-
24 freedom struggle

valence of extreme poverty among its people most of whom lived

below the margin of subsistence in normal times and died in
lakhs when droughts or floods hit the land. The per capita
income was low and unemployment widespread. Dadabhai
Naoroji showed in 1880 that nearly 50 per cent more was spent
on feeding and clothing a criminal in an Indian jail than was
the average income of an Indian. This poverty resulted in poor
health, low life expectancy and infant mortality. The poverty of
the people found its visible manifestation in the series of famines
which ravaged the country during the second half of the 19th
century. Twenty of the years from 1860 to 1908 were years of
famine. According to one estimate, nearly 29 million people
died during famines from 1854 to 1901. These famines reveal¬
ed that poverty and chronic starvation had taken firm roots
in colonial India.
The poverty of India was not a product of its geography or of
the lack of natural resources or of some ‘inherent’ defect in the
character and capabilities of the people. Nor was it a remnant
of the Mughal per iod or of the pre-British past. It was mainly a
product of the history of the last two centuries. Before that India
was no more backward than the countries of Western Europe.
Nor were the differences in standards of living at the time very
wide among the countries of the world. Precisely during the
period the countries of the West developed and prospered, India
was subjected to modern colonialism and was prevented from
developing. All the developed countries of today developed
almost entirely over the period during which India was ruled by
Britain, most of them doing so after 1850. Till 1750 the diffe¬
rences in living standards were not wide between the different
parts of the world. It is interesting, in this connection, to note
that the dates of the beginnings of the industrial revolution in
Britain and the British conquest of Bengal virtually coincide !
The basic fact is that the same social, political and economic
 THE IMPACT OF BRITISH RULE 25

processes that produced industrial development and social and

cultural progress in Britain, also produced and then maintained
economic underdevelopment and social and cultural back¬
wardness in India. The reason for this is obvious. Britain sub¬
ordinated the Indian economy to its own economy and deter-
mined the basicm social trends in India according# to *her own
needs. The result was stagnation of India’s agriculture and
industries, exploitation of its peasants and workers by the
zamindars, landlords, princes, moneylenders, merchants, capi¬
talists, and the foreign government and its officials, and the
spread of poverty, disease, and semi-starvation.

IMPACT IN THE CULTURAL AND SOCIAL FIELDS

Along with British rule also came a link with the West; and
modern ideas which were first developed in Western Europe made
their entry into India. Even if the British had never come to
India, this country would not have remained cut-off from all the
changes that were taking place in the West in the 18th and 19th
centuries. The winds of change would certainly have reached
our shores, because India had never followed a closed-door
policy. Through trade and travel she had for centuries established
channels of communication not only with the countries of Asia
but also with Europe. Through these sources news of events and
happennings in Europe and elsewhere and details of the new thinking
taking place in the West were already reaching India in the 18th
century. But it might have been a slow process spread over a long
period of time. British rule not only hastened their arrival in India
but the very nature of the foreign domination quickened these
influences with a local meaning charged with immediacy and
relevance. _
The intellectual life of the Indian people began to undergo
26 FREEDOM STRUGGLE

revolutionary changes influenced by such ideas as democracy and

sovereignty of the people, rationalism and humanism. These new
ideas helped Indians not only to take a critical look at their own
society, economy and government, but also to understand the
true nature of British imperialism in India.
Modern ideas spread through many channels Apolitical parties,
the Press, pamphlets and the public platform. The spread of
modern education introduced in India after 1813 by the Govern¬
ment, the missionaries and private Indian efforts also played an
important role. This role is, however, complex and full of contra¬
dictions.
For one, the spread of modern education was very limited.
For nearly one hundred years it failed even to compensate for
the ruin of the traditional educational system. If the foreign
government neglected primary and school education, it turned
hostile to higher education early, that is, soon after 1858. As
many of the educated Indians began to use their recently acquired
modern knowledge to analyse and criticise the imperialist and
exploitative character of British rule and to organise an anti¬
imperialist political movement, the British administrators began
to press continuously for the curtailment of higher education.
The Government, of course, failed in its efforts to check the
growth of higher education, because, once started, popular pres¬
sure kept it going even though there was a continuous deterior¬
ation in the quality of education.
If the educational system acted as the carrier of nationalism it
did so indirectly by making available to its recipients some of
the basic literature in the physical and social sciences and the
humanities and thus stimulating their capacity to make social
analysis. Otherwise its structure and pattern, aims, methods,
curricula and content were all designed to serve colonialism.
A few other aspects of Indian education arising out of its
colonial character should be noted. One was the complete neglect
 THE IMPACT OF BRITISH RULE 27

of modern technical education which was a basic necessity for

the rise and development of modern industry. Another was the
emphasis on English as the medium of instruction in place of the
Indian languages. This not only prevented the spread of educa¬
tion to the masses but also created a wide linguistic and cultural
gulf between the educated and the masses. Government’s refusal
to allocate adequate funds for education gradually reduced the
educational standards to an extremely low level. And because
the students had to pay fees in schools and colleges, education
became a virtual monopoly of the middle- and upper-classes and
the city- and town-dwellers.
New ideas, a new economic and political life, and British rule
produced a deep impact on the social life of the Indian people
that was first felt in the urban areas and which later penetrated
to the villages. Modern industries, new means of transport,
growing urbanisation and increasing employment of women in
factories, offices, hospitals and schools promoted social change.
Social exclusiveness and caste rigidities were eroded. The total
disruption of old land and rural relationships upset the caste
balance in the countryside. Though many of the evils persisted,
the penetration of capitalism made social status dependent mainly
on money and profit-making became the most desirable social,
activity.
In the beginning the policies of the colonial state also encourag¬
ed social reform. Efforts were made to modernise Indian
society in order to enable the economic penetration of the country
and the consolidation of British rule. To some extent, the
humanitarian instincts of some of the officials aroused by the
glaring social injustices enshrined in the Indian caste system and
the low status of women in society also played a role. The
Christian missionaries also contributed towards the reform of
Indian society at this stage. But very soon the basic conservative
character and long-term interests of colonialism asserted them-
28 FREEDOM STRUGGLE

selves and colonial policies towards social reform were changed.

The British, therefore, withdrew their support from the re¬
formers and gradually came to side with the socially orthodox
and conservative elements of society.
The social policy followed by the British, however, did not
remain passive. In order to meet the growing challenge of
nationalism, the rulers increasingly followed the policy of divide
and rule and actively encouraged communalism and casteism
which, in turn, strengthened the reactionary social forces.
The new intellectual and political stirrings among the people
also led to movements for social change. But the most powerful
forces for social change arose when the lower castes and women
themselves became conscious of their depressed condition and
began to struggle for the re-modelling of society. Led by men
such as Jotiba Phule the lower castes built up powerful move¬
ments from the end of the 19th century. Similarly, the lower
castes in Kerala and other parts of South India organised them¬
selves during the 1920’s and 1930’s to fight against the socio¬
economic oppression by the upper castes. Women and tribal
people too rose in defence of their rights. In order to mobilise
all the people in the struggle against imperialism, the national
movement became committed to the goals of abolishing all
distinctions and disparities based on caste, sex or religion.
Moreover, common participation in demonstrations, public
meetings, popular movements, trade unions and kisan sabhas
weakened notions of caste and male superiority.
The modernisation of Indian culture had one other important
facet. While the orthodox and socially reactionary sections of
the Indian society opposed the introduction of modern culture in
order to preserve their threatened social and cultural position,
certain sections of the middle- and upper-class Indians suffered
from the opposite tendency. They blindly imitated Western life
and culture instead of carefully assimilating their positive,
 THE IMPACT OF BRITISH RULE 29

humanist, and scientific features. They aped European manners

and customs not realising shat modernity was more a question of
approach, of thinking, of values, and not of manners of speech,
or dress, or eating habits. They did not realise that modern
ideas and culture could be best imbibed by integrating them into
Indian culture.
Once again, the roots of this phenomenon went back to colonial
policies. In order to make Indians better customers for their
goods and more loyal subjects of the Raj, the British made every
effort to impose on India, the colony, the culture of Britain, the
metropolis.
British writers and statesmen also used their criticism of Indian
culture and society to justify British political and economic domi¬
nation over India. They declared that because of their inherent
social and cultural defects Indians were destined to be ruled per¬
petually by foreign masters. Both these factors produced a strong
reaction in India. Many Indians felt it necessary to prove their
‘fitness’ for self-government by glorifying their remote past.
Others held up the imitators of Western culture to ridicule and
opposed the very introduction of modern ideas and culture.
They believed that the best way to preserve cultural autonomy
was to look inwards once again. Even though this trend of
thought remained in a minority, it had a certain influence over
the people, especially the urban lower-middle classes.
British rule brought the entire geographical area of the country
under a single administration. It also unified the country by
introducing a uniform system of law and government. The
introduction of modern methodsof communication like railways,
telegraphs, a modern postal system, development of roads and
motor transport produced the same unifying effect. The destruc¬
tion of rural and local economic self-sufficiency and the growth
of internal trade created conditions for the rise of a unified Indian
economy. Modern industries were all-India in their scope for
30 FREEDOM STRUGGLE

both the sources of their raw materials and their markets

embraced the entire country. Even their labour force was re¬
cruited on a wide inter-regional basis. Increasingly the economic
lot of the Indian people was getting inter-linked and India’s
economic life was becoming a single whole. A common pattern
of education and the acquisition of modern ideas by the people
all over the country also gradually gave birth to an all-India
intelligentsia with a common approach and common ways of
looking at society. Similarly, the two new classes born in this
period, namely, the capitalist class and the working class, were
all-India in character and stood above the traditional divisions
of caste, region and religion.
In addition to all this, the very existence of a common enemy
that oppressed all the Indian people irrespective of their social
class, caste, religion or region, bound them together as one. In
its turn the anti-imperialist struggle and the feeling of solidarity
born in its course provided the emotional and psychological
bond that knit the people together and led to the emergence of a
common national outlook.

INDIAN SOCIAL GROUPS AND CLASSES AND BRITISH RULE

With the passage of time the impact of the British Raj

emerged in clearer outline and the clash and contradiction bet¬
ween the aims and objectives of British rule and the interests of
the Indian people became clear and obvious. More and more
Indians realised that the British ruled India to promote their
own interests, that in doing so they did not hesitate to sacrifice
Indian interests to those of the British nation in general and
those of British capitalists in particular, and that colonialism
had become the major cause of India's economic, social, cultural
and political backwardness. -Different classes and groups of
 THE IMPACT OF BRITISH RULE 31

Indian society gradually discovered that British rule was hamper¬

ing their development in all basic aspects.
The peasantry was perhaps the chief victim of British colonial¬
ism. The Government took away a large part of its produce in
the form of land revenue and other taxes. It was soon caught in
the firm clutches of the landlord and the moneylender. The
peasant found himself master neither of his land nor of the crops
he produced; not even of his own labour power. And when the
peasants organised political and economic struggles against the
zamindars, landlords and moneylenders, the Government brought
into action against them the entire police and judicial machinery
in the name of law and order and often brutally suppressed their
struggles. In time the peasants became aware of the role of
imperialism and saw that it was in the main responsible for
their plight.
The artisans and craftsmen had also suffered much at the hands
of imperialism. Their centuries-old sources of livelihood had
been taken away without the development of any new, compensat¬
ing avenues cf employment. Their condition was extremely
precarious and wretched by the end of the 19th century. Conse¬
quently, they took a very active part in the anti-imperialist
struggles of the twentieth century.
With the growth of modern industries was born a new social
class in India —the working class. Though tiny in number and
forming a very small part of the population, this class represented
a new social outlook. It did not have to carry the burden of
centuries of tradition, customs, and ways of life. Its outlook
and interests were from the beginning all-India in character.
Moreover, the workers were concentrated in factories and cities.
All these factors gave their political actions a significance far
greater than their numbers would suggest.
Indian workers worked and lived under highly unsatisfactory
conditions. Till 1911 there were no regulatory provisions con-
32 FREEDOM STRUGGLE

ccrning their hours of work. There did not exist any kind of
social insurance against sickness, old age, unemployment,
accident or sudden death. There were no provident fund
schemes. And a maternity benefit scheme, though a highly un¬
satisfactory one, came into operation only in the 1930s.
Real wages of factory workers declined during the period 1889
to 1929 and it was only after the development of a militant trade
union movement that they rose in the 1930s to the level prevail¬
ing between 1880 and 1890, and this when labour productivity
went up by more than 50 per cent. The result was that the
average worker lived below the margin of subsistence. Summing
up the conditions of the Indian workers under British rule, Prof
Jurgen Kuczyaski, the well-known German economic historian,
wrote in 1938 : “Underfed, housed like animals, without light
and air and water, the Indian industrial worker is one of the
most exploited of all in the world of industrial capitalism.”
Conditions in the tea and coffee plantations were even worse.
These plantations were situated in thinly populated areas with
an unhealthy climate, but the planters would not pay adequate
wages to attract labour from outside. Instead, they used false
promises and fraud to recruit labour, and coercion and
violence —physical torture being a common method —to keep them
on the plantation as virtual slaves. The Government gave them
fbll help and passed penal lav/s to enable them to keep the plan¬
tation workers under oppressive subjugation.
In course of time the Indian working class came to adopt a
militant anti-imperialist approach.
Another major social section of the population that came to
form the backbone of the nationalist movement was that of the
middle- and lower-middle classes. New opportunities had opened
to these groups in the first half of the 19th century when the
British recruited an entire army of petty Government servants
and by opening new schools and law courts created new jobs and
 THE IMPACT OF BRITISH RULE 33

professions. Also, the sudden growth in internal and foreign trade

led to the expansion of the merchant class at all levels. But the
, I
logic of an underdeveloped colonial economy soon asserted itself.
By the end of the 19th century, even the limited number of
educated Indians —fewer in the whole of India than at present in
a small territory such as Delhi —were faced with growing un¬
employment. Moreover, even those who found jobs discovered that
most of the better-paid jobs were reserved for the English middle-
and upper-classes. In particular, employment prospects became
increasingly bleak for those who were forced to drop out from the
universities without getting a B.A. degree. The middle- and lower
middle-class Indians soon realised that only a country that was
economically developing and socially and culturally modern
could provide them economic and cultural opportunities to lead
a worthwhile and meaningful life and, above all, save them from
rapid impoverishment, unemployment, and loss of socio-econo¬
mic status.
The Indian industrial capitalist class developed after 1858. It
soon entered into competition with the British capitalists and
realised that its growth was checked by the official trade, tariff,
transport, and financial policies of the Government. While struggl¬
ing for independent eonomic growth, it came into conflict w'ith
imperialism on almost every basic economic issue.
The Indian capitalist class needed active and direct Govern¬
ment help to compensate it for its initial weakness and
handicap in competing with the firmly established industries
of Western Europe. The contemporary industries of France,
Germany and Japan were being developed with active and
massive Government help. Such help was denied to Indian
capitalists. Most of all Indian industry needed tariff protection
so that cheaper foreign goods would not outsell its products.
Such protection was not given; instead, free trade was introduced
more completely than in any other country of the world.
34 FREEDOM STRUGGLE

A sympathetic bureaucracy could have helped and assisted

the Indian capitalists in innumerable ways. In Western
Europe the bureaucracy was as pro-capitalist in outlook as
the capitalist class itself. Hundreds of links bound the two
together. In India, the higher bureaucracy was foreign. It dined
and wined with British capitalists. Its natural sympathy lay with
its compatriots and their industrial ambitions whether in Britain
or in India. On the other hand, it was unsympathetic and
even hostile to Indian industrial efforts.
The Indian capitalists feared above all domination and
suppression by the far stronger foreign capital. Their in¬
stinct for survival was in particular aroused after 1918 when
a large-scale inflow of foreign capital investment into Indian
industry began to occur and the giant British industrial cor¬
porations started forming subsidiaries in India in order to take
advantage of the tariff protection granted during the 1920’s
and !93G’s, the cheaper Indian labour, and the nearness of the
market. The Indian capitalists now raised the slogan, ‘Indian
domination of Indian markets’.
The Indian capitalists thus increasingly found themselves in
open contradiction with the colonial economic structure,
administrative machinery and policies. They gradually rea¬
lised that they needed a nation-state and a government
favourable to indigenous capitalists. The rapid development
of Indian trade and industry could not occur so long as
foreign imperialism dominated the country. Of course, as men
of property and members of a weak though developing class,
they did not immediately come into open and direct confronta¬
tion with the foreign rulers on whom they depended for so many
administrative favours. But after 1918 they began to support,
mostly financially, the rapidly developing nationalist movement
and individual nationalist leaders.
The most important and creative role in the rise of
 THE IMPACT OF BRITISH RULE 35

nationalism was played by the modern Indian intelligentsia.

It v/as the first social group in the country to recognise the
fact that the establishment of British power in India marked
a sharp break with the past and the beginning of a new his¬
torical era. Its initial response to British rule was very
positive. In the beginning of the 19th century, men such
as Raja Raramohun Roy had clearly seen that blind patriot¬
ism would not do, that the causes of the defeat of such a
vast country as India by a handful of foreigners lay in the
weakness of its internal social, economic, political and intel¬
lectual make-up, and that Britain did at the time represent
a superior culture and civilisation. They made a frank and
ruthless analysis of the contemporary Indian social set-up and
organisation which, they said, could not serve as the basis
for the future development of India. They, therefore, set out
to modernise their society and country.
In the economic realm they were attracted by modern indus¬
try and the prospects of economic development and prosperity.
They hoped that Britain, economically the most advanced
country of the time, would introduce modern science and
technology and economic organisation in its dependencies,
including India. In the political realm they were attracted by
modern thought and the doctrine of the sovereignty of the
people leading to democracy, freedom of speech, the Press,
association and the right to publicly criticise the rulers.
They also witnessed before their very eyes the process of the
unification of India and the welding of the Indian people into
one common nation. They hoped that Britain would help
to complete the process. As opposed to faith, they were
attracted by the force of modern rationalism. They also
began to see that literature and the arts must be made popular
and no longer cater only to the elite. For this purpose they
advocated the spread of modern education througn the
36 FREEDOM STRUGGLE

medium of the English language, on the one hand, and the

development of modern Indian languages, on the other. In
the social field, they were attracted by social liberty and the
humanistic conception of society and the individual that every
individual should be prized for his own sake.
Thus for nearly half a century, the modern Indian intellec¬
tuals believed that the re-shaping and transforming of Indian
society could and would occur under British rule, because
Britain was the most advanced country of the time. Conse¬
quently, they supported British rule and even described it as
‘providential’. This support they gave even during the Revolt
of 1857.
However, in time, gradual and general disillusionment set
in when developments during the first three-quarters of thf
19th century did not bear out their expectations in any
field. They now began to see that their expectations were
misplaced and were based on a wrong understanding of the
nature and character of British rule.
Thus, in practice, the British did not transfer modern techno¬
logy and industry to India. The series of devastating famines
that held India in their grip from 1866 to 1901 shattered
the day-dreams of ‘guided’ development and brought home
to the intellectuals the stark poverty of the people and the
process of the economic underdevelopment of the country. They
realised that so long as the imperialist control of the Indian eco¬
nomy continued India would not be able to develop econo¬
mically; that instead it will continue to underdevelop further. In
the political field, British officials and political leaders had
discarded the slogan of training Indians for self-government and
declared that the political aim of British rule was to establish a
permanent ‘benevolent despotism’. Indians, they said, were
‘unfit’ for self-government or democracy. Freedom of the Press
which had so attracted the Indian intelligentsia soon began to be
 THE IMPACT OF BRITISH RULE 37

tampered with. Even elementary civil rights, the freedom of

thought, speech and association were increasingly violated and
restricted. Law and order which had earlier appeared to them
as the prime condition for peaceful development and modernisa¬
tion increasingly became a strait jacket on political apd economic
protest. Far from completing the unification of India and its
flowering into a single nation, the British tried to maintain their
hold over the country by setting into motion the divisive forces
of communalism, casteism and regionalism and by bolstering up
the decadent princely order. In the cultural field the Indian
intellectuals noted that the progressive impulse had withered
rather quickly. The British Indian Government spent less than
three percent of its budget on education, completely neglected the
education of the masses and women, and turned hostile to higher
education and the spread of modern ideas. After 1858 the British
rulers abandoned all attempts at social reform and began to ally
themselves with the most backward, traditional, obscurantist,
cultural, religious and social forces.
Consequently, the modern Indian intellectual began the hard
task of examining and understanding afresh the basic character
of British rule. Their understanding took time to develop. But
by the end of the 19th century, they had come to realise that
what had appeared to them earlier as the modernisation of India
was in fact its colonialisation. They now set out to build up a
nationalist political movement against imperialism.
Three other social groups— the zamindars, landlords, and
princes, the higher bureaucracy (the Indians in the higher cadres
of government service), and the traditional intelligentsia —had
an unsure, two-sided attitude to imperialism. The zamindars,
landlords and princes were as a class loyal to foreign rule since
their interests coincided with those of the rulers. Similarly, the
Indian members of the higher bureaucracy shared with the rulers
the benefits of a high standard of living in a poor country and
 38 FREEDOM STRUGGLE

the feel of administrative power and high social status. They

remained by and large loyal instruments of British rule to the
end. But even from these two social strata many individuals
joined the national movement moved by the prevailing spirit of
patriotism.
The traditional intelligentsia consisting of religious thinkers.,
functionaries, and preachers and teachers in the traditional edu¬
cational system was torn by conflicting pulls. Their conservative
social and religious outlook inclined them towards political con¬
servatism. They had also a long historical tradition of loyalty to
the powers that be. At the same time most of the traditional
intelligentsia at the lower levels suffered a sharp decline when the
spread of modern schools and colleges led to the closure of the
traditional pathashalas, madrasas, and the traditional centres of
higher learning. Many of the traditional intellectuals were also
bitterly hostile to modern culture and thought and the religious
and social reform movements, both on ideological grounds and
because they undermined their own hold over society. The
aggressive proselytising propaganda of the Christian missionaries
al^o aroused their anger.
%

The result was that in the end two opposite trends emerged
among the traditional intellectuals. The followers of one trend
favoured actively joining the national movement while maintain¬
ing their aversion to modern ideas; the followers of the other
trend supported the foreign rulers in the hope of maintaining
their traditionally dominant position in society. The Govern¬
ment actively encouraged the latter trend.
That left the control of temples, maths, mosques, dargahs,
gurudwaras, and other religious institutions firmly and undisturb¬
ed in the hands of the traditional intelligentsia. The Government
also began to extend patronage to the traditional intelligentsia
through pensions, financial rewards and bestowal of titles and
honours. It also now took steps to keep alive artificially the
 THE IMPACT OF BRITISH RULE 39

traditional educational system. As we have seen earlier, it also

abandoned the policy of social and cultural reform and thus
acquired respectability in the eyes of the orthodox. In order to
prevent the spread of modern ideas of nationalism, democracy,
and economic development, the British even propagated the view
that the traditional ideas and institutions of India suited them
well and that Indians should concentrate on their philosophic and
religious heritage and the so-called ‘spiritual’ aspects of their life,
leaving the British to manage their economy and politics and
administration. This division of labour also attracted the tradi¬
tional intelligentsia.
Another major factor that aroused all Indian princes and
paupers, zamindars and tenants, the higher bureaucrats and the
clerks, the rich and the poor to nationalist fervour was the
exhibition of racial arrogance by the rulers. The British in
India had always kept their distance from Indians and felt them¬
selves to be racially superior. But a qualitative change occurred
during the second half of the 19th century when the social and
racial gulf between the two was widened. A wave of racialist
doctrines pleaching the inherent superiority of the whites over
the blacks spread over Europe as a part of the resurgence of
imperialism and imperialist ideologies. The British in India now
openly proclaimed that Indians were an inferior race and asserted
the privileges of an occupying power. Even such a high personage
as Mayo, the Viceroy, wrote to the Lieutenant-Governor of the
Panjab in 1870 : “Teach your subordinates that we are all British
gentlemen engaged in the magnificent work of governing an
inferior race.” At this brazen display of racial arrogance every
thinking and self-respecting Indian felt insulted and humiliated
and was aroused to nationalist activity.
To sum up, the basic colonial character of British rule and its
harmful impact on the lives of the Indian people led to the rise
and development of a powerful anti-imperialist movement in
40 FREEDOM STRUGGLE

India. This movement was a national movement because it

embraced within its fold all the different classes and groups of
Indian society. These classes and groups had their own contra¬
dictions with imperialism which brought them together in a
common national movement. There also existed mutual clashes
of interests among them. But they sank their mutual differences
and united against the common enemy.
 II THE EARLY PHASE

TRADITIONAL RESISTANCE

Thb Indian people resisted British rule in India from its very
inception. Hardly a year passed till 1857 when some part
of the country -©r the other was not convulsed by armed
rebellion. This continuous resistance, wholly traditional in
character, took three broad forms : civil rebellions, tribal
uprisings, and peasant movements and uprisings.

Civil Rebellions

The process of the British conquest of India and the consolida¬

tion of British rule was accompanied by serious discontent
and resentment among the people. Even the Indian soldiers
serving in the British Indian army were affected. For nearly
100 years popular discontent took the form of armed resistance
led by the deposed chieftains or their descendants and relations,
zamindars and poligars, and ex-soldiers, officials and other
retainers of the Indian States. Large sections of the peasantry
and artisans joined these revolts, because of their own grievances
and hardships, often forming the backbone of these revolts.
These civil rebellions began with the very establishment of
British rule in Bengal and Bihar. Intensification of the land
revenue demand, exploitation of the artisans by the East India
Company and its servants, and the uprooting of old zamindars
42 FREEDOM STRUGGLE

created an explosive situation. Popular revolts occurred in

almost every district and province.
The demobilised soldiers and displaced peasants of Bengal
participated in the famous Sanyasi rebellion led by religious
monks and dispossessed zamindars. The Sanyasi rebellion lasted
from 1763 to 1800. Then came the Chuar uprising covering
five districts of Bengal and Bihar and lasting from 1766 to
1772. Another Chuar outburst occurred from 1795 to 1816.
Extension of the British power to other parts of the
country led to similar revolts. The rebellion of Orissa
zamindars lasted from 1804 to 1817. In South India, the
Raja of Vizianagaram revolted in 1794. The poligars of Tamil
Nadu revolted during the 1790’s, of Malabar and Dindigal in
1801, of coastal Andhra from 1801-05, and those of Parlaki-
medi from 1813 to 1834. Mysoreans rebelled in 1800 and then
again in 1831. The Vizagapatam Uprising broke out during
1830-34. Diwan Velu Tampi of Travancore rebelled in 1805.
In Western India the chiefs of Saurashtra revolted repeatedly
from 1816-32. The Kolis of Gujarat did the same in 1824-25,
1828, 1839, and 1849. There were numerous uprisings in
Maharashtra. Maharashtra was, in fact, in perpetual revolt.
The Kittur Uprising (1824-29). the Kolahpur Uprising (1824),
the Satara Uprising (1841), and the revolt of Gadkaris (1844)
may be mentioned in particular. Northern India was no less
turbulent. The Jats of western U.P. and Haryana created
serious disturbances in 1824. Other prominent rebellions were
those of the Rajputs of Bilaspur in 1805, the Taluqdars of
Aligarh in 1814-17, and the Bundelas of Jabalpur in 1842.
These rebellions, running like a thread through the history
of the first 100 years of British rule in India, were based on
the traditional links and loyalties between the peasants and
the zamindars and the petty chieftains. They were wholly local
and isolated in character. They were backward-looking and
 THE EARLY PHASE 43

lacked any modern feeling of nationalism or a modern

understanding of the nature and character of colonialism
or the building of a new society on the basis of new social
relationships. Their leadership was inevitably traditional
and completely unaware of the changing world around them.
They did not pose a real challenge to British power even
though the British had sometimes to deploy large armies
to suppress them. Their great contribution lay in the
establishment of valuable local traditions of struggle against
foreign rule.
The culmination of the traditional opposition to British rule
came with the Revolt of 1857 in which millions of peasants,
artisans, and soldiers participated. The Revolt of 1857 was to
stake British rule to its roots.
The Revolt began with a mutiny of the sepoys, or the Indian
soldiers of the East India Company’s army but soon engulfed
wide regions and people. It was a product of the accumulated
grievances of the people against the foreign government. The
peasants were discontented with the official land revenue
policy and the consequent loss of their lands and the oppression
and corrupt practices of the police, petty officials, and the lower
law-courts. The middle- and upper-classes of Indian society,
particularly in the north, were hard hit by their exclusion from
the well-paid higher posts in the administration. Men who fol¬
lowed cultural or religious pursuits, for example, priests and
scholars, pandits and maulavis, found themselves without in¬
comes as their patrons, the Indian rulers, princes, and zamindars,
lost authority. The annexation of Avadh by the British in 1856
was widely resented and especially in Avadh. This action
angered the Company’s soldiers, most of whom came from
Avadh. Moreover, they bad now to pay higher taxes on the
lands their families held in Avadh. The British also confiscated
the estates of a majority of the taluqdars or zamindars. These
 44 FREEDOM STRUGGLE

dispossessed taluqdars became dangerous opponents of British

rule. The annexationist policy followed by the British Viceroy,
Lord Dalhousie, also. created panic among many rulers of the
native states. These rulers now realised that total submission
and humiliating declarations of loyalty to the foreign power
could not guarantee their existence. This policy of annexation
was, for example, directly responsible for making Nana Sahib,
the Rani of Jhansi, and Bahadur Shah staunch enemies of the
British. The Company’s soldiers or the sepoys were discontented
with their low pay, and hard life and the contemptuous treat¬
ment meted out to them by their British officers. As a contempo¬
rary English observer noted : “The sepoy is esteemed an inferior
creature. He is sworn at. He is treated roughly. He is spoken of
as a ‘nigger’. He is addressed as a ‘suar’ or pig... The younger
men. ..treat him as an inferior animal.” Moreover, a sepoy had
little prospects of promotion; no Indian could rise higher than a
subedar drawing sixty or seventy rupees a month.
Thus, by 1857, conditions were ready fora mass upheaval. The
spark was provided by the episode of the greased cartridges. The
cartridges of the new enfield rifle had a greased paper cover whose
end had to be bitten off before use. The grease was in some
instances composed of beef and pig fat. The sepoys were angered
at this affront to their religious feelings. They were ready to
rebel. And their mutiny was to provide other sections of Indian
society the occasion to revolt.
The Revolt began at Meerut, 36 miles from Delhi, on 10 May
1957, with a mutiny of soldiers, and then gathering force spread
to a vast area from the Panjab in the north and the Narmada
in the south to Bihar in the east and Rajputana in the west.
The Meerut soldiers killed their officers and set off for Delhi.
Their appearance in Delhi the next morning was a signal to
the Delhi soldiers who in turn revolted, seized the city, and
proclaimed the aged Bahadur Shah, the Emperor of India. The
 THE EARLY PHASE 45

soldiers thus transformed their mutiny into a revolutionary war.

From now on, all soldiers and Indian chiefs and zamindars who
took part in the revolt hastened to proclaim their loyalty to the
Mughal Emperor who became a symbol of Indian unity.
Everywhere in Northern and Central India the mutiny of the
sepoys was followed by popular revolts of the civilian popula¬
tion. The common people often fought with spears and axes,
bows and arrows, lathis and scythes, and crude muskets. It is
the wide participation in the Revolt by the peasantry and the
artisans which gave it real strength especially in the areas of the
present-day Uttar Pradesh and Bihar. According to one estimate,
of the total number of about 150,000 men who died fighting the
English in Avadh, over 100,000 were civilians.
An important element in the strength of the Revolt of 1857 lay
in Hindu-Muslim unity. Among the soldiers and the people as
well as among the leaders there was complete co-operation as
between Hindus and Muslims. All the rebels recognised Bahadur
Shah, a Muslim, as their Emperor. The Hindu and Muslim
rebels and sepoys respected each other’s sentiments. For
example, wherever the Revolt was successful, orders were im¬
mediately issued banning cow-slaughter out of respect for Hindu
sentiments. Moreover, Hindu and Muslims were equally well-
represented at all levels of leadership. A senior British official
later complained : “In this instance we could not play off the
Mohammedans against the Hindus.” In fact the events of 1857
clearly bring out that the people and politics of India were not
basically communal in medieval times and before 1858.
In the end British imperialism, at the height of its power
the world over and supported by most of the Indian
princes and chiefs, proved militarily too strong for the rebels
who lacked weapons, organisation, discipline and a united and
determined leadership. Before they could make good these defi¬
ciencies, the British Government mobilised its immense resources
46 FREEDOM STRUGGLE

and suppressed them most ruthlessly. The rebels were dealt a

powerful blow when the British captured Delhi on 20 September
1857 and made the Emperor Bahadur Shah a prisoner. The other
leaders carried on bravely but fell one by one. Nana Sahib was
defeated at Kanpur. His loyal commander, Tantia Tope, carried
on heroic and brilliant guerilla warfare until April 1859 when a
zamindar friend betrayed him to the enemy. The Rani of Jhansi
died fighting with sword in hand on 17 June 1858. By 1859,
Kunwar Singh of Bihar, Bakht Khan, the brilliant sepoy who
had risen to the military command of the Delhi rebels, Khan
Bahadur Khan of Bareilly, and Maulavi Ahmadullah of Faizabad
were all dead, while the Begum of Avadh had to flee to Nepal.
By the end of 1859, British authority over India was fully esta¬
blished but the Revolt had not been in vain. Though it was a
desperate effort to save India in the old way and under traditional
leadership, it was the first great struggle of the Indian people for
freedom from British imperialism. The heroes of the Revolt
soon became household names in the country, even though the
very mention of their names was frowned upon by the rulers.

Tribal Uprisings

The tribal people, spread over a large part of India, participat¬

ed in hundreds of uprisings. They resented the extension of
British control and the intrusion of the colonial administration.
And, most of all, they objected to the penetration of their
simple and sheltered lives by the moneylenders, traders, and
revenue farmers who were the instruments of the British in
bringing the tribal people within the influence and control of
colonial economy and exploitation. The rebellions of the tribal
people were marked by immense courage and sacrifice on
&fheir part and veritable butchery on the part of the official
 THB EARLY PHASB 47

machinery of suppression. Lakhs died in unequal battles between

angry but disorganised men armed with such primitive weapons
as axes, bows and arrows on the one side and the disciplined
regiments of the British Indian army equipped with the latest
weapons of war. Among the numerous tribal revolts those of
the Kols from 1820 to 1837, the Santhals in 1855-56, the Rampas
in 1879, and the Mundas from 1895-1901 stand out.

Peasant Movements and Uprisings

The main brunt of colonial exploitation was borne by the

Indian peasantry which, consequently, fought back at every
step. Unfortunately, the details of peasant resistance to-British
colonialism are not easily available. They still lie hidden in
Government archives hnd other sources of modern history.
Moreover, the peasant revolts are to be often found listed as acts
of lawlessness and dacoity in the official records. It is only
in the last few years that we have begun to get some preliminary
glimpses of the numerous acts of peasant resistance to British
authority.
As we have seen earlier, the peasants formed the back¬
bone of the civil rebellions which were often led by zamindars
and petty chieftains. This was, above all, true of the Revolt
of 1857. Another set of peasant revolts took on a religious
colouring. Starting out as movements of religious and social
reform and purification, they soon revealed their agrarian origins
by frontally attacking the new zamindars, landlords, and money¬
lenders, irrespective of their religion. In the end they clashed
with British imperialism. Such were, for example, the Wahabi
Movement that at one stage embraced Bengal, Bihar, the Panjab,
and Madras, the Farazi Movement of Bengal, and the Kuka
Revolt in the Pan jab.
48 FREEDOM STRUGGLE

There was a certain shift in the nature of peasant resistance to

British rule after 1858. The peasants now fought directly for
peasant demands and against the Government, the foreign
planters and the indigenous zamindars and moneylenders.
One of the greatest peasant movements of the modern era
was the indigo agitation that engulfed Bengal in 1859-60. Indigo
cultivation was a strict European monopoly The foreign
planters compelled the peasants to cultivate indigo and subjected
them to untold oppression. To force them to produce indigo
at uneconomic rates the planters took recourse to illegal beatings
and detentions. This oppression was vividly portrayed by the
famous Bengali writer Dinbandhu Mitra in his play Nil Darpan
published in 1860. The peasant anger burst out in 1859.
Hundreds of thousands of peasants spontaneously refused to
cultivate indigo and stoutly resisted the physical brutality and
violence of the planters and their armed retainers. The new
intelligentsia of Bengal rose to the occasion and organised a
powerful campaign in support of the rebellious peasantry. The
Government was compelled to appoint a commission leading
to the mitigation of the worst abuses of the system. But both
planter oppression and peasant resistance continued. The indigo
peasants of Bihar revolted on a large scale in Darbhanga and
Champaran in 1866-68. Similarly the peasants of Jessore in
Bengal revolted in 1883 and 1889-90.
Agrarian unrest broke out once again in the 1870’s, in East
Bengal this time. The powerful zamindars of Bengal were
notorious for their oppression of the tenants. They freely
took recourse to ejection, harassment, illegal seizure of property,
including crops and chattels and extortions, and large-scale
use of force to increase rents and to prevent the peasants
from acquiring occupancy rights. The Bengal peasants also
had a long tradition of resistance stretching back to 1782, when
the peasants of North Bengal had rebelled against the East
 THE EARLY PHASE 49

tadia Company’s revenue farmer. Debi Singh. From 1872-76

tney united in no-rent unions and attacked zamindars and
their agents in different parts of East Bengal. Peasant resist¬
ance was suppressed only after the Government intervened
and took energetic steps to put it down. Even so, peasant unrest
broke out sporadically in the succeeding years and was quietened
only when the Government promised to undertake legislation
to protect the peasants from the worst aspects of zamindari
oppression. Once again large sections of the new intelligentsia
gave support to the peasants’ cause.
A major agrarian outbreak occurred in the Poona and
Ahmednagar districts of Maharashtra in 1875. In Maharashtra
the Government had settled the land revenue directly with the
peasants. At the same time the Government’s revenue demand
was pitched at such a high level that most of the peasants found
it impossible to meet it without borrowing from the money¬
lenders who charged very high interest. More and more land
was mortgaged or sold to the moneylenders who resorted to
every possible legal and illegal trick and chicanery to strengthen
their hold over the cultivator and his land. Peasant patience
got exhausted by the end of 1874. The peasants of Poona
and Ahmednagar districts organised a social boycott of the
moneylenders which was soon transformed into agrarian riots.
Everywhere they took forcible possession of their debt bonds,
decrees, and other documents dealing with their debts and burnt
them publicly. The police failed to meet the fury of peasant
resistance which was suppressed only when ‘the whole military
force at Poona, horse, foot and artillery’ took the field against
them. Once again, the modern intelligentsia of Maharashtra
supported the peasant demands. But they also pointed out
that the real source of peasant misery lay in the high land
revenue demand and the failure of the Government to provide
cheaper sources of credit to the peasant.
I

50 FREEDOM STRUGGLE

Peasant unrest also broke out in other parts of the country.

Goaded by landlords* (Jenmis) oppression, t^e Moppila peasants
of Malabar (north Kerala) organised 22 rebellions from 1836
to 1854. Moppila discontent found renewed expression in five
major outbreaks from 1873-80. Similarly, high land revenue
assessment led to a series of peasant riots in the plains of Assam
during 1893-94. The peasants refused to pay the enhanced
revenue demand, unitedly resisted official attempts to seize their
fields, and fought back the revenue collectors. The Government
had to mobilise a large network of soldiers and armed policeman
to suppress the peasant movement. Many peasants were killed
in brutal firings and bayonet charges. The barbarous behaviour
of the police and the army at that time is remembered/to this
day by the people of Assam.
At no stage did the peasant movements and popular uprisings
of the 19th century threaten British supremacy over India.
They represented an instinctive and spontaneous response of the
peasantry and the tribal people to large-scale dispossession and
intolerable oppression consequent upon the eolonialisation of
the Indian economy. Their anger was often (greeted against the
immediate source of their misery —the indigq planter, the zamin-
dar, or the moneylender. But they alsp stoutly resisted the
British effortsto bolster the colonial agr/arian structure in the
name of maintaining law and order ThuS in practice the ignorant
and illiterate masses of India showed a better appreciation of the
menace of colonialism than the newb educated or upper-class
Indians. At the same time, their struggles were foredoomed
to failure. Their faith, their courage *md heroism, their willing¬
ness to make immense sacrifices were no match against the
imperialist power armed with the latest weapons and the
resources of a world-wide empire. They did not possess a new
ideology, or a new social, economic, and political programme
based on an analysis of the new social forces generated by
 THE EARLY PHASB 51

colonialism. They lacked a positive concept of society or a

new way of life that could unite the people on a wide scale.
Scattered and sporadic and disunited uprisings, however
numerous, could not defeat modern imperialism. For that, an
attack based on modern thought and analysis, on a new vision
of society, and on new ideologies and parties capable of mobilis¬
ing the masses for nationwide political activity was needed.
This came about in the 20th century when the discontent of the
peasant masses was merged with the general anti-imperialist
discontent and their political activity found expression in the
wider national movement and the modern kisan movements. The
popular movements and rebellions of the 19th century did,
however, reveal the immense sources of resistance to imperialism
that lay dormant among the Indian people.

MODERN POLITICS AND NEW POLITICAL ASSOCIATIONS

The second half of the 19th century witnessed the flowering

of national political consciousness and the foundation and growth
of an organised national movement. During this period the
modern Indian intelligentsia created political associations to
spread political education and to initiate political work in the
country. This work was to be based on new political ideas,
a new intellectual perception of reality, new social, economic,
and political objectives, new forces of struggle and resistance
and new techniques of political organisation. It was to represent
a turning point in ideology, policy, organisation and leadership.
The task was difficult, since Indians were utterly unfamiliar
with modern political work. Even the notion that people could
organise politically in opposition to their rulers was a novel
one. Consequently, the work of these early associations and
of the early political workers proceeded rather slowly and it took
52 FREEDOM STRUGGLE

more than half a century to bring the common people within

the fold of modern politics.
Raja Rammohun Roy was one of the first Indian leaders
to start an agitation for political reforms. He fought for the
freedom of the Press, trial by jury, the separation of the executive
and the judiciary, appointment of Indians to higher offices,
protection of the ryots from zamindari oppression, and develop¬
ment of Indian trade and industries. He based his entire public
activity on the hope that a period of British rule would be
followed by the emergence of a free India. He took keen
interest in international affairs and everywhere he supported the
cause of liberty, democracy and nationalism.
Rammohun’s tradition was carried on after his death by
the radical Bengali youth known as the Derozians, so named
after their famous Anglo-Indian teacher Henry Vivian Derozio.
Derozio inspired his pupils with a fierce love of liberty and
patriotism based on the ideas of the French Revolution, Tom
Paine, and Jeremy Bentham. The Derozians started numerous
public associations to discuss modern ideas and their appli¬
cation to India and a large number of newspapers and journals to
propagate these ideas. Thus the germs of modern political
consciousness were sown in the 1820’s and 1830’s by Rammohun
Roy and the Derozians.
The first political association to be started in India was the
Landholders’ Society at Calcutta in 1838; but it was started
with the narrow aim of protecting the class interests of the
zamindars of Bengal, Bihar and Orissa. In 1843, the Bengal
British Indian Society was organised with wider political
objectives. In 1851 came the British Indian Association.
Simultaneously, the Madras Native Association and the Bombay
Association were established in 1852. Many similar associations
and clubs were established in smaller cities and towns all over
the country. Almost all of them were dominated by wealthy
 the early phasb 53

commercial or zamindari elements and were local in character.

They presented political and economic demands before the British
Indian Government and the British Parliament and worked
mainly for administrative reforms, larger employment of Indians
in administrative services, the spread of education, association of
Indians with the government, and, the encouragement of Indian
trade and industries.
The failure of the Revolt of 1857 made it clear that the
traditional political resistance to British rule under the leader¬
ship of the landed upper classes— zamindars, princes and land¬
lords —could no longer succeed and that resistance to colonialism
must flow along new channels. On the other hand, as we
have seen earlier, the character of British rule and policies
underwent a major change after 1858. It became more reac¬
tionary. The Indian intelligentsia gradually but increasingly
became more critical of British policies and began to grasp
the exploitative character of British rule. It may be noted
that the reaction of the modern Indian intelligentsia to colo¬
nialism, in contrast with the instinctive reaction of the peasantry
was hesitant, less militant, and less scientific. The understanding
of the Indian intelligentsia took a long time to develop. But the
process once begun, based as it was on modern thought, probed
deeper into the real nature of imperialism and was ultimately
transformed into modern political activity.
The politically conscious Indians realised that the existing
political associations were too narrowly conceived to be useful
in the changed circumstances. For example, the British Indian
Association had increasingly identified itself with the interests
of the zamindars and consequently with the ruling power. But
the new politics had increasingly to be based on a critical
attitude to British rule. And so, they groped their way towards
a new type of nationalist political organisation.
In 1866 Dadabhai Naoroji organised the East India Assoc’ ’^n
54 FREEDOM STRUGGLE

in London to discuss Indian questions and to influence British

public opinion. 'Branches of the Association were organised
in major Indian cities. Dadabhai Naoroji was soon to be known
to his contemporaries and to the succeeding generations of
Indians as the Grand Old Man of India. Born in 1825, he
became a successful businessman but he dedicated his entire
life and wealth to the national movement. His greatest contri¬
bution came in his economic analysis of British rule. He
showed that the poverty and economic backwardness of India
were not inherent in local conditions, but were caused by colonial
rule which was draining India of its wealth and capital. All
his life Dadabhai kept in touch with youth and continuously
developed his thought and politics in a radical direction.
Justice Mahadev Govind Ranade, Ganesh Vasudev Joshi, S.H.
Chiplunkar and others organised the Poona Sarvajanik Sabha
in 1870. The Sabha carried on active political education for the
next thirty years.
The openly reactionary and anti-Indian measures introduced
under Lytton’s Viceroyalty from 1876 to 1880 quickened the pace
of Indian nationalist activity. The removal of import duties on
British textiles to appease Lancashire manufacturers’ jealousy of
the rising Indian textile industry, the aggressive and expansionist
war against Afghanistan, whose expense was thrown on the
Indian exchequer, the Arms Act which was intended to make it
impossible for the Indian people to offer any kind of resistance
or even train themselves for defence, the Vernacular Press Act
which sought to curb the growing criticism of British rule, the
holding of the Imperial Durbar at Delhi at a time when miUions
were dying of famine, and lastly the reduction of the maximum
age of competition for the Indian Civil Service examination from
21 to 19 which further reduced the chances of Indians entering
the Civil Service— all these steps were visible manifestations of
the exploitative and colonial character of British rule. Spontane-
 THE EARLY PHASE 55

ous protests against these measures were organised all over the
country. The doctrine of Swadeshi was first preached during
the 1870’s as a method of protecting Indian industries against
the onslaught of British manufacturers.
The new political mood among the young Indians was first
noticed in Bengal. The conservative and pro-zamindar politics
of the British India Association did not suit the new middle class
and the intelligentsia, who now staked their claim to be the
champions of the people in competition with the zatnindars.
They also refused to accept the doctrine that India must be ruled
by Britain forever. Led by Anand Mohan Bose and Surendra
Nath Banerjea, they founded the Indian Association in July 1876.
The first issue taken up by the new association for agitation was
that of the reform of the system of the Civil Service examinations.
The association sent Surendra Nath Banerjea as a special delegate
to other parts of the country to canvass support for the agitation.
He was perhaps the first modern Indian to gain an all-India
popularity. In order to bring the common people into the cur¬
rent of the broad political movement, the leaders of the Indian
Association organised agitations in favour of the rights of the
tenants against the zamindars and the plantation workers against
the foreign tea planters. The Association also opened branches
in different towns and villages of Bengal and in many cities out¬
side Bengal.
The younger elements were also active in other parts of India.
In 1884, M. Viraraghavachari, G. Subramania Iyer, Ananda
Charlu and others formed the Madras Mahajan Sabha. In
Bombay, Pherozeshah Mehta, K. T. Telang, Badruddin Tyabjii
and others formed the Bombay Presidency Association in
1885.
 THE FOUNDATION OF THE NATIONAL CONGRESS

The politically conscious Indians were increasingly becoming

aware of the need for an all-India organisation not only to
provide a common forum for the meeting of minds and the for¬
mulation of a common programme of activity, but also to carry
on public education with a view to creating in time a broad-based
freedom struggle. The social basis for such an organisation was
now well laid and enough experience had been gathered. Many
Indians from different parts of the country — Dadabhai Naoroji,
Justice Ranade, Pherozeshah Mehta, K. T. Telang, Rahimutullah
Muhammed Sayani, Jhaverilal Umasbankar Yajnik, and Badrud-
din Tyabji in West India, G. Subramania Iyer, S. Subramania
Iyer, and Ananda Charlu in South India, and W. C. Bonnerjee,
Surendra Nath Banerjea, Ananda Mohan Bose, Lai Mohan Ghosh
and Kali Charan Banerjee in Eastern India —had simultaneously
begun to plan the setting up of an all-India nationalist organisa¬
tion. The Indian Association had already in December 1883
sponsored an All-India National Conference. But the attempt
had not been very successful. The idea was given a more con¬
crete shape by the Bombay group of nationalist political workers
who co-operated with A. O. Hume, an Englishman and a retired
Civil Servant, to bring together at Bombay in the last days of
December 1885 political leaders from different parts of the coun¬
try. These leaders decided to start the Indian National Congress
to be presided over in the first instance by W. C. Bonnerjee.
It has been said that Hume’s main purpose in encouraging the
foundation of the Congress was to provide a ‘safety valve’ or a
safe outlet to the growing discontent among the educated Indians.
He wanted to prevent the union of a discontented nationalist
intelligentsia with a discontented peasantry. By patronising a
mild political movement he hoped to prevent it from getting out
of control. Hume was to write later : “No choice was left to
Delegates to the First Session of the Indian National Congress, 1885
 Dadabhai Naoroji M. G. Ranade

Surendra Nath Banerjee Badruddin Tyabji

Aurobindo Ghosh Gopal Krishna Gokhale

Lala Lajpat Rai, Bal Gangadhar Tilak and Bipin Chandra Pal
Proclamation in protest of Bengal Partition

Home Rule League Procession in Poona

 \
THE EARLY PHASE 57

those who gave the primary impetus to the movement. The fer¬
ment. ..was at work with a radically increasing intensity, and
it became of paramount importance to find for its products an
overt and constitutional channel for discharge, instead of leaving
them to fester as they had already commenced to do, under
the surface.”
This explanation is, however, totally inadequate and misleading
as an explanation of the foundation of the National Congress.
This at the most explains to a limited extent Hume’s role in the
episode. The Indians who actively worked for the creation of
an all-India political organisation represented new social forces
that were increasingly opposed to the exploitation of India for
British interests. They needed an organisation that would fight,
for India’s political and economic advancement. They were
patriotic men of high character and were in no way stooges of
the foreign government. They co-operated with Hume because
they did not want to arouse official hostility to their early politi¬
cal efforts and they hoped that a retired Civil Servant’s active
presence would allay official suspicions. If Hume wanted to use
Congress as a ‘safety valve’, the early Congress leaders hoped to
use him as a ‘lightening conductor’. Gopal Krishna Gokhale was
to point out later in 1913 that

no Indian could have started the Indian National Congress...

If an Indian had... come forward to start such a movement,
embracing all India, the officials would not have allowed it to
come into existence. If the founder of the Congress had not
been a great Englishman and a distinguished ex-official, such
rvas the distrust of political agitation in those days that the
authorities would have at once found some way or the other of
suppressing the movement.

In any case, there is no doubt that with the foundation of the

58 FREEDOM STRUGGLE

Indian National Congress in 1885 the struggle for India’s free¬

dom was launched in a small, hesitant and mild, but organised
manner. It was to grow in strength year by year and in the end
involve the Indian people in powerful and militant campaigns
agdnst the foreign rulers.
It would, however, be wrong to look upon the Indian National
Congress as the sole or even the chief medium for the spread of
nationalist consciousness during the years 1885 to 1905. There
were numerous other channels for the development and articula¬
tion of nationausm during this period. Numerous local and pro¬
vincial political associations carried on day-to-day political
agitation. Provincial Conferences were held every year and in¬
volved a larger popular participation. Most of all the nationalist
newspapers acted as the organisers and publicists of nationalism.
Most of the newspapers of the period were not carried on as
business ventures but were consciously started as organs of
nationalist activity. Their ownefs and editors had often to make
immense personal sacrifices. All the major nationalist news¬
papers of the period were founded before the National Congress
came into being. The Amrita Bazar Patrika, the Indian Mirror,
the Sanjivani, and the Bengalee in Bengal, the Hindu , the
Swadesatnitran, the Andhra Prakasika and the Kerala Patrika,
in Madras, the Mahratia , the Kesari, the Indu Prakash , and the
Sudharak in Bombay, the Advocate, the Hindustani and the
Azadin U.P., and the Tribune, the Akhbar-i-Am and the Koh-i-
Noor in the Panjab, ware some of the prominent nationalist
newspapers of the period.

THE PROGRAMME AND ACTIVITIES OF

THE EARLY NATIONALISTS

The early Indian nationalist leadership believed that a direct

 THE EARLY PHASE 59

struggle for the political emancipation of the country was not

yet on the agenda of history. What was on the agenda was the
arousal of national feeling, consolidation of this feeling, the
bringing of a large number of the Indian people into the vortex of
nationalist politics and their training in politics, political agitation
and struggle. The first important task in this respect was the crea¬
tion of public interest in political questions and the organisation
of public opinion in the country. Secondly, popular demands had
to be formulated on a country-wide basis so that the emerging
public opinion might have an all-India focus. Most important
of all, national unity had to be created, in the first instance,
among the politically conscious Indians and political workers
and leaders. The early nationalists were fully aware of the fact
that India was a nation in the making, that Indian nationhood
was gradually coming into being and could not, therefore, be taken
for granted as an accomplished fact. The political leaders must
constantly work for the development and consolidation of the
feeling of national unity irrespective of region, caste, or religion.
The Indian National Congress, for instance, hoped to make a
humble beginning in this direction by promoting close contact
and friendly relations among active nationalists from different
parts of the country. The economic and political demands of
the early nationalists were formulated with a view to unify the
Indian people on the basis of a common economic and political
programme.

ECONOMIC CRITIQUE OF IMPERIALISM

Perhaps the most important part of the early nationalists’

political work was their economic critique of imperialism. They
took note of all the three forms of contemporary economic
exploitation, namely, through trade, industry, and finance. They
60 FREEDOM STRUGGLE

dearly grasped that the essence of British economic imperialism

lay in the subordination of the Indian economy to the British
economy. They vehemently opposed the British attempt to
develop in India the basic characteristics of a colonial economy,
namely, the transformation of India into a supplier of raw
materials, a market for British manufactures, and a field of invest¬
ment for foreign capital. They organised a powerful agitation
against nearly all the important official economic policies based
on this colonial structure. Moreover, in every sphere of
economic life they advocated the lessening and even severance of
India’s economic dependence on England.
The early nationalists constantly wrote and spoke about India’s
growing poverty and linked it with the British economic exploita¬
tion of India. Dadabhai Naoroji pointed out that Indians “were
mere helots. They were worse than American slaves, for the
latter were at least taken care of by their masters whose property
they were”. He declared that British rule was “an everlasting,
increasing, and everyday increasing foreign invasion”, that was
“utterly, though gradually, destroying the country”.
The early nationalists criticised the official economic policies
for bringing about the ruin of India’s traditional handicraft
industries and for obstructing the development of modern indus¬
tries. Most of them opposed the large-scale import of foreign
capital for investment in the Indian railways, plantations, and
industries on the ground that it would lead to the suppression of
Indian capitalists and the further strengthening of the British
hold on India’s economy and polity. They believed that the
employment of foreign capital posed a serious economic and
political danger not only to the present generation but also to the
generations to come. They asked for active administrative
measures to keep out foreign capital.
The chief remedy suggested by the early nationlists for the
removal of poverty was the modernisation of Indian life in all
 THE EARLY PHASE 61

fields, and, in particular, the development of modern industry.

But rapid industrialisation required active State assistance and a
policy of tariff protection. They urged the Government to aid
Indian industries through financial subsidies, loans and guaran¬
tees through State-aided or controlled banks, by borrowing
abroad and lending in India, by pioneering State-owned industries
in fields such as steel and mining, which Indian capitalists were
too weak to enter, but, which were essential for industrial deve¬
lopment, by collecting and disseminating industrial and commer¬
cial information, and, by promoting technical education.
The early nationalists also popularised the idea of Swadeshi as
a means of promoting Indian industries. Many Swadeshi stores
were opened. Ganesh Vasudev Joshi attended the Imperial
Durbar of 1877 dressed in immaculate hand-spun khadi. In 1896
a powerful Swadeshi campaign was organised in Maharashtra
during which students publicly burnt foreign cloth.
The nationalists organised a powerful all-India agitation
against the abandonment of tariff duties on imports from 1857 to
1880 and against the imposition of Cotton Excise Duties in
1849 and 1896. This agitation played a major role in arousing
countrywide national feelings and in educating the people
regarding the real aims and purposes of British rule in India.
The Kesari from Poona wrote on 28 January 1896 : “Surely
India is treated as a vast pasture reserved solely for the Europeans
to feed upon.” And P. Ananda Charlu, an ex-President of the
Indian National Congress, commented in 1896 in the Legislative
Council : “While India is safe-guarded against foreign inroads
by the strong arm of the British power, she is defenceless in
matters where the English and Indian interests clash and where
(as a Tamil saying puts it) the very fence begins to feed on the
crop.”
The early nationalists carried on a persistent agitation for
the reduction of the heavy land revenue demand. They urged
62 FREEDOM STRUGGLE

the Government to provide cheap credit to the peasantry through

State-sponsored agricultural banks and to make available large-
scale irrigation facilities. Some of them also criticised the semi-
feudal agrarian relations that the British sought to maintain.
They also agitated for improvement in the conditions of work
of the plantation labourers. They demanded a radical change
in the existing pattern of taxation and expenditure. They
pointed out that the existing system of taxation put heavy
burdens on the poor, while leaving the rich, especially the
foreigners, with a very light load. They, therefore, demanded
abolition of the salt tax and other taxes that hit the poor and
the lower middle-classes hard. The existing pattern of expendi¬
ture, they said, was geared to the imperial needs of Britain,
instead of promoting the development and welfare of the Indians.
They condemned the high expenditure on the army that was
used to maintiain Britain’s domination in Asia and Africa. They
also attacked the expenditure on the Civil Service whose members
were paid high salaries that were out of all proportion to the
level of the economic development of the country. They critcis-
ed the official policy of promoting foreign trade and railway
development with a view to promote imports of manufactures
and exports of raw materials. Trade and transport policies,
they said, should be geared to internal economic development.
One of the most powerful weapons in the nationalist armoury
of anti-imperialist criticism was that of the drain theory. The
nationalists pointed out that a large part of India’s capital and
wealth was being drained out or exported to Britain unilaterally or
without return in the form of interest on loans, earnings of British
capital invested in India, and the salaries and pensions of the
civil and military personnel serving in India. The drain was
the visible and concentrated form that the foreign economic
exploitation of India took. By attacking the drain, the early
nationalists called into question the very essence of the economics
 THE EARLY PHASE 63

of imperialism. It was also the symbol through which the

common man could grasp the existence of colonial exploita¬
tion.
There was a claim being made in those days that British
rule had brought India the benefits of security of life and
property. Questioning this claim Dadabhal Naoroji remarked :

The romance is that there is security of life and property

in India; the reality is that there is no such thing. There
is security of life and property in one sense or way — i.e.,
the people are secure from any violence from each other
or from Native despots. ...But from England’s own grasp
there is no security of property at all, and, as a conse¬
quence, no security for life. India’s property is not secure.
What is secure, and well secure, is that England is per¬
fectly safe and secure, and does so with perfect security,
to carry away from India, and to eat up in India, her
property at the present rate of £30,000,000 or £40,000,000
a year. ..I therefore venture to submit that India does not
enjoy security of her property and life... To millions in
India life is simply “half-feeding” or starvation, or famines
and disease.

The British also tried to suggest that with their coming

law and order came to be maintained efficiently in the country.
Refuting this with scorn and sarcasm Dadabhal said :

There is an Indian saying : ‘Pray strike on the back, \but

don’t strike on the belly.’ Under the native despot the,
people keep and enjoy what they produce, though at times
they suffer some violence on the back. Under the British
Indian despot the man is at peace, there is no violence;
his substance is drained away, unseen, peaceably and subtly —
64 FREEDOM STRUGGLE

he starves in peace and perishes in peace, with law and

order !

So this agitation on economic questions led to the growth

an all-India opinion that British rule was based on the
Exploitation of India, was leading to its impoverishment and
was producing economic backwardness and underdevelopment.
These disadvantages far outweighed any indirect advantages that
might have followed British rule.

ADMINISTRATIVE REFORMS

The early nationalists were fearless critics of individual

administrative measures and worked incessantly for the reform
of an administrative system ridden with corruption, inefficiency
and oppression. The most important administrative reform
for which they agitated was the Indianisation of the higher
grades of the administrative services. This demand was put
forward on economic, political, and moral grounds. Econo¬
mically, the high salaries paid to the Europeans put a heavy
burden on Indian finances and contributed to the drain, since
a large part of these salaries was exported to Britain. Politically,
the European civil servants ignored Indian needs and, in
particular, favoured European capitalists at the cost of Indian
capitalists. Morally, it dwarfed Indian character reducing the
tallest Indian to a position of permanent inferiority in his
own country. At the same time, the early nationalists agitated
for higher salaries to the low-paid Sower grade government
employees. They believed that a great deal inefficiency and
corruption at the lower levels due to the very low salaries
paid to the employees at the base.
The early nationalists constantly agitated against the oppressive
 THE EARLY PHASE 65

and tyrannical behaviour of the police and the Government agents

towards the common people. The nationalist newspapers daily
brought to light numerous examples of such tyranny. The
nationalists demanded the separation of the judiciary from the
executive so that the people might get some protection from the
arbitrary acts of the police and the bureaucracy. They criticised
the delays of law and the high cost of the judicial process. They
condemned the perversion of justice every time an Indian was
involved in a criminal dispute with a European and demanded
that the principle of equality before the law should be applied
to the Europeans also. They opposed the policy of disarming
the people and argued that ail people had the right to bear arms.
They opposed the aggressive foreign policy against India’s
neighbours. They protested against the policy of the annexation
of Burma, the attack upon Afghanistan and the suppression of
the tribal people in North-Western India.
The early nationalists criticised the low level of the welfare
services in India and urged the Government to undertake and
develop the welfare activities of the State. In particular, they em¬
phasised the need for the spread of education among the masses.
They also demanded greater facilities for technical and higher
education and the extension of medical and health facilities. Most
of all, as we have seen earlier, they demanded active adminis¬
trative measures to develop Indian industries and agriculture.
The nationalist leaders also took up the cause of Indian
workers who had migrated to British colonies such as South
Africa, Malaya, Mauritius, Fiji, the Wrest Indies, and British
Guiana. These workers were being subjected to extreme terms of
racial discrimination and other kinds of oppression in these
countries. In most cases their lot was no better than that of
slaves. The nationalists gave full support to the popular
struggle for human rights that was being waged in South Africa
after 1893 by Mohandas Raramchand Gandhi.
66 FREEDOM STRUGGLE

The Indian leaders also took up the cause of the plantation

workers who were forced to live in conditions of near-slavery
on low wages by the foreign planters. At the same time, it
may be noted that they did not raise their voice in defence
of the Indian factory and mine workers who were also being
subjected to ruthless exploitation. In this case the Indian leaders
gave precedence to the interests of the Indian capitalists.

DEFENCE OF CIVIL RIGHTS

From the beginning the politically conscious Indians had

been powerfully attracted to modern civil rights, namely, the
freedom of speech, the Press, thought, and association. Conse¬
quently, they put up a strong defence of these civil rights
whenever the Government tried to curtail them. The Vernacular
Press Act of 1878, which sought to gag Indian language news¬
papers, was firmly opposed by them till it was repealed in
1880. Similarly, official attempts during the 1890’s to curb
newspaper criticism under the garb of protecting official secrets
were stoutly opposed.
The most dramatic incident in this respect was the arrest
of B. G. Tilak and several other leaders and newspaper editors in
1897 on the charge of spreading disaffection against the British
Indian Government . Tilak, already a prominent nationalist leader,
was given the barbarous sentence of rigorous imprisonment
for 18 months. Two Poona leaders, the Natu Brothers, were
deported without trial. Several other newspaper editors were
meted out similar punishments. The nationalist newspapers
and political associations were up in arms against this attack
on civil liberties and a countrywide protest movement was
organised. Overnight Tilak became a popular all-India leader
and was given the title of Lokmanya by the people.
 THE EARLY PHASE 67

The Government now enacted new Jaws to curb the freedom of

speech and the Press and to increase the powers of the police.
Nationalist workers could now be dealt with in the same manner
as goondas and other bad characters. A nationwide opposi¬
tion to these laws was organised. In fact, from now on, the
struggle in defence of civil liberties was to become an inseparable
part of the struggle for freedom.

CONSTITUTIONAL REFORMS AND THE DEMAND

FOR SELF-GOVERNMENT

From the beginning the early nationalists believed that India

should eventually move towards democratic self-government.
But they did not demand immediate fulfilment of this goal.
Instead, they suggested a step by step approach towards freedom.
Their immediate political demands were extremely moderate.
To start with, they said, India should be given a larger share
in the government by expanding and reforming the existing
Legislative Councils. By the Indian Councils Act of 1861, pro¬
vision had been made for the nomination of a few non-officials to
the councils. These non-official government nominees were
usually zamindars and big merchants who completely toed the
official line. For example, in 1888, they supported without
hesitation an increase in the salt tax. They were often derisively
described on the Congress platform with such epithets as ‘gilded
shams’ and ‘magnificent non -entities’. The nationalists demanded
the widening of the powers of the Councils and an increase
in the powers of the members to discuss the budget and to
question and criticise the day to day administration. Most of all
they deinanded membership of the Councils for the elf^^d
representatives of the people.
68 FREEDOM STRUGGLE

Under popular pressure the Government amended the old

provisions and passed the new Indian Councils Act of 1892.
The Act increased the number of non-official members, a few
of whom were to be indirectly elected. Members were also
given the right to speak on the budget but not the right to
vote upon it. Such a meagre reform left Indians utterly dis¬
contented. They saw in it a mockery of their demands. They
now agitated for a non-official elected majority in the Councils
and, most of all, for non-official Indian control over the
public purse. They raised the slogan : no taxation without
representation. At the same time, they failed to broaden the
base of their democratic demand. They did not demand the
right to vote for the masses or for women. Obviously, their
demand would only benefit the middle- and upper-classes.
The early nationalists made a great advance in their political
goals at the turn of the century. Their demand was no longer
confined to petty reforms. They now demanded full self-govern¬
ment, including full Indian control over all legislation and
finances, on the mode! of the self-governing colonies of Canada
and Australia. They now demanded a change in the system. For
example, this demand was made by Dadabhai Naoroji in 1904
and Gopal Krishna Gokhale in his Presidential Address to
the Congress in 1905. Dadabhai Naoroji was the first Indian
to use the word Swarajya for this demand at the Calcutta
Session of the Congress in 1906, Thus, the basic difference
of the early nationalists with the later nationalists did not
lie in a different definition of the nationalist political goal.
The real difference lay in the methods of struggle to achieve the
agreed goals and the character of the social classes and groups
on whom the struggle would be based. In other words, the diffe¬
rence was not in the goals but on how to realise them in practice.
 THE EARLY PHASE 69

METHODS OF POLITICAL WORK

It was the methods of political work of the early nationalists

that earned them the title of Moderates. These methods can
be summed up briefly as constitutional agitation within the
four corners of the law and slow, orderly political progress.
They believed that their main task was to educate people in
modern politics, to arouse national political consciousness and
to create a united public opinion on political questions. For
this purpose, they relied on several methods. They held meetings
where speeches of a very high political and intellectual calibre
were made and resolutions setting forth popular demands were
passed. Through the Press, the nationalists carried on a daily
critique of the Government. They also sent numerous memorials
and petitions to high Government officials and the British Parlia¬
ment. These memorials and petitions were carefully drafted
documents in which facts and arguments were diligently
marshalled. Though ostensibly these petitions were addressed
to the Government, their real aim was to educate the Indian
people. For example, when in 1891 the young Gokhale expressed
disappointment at the two-line reply of the Government to a
carefully prepared memorial by the Poona Sarvajanik Sabha,
Justice Ranade replied :

You don’t realise our place in the history of our country.

These memorials are nominally addressed to Government, in
reality they are addressed to the people, so that they may
learn how to think in these matters. This work must be done
for many years, without expecting any other results, because
politics of this kind is altogether new in this land.

A second objective of the early nationalist political work was

to influence the British Government and British public opinion
 70 FREEDOM STRUGGLE

to introduce the desired changes. The early nationalists initially

believed that the British were unaware of the real conditions
of India. They, therefore, set out to enlighten the British public
and political leaders through memorials and petitions and by
carrying on active political propaganda in Britain. Deputations
of leading Indian leaders were sent to Britain. In 1889, a British
Committee of the National Congress was founded. In 1890,
this Committee started a journal called India. Dadabhai
Naoroji spent a major part of his life and income in Britain
doing propaganda work among its people and politicians.
Even though the early nationalists believed in legal agita¬
tion only, they failed to organise a nationwide or continuous
agitation even on this limited basis except through the news¬
papers. This was partly due to the extreme paucity of funds.
They were constantly short of money. The rich Indians —
merchants, industrialists, and zamindars— did not yet give any
financial support to the nationalist movement. Most of the
political leaders had to maintain themselves on their own
earnings, which were often meagre. For example, Surendra Nath
Banerjea and Gopal Krishna Gokhale lived on the modest
earnings of a teacher and Tilak ran a private coaching class
for law students. This lack of funds partially explains the
predominence of lawyers and journalists— the two independent
professions— among the early nationalist leaders.

ROLE OF THE MASSES

The basic weakness of the early nationalist movement lay in

its narrow social base. The movement did not yet have a wide
appeal. The ^rea of its influence was in the main limited to the
urban educated Indians. In particular the leadership was con¬
fined to professional groups such as lawyers, doctors, journalists
ari teachers, and a few merchants and land-owners.
 THE EARLY PHASE / 1

The leaders lacked political faith in the masses. They believed

that the Indian people lacked the character and capacity to take
part in modern politics and to wage a successful struggle against
the most powerful imperialist power of the day. Describing the
difficulties in the way of the organisation of active political strug¬
gle, Gokhale pointed to “endless divisions and sub-divisions in
the country, the bulk of the population ignorant and clinging
with a tenacity to the old modes of thought and sentiment, which
are averse to all changes and do not understand change”. The
Moderate leaders made a serious mistake here. They only saw
the social, cultural, and political backwardness of the masses, but
they did not see that the masses alone possessed the qualities of
heroism and sacrifice that a prolonged anti-imperialist struggle
would require, that the masses alone could provide the real force
behind their political demands, and that even the cultural and
political backwardness of the masses could be removed only in
the course of a struggle. They believed that militant mass
struggle against imperialism could be waged only after the
heterogeneous elements of Indian society had been welded into a
nation. But in fact it was only in the course of such a struggle
that the Indian nation could get formed. The result of this
wrong approach towards them asses, itself the product of their
isolation from the masses, was that the masses were assigned a
purely passive role in the early phase of nationalism. It also led
to political moderation. Lacking mass support, they felt that the
time was not yet ripe for throwing a challenge to the foreign
rulers. To do so would be to invite premature repression. As
Gokhale put it : “You do not realise the enormous reserve of
power behind the Government. If the Congress were to do any¬
thing such as you suggest, the Government would have no
difficulty in throttling it in five minutes.” The later nationalists
were to differ from the Moderates in precisely this respect.
Having full faith in the capacity of the Indian people to struggle.
72 FREEDOM STRUGGLE

they advocated a plan of militant mass struggle against imperial¬

ism. They believed that suppression by the Government would
not ‘throttle’ the movement but would educate the people and
further strengthen their resolve to overthrow imperialism.
The narrow social base of the early national movement should
not,however, lead us to the conclusion that it fought for the narrow
interests of the social classes and groups which joined it. Its
programme and policies championed the cause of all sections of
the Indian people and represented nationwide interests against
colonial exploitation. Only, it failed to mobilise all the people
in the anti-imperialist struggle and, consequently, it was forced
to compromise with imperialism, often even talking of loyalty to
the Raj.

OFFICIAL ATTITUDE

From the beginning the Government was hostile to the deve¬

lopment of nationalist forces. It had come down heavily on the
Indian Press in 1878 when it had tried to spread nationalist con¬
sciousness through criticism of colonial policies. Dufferin had
looked with apprehension on the founding of the Indian National
Congress. He had noted that “the functions of such an assembly
must of necessity consist in criticising the acts or policy of Govern¬
ment and in formulating demands which it would be impossible
to grant”. He had tried to divert the movement by suggesting to
Hume that the Congress should devote itself to social rather than
political affairs.1 But the Congress leaders had refused to make

1The erroneous but widely prevalent view that it was on Dufferin’s advice
that the Congress shifted from social to political affairs was first put
forward by W. C. Bonnerjea in the introduction to a book in 1898 and has
since been carried forward by other writers. DulTerims private papers
show that the truth was the reverse of Bonerjea’s failing memory.
 THB EARLY PHASE 73

the change. Still the British authorities had not adopted *an
openly hostile attitude. They had hoped that the National
Congress would keep itself busy with academic discussions
confined to a handful of the politically conscious Indians. They
were also willing to accommodate the more brilliant among the
nationalist leaders with seats in the legislative council and well-
paid jobs in the judicial and other services.
But it soon became apparent that the National Congress and
other nationalist associations and persons and newspapers would
not confine themselves to such a limited role. The newspapers
reached out to the people and the Congress began to publish
popular pamphlets in Indian languages. The nationalist message
began to be preached through mass meetings. The British could
not tolerate the political awareness spreading among the common
people. That was nothing but sedition. The nationalist economic
agitation exposed the real, exploitative face of imperialism. As
George Hamilton, Secretary of State for India, complained to
Dadabhai Naoroji in 1900 : “You announce yourself as a sincere
supporter of British rule; you vehemently denounce the conditions
and consequences which are inseparable from the maintenance
of that rule.” Earlier Dufferin had written about the role of the
nationalist press in 1886 : “In this way there can be no doubt
there is generated in the minds of those who read these papers...
a sincere conviction that we are all of us the enemies of mankind
%

in general and of India in particular.”

British officials now began publicly to criticise and condemn
the National Congress and other nationalist spokesmen. The
nationalists were branded as ‘disloyal babus’, ‘seditious Brah¬
mins’ and ‘violent villains’. The Congress was described as a
‘factory of sedition’ and the Congressmen as ‘disappointed
candidates for office and discontented lawyers who represent no
one but themselves’. In 1887,xDufferin attacked the National
Congress in a public speech and ridiculed it as representing only
 74 FREEDOM STRUGGLE
*

‘a microscopic minority of the people’. George Hamilton

accused Congress leaders of possessing ‘seditious and double¬
sided character’. He was so bitter at Dadabhai Naoroji’s
exposure of British rule that he came down to common abuse of
the great leader, declaring that residence in England and associ¬
ation with radical and socialist British leaders had “deteriorated
whatever brains or presence he may originally have possessed”.
Curzon, the Viceroy, declared in 1900 that “the Congress is
tottering to its fall, and one of my great ambitions, while in
India, is to assist it to a peaceful demise”. He described the
Congress as that ‘unclean thing.’ Some British publicists even
accused the Congress of receiving Russian gold !
The British authorities pushed further the policy of ‘divide and
rule’ to counter the growing nationalist movement. They realised
that the growing unity of the Indian people posed a major threat
to their rule. George Hamilton wrote to Elgin, the Viceroy, in
1897 : “The solidarity, which is growing, of native opinion and
races and religions in antagonism to our rule frightens me as
regards the future.” The British officials, therefore, encouraged
Sayyid Ahmed Khan, Raja Shiva Prasad, and other pro-British
individuals to start an anti-Congress movement. They also tried
to drive a wedge between Hindus and Muslims. They fanned
communal rivalry among the educated Indians on the question
of jobs in Government service. While immediately after the
Revolt of 1857 they had repressed the Muslim upper-classes and
favoured the Hindu middle- and upper-classes, after 1870 they
made an attempt to turn upper- and middle-class Muslims
against the national movement. They cleverly exploited the
controversy around Hindi and Urdu to promote communal feel¬
ings. The cow protection movement started by orthodox Hindus
was used for the same purpose. Kimberley, the Secretary of State
for India, wrote to Lansdowne, the Viceroy, on 25 August
1893 that this movement “makes all combinations of the Hindus
 THE EARLY PHASB 75

and the Mohammedans impossible, and so cuts at the root of the

Congress agitation for the formation of a united Indian people”.
The ‘divide and rule’ policy was not confined to Hindu and
Muslim differences only. An effort was made to turn the tradi¬
tional feudal classes against the new intelligentsia, province
against province, caste against caste, and group against group.
Attempts were also made to create a split in the nationalist ranks
by adopting a more friendly approach towards the more conser¬
vative or moderate sections. In the 1870’s and the 1880’s the
leaders belonging to the older associations like the British Indian
Association were sought to be appeased and turned against the
‘radical’ Congress leaders. In the 1890’s efforts were made to
separate the radicals of yesterday— W. C. Bonnerjea, Justice
Ranade, Gokhale and others —from leaders such as Dadabhai
Naoroji and Surendra Nath Banerjea who came to be considered
as extremists. After 1905, when differences arose between the
Moderates and the Extremists inside the Congress, the British
rulers made a determined effort to create a split.
The British authorities also followed a policy of apparent con¬
cessions on the one hand and ruthless repression on the other to
put down the growth of nationalism. The more moderate sections
of the nationalist opinion were appeased by making concessions
on the maximum age of recruitment to the Indian Civil Service,
providing larger openings to Indians in other Government
services, widening the scope of local municipal government, and
passing the Indian Councils Act of 1892. Simultaneously, a policy
of repression was followed to frighten the weak-hearted. Elgin,
the Viceroy, openly threatened Indians in 1898 with the declara¬
tion, “India was conquered by the sword and by the sword it
shall be held.” Already as we have seen, a powerful attack was
launched on the nationalists in Western India with the arrest of
Tilak and other newspapermen. In 1898 laws were enacted curbing
76/ FREEDOM STRUGGLE

the freedom of the Press and speech and increasing the powers of
ihe police and the magistracy.
The British authorities believed that the spread of education
had been a major cause of the growth of nationalism. Plans
were now set afoot to impose greater government control over it
and to change its modern, liberal character. George Hamilton
outlined these plans to the Viceroy during 1899. Firstly, he
said, the Government should “exercise a greater control over
education, its organisation and textbooks”. This was sought
to be done through the Education Act of 1903 and by keeping
strict control over teachers through the system of government
inspection of schools and colleges. Secondly, the Government
decided to promote private colleges run by religious trusts.
Modern secular education, which led to the spread of rational,
democratic, and nationalist ideas was sought to be replaced
by a system based on religious and moral training. Even though
based on Indian religions and glorification of Indian culture,
this new system was reactionary as it did not cultivate a forward
looking, modern spirit among the young. This policy showed
how by the end of the 19th century British imperialism was
willing to join hands with the socially and intellectually reaction¬
ary and moribund forces. It had no longer any serious
objection to revivalism and conservatism. Social and cultural
conservatism could be accommodated within the framework of
imperial rule. But it feared above all the spread of modern ideas.

CRITICAL EVALUATION

Later critics were to point out that the early nationalists

did not achieve much practical success. Very few of the reforms
for which they agitated were introduced. The alien rulers treated
them with contempt and sneered at their politics. As Lajpat
 THE EARLY PHASE 77

Rai later wrote : “After more than 20 years of more or less

futile agitation for concessions and redress of grievances, they
had received stones in place of bread.” In fact, the Govern¬
ment instead of becoming more liberal had become more
reactionary and repressive. Moreover, the early national move¬
ment had failed to acquire any roots among the common people
and even those who had joined it with high hopes were- feeling
more and more disillusioned. Its critics ridiculed its politics
as ‘halting and half-hearted’ and its methods as mendicancy or. ,
beggary through prayers and petitions. They pointed out that
with the exception of a handful, most of the early national¬
ists had made no personal sacrifice and undergone little personal
discomfort. Moreover their programme was confined within
the narrow limits of capitalism. They could not visualise
India’s development except along capitalist lines. This inevit¬
ably limited the extent of their appeal among the common
people and their capacity to move them to political action.
The critics were, however, not quite correct in declaring
the early national movement a failure. No doubt their practical
achievements were meagre and their political assumptions and
outlook had become outdated by the beginning of the 20th
century because of the changes in the character of the British
rule. They had failed even to carry out an all-India constitu¬
tional agitation. The younger elements were no longer attracted
by them and the masses remained untouched by their organisation
or propaganda. And, by 1905, they had reached the limits of
their political growth.
But, historically viewed, the political record of the early
nationalists is not all that bleak. On the contrary, it is quite
bright if the immense difficulties of the task they had undertaken
are kept in view. In fact, it was their very achievements in
the wider sense that led later to the more advanced stages
of the national movement and made their own approach histori-
78 FREEDOM STRUGGLE

cally obsolete. Thus the early nationalists represented the

most progressive force of the times. They made possible a
decisive shift in Indian politics.
They succeeded in creating a wide political awakening and
in arousing among the middle- and lower-middle class Indians
and the intelligentsia the feeling that they belonged to one
common nation— the Indian nation. They made the people of
India conscious of the bonds of common political, economic,
and cultural interests and of the existence of a common
enemy in imperialism and thus helped to weld them in a
common nationality. They popularised among the people the
ideas of democracy and civil liberty. It was in the course of
the buiding up of the National Congress and other popular
and nationalist associations that the Indians acquired a practical
knowledge of democracy at a time when the rulers constantly
told them that they were fit only for ‘benevolent’ or ‘oriental’
despotism. Moreover, a large number of nationalist political
workers were trained in the art of modern politics, and the
people familiarised with the concepts and ideas of modern
politics.
Most of all they did pioneering work in mercilessly expos¬
ing the true character of British imperialism in India. They
linked nearly every important economic question with the
politically dependent status of the country. And, therefore,
even though they were moderate in politics and political methods,
they successfully brought to light the most important political
and economic aspect of the Indian reality —that India was
being ruled by a foreign power for the purposes of economic
exploitation. Any regime is politically secure only so long
as the people have a basic faith in its benevolent character
or they are at least willing to acquiese in its continuation. This
provides legitimacy to the regime; this is its moral founda¬
tion. The economic agitation of the early nationalists competely
 THE EARLY PHASE 79

undermined this moral foundation of British rule. It corroded

popular confidence in its benevolent character, in both its
good results as well as its good intentions. Once, in this period
of intellectual unrest, this basic task had been performed, it
was inevitable that the radical exposure of British imperialism
would spread to the political field. The struggle, the broadening
of its social base, the radicalisation of its social, economic
and political goals, the involvement and induction of the masses,
and the organisation of mass movements could and did come
later. Once the main issues were clarified, any mistakes in
the understanding of the forces and tactics of political
struggle could always be corrected with reference precisely to
these issues. This crucial, preliminary character of their own
political work was fully recognised by the early nationalists.
For example, in a letter to D. E. Wacha dated 12 January
1905, Dadabhai Naoroji wrote :

The very discontent and impatience it (the Congress) has

evoked against itself as slow and non-progressive among the
rising generation a re among its best results or fruits. It is
its own evolution and progress... (the task is) to evolve the
required revolution— whether it would be peaceful or violent.
The character of the revolution will depend upon the wisdom or
unwisdom of the British Government and action of the British
people.

The period from 1858 to 1905 was the seed-time of Indian

nationalism; and the early nationalists sowed the seeds well
and deep. Instead of basing their nationalism on appeals to
shallow sentiments and passing emotions, or abstract rights
of freedom and liberty, or on obscurantist appeals to the
past, they rooted it in a hard-headed and penetrating analysis
of the complex mechanism of modern imperialism and the
80 FREEDOM STRUGGLE

chief contradiction between the interests of the Indian people

and British rule. The result was that they evolved a common
political and economic programme which united rather than
divided the different sections of the people. Later on, the
Indian people could gather around this programme and wage
powerful struggles.
It can, therefore, be said that in spite of their many failures,
the early nationalists laid strong foundations for the national
movement to grow upon and that they deserve a high place among
the makers of modern India. As Gopal Krishna Gokhale,
the last of the great Moderates, put it, while evaluating the role
of the founding fathers of Indian nationalism :

Let us not forget that we are at a stage of the country’s

progress when our achievements are bound to be small, and
our disappointments frequent and trying. That is the place
which it has pleased Providence to assign to us in this struggle,
and our responsibility is ended when we have done the work
which belongs to that place. It will, no doubt, be given
to our countrymen of future generations to serve India by
their successes; we, of the present generation, must be content
to serve her mainly by our failures. For, hard though it
be, out of those failures the strength will come which in
the end will accomplish great tasks.
 Ill THE ERA OF MILITANT NATIONALISM

During the LATTER HALF of the 19th century political conscious¬

ness of the people had been growing steadily. But the leaders
failed to obtain any concessions from the British rulers. At the
same time the colonial exploitation of the country continued.
Lacking adequate opportunities in business and commerce, the
young educated middle class turned more and more to the public
services and the legal profession. Some of the more enterpris¬
ing took to journalism. Opportunities in the public services
were strictly limited. In 1903, for example, only sixteen
thousand Indians held posts at salaries higher than Rs. 75 a
month. In the legal profession failures were frequent and
journalism was, at that time, a pretty precarious profession.
The real crux of the problem was, however, not the number
of unemployed graduates, but the huge wastage arising from
failures at examinations. It was among these ‘unemployable’
young men that frustration was most prevalent.
By the turn of the century the general mood of discontent had
spread to the rural gentry, the peasantry and the workers. It is
not surprising, therefore, that the moderate leaders who went
on pleading with the Government for reforms were beginning to
be less and less popular. The inevitable happened. The situa¬
tion threw up a large number of new leaders who were more
radical in their demands and who believed in a more militant
form of nationalism. They came to be called Extremists. While
the main support for the moderate leaders had come from the
intelligentsia and the urban middle class, the new leaders who
 82 FREEDOM STRUGGLE

emerged appealed to a wider circle of the lower middle classes,

the students, and even a section of the workers and peasants.
The early intellectual leadership was provided by persons such
as Rajnarain Bose and Bankim Chandra Chatterjee in Bengal
and Vishnu Shastri Chiplunkar in Maharashtra. Bankim’s
hymn to motherland began with Bandemataram which later
became a stirring call of patriotism and self-sacrifice.
It must also be remembered that the experience gained during
the early phase of the national movement had given stature and
maturity to the leaders. They had grown in self-respect and
self-confidence. They felt they had the capacity to govern them¬
selves; they had acquired a faith in the future development of
their country. Swami Vivekananda was not a political leader
but he too repeatedly emphasized the need for a firm belief in
one’s own strength. He declared :

If there is a sin in the world, it is weakness; avoid all weak¬

ness, weakness is sin, weakness is death... And here is the test
of truth. ..anything that makes you weak physically, intel¬
lectually and spiritually, reject as poison, there is no life in it,
it cannot be true.

Vivekananda was the first to speak openly and courageously

against day-dreaming about the glories of the past. He wanted
the Indian nation to build the future with firmness and vision.
'“When, O Lord,” he asked, ‘‘shall our land be free from this
eternal dwelling upon the past ?” Though a religious leader, he
declared that religion was not for empty bellies and it must
contribute to human welfare.
Events in many foreign countries during this period also
helped to generate among the Indian people a militant national¬
ism. Especially the emergence of Japan as a modern, powerful
country after 1868, gave a new hope to Indians. Japan had
 THE ERA OF MILITANT NATIONALISM $3

proved that even a backward Asian country could, through its

own efforts become strong without help or assistance from the
West. In less than 50 years Japan had become an industrial
nation and a strong military power. She had introduced primary
education for all and set up an efficient, modern administration.
Here was an example for India to follow. Similarly, the defeat
Italy suffered at the hands of Ethiopia in 1896 and the victory
of Japan over Russia in 1905 proved false all claims of white
superiority over other peoples.
The fight of the people in Ireland, Russia, Egypt, Turkey and
China for freedom proved to the Indian people that a united
nation, prepared to suffer for its principles, could fight against
even the most powerful government.
The most outstanding leader among the Extremists was Bal
Gangadhar Tilak. Later, he came to be known as Lokmanya
Tilak. Tilak was born in 1866. He graduated from the Bombaj
University and devoted his entire life to the service of the
country. Tilak made excellent use of his great flair for journal¬
ism to mould public opinion in favour of his political aims and
objectives. Along with G. G. Agarkar he founded two news¬
papers, one in English called the Maratha, and the other in
Marathi called the Kesari.
From 1889 he himself edited the Kesari and the paper became
the most eloquent champion of the nationalist cause. Tilak
wrote and spoke asking the people to be unafraid and selfless,
proud and self-confident. He reorganized the traditionalist
Ganesh festivals and introduced Shivaji festivals to popularise
nationalist ideas among the common people.
Tilak was the first to advise peasants in Maharashtra to with¬
hold payment of land revenues when their crops failed owing to
drought or famine or pestilence. He called for Swadeshi and
boycott of British goods when Elgin, the Viceroy imposed an
excise duty on Indian mill-made cloth.
84 FREEDOM STRUGGLE

Not unexpectedly the British authorities began to be worried.

They arrested Tilak in 1897 and charged him with spreading
hatred and disaffection against the Government. His defence
was bold and unflinching. He refused to apologise and accepted
with pride rigorous imprisonment for 18 months. His example
and sacrifice had an electrifying effect. He became the living
symbol of the new nationalism.
In addition to Lokmanya Tilak, leaders such as Bipin Chandra
Pal, Aurobindo Ghosh and Lala Lajpat Rai were the chief
exponents of this militant school of nationalism. Their pro¬
gramme had three aspects. Firstly they wanted the Indians
themselves to work for and obtain their freedom and make a
determined effort to rise above the degraded position they were
forced to occupy under foreign rule. For the fulfilment of this
goal no sacrifice was too great, no suffering too much. Therefore,
they pleaded for courage, self-confidence and a spirit of sacrifice.
Secondly, they repudiated as totally false the suggestion that
India needed the ‘benevolent guidance’ and assistance of foreign¬
ers. They hated foreign rule and they firmly proclaimed that
Swaraj or full independence was the only goal worth fighting
for. Lastly, they had an abiding faith in the strength of the
masses and they prepared to win freedom through mass action.

THE PARTITION OF BENGAL AND THE BENGALI RESPONSE

When Curzon entered the scene, the ferment of extremism had

already begun to work. His policy only quickened its growth.
He attacked the cherished ideals of local self-government, educa¬
tional autonomy and freedom of the Press. He curtailed the
number of Indians in the Calcutta Corporation. He increased
the official control over the Indian universities in the name of
educational reforms. A university commission set up by him
 THE ERA OF MILITANT NATIONALISM 85

recommended abolition of second-grade colleges and law classes,

increase of fees, reduction of the terms and numbers of the
senators, tighter control of the education department and wide
powers over affiliation. Abolition of the law classes and second-
grade colleges would not only mean less employment for the
Indians who ran them and taught in them, but also fewer oppor¬
tunities for Indians to acquire higher education and to enter
the legal profession. Enhancement of fees would block the road
of the poor to clerical and teaching jobs. The Moderates
opposed the bill but Curzon made few concessions. The demand
for national education grew louder.
His Indian Official Secrets (Amendment) Act aimed at pro¬
tecting the oppressive officials from public criticism. It seemed
to be a continuation of Lytton’s policy and turned the Press
more nationalist than before. He spent Indian money
lavishly on foreign missions, the Delhi Durbar and the Tibetan
expedition. He refused to reduce the land tax. Finally came
the partition of Bengal. It was ostensibly for better adminis¬
tration of an unwieldy province but really for curbing the
radical Bengali nationalists. Administrative convenience and
development of Assam were the avowed objects of the plan.
But politics had crept in. The officials talked of freeing the
eastern districts from ‘the pernicious influence of Calcutta’
and ‘a juster deal for the Moslems.’ They wanted to transfer
to East Bengal, Bakharganj and Faridpur which had become
hot-beds of extremism.
There was widespread protest. The Congress called the plan
‘preposterous’. Two alternatives were suggested —either put
Bengal under a Governor, or separate the Hindi- and Oriya-
speaking peoples without dividing the Bengali-speaking ones.
Curzon brushed the protest aside as empty rhetoric of the
Bengali babus. It only proved that partition had become politi¬
cally desirable, and, if the Government yielded, a source of
86 FREEDOM STRUGGLE

increasing trouble would be cemented on the eastern flank

of India.
During his visit to East Bengal in February 1904 he enlarged
the first scheme. Bengal was now' to lose fifteen districts alto¬
gether and her population would be reduced to 54 million.
Risely wrote : “Bengal united is a power. Bengal divided
will puli several different ways... one of our main objects is
to split up and (hereby weaken a solid body of opponents
to our rule”. Lord Hardings admitted later that “the desire to
aim a blow at the Bengalis overcame other considerations”.
But the official designs were to be submerged under the united
protest of all section of the Bengalis —zamindars, lawyers,
merchants, the city poor, the workers and, above all, the
students. The sentiments of a very sensitive and proud section
of the Indian people had been rudely trampled upon.

THE ANTI-PARTITION MOVEMENT

Curzon got the unwilling consent of the Secretary of State

and published the plan in July 1905 and found that he had
brought about a unity which he had tried to destroy. The
anti-partition movement was the work of all sections of the
Bengali people and the entire national leadership. Moderates,
such as Surendranath Banerjea took the initiative at the early
stages but more extremist elements such as Bipin Chandra Pal,
Aswini Kumar Dutta and Aurobindo Ghosh soon secured con¬
trol over the movement. It was chiefly an urban movement
though it touched the rural people.
It began with a mammoth meeting at the Town Hall, Calcutta,
on 7 August 1905, when the resolution on boycott of British
goods was adopted. 16 October, when the partition was made
effective, was called a day of national mourning. There was
 THE ERA OF MILITANT NATIONALISM 87

a general hartal. People fasted and went bare foot to take

a bath in the Ganga, shouting Bandetnataram and singing
patriotic songs. Hindus and Muslims tied rakhi to one
another’s wrists as a symbol of the fraternity of all Bengalis.
Rabindranath’s Swadeshi songs gave expression to the people’s
anguish and anger. In every note they breathed a poignant love
for the land and the people going to be divided. The Bengalis
rose like one man to resist, to suffer and to sacrifice. Mofussil
districts, such as Barisal and Mymensingh, were soon caught in
the fire of patriotism. Gokhale, presiding over the Benaras
Congress, referred to the partition as ‘a cruel wrong’ and
“a complete illustration of the worst features of the present
system of bureaucratic rule its utter contempt for public opinion,
its arrogant pretensions to superior wisdom, its reckless dis¬
regard of the most cherished feeling of the people , its cool
preference of service interests to those of the governed”.
The ideas of Swadeshi and boycott, born of the popular
feelings in 1905, were not new. The Americans, the Irish
and the Chinese had adopted them before. Swadeshi, as a
purely economic measure for the development of Indian industry,
had been preached by Gopalrao Deshmukh, G. V. Joshi and
M. G. Ranade of Maharashtra and Rajnarain Bose, Nabagopal
Mitra and the Tagore family of Bengal. Similarly, Bholanath
Chandra had recommended boycott in the 1870’s to bring
economic pressure on the British public. Tilak had led
a full-fledged boycott campaign in 1896. It was realized that
Swadeshi and boycott were complementary. One would not
succeed without the other.
These old concepts got a new impetus from the anti-partition
movement. But it also brought to the open differences between
the Moderates and the Extremists. The Bombay Moderates
were against the idea of boycott as a general political
weapon, though they welcomed Swadeshi. Gokhale would leave
 U FREEDOM STRUGGLE

alone the word ‘boycott’ which implied ‘a vindictive desire

to injure another’ and ‘which created unnecessary ill-will against
ourselves’. Surendranath Banerjea considered boycott a special
measure for fighting an immediate injustice. He hoped that
it would cease to be used when the partition was annulled.
Lajpat Rai was more radical. The attention of the British,
he said, would only be forced to the grievances of Indians
by directly threatening their pockets. To Tilak, Pal and
Aurobindo boycott had many implications. It was an economic
pressure on Manchester, a weapon of political agitation against
imperialism and a training in self-sufficiency for the attainment
of Swaraj.
For the time being, the differences were muted. The anti¬
partition agitation grew into the Swadeshi movement which gave
cohesion and vigour to scattered and timid forces. The events in
Bengal shook the belief of many Congress leaders in the justice of
the British people and the efficacy of moderate methods of
constitutional agitation through memorials, meetings and news¬
paper articles. Swadeshi brought into politics new classes of
people without distinction of caste and creed. It taught the
Press to be outspoken, students to rebel, Hindus and Muslims to
co-operate, and people to reflect on their political and economic
condition, to shed fear, to defy authority and to welcome
lathi-charge, prison or even the gallows as honours won in
the service of the country.
The Benaras Congress made an emphatic protest against the
partition of Bengal and the repressive measures adopted by the
Government. It endorsed Swadeshi and boycott for Bengal. It
did not, however, approve of a boycott for the whole of India.
Rut Lajpat Rai asked other provinces to follow the example
of Bengal, and Tilak stressed that the basic goal of Swadeshi,
boycott and national education was the attainment of Swaraj.
The call for boycott and Swadeshi was given at thousands
 THE ERA OF MILITANT NATIONALISM 89

of public meetings all over Bengal and in most of the major

cities and towns of India. It had two aspects. On the one
hand, British wares were burnt at public places and shops
selling them were picketed; on the other, a vigorous drive
was made for the production and sale of Swadeshi goods. The
confectioners vowed against using foreign sugar, washermen
against washing foreign clothes, priests against performing pujas
with foreign materials. Women of the Deccan and Bengal gave
up foreign bangles and glass utensils. Students refused to use
foreign paper. Even doctors and pleaders refused to patronise
dealers in British manufactures. Picketing was combined with
the traditional mode of social ostracism. In some places, such as
Barisal, merchants voluntarily gave up salt and cloth to be
destroyed, for which they invited the wrath of the punitive
police.
On the positive side, the movement gave a stimulus to cottage
industries and even large-scale enterprises of various sorts.
Swadeshi textile mills, match and soap factories, potteries and
tanneries sprouted up everywhere. Acharya P. C. Ray set up
his Bengal Chemicals Factory, which became famous in a very
short time, Gurudev Tagore himself helped in setting up a
Swadeshi store. The entire capital of the Tata Iron and Steel
Company which had refused all Government and foreign help,
was subscribed by Indians within three months. Many zamin-
dars and merchants joined hands with political leaders to
found banks and insurance companies. Even steamship concerns
were floated.
The Swadeshi movement activated new movements in the
realm of culture also. A new type of nationalist poetry, prose
and journalism, surcharged with passion and filled with idealism,
was born. The patriotic songs composed at that time by poets
such as Rabindranath Tagore, Rajani Kanta Sen, and Mukunda
Das were not only topically effective but had a literary quality
 90 FREEDOM STRUGGLE

of permanent value, They are sung in Bengal to this day.

Political journalism which resulted from the Swadeshi and
national movements produced some classic testaments on free¬
dom, liberty and self-reliance.
Tilak carried to Western India the cult of boycott and
Swadeshi. He led a great bon fire of foreign cloth at Poona.
He opened cc -operative stores as the head of the Swadeshi
Wastu Pracharini Sabha. He exhorted the Bombay mill-owners
to supply dhotis at moderate rates. A Swadeshi Weaving Com¬
pany was formed at Poona.
A wave of agitation swept Punjab against the use of foreign
sugar, the import of which had largely reduced domestic
manufacture and cane production. Merchants of Rawalpindi
vowed not to deal in it and the Brahmin priests of Multan
banned all temple offerings containing it. The movement spread
to Hardwar, Delhi, Kangra and Jammu. Syed Haidar Reza
was the moving spirit of Swadeshi in Delhi. Chidambaram
Pillai founded the Swadeshi Steam Navigation Company in
Tuticorin on the east coast of the Madras Province.

THE GROWTH OF MILITANT NATIONALIST MOVEMENT

The spirit of Swadeshi wanted the people to educate them¬

selves on national lines. The scheme of national education
had been formulated by Satish Chandra Mukerjee, the editor
of the Dawn in 1898. The British system of education was
regarded as anti-national. It called for a soulless memorization
of alien knowledge which had no relation to Indian conditions
and culture. The medium of English killed the joy of learning,
discouraged free thought and prevented creative writing.
Rabindranath Tagore had shown the way by founding Santi-
niketan. Curzon’s Indian Universities Act and the Carlyle
 THE ERA OF MILITANT NATIONALISM 91

Circular to District Magistrates prohibiting students’ participa¬

tion in political demonstrations prompted the establishment of
the National Council of Education. The Bengal National College
was founded in 1906 with Aurobindo as Principal. Science
and technology found their due place in its curriculum but
emphasis was placed on things Indian. It aimed to produce Indian
scientists, historians and industrialists but more at stimulat¬
ing patriotism. It was to prepare the cultural soil on which
liberty could thrive. The regional Indian language was to be
the chief medium of instruction. The Bengal Technical Institute
emphasized technical education which had so long been neglected.
Students were sent on scholarships to Japan to learn ad¬
vanced methods. Scores of national schools came up all over
the country.
Tagore preached the cult of self-reliance— atmasakti, the main
plank of which was social and economic regeneration of the
villages. While Aswini Kumar Dutta tried to give it a practical
shape in Barisal by abolition of the caste disabilities of the
Namasudras and other evils like early marriage, the dowry system
and heavy drinking, the Extremists as a whole considered political
independence as more important. “Our nation is like a tree’’,
wrote Tilak in the Kesari, “of which the original trunk was Swa-
rajya and branches were Swadeshi and boycott.” Swadeshi
in fact led to Sw'araj. Hence the movement was to be widened
from an anti-partition agitation into a passive resistance campaign
against all forms of foreign rule. It was to mean not only
boycott of British goods and schools but of law-courts, munici¬
palities and Legislative Councils; in short, all association with
the Government. By striking at the root of British prestige its
enchantment was to be dispelled. Administration was to be
made impossible by an organized refusal to pclp British com¬
merce to exploit and British bureaucracy to oppress the Indian
people.
92 FREEDOM STRUGGLE

Before the Extremists could capture the Congress for an all-

out struggle, they had to bring the peasants and the workers into
the movement. The message of Swadeshi began to reach the
masses, and, because of its direct relevance to their own welfare
and prosperity it made sense to them in a way in'which theoreti¬
cal and abstract political concepts could not. They would have
responded more vigorously perhaps if the Extremists had called
upon the peasants to start a no-rent campaign or the workers to
strike against the capitalists. Although this was not done, the
role of the peasants and the workers was significant. The indigo
ryots of Champaran in Bihar rose in rebellion. Disturbances
took place in Assam and Mymensingh. /
Aswini Kumar Dutta
led the Muslim peasants of Barisal in their agitations. A wave
of strikes broke out in Bengal engulfing the East Indian Railway,
the Clive Jute Mills and the iron works and presses. The port
of Calcutta was paralysed for some ti'me. Tilak made an appeal
to Bombay workers which almost succeeded in resulting in a
general strike after his arrest. Chidambaram Pillai organized a
strike of the Tuticorin Coral Mill.
But the brunt of the fight fell on the youth of the country.
Inspired by the radical press, like the Sandhya, the Jugantar, the
Kesari and the Punjabi, they jumped into the fray. There was
an element of despair in the involvement of students, clerks and
teachers. They formed national volunteer groups in every town
of Bengal. Wearing yellow turbans and red shirts, they marched
out of Government schools, colleges and offices in thousands,
shouting Bandemataram, singing national songs, picketing shops
or selling Swadeshi goods. The schools and colleges, the students
of which took an active part in the movement, lost Government
grants or University affiliation. Their students were debarred
from scholarships and jobs under the Government. A reign of
terror was let loose in Eastern Bengal and Assam. Boys were
fined, expelled and severely beaten. Kingsford, the English
 THE ERA OF MILITANT NATIONALISM 93

Presidency Magistrate of Calcutta, ordered the flogging of a

mere boy of fourteen. A similar lot befell boys as far off as
Amravati or Kohlapur. Repression led to anger and anger to
active participation in terrorist activities.
The Muslims took part in large numbers in the beginning and
women came out of purdah for the first time to join processions
or picketing. Liakat Hossain of Patna was one of the earliest to
suggest boycott. He was an organiser of the East Indian Railway
strike. His fiery Urdu pamphlets roused Muslim sentiments.
Abdul Rasul presided over the Barisal Conference
which was broken up by a police charge. Abdul Halim
Guznavi, a zamindar and a lawyer, started Swadeshi industries
and led the boycott of British leather goods. Abdul Kalam
Azad met Aurobindo and helped to extend revolutionary work
outside Bengal. Though some of the Extremists unwisely aliena¬
ted Muslims through over-enthusiasm and over-emphasis on
Hindu religious symbols, leaders such as Surendranath Banerjea,
Aswini Kumar Dutta and Rabindranath Tagore repeatedly stres¬
sed Hindu-Muslim unity.
The repressive methods of the Government, especially the brutal
assault on the delegates to the Barisal Conference, strengthened
the resolve of the Extremists to carry on the struggle. At the
Calcutta Congress (1906), Dadabhai Naoroji placated extremist
sentiment by declaring that the goal of the Congress was to be
“Self-Government or Swaraj like that of the United Kingdom
or the colonies”. The Extremists interpreted Swaraj in their own
way. The tempo of the movement rose with the deportation
of Lajpat Rai and Ajit Singh of Punjab and the prosecution of
the Sandhya and the Bandemataram for publishing seditious
articles. Brahmabandhab Upadhyaya, editor of the fire-eating
Sandhya died during his trial. Bipin Chandra Pal was in jail.
Tempers did not cool with the release of Lajpat Rai and
talk of reforms. The radical wing of Tilak and Aurobindo decided
94 FREEDOM STRUGGLE

on a showdown when the venue of the Congress was shifted from

Poona to Surat and Tilak’s claim to the presidency was rejected
for that of Rashbehari Bose. The Moderates’ attempt to water
down the resolution on boycott proved to be the last straw. The
Surat Congress broke up in chaos. The nationalists had been
split into two warring camps which weakened the movement.
While Tilak was still for responsive cooperation, Aurobindo
resolved upon aggressive resistance of the Russian terriorist type.
What he meant became clear with the Bomb attacks in Muza-
ffarpur and the discovery of the hideout of the terrorists at
Maniktala. Tilak lent it moral support in the Kesari. “If the
administration was Russianized,” he wrote, “people must take to
Russian methods.” He was sentenced to six years’ transportation
to Mandalay. Paranjpye, editor of the Kal was jailed for
nineteen months. Nine Bengali leaders were deported. Chidam¬
baram Pillai of Madras and Harisarvottama Rao of Andhra were
imprisoned. The Government censored all newspapers, prohibited
mass meetings and started prosecutions against the revolutionary
associations. With Aurobindo’s escape to Pondicherry and his
decision to give up politics and the national movement for reli¬
gion, the open movement came to an end.
The militant nationalists had added a glorious chapter to the
history of the national movement. They had clarified its objec¬
tives, taught people self-confidence and self-reliance and prepared
the social base of the movement to include the lower middle
classes, students, youth and women. New methods of political
organization and new modes of waging political struggles had been
introduced. At the same time certain old weaknesses had per¬
sisted. The mass of the common people, the workers, and the
peasants, were still outside the mainstream of national politics.
In spite of heroic talk of efforts at organizing mass struggles, such
struggles were on the while absent. Passive resistance and non-co-
operation remained mere ideas. The task of finding effective forms
 THE ERA OF MILITANT NATIONALISM 95

of political struggle was still unfulfilled and the country was still
without an effective nationalist organization. Nor was the
boundary of capitalism transcended. Tilak and others still saw
social and economic development as bounded by capitalist enter¬
prise. Lastly, unlike the early moderate nationalists, the militant
nationalists did not realize the full significance of India being
a country with many religions, castes and regions. While their
militant anti-imperialism meant a great leap in national
consolidation, the upper caste and Hindu tinge they imparted to
it weakened the process of national unification and was to contri¬
bute to the bitter harvest of communalism in later years.

THE RISE AND GROWTH OF REVOLUTIONARY TERRORISM

In spite of the vigour and comprehensiveness of the national

movement, the partition of Bengal was not repealed. Instead
the Government became even more repressive than before. These
two facts had an immediate effect on the minds of the impatient
young who were in a rebellious mood. Even prior to the
Bengal partition movement, Tilak, the leader of the extremist
group, had inflamed the tempers of some of his younger followers
sufficiently to lead them to individual acts of terrorism. As early
as 1897, two brothers Damodar and Balkrishna Chapekar of'
Poona, had assassinated two unpopular British officers. Later,
Aurobindo Ghosh had actually planned some revolutionary
activities. The events following the partition of Bengal, accen¬
tuated the revolutionary impulses of many young Indians. They
took to the bomb and the pistol and individual acts of terrorism.
They lost all faith in constitutional agitation, or even in
passive resistance. The British, they felt, must be over-thrown
by force. The Jugantar expressed their credo in an editorial
published on 22 April 1906, after the Barisal Conference was
yo FREEDOM STRUGGLE

broken up by the police, “The remedy lies with the people

themselves. The 30 crores of people inhabiting India must raise
their 60 crores of hands to stop this curse of oppression. Force
must be stopped by force.”
But these young terrorists, however, did not try to plan or
organize a revolution based on violence and involving the whole
country with the masses participating. They preferred to follow
in the footsteps of the Irish terrorists and the Russian Nihilists
and assassinate individual officials, who either because of their
anti-Indian attitude or because of their repressive actions, had
become unpopular. The idea was to strike terror in the hearts of
the rulers and thus to arouse the people politically and ultimately
to drive the British out of India. By its very nature the planning
and organization, the recruitment and training had to be secret
underground activities. Many secret societies were set up, espe¬
cially in Bengal and Maharashtra. Some of them functioned
under the guise of physical culture clubs or associations. Of these
the Anusiian Samitis of Calcutta and Dacca, the Jugantar of
Calcutta and Mitramela started by the Savarkar brothers in
Maharashtra, became the quite well-known. When V. D. Savarkar
went abroad, his elder brother Ganesk started the Abhinava
Bharat Society, which soon had many branches all over Western
India.
Public attention was seriously drawn to revolutionary terror¬
ism by an attempt on the life of Kingsford, now the District
Judge of Muzaffarpur, by two young men, Khudiram Bose and
Prafutla Chaki. The bomb, however, killed two innocent ladies.
Khudiram was caught and Prafulla committed suicide rather than
surrender. A conspiracy case was started at Alipur against
Aurobindo, his brother Barin and others, which was interrupted
by the killing of the approver by the revolutionary terrorists
within the jail compound. The officers in charge of the investi¬
gation and the prosecution were also assassinated one by one.
 THE ERA OF MILITANT NATIONALISM 97

While Aiirobindo was acquitted, four others, including his brother

Barin were deported to the Andamans and several others sen¬
tenced to long terms of imprisonment, Khudiram was hanged
and Satyefi Basu and Kanai Dutta who had killed the approver
met with a similar fate.
In Maharashtra Nasik, Bombay and Poona became centres of
bomb-manufacture. An attempt was made on the Viceroy’s life.
Jackson, District Magistrate of Nasik, was shot at a farewell
party. Even before this, M.L. Dhingra killed Curzon-Wyllie,
an official of the India Office in London as a protest against the
inhuman transportations and hangings of young Indians. He
was executed. “The only lesson,” he wrote before death,
“required in India is to learn how to die and the only way to
teach it is by dying alone.”
In Madras Province the people were excited by the eloquent
speeches of Bipin Chandra Pal. Chidambaram Pillai openly
spoke of absolute independence. His arrest led to a serious riot
in Tuticorin and Tinnevellv in which the police opened fire on a
defiant crowd. Ashe, who had ordered the firing at Tinneveily,
was assassinated by Vanchi Aiyar of the Bharatha Matha Asso¬
ciation. Unable to escape, Vanchi Aiyar shot himself.
The secret organizations of Punjab thrived on repeated famines
and increase of land revenue and irrigation taxes. The settlers
of the canal colonies apprehended restrictions on ownership
rights. The begar system caused irritation. Incidents in Bengal
further inflamed the Punjabis. The 50th anniversary of the
Revolt of 1857 was approaching and speeches frequently called
upon the Sikh regiments to revolt. Assaults on Europeans took
place at Lahore and riots broke out in Rawalpindi following the
prosecution of Lajpat Rai’s Punjabi. Aj it Singh was the heart
and soul of this movement and he was helped by Aga Haider and
Syed Hyder Riza. Deportation of Lajpat Rai and Ajit Singh
quietened things for a while.
98 FREEDOM STRUGGLE

Rashbehari Bose, then a clerk at Dehra Dun, became the link

between Bengal and Punjab. One of the bombs prepared in
Bengal was thrown at the Viceroy Lord Hardinge, as he was
entering Delhi on 23 December 1912, to prove that the repres-
sion-and-reforms policy would not pay. Rashbehari Bose’s
Liberty pamphlets, along with the Jugantar pamphlets, continued
the traditions of the revolutionary press.
Some of the terrorist revolutionaries went abroad and estab¬
lished centres in Europe. They planned to obtain the help of
countries which were not friendly to Britain or to collect arms and
send them to their comrades in India secretly. Shyamji Krishna
Varma, V. D. Savarkar and Lala Hardayal went to London. In
Europe Madame Cama and Ajit Singh were prominent.
The terrorists added a colourful and inspiring chapter to the
history of our freedom movement. Their desperate deeds and
daring plans, cool action and indifference to death won them a
lasting place in the memory of the nation. But with all their
idealism and suffering, they were bound to fail. Acts of individual
violence, however heroic, cannot mobilize the masses, and could
be easily dealt with by an imperialism at its zenith. A series of
conspiracy cases, stern penalties and harsh laws broke their back.
The Newspaper (Incitement to Offences) Act, the Criminal Law
Amendment Act, the Explosive Substances Act and the Indian
Press Act were added to the armoury of the bureaucracy.
Secondly, most of the time the terrorists were working at cross¬
purposes without a common plan and a central leadership.
Thirdly, they had no base among the people. For one thing, be¬
ing secret organizations, they could not take the people into their
confidence. It should also be remembered that the samitis were
filled with men of the middle class intelligentsia out of touch
with the peasants and the workers. The Moderates openly dis¬
owned them and many Extremists were reluctant to accept them.
But no sacrifice so total, can entirely go waste. The country
 THE ERA OF MILITANT NATIONALISM 99

brooded over the memory of the martyrs for ‘they gave us back
the pride of our manhood’.

MORLEY-MINTO REFORMS

For the time being the militant nationalists and the revo¬
lutionaries forced the Government to think of conciliatory
steps. Along with stern measures of repression, the Govern¬
ment tried to encourage Muslim separatism and to separate the
Moderates from the Extremists by constitutional reforms. Minto
Curzon’s successor as Viceroy had decided to play the game of
‘Divide and Rule’. A deputation of Muslim leaders, led by the
Aga Khan, met him at Simla in October 1905 and secured from
him a promise of communal electorates and weightage, When the
Morley-Minto Reforms came at last in 1909, their terms pleased
very few.
An Indian was to be appointed a member of the Governor-
General’s Executive Council and of each of the Provincial Exe¬
cutive Councils. The strength of the Imperial and the Provincial
Legislative Councils was raised but their character remained
unchanged. An official majority was retained at the Centre,
where only 27 members out of a maximum of 60 were to be
elected through a very narrow electorate. Though non-officials
were in a majority in the Provincial Legislatures, the nominated
members usually voted with the officials against the elected.
There were three main types of electorate for the Central Legis¬
lature : (1) general, consisting of non-official members of the
Provincial Legislative Councils; (2) class, such as Muslims and
landholders; and (3) special, like the Universities and Chambers
of Commerce. The greater part of the non-official members
in the Provincial Councils were to be elected by groups of
local bodies, landholders, traders and Universities. Muslims,
 100 FREEDOM STRUGGLE

landlords and European capitalists got reserved seats. Women

had no vote. The Governors and the Governor-General could
exclude any person as politically undesirable.
The powers of the Legislatures were limited. Only the member
who had asked a question could ask a supplementary. Import¬
ant areas of public interest, such as the Army and the Native
States, were excluded from debate and resolution. Discus¬
sion and voting on separate heads of the budget were allowed
but no resolution or voting was permitted on the whole budget.
The Moderates had been willing to compromise but felt
cheated by Morley who denied that the reforms had ever been
meant to introduce a Parliamentary form of government. The
arbitrary powers of disqualification, the narrow franchise, the
official majority at the Centre and the hoax of non-official
majorities in the Provinces, the restriction on debate and the
limited power of influencing the budget disillusioned the Mode¬
rates. They could only act as a sterile opposition. The Congress
as a party disapproved of communal electorates. The majority
of Congressmen lost faith in the Moderate approach. The
Extremists made a fierce political attack on the Moderates
whose influence rapidly waned. The encouragement to Muslim
separatism made the task of organizing a broad-based national
movement uniting all the Indian people irrespective of their
religion, caste or language more difficult. The real purpose
of the reforms was to divide the nationalist ranks and check
the growth of unity among the Indians.
Lord Hardinge tried to placate Indian opinion by annulment
of the partition of Bengal in 1911. Bihar and Orissa were
taken out of Bengal and Assam was made a separate province.
At the same time the capital was transferred to Delhi.
If the annulment of partition somewhat soothed the Bengali
sentiment, the root causes of unrest had not been tackled.
Nor could repression represented by such legislative measures as
 THE ERA OF MILITANT NATIONALISM 101

the Press Act, 1910 or the Special Tribunals under the Criminal
Law Amendment, Act 1908 be expected to check the growth of
militant nationalism.

THE RISE AND GROWTH OF COMMUNALISM

Indian nationalism grew and developed during the second half

of the 19th century. During this early phase political conscious¬
ness among the Muslims lagged behind. Nationalist ideas
spread among the Hindu and Parsi middle- and lower middle
classes. But not to an equal extent among the Muslims belonging
to the same social classes.
Before the British came and gradually set up a foreign govern¬
ment on Indian soil, the Hindu and Muslim masses had on the
whole lived together without antipathy or bitterness though there
had existed certain religious trends which were exclusive and
antagonistic. The divisions of the society were class-wise. There
were the rich and the poor; there were the educated and the
uneducated; there were the rulers and the ruled. Among these
classes and groups there were both Hindus and Muslims. This
was so during the Mughal period also. Even at the time of the
1857 Revolt Hindus and Muslims fought together side by side
and their anger was directed against the common enemy, the
foreign rulers at whose hands all India suffered alike.
After the revolt had been put down, the British were parti¬
cularly hard on the Musilms because they had come to the
conclusion that the revolt was led by the Muslims and that
they were primarily responsible for it. It is estimated that
in Delhi alone 27,000 Muslims were sentenced to death during
the revolt and the short period immediately following. For
years the Muslims w'ere viewed with suspicion by the British.
With the rise of the nationalist movement, however, the
102 FREEDOM STRUGGLE

British attitude changed. During the 1870’s this became more

and more noticeable. As everything else the British did or
attempted to do this change was politically motivated and was
the result of the new tactics the British began following to safe¬
guard their own interests. As the national movement spread and
grew there was the threat that it might unite the people and
pose serious problems for the Empire. A united people cannot
be kept under subjugation for a long time. So in addition to
repression and stringent action to control, and, if possible,
completely dry-up the rising tide of nationalism, the British
decided to do all they could to keep the people disunited and
quarrelling and competing among themselves. They decided to
divide the people in the name of their different religions and to
encourage communal and separatist tendencies in Indian politics.
They claimed to be the champions of the Muslim minority and
went all out to win over to their side Muslims, zamindars,
landlords and the educated middle classes. They also tried to
introduce and build up other types of divisions. They talked
of Bengali domination and tried to encourage provincialism.
They tried to exploit the caste structure of the Indian society
and play the non-Brahmins against the Brahmins and the
lower castes against the higher castes. By helping the demand
to replace Urdu by Hindi in law courts they promoted social
and communal bitterness among the Hindus and Muslims of
U.P. and Bihar. Thus even legitimate demands of different
sections of Indian society and the problems of democratization
of the Indian society were exploited to create disharmony among
Indians. The Indian social situation was quite complex. In
many internal social and cultural questions rights and wrongs
were inextricably mixed and had to be carefully and patiently
separated. This complexity was utilized by the alien rulers for
their own purposes.
The rise of Muslim communalism is associated with the
 THE ERA OF MILITANT NATIONALISM 103

name of Sayyid Ahmed Khan. He began as a great educationist

and social reformer. He tried to bring the teaching of the Quran
in line with modern ideas and emphasized the value of service.
His attitude in the matter led to a sharp conflict between him
and leaders of orthodox Islam. During this stage, Sayyid Ahmed
believed in the close cooperation of the Hindus and the Muslims.
For the establishment of the Mohamedan Anglo-Oriental College
at Aligarh, he received donations from both Hindus and Muslims.
However, with the rise of the Indian National Congress, Sayyid
Ahmed became apprehensive about the position of the Muslims,
particularly of the Muslim zamindars many of whom had sup¬
ported him. The British also pulled strings behind the scenes.
Sayyid Ahmed Khan now declared that the interests of Hindus
and Muslims were different and even opposite. He became a full-
fledged loyalist and, when the Indian Congress was founded in
1885, he opposed it and organized, along with Raja Shiva Prasad
of Benares, a counter-movement swearing loyalty to the British.
He told his followers that if the British withdrew, the Hindu
majority would dominate over and be unfair to the Muslim
minority. He advised the Muslims not to join the Indian National
Congress, though other Muslims leaders such as Badruddin
Tyabji, appealed to them to join the new national organization.
The views of Muslim leaders such as Sayyid Ahmed Khan were
contrary to facts, and unscientific and irrational. Though Hindus
and Muslims believed in their own different religions, they had
common economic and political interests. Even socially and
culturally, both the masses and the upper classes of Hindus and
Muslims had come to have common ways of life. A Bengali
Muslim and a Bengali Hindu, for example, had much more in
common than a Bengali Muslim and a Punjabi Muslim. What
is more important Hindus and Muslims were oppressed and
exploited alike by the rulers. Sayyid Ahmed Khan had himself
said in 1884 :
104 FREEDOM STRUGGLE

Do you not inhabit the same land ? Are you not burned
and buried on the same soil ? Do you not tread the same
ground and live upon the same soil ? Remember that the
words Hindus and Mohammedan are only meant for religious
distinction; otherwise all persons, whether Hindu or Moham¬
medan, even the Christians, who reside in this country, are
all in this particular respect belonging to one and the same
nation. Then all these different sects can be described as
one nation, they must each and all unite for the good of
the country which is common to all.

It is, therefore, worth examining how the new way of thinking

along communal lines grew among large sections of the Muslims.
This was to some extent due to the relative backwardness of
Muslims in education and trade and industry. Muslim upper
classes consisted mostly of zamindars and aristocrats. Because
the upper class Muslims during the first 70 years of the 19th
century were very anti-British, conservative and hostile to
modern education, the number of educated Muslims in this
country remained very small. Consequently, modern Western
thought with its emphasis on science, democracy, and national¬
ism did not spread among Muslim intellectuals, who remained
traditionally backward. Later, as a result of the efforts of
Sayyid Ahmed Khan, Nawab Abdul Latif, Badruddin Tyabji
and others, modern education spread among Muslims. But the
proportion of the educated was far lower among Muslims than
among Hindus, Parsees, or Christians. Similarly, the Muslims
had also taken little part in the growth of trade and industry.
The small number of educated persons and men of trade industry
among the Muslims enabled the reactionary big landlords to
maintain their influence over the Muslim masses. As we have
seen earlier, landlords and zamindars, whether Hindu or Muslim,
supported British rule out of self-interest. But, among the
N.C.O. Volunteers parading in the streets of Calcutta. 1921

Bonfire of foreign cloth in Bombay

''% -r'TOw.vAv,'*
Mohammad Ali C. Vijayaraghavachariar

M. A. Ansari Sarojini Naidu

 C. R. Dass Motilal Nehru

Madan Mohan Malaviya Mohammed Ali Jinnah

Surya Sen Bhagat Singh

Cellular Jail, Port Blair

 THE ERA OF Mil IT A NT NATIONALISM 105

Hindus, the modern intellectuals and the rising commercial and

industrialist class had/^>ushed out the landlords from leadership.
Unfortunately, the ^posite remained the case with the Muslims.
The educational backwardness of the Muslims had another
harmful consequence. Since modern education was essential for
entry into Government service or the professions, the Muslims
had also lagged behind the non-Muslims in this respect. More¬
over, the Government had consciously discriminated against
the Muslims^ after 1858, holding them largely responsible for the
Revolt of 1857. When modern education did spread among the
Muslims the educated Muslim found few opportunities in business
or the professions. He inevitably looked for Government employ¬
ment. And, in any case, India being a backward colony, there
were very few opportunities of employment for its people. In
these circumstances, it was easy for the British officials and the
loyalist Muslim leaders to incite the educated Muslims against
the educated Hindus. Sayyid Ahmed Khan and others raised
the demand for special treatment for the Muslims in the matter
of Government service. They declared that if the educated
Muslims remained loyal to the British, the latter would reward
them with Government jobs and other special favours. Spine
loyalist Hindus and Parsees too tried to argue in this manner,
but they remained a small minority. The result was that while
the country as a whole, independent and nationalist lawyers,
journalists, students, merchants and industrialists were becom¬
ing political leaders, among the Muslims loyalist landlords and
retired Government servant still influenced political, Opinion.
Bombay was the only province where the Muslims ha 4 taken to
commerce and education quite early; and there the Nationalist
Congress included in its ranks such brilliant Muslims as Badrud-
din Tyabji, R. M. Sayani, A. Bhimji, and the young barrister
Mohammed Ali Jinnah. Moreover, in Bengal, U.P. and the
Punjab also the spread of modern ideas created nationalist wings
106 FREEDOM STRUGGLE

among Muslims breaking the monopoly of the loyalist elements

in the leadership. We can sum up this aspect of the problem
with a quotation from Jawaharlal Nehru’s The Discovery of
India :

There has been a difference of a generation or more in the

development of the Hindu and Muslim middle classes, and
that difference continues to show itself in many directions,
political, economic and other. It is this lag which produces a
psychology of' fear among the Muslims.

There was one other important reason for the growth of

a communal way of thinking during the period. Indian history
had been presented by British historians with a special slant
and, later, their Indian counterparts unfortunately followed in
their footsteps, and, wrote and taught in such a way as to arouse
and foster communal feelings. For example, the ancient period
was identified as the Hindu period and the medieval period as the
Muslim period. During the medieval period Turk, Afghan and
Mughal dynasties ruled. Instead of explaining the nature of their
rule, they were all bundled together as Muslims and the
period itself was referred to as the Muslim period. To talk
of Muslim rule implied that all rulers were Muslims and all
Hindus were the ruled. The actual fact was that the rulers,
nobles, chiefs, and zamindars, whether Hindu or Muslim, treated
the masses, both Hindu and Muslim, alike, that is, with the
same contempt and disregard, as inferior creatures to be
made use of for their own benefit. The Muslim masses were
as poor and as oppressed by the taxes as the Hindu masses. These
historians did not realize that politics in India during the
ancient and medieval periods was like politics anywhere else, and
followed the dictates of the economic and political interests of
the rulers and seldom any religious considerations. No doubt,
 THE ERA OF MILITANT NATIONALISM 107

both the rulers and the rebels often used religion as an

outer colouring to disguise their real material interests and
ambitions. But this does not mean that the objectives
themselves were religious or communal. Again, the, British
and communal historians did not lay stress on the composite
culture of India. The cultural pattern of India was, undoubtedly,
diverse, but, there was a common thread running through,
and, what is more important, the diversity was primarily
class-wise and region-wise. By introducing the false concept
of distinct and separate Hindu and Muslim cultures the com¬
munal approach to history came to generate divisive tendencies.
The religious reforms movements also had a similar impact.
These movements made an important contribution as they
opposed irrational and obscurantist thinking, spread rational and
humanistic ideas, weeded out many of the corrupting elements
from the 19th century religious beliefs and practices and
fostered greater self-respect among the Indian people. At the
same time many of them tended to divide Hindus, Muslims,
Sikhs and Parsees as also high caste Hindus from low caste
Hindus. Any over-emphasis on religion in a country of many
religions was bound to have a divisive effect. Moreover, the
reforms put a one-sided emphasis on the religious and philoso¬
phical aspects of cultural heritage. These aspects were not a
common heritage of all people. On the other hand, art and
architecture literature, music, science and technology in which all
sections of the people had played an equal role were not suffi¬
ciently emphasized. In addition, the Hindu reforms invariably
confined their praise of the Indian past to its ancient period.
Even a broad-minded man such as Swami Vivekananda talked
of the Indian spirit or India’s past achievements in this sense
alone. Similarly, many of the Muslim reformers turned to the
history of West Asia for their traditions and moments of pride.
Thus, the reformers’ activities tended to create the notion of two
 108 FREEDOM STRUGGLE

separate peoples. Moreover, some of the religious reform

movements did not confine their activities to positive? aspects
of reform. They also started crusades against other religions,
thus contributing to the growth of communal ism in the 20th
century.
The communal view of politics was unscientific and irrational
but it played upon the fears from which a minority tends to
suffer. Under such circumstances it is the duty of the religious
majority to convince the minority by its attitude and behaviour
that its numbers would not be used to injure the minority.
They must not only convince the members of the minority
community that their religion and social and cultural traits
will be safe, but make them realize that decisions concerning
economic and political matters will be taken purely on secular
considerations and religion will not be a factor in arriving
at them. This is exactly what the early nationalists did. They
tried to unite the people and weld them into a nation on the
basis of their common interests— national, economic and political.
They gave assurances that there would be no interference with
the religious and social life of the people. The Indian National
Congress even went to the extent of agreeing in 1889 that no
proposal would be endorsed which was considered harmful to the
Muslims by a majority of the Muslim delegates. In other words,
the early nationalists tried to modernize the political outlook of
the people by teaching that politics should not be based on
religion and community.
Unfortunately, some of the later leaders did not strictly con¬
form to these wise postulates of secular politics. The militant
nationalists gave a great fillip to the national movement and
made the people surge forward with energy and drive, but some
of their actions led to the resurgence of communalism and was
a step back in respect of the growth of "national unity. Their
propaganda and publicity were effective in arousing the people but
 THE ERA OF MILITANT NATIONALISM 109

they did have a considerable religious flavour. They emphasized

the ancient Indian heritage to the exclusion of the medieval
Indian culture. They tended to identify the Indian nation with
the Hindus and Indian culture with Hindu religion and what they
considered to be the Aryan heritage. For example, the Shivaji
and Ganapati festivals organized by Tilak, the semi-mystical
approach of Aurobindo to India as mother and nationalism
as a religion, the oaths the terrorists took before Goddess
Kali, purifactory baths in the Ganga for the auspicious
inauguration of the anti-partition campaign —these were not
likely to appeal to all Indians everywhere. They had a strong
religious bias and, an upper caste Hindu bias at that. While
ordinary secular-minded Indians might not have liked this
religious aura collecting around a purely political movement,
some Muslims and followers of other religions, no doubt, found
the imagery and the ritual repugnant to their faith and
susceptibilities. Similarly, an uncritical praise of the ancient
period and religion was not acceptable to the lower caste Indians
who had for centuries suffered under the most destructive caste
oppression which had developed precisely during the ancient
period. Again, if one tried to make a national hero out of Shivaji
and Pratap, one automatically implied that Mughal rulers were
anti-national ‘foreigners’. But, in fact, the latter were as much
Indians as the former. Moreover, all of them belonged to the
ruling classes. Their mutual struggles had to be viewed as
political struggles in their particular historical settings. To view
Pratap and Shivaji as ‘national’ heroes and Akbar and Aurangzeb
as ‘foreigners’ was to project into past history current communal
ways of thought. This was both bad history and a blow to
national unity.
This does not, of course, mean that the militant nationalists
were anti-Muslim or even mainly communal-minded. On the
contrary, many of them, especially Tilak, were all for Hindu-
110 FREEDOM STRUGGLE

Muslim unity. Most of them were modern and progressive in

their thinking. Even the terrorists were in practice inspired by
similar terrorists in the European countries, who believed that
economic redress and political freedom could be achieved only
through a violent revolution. But the fact remains that there
was a certain Hindu tinge in the political work and ideas of the
militant nationalists. Their ultimate objectives might have been
secular but their formal behaviour was not British and pro-British
propagandists cleverly took advantage of this fact. This resulted
in a large number of educated Muslims remaining aloof from or
turning hostile to the national movement, thus falling an easy
prey to a separatist outlook. Even so, quite a large number of
advanced Muslim intellectuals such as the barrister Abdul Rasul
and Hasrat Mohani joined kthe Swadeshi movement and
Mohammed Ali Jinnah became one of the leading younger
leaders of the National Congress.
In a poor, backward country which was being actively under¬
developed under colonial domination, employment opportunities
were limited especially to the educated classes. There was, there¬
fore, stiff competition for the limited number of available jobs in
the country at that time. The far-sighted Indians worked for the
economic and political uplift of the country. But the situation
was also exploited by vested interests, both Indian and British,
to arouse communal, religious, as also caste and regional feelings.
There was a clamour for reservation of seats and jobs for all
sorts and kinds of sections and groups. Narrow-minded, short¬
sighted Muslims and Hindus alike began talking about their own
nationalisms, as though nationalism was divisible and could be
of many sectarian kinds and economic welfare could be promoted
other than by a common struggle against imperialism and the
vested interests.
A concrete shape and setting to the communal theory was given
in 1906 when the All-India Muslim League was set up under the
 THE ERA OF MILITANT NATIONALISM ill

leadership of the Aga Khan, Nstw&b Salimullah of Dacca and

Nawab Mohsin-ul-Mulk. The self-interest of one section of
educated Muslims and the reactionary vested interests of the
Muslim zamindars and upper classes, was responsible for this
retrograde step. The League supported the partition of Bengal
and demanded special safeguards and separate electorates.
The British were waiting for just such an opportunity. They
made full use of it and announced that they would protect the
‘special interests’ of the Muslims. The League loyally undertook
to oppose every national and democratic demand of the Congress.
In Bengal, the loyalist League leaders were big zamindars who
were, moreover,* outsiders in Bengal; they were not Bengali*.
Consequently, they had little sympathy for the Bengali Muslim
tenants.
Almost from the beginning the fundamental falseness of the
League claim that the interests of the Muslims were different and
divergent from those of the rest of the nation, was obvious to a
large section of the educated and modern Muslim young men.
They were attracted by radical, nationalist ideas and they refuted
the notion that the League represented the view's and interests
of all Muslims. The Ahrar movement which was both national
and militant, was started at about this time by leaders such as
Maulana Mohamad Ali, Hakim Ajmal Khan and Mazhar-ul-
Haq. Similarly, a section of the traditional Muslim scholars,
roused by patriotism, began participating in national politics
eschewing communal ways of thinking. The most prominent
among these was Maulana Abul Kalam Azad.
During the first few years of the second decade of the present
century Turkey had to fight wars against Italy first, and, later,
with the Balkan powers. Turkey at that time was the strongest
Muslim power. Its empire included most of the places holy to
Muslims. Till 1857, the Indian Mualims had recognized the
Mughal emperor as Imam, i.e. both political and religious head.
112 FREEDOM STRUGGLE

After the deposition of the Mughal emperor and the growing

pressure of Russia upon the Ottoman empire the British decided
to safeguard Turkey and emerge as the champions of the Muslims.
They, therefore, encouraged the growth of a pan-Islamic move¬
ment which implied accepting the Sultan of Turkey as the Caliph
of ail the Muslims. When the safety and welfare of Turkey were
threatened by the British during the First World War, Indians
reacted sharply. Anti-British and anti-imperialist sentiments
grew rapidly among the Muslims. As a direct result of this the
radical young Muslims in India joined the nationalist ranks which
were also anti-imperialist. For several years, between 1912 and
1924, the loyalist Muslim Leaguers were completely stripped of
all influence by nationalist young Muslims.
But there was a negative side to these developments. The
agitation on the khilafat question deflected the tninking of the
educated, militant, nationalist Muslims from a radical secular
approach tc politics. Instead of taking up the fight against British
imperialism on the ground that it undermined the economic and
political interests of the people, they took it up because the Cali¬
phate and the holy places in the Ottoman empire were endangered.
Moreover, the heroes and myths and cultural traditions they
appealed to belonged not to ancient or medieval Indian history
but to West Asian history. Thus, even their political appeal was
based on religious sentiments. In the long run, this approach too
proved detrimental to the growth of nationalism, because it did
not promote among the Muslim masses a scientific and secular
attitude to political and economic questions.
While no organized Hindu communal movement and organiza¬
tions opposing the Indian National Congress emerged during the
period Hindu communal ideas were widespread. One reason why
no separate Hindu communal organization came into being was
that the Hindu communal trend found accommodation within the
broad nationalist trend unlike the Muslim communal trend which
 THE ERA OF MILITANT NATIONALISM 113

had to function outside the nationalist stream. Some leaders

began talking about Hindu nationalism, about Muslims as
‘foreigners’, about safeguarding Hindu interests, even about a
‘Hindu’ share of seats in the legislatures and the services. Thus,
Muslim and Hindu communalism inter-acted and provided
sustenance to each other.

THE YEARS OF THE FIRST WORLD WAR

The declaration of war by Great Britain against Germany in

1914 automatically drew India into its vortex. The Indians had
not been consulted either before the declaration of war or before
the Government committed the Indian people and Indian
resources to fighting the war primarily for British imperial inte¬
rests. The contribution of India, although not voluntary, was
considerable. More than one million Indians were sent to
different theatres of war from France to China. Ore in ten
became a casualty. The total war expenditure ran to more then
£127 million. India’s national debt increased by 30 per cent
and a good part of it was forced on the people.

EARLY NATIONALIST RESPONSE

At the beginning Indian leaders declared their sympathy and

support for Britain. It would be wrong to think, however, that
a genuine popular feeling in Britain’s favour existed. The Mode¬
rates and the Extremists alike learnt with satisfaction of German
victories. The Congress made no secret of the fact that it
demanded political reform as a price for Indian loyalty. Gandhiji
actively helped recruitment to qualify for Swaraj through ‘the
good offices of the statesmen of the Empire’. In 1918 he was to
114 FREEDOM STRUGGLE

say “...nothing less than a definite vision of the Home Rule to

be realized in the shortest possible time will satisfy the Indian
people.”
But many were misled by the high sounding war aims pro¬
claimed by the Allies. Lloyd George said, “The Allies are fighting
for nothing but freedom.” President Wilson’s ‘fourteen points’
seemed to reinforce these noble ideals. It is no wonder, therefore,
that most Indians failed to see the real character of the war as a
struggle among the imperialist powers for colonies and markets.
Early enthusiasm, however, flagged for want of an indication
that Indian cooperation would be recognized in reforms.
Surendranath Banerjea predicted that the Government’s long
delay in announcing reforms would undermine the Moderates’
influence.
Two factors brought the Moderates and tae Extremists together
—the death of Pherozeshah Mehta and G. K. Gokhale, and, the
return of Ttlak from Mandalay. The Bombay Congress (1915)
practically threw open membership to the Extremists at the sug¬
gestion of Mrs Annie Besant. Her deep reverence for Indian
culture, devotion to social and educational projects and com¬
mitment to full self-government within the British Common¬
wealth had already made her a political leader of importance.
Inspired by the Irish rebellion, she started the Home Rule League
in September 1916. She utilized the resources of the Theosophi-
cal Society and the tactics of the Irish nationalists to found,
within a few days, branches of the League all over the country.
Tilak. joined the fray with his own Home Rule League. His
simple speeches and hard-hitting articles once again emphasized
patriotism, fearlessness and sacrifice. He limited his field of
activities to Maharashtra and the Central Province, while Mrs
Besant, ably supported by her many followers, organized the
movement in the rest of the country. The war meant heavy taxes,
soaring prices and increasing miseries for the poorer classes.
 THE EftA OF MILITANT NATIONALISM 115

They responded to the Home Rule appeal. So did & great number
of women.

THE REVOLUTIONARY MOVEMENT AT HOME AND ABROAD

While the stimulus of war was thus revitalizing the Congress,

the revolutionaries decided to exploit the situation with the help
of Germany. Repressive measures of the Government had brought
disarray in their ranks. But from 1912 they were re-grouping for
a second trial of strength. The Indian revolutionaries abroad
added a new dimension to our struggle for freedom. They were
not just individuals who had fled abroad to escape prison or
death. Most of them were sent with a plan to organize centres
in Europe, U.S.A., the Middle East and South-East Asia,
where the cause of India might be propagated and arms and
money collected to further revolution at home. They recruited
fresh cadres from Indian students, businessmen and emigrant
labour. They gathered the support of progressive or socialist
movements wherever they went. With the outbreak of war they
could try to establish contact with the Indian army units stationed
abroad, prisoners of war and others hostile to British rule. In
collaboration with Germany they planned to supply the Indian
revolutionary organizations with recruits, funds and arms. They
never meant to be tools in German hands.
After Savarkar’s arrest and abortive attempt to escape, the
London revolution ariesdispersed. Virendranath Chattopadhyaya
went to Paris and then to Germany. A committee of the resident
Indians was formed in Berlin with German Foreign Office sub¬
sidy, which later came to be known as the Indian Independence
Committee. Virendranath became its secretary. It sent missions
to Baghdad, Istanbul, Persia and Kabul to work among Indian
army units and Indian prisoners of war. Raja Mahendra Pratap
 116 FREEDOM STRUGGLE

was sent to Kabul with Maulana Barkataujlah and Maulana

Obeidullah Sindhi, where they formed a Provisional Government
of India.
Meanwhile, Hardayal arrived in the United States where
Taraknath Das and Sohan Singh Bhakna had already been
spreading a revolutionary message among the Indian emigrants
settled on the west coast and feeling rather embittered about
the strict American immigration laws. They organized a party
called Ghadr, taking the name of a weekly paper published from
1 November 1913, in commemoration of the uprising of 1857. Its
programme included work among troops, assassination of
officials, publication of revolutionary, anti-imperialist literature
and procurement of arms. San Francisco became its headquarters
and branches were set up all along the U.S. coast and the Far
East, The idea was to bring about a simultaneous revolt in
all the British colonies. “Wanted brave soldiers,” the Ghadr
advertised, “to stir up Ghadr in India. Pay — death; Price —
martyrdom; Pension — liberty; Field of battle — India.”
The Komagatamaru incident helped the activities of the Ghadr
Party. This was a ship chartered to carry emigrants to Canada.
When it arrived, the passengers were forced to return after two
months of privation and uncertainty. When the Komagatamaru
at last dropped anchor at Calcutta harbour, the passengers^efused
to board the train reserved for them by the Government. A riot
ensued in which 20 to 40 were killed and many injured. The
Toshamaru met with a similar fate. The Punjabis abroad, inflamed
by this news, hastened back to India and joined the victims to
launch a vigorous armed campaign against British rule. Unable
to secure German arms, they contacted the Bengal revolutionaries,
among whom new leaders had emerged among the Bengal
terrorists such as Jatindra Nath Mukherjee, Rashbehari Bose and
Narendra Nath Bhattacharya. Seduction of Indian troops,
simultaneous attacks on police lines and treasuries from Peshawar
 THE ERA OF MILITANT NATIONALISM 117

to Chittagong and an ultimate declaration of war with German

arms were the major features of the plan. Unfortunately, however,
treachery foiled the rising fixed for 21 February 1915. V. G.
Pingle, an important member of the conspiracy, was arrested in
the Cavalry Lines at Meerut in possession of bombs. Rebellious
regiments were disbanded. Many of the conspirators were
executed or transported to the Andamans. Rashbehari Bose
escaped to Japan.
Jatin Mukherjee avoided isolated acts of assassination for a
more ambitious scheme. A big haul of Mauser pistols, consigned
to Rodda and Company, came in handy. A most memorable
battle took place on the banks of the Buribalam river at Balasore
between five Bengali terrorists waiting to unload German arms
and a battalion of armed police in which Jatindra Nath died of
wounds he received while fighting heroically from a trench.
The revolutionary movements during the war failed because of
a lack of co-ordination among the Indian leaders and a lack
of communication between the Indian revolutionaries, the Berlin
Committee and the Ghadr Party. The Government, suspicious
from the beginning, persuaded the United States authorities to
take steps to foil shipment of arms. Any activities in America
were made impossible after she joined the Allies in the war
against Germany. There was a trial of the Ghadr leaders in
San Francisco, which wiped out all chances of any further
revolutionary activities based in the United States.

The Lucknow Pact

While circumstances were forcing the Government to see things

from a new angle, a way was shown by the Lucknow Pact
between the Congress and the Muslim League in 1916. The
Lucknow Congress was the first united Congress since 1908.
118 FREEDOM STRUGGLE

The Home Rule agitation had infused a fighting spirit into

it. An understanding was achieved with the Muslim leaders
such as Maulana Azad, Ansari and Ajmal Khan. So long led
by feudal elements, the League was outgrowing the limited
political outlook of the Aligarh School and" taking a more
militant attitude. With the suppression of Azad’s Al-Hilal and
Mohammad Ali’s Commrade and their subsequent internment
the nationalists among the Muslim leaders were ready for
cooperation with the Congress. The result was the Lucknow
Pact.
Tilak played an important roie in bringing the Congress and
the Muslim League together, because he realized that success
could be achieved only through Hindu-Muslim unity. A body
of extremists would be less effective than a united nationalist
organization. In his eagerness to achieve unity he even accepted
the principle of separate electorates and weightage to the Muslim
minority. The number of Muslim members in legislatures was
specifically laid down province by province. It was to be one-
third in the Imperial Legislative Council. No legislature was to
proceed with any measure if three-fourths of the members
belonging to a religion opposed it. In return, the Congress
and the League jointly demanded abolition of the Indian Council,
election of four-fifths of the Central and the Provincial Legisla¬
tive Council members, a promise of non-interference in pro¬
vincial matters and full control over the Central Government,
except defence and foreign policy. The Lucknow Pact was
an important step forward in achieving Hindu-Muslim unity.
But, as Gandhiji said, it was a pact for power between the educat¬
ed and rich Hindus and the educated and rich Muslims. It
did not involve the Hindu and Muslim masses. It still emphasiz¬
ed the false notion of the separate interests of Hindus and
Muslims, and , therefore, the separate political existence of
Hindus and Muslims. It was based on the pernicious and wrong
 THE ERA OF MILITANT NATIONALISM 119

action that Hindus and Muslims formed separate communities.

It was not very conducive to the growth of secularism and
it kept the door open for future communal ism. A compromise
on the fundamental basis of Indian unity, it was bound to
, lead to more and more concessions till the whole structure
gave way.
For the time being, however, the Government was confronted
with a definite united demand by two major political parties
in the country. It further faced the agitation of the Home
Rule League which had attracted the younger generation of
leaders. There were also the revolutionary movements at home
and abroad to reckon with. Once again the Government res¬
ponded with a dual policy of reforms and repression. While the
Viceroy Chelmsford pressed the Secretary of State for a declara¬
tion on reforms, the Home Member talked of setting up a dam
to stem the new flood. The Home Rule League was suppressed.
Mrs Besant was arrested. The Congress protested to the Viceroy
and elected Mrs Besant as the President of the Calcutta Congress
(1917). Although the Congress shelved the suggestion for passive
resistance put up at Madras, it was completely identified with the
Home Rule demand. It demanded full self-government at an
early date and the Congress-League scheme as the first stage of
reforms.

Official Response : Repression a^d Promise of Reform

The response of the Government was announced by Montagu,

the Secretary of State, in Parliament on 20 August 1917.
The measures he suggested came to (3 late and did not go far
enough. Of course, Montagu laid down for the first time a
goal for Indian reforms, realization of responsible govern¬
ment in India. But it was to be gradually progressive and
 120 FREEDOM STRUGGLE

effected through increasing association of Indians in every

branch of administration and careful development of self-govern¬
ing institutions. This implied successive stages of reforms, with
the British Government as the judge of the time and measure
of each advance. Their decision again would be based on
the quantum and nature of Indian cooperation and British assess¬
ment of the Indians5 capacity for discharging responsibilities.
In practice, effective power was to be wielded by the British
in British interests. The reforms were a mere sop thrown to
placate the moderate nationalist opinion and to separate them
from the militant nationalists.
While making promises of reform the Government prepared to
suppress the forces ot anti-imperialist struggle. The Criminal
Law Amendment Act made conspiracy a criminal offence and
enabled Government to institute summary trials by special
tribunals. People were interned on mere suspicion for an
indefinite period and detenus were cruelly treaxed. Promise of
reforms to placate nationalist demands and mislead the national¬
ist movement; repression to maintain the firm grip of the rulers
over the ruled. Imperialism was to be maintained at all costs by
many kinds of measures.
 IV THE STRUGGLE FOR SWARAJ

GATHERING STORM : THE IMPACT OF THE WAR YEARS

During the war years Indian nationalism had matured. The

movement had collected momentum and had in a sense become
more forceful,, The contribution made by India to the war
effort had been appreciated to some extent by the British
Government and there was reason to hope that India w'ould be
rewarded with some major reforms, if not complete self-govern¬
ment. The mood of the nationalists was one of expectancy,
but if their hopes were belied they were prepared to fight back.
There was subdued optimism on the economic front also.
During the war foreign imports had* almost ceased. But Britains’
wartime needs had increased. Some of these needs had to be met
by India through increased production. Consequently, Indian
trade and industry had prospered to a certain extent. It had
given India an idea of wbat progress could be achieved if given
the incentive and the opportunity. It had given the Indian
industrialists a taste of high profits and prosperity. An Industrial
Commission was set up in 1916 which had recommended that the
Government play a more active part in industrial development
and'to build up an adequate administrative machinery to assist
progress forward. Indian capitalists looked forward to major
changes in industrial policy.
Alongside these hopes and expectations were fears and
doubts. Prices of manufactures had risen sharply but not those
of agricultural produce. Enormous profits were made in steel
122 FRBBOOM STRUGGLE

and cotton piece goods, and a larger scope for employment of

Indians was created, but these benefits did not actually reach
the masses. The Indian Muritious Board initiated measures to
purchase stores in India. The Indian capitalists, however,
could not take full advantage of the situation as India had few
machine-making industries. Exports suffered by wartime con¬
trols and lack of shipping. Production trailed off towards the
end of the war. Closures and unemployment followed. Prices
of daily necessities had risen very high in the meantime. Bet¬
ween 1914 and 1920 the index of wholesale prices in Calcutta
rose by over 100 per cent and prices of food-grains rose by
93 per cent. The situation was not far different in other areas.
All these caused acute distress to the common people. The
peasantry groaned under heavy rents and taxes. There was
general anxiety about the future. The industrialists wanted
protection and state aid. Was a victorious Britain likely to
concede the demands of Indian economy ?
Immediately the war ended, the economic situation took a turn
for the worse. First, prices shot up. Foreign goods once again
began to be imported, and foreign capital began to be invested
in a large-scale. A growing reduction of economic activity
followed. Indian industries faced heavy losses and even closure.
In the political field also there was much disillusionment.
During the war years nationalism had received a great fillip in
all the countries of Asia and Africa. To win popular support
Britain, the United States, France, Italy and Japan had all
spoken about the war to defend democracy and pledged them¬
selves to stand by the right of self-determination of all countries
and peoples. After the war, however, they did not appear
willing to put an end to colonialism.
The peace treaties of 1919 belied the war aims of the Allies and
‘the fourteen points’ of President Wilson. There was a certain
amount of sympathy for the Germans who had tried to help
 THE STRUGGLE FOR SWARAJ 123

the revolutionary movement in India. The Treaty of Versailles

appeared to proclaim a rule of revenge. The distribution of
the colonies of the defeated powers among the victors, the denial
of self-determination to Central European peoples, the heavy
burden of reparations imposed on Germany and, finally, the
treatment of the Turkish, empire, shocked Indians. The Allies
decided to dismember the Ottoman Empire in the face of Lloyed
George’s wartime promise. The landing of the Greeks and the
Italians in Turkey with Allied support seemed to herald the
destruction of the Ottoman empire and the Caliphate. The
Caliph was looked upon by large sections of Muslims as their
religious head. They felt that any weakening of the Caliph’s
position would adversely affect the position of Muslims in other
countries which were under imperialist domination. The result
was the birth of the Khilafat Movement.
While the Home Rule agitation and the Khilafat Movement
were beginning to stir India, revolution broke out in Tsarist
Russia in November 1917, and the Bolsheviks established the
first socialist state in the world. While the Allies did the
opposite of what they had preached, Soviet Russia created
a great impression by unilaterally renouncing its imperialist
rights in Asia. The Tsarist colonies were granted self-determi¬
nation. The Asian nationalities in the U.S.S.R. were given equal
status. The Revolution underlined the immense strength and
vitality of the common people, who successfully withstood the
intervention of the imperialist states and the strains of civil
war. It put heart into the colonial peoples everywhere. The people
in far-off villages heard of it from soldiers returning from the
war. Lenin’s decrees distributing land among the landless excited
the intelligentsia. The Delhi Congress asked not only for India’s
right to self-determination but for the declaration of the rights
of the people of India.
The proclamation of the Irish Republic by the Sinn Fein party
124 FREEDOM STRUGGLE

gave a further stimulus. The Irish guerillas of Michael Collins

continued a desperate fight against the British. Repressive
measures of the latter reminded Indians of the Rowlatt Bills.
In Egypt the Nationalist Party of Zaghlul Pasha had grown
tremendously during the war. The deportation of Zaghlul in
1919 was followed by a serious insurrection which the British
army savagely put down. Independence of Egypt was declared
in March 1920. Almost at the same time Mustafa Kemai Pasha
of Turkey was declaring war against the Allied occupation and
setting up a provisional government. When the Allies allowed
Japan to keep Shantung, which had been tilt then a German
concession, there was violent resentment in China. The May
Fourth Movement, in which intellectuals and student played an
important part, organized a boycott of Japanese goods. The
Chinese refused to sign the Treaty of Versailles.
While these new forces underlined the emergence of new chal¬
lenges and the inauguration of new mass-based national struggles
the official policy proved to be halting. Montagu's declaration of
20 August 1917 was followed by the release of the Home Rule
prisoners the removal of the racial bar to enter the commis¬
sioned ranks in the army and a personal visit of the Secretary
of State to India. Montagu succeeded in mollifying the Moderates
but failed to win over the Extremists.
The actual scheme of reforms fell far short of the nationalists’
demands. Its main feature was Diarcny. a kind of double
government in the provinces. While the charge of the less import¬
ant departments, like education and sanitation, wouid be
‘transferred’ to Ministers chosen from the elected members
of the Provincial Legislature, the crucial ones, like finance,
police and general adminstration, were “reserved” for the
members of the Executive Council, that is, the bureaucracy, res¬
ponsible only to the Government of India and Parliament. The
Governor was to preside over both the wings of the Executive
 THE STRUGGLE FOR SWARAJ 125

but not always together. While the Ministers would be

responsible to the Legislative Council for their subjects, the
Governor might not accept their advice at all. The character
of the Central Government remained as it was, except that a
second Indian was included in the Governor-General’s Execu¬
tive Council. It remained responsible to Parliament as before.
The Centre was to have legislature of two houses with an
elected majority in the lower house and an official majority in
the upper chamber. The Provincial Legislatures were expanded
and elected majorities on a broader franchise was conceded.
There was to be devolution of some financial and legislative
powers to the Provinces. The residuary power were, however,
retained by the Government of India. Separate electorates were
extended to the Sikhs in the Punjab.
The most disappointing feature of the Reforms was that under
its provisions the legislature had no control to speak of over
the Governor-General and his Executive Council. At the same
time the Central Government had an all-pervasive control over
the provinces. Added to all this, the franchise was so restricted
that it could scarcely be called democratic. For example* in
1920 there were only 909,874 voters for the lower house, while
for the upper chamber it was 17,364.
The publication of the Report on 8 July 1918 was the signal
for the clash between the Moderate and the Extremists. While
the former welcomed it, Tilak declared it to be “entirely
unacceptable.” A special session of the Congress at Bombay in
August 1918 called it “disappointing and unsatisfactory,” and
demanded almost complete Provincial Autonomy, a measure of
resposibility for the Central Government and India’s fiscal inde¬
pendence. The Moderates, much reduced in numbers by now
refused to attend the session and by November 1918 were meeting
separately. Next year they set-up a separate organization of
their own, the National Liberal Federation of India, with
126 FREEDOM STRUGGLE

Surendranath Banerjea as President. But they were no longer

a political force in the country.
Gandhiji’s initial response to retorms was favourable. But
the Government following the policy of concessions and repres¬
sion made one fatal mistake of presenting the nationalists
with a strong dose of repressive legislation at about the same
time. The Rowlatt Committee formed to examine the revolu¬
tionary activities of the years between 1905 and 1918, suggested
certain measures of arbitrary arrest without trial, internment
and >estriction of movement of persons suspected of anti-
Government activities. j The judges were empowered to try
political cases without jury; and no appeal was possible.
Mere possession of an incriminating document was made punish¬
able. The proposals opened the eyes of Gandhiji. He said,
“They are a striking demonstration of the Civil Service to
retain its grip of our necks. I consider the Bills to be an open
challenge to us.”

THE EMERGENCE OF GANDHIJI

Gandhiji’s emergence as the undisputed leader of the Indian

National Congress is an interesting story by itself. His heroic
fight for the Indians in South Africa was well-known. His novel
method of Satyagraha had yielded good results. The Congress
stalwarts had formed a high opinion of his character and
organizing ability. Till his arrival in India in 1915, however,
he had not played any leading part in the Congress circles and
was unknown to tfie masses. He seemed to young men like Jawahar-
lal Nehru to be “very distant and different and unpolitical.”
But this distance was a boon. People were not disillusioned
about him as they were of the Moderates, and, even of the
Extremists to some extent. His austere habits and saintly grace.
 THE STRUGGLB FOR SWARAJ 127

his use of Indian languages in preference to English, and

of religious texts, had an effect on the people who took him to
their hearts at once. Gandhiji was firmly rooted in the Indian
earth and it was from that fact that he drew this immense
strength.
In the course of his struggle against racialism in South-Africa,
he had developed his philosophy of action— Satyagraha. Its two
major elements were truth and non-violence. He defined it to be
soul-force, or love-force, the force which is born of truth and
non-violence. The Satyagrahi would refuse to submit to what¬
ever he considered to be wrong. He would remain peaceful under
all provocations. He would resist evil but would not hate the evil¬
doer. He would vindicate truth not by inflicting suffering on the
opponent but by accepting suffering himself. He hoped thereby
to arouse the conscience of the wrong-doer. To be successful
the Satyagrahi must utterly give up fear, hatred and falsehood.
He differed from the passive resister, for he gave up violence
not from expediency but as a matter of principle. Passive resist¬
ance, he said, was a weapon of the weak while Satyagraha
was the weapon of the strong.
Swadeshi was his watchword. He defined it to be “that spirit
in us which restricts us to the use and service of our immediate
surroundings to the exclusion of the more remote.” Hence his
emphasis on manual labour which he called ‘bread-labour’, and
on the charkha.
If Satyagraha was successful in Africa, why not try it in
India ? “I have no doubt,” he said, “that the British Govern¬
ment is a powerful Government, but I have no doubt also
that Satyagraha is a sovereign remedy.” He experimented
with it in Champaran in Bihar and in Ahmedabad and Kaira in
Gujarat.
While other politicians were debating the reforms, Gandhiji
rose to the call of the peasants of Champaran in Bihar. Under
I2S FREEDOM STRUGGLE

the Tinkathia system they were bound by law to grow indigo on

3/20th of their land and sell it to the British planters at prices
fixed by them. They were liable to unlawful extraction and
oppression by the planters. Gandhiji held a systematic enquiry into
their grievances, despite threats of imprisonment. He produced
such irrefutable evidence from the long suffering peasants that the
Government had to appoint an enquiry committee. He was one
of its members. The outcome was more than the abolition of
the system. The sleepy villages had been aroused from the
inertia of centuries. Young nationalists, like Rajendra Prasad,
Mazhar-ul-Huq, Mahadev Desai and J. B. Kripalani, had worked
with him in Champaran and were impressed by his idealism
as well as his dynamic, fearless, practical and down to earth
approach to political action.
There was a similar opportunity offered in the Kaira District
of Gujarat. The crops had failed in that district in 1918 but
the officers insisted on full collection of land revenue. Gandhiji
organized the peasants to offer Satyagraha. They refused to
pay revenue and were prepared to suffer all consequences. Even
those who could afford to pay declined to do so as a matter of
principle, in spite of all threats of coercion and attachment. The
Government was ultimately forced to yield ground and arrive at
a settlement with the peasants. During this movement Indulal
Yagnik was one of the chief lieutenants of Gandhiji. Sardar
Vallabhbhai Patel a flourishing, strong-minded barrister of
Ahmedabad was so impressed by the success of the Kaira
satyagraha that he became one of the most eminent and power¬
ful followers of Gandhiji.
The mill-workers of Ahmedabad had also caught his attention
in 1918. He led them in a strike against the mill-owners who
had refused to pay them higher wages. When the workers
seemed to weaken, he rallied them by undertaking a fast. It
attracted such wide all-India attention and united the mill-
 THE STRUGGLE FOR SWARAJ 129

workers of Ahmedabad so firmly, that afraid of consequences the

mill-owners gave in on the fourth day of Gandbiji’s fast and
agreed to a 35% wage rise.
These first experiments in Satyagraha brought Gandhiji into
close touch with the masses, both the peasants in the rural areas
and the workers in the urban areas. This was one of the great
contributions of Gandhiji to the national movement. In spite of
its overall, comprehensive objectives, in spite of the economic
insight of the leaders and the way they had laboured to collect
information aoout the hardships and poverty of the masses and
marshal them into convincing, unanswerable arguments, the
national movement had by and large remained the concern of the
urban lower middie class, middle class and the intelligentsia.
With the coming of Gandhiji the masses became all at once
active participants in the movement. Also, Gandhiji was
perhaps the only leader whose personal identification with the
rural masses was total and complete. He fashioned his own
personal life along ways familiar to the villagers, and spoke a
language they could easily understand. In course of time he
became the symbol of the poor and the downtrodden, of the
large masses that lived in rural India, and, in this sense was a
truly representative Indian, whose authenticity could not be
questioned or doubted.
Hindu-Muslim unity, removal of untouchability and raising
the status of women, were three causes very close to Gandhiji’s
heart. He referred to the so-called untouchables* as Harijans.
Once he wrote of the India of his dreams :

I shall work for an India in which the poorest shall feel that it
is their country, in whose making they have an effective voice,
an India in which there shall be no high class and low class
of people, an India in which all communities shall live in
perfect harmony... There can be no room in such an India
 130 FREEDOM STRUGGLE

for the curse of untouchability... Women will enjoy the same

rights as men ... This is the India of my dreams.

When the Rowlatt Bills were passed, in spite of unanimous

Indian opposition, Gandhiji’s patience came to an end. He
decided to try to oppose it with Satyagraha. This time it was
not to be a local campaign with limited objectives. He started a
Satyagraha Sabha and devised a pledge to disobey these repres¬
sive laws. A general hartal all over the country was called for
6 April 1919, and, this was to be followed by civil disobe¬
dience. The hartal was a unique success, but police firing on a
Delhi crowd caused a number of casualities, both Hindu and
Muslim. When Gandhiji, who was on his way to Delhi was
stopped en route and forcibly sent back to Bombay, police
charged again upon the milling crowd. Riots followed at several
places.
And then occurred the massacre of Jallianwala Bagh on
13 April. The people of the Punjab had been excited over war-
loans and Governor O’Dwyer’s harsh methods of recruitment.
The Muslims were deeply affected by the Khilafat propaganda.
The Government unnecessarily panicked and ordered the arrest
of the principal leaders, Dr Satyapal and Dr Saifuddin Kitchlu.
The result was mob fury at Amritsar, where, following a police
firing some officials were killed and two British women seriously
injured. When people defiantly assembled next day at Jallian¬
wala Bagh, General Dyer wanted to- strike terror into the whole
of the Punjab and ordered his troops to open fire without warning
on the unarmed crowd in a park from which there was no
way out. When Dyer withdrew after all his ammunition was
exhausted he left about 1,000 dead and several thousand wounded.
The massacre of Amritsar, which even Montagu called ‘preventive
murder,” was followed by a series of humiliating orders. Curfew
was imposed for weeks. People were flogged in public and made
 THE STRUGGLE FOR SWARAJ 131

to crawl where the two British women had been assaulted.

Students had to walk sixteen miles a day for roll calls. Arrested
persons were confined in cages. Hostages were taken; property
was confiscated or destroyed; and Hindus and Muslims were
hand-cuffed in pairs to demonstrate the consequences of unity.
Martial law was proclaimed. Rabindranath Tagore renounced
his knighthood in protest declaring :

The time has come when badges of honour make our shame
glaring in their incogruous context of humiliation, and, I, for
my part, wish to stand shorn of all special distinctions, by the
side of my countrymen who, for their so-called insignifi¬
cance are liable to suffer degradation not fit for human
beings.

The Punjab tragedy brought Gandhi ji into the forefront of

Indian politics. The Congress boycotted ihe official Committee
of Enquiry headed by Lord Hunter, which the Government had
appointed. Many of the erstwhile moderate nationalists also now
joined forces with Gandhiji.
The temper of the country was reflected in the Amritsar
Congress held in 1919. C. R. Das was in favour of rejecting the
Reforms but Tilak was for responsive cooperation. Ultimately
there was a compromise and the Congress agreed to so work the
reforms as to secure an early establishment of full responsible
Government. But C. R. Das made his attitude clear. He was “not
opposed to obstruction, plain downright obstruction, when that
helps to attain our political goal.”
All this time Gandhiji was being slowly drawn into the
Khilafat Movement from which platform he was soon to declare
non-cooperation against the Government. He had been inte¬
rested in Hindu-Muslim unity since his days in South Africa.
The Lucknow Pact, according to him, did not form an adequate
132 FREEDOM STRUGGLE
s

basis for unity. He had established contact with the Ali

brothers and felt that their Khilafat demand was just. He
protested against their arrest. The Versailles Treaty sharpened
the edge of the movement now by dismembering the Turkish
empire. The Sultan was deprived of real authority in his
remaining dominions. The Muslims of India decided to force
Britain to change her Turkish policy. A Khilafat Committee
was formed under the leadership of Maulana Azad, Hakim
Ajmal Khan and Hasarat Mohani. Gandhiji was willing to help
it. The Khilafat agitation was to him "an opportunity of uniting
Hindus and Mohamedans as would not arise in a hundred years ”
Gandhiji viewed it rather too simply as a unity of hearts, “If
I deem the Mohamedan to be my brother,” he wrote in Young
India, "it is my duty to help him in his hour of peril to the
best of my ability, if his cause commends itself to me as just.”
In November 1919 Gandhiji was elected President of the
Khilafat Conference. It asked Muslims not to join public cele¬
brations of the Allied victory and held out threats of boycott
and non-cooperation if the British did not do justice by Turkey.
Azad, Akram Khan and Fazlul Huq toured Bengal supporting
the cause of Khilafat, as well as, Hindu-Muslim unity. The
Maulanas of the Deoband School and the Ulemas of Lucknow
did the same thing in Northern India. The Amritsar Congress
and the Muslim League lent their full support to the movement.
Early in 1920 a joint Hindu-Muslim deputation met the Viceroy,
who frankly asked it to give up hope. A deputation to England
followed. But the Prime Minister, Lioyd George, curtly told it
that Turkey would not be treated differently from the defeated
Christian powers. The terms of the Treaty of Sevres were
known in the middle of May. Turkey retained Constantinople
but was severely reduced in size and population. Gandhiji
decided to start a Satyagraha movement on the Khilafat issue.
This non-cooperation programme was launched on 1 August.
 THE STRUGGLE FOR SWARAJ 133

For its success Congress support was essential. But Gandhiji

had a tough time persuading it to take the final plunge. Gandhiji’s
appeal had attracted both the Moderate and the Extremist rank
and file, for he had cleverly combined the goal of the former,
Swaraj within the empire, with the means of the latter, non¬
cooperation. Even the revolutionary terrorists wanted to give
him a chance. The Gujarat and Bihar Congress Committees
had already approved it.
Tilak’s death in August 1920 removed the most redoubtable
critic from the field. C. R. Das had mental reservations but
Gandhiji’s call for sacrifice and renunciation appealed to his
emotions strongly. The Special Calcutta Congress (4-9 Sep¬
tember 1920) hotly debated the pros and cons. When Gandhiji
proposed boycott of the Legislative Councils, Das challenged
him : “These (reforms) are not gifts of the British Government.
Reforms have been wrung out of the hands of the British
Government. I want to make the Councils an instrument for
the attainment of Swaraj and to use the weapon which is in
the hollow of your hands to bring about the full, complete
Swaraj.’’ He would enter the Council not to help but to embar¬
rass. It was to be a form of non-cooperation from within.
Lajpat Rai was against boycott of schools. Bipin Chandra
Pal advised cautious preparation. Motilal Nehru, however,
turned the scales in Gandhiji’s favour. Another compromise
was effected. Boycott of schools and courts was to be ‘gradual.’
But candidates for the elections were to withdraw and voters
were to refuse to vote. The objectives, again, were to include
Swaraj. The final decision was to be taken by the Nagpur
Congress.
The Congress was thus prevented from campaigning for the
first elections under the new reforms. Das regarded it as a dead
issue at Nagpur. Gandhiji’s case was further strengthened by the
exoneration of O’Dwyer who had been Governor of the Punjab
134 FREEDOM STRUGGLE

during the Jallianwala Bagh incident and the British refusal to

concede the demand for full responsible government. Das realized
that he would not be able to carry even the Bengali contingent with
him. Mohammad Ali brought about a compromise. Das moved
the non-cooperation resolution which declared that the entire
scheme, beginning with the renunciation of all voluntary asso¬
ciation with Government at one end and refusal to pay taxes
at the other, should be put into force at a time to be decided
by the Congress. Resignation from the Councils, renunciation
of legal practice, nationalization of education, economic boycott,
organization of workers for national service, raising of a
national fund and Hindu-Muslim unity were suggested as steps
in the programme. Malaviya and Jinnah opposed the goal
of Swaraj because it was not made clear whether any connection
would be maintained with the empire. But Gandhiji’s promise
of militant action in the coming year carried the day. Only two
votes were cast against him.
The Nagpur session revolutionized the structure of the Cong¬
ress organization by giving it a new constitution. The Congress
was transformed into a compact and effective political organiza¬
tion with a Working Committee of fifteen, an All-India Com¬
mittee of 350 and Provincial Committees with roots going down
to districts, towns, talukas and villages. The Working Com¬
mittee was to be a homogeneous body, active throughout the year.
Its decisions were largely to be unanimous. Matters of great
importance were to be discussed by the A.I.C.C. which could
review the Working Committee decisions and, had even over¬
riding powers. The Provincial Committees were re-organized
on a linguistic basis and consisted of one for each region
(Pradesh). Each village with five or more Congress members
would have a unit; over them would be circle units, taluka
units and district units, in ascending order. Delegates to the
annual session of the Congress would be elected on the basis
 the Struggle for sWaraJ 13$

of membership— one for 50,000. This made the Congress a far

more representative body. Its membership rose by leaps and
bounds as the subscription was only four annas a year. Even
this was not compulsory. Acceptance of the goal of the Cong¬
ress and adherance to its principles were enough to qualify
for membership. This brought the party within the reach of
India’s poor millions. It became more youthful when the age-limit
for membership was reduced to eighteen. There was a distinct
rise in the number of Muslims and women who joined the
Congress. By 1923 rural membership was double the number
from urban areas. The fundamental change was not only in
the social composition of the party but even more in its outlook
and policy. Membership was no longer a passive act but a
lively commitment for which sacrifices were demanded. The
Congress became an instrument of political socialization. It
took up constructive tasks, like Khadi, removal of untouch-
ability, prohibition of liquor, and national education. Use of
Hindi and other Indian languages broke the barrier between
the educated and the masses. A Tilak Swaraj Fund had been
started and within six months more than a crore of rupees
had been collected. This made the organization financially
secure. Thus a secular party organization based, on mass sup¬
port, decided to fight the imperialists under Gandhiji’s leader¬
ship with a novel weapon.
All the Congress candidates having withdrawn from elections,
the emphasis fell on boycott of courts by lawyers, of educational
institutions, foreign cloth and liquor shops. “Education can
wait,” said Das, “Swaraj cannot.” A large number of students
left their schools and colleges. Teachers resigned in large
numbers. National colleges like the Jamia Millia Islamia and
the Kashi, Bihar and Gujarat Vidyapeeths were set up. Narendra
Dev, Rajendra Prasad, Zakir Husain and Subhas Chandra Bose
taught in such national colleges. Complete boycott of foreign
136 FREEDOM STRUGGLE

cloth was to be achieved by 30 September 1921. This was to be

done by picketing and public bon fires as in the days of the
Swadeshi movement during the first decade of the century. The
student community was organized as national volunteers. They
did propaganda for the nationalist cause, collected donations,
demonstrated against cooperators, ran arbitration courts, and,
picketed shops selling foreign goods.
A wave of unprecedented enthusiasm swept the land; the
high and the low, men and women, Hindus and Muslims, the
conservative, the liberal and the radical all alike were affected.
Women gave up purdah to join the struggle in large numbers
and offered their jewellery for the Tilak Fund or gladly went
to prison.
The Khilafat Committee asked the Muslims not to join the
army and for this the Ali brothers were arrested. The Congress
called upon all Indians not to serve the Government in any
way. As the tempo rouse, unemployed labourers, factory
workers and the urban poor joined the movement. There were
some major strikes not only in industrial centres but also in
the tea plantations of Assam.
The rural areas were alive and filled with a new enthusiasm.
The call of the Congress for refusal of payment of taxes struck a
very sensitive chord in the hearts of the exploited peasants. The
peasants ofMidnapore refused to pay Union Board taxes and
peasant unions were started for the first time in Bengal. The
agitation led by Duggirala Gopalakishnaya of Guntur w as an eye-
opener. In defiance of orders to pay municipal taxes, the whole
population of Chirala moved out to establish a new township.
A parallel council was set up at Vijayawada. All village officers
resigned in Peddanadipadu and 95 per cent of the rate payers
refused to pay taxes. In Guntur, Krishna and Godavari district
non-payment of taxes was decided upon. Grazing fees were to
be refused in Palnad. The Andhra Pradesh Congress Committee
 THE STRUGGLE FOR SWARAJ 137

supported these measures and the Ahmedabad Congress

authorized the movement, provided all other conditions like
Khadi, non-violence and Hindu-Muslim unity were fulfilled.
Guntur even fulfilled Gandhiji’s condition in taking the signa¬
tures of the ryots. In Rai-Bareli and Faizabad in U.P. tenants
refused to pay illegal cesses. They naturally came into clash
with the zamindars and the police. There were attempts to
rush law courts and rescue arrested persons. Jawaharlal Nehru
who entered national politics about this time was greatly
influenced by these events. There were strikes in some of the
important collieries. In Bihar the Tana Bhagat Movement of
the Adivasis or Chhotanagpur threatened non-payment of
Chowkidari tax and rent. In Orissa the tenants of the Kanika raj
refused to pay abwabs. In the Punjab the Akali Movement
aimed at removing corruption in the management of Gurdwaras.
Gaining control of the holy temples was regarded as the first step
to political independence. In Malabar the Mappilas had started
a movement against local zamindars and money-lenders, which
unfortunately assumed a communal colour. In fact, there was
a sudden realization that in the villages of India there was an
immense reservoir of strength which, properly handled, might
topple down the mighty Raj. The Government was not really
worried by a drop in the purchase of British cloth or a fall
in the sale of liquor. What really caused them anxiety was
the mass awakening in all parts of India.
A more spectacular success attended the movement for boycot¬
ting the visit of the Prince of Wales. Bombay observed hartal
and arranged a meeting on the beach where Gandhiji made a bon
fire of foreign cloth. But the mob turned unruly and assaulted the
Europeans and Parsees who showed their loyalty to the prince.
There was police firing and riots in which 53 persons were killed.
The hartal in Calcutta was total but marred by a clash between
the police and the Khilafatists.
138 FREEDOM STRUGGLE

The Government was hard-pressed and decided to take repres¬

sive measures. The Congress and the Khilafat volunteer organiza¬
tions were declared unlawful. Public assemblies and processions
were banned. This was a challenge to the freedoms of speech
and association without which no political movement could
continue. Das decided to accept the challenge and disobey the
order. “I feel the hand-cuffs on my wrists,” he said, “and the
weight of iron chains on my body... The whole of India is a vast
prison... What matters it whether I am taken or left ? What
matters it whether I am dead or alive ?” After his wife and son
were arrested, thousands began to enlist as volunteers. The
prisons of Calcutta overflowed. The jail became “a holy place of
pilgrimage.” Exasperated the police began to charge and assault
the volunteers indiscriminately. 1 Mass arrests were ordered.
During the next few months nearly 30,000 nationalists were put
in prison. Das himself courted arrest and Motilal Nehru, Lajpat
Rai and Gopabandhu Das of Orissa followed him into prison.
By the end of 1921 all important leaders except Gandhiji were
behind prison bars. The Working Committee had permitted each
province to start civil disobedience on certain conditions. But
the outbreak of the Mappila rebellion and the Bombay riots
made Gandhiji uneasy. He wanted “to hasten slowly.” He
decided to shift the emphasis of the movement from the cities,
where non-violence had failed, to the village. The Ahmedabad
Congress authorized individual or mass civil disobedience and
Gandhiji issued his famous ultimatum to the Viceroy on
1 February 1922 : “There is nothing before the country but to
adopt some non-violent method for the enforcement of its
demands including the elementary rights of free speech, free asso¬
ciation and a free Press.” Gandhiji would try it in one taluka in
Gujarat — Bardoli.
Before mass civil disobedience was started in Bardoli, there
was a case of mob violence at Chauri Chaura in U.P. In reply to
 THB STRUGGLE FOR SWARAJ 139

wanton police firing, some peasants set fire to a police station and
caused the death of twentytwo policemen. The Working Com¬
mittee was hastily summoned to Bardoli. At Gandhiji’s insistence
it dropped civil disobedience and opted for a constructive
programme.
The decision of Bardoli came as a shock to many national
leaders. Subhas called it a “national calamity.” Jawaharlal Nehru
mentions in his autobiography his “amazement and consterna¬
tion” at the decision. M. N. Roy saw in it a weakening of
the leadership rather than of the masses. Others accused Gandhiji
of curbing the political initiative of the masses and keeping them
under rigid upper class control.
Gandhiji had a hard time in explaining the decision to his
followers. He assured Nehru that “if the thing had not been
suspended we would have been leading not a non-violent but
essentially a violent struggle. The cause will prosper by this
retreat.... We have come back to our moorings.” On his part,
he could show enough examples of mob violence preceding
Bardoli. By his successive postponements he had given warning
that he would not have Swaraj at the cost of the sacred principle
of Satyagraha. He was leading an unarmed struggle against an
armed power and he knew who would win if violence were let
loose.

THE RECEDING TIDE

Lord Reading, the Viceroy, had all this, time been trying to cause
a split between the Congress and the Khilafatists through a revi¬
sion of the Treaty of Sevres in favour of the Caliph. He postponed
Gandhiji’s arrest till the movement began to disintegrate. The
Bardoli resolution in his view “left the organization without any
clearly defined and intelligible objectives. From that moment.
140 FREEDOM STRUGGLE

disintegration and disorganization set in, enthusiasm evaporated,

disillusionment and discouragement prevailed in the ranks of the
party.” He had Gandhiji arrested on 10 March 1922 and
charged with spreading disaffection against the Government.
The trial of Gandhiji became historic because of the explana¬
tion offered by Gandhiji for his actions, though he pleaded
guilty to the charge itself. In his statement he dealt at length
with his own transformation from a loyal supporter and even
admirer of the British to an uncompromising critic and oppo¬
nent of British rule in India and explained :

t came reluctantly to the conclusion that the British connec¬

tion had made India more helpless than she ever was before,
po/litically and economically. A disarmed India has no power
of resistance against any aggression... She has become so poor
that she has little power of resisting famines... Little do town-
dwellers know how the semi-starved masses of India are slowly
sinking to lifelessness. Little do they know that their miserable
comfort represents the brokerage they get for the work they
do for the foreign exploiter, that the profits and the brokerage
are sucked from the masses. Little do they realize that the
Government established by law in British India is carried on
for the exploitation of the masses. No sophistry, no jugglery
in figures, can explain away the evidence that the skeletons in
many villages present to the naked eye... In my opinion,
administration of the law is thus prostituted, consciously or
unconsciously, for the benefit of the exploiter. The great mis¬
fortune is that Englishmen and their Indian associates in the
administration of the country do not know that they are
engaged in the crime I have attempted to describe. I am
satisfied that many Englishmen and Indian officials honestly
believe that they are administering one of the best systems
devised in the world, and that India is making steady, though
 THE STRUGGLE FOR SWARAJ 141

slow progress. They do not know that a subtle but effective

system of terrorism and an organized display of force on the
one hand, and the deprivation of all powers of retaliation or
self-defence on the other, have emasculated the people and
induced in them the habit of simulation.

He concluded by saying that he believed that “non-cooperation

with evil is as much a duty as is cooperation with good.”
He asked the qourt to award him “the highest penalty that can
be inflicted' upon me for what in law is a deliberate crime, and,
wliat appears to me to be the highest duty of a citizen.”
Judge Broomfield, who tried the case, acknowledged “the fact
that in the eyes of millions of your countrymen you are a great
patriot and great leader”, but “as a man subject to the law, who
has, by his own admission broken the law,” sentenced Gandhiji
to six years imprisonment, the same sentence as was passed on
Lokmanya Tilak in 1908.
With most of the leaders in jail the first non-cooperation ended
without the mass civil disobedience even being started. Very
soon thereafter the Khilafat question also became unimportant.
Mustafa Kemal Pasha had come to power in Turkey and in
November 1922 the Sultan was stripped of all political power.
Kemal Pasha set about modernizing Turkey and setting it up as
a secular state. The Caliphate was abolished.
About the Khilafat agitation and the way Gandhiji and other
Congress leaders tried to associate the national movement with
it, there can be two opinions. Some feel that it was ill-
concieved and retrograde because it did not achieve Hindu-
Muslim unity and for a time at least it introduced a religious
stream into a political movement. For these reasons it has been
argued that the Khilafat movement was a mistake. Others feel
that the movement provided an opportunity for the national
leadership to convince the Muslims that the nation was equally
142 FREEDOM STRUGGLE

concerned with problems affecting the Muslims The oppor¬

tunity should have been made use of, as indeed it was.
In retrospect it seems clear that the Khilafat movement did
bring the urban Muslims into the national movement and was
largely responsible for the widespread enthusiasm and sense of
involvement that prevailed among all sections of the people at
that time. It is also true that there was nothing wrong in
principle a national movement espousing a cause which affected
only one section of the community. There was a predominant
element of anti-imperialism in both the national and Khilafat
movements. If this common denominator could have been
used to forge a common desire to fight imperialism as the only
way to further the political and economic interests of the country
as a whole, there would have been nothing wrong in that.
Repressive measures at home and events in Turkey conspired to
frustrate the movement in achieving these ultimate objectives,
although the nationalist leadership welcomed the emergence of
a secular and anti-imperialist State in Turkey.
It would also be a mistake to conclude that this first non¬
cooperation movement was a total failure. It surely contributed
to an awakening of the* masses to economic problems and
their political cause, namely imperialism. Even the unsophisti¬
cated villagers began to feel that Swaraj was the sovereign
remedy for their ills. They felt a new sense of freedom in parti¬
cipating in the national struggle. The fear of the Raj was con¬
quered. Ordinary people, men and women, rich and poor, showed
willingness and ability to endure hardships and punishment in
defiance of Government. There was also an increasing recogni¬
tion of social evils like untouchability and drinking. The
emphasis on Khadi was a realistic assessment of rural needs. Out
of the experience of this attempt to defy openly the foreign
rulers and the government they had set up was born a new sense
of self-confidence and self-esteetn which wiped out the humiliation
 THE STRUGGLE FOR SWARAJ 143

of retreat. Gandhiji knew that herein lay the strength of his

Satyagraha. Its failure did not matter much, for it could only be
temporary. As Gandhiji himself explained: “The fight that was
commenced in 1920 is a fight to the finish, whether it lasts one
month or one year or many months or many years.”

THE SWARAJISTS

When the mass civil disobedience movement was dropped there

was widespread disappointment which led to a sudden dissi¬
pation of enthusiasm in the nationalist struggle. There was even
a sense of disillusionment and questions began to be asked about
the efficacy of Satyagraha. Was it at all possible to train
hundreds of millions of people in the art of non-violence ?
Even if it was possible, how long would it take ? With many
leaders in jail the rank and file felt disorganized.
At this stage a new lead was given by C. R. Das and Motilal
Nehru. When the Civil Disobedience Enquiry Committee reported
that the country was not yet ready to embark on a general mass
civil disobedience movement, and the constructive programme
found only a limited response, C. R. Das and Motilal Nehru
suggested that instead of boycotting the legislatures, non-
cooperation should be carried into the Councils. They suggested
Council-entry to render the reforms unworkable from within.
The suggestion met with a ready response from quite a few
Congressmen but the orthodox Gandhians like Rajagopalachari,
Rajendra Prasad and Valiabhbhai Patel, were for continued
boycott. The two factions come to be called pro-changers and
no-changers. The question came to a head at the Gaya
Congress in December 1922. As President, C. R. Das made
a vigorous plea for Council-entry, but Rajaji’s group carried the
day. C. R. Das resigned and with Motilat Nehru, Vithalbhai
f44 FREEDOM STRUGGLE

Patel, Malaviya and Jayakar formed a party within the Congress.

It was called the Congress-Khilafat Swaraj Party. C. R. Das was
the President and Motilal Nehru as one of the secretaries.
The new party kept in view the essential principles of non¬
violence and non-cooperation. It proposed to demand the right of
framing a constitution and, on refusal, to resort to a policy of
“uniform, continuous and consistent obstruction with a view to
make Government through the Assembly and Councils impossi¬
ble.” The imagination and emotionalism of C. R. Das formed
a perfect foil to the objectivity and firmness of Motilal. They
fought the elections of November 1923 and practically wiped out
the liberals though they had had very little time to organize. They
won an absolute majority in the Central Province. They were
the largest party in the Bengal Council and the second largest in
the United Province and Assam, although in other provinces
their record was not so good. In the Central Legislative Assembly
they captured 42 out of the 101 seats.
But the no-changers were not yet convinced about the correct¬
ness of the Swarajist stand. A fierce political controversy raged
between the two groups. But both groups remained loyal to
Gandhiji and Congress; both were anti-imperialist and truly
national in thinking and belief. So in spite of differences on the
question of Council-entry they retained mutual respect for each
other and the unity of the party itself was not threatened.
In the Central Assembly the Swarajists formed a coalition,
called the Nationalist Party, with thirty Moderate and Muslim
members. In the Provincial Councils the made similar arrange¬
ments. They demanded release of all political prisoners,
repeal of repressive laws, provincial autonomy and the imme¬
diate summoning of a Round Table Conference to draw up a
scheme for full control of the Government by the Councils. If
the Government refused to comply, they threatened to bting the
administration to a deadlock by refusing to vote supplies.
 (liE STRUGGLBFOR SWARAJ 145

In the beginning the Moderates and the Hindu and Muslim

communalists co-operated with the Swarajists in the Central
Legislature in putting forward resolutions recommending release
of detenus and political prisoners and repeal of repressive laws.
In March 1925, they succeeded in getting Vithalbhai Patel,
a prominent nationalist from Gujarat elected as President of the
Central Legislative Assembly.
But the Swarajists failed to achieve much and decided to walk¬
out of the Central Assembly in March 1926. “The cooperation
offered,” said Motilal, “has been contemptuously rejected and
it is time for us to think of other ways to achieve our object.”
In Britain a Labour Government which had come to power
earlier in 1923 was shortlived and even when in office had no
specific plans for India. The return of the Conservatives to
power under Baldwin saw Lord Birkenhead at the India Office,
Like the rest of the Cabinet, he thought that the 1918 reforms
had gone too far and it would be unwise to grant more reforms
for some time. He could not conceive how India could ever be
fit for Dominion Status. He wanted to adhere rigidly to ten
year period proposed in the Act of 1919, for re-examination of
the situation.

Meanwhile communal ism was beginning to make headway in

the country, feeding on political inactivity and frustration. Even
the Swarajists were affected by the virus of communalism. Some
of the members including Madan Mohan Malaviya, Lala Lajpat
Rai and N. C. Kelkar, formed themselves into a group of
“responsivists” and offered cooperation to the Government.
They claimed that they were thus safeguarding the interests of
Hindus. They accused Motilal and Das of being pro-Muslim.
It was tragic that at this important juncture C. R. Das passed
away suddenly in June 1925.
The Muslim League and the Hindu Mahasabha, started in
1917, on?? more became active- Communal riots broke out in
146 FREEDOM STRUGGLE

Delhi, Lucknow, Allahabad, Jabalpur and Nagpur. Gandhiji

who had been released on 5 February 1924 for reasons of
health tried to stop the spread of the communal virus by under¬
taking a twentyone day fast in September of that year to do
penance for the inhumanity revealed in communal riots. Though
Gandhiji’s fast led to unity conferences restoration of harmony
could not be achieved. The next two years saw a further
spread of communalism in a virulent form. Not less than sixteen
riots took place in 1925. The Calcutta riots of 1926 were the
worst. Riots were now shifting from larger cities to smaller
towns. The Simon Commission listed 112 communal riots between
1922 and 1927 in which approximately 450 lives were lost and
5,000 persons were injured. 1927 was a year of despair. The
attempts of Motilal and Azad to get a pledge from all parties
to keep out of communal politics did not succeed. In the midst
of this growing violence Gandhiji felt helpless and wrote in
anguish, “My only hope lies in prayer and answer to prayer.”

THE GENESIS OF A NEW PHASE

By 1928, the struggle against British Imperialism entered a new

phase. In the five previous years, the British Government had met
the anti-imperialist movement with an intensification of political
repression. After the decision to drop the Non-Cooperation
Movement tensions had developed within the Congress between
the Swaraj Party and the ‘constructive workers’ who wanted no
change in the original decision to boycott the Councils. Sanga-
than and Shuddhi movements among the Hindus, and Tanzeem
and Tabligh movements among the Muslims, which implied
conversion and reconversion had grown among the religious
extremists on either side, and they did not help to restore com¬
munal harmony. Distrust and suspicion grew
 THE STRUGGLE FOR SWARAJ 147

In different parts of India the working class was split and

divided into advanced and backward groups. A relatively
younger generation knew of the socialist ideals, which were
spreading from the U.S.S.R., which had celebrated its tenth
anniversary in 1927, and small groups of dedicated political
workers began to diffuse their own interpretations of communism
to industrial workers in some towns, principally in Maharashtra
and Eastern U.P., and the peasants in the villages, especially
in the Punjab. One of their purposes was that the more middle
class-oriented Congress (which they considered the most prog¬
ressive party of the middle class) should link human, social and
economic problems of concern to the masses, like industrial
working conditions and land distribution, with its own demands
for legislative reform. They also wanted a political programme
to be accepted which was more radical than that of the
Congress.
On the other hand, sectional political groups were also begin¬
ning to establish contacts with the working class as well as the
agrarian poor. These groups emphasized mainly communal
interests and tried to influence the Muslim agrarian poor, as
well as urban workers and lower castes among the Hindus.
They sought special privileges, political, representation in
Legislative Councils and special access to education and to
social welfare facilities. They also wranted to be treated as
equals in a democratic society. This trend was particularly
noticeable among the “untouchables” and other depressed
classes and among some sections of agriculturists in East
Bengal, such as, the Namasudras. Their methods consisted
mainly , of direct negotiations with the Government which now,
as always practised a policy of ‘Divide and Rule.’ ‘Finally’ in
Madras, the Justice Party claiming to represent the interests of
non-Brahmins opposed the Congress which they claimed was
dominated bv Brahmins
148 FREEDOM STRUGGLE

Gandhiji and his followers sought, indeed, to destroy the insti¬

tution of untouchability so as to cure communal trends within
the Hindu religion. The Communist movement, principally
in Bombay, sought to win workers away from communalism so
as to eliminate separatism and write the workers into one
class. However, in the 1920s, political differences within the
anti-imperialist front, the growing communal feelings among
many sections and the various enticement to non-Congress
political groups which were held out by the Government,
resulted in tendencies that threatened to break up the society
into divergent sections and groups, and these tendencies
weakened the national movement.
It, however, gained a new basis of unity, in November 1927.
From London, the British Cabinet announced that it had been
decided to appoint two years ahead of time a Royal Commis¬
sion to review the fitness of India for further reforms and
extension of parliamentary democracy. A British politician. Sir
John Simon was its Chairman; it, therefore, came to be called
popularly as the Simon Commission. None of the seven other
members were Indians, The imperialist hope that this offer
would contain and check the national movement was belied
by the wave of indignation which greeted the announcement.
M. A. Ansari, the Congress President at the Madras session
of 1927, declared a Congress boycott of the Commission’s
work of enquiry. It was said, “Indian people are entitled to
determine their own Constitution either by a Round Table
Conference (of all groups concerned) or by a convention parlia¬
ment. That claim has been definitely negatived by the appoint¬
ment of the Commission... we cannot be parties to an enquiry
into our fitness for Swaraj or for any measure of responsible
government... The third reason (for boycott) 'is undoubtedly
the affront to Indian self-respect involved in the deliberate
exclusion of Indians from the Commission, ’’
 THE STRUGGLE FOR SWARAJ 149

While the Congress emphasized the first and second reasons,

the third one, of affront to the self-respect of the Indian
people, appealed most to the liberals, like Tej Bahadur
Sapru, who had diligently cultivated the art of parliamentary
institution and practice by co-operating in a large measure with
the government. Therefore the Congress, the Liberal Federa¬
tion, and initially, even the Muslim League, decided to boycott
the Simon Commission. The Congress slogan “Go Back,
Simon,” which confronted the Commission wherever they went
created a bond of unity in the national struggle; not of social
union or of similarity in political programmes but at least of
common opposition to imperialist policy. On 3 February 1928
when the Commission landed in Bombay, it was met by huge
processions, marching with “Go Back, Simon” banners and
black flags. At an evening meeting of fifty thousand people on
the Chowpathy sands, different parties condemned the Cabinet
decision. Only a majority in the Council of State at New
Delhi, which was largely nominated by the British, agreed to
co-operate.
Meantime, labour involvement in the national struggle grew
though the emphasis was on strengthening the trade union
movement and improving the conditions of the working class.
In 1927, in Bombay, workers and peasants forced the autho¬
rities to suspend the draft Minimum Land Holding Act, which
would have permitted increase of the amount of land that pros¬
perous farmers could own, thus, impoverishing the poorer local
peasants. In the Bengal-Nagpur Railway Company, wholly
owned by a British private business firm with its headquarters at
London, the workers at the Kharagpur Locomotive Repair and
Maintenance Workshop (who came from different communities
and races) led what became a general strike against low wages
and arbitrary action by the company authorities. This strike
was supported by many national leaders, such as Jawaharlal
150 FREEDOM STRUGGLE

Nehru and the rising trade union organizer and leader V. V. Giri.
Jawaharlal Nehru who at this time commanded the support
of left-wing Indian yofith, became a member of the League
for Struggle against Fascism and Imperialism which had been
set up in Europe and which was sympathetic to the Third
International of Workers of the World, set up by U.S.S.R. in
Moscow.
Left-wing workers and leaders attracted to socialist ideas
were in sympathy with the boycott of the Simon Commission.
Labour participation in the agitation strengthened the mass
movement in 1928 and 1929. The ‘Go Back, Simon’ agitation
led to the formation of the Students Federation. This
association at first inculcated nationalist as well as socialist
consciousness, among college students.
At the leadership level the boycott led to a parallel attempt
to formulate plans for an Indian constitution. In 1927 at the
Madras Congress a resolution moved by Jawaharlal Nehru and
supported by the Subhas Bose’s group was accepted that the
ultimate objective of the Congress was to gain Puma Swaraj
or complete independence for India. However, the challenge
of the Secretary of State for India, Lord Birkenhead, to the
Swaraj Party “to produce a constitution which carried behind it
a fair measure of general agreement among the great peoples of
India,’’ was also taken up. This implied a new set up approved
by the British Government and within the framwork of the
empire. The Congress Working Committee, the All-India
Liberal Federation, the Muslim League and other organizations
met,'finally at Lucknow in August 1928 where in the form of an
All-Parties Conference, it accepted a Draft Constitution drawn
up by a Committee under the Chairmanship of the veteran
Swarajist leader Motilal Nehru.
 THE MOTILAL NEHRU REPORT

This Report provided for responsible Government, that is,

supremacy of a popularly elected legislature over the executive,
which was then supreme in British India. It provided for a
bicameral, sovereign Parliament,, with the same autonomous
power as enjoyed by the Dominion Parliaments within the
British empire such as Canada or Australia. The Senate would
have 200 members elected by the Provincial Councils on the
basis of proportional representation. The House of Representa¬
tives would have 500 members to be elected on the basis of
adult suffrage. There would be no special representation in
Parliament for communal groups except for Muslims in Bengal
and for non-Muslims in the North-West Frontier. In the Pro¬
vincial Councils seats would be specially reserved for minorities
on the basis of population. Exception would be made in the
case of Punjab and Bengal, where Muslims were in a majority.
In these two areas no reservation seats of would be provided and
representation would be on the basis of adult suffrage alone.
The Nehru Report reflects the conservative views of the
older generation of Congress leadership in 1928. While
accepting the younger generation’s demand for Puma Swaraj,
they interpreted it to mean Dominion Status within the empire.
They were also not prepared to accept democratic and secular
principles in their totality. They did not try to resolve the
question of communalism in an uncompromising forthright
manner. Exceptions were made to the principle of equal repre¬
sentation to all citizens both at the level of the Central Parlia¬
ment and at the level of the Provincial Councils. In fact, only
such special representation proposals would have satisfied those
nationalist Muslims who had not joined the Congress and wanted
safeguards for the protection of their minority interests, as a
security for being ready to trust the vast Hindu Majority.
 152 FREEDOM STRUGGLE

The rift with the even more extreme Muslim League came in
December 1928. The All-Parties Convention met in Calcutta,
at the time of the Congress session there, to ratify the Nehru
Report. Mohammed Ali Jinnah, a Congress leader till 1921
and now a prominent communalist leader demanded more repre¬
sentation for Muslims in both the Parliament and in the
Bengal and Punjab Provincial Councils. He wished to ensure
Muslim predominance in the Punjab and Bengal in such a way
that the underprivileged Muslims who were in a majority in
these provinces could catch up in the utilization of education,
employment opportunities and social welfare, by the use of
legislative power. He was supported by the more loyalist
Muslim politicians, such as the Aga Khan and Sir Muhammad
Shafi, who represented the new educated professional class,
landed gentry and merchants eager to seize local power
from the more advanced Hindu sections of the same classes.
They were not prepared to make the same concession to
democratic principles that were advised by a range of other
Muslim politicians like Dr Ansari of the Congress, the
Maharaja of Mahmudabad, a U.P. landlord or Sir Ali Imam,
a Bihar Judge. The All-Parties Convention rejected their
demands. The Hindu communalists also became adamant
The Sikh communalists also now demanded special represents
tion for themselves as a linguistic and religious minority a
the Punjab. Both Jinnah and the Sikh communalists with¬
drew from the Convention reducing drastically “the fair
measure of general agreement” the Nehru Report was intended
» to have.
These developments strengthened the criticism of the Dominion
Status idea, which began to be voiced by Jawaharlal Nehru and
Subhas Bose, the two General Secretaries of the Congress, who
represented the left-wing youth. They now swung the Congress
towards implementing the Madras resolution on Puma Swaraj.
 THE STRUGGLE FOR SWARAJ 153

In the Calcutta Congress session over which Motilal Nehru

presided a clause was included in the resolution supporting
the Nehru, Report which said that “nothing in this resolution
shall interfere with the carrying on in the name of the Congress
of the propaganda for complete Independence.” The Calcutta
Congress also resolved that if the British Government did not
accept the Nehru Report by the end of 1929, at the next
Lahore session the Congress would give a call for a new civil
disobedience campaign.
Differences had been resolved through a compromise and
party unity cemented. Gandhiji who was re-emerging as supreme
leader of the Congress after about six years of retirement in
Ahmedabad, and who wanted harmonious settlement of conflicts,
was chiefly responsible for this. He arranged that Jawaharlal
Nehru should succeed his father as President at the Lahore
session.
The Lahore session committed the Congress definitely to an
uncompromising demand for Puma Swaraj, total, that is, full
independence. Dominion Status within Commonwealth was no
longer acceptable. The dilly-dallying with reforms— ‘always
too little, always too late’— was over.
On the 31 December 1929, as the clock struck the mid¬
night hour and ushered in the New Year, a vast multitude of
people saw Jawaharlal Nehru unfurl the tri-colour national
flag on the banks of the Ravi ana heard him proclaim that it
was “a crime against man and God to submit any longer”
to British rule.
There was a new hope abroad, a new excitement. The air was
charged with the determination of the people to fight to be
free.
 V INTIMATIONS OF FREEDOM

The nineteen-thirties saw the freedom struggle take many

steps forward. The decade began with the second non¬
cooperation movement; it ended with the beginning of the
second World War and the Congress ministries in the Provinces
resigning as a protest against India being involved in the War
without her consent. But before we trace the course of the
national movement during these ten years we must take note of
the re-emergence of revolutionary terrorist activities towards the
end of the ’twenties and their continued incidence during the
first few years of the 1930s. During this period also the labour
movement gained a foot-hold in the political thinking in the
country. All these influenced political developments during the
1930s.
In 1928 alone there were 203 strikes in India involving 505,000
workers. Membership had considerably increased in the revolu¬
tionary Girni Kamgar Unions of the cotton textile industry in
Bombay and Southern Maharashtra. Unions pledged to work for
revolution had been started by the workers of the South Indian,
and, Madras and Southern Maratha Railways. Communist
newspapers like Kirti, Mazdur, Kisan, Spark and Kratiti spread
in the towns. Youth leagues were established and became
popular among lower-middle class students who had little
sympathy for the upper-middle class Swarajist leaders of the
Congress. However, they did not organize themselves for a
struggle for socialism in a disciplined manner. They did not
form workers’ parties involving the large masses of the urban
 INTIMATIONS OF FREEDOM 155

working class and train them to agitate for better standard based
on socialist ideals, nor did they take steps to link Indian labour
with international working class movements.
At the time of the Calcutta Congress and the All-Parties
Convention, communists convened the first All-India Conference
of Workers’ and Peasants’ Parties. The conference stressed the
need for proletarian class struggle, abolition of land-ownership,
“in principle without compensation,” a shorter working day and
a minimum wage, and, freedom of press, speech and trade union
organization. It criticized the 1928 Congress acceptance of
Dominion Status as a desirable interim goal.
The British ruling class felt that the initiative in the anti-
Simon agitation was passing to the Left. Another Royal
Commission, the Whitley Commission on Labour was appointed
to visit India and suggest measures for the improvement of
labour relations and the betterment of labour welfare. These
were the main sources of strength for the Leftist movement and
the idea was to mislead the working class into thinking that the
Government was more interested in their welfare than the leaders
who spoke vaguely of socialism and revolution. But the workers
were not taken in. The reformist Whitley Commission was
boycotted by many workers’ organizations, when it arrived in
India in 1929. They remembered that in 1928, the Government
had tried to pass through the Central Legislative Assembly a
Trade Disputes Bill and an amendment to the Public Safety
Act which were not only not to their advantage but which would
actually have curtailed their freedom of action. The proposed
legislative measures contemplated permitting the executive to
curtail strikes and take emergency measures (without legislative
control) if the executive considered that the law and order
situation had collapsed in the Provinces. They would also
-jpake it more difficult for Indian political parties to make
contacts for money and support with world organizations which
156 FREEDOM STRUGGLE

supported the leftist in India, Members of the Central Legisla¬

tive Assembly , led by Motilal Nehru, rejected these Bills,
In March 1929, a general strike (jointly called by the Girni
Kamgar Union and the railway workers) took place in Bombay.
This was in protest against the dismissal of workers who had
taken part in the 1928 strikes and the employment of Pathan
workers in their place. The striking workers argued that these
acts were aimed at undermining trade union solidarity, and had
resulted in Hindu-Muslim riots in the mills. The strike spread
to Kanpur and Calcutta. Immediately after this, on 20 March
1929, thirtythree prominent labour leaders from ail over India
were arrested on a charge cf conspiracy to revolt against the
British Crown. They included Muzaffar Ahmed, Dange,
Mirajkar and P. C. Joshi, who all later became well-known
Communists; two British Communists, Ben Bradley and Philip
Spratt, who had been sent to help Communists in Bombay; and
also some non-Communist radicals. A special ordinance was
issued by the Viceroy, Lord Irwin, putting in force the two
repressive Bills disallowed by the Legislative Assembly. The
‘conspirators’ were taken to Meerut, far from the big industrial
centres of working class solidarity. Here the ‘Meerut Conspi¬
racy Case’ was tried for several years, till 1933, in fact. Finally
most of the prisoners were declared guilty and sentenced to
varying terms of imprisonment. The Communists among them
brought as their plea in court a long justification of their
ideology and anti-imperialist position. This was suppressed.
We now know that the Government had also thought of arrest¬
ing Jawaharlal Nehru as a conspirator, but refrained from
doing so because of the agitation to which this might lead.
Nehru did try to arrange for legal assistance to the Meerut
detenus, but the events of 1929-31 pushed the Communist trial
out of public attention.
Strikes, however, continued throughout 1929. At the A1TUC
 INTIMATIONS OF FREEDOM 157

Nagpur session, left-wing trade unionists were supported by

Congress in the demand for wholesale boycott of the Whitley
Commission and the demand for affiliating the AITUC with the
League against Imperialism. The N. M. Joshi group which was
not in favour of these demands was defeated. Leaving the AITUC,
it formed the All-India Trade Union Federation. This organiza¬
tion eschewed revolutionary objectives and even gave up political
demands, sticking only to the alleviation of the economic condi¬
tions of workers. But generally speaking, even the more radical
groups of the working class did not join the national movement
organized by the Indian National Congress. As Jawaharlal
Nehru wrote in his autobiography.

The advanced sections of workers fought shy of the National

Congress. T hey mistrusted its leaders and considered its ideo¬
logy bourgeois and reactionary, which indeed it was from the
labour ooint of view.

Thus, because of these contrary trends of dissidence, one

conservative and the other radical, and, also, because of
Government repression the effect of labour participation in the
nationalist upsurge of the early 1930s was weakened.
In the Punjab, U P. and Bengal there was a revival of terrorist
activities among lower-middle class youth who felt frustrated
with the moderate and non-violent policies of the Congress. In
1925 there had been the famous Kakori Conspiracy Case in the
U.P. in which Bengalis were also involved. Ramprasad Bismii,
Roshanlal and Ashfaqulla — three of the accused were sentenced
to death and executed. Some of the remaining suspects had
avoided arrest and absconded. By 1928 Chandra Shekhar
Azad was the only one of the absconders still at large. He now
took a leading part in reorganizing the Hindustan Republican
Army. Its name was changed to Hindustan Socialist Republican
158 FREEDOM STRUGGLE

Association and its objective became an Indian Socialist

Republic.
When the Simon Commission arrive! on 30 October for its
enquiry in Lahore, it was met by the usual “Go Back, Simon”
demonstration led by the veteran leader of Punjab, Lala Lajpat
Rai. The police tried to beat back the non-violent procession
and in the melee, Lajpat Rai was injured and he later died.
Mr Saunders (the Police Superintendent who had been in control
of the lathi-charge) was shot dead by Bhagat Singh, who was
the leader of the Punjab N^ujawan Bharat Sabha and a member
of the Hindustan Socialist. Republican Association. He managed
to escape with his associates. Bhagat Singe born in 1907., was
a nephew of the famous Ajit Singh. In 1928, the Naujawan
Bharat Sabha had also contacted the Kirti Kisan Party in the
Punjab, and in October Bhagat Singh and his comrades had
attended a meeting in Delhi near Ferozeshah Kotla for the for¬
mation of the Hindustan Socialist Republican Association
(HSRA). The Sabha believed that popular mass revolutionary
action could liberate the country from colonial slavery and put
forward the slogan ‘Revolution by the masses for the masses.’ It
also believed in the need for political explanatory work among
the villagers and emphasized that terrorism was only the first,
inevitable stage in the revolutionary struggle, its aim being to
arouse the masses through terrorist acts of individual heroism
and sacrifice.
Acting on these beliefs, the HSRA decided to emerge from
hiding, appear before the Indian people and take the full respon¬
sibility for their actions. On 8 April 1929 in the Central
Legislative Assembly, the Finance Member had just announced
the promulgation of the Special Ordinance bringing into force
the Trade Dispute Bill and Public Safety Amendment Bill. As a
gesture of protest against this autocratic repression, Bhagat
Singh and Batukeshwar Dutt threw a bomb from the visitors’
 INTIMATIONS OF FREEDOM 159

gallery at the government benches. They also hurled into the

Assembly Hall copies of publication entitled the ‘Red Pamphlet.’
No body was hurt, because the bomb which exploded noisily was
quite harmless. These revolutionaries did not want to kill or hurt
anyone. But as was explained in a leaflet, they wanted “to make
the deaf hear.” They then allowed themselves to be arrested so
that they could explain their ideology in public using the court
as a forum. vThis was what the Communists were also trying
to do at Meerut.
The ideologies of the Communist labour organizers and the
Hindustan Socialist Republican Association were different in
some basic aspects. Yet many similarities in methods and ideo¬
logy are apparent. In general, both groups presented to the
people an open challenge against the brutal repression and divi¬
sive tactics of British imperialism. Since the masses were not
prepared for Communism and the underprivileged lower-middle
class had a tradition of hero-worshiping of terrorists, since the
days of the 1905 movement, therefore, Bhagat Singh and the
HSRA captured the popular imagination most, and helped the
masses to rally to the civil disobedience movement, when it
started after the Lahore Congress. Congress itself was not really
united.
To Gandhiji and some of his close associates non-violence
was an article of faith. They could not under any circumstances
countenance violence and terrorism of any kind. They were
totally opposed to revolutionary activities. There were others
who had accepted Gandhiji, his leadership and his programme
of action as the best under the circumstances and the most likely
to succeed. They eschewed violence because they realized that
the fight with the Government would be unequal. These persons
felt that if the revolutionaries in their own way weakened
British rule or enlisted the support of the masses for the
freedom struggle, they might view terrorist activities as one
 160 FREEDOM STRUGGLE

more blow aimed at imperialism. There were also some who felt
that both kinds of agitation were necessary. Similarly, there
were differences inside the Congress as to socialism. Some were
honestly and sincerely leftist in their thinking. Others were as
clearly opposed to it. Gandhiji and his followers believed in a
political and economic programme which claimed to include in
it the egalitarian and anti-acquisitive principles of socialism,
and, even communism, but excluded such fundamental tenets as
State ownership and the superior importance of the community
over the individual. In fact, Gandhiji believed in the evolution
of the individual into a highly moral human being, so that the
society made up of such exemplary citizens would be an ideal one
in which the government would be required to govern very little.
For these reasons there were no real links between the revolu¬
tionary terrorists and Congress leaders though they had objectives
in common. Therefore, the response of the masses was to some
extent dissipated and weakened by lack of direction and guidance
from the leadership.
Similarly, the revolutionaries, themselves did not make full use
of the opportunities offered for a determined fight. Their sacri¬
fice and idealism in giving themselves up and the lack of a sense
of organization weakened the impact. A central dynamic mobi¬
lizing force appeared to be missing.
The government started a case against Bhagat Singh and his
x comrades which was called the Lahore Conspiracy Case. Some
Of the accused protested against being treated as common
criminals, and not as political prisoners, who had declared open
war against the Crown. To draw public attention to their stand
they went on a hunger-strike. Finally, the jail authorities were
compelled tolfeed them forcibly so that they would not die as
martyrs. But Latin Das whose last words were ‘I will stick to
the last’ refused to take food and medicine and died on
13 September 1929.
 INTIMATIONS OF FREEDOM 161

Bhagat Singh and many other revolutionary terrorists had

already, after 1925, imbibed some of the basic ideas of Marxism.
Now, many of them in jail and outside submitted to renewed
scrutiny the ideas of individual terrorism and heroism and finally
abandoned them in favour of the idea of a socialist revolution
by the masses. This led to a decline of terrorism in Northern
India.
A few other developments that preceded the Lahore Puma
Swaraj resolution of the Congress must be carefully noted
to understand in proper perspective the manner in which
the freedom struggle proceeded during the 1930s. The Labour
Party had come to power in the British General Elections.
Ramsay Macdonald, a socialist and an erstwhile friend of Indian
nationalism was the new Prime Minister. But he also tended to
defend the basic idea of the British empire, which disappointed
his Indian admirers, Lord Irwin, the Viceroy, went to England
for consultations and after returning to India issued a state¬
ment in October 1929, that following Simon Commission’s final
report, a Round Table Conference would be held to get the
greatest measure of agreement of all parties to the proposals.
An All-Party Conference (in late 1929 under Gandhiji and
Motilal Nehru’s leadership) signed a manifesto welcoming
the Irwin Declaration of October, and calling for general
amnesty to all political prisoners as evidence of British good
faith. Jawaharlal Nehru had at first planned to bring out a
more uncompromising counter-Manifesto, along with Subhas
Bose. But he was prevailed upon to add his signature to that of
his father and of Gandhiji, who had by now become his mentor.
Jinnah also agreed with the Delhi Manifesto, but would
have liked it to be in unconditional support of the Irwin
Declaration. Thus, just before the famous Independence
Resolution of the Lahore Congress, the nationalists presented a
far from united front. There were differences between the old
162 FREEDOM STRUGGLE

and the new, between the moderate leadership, whose authority

had begun to wane and the left-wing leaders who influenced
image, especially of the youth, between those who would
be content for the present with Dominion Status within the
empire and others who stood firm and uncompromising for
Purna Swaraj, between Gandhiji and Motilal on the one hand,
and, Jawaharlal Nehru, Subhas Bose and the radical group on
the other. In the midst of these differences it was Jawarharlal
Nehru who set the tone in the 1930s.
As it happened, the Viceroy’s own incapacity to commit the
British Government to even the concessions hoped for by the
Delhi Manifesto led to a breakdown of the growing friendliness
between Irwin and the anti-radicals. He informed Gandhiji,
Motilal and Jinnah who met him on 23 December, just before
the Lahore Congress that he would be unable to commit Govern¬
ment to any stand at the Round Table Conference. At the last
moment, Gandhiji swung over to accepting the left-wing’s
unconditional position on Purna Swaraj. “I have burned my
boats,” he is reported to have said. On the other hand some
felt that by joining the left-wing camp, he had weakened its
uncompromising position.
On 30 December, at Lahore, meeting in a town still profoundly
stirred by the activities of the Hindustan Socialist Republican
Association, the Congress accepted a resolution which, while
endorsing the Delhi Manifesto, stated that in view of Lord
Irwin’s stand, nothing was to be gained by the Congress partici¬
pating in a Round Table Conference. It declared that the
Nehru Report had also lapsed, and that it was now necessary
to start a campaign for complete independence.
The Congress resolution had described this campaign
as civil disobedience. This was interpreted by the no-Change
group as boycotting all legislative, executive and other govern¬
ment institutions. Gandhiji supported this because of his fear
 INTIMATIONS OF FREEDOM 163

of the violent revolution advocated by the youth. He stated that

“Civil Disobedience alone can save the country from impending
lawlessness and secret crime, since there is a party of violence
in the country which will not listen to speeches, resolutions or
conferences, but believes only in direct action.’’ The Swarajist
position of carrying the fight into- the legislatures had been
given up. But a resolution sponsored by Subhas Bose to orga¬
nize a constructively revolutionary campaign and moving that
“Co egress should aim at setting up a parallel Government in the
country, and to that end, should take in hand the task of orga¬
nizing the workers, peasants and youths,” was defeated.
Yet, while recognizing the contradictions which weakened
the internal structure of the freedom movement, we cannot ignore
the genuineness of the spirit of unity which prevailed on
1 January 1930. The broad masses of India sympathized with
the Congress demand for Puma Swaraj. The demand made sense
not only to the youth, but also to the older generation and to
Moderate Swarajists and no-Changers in the Congress. They
sincerely felt at the time that the Government would not
irust the Indian people with self-government and, that Indepen¬
dence was the only way in which India could progress. The
Muslim League, local groups of collaborationists and the Libe¬
rals were the only ones who did not endorse the demand for
Purna Swaraj, and they were in a minority. To this extent, the
feeling of overall unity which the ‘Go Back, Simon’ movement
bad created still continued.
The desire of Subhas Bose and others for the formation of
small, local groups to oganize the campaign for independence
cannot be ignored. But the mass support given to the move¬
ment in 1930 all over India, was largely the result of Gandhiji’s
message of nationality, self-respect and constructive work in the
villages.
164 FREEDOM STRUGGLE

PREPARATIONS FOR THE CIVIL DISOBEDIENCE CAMPAIGN

January 1930, was a month of high enthusiasm in India. No

date had been set for the opening of the campaign; nor had any
programme been drawn up. These had been left to Gandhiji to
decide. Gandhiji, in his turn, had given a verbal assurance
that the movement would not be suspended or called off as
had happened after the Chauri Chaura incident. Nehru has
referred to this in his autobiography :

He (i.e. Gandhiji) did give us the impression that civil

disobedience when it came, will not be stopped because of a
sporadic act of violence... This assurance went a long way in
satisfying many of us.

A Manifesto or Pledge of Independence to be publicly

taken all over India by as many people as possible on the
26 January 1930 was, however, adopted. On this date civil
disobedience was supposed to commence. It was declared
Independence Day.
The Independence Pledge started by declaring in language
which appealed to all anti-imperialists, liberals, radical democrats
and socialists alike, the reasons for opening the campaign.

We believe that it is the inalienable right of the Indian

people as of any other people, to have freedom and to enjoy the
fruits of their toil and have the necessities of life so that they
may have full opportunities o. growth. We believe also that jf
any Government deprives the people of these rights and
oppresses them, the people have a further right to alter it or to
abolish it. The British Government in India has not only
deprived the Indian people of their freedom, but has based
itself on the exploitation of the masses, and has ruined India
 INTIMATIONS OF FREEDOM 165

economically, politically, culturally and spiritually. We believe,

therefore, that India must severe the British connection and
attain Purna Swaraj or complete independence.

But for the very reason that the pledge was to appeal to all
sections and groups alike, it left out certain controversial issues.
The destruction of the ancient handicrafts and agricultural
production by which the village peasantry had subsisted for
centuries was mentioned as the cause for the economic ruination
of the country; and the continuance in new forms of the drain
of wealth to Britain was also referred to. No mention was, how¬
ever, made of the problems of modern industrialization which
had equally suffered from imperialist discrimination. The
political ruination was attributed to the “system of educa¬
tion,” a very inadequate explanation, indeed. The spiritual
ruin was, the pledge suggested, the result of compulsory dis¬
armament, Indians not being permitted to bear arms and the
presence of ‘an army of occupation’ and the consequent spirit of
dependence on foreign military strength for internal security.
From all this followed the justification for Gandhian non-violent
civil disobedience as a weapon in the freedom struggle :

We recognize that the most effective way of gaining our

freedom is not through violence. We will, therefore, prepare
ourselves by withdrawing, so far as we can, all voluntary
association from the British Government and will prepare for
civil disobedience, including non-payment of taxes. We are
convinced that if we can but withdraw our voluntary help
and stop payment of taxes without doing violence even under
provocation, the end of this inhuman rule is assured.

Then followed a sentence pledging obedience to Congress

instructions from time to time for establishing Purna Swaraj.
 166 FREEDOM STRUGGLE

Socialist ideas were not reflected in the analysis of ‘the

fourfold disaster’ that had overtaken the country. The method
adopted by the Working Committee was an appeal to the
alien rulers to undergo a change of heart. But its success
depended on the attitude of the ruling class.
An article written at this time by Gandhiji in his paper, Young
India enumerated ‘eleven points’ of administrative reform; if
Lord Irwin accepted them, Gandhiji believed, the call for civil
disobedience could be withdrawn. He was still not sure of his
pian of action. Asked by the great Indian poet and nationalist,
Rabindranath Tagore, who was far more radical, Gandhiji
replied :

I am thinking furiously, day and night, and I do not see

any light coming out of the darkness.

As late as 6 March, he wrote to Irwin asking for immediate

removal of the evils enumerated in the ‘eleven points’ and
indicating that otherwise he would have to break British laws in
a manner, which would be comprehensible to the peasantry.
Jawaharlal Nehru was compelled to remark in his autobiography :

What was the point of making a list j^our political and

social reforms when we were talkipgTn terms of Independence.
Did Gandhiji mean the same Thing when he used this term
as we did or did we speak a different language ?

THE SALT SATYAGRAHA

Finally, Gandhiji took the decision. He would leave his

Sabarmati Ashram accompanied by 78 selected followers on
12 March 1930 and walk 200-miles through the Gujarat villages
to Dandi on the sea coast. There Gandhiji and his followers
 INTIMATIONS OF FREEDOM 167

would break the law by manufacturing illegally, but openly, salt

from the sea. National consciousness, in general, was electrified
when Gandhiji began his Dandi March. As he walked, leaning on
his stick, frail and peasant-like figure, villagers flocked to see
Gandhiji on his way to break a law which by taxes, increased
the price of a daily necessity. Volunteers poured into his ranks
to join what became a non-violent column marching on Dandi.
In the large towns all over India, a fever of enthusiasm grew
among the lower-middle classes. One expression of this, was
the entry of women into the civil disobedience movement. In the
Young India on 30 April, Gandhiji had appealed to Indian women
to take up spinning yarn on the charkha, and, to come out of
their household seclusion and picket shops selling foreign goods
or liquor and Government institutions. Previously only a few
women, mostly from the families of national leaders like C. R.
Das and Motilal Nehru, or, some college students in the large
cities had taken part in public political demonstrations. Now
far more women joined the movement and courted arrest. In
Delhi alone, which in those days was a socially conservative city,
1,600, women were imprisoned for political activity. In Bombay
middle class women in large numbers joined the national
struggle. Even British observers wrote that if the civil disobe¬
dience movement had not accomplished anything else, it had
contributed greatly to the mass social emancipation of Indian
women. This was one of its positive aspects. It accomplished
in weeks, what three-quarters of a century of social reform
movements had failed to do for the emancipation of Indian
women
Meanwhile, through the summer heat of April and May 1930,
the rank and file volunteers defied the salt laws. Gandhiji was
arrested before he could offer Satyagraha and make salt at the
government depot at Dharasana. His place was taken U&-
leader of movement by Abbas Tayabji, scion of the great Bomb/ay
168 FREEDOM STRUGGLE

family of nationalist Muslims; he too was arrested. The next

leader was the fiery poet and nationalist, Sarojini Naidu. Her
attempt to raid Dharasana on 21 May, has been vividly
described by an American journalist, Webb Miller, who had
with great difficulty reached the spot.

Mrne Naidu called for prayer before the March started and
the entire assemblage knelt. She exhorted them : “India’s
prestige is in our hands... You will be beaten but you must
not resist : you must not even raise a hand to ward off blows.
Shrill cheers terminated her speech.
Slowly and in silence the throng commenced the half-mile
March to the salt depots... The salt-deposits were surrounded
by ditches filled with water and guarded by four hundred
native Surat police... Half a dozen British officials commanded
them. The police carried lathis —five-foot clubs tipped with
steel. Inside the (barbed wire) stockade, twentyfive rifle-men
were drawn up.
...Police officials ordered the marchers to disperse under a
recently imposed regulation which prohibited gathering of
more than five people in any one place. A picked column
silently ignored the warning and walked forward... scores of
native police rushed upon the advancing marchers and rained
blows on their heads with their steel-shod lathis. Not one of
the marchers raised an arm to fend off the blows... I heard
the sickening whacks of the clubs on unprotected skulls. The
waiting crowd of watchers groaned and sucked in their
breaths in sympathetic pain at each blow.
...In two or three minutes the ground was quilted with
bodies. Great patches of blood widened on their white
clothes. .. When everyone of the first column had been knocked
down, stretcher-bearers rushed up unmolested by the police
and carried off the injured...
 1* GREAT MARCH FOR LIBERTY, BEGINS.
Mahatma Starts With His Chosen Band Of 78, LABOUR GOVT. CANT
*«*>**sr :*%º*** xa*X
PLAY TORY GAME '
RUMOURS OF IMPENDING ARREST
3Cm mm* ‘Daily Herald” Quotes Burke
BELIED. * IAPAH.
On “Great Empire & little !
>'tetoduBm W&&Chimse Ait» V®n5m.
xitakm Knotted Minds”
Ashram Bested By Eager Crowds: 'M£8&ftC* or SALT"
umoott. mm. at
“NO REPRESSIVE POLICY
aaiaosjwa. to* *%
smL-srmmc scmzs m mmm umwBii. \*?^*** **
-*w>**rp»W
B*www««
t* o»a. smkw*
* fctfctt oww». «S
n*irt
« W SM
** ‘ IN INDIA”.
, Ksowtews -kb* bow** Qx *ro-«. -saw t«
>•**4* *a«r*i»a *•»««# t*
.^W^.-vvVVVW umjtv*. sews n
1,090 WOMEN PARTICIPATE IN HUGE PSQCESSION. .
Ati*t o» «*>»* to»#*w
„
a**-
_
reboot*
.'%ttAPVt
ct a*» to*s--.
a t Q» to»to %
w.«*tow rswkc «
* 4a Hdtott. toWt*» U t&* ; •• -„
uttimwatw 4 :»vc«t« to»s (aw toto* <P»to*rt»W:i to ^
— » tt» ««*» an »r jwtotowi toe«w «*t*« mi#*** m*» f&m. »? % *»
i c **«»** toto**** few*ar w^to-t t*w» «« .-.tiawto trr <w tw totrf towettotts* «: »>sa <w trttotof ae*?wr »» **-;t»*r »% *% »»»-*• » wr*!4**
nmrtax ** »-»» » -tt W tto» Mtofto* ottr<* tSJ tm*w J toAtm 1*» to*n «fr %- it «w4*rts!jwOT to»»R aat «* tstotr
tar MU V «*«*. Jtttoi » fajrf otot »aw- - tt« wm «srea»fc _ . tt» Vto*s.»? ttott WtoW to tjm *6
«f W» toto**'' **£ tton* *wrf*l «*J»- to »9 »w nuslM V» 7V« _ .. powstott; txmc-ay to * totowtote* '““ *" *~*4“ “-**A‘
'to aw *w«». to- SJa^-aw b*» w» -*«««* ot tow* <fcto««s s»t* Kat&i*e ‘U Urarpty tmnentur ^aa> e*itio* SSiww at Ow wm.' •-''tttot-t war tot
w totw «-»» «w t*»to»-*a to « to** »>“« »« «mw Wes* « itoto »*as-t»aw wa a*M> wwjw TIPS SORKMSit 0r«M4t " a* » m *»es tto o*a»»y ^s>**t^to toaw^ rwtotoatto »A *
.*»<* <*% *Jtcrtr »*» ft-**-*** •<•)** JW
»»» wftt-i* fwe*w .&fcm «tt* ttuoaxu
*«4
»««w«a
**tft
t
' . ‘ **“ jtoto jwtotvtoj w .feS2?%2S2S &!
tsft •»«««“. l«to«» to Sms st . . . .
? tow* towtn* Stto«toi*4 to* j-wtr «>»*» ***» **« to juhs tr w-jv4» ftw flaxy .»:«»»»% «% » •m-ww*
:*aMt #, » t» a* »»»« u*t« »*«**«< *« «»**** «*« m»<- taw rwR «*stor» «r k»s«>*»* tswt «*' «w- *w<w ttot »:s*.p3».tt* **r«a to*-*»» ^** £**??*:
fteao «*rt « o>« it*xmnt nt ts>*xttt tow n**t*»t> .... 'tat Jftot ftspa *B* swotot* to itoto to« ta^wtaw
«HM -ft -Wto MfttortftT tut 'U> as fctw flw SttStotoW*’-
w_„,
trust raw —
ttoo , ’nr*
„„ .
tosatatw . . aw* . at wtoptoHmt* tS »rf*a w
*> «aeto fat totwt «*» ^
! lrf>M irte- *9 «*** to* **«n*y tow tttot t<to 6*tf> _ 85*« ««*« <» wo trow! «sw« >p*ut mm a u mm** w* !to*» »a**s> » t«*. ^waaa#. tu> . wto w ft»t tt
;»to *w r*fcv*«<-* wWto to tow-Mtoca «•..<• *tto >«»«*>• cMtottw cto «t8to« itowtwa.^^toetoTtoiW «w*r »o*.«»a.-*ot »>a-»»» w*«
S*$t a* **» eo-twscwj*,. Oran* «*«<**<* !««
f
WtMw
VtoMsr *toto
*t C<w***f*» ft»»
to*w» tor «*y
to Ito» »tw»to»
"Wr (**•>*«»«*
tBto »<>«* *JW«r t»#to
<w>l «« w»*«wm»
% v«SA.i*.
rr - “**“®*’
t VVSVVWVVVWVWVVVVV'
isrsMTSsaatSS#®1
::^ »•'»«»,
„ jur’Jmzius.nss
tttmtAH. to* ttwto
trttoto* *T «* Wtofe -to tows *t Ok* »W«»»S*to * 14- - — of **-
— tftw t SBt <toft st«
W P±* %naO*& * srtort * trto* an to* trruH y*» tosewt^i »S SV% PtA* ttoto «r* W t^tit iafts «W*nft, wtaefc ‘ ‘> fttoj
U~*-» »*» -vstow to“«* c fcfttoto*. *% ** '- tto! loo** »p» Ctoto* WISW5 -watttoi*. ito«*!*t tsamwatofttoi: ttttWto
; tft «*« os*« w tmrmt ttu * ««wr«!to ii fttto
. » sjt* »««»• t< a# «mt» t*«-
^1. n : to*toa iw s*ft stotorftw »», **,*< toetwftto—- ;
'rn&mk to V*to»^ sewatsto tttvemx&i-
5 fttwtsasAfttt*, to*«a »
? ; toi*»ftttw tfatoM* atoato ~ no « % £ JS 0**0*”
r%11u %%i >•
&^;Wa*;jw«:»
“ :*s¥tfcft!ft
.. - A
to*
s (MS itoftftt ewt tt»to fti
• '. «j» ft* *»*«*- ««««»
•-'! a* *tok tt '
^
.£»’«J*»5»s2^si!!S?S?54S»^SS?«Ei
~.V
jf tv>. itoea aesattotto* totwto*.
t>«- , T % % >-•%
%- ««««• ,*M«f TO*** SWOBS* W6*
sssrine «S: rs^?s^s
* tto* «!**» to Cwtot «» «to!! * flMr EKAatw* J
o**a tbssr JuiUw. toatto c>i.„ n. , Tto^~* V3*toli-2u ««»*• toa* to i

Press Coverage for Dandi March

Gandhiji breaking the Salt law at Dandi Khan Abdul Ghaffar Khan
Krishna Menon, General Liste and Jawaharlal Nehru in Spain, 1938
 Subhash Bose, Nehru, Gandhi and Patel

C. Rajagopalachari Abul Kalam Azad

 A Women's Regiment of the I.N.A.

Jayaprakash Narayan Ram Manohar Lohia

 INTIMATIONS OF FREEDOM lf$9
Then another column formed while their leaders pleaded
with them to retain their self-control... They marched... with¬
out the encouragement of music or cheering or any possibility
that they might escape serious injury or death. The polic$
rushed out and methodically and mechanically beat down tfc
second column... I say eighteen injured being carried of
simultaneously, while fortytwo still lay bleeding on th>
ground awaiting stretcher-bearers.

Then followed a detailed description of Indian policemen

advancing into the waiting crowd and beating them down as
they sat waiting, after refusing an order to disperse. Miller’s
own reaction was :

At times, the spectacle of unresisting men being methodically

bashed into bloody pulp sickened me so much that I had to
turn away... I felt an indefinable sense of helpless rage ard
loathing...

Non-violent organization nearly broke down several times.

The leaders had to exhort the intensely excited men to remember
Gandhiji’s instructions. It seemed that the unarmed throng was
on the verge of launching a mass assault on the police. The
British police superintendent got his riflemen on to a small
hillock, ready to fire into the crowd. But the leaders, managed
to keep the volunteers in check.
By 11 00 a.m. that forenoon it had become very hot; the
temperature had risen to 116°F and the demonstrations subsided.
320 people had been severely wounded, 2 had died, and, there
were only few nationalist doctors in attendance. When Miller
attempted to send the story to the world Press, it was at first
stopped by the authorities and then censored. Much later he
published it in a book.
 170 FREEDOM STRUGGLE

Demonstrations were organized throughout India against

Gandhiji’s arrest. In Bombay, riots broke out at Bhendi Bazar
and at Wadala, the salt pans, but the procession which marched
through the European quarters was entirely non-violent. In
Madras, police beating was indiscriminate. Boycott of British
cloth was highest in Bengal, Bihar and Orissa; in the U. P., the
peasants and zamindars were called upon to withhold all pay¬
ment of revenues, and after October, peasants were asked to
withhold rent to the zamindars. In the Central Provinces
Satyagraha was launched against forest taxes. In Karnataka, a
successful no-tax campaign was launched.
The movement spread quickly and reached the farthest areas
of the country. In the western hills of the North-West Frontier
Province, there had been frequent uprisings against British rule
by Pathan tribesmen. The people of Dera Ismail Khan and Pesha¬
war and the river valley of Bannu and Kohat lived in relatively
more settled agricultural conditions under local chiefs. Khan
Abdul Ghaffar Khan, one of the chiefs from the village Utmanzai
near Peshawar had started the first Pathan educational society.
For his activities in support of the Hijratand pro-Afghan move¬
ments in 1919, he had been kept in prison and then in exile from
the Province for a long time. He returned just before 1929. With
his elder brother, Doctor Khan Sahib, who had had the benefit
of modern education, he had organized many Pathans in support
of the non-violent Gandhian movement. Abdul Ghaffar Khan,
who was reputed for his strength of character and determination
came to be known as ‘Frontier Gandhi’. He organized first a
nationalist wing of the Pathan Jirgah or tribal council. This
wing similar to the Congress volunteer units, was known as the-
Khudai Khidmatgars, the Servants of God. Because of the uni¬
forms they wore they came to be popularly known as Red Shirts.
They called for Pathan regional nationalist unity and a struggle
against colopialism and the impoverishment of the handicraft
 INTIMATIONS OP FREEDOM 171

workers. They gained the support of the masses, both the poor
peasants and the urban handicraft workers. In 1930 the Khudai
Khidmatgars were about 80,000 strong. Abdul Ghaffar Khan
found it more difficult to control the violent passions of his
followers than did the Gandhian leadership in other parts of
the country.
In Peshawar, the civil disobedience campaign was due to
start on 20 April, when large numbers of poor peasants had
gathered for the Id celebrations. Many frontier tribesmen,
due to return home after seasonal work in the plains, were
present to take part in the celebrations. When local Congress¬
men were arrested, the urban crowd rose in protest and endeav¬
oured to free them from the police. The tribesmen joined in.
Tempers rose and shots were fired from both sides. A popular
uprising ensued. Barricades were raised against British armoured
cars, which were sent in to crush the Peshawar uprising. The
officials and the urban, upper class gentry took refuge within the
military cantonment. Meanwhile, the Akalis, the militant Sikhjre-
formers and nationalists, were fomenting revolt among the ImMn
soldiers of the army. When two platoons of the Royal Garhwal
Rifles, crack hill soldiers, were ordered to fire on the crowd,
they responded to the appeal of one of their comrades, Chander
Singh Garhwali, and refused to fire and began to fraternise with
their Muslim Pathan brethren. This was once again proof pf
the weakness of the British policy of ‘Divide and Rule.’ If the
exploited people could in advance be educated to remain united,
the policy could not succeed.
The Garhwali platoons were surrounded by British troops
from the cantonment and later court-martialled. A few of their
leaders were executed'for mutiny. However, early in May, the
Afridi and Mohmand tribes in the hills revolted and marched
on Peshawar to join the town uprising. In the Punjab, there
was a show of solidarity for Peshawar, principally by the Akalis,
172 FREEDOM STRUGGLE

who sent a detachment to help the local agitators. This

detachment was held dp by the British army at the river Jhelum.
And finally, a British military punitive expedition marched into
the North-West Frontier Province and drove the tribesmen back
into the hills.
In the East Bengal port of Chittagong, an armed uprising was
attempted by the local lower-middle class youths led ’by a
veteran terrorist, Surya Sen. They planned to launch simul¬
taneous attacks on British armouries in East Bengal.
Surya Sen’s lieutenants, Ambika Chakraborty, a local Con¬
gressman, Loknath Bal, and, Ganesh Ghosh, who later became
a prominent Communist, mobilized local college and school
students, who included young boys like Ananda Gupta and
Tegra (Tiger) Bal, as well as as, courageous young women like
Kalpana Dutt and Pritilata Wadedar.
A manifesto issued by Surya Sen in the name of the Indian
Republican Army, Chittagong Branch, called on Indians to
rise in war against British rule. He and his followers set out
to attack the Europeans in Chittagong at four centres. The
police armoury was raided by 50 youths clad in British Indian
army uniforms for disguise. This episode came to be called the
Chittagong Armoury Raid.
But in their hurry, the raiders had failed to take cartridges for
the Lewis guns and the rifles which they had captured. A
small and poorly-equipped Government force under the Deputy
Inspector-General of Police was able to force them to retreat
from the town into the hills beyond Chittagong. On the 22 May
fiftyseven of the revolutionaries were surrounded on the Jalala¬
bad range by a British regiment. Still many of them managed
to escape to continue guerilla warfare, by the most 64 British
troops had been killed. The youngest of the revolutionaries,
Tegra Bal was mortally wounded by one of the first shots and
his last words to Lokenath were “I am going, fight to the last.”
 INTIMATIONS OF FREEDOM 173

After this revolutionary terrorism spread in Bengal. In August

Benoy Bose, a student in the Dacca Mitford Hospital School
&hot at and killed a senior British police official and then escaped.
In December, with two others* Badai and Dinesh, he entered the
Writers’ Buildings, the Government Headquarters in Dalhousie
Square in Calcutta. They shot down the Inspector-General of
Prisons in his office and then ran through a corridor shooting at
any European officers they saw. Rather than be captured,
Badai took cyanide and died, while Benoy and Dinesh shot
themselves. Benoy Bose died within a few days, but Dinesh
recovered and was then tried and hanged.
Terrorism was kept alive in the north by the veteran,
Chandrasekhar Azad. The police captured his aides and his
sources of supply were unearthed. In February 1931, betrayed
to the police, Chandrasekhar died, fighting to the last at Alfred
Park in Allahabad.
Previously, in 1930, the Government had taken supra-legal
powers under the Lahore Conspiracy Case Ordinance, which
enabled them to try Bhagat Singh and his comrades without the
usual rules of evidence and right of appeal. On 7 October,
Bhagat Singh, Sukhdev and Rajguru were condemned to death
and others sentenced to transporation for life. Many of them
were confined in the notorious Cellular Prisons in Port Blair in
Andamans.
These revolutionary terrorist attacks reflect the patriotic urges
of the East Bengal and U.P. lower-middle class youth. These
urges could not find expression through the traditional channels
of the nationalist movement. The Gandhian philosophy of
non-violence did not appeal to their imagination either. Hence
they turned to terrorism. But their acts of violence carried
within them the seeds of their own doom. Despite the courage
of the boys and girls, who participated, they were bound to be
unsuccessful in the face of the police aqd military might of the
174 FREEDOM STRUGGLE

Government. There was no real panic on the part of the British,

only a grimmer determination to root out and destroy the
revolutionary terrorists. One reason was that sympathetic
popular uprisings did not follow in the wake of terrorist attacks.
The masses were not yet ready to participate in or bring about
a violent revolution for they were neither trained in politics
nor organized by the revolutionaries.
Another popular uprising took place in Sholapur in Southern
Maharashtra. Here the civil disobedience movement was
opened in May by a ‘War Council’ set up by the local
Congress Committee. The national flag was hoisted in the
town, while the police and other civilian officials loyal to
the British Raj retreated to the railway station. The British
administration imposed a black <?ut on news from Sholapur,
2,000 British troops had to be sent to put down the uprising.
Many of the rebel revolutionaries were hanged or imprisoned.
Alongside these revolutionary activities many peasant move¬
ments grew. The no-tax campaign of the 1930s gave rise to
these movements but their origins lay deeper in the exploitation
of the peasants by landlords. Due to the world capitalist crisis,
international market prices of agricultural commodities had
fallen. As the peasants’ share in profits from saie declined,
they became increasingly unable to pay dues to landlords, in the
shape of rent, and to the state, in the form of land revenue and
other taxes.
The U,P. Congress (of which Jawaharlal Nehru was the presi¬
dent) passed a resolution in March 1930, proposing that the
national programme should include reduction of the land tax,
a moratorium on all debts with only partial compensation to
moneylenders and also reduction of the arbitrary powers of
landlords to evict tenants. The Congress Working Committee
accepted the first point, which satisfied landlords as well as
peasants, but not the others.
 INTIMATIONS OF FRBEDOM 175

The no-tax campaign started in Allahabad district in Awadh

where M. N. Roy and his followers joined the Congress in
spreading socialist ideas in the villages. In Kishorganj in East
Bengal, a region which grew only jute, the drop in world jute
prices, a direct result of the world capitalist depression, hit
all the peasants who cultivated jute. They stopped paying rent
and received support and sympathy from Calcutta workers.
Troops had to be sent to Kishorganj to stamp out the peasant
movement. In Buldana district in Berar, in December, the cultiva¬
tors suffered from the merciless fleecing of merchants and money¬
lenders who bought up the cotton crop which was their predomi¬
nant produce. The local landlords increased the exploitation of
the tenants and agricultural labourers. So the Buldana labourers
and cultivators formed a peasant union which called for non¬
payment of taxes, rent and interest. Organized peasant volun¬
teers resisted British tax officials and marched to the beat of
drums from village to village, confiscating moneylenders’
and landlords’ property and crops and setting their houses on
fire. This action united various castes, as well as Hindus and
Muslims, and was a genuine uprising of the rural poor. Again
troops had to be sent to Buldana to reinforce the police and
crush the uprising.
Such peasant revolts were not taken note of by the world public
or even the Indian nation in the way that Gandhiji’s Dandi March
drew attention. But they formed the early nucleus of the All-India
Kisan Sabha which greatly mobilized the peasantry to the con¬
sciousness that imperialism was the cause of the conditions
under which they were being exploited. The militant peasantry
fought for their own class, but they also sympathized with the
courageous urban revolutionaries who worked in the countryside.
Thus we find that different strands entered the mass movements
which flowed from the 1930 civil disobedience campaign and not
all of them were organized in terms of Gandhian non-violence.
176 FREEDOM STRUGGLE

GOVERNMENT RESPONSE

Even before the popular uprisings took a violent turn, Govern¬

ment reaction was far from conciliatory. It was, in fact,
quite provocative. In late April, ordinances were passed,
demanding securities from the Press and outlawing the Con¬
gress organizations; Government was authorized to confiscate
the property of the latter. Those who broke laws were arrested
en masse and the Congress leaders were put in prison by early
May. Then commenced a reign of terror on the rank and file
of the Congress cadres and their sympathizers.
The Congress appointed a non-official Commission to investi¬
gate charges of terror brought by various people against the
Government. The Commission’s findings were published under
the title The Congress Indictment and contained many instances
of official terrorising in different parts of India. A common
story was of brutalities committed by British soldiers on passers-
by, men as well as women, in cities after popular outbreaks
had occurred there. In Madras, we hear for the first time of a
practice later to become common all over India.
i

The police made a new departure in prosecuting people as

forming an unlawful assembly, by gathering together a num¬
ber of picketersfrom various centres, putting them in a lorry,
taking them a long distance from the city and leaving them
there to find their way back as well as they could without any
money.

In Ankola and Siddapur talukas of Karnataka, 330 families

consisting of 2,000 people had their lands confiscated; 166 houses
were forfeited, and movable property was attached. The pena¬
lised people were generally poor and with very limited assets.
In Siddapur, 37 women Satyagrahis fasted at the doors of those
 INTIMATIONS OF FREEDOM 177

who had bought the property that had been confiscated and
later auctioned. But the fact that there were still people
prepared to buy the property showed that the Gandhian philo¬
sophy had not yet been accepted by the entire nation.
In Bengal, firing and lathi charges were the order of the day.
Police entered the buildings of the Calcutta University and in
the class-room mercilessly beat innocent students. In Gujarat,
the peasants began to migrate across the border to the princely
state of Baroda. Reporting this Strange migration, H. N.
Brailsford, an English friend of the Indian people, wrote :

A few burned the rich crop which they were too late to
remove. I visited one of their camps. They have buik tem¬
porary shelters with matting for walls and palm leaves on
sacking for roof... I asked a big group of them why they had
left their homes. The women gave the promptest and simplest
answer : “Because Gandhiji is in prison.” The men were
still conscious of an economic grievance; ‘farming does not
pay and the tax is unjust.’ One or two said, ‘to win Swaraj’.

Brailsford reported in detail how the Surat police intimidated

the people who wanted to return.
In the Midnapur district of West Bengal the Gurkha troops
and punitive police unleashed a reign of terror which did not
spare even the honour of women. Simple peasants cheerfully
bore the wanton distribution of their nuts and all the little
possessions they had on earth, but still refused to pay taxes.

THE FIRST ROUND TABLB CONFERENCE

In mid- 1930, the Simon Commission submitted its Report.

In November, the British Government convened in London
the first Round Table Conference, the British version of
178 FREEDOM STRUGGLE

an All-Parties Convention, under Ramsay Macdonald’s own

chairmanship. This conference was naturally boycotted by the
Congress. The other Indian mambers and representatives of
the Indian Princes agreed that an Indian Federation including
the Native States should be formed with a parliamentary
system of Government. Dominion Status with the Cabinet form
of executive based on collective responsibility was acceptable to
the conference.
Soon after, members of the Congress Working Committee who
were in prison were released. When the Round Table Confe¬
rence delegates arrived back in India. Tej Bahadur Sapru met
Gandhiji and prevailed on him to meet Lord Irwin and negotiate
a settlement in the name of the Congress.
Meanwhile, in December 1930, the Muslim League in its
Allahabad session had openly opposed the civil disobedience
campaign. This enabled Lord Irwin to claim that Gandhiji was
not speaking for these interests and, therefore, did not represent
the entire Indian nation, which was the Congress position.

GANDHI-IRWIN PACT

From 17 February to 5 March Gandhiji negotiated with the

Viceroy in Delhi for a settlement. The Independence Resolution
of the Congress and the 26 January pledge were ignored in the
negotiations. This caused great pain to Nehru as well as to other
leftist leaders. Gandhiji agreed, that Congress would open dis¬
cussions on the basis of agreements reached at the first Round
Table Conference. The civil disobedience campaign would be
called off with some assurance by Government that indemnities
would be paid to those who had suffered in it. The Working
Committee was divided when it met on 5 March 1931, at
2.30 a.m. to discuss the results of the talks. Many people hailed it
 INTIMATIONS op freedom \n

as a victory because the Viceroy had to negotiate a settlement.

Others were not happy. Gandhiji had personally to explain
his views to Jawaharlal Nehru privately. Nehru wrote later :

The interpretation (of clause 2 of the agreement which opened

the possibility of discussions on the form of government)
seemed to me to be a forced argument and I was not convinced
but I was somewhat soothed by his talk... For a day or two I
wobbled not knowing what to do. There was no question of
preventing that agreement then...

In fact on 5 March itself the agreement was signed by the two

parties and came to be known as the Gandhi-Irwin Pact.
In his talks with the Viceroy, Gandhiji had raised various other
points. One was the question of amnesty to those political
prisoners who had been “convicted for violence” under the
Special Ordinances. Gandhiji had, in fact, pleaded for the with¬
drawal of these ordinances. He had also wanted reparations to be
paid to those whose lands had been confiscated. He had also
asked for the end of the government salt monopoly. On all these
questions raised by Gandhiji, Irwin was adamant. He agreed to
lower the land tax slightly in some areas. But on the major issue
of Gandhiji’s request for remitting the death sentence on Bhagat
Singh, Sukhdev and Rajguru he not only firmly refused, but
would not agree even to hold up the matter. They were executed
on 23 March. On various questions the repressive measures of
the government were in no way relaxed and Gandhiji failed to
obtain the concessions he had wanted.

THE KARACHI CONGRESS

The Congress met for the first time after Lahore in Karachi,
on 29 March, six days after the execution of Bhagat Singh,
 180 FREEDOM STRUGGLE

Sukhdev and Rajguru. According to Pattabhi Sitaramayya,

the official historian of the Congress, “at that moment, Bhagat
Singh’s name was as widely known all over India and was as
popular as Gandhiji’s.’’ In fact, hostile demonstrations greeted
Gandhiji when he arrived for the Karachi Congress and a resolu¬
tion was proposed for adoption at the session which praised the
bravery and self-sacrifice of the terrorists. This was against the
non-violent orthodoxy of the body, and Gandhiji accepted it only
after a preliminary clause had been added to it. As amended it
read : “The Congress, while dissociating it self from and disapprov¬
ing of political violence in any shape or form, places on record
its admiration of the bravery and sacrifice of...”
This amendment was opposed by the youth volunteers with
Subhas Bose’s support, but they failed, though by a very narrow
majority of votes.
In general, the Karachi session’s major political resolution
went back to the compromise position of the Madras and Calcutta
sessions. It called for Puma Swaraj, but also accepted the
Gandhi-Irwin Pact which opened the way for re-consideration
of objectives. Not unnaturally, the wave of enthusiasm of
January 1930 began to recede somewhat. There was little scope
for peoples’ participation in the prevailing situation. It was up to
the leaders to decide the next step.
But in one respect, the Karachi Congress marks another step
forward from January 1930. A resolution was adopted on
Fundamental Rights and Economic Policy which represented the
Party’s political, economic, and social programme of democracy
for the future. This had not previously been formulated in clear
terms. The main points were :

(i) Assurance of popular fundamental rights;

(ii^ Removal of caste and religious disabilities of all sections
of the people;
 INTIMATIONS of freedom 181

(iii) Development of regional national languages and establish¬

ment of Indian provinces on a linguistic basis;
(iv) Reduction of taxes;
(v) Prohibition of begar or forced labour, in vogue in back¬
ward regions and many of the Native States;
(vi) Abolition of salt duty; and
(vii) Protection of the special rights of workers, such as healthy
working conditions, minimum living wage, unemployment
insurance, an 8-hour day and paid holidays.

Congress also began to work on evolving their agrarian pro¬

gramme, though the Karachi Congress found itself unable to
demand abolition of the large estates of the semi-feudal land¬
lords. This trend shows, how despite the virtual defeat of the
left revolutionary trend in the activities of 1930, the national
leadership had to accept some of the tenets at least of a radical
democracy, as a result of the mass upsurge of the previous four
years. The nationalist leadership now had to move under the
banner of these democratic principles for the rest of the period of
the freedom struggle. Thus, the Karachi session while it repre¬
sents the political victory of the Gandhian policy of eliminating
conflicts both internal and external, through the logic of persua¬
sion, marks also the introduction of the radical and socialist
trend as a predominant element in the Congress programme.

SECOND ROUND TABLB CONFERENCE AND

I HE COMMUNAL QUESTION

Simultaneously with the Congress, the Workers and Peasants

Party and the All-India Youth League met in Karachi. The for¬
mer adopted a programme on labour and the peasant question
which went much farther than the Congress Resolution on Funda-
182 FREEDOM STRUGGLE

mental Rights and Economic Policy. The latter called for conti¬
nuance of the fight for Purna Swaraj. It also condemned the
Gandhi-Irwin Pact and the Congress decision to participate in
the second Round Table Conference.
On the other hand, the communal problem was increasing in
intensity. Already, on 24 and 25 March, a violent com¬
munal riot had taken place at Kanpur, resulting in some deaths
on both sides. This marked the recrudescence of communal
rioting, which was followed by the declaration by Jinnah and the
reactionary Muslim groups of their disunity with the Congress
political programme.
From April to June 1931, the Congress debated presentation
of its views at the second Round Table Conference. Instead of
sending a fairly large delegation which the Government was will¬
ing to accommodate, only Gandhiji was selected to represent the
Congress. Had nationalist Muslims like Dr Ansari accompanied
Gandhiji as Congressmen to London, British public opinion
might have been convinced that the Congress did represent
progressive Muslim opinion. Instead, the Congress hoped that
Ansari would be nominated to the Conference in his own right.
Also, as Subhas Bose had pointed out, Gandhiji had begun to
say that “if the Muslims made a united demand on the question
of representation, electorate, etc., in the new Constitution, he
would accept the demand.” This strengthened the resolve of
‘the reactionary Muslims.’ What led Gandhiji later to state
categorically that he would not accept the demand for separate
electorates, was Subhas Bose’s firmness and a statement made
by nationalist Muslims :

If for any reason Gandhiji gave up the demand for a

common electorate for both Hindus and Muslims and accepted
the demand of the reactionaries for a separate electorate for
each community, they (i.e., the nationalist Muslims) would
 INTIMATIONS OF FREEDOM 183

oppose the reactionary Muslims and also Gandhiji because

they were convinced that separate electorates were bad not
only for the country as a whole but also for the different
communities.

In April, Lord Irwin was succeeded by Lord Willingdon as

Viceroy. The new Viceroy was basically even less ready to take
a liberal position. He disagreed with Gandhiji about the latter’s
complaint that Provincial Governments were committing breaches
of the Gandhi-Irwin agreement regarding non- victimization of
political offenders and turned down Gandhiji’s request for a
board of arbitration to settle differences. His officials believed
that this would amount to accepting the parallel authority of
Congress. Meanwhile, in the North-West Frontier Province and
in the U.P. serious victimization continued of the Khudai Khid-
matgars and the no-tax compaigners. Gandhiji tried to force the
issue in August by refusing to go to London but Willingdon was
adamant, and also upheld a decision not to nominate Dr. Ansari
to the Round Table Conference on the ground that other
Muslim delegates were opposed to Ansari’s independent candi¬
dature, since he was a member of the Congress. In reality, the
British Government was determined to strengthen the hands of
Hindu and Muslim communalists as part of their policy of
‘Divide and Rule’. While nationalists like Ansari were refused
nomination, Hindu, Sikh and Muslim communalists were given
a degree of representation that was out of all proportion to their
political influence in the country. Gandhiji finally gave way after
meeting the Viceroy in Simla along with Vallabhbhai Patel,
Prabhashanker Patkani and Jawaharlal Nehru. He got the
promise of a Government enquiry into the forcible collection of
land revenue in some Surat villages, but “not in regard to other
matters hitherto raised by the Congress”. Gandhiji did
make a reservation about Congress recourse to defensive direct
184 FREEDOM STRUGGLE

action in case of failure of the enquiry. But his departure for

London on the 15 August 1931 was inevitably construed as a
sign of his pliability.
All these indicated in advance the Congress failure at the
second Round Table Conference which was held from September
to December 1931. Gandhiji arrived after the other delegates,
one day before the Conference was due to begin, and received a
warm welcome from the British working class. He stayed in the
East End of London and toured Lancashire. Although that region
had been hard hit by the Congress boycott of British textiles. The
workers demonstrated their sympathy with the anti-imperialist
struggle of the Indian people. But the British Ministers and
many of the communal leaders had already found a way of
keeping the nationalists at bay. They insisted on placing the
issue of communal concord before that of agreement on consti¬
tutional reform to which Gandhiji still gave priority. On this
issue, deadlock ensued in the Minorities Committee, which was
presided over by the Prime Minister. He asked all the members
to sign a joint request to him to settle the communal question
and pledge themselves to accept his decision. Npt all agreed.
Nor could they have. The British knew that the different com-
fnunal ieaders would check-mate one another. Gandhiji made
thsvery logical appeal in the committee that “the solution can be
the crown of the Swaraj Constitution, not its foundation, if only
because our differences have hardened, if they have not arisen,
by reason of the foreign domination. I have not a shadow of
doubt that the iceberg of comrpunal difference will melt under
the warmth of the sun of freedom.”
But the Muslim communaNsts at the Conference, like the Aga
Khan stood for the most reactionary interests bent on preserving
themselves under the protection of the British imperialism. The
Hindu and Sikh communalists were equally willing to play into
the hands of imperialism. All of them, in their own separate
 INTIMATIONS OF FREEDOM 185

ways, played an important role in frustrating Gandhiji’s efforts

at presenting a united front at the Conference.
Finally in December 1931 Macdonald proposed to carry on
according to the terms of the 1930 concord, endorsed Willingdon’s
policy, and outlined the main points of a proposed Government
of India Act, which would provide for a strong Federal Centre
and Provincial Autonomy giving a limited measure of self-govern¬
ment to the Provinces. The most important Federal areas of
finance, foreign relations (including the decision to make war)
and defence would be the prerogative of the Parliament in West¬
minster and of the Viceroy. In disgust, Gandhiji returned to
India.

OFFICIAL REPRESSION RENEWED

The Willingdon Government now decided to take sterner

measures of repression against the entire national movement
than those taken by Irwin in 1930. When U.P. Congressmen
advised peasantry to withhold payment of rent, pending negotia¬
tions with the Government, they were arrested wholesale,
including their leaders, Nehru and Purushotamdas Tandon,
even five days before Gandhiji returned from London. In the
N.W.F.P., Abdul Ghaffar Khan, his elder brother Dr Khan
Sahib and other nationalist-leaders were thrown into prison. In
Bengal, the town of Chittagong was left for three days to the
mercy of non-official Europeans who, with bands of hooligans,
looted nationalists’ homes without police interference. Even
prisoners in the notorious Hijil prison near Kharagpur were
beaten up in 1931 by the jailers who later fired on them, killing
two.
 186 FREEDOM STRUGGLE

THE INDIVIDUAL DISOBEDIENCE MOVEMENT

When Gandhiji, after his return, protested to Willingdon, he

was met by an adamant attitude. Congress, however, was
still “prepared to tender cooperation to the Government”,
provided the Viceroy lifted the ordinances and permitted the
Congress to continue the campaign for Purna Swaraj. This
was an attitude quite distant from the spirit of the Lahore
Congress. Yet it still threatened a renewal of civil disobe¬
dience. Government disregarded the threat. On 4 January
1932, a fresh batch of Congress leaders including Gandhiji and
Vallabhbhai Patel, the Congress President, were arrested. Now
jail beatings on political prisoners and attempts to treat them
as common criminals became more common than ever before.
Terrorist reprisals against official terror spiralled in 1932.
Gandhiji expressed the wish that civil disobedience should not
be offered en masse but individually, through specific actions.
His argument was that non-violent people should have the
courage to stand alone. But his real reason was, perhaps, fear
of mass action leading to violence under provocation by the
Government and in frustration against the lack of success of the
movement. When the annual Congress session was scheduled
for 24 April at Delhi under the acting Presidentship of Madan
Mohan Malaviya, most of the leading members were arrested
under the Ordinances. The others held a meeting near the Clock
Tower in Chandni Chowk, Delhi, under the officiating Presi¬
dentship of Seth Ranchoddas, an Ahmedabad delegate. They
too, were arrested, but, however, released on 1 May.

THE COMMUNAL AWARD

A new trend away from mass movements was the revival of

Gandhiji’s old concern for gaining support from the Harijans,
 INTIMATIONS OF FREEDOM 1 8r

Scheduled Castes and Tribes. This was his answer to the British
policy of ‘Divide and Rule’ which found expression in the
official Communal Award declared early in 1932 by Ramsay
Macdonald. The Award provided for separate Hindu, ‘Untouch¬
able’ and Muslim electorates for the new Federal legislatures,
treating Hindus and Harijans as two separate political entities.
Gandhiji took this as a challenge. He was supported by many
untouchables, such as a M, C. Rajah. They wanted a common
electorate with reservation of seats for the Harijans. But some
of them led by Dr Ambedkar refused to accept a system which
called Harijan Hindus, without abolishing untouchability.
Willingdon seized these opportunities to insist that the Com¬
munal Award must be accepted. Consequently Gandhiji who was
then interned in Yeravda Jail, near Poona, began in September
a fast unto death. He opposed the Award but demanded reser¬
vation of far more seats for Harijans within the Hindu electo¬
rate than was provided for them in the Award itself. Ambedkar
accepted Gandhiji’s stand. The Poona Pact was accepted by
Government as an amendment to the Communal Award.
This increased Congress influence through organizations such
as the All-India Untouchability League and the Servants of the
Untouchables Society. Congress propaganda among the back¬
ward Scheduled Tribes in Central India, South Bihar and the
hill areas of Orissa, where Congress sympathizers like the
English ex-missionary Verrier Elwin, and Shamrao Hivale
were working devotedly, spread ideas of nationalism and
democracy among people hitherto relatively untouched by
Indian nationalism. Also important in this movement was
the campaign for opening all temples to Harijans. 8 January
1933, was observed as ‘Temple Entry Day . In many of the
pilgrim centres of India, frequented by many castes, creeds
and regional language groups the uplift of the lowly came to be
linked with nationalism and strengthened its appeal.
188 FREEDOM STRUGGLE

Meanwhile, the second civil disobedience campaign or the

‘Individual Disobedience’ movement as it should properly be
called was weaker in its mass impact than the 1930 campaign,
but among the peasantry, Congress influence remained domi¬
nant. The no-tax and no-rent movement continued in the
U.P. and in the N.W.F.P.
1932-33 was perhaps the last year of British rule in India, in
which the flames of orthodox terrorism (as distinct from non¬
violent civil disobedience and civil resistan&e) leapt high, and
were then practically extinguished by repression particularly in
Bengal. There were various acts of terrorism and quite a few
unpopular officers were assassinated, including one or two
Indians. At a Calcutta University Convocation, while Sir
Stanley Jackson, the new Governor of Bengal had been presiding
he was shot at in public by a brilliant girl student of the
Diocesan Women’s College, Bina Das, but the bullet hit a note¬
book in his pocket and his life was saved. Bina Das was sentenced
to life imprisonment and not released till Independence.
In June 1932, troops surrounded a village near Chittagong
where Surya Sen and four other guerillas were hiding in a
house. Capt Cameron their leader was killed in a barrage of
shots from the stairs, and in the melee, Surya Sen escaped with
two girl comrades, Pritilata Wadedar and Kalpana Dutt. In
early 1933 Surya Sen was finally seized in the village of Gairala,
betrayed by a villager to a large Gurkha force. He was treated
with respect by his military captors, but finally hanged at
Dacca. Even today, his memory is revered by the leaders and
people of Bangla Desh as a national hero. The breakdown of
this movement was due to the isolation of the terrorists, consist¬
ing principally of urban school and college students, from their
own urban roots and to their failure to comprehend the needs
of the peasantry for a radical agrarian programme, such as had
been started in the U.P. and other areas.
 INTIMATIONS OF FREEDOM 189

Independence Day, 1933 was, celebrated with unprecedented

enthusiasm. At Badangunj in Hooghly District in Bengal, a
Congress procession was dispersed by police firing. In
February, Kasturba Gandhi was arrested while leading another
Congress procession at Borsad in Gujarat and sentenced to six
months imprisonment. In March 1933 the Congress session
was to be held at Calcutta, under Madan Mohan Malaviya
(who was also in the Hindu Mahasabha) as President. But he
and a thousand delegates were arrested before they could attend.
While the police tried to break up the meeting, delegates in the
centre of the crowd held the session under the officiating Presi¬
dentship of J. M. Sen Gupta and reaffirmed the goal of Puma
Swaraj, civil disobedience as its method and boycott of foreign
cloth and British goods.
Nearly 1,20,000 persons including several thousand women
and quite a number of children were arrested and imprisoned
during this period. This showed that the popular will to
continue civil disobedience was unabated. But Gandhiji merely
concentrated on the Harijan problem. In May 1933, he
announced a 21 -day fast for purification of the minds of himself
and his associates, and for concentrating on the cause of the
Harijans. The Government promptly released him. He then
issued a statement recommending that the Congress should
suspend civil disobedience temporarily. One year later in
April 1934 the movement was finally abandoned.
Meanwhile, the British Government called the third Round
Table Conference in London in November 1932. The Congress
was not represented as it had decided not to accept the invita¬
tion to attend, arguing that in view of the stand taken by the
government no useful purpose would be served. The discussions
at the Conference, however, led to the decision of the British
government to pass the India Act of 1935, introducing some
further reforms. The new Act proposed a federal government
3-90 FREEDOM STRUGGLE

at the centre and provincial governments with a larger measure

of autonomy. For the first time the princely states were brought
directly into the picture because the Federal Union was to
comprise of the Provinces of British India and the princely
states. This appeared to concede the principle that India was
one country and the Indians one nation. But the real intention
of the British was to use the princes to counter-balance the
anti-imperialist doctrines and programmes of the nationalist
leaders. Therefore, the States were given disproportionate
weightage in the bicameral Federal Legislature at the Centre.
Not only that. The States’ representatives were not to be elected
by popular vote but appointed by the rulers. Even in rest of
the country the franchise was woefully restricted. Not more
than 14 per cent of the population in British India had the fran¬
chise. Even this safely constituted legislature was not to have
full powers. It had no control over defence and foreign rela¬
tions; over the other subjects coming under its purview the
Governor-General retained special control. The Governor-Gene¬
ral and the Governors would continue to be appointed by the
British Government and would be responsible directly to it.
In the provinces the measure of autonomy given was nullified
by the special powers invested in the Governors. They could
not only veto legislative action proposed by the elected repre¬
sentatives, but they had the power to enact laws and promulgate
ordinances on their own. The Governor also retained full con¬
trol over the civil service and the police.
The India Act of 1935 satisfied very few. The Congress found
it “totally disappointing.” Others found it inadequate to vary¬
ing degree. The British Government had not really parted with
the poiltical and economic power they wielded over the people of
India. Only the structure of government was slightly changed.
Popularly elected ministers were injected into the British
administration of India, but foreign rule was to continue.
 INTIMATIONS OF FREEDOM 191

The provincial part of the Act was to be put into operation

immediately; the federal part was to follow later. Though totally
opposed to the provisions of the Act, the Congress decided
to contest the elections, more to prove to the British Government
what a strong following the party had in the country, than to
co-operate in working the Act. This objective was fully achiev¬
ed. The Congress swept the polls in most of the Provinces.
There could be no possible doubt that the vast majority of the
Indian people supported it. Many argued that having won the
elections there was no point in refusing to accept office. Nehru
and other left-wing elements were opposed to office acceptance.
They said that it would hamper the struggle for freedom. But
the majority was for office acceptance. Congress ministries
took office in seven out of the eleven provinces in July 1937.
Some time later the Congress formed coalition ministries in
two more provinces. Only in Bengal and the Punjab were there
non-Congress ministries.
Because of the limited character of the power of the provincial
governments, the social base of the Congress itself— its ranks
included workers and peasants as also capitalists and landlords —
and the conservative character of the dominant sections of
Congress leadership, the Congress ministries did not undertake
to change the basic character of the administration; they did
not introduce any radical changes. But, within the narrow
limits permitted, they did try to improve the lot of the people
to some extent. They introduced a new approach to govern¬
ance and set up commendable standards of honesty and service.
Attempts were made to pay greater attention to and improve
primary, technical and higher education and the public health
services. New tenancy and debt relief laws were passed to help
the peasants, though such legislation was often a compromise
since it was passed with the consent of the landlords and zamin-
dars. Trade unions felt more free to negotiate for better work-
192 FREEDOM STRUGGLE

ing conditions and higher wages, though in some Provinces, they

were compelled to wage a bitter struggle. The control on civil
liberties was relaxed and the freedom of the Press enhanced,
though the popular fear of and aversion to the police and
administrative authority continued.
But the most important benefit was psychological The people
felt different. There was a taste of victory in seeing the fam iiar
jailbirds in seats of office. There was a spirit of optimism and
self-confidence in the air. Here at last, the people thought,
were the first intimations of freedom.
 VI THE ACHIEVEMENT OF FREEDOM

The five years preceding the Second World War were per¬
meated in India with a good deal of fresh thinking. Though
fully committed to nationalist, anti-imperialist ideals and the
ultimate objective of freedom, not all accepted the programme
and methodology of the Congress. Nor was there a clear pola¬
rization of thinking. Not only did the non-Congress leaders and
groups espouse different ideologies and different lines of action,
but even inside the Congress two parallel streams of political
thinking had developed and gained strength.
The first outcome of this fresh thinking was necessarily nega¬
tive in one sense. It was realized that terrorism had spent
itself as a revolutionary force. It had not succeeded in arousing
the people to a national uprising for the overthrow of the
British. With the elimination of most of the terrorists through
execution or imprisonment, or their absorption in the Commu¬
nist and other movements, revolutionary terrorism subsided.
On the positive sjde there were three clearly discernable
trends. First, there was the spread of socialist ideas inside and
outside the Congress. Second, there was the development
of the trade union movement independent of the national free¬
dom movement, though sometimes in alliance with it. Lastly,
there was the growth of the peasant movement.
1929 witnessed a great economic slump or depression in the
United States. This slump inevitably spread to the other capi¬
talist countries. Production fell steeply and foreign trade
declined to an alarming extents Consequently there was acute
194 FREEDOM STRUGGLE

economic distress and large scale unemployment. In contrast to

this Soviet Russia presented a rosy picture. In Russia there
was no depression,, no unemployment. At the end of the two
Five Year Plans production had gone up by four times. The
difference was obvious and drew attention to the Communist
model, socialism and the benefits of economic planning.
These developments in the outside world attracted wide
attention in India also. Consequently socialist ideas activated
a good deal of fresh thinking among both the leaders and the
people. Especially the young, the workers and the peasants were
attracted to the new ideology.
Inside the Congress, this Leftist trend resulted in the election
of Jawaharlal Nehru as President of the Congress for two suc¬
cessive sessions in 1936. Nehru was followed by Subhas
Chandra Bose, also well-known for his radical new thinking. He
was elected President of the Congress in 1938, and, again, in
1939, in spite of the fact that Gandhiji himself and many of his
followers were opposed to him in 1939. At the Lucknow Con¬
gress in 1936 Nehru had pleaded openly for the acceptance of
socialism as the Congress goal. He wanted the Party to come
closer to the peasantry as well as the urban working class. He
also pointed out that this was the best way of weaning away
the masses from communalism. In his presidential address he
said :

I am convinced that the only key to the solution of the world’s

problems and of India’s problems lies in socialism, and, when
I use this word, I do so not in a vague humanitarian way but
in the scientific, economic sense... That involves vast and revo¬
lutionary changes in our political and social structure, the end¬
ing of vested interests in land and industry, as well as the
feudal and autocratic Indian states system. That means the
ending of private property, except in a restricted sense and
 THE ACHIEVEMENT OF FREEDOM 195

the replacement of the present profit system by a higher ideal

of cooperative service. It means ultimately a change in our
instincts and habits and desires. In short, it means a new civi¬
lization, radically different from the present capitalist order.

The socialist trend was equally obvious in the leadership out¬

side the Congress. It led to the growth of the Communist Party
and the setting up of a Congress Socialist Party. In the early
days the Communist Party worked under the leadership of P. C.
Joshi. The Congress Socialist Party was set up in 1934 by
Acharya Narendra Dev and Jai Prakash Narayan. It had an
organization, a journal and clearly defined Puma Swarajist
goals. It was committed to impelling the Congress to adopt
‘socialist principles’. In Kerala, Andhra and Tamil Nadu, the
Congress socialists swung closer to Marxism than their counter¬
parts in North India.
The trade union movement, too, had been crippled by repres¬
sion. The official ban on the Communist Party was followed by
the Government ban in late 1934 on the Red Flag Trade Union
Federation. Thus, Communists who were released from prison
after the end of the Meerut Trials, had no alternative but to work
through renewed membership of the All-India Trade Union
Congress. In the Congress and Royist dominated AITUC, they
were in a minority. The Indian National Trade Union Federa¬
tion, led by Joshi, Chaman Lai and Mrinal Kanti Bose had
meanwhile merged itself with the All-India Railwaymen’s Federa¬
tion, led by V. V. Giri. Giri or Mrinal Kanti Bose were closer
to the nationalism then prevalent in the Congress organization.
A composite organization was now formed, called the National
Trade Union Federation (NTUF) which was also supported by
those left-wingers in the nationalist ranks, v/ho could not accept
the theories of class struggle of either the Communists or of
| M. N. Roy and his followers.
196 FREEDOM STRUGGLE

Prior to the ban of the Red Flag Trade Union Federation the
three federations had participated, in a limited way, in organiz¬
ing from Bombay in the summer of 1934, a strike among the
Indian textile workers against a very large cut in their wages.
Nearly 1,20,000 workers joined the strike. Police repression, the
lukewarm attitude of the right-wing trade union leaders and the
use of blacklegs (from unemployed labour, of whom there were
90,000 in Bombay alone) had led to the collapse of the strike
in June.
A third trend developing in this period, was the spread of
Gandhism, Congress socialism and communism into the infant
kisan or peasant movement. The workers and peasant parties
of the 1920s and the spontaneous peasant protest movements at
the time of the 1929-31. Depression had been repressed by
Willingdon. Peasant leaders in some districts now began to
re-emerge and start their activities again.
In Bihar, Sahajananda Saraswati organized a powerful local
Kisan Sabha which espoused the left-agrarian programme, ear¬
lier popularized in the U. P. Another important peasant leader
who later gained influence in the backward districts of Bihar
was Karyanand Sharma. In the N.W.F.P. the Khudai Khid-
matgars, and, in Southern Maharashtra, Royists revived peasant
demands. In the large native State of Hyderabad, the exploita¬
tion of the poor peasantry of the districts neighbouring southern
Maharashtra was resisted by Swami Ramanand Tirth. He had
started life in a Gandhian school in a Maharashtra district,
moved into the reformist wing of the Bombay city trade union
movement, and then opened a Gandhian village welfare organi¬
zation in Aurangabad district. Ramanand Tirth’s efforts created,
in later years, a mass peasant base for the Hyderabad State
Peoples’ Congress which led the struggle for the integration of
Hyderabad with the Indian Union after 1947. In South India,
caste organizations of the Vanniyars, numerically predominant
 THE ACHIEVEMENT OF FREEDOM 197

in North Tamil Nadu, and the Thevars and Nadars, numerically

predominant in South Tamil Nadu, as well as the Iravas in
Kerala, demanded a greater share in municipal and democratic
self-government. In the Manbhum and Purulia districts of
south-west Bengal and the Ranchi and Singhbhum districts of
Bihar, Gandhian workers had started work to spread Gandhiji’s
ideals of nationalism and non-violence among the backward
peasantry. These ideas sometimes reached the underprivileged
tribal people. In Chotta Nagpur, the Tana Bhagat tribal protest
movement later made a cult of Gandhi Maharaj. In Nagaland
(contiguous to Assam), a violent uprising against British rule by
some Nagas was led by one of their priests who declared a
young girl, Guidalo, who was supposed to possess divine powers,
to be their Rani or Queen. Rani Guidalo claimed to support
the nationalist movement. In the late 1930s, Maulana Abdul
Hamid Khan Bhashani organized in the Sylhet district of
southern Assam a powerful peasant movement, which spread
into the neighbouring district of Mymensingh in east Bengal.
These movements were neither unified, nor all under Congress
control. Many of the Kisan Sabhas were led by Congress
socialists. Occasionally some of the peasant movements, for
example, Tarakeswar Satyagraha of 1937 in Bengal, and the
Vayalar Satyagraha in Travancore State, were inspired and led
by local Communist organizers. Where the Congress construc¬
tive workers were in charge, the peasant awakening had an over¬
all reformist and national complexion. But in other areas the
peasantry were concerned with local class problems and only in
a distant, incidental way with the national movement itself. In
a few of these movements, religious leadership was strikingly
present. Peasantry in backward areas are sometimes emotionally-
stirred by appeals to primitive morality. The exponents of
this morality are their local religious or caste or tribal preachers
and teachers. Such appeals to religion as an indirect protest
|198 FREEDOM STRUGGLE

igainst exploitation are quite common in the history of the

liberation struggles among peasants of many countries.
At the same time, many of the political workers involved in
the education and organization of the rural peasantry were
powerfully stirred by the Marxist ideology which Communists
and Congress socialists put forward. Joint front political
demonstrations provided a common meeting ground. Similarly,
contacts were established whenever large numbers of political
prisoners were detained together, as for example, in the deten¬
tion camps at Hijli and Buxar, or the prisons of Mandalay and
Andamans. Many Gandhians and terrorists found time to read
during their imprisonment the books and pamphlets which
turned them from non-violence or the cult of the bomb and
group heroism to the Marxist concepts of class struggle. On May
Day, 1935, thirtyone detenues in the Andamans jail, including all
of Bhagat Sihgh’s remaining comrades, formed themselves into
the Communist Co-ordination. Later, some members of the
Chittagong group in the Andamans also switched over to Com¬
munism. These people were, however, outnumbered by the
political workers of the Congress engaged in the rural areas,
most of whom were exponents of Gandhiji’s sarvodaya ideology.
It is in the context of these general trends that new alignments
developed in the liberation struggle.

states’ peoples movements in the national struggle

British India was ruled by the direct executive authority of

the Viceroy. The rest of the country was made up of a large
number of princely states, referred to by the British as Native
States. These States varying from very large to very small in area
and population and scattered all over the country and interspers¬
ing the British Indian areas, were ruled indirectly by the British
through the Princes and Chiefs themselves.
 THE ACHIEVEMENT OF FREEDOM 199

The princes ruled their States as they pleased. Most of

them took care to see that their relations with the British
rulers were maintained with due submissive decorum. A few
did not do this. This displeased the British authorities and they
suffered the consequences, losing control over their States.
But the main point to note is that British rule and influence
in India resulted in reactionary, feudal despotism being main¬
tained and continued in most of the princely states. By and
large there was very little of democratic government; the
standard of living of the people was glaringly low compared
to the pomp and extravagance of the way in which the
princes themselves and their nobility lived; and in quite a
few cases there was positive oppression. Under ordinary
circumstances a corrupt or autocratic despot was overthrown
by internal revolt or aggression from outside. In the case
of the Indian princely states British rule made both these
impossible. The princes felt secure and entrenched in their
feudal positions.
These unsatisfactory and often contradictory circumstances
gave birth to local organizations in the princely states which
reflected popular restiveness there. They were variously called
Praja Mandal or States’ Peoples’ Conference; Mysore had a
State Congress. All of them were local and concerned with the
affairs of that particular State. When the soldiers belonging to
the contingents raised by the princely states and sent to fight
in the first World War returned, they helped spread of
democratic ideas in their States. Moreover the non-cooperation
movement produced a deep impact.
In 1920, for the first time, the Congress meeting for the
annual session at Nagpur called on the princes to grant at
once full responsible government in their States. But at the same
time, the Congress resolutions made it clear that while people in
the States (referred to as States’ People) could become individual
 FREEDOM STRUGGLE

members of the Congress, they could not use the membership

to interfere In the internal affairs of individual States. If
they wiahed to do so ft would have to be in their own individual
capacity not in the name of the Indian National Congress.
ThijS applied to the British Indian members of th£ Congress
as 'well. Generally the Congress felt political activities in each
State should be organized and controlled by the local Praja
Mandal or States’ Peoples’ Conference.
The British Government had formed a purely consultative
body of the princes called the Chamber of Princes (or Narendra
Mandal) which was meant to standardize their relationship.
This chamber was divided within itself because of squabbles
about relative rank between different grades of princes. In
the year of the appointment of the Simon Commission, the
British Government also appointed the Harcourt Butler Indian
States Committee to recommend measures for the establishment
of a better relationship between the States and the Central
government. In response to this move of the government,
nationalists among the States’ people, such as Balwantray Mehta
and Manilal Kothari of Kathiawad, and, G. R. Abhyankar
of the Deccan, convened an All-India States’ Peoples Conference
in December 1927, which though based on West Indian initia¬
tive was attended by 700 delegates from all over India. The- .
AISPC’s aim was to influence the governments of the
States ‘‘to initiate the necessary reforms in the administra¬
tion by the force of collective opinion of the people of the
States,” and to emphasize popular representation and self-
government by the elective principle in all States. The Con¬
ference also wanted the distinction between public revenue and
the private income of the ruler clearly recognized. This
was necessary to end the exploitation of public monies for
personal expenditure. The Conference also pleaded for the
separation of the judiciary and the executive, so that autocratic,,
 THE ACHIEVEMENT OF FREEDOM * 201

fiats would stand abolished. Finally, the AISPC urged the

establishment of constitutional relations between British India
and the Indian States and an effective voice for the States’
people in this relationship. This it was argued would hasten the
attainment of Swaraj by the whole of India.
Almost from the time the first Conference was called in
December 1927, the All-India States’ Peoples Conference became
a permanent, continuing political organization It was consist¬
ently anti-feudal, but not as clearly anti-imperialist as the
Congress. This was to a great extent explained by the fact
that as far as the States’ people were concerned, the feudal
system was the more direct exploiter.
One of the immediate results of the setting up of the AISPC
was that the struggles of the peoples of the different States
ceased to be isolated, local incidents had acquired an all-India
indentity. Thus Jawaharlal Nehru in his presidential address
to the Lahore Congress speaking of Puma Swaraj, could
officially declare that :

The Indian States cannot live apart from the rest of

India... the only people who have the right to determine the
future of the States must be the people of these States.

The 1929 Congress also passed a resolution endorsing the

AISPC demands.
As a direct consequence of their stand that the States should
be treated as integral parts of the whole of India, the AISPC
had requested the British Government to agree to the people of
the States being represented at the first Round Table Confe¬
rence. The request was not acceded to. The ATSPC then pre¬
sented a memorandum to the Congress advocating an all-India
federal constitution, in which all fundamental rights and pri¬
vileges which the Karachi Congress had called for in British
202 FREEDOM STRUGGLE

India would be accorded to the States’ people as well. The

antifeudal movement thus came to be democratized and aligned
to the national movement.
But Gandhiji reiterated the 1920 non-intervention stand.
Gandhiji argued that a movement started externally could not be
successful,. and that the people of the States should learn self-
reliance. However, he encouraged a Congress resolution that
the princes should accord fundamental rights to their subjects.
The federal principle was recognized in the India Act of 1935
but the proposals so manipulated the situation that the States
were used to obstruct the demands of nationalism. The act
provided two-fifth of the seats in the Upper House and one-
third of the seats in the Lower House at the Centre to the
States. This was not according to the recognized pattern of
proportional representation, nor, were the representatives from
the States actually to represent the people of the States. They
were merely to be the nominees of the rulers.
In many of the States particularly in Rajkot, Jaipur, Kashmir,
Hyderabad and Travancore significant movements were launch¬
ed demanding that the democratic principle should be recog¬
nized and the government administration re-organized. The
princes replied with ruthless repression. Some of them tried to
stem the tide of popular revolt by inflaming communal passions.
The Nizam of Hyderabad, for example, tried to brand the
popular movement as anti-Muslim; similarly, the Maharaja of
Kashmir tried to make out that the popular movement was anti-
Hindu; in Travancore it was suggested that the Christians and
their Church were behind the agitation and that it was intended
to overthrow the Hindu Maharaja.
The Indian National Congress had begun to support the
States people in their struggle for freedom and demanded the
introduction of democratic government and the grant of civil
liberties to the people. Whent he Congress spoke of indepen-
 THE ACHIEVEMENT OF FREEDOM 203

dence it made it clear that the independence of all the people in

India, including those in the princely states, was the ultimate
goal. At the Tripuri Congress (1938) it was decided that the
organization should involve itself closely with the movements in
the princely states. To underline the common aspirations of
all the people of India, the All-India States’ Peoples’ Confe¬
rence elected Jawaharlal Nehru as its President in 1939. The
movements in the princely states not only stirred the political
consciousness of the people in the States, but it was also respon¬
sible for introducing a new dimension to the concept of the unity
of India.

INTEREST IN WORLD AFFAIRS

It was during the latter half of the 1930’s that the Indian
national movement in general and the Congress leadership in
particular began taking a more conscious interest in world affairs
and learning to correlate happenings abroad and their impact
on the people at home. * From the very beginning the Indian
leaders had objected to the use of the Indian army and Indian
resources to further British imperial ambitions in foreign coun¬
tries, specially those of Africa and Asia. This opposition crys-
talized and formulated itself as a policy of the Congress from its
inception in 1885. As a direct result of this the Congress had
also begun to formulate a foreign policy for the country, which
will serve her own interests and not those of Britain. This policy
was generally in favour of opposing all forms of imperialism.
In February 1927, Jawaharlal Nehru attended the Congress of
Oppressed Nationalities at Brussels. This conference had been
organized by political exiles and revolutionaries from Asian.
African and Latin American countries, where the people were
suffering from economic or political exploitation by the
204 FREEDOM STRUGGLE

imperialist powers. The Brussels Congress wanted to co¬

ordinate and plan a common struggle against imperialism.
Nehru attended as a representative of the Indian National
Congress. In his address to the Congress he said :

We realize that there is much in common in the struggle

which various subject and semi-subject and oppressed people
are carrying on today. Their opponents are often the same,
although they sometimes appear in different guises, and, the
means employed for their subjection are often similar.

It was at this Brussels Congress that the League Against

Imperialism was founded. Nehru was elected a member of the
League’s Executive Council. At the Madras Congress which
was held towards the end of the same year, after an excited
discussion, the government was definitely warned that India
would not be prepared to support any war or war-like activity
undertaken by Britain to further or safeguard its imperialist
objectives.
In the 1930’s the Congress became more and more firm in
its stand against imperialism in any part of the world. The
Congress openly supported national movements in the countries
of Asia and Africa. By this time fascism was emerging in Italy,
Germany and Japan as a new threat to democracy. In its own
fanatical way fascism was one type of imperialism. It was also
racialist in concept. The Congress, therefore, gave unqualified
support to anti-fascist struggles in Ethiopia, Spain and Czecho¬
slovakia. In 1937 Japan attacked China. The Congress branded
this as an act of imperialist aggression and passed a resolution
asking the Indian people “to refrain from the use of Japanese
goods as a mark of their sympathy with the people of China.”
Next year in 1938 a medical mission, under Dr M. Atal, and,
including Dr Kotnis, was sent to China to work with the
Chinese army.
 THE ACHIEVEMENT OF FREEDOM 205

This policy of the Indian National Congress was the outcome

of a recognition that the future of the countries of Asia and
Africa was interlinked, and, that the approaching struggle bet¬
ween fascism and the forces of freedom, socialism and demo¬
cracy would seriously affect India. Though these ideas were
shared by the large majority of the Indian leaders, it was Nehru
who was their chief spokesman on foreign affairs. In this he
spoke not only for the Congress but for the entire nation. He
was the first, among the Indian leaders, to recognize the import¬
ance of world events in the development of our own country
and he gave repeated expression to his views on this subject.
For example, in his presidential address to the Lifcknow Con¬
gress in 1936 he said :

Our struggle was but part of a far wider struggle for freedom,
and the forces that moved us were moving millions of people
all over the world and driving them into action. Capitalism,
in its difficulties, took to fascism... it became, even in some of
its homelands, what its imperialist counterpart had long been
in the subject colonial countries. Fascism and imperialism
thus stood out as the two faces of the now decaying capital¬
ism... Socialism in the west and the rising nationalism of the
Eastern and other dependent countries opposed this combina¬
tion of fascism and imperialism.

Nehru stressed that India would not participate in any war

between imperialist powers. India would, however, wholeheart¬
edly offer her support “to the progressive forces of the world,
to those who stood for freedom and the breaking of political
and social bonds,” for “in their struggle against imperialism
and fascist reaction, we realize that our struggle is a common
206 FREEDOM STRUGGLE

GROWTH OF COMMUNALISM

The limited democracy granted by the 1935 Act, once again

sparked off trends of regionalism as well as communalism, both
of which were nurtured by the ‘Divide and Rule’ policy of the
government, the semi-feudal forces of the zamindars and land¬
lords all over the country and the rise of a type of militant
religious fanaticism. The Congress won only 26 of the 58 seats
reserved for the Muslims which it contested. Even of these 26
seats 15 were won in the North West Frontier Province due to
the powerful influence of Khan Abdul Ghaffar Khan and his
Khudai Khicfmatgars. The Muslim League captured not many
more seats from those reserved for the Muslims. The Congress
realized that in spite of its own deliberately postulated and
sincere desire to plead the cause of the whole nation, in spite of
the nationalist Muslims in its ranks, the Muslim masses were yet
to be won over. So the party went about consolidating its
position with the victories won and giving serious thought to the
need for organizing a mass-contact programme.
The Muslim League launched a bitter attack on the Congress
accusing it of trying to deprive the Muslim minority of its
separate identity and integrity. The League began to expound
the theory that the Hindus and Muslims were in fact two diffe¬
rent nations.
Among the Hindus also, caste based associations under
apparently general democratic banners now became prominent.
Chief among these were Dr Ambedkar’s Independent Workers’
Party in Bombay, principally of depressed class workers, sup¬
ported by the NTCJF leaders, and, the revived Justice Party in
Madras opposed to the allegedly Brahmin-dominated Congress.
Similar organizations sprouted in other areas also. The Hindu
Mahasabha was already in existence. Early in 1935, the
Rashtriya Swayam Sevak Sangh came into existence. The Hindu
 THE ACHIEVEMENT OF FREEDOM 207

communalists further embittered Hindu-Muslim relations in the

years to come. To match the Muslim communal theory of two
nations they erected the equally unscientific theory that Hindus
formed the Indian nation and the followers of other religions
were ‘foreigners.’ The effect of both communal theories was to
divide the Indian people and thus weaken the struggle against
foreign rule. Moreover these Hindu and Muslim communal
organizations taught their followers to. fight against the Con¬
gress. Towards foreign imperialists they had an attitude of
submission and cooperation. Whenever the British Government
attacked the Congress and other nationalist organizations the
two communal groups co-operated with the authorities.
Communal tension grew after 1939. The root of this increased
communal tension was not Corfgress intransigence, but the
reactions between British imperial policy and Indian com-
munalism and regionalism. The British policy, while appearing
to increase the quantum of representative government, tried to
encourage the aspirations for power of the urban properties and
rich peasant classes and the elements of hierarchical and
undemocratic conservatism to which some sections of the people
were still prone. These classes tended to seek help from regional-
ist and communalist parties, Hindu as well as Muslim, which
danced to the rhythm of ‘Divide and Rule’.
In the provinces where the Congress ministries took office
several reforms were introduced by the governments in the
field of labour dispute arbitration, improvement of Harijans’
conditions, dissemination of primary education and to tackle
the glaring problem of cheap drink being available in shops
near the industrial areas of towns. Prohibition was initiated
by the Congress ministry in Madras. This led to prohibition
becoming a plank of future Congress programmes. The
Madras government also initiated a system of tripartite bargain¬
ing in labour disputes in which Government provided a
208 FREEDOM STRUGGLE

conciliation machinery for trade unions and employers to

settle their differences. This system also, became an important
element in future labour relations during the post-Independence
period. It represented a liberal attempt to resolve labour
disputes by the use of the collective bargaining method. It
increased the political strength of trade unions, but also made
them more amenable to appeals for industrial harmony. The
left-wing trade unions criticized it as leading to class collabora¬
tion between the workers and capitalists, and, therefore, to
the perpetuation of the capitalist system. In general, the
Congress ministries’ positive actions from 1937 to 1939 represent
attempts by right-wing and moderate nationalist leaders to
implement Gandhian policies, which became a part of the
official creed of the Indian government in the early years after
Independence.
N.W.F.P., Punjab, Sind, Bengal and Assam were the provinces
for which Pakistan had been demanded in 1935. But the Muslim
League had fared poorly in the elections in these areas. It
had done well only in provinces like U.P. where the Muslims
were a minority. If the Congress had read the lessons of
the 1937 elections correctly they would have interpreted the
failure of many Muslims to vote for it, as an expression of
fears by regional religious minorities that the religious majority,
namely, the Hindus, might use their preponderance in the
Provincial Governments to eliminate them. The Congress was
not able to realize that such fears come naturally to a minority
in any country and that these fears were encouraged by the
wide prevalence of communal thinking, within and outside
the Congress ranks. Many Congress leaders felt that a resolute
struggle against communalism within its otyn ranks and an
effort to educate and wrin over the anti-imperialist and
independent Muslims by adopting a friendly and understanding
approach towards them, and a vigorous effort to organize
 THE ACHIEVEMENT OF FREEDOM 209

the peasantry against all feudal elements, was the only answer in
the situation.
In March 1937, Nehru announced the formation of a Congress
wing to organize mass contact with Muslims and to convey
the anti-imperialist struggle to them. This persuaded religious
groups of North Indian Muslims like the Majlis-i-Ahrar and
the Jamait Ulema-i-Hind to join hands with the Congress.
But the mass contact programme did not fully succeed because
the Congress leadership was unable to mobilize all sections of
the exploited people.
But this mass-contact programme accentuated the fears of
the Leaguers like the wealthy western U.P. landowner Liaquat
Ali Khan, who now became one of the staunch supporters
of Jinnah. They were afraid that the increasingly radical
agrarian programme of the Congress would undermine their
semi-feudal position and that the growth of anti-imperialist
sentiments among the Muslims would lead to the withdrawal
of official patronage of the communal leaders.
But, obviously, the communal elements could not offer these as
reasons for their opposition to the Congress. Instead, they seized
the opportunity to exaggerate the failures of the Congress. In
Bengal they accused the Congress of following a pro-landlord,
right-wing policy. In the U. P. they exploited the Congress
failure to develop a mass-contact policy and at the same time
accused it of having weakened the Muslim upper class. In his
presidential address to the Lucknow session of the League in
1937, Jinnah declared that the Congress ministries were being
unjust and oppressive towards the Muslims.
The Muslim League began an active programme of political
expansion. By 1938, 170 new League branches had been estab¬
lished, 90 in the U. P. and 40 in the Punjab. One lakh
members were enlisted in the U. P. alone. A Bangla Desh
historian, Prof A. F. Salahuddin Ahmed has evaluated correctly
210 FREEDOM STRUGGLE

this phase of Muslim League politics, in the context of the

demand for Pakistan, which it made in 1940. In a paper
presented at an UGC Seminar on Bangla Desh held in Calcutta
in April 1972, Prof Ahmed stated :

The movement which led to the creation of Pakistan was

not a religious movement... Fear of Hindu political domina¬
tion which would adversely affect the (Muslim) community’s
political, economic and cultural interests seemed to have
been important factor which influenced the movement.
Although in traditional Islam, politics and religion are inse¬
parable this is no longer true of contemporary Muslim
society... Few of the leaders of the movement had any deep
personal attachment to traditional Islam. It was precisely
for this reason that orthodox Muslims represented by such
organization as Majlis-i-Ahrar, Jamait Ulema-i-Hind did
not support the League, maintaining that its leadership was
not quite Islamic. Despite the opposition of these orthodox
Muslim theologians (it should be noted that not all Muslim
theologians were opposed to the Muslim League) the Muslim
League gained the adherence of Muslim middle class and
through it the Muslim masses. To them Pakistan offered an
opportunity for many-sided development without fear of
competition.

THE SECOND WORLD WAR

When War broke out in September 1939, it placed the Indian

leaders in a difficult situation. They were totally opposed to the
Fascist philosophy standing as it did for a kind of ruthless
totalitarianism which included in it elements of racialist bigotry.
Even before 1939, during the years Fascism was emerging as a
 THE ACHIEVEMENT OF FREEDOM 211

political philosophy with an expansionist programme of aggres¬

sion, many Indian leaders such as Jawaharlal Nehru had been
much pertnrbed at the developments in Europe. The Congress
had in unequivocal terms condemned Fascism and declared
themselves openly in support of the suffering people of Spain,
Ethiopia and Czechoslovakia. Their attitude to the development
of Fascist trends in Japan was the same and they logically
supported China when she was attacked, branding Japan as
the aggressor. But they were as strongly opposed to imperialism.
Their attitude to the war would, therefore, depend on its aims
and objectives. If it was going to be a war between the old im¬
perial powers anxious to retain their colonies and their colonial
domination over many nations of Asia and Africa and the new
imperialists represented by the fascist powers, who wanted
their own share in the spoils of colonialism, India would have
nothing to do with it. But if the Allies were going to change
their ways and fight the fascists really and truly to ‘save the
world for democracy’, India would offer her support to the
maximum extent possible. There must, however, be tangible
evidence to show that the Allies meant what they professed.
Specifically, Britain should immediately give^up her imperial
and colonial domination of India and arrange for a reasonable
quantum of self-government by the Indians themselves.
But these feelings of the leaders and people of India were
neither heeded nor even taken into consideration. On 3 Sep¬
tember 1939 war was declared. This automatically committed
India to belligerency. The federal part of the India Act of 1935
had not yet been given effect to, and, therefore, purely from the
constitutional point of view the Viceroy’s action was both legal
and valid. But it was scarcely likely to appeal to Indian senti¬
ments. There existed a Central Legislature. There were popu¬
lar governments in the Provinces. There were well organized,
fully recognized political parties in the country. There were
212 FREEDOM STRUGGLE

many leaders of the Indian people with whom the Government

had been accustomed to hold discussions with a view to arriving
at mutually acceptable solutions to problems. But none of
them were consulted. This was all the more shocking to the
Indian people because the Government had had prior indication
of the attitude of the Indian leaders to the impending war. In the
summer of 1939, the Congress Party in the Central Legislative
Assembly had abstained from the session as a protest against
Indian -troops being sent to Malaya and the Far East as a pre¬
cautionary measure.
But, possibly because of the very strong anti-fascist feelings
among the leaders, the Congress’s immediate reaction to the
declaration of war was conciliatory. On 14 September 1939 the
Congress issued a statement which clearly explained the views
of the party :

If the war is to defend the status quo , imperialist posses¬

sions, colonies, vested interests and privilege then India can
have nothing to do with it. If, however, the issue is demo¬
cracy and a world order based on democracy, then India
ii- intensely interested in it... A free democratic India will
gladly associate herself with other free nations for mutual
defence against aggression and for economic cooperation...
(but) cooperation must be between equals and by mutual
consent ... The Working Committee, therefore, invite the
British Government to declare in unequivocal terms what
their war aims are in regard to democracy and imperialism
and the new order that is envisaged; in particular, how these
aims are going to apply to India and to be given effect to in
the present... The real test to any declaration is its applica¬
tion in the present...

The Viceroy’s reply was far from satisfactory fjoM the Indian
point of view. After having delayed answering for more than
 THE ACHIEVEMENT OF FREEDOM 213

a month, the Viceroy regretted on 17 October 1939 his inabi¬

lity to elaborate the war aims of Britain further than the
Prime Minister had done. As for the immediate present, the
Viceroy was prepared to include more Indians in th§ Executive
Council. Transfer of substantial power to the Indian people
was considered impracticable during the war. A carrot was,
however, dangled at a safe distance, in the hope that it would
offer some consolation to the cruelly disappointed Indian
nation. After the war, Britain would be prepared to consult
various sections and groups to see what modifications were
necessary in the 1935 Act so that “India may attain her due
place among the great Dominions”.
Not only was there to be no immediate indication of Britain's
willingness to part with power but even in the distant future,
it was still to be Dominion Status within the empire, not full
and complete freedom. The statement was most unacceptable
to the Congress, and, therefore, the Working Committee rejected
the Viceroy’s offer and called on the Congress ministries to
resign before the end of October.
But the door was left slightly open. The statement indicated
that if there should be a change in Britain’s attitude and
policy, room could be found for cooperation. “In the circum¬
stances,” the statement said, “the committee cannot possibly give
any support to Great Britain for it would amount to an endorse¬
ment of the imperialist policy...” This amounted to an offer
of conditional cooperation if the British policy towards India
should change.
Even a year later, in October 1940, when Gandhiji thought of
launching a fresh Satyagraha movement, it was decided that the
campaign should be limited to selected individuals. This was
because in spite of the recalcitrant attitude of the Government,
neither the Congress nor Gandhiji wanted the war effort to be
seriously hampered by a mass movement. The Satyagraha
 %

,214 FREEDOMSTRUGGLE
was, in fact, intended to disprove the British claim that India
was wholeheartedly helping the war effort. Gandhiji explained
the aim of the individual Satyagraha movement in a letter to
the Viceroy :

...The Congress is as much opposed to victory for Nazism

as any British citizen can be. But their objective cannot be
carried to the extent of their participation in the war. And
since you and the Secretary of State for India have declared
that the whole of India is voluntarily helping the war effort,
it becomes necessary to make clear that the vast majority of the
people of India are not interested in it. They make no
distinction between Nazism and the double autocracy that
rules India.
This individual civil disobedience movement was launched
in October 1940. Vinoba Bhave was selected by Gandhiji to
be the first leader to offer satyagraha.

THE CRIPPS MISSION

The war in Europe progressed to a climax by 1941. Having

over-run Poland, Belgium, Holland, Norway and France, as well
as most of Eastern Europe, though the Battle of Britain had
been lost, Germany launched an attack on Russia in June 1941.
In December Japan came into the war with a surprise attack
on Pearl Harbour. Thus, by the end of 1941, the war had
assumed the proportions of a world conflagration, with the
United States and the Soviet Union fully involved and fighting
on the side of the Allies. But this did not seem to foretell
an early victory. On the other hand, in the Asian theatre the
early successes were all in favour of Japan. Philippines, Indo-
Cbina, Indonesia, Malaya and Burma were all rapidly conquered.

/
 the achievement of freedom 2i5

The Japanese forces occupied Rangoon in March 1942. India’s

frontiers were directly threatened.
Britain was now desperately anxious to have the full and
active cooperation of India, not only to halt the Japanese
advance but for the overall war effort. To secure this coopera¬
tion, Britain felt that India had to be offered some firm promises
for the future and a fuller measure of self-government for the
present. The British Government accordingly sent Sir Stafford
Crimps, a member of the War Cabinet, to India with a Draft
Declaration. A brilliant lawyer and an avowed socialist, he
had long been a serious student of the Indian question and had
the reputation of being favourably disposed to Indian aspira¬
tions. He was known to Nehru personally. But the Draft
Declaration he had brought did not contain much to recommend
it. It offered Dominion Status immediately the war ended, but
also gave India the right of secession. To implement this pro¬
posal a Constituent Assembly would be set up as soon as hostili¬
ties ceased. The members of the Assembly were to be drawn
from both British India and the Native States. The British
Indian members would be elected by the Lower Houses of the
Provincial Legislatures. The representatives from the States
would be nominated by the rulers. The British Government
agreed to accept the Constitution framed by the Assembly and
negotiate a treaty arrangement with India. But there was a
proviso that any Province could, if it so desired, remain outside
the Indian Union and negotiate direct with Britain. For the
duration of the war no constitutional changes were proposed, but
the hope was expressed that the Indian parties and leaders
would agree co co-operate in the formation and functioning of a
‘National Government’. The actual military aspects of defence
would, of^ourse, continue to be looked after by the British
Commander-in-Cbief, but there would be an Indian as Defence
Member. ^
216 FREEDOM STRUGGLE

This Declaration was rejected by almost all the parties, though

for different, and often for diametrically opposite reasons. The
Congress could not be expected to welcome the principle of non¬
accession for any Province. The Working Committee, however,
accepted the democratic principle of self-determination. There¬
fore, the Committee’s resolution went out of its way to state that
“the Committee cannot think in terms of compelling the people
of any territorial unit to remain in an Indian union against their
declared and established will”. The Congress also found ‘the
introduction of non-representative elements’ in the Constituent
Assembly unacceptable. But most of all it did not want to rely
on future promises. It wanted a tangible share in political
power in the present. To fight for freedom in other lands, it
wanted some form of self-government here and now. The
Muslim League on the other hand welcomed the possibility of
Provinces remaining outside the Union, because of the recogni¬
tion implicit in it that the Muslim majority Provinces and areas
may, if they so desired, form a separate Union of their own.
But the League criticized the proposals because the procedure
envisaged for the drafting of a constitution was vague and the
offer itself was rigid and did not permit of any modifications. The
Hindu Mahasabha feared partition of the country, and, there¬
fore, opposed the proposals; the Sikh communalists because
they were afraid that the Muslim majority of the Punjab would
opt to stay out of the Union; Ambedkar because he feared the
Harijans would be left at the mercy of caste Hindus. All of
them found the proposals for the interim period vague and
unsatisfactory as the measure of Indian control over the adminis¬
tration was not specifically spelt out. That nothing much by
way of self-government was proposed became clear when
Cripps who had spoken of a ‘National Government’ and about a
‘Cabinet’ during the early stages of the talks, suddenly clarified
that only an expansion of the Viceroy’s Executive Council was
 THE ACHIEVEMENT OF FREEDOM 217

intended. Ultimately, the proposals were rejected and the Cripps

Mission failed to resolve the deadlock.

THE REVOLT OF 1942

The failure of the Cripps Mission plunged the country in

despondency and anger. There was a general mood of frustra¬
tion prevalent in most quarters. The only exceptions were the
Muslim League and some individuals who had benefited from
the enlarged employment opportunities and lucrative contracts
the war had brought. But the question was what step to take
next. Inaction was intolerable.
Gandhiji had not taken much interest in the Cripps offer but
the failure of the mission had disappointed him very much. He
was also perturbed by the developments in South East-Asia. The
British withdrawal from Malaya, Singapore and Burma had been
followed by a total collapse of local resistance and surrender
to Japan was total and abject. A similar catastrophe had over¬
taken Philippines and Indonesia. What was called ‘defence in
depth’ with its scorched earth policy had ravaged the countries
wholesale. A taste of what the future might hold in store for India
was available in the havoc that had resulted from the destruction
of thousands of small river boats in Bengal to prevent them
falling into enemy hands should there be an invasion through
the eastern frontier. Not only had the economy of Bengal been
seriously affected but a major crisis had developed in the distri¬
bution of food supplies. Gandhiji and the Congress leaders were
anxious that what had happened in Malaya anji Burma should
not be repeated in India. The people reacted in panic when
faced with military aggression. They did not face the crisis with
defiant resistance. This too should be prevented in India.
Gandhiji came to the conclusion that the only way the people of
218 FREEDOM STRUGGLE

India could be made to shed all fear and fight the aggressor was
to make them feel not only that they were their own masters but
also that the defence of the country was their duty and they
could not shirk the responsibility in the belief that defence was
the concern of the British. Therefore, he decided to launch a
movement calling upon the British to hand over power to the
Indians and quit. Gandhiji explained : “I know that the
novelty of this idea and that too at this juncture has caused a
shock to many people. Even at the risk of being called mad, I
had to tell the truth if I was to be true to myself. I regard it as
my solid contribution to the war and to India’s deliverance from
the peril.”
Many of the leaders considered the moment inopportune to
make such a drastic demand. They were afraid of the conse¬
quences of panic and anarchy on the one hand and total helpless
subjugation of the people by a ruthless enemy like Japan on the
other. Nehru had still other thoughts. The failure of the
Cripps Mission had deprived the leaders of an opportunity ta
co-operate in full measure in the defence of the country. Was the
country now to be plunged in a massive upheaval which might
result in the defeat of the anti-fascist efforts of the Allies ? He
was particularly concerned about the choice between fighting the
imperialist domination of India by Britain and letting down
Russia and China in their war against the Axis powers.
The arguments and discussions were long and bitter. Gandhiji
was firm but also overwhelmingly persuasive. He agreed that
the British forces might remain in India, that they might even be
offered bases to operate from, on condition that political power
was transferred to India immediately. If even this was not
acceptable he would leave the Congress and ‘‘out of the sands of
India create a movement which would be larger than the
Congress itself”.
The Working Committee met in Wardha early in July and
 THE ACHIEVEMENT OF FREEDOM 219

formulated the ‘National Demand’. It called -upon Britain

immediately to transfer power to Indians and ‘Quit India’. If
the proposal was rejected “the Congress will then be reluctantly
compelled to utilize all the non-violent strength it might have
gathered since 1920”, and launch a movement of direct action.
A meeting of the AICC was called at Bombay on 7 August to
endorse this policy decision.
Meantime, Generalissimo Chiang Kai-Shek of China and
President Roosevelt of the United States tried to persuade
Britain to resolve the deadlock and come to terms with India.
But Churchill was uncompromising. He publicly declared
that he had not “become His Majesty’s first minister to preside
over the liquidation of the British Empire”.
The AICC session at Bombay jn August 1942 has become
historic. It passed the famous ‘Quit India’ resolution. It
was not, however, a bald, uncompromising demand. There was
an offer of cooperation in the war effort contained in it.
It also challenged the Government to act and act immediately.
“On the declaration of India’s independence a Provisional
Government will be formed and a Free India will become an
ally of the United Nations.” The Muslim League was promised
a constitution “with largest measure of autonomy for the
federating units, and with the residuary powers vesting in these
units”. In conclusion the resolution plainly stated “that it is
no longer justified in holding the nation back from endea¬
vouring to assert its will against an imperialist and authoritarian
government... The Committee resolves, therefore, to sanction...
the starting of a mass struggle on non-violent lines on the widest
possible scale ..such a struggle must inevitably be under the
leadership of Gandhiji.”
After the resolution had been passed Gandhiji addressed the
assembled delegates. In the course of his speech he said : “The
actual struggle does not commence this very moment. You have
220 FREEDOM STRUGGLE

merely placed certain powers in my hands. My first act will be

to wait upon His Excellency the Viceroy and plead with him for
the acceptance of the Congress demand. This may take two
or three weeks. What are you going to do in the meantime ? There
is the spinning wheel. ..but there is something more you have to
do... Everyone of you should, from this moment, consider
himself a free man or woman and even act as if you are free
and no longer under the heel of this imperialism...”
But the Government did not wait for Gandhiji to meet
the Viceroy. The official machinery had obviously been
kept on the ready and it moved with lightning speed. Within
hours after the AICC meeting had concluded late on the night
of 8 August, Gandhiji and all the members of the Congress
Working Committee were arrested and hustled away from
Bombay in a special train. Gandhiji was detained at the Aga
Khan Palace in Poona; the other leaders were sent to Ahmed-
nagar Fort.
News of the ‘Quit India’ resolution and of the arrest of the
leaders reached the people together on the morning of 9 August.
They were aghast and taken completely unawares. Public
reaction was immediate and spontaneous. Public life virtually
came to a standstill; all business was suspended. Every city
and town observed a hartal. There were demonstrations and pro¬
cessions everywhere. National songs and slogans demanding the
release of the leaders rent the air. There was no violence as yet.
Agitated and excited though they were, the crowds remained on
the whole peaceful. But there was much tension and the very
size of the crowds made the Government nervous. When the
crowds did not heed warnings and refused to disperse, the*
police invariably opened fire. In Delhi alone during two days
(11 and 12 August) the police opened fire on unarmed crowds on
fortyseven differnt occasions. Seventysix persons were killed
and one hundred and fourteen severely injured. It was the same
 THE ACHIEVEMENT OF FREEDOM 221

everywhere — public demonstrations, police violence and firing,

arrests.
Very soon the situation went completely out of control. The
people had no guidance; most of the leaders were in prison; some
had gone underground; and passions were raging high. In¬
dividuals and groups interpreted the situation to the best of
their lights and acted as they thought best. The continuing
police repression and ‘Ordinance Raj’ further inflamed the
feelings of the people. There had been no Congress call for civil
disobedience. Therefore, what started as individual acts of angry
defiance, soon swelled into a movement, and the movement into
a revolt.
The revolt was spearheaded by the students, workers and the
peasants. There were strikes in factories, colleges and schools.
Police Stations, Post Offices and Railway Stations which were
considered the symbols of British authority in the country were
attacked, set on fire or wrecked. Later some acts of sabotage
were also indulged in. Telephone wires were cut and attempts
made to derail trains. There was continuous exhortation to
peasants to withhold tax payments. In many areas, the peasants
set up alternative regimes, where the writ of the Government
did not run for days and weeks. In Balia, the local leaders took
over the town and had to be driven out by armed detachments.
In Sutahata, Satara, and the Karnataka the peasantry started
underground guerilla resistance to British rule, which continued
till 1944. Jai Prakash Narayan, Ram Manohar Lohia, Aruna
Asaf Ali were among the prominent leaders of the underground
movement. Revolutionary yiolence occurred on a larger scale.
The revolt was not confined to British India alone. People in
many of the Native States were also affected. The Government
reacted sharply and let loose a reign of terror. Lathi-charges,
firing and mass arrests became such a common feature that the
country was transformed into a police state. There were several
222 FREEDOM STRUGGLE

cases of unarmed crowds being machine-gunned from the air.

Police atrocities became daily occurrences. Punitive fines and
summary sentences became the order of the day. The revolt
was short-lived but intense. The Government succeeded in putting
it down but not before over ten thousand people had died in
police and milhary firings. Such wide-scale and intense repres¬
sion had not been seen in the country since the Revolt of 1857.
The Revolt of 1942 failed because an unarmed people without
leaders and proper organization could not win against the
mighty strength of an imperial government in power. But
the revolt had achieved two things. It had given utterance
to India’s anger against imperialism and her determination
to be free, in a striking and unmistakable manner; it was a
living testament to the white hot intensity nationalist feelings
had reached and the limits to which the people were prepared
to suffer and sacrifice in exercise of their right to be free.
Secondly, after the Revolt of 1942 there could have been no doubt
left in the minds of the British rulers that the days of imperial¬
ist domination of India were strictly numbered.
In one sense the Revolt of 1942 marked the culmination
of the Indian Freedom Movement. After the August 1942 upris¬
ing, it was only a question of time and determining the actual
mechanics of the transfer of power and the pattern of Govern¬
ment the country was to have after independence. There were
no doubt many political developments and much parleying
and bargaining between the 1942 Revolt and the actual coming
of independence in 1947. But that the freedom struggle was
bound to win was no longer in doubt.

THE SIMLA CONFERENCE

By the spring of 1945, the war in Europe was moving to an

end. In India, Linlithgow had been succeeded by Wavell as
 THE ACHIEVEMENT OF FREEDOM 223

Viceroy. He was a professional soldier and had been Commander-

in-Chief of India when Linlithgow was Viceroy. The opinion
of the military experts at that time was that the war with Japan
may continue for some time —at least one year —more. With
this view Wavell, as an army man himself, concurred. (There
was no clue yet as to the dramatic end of the war in Asia with
the induction of nuclear weapons in August 1945). Continuance
of the war in Asia would mean greater use and fuller utilization
of bases in India and of Indian resources. In the prevailing
political temper of the country Wavell felt it would be essential
to break the impasse and find a way to involve the leadership and
people of India in fighting the Japanese.
In April 1945 the war in Europe ended. Churchill resigned
and fresh elections were due to be held. On 14 June new' pro¬
posals were announced to introduce further constitutional
changes in India ‘within the framework of the 1935 Government
of India Act’. All the members of the Congress Working
Committee were released — the detention order on Gandhiji had
already been lifted —and a conference of representative political
leaders was called. It was to be held at Simla starting on 25 June.
The proposals were conciliatory to some extent but unsatis¬
factory and provocative in one respect. The Viceroy’s Executive
Council was to be wholly Indian, except for the Viceroy himself
and the British Commander-in-Chief. The Viceroy’s special
powers would not officially lapse but an assurance was available
that they would not be used ‘unreasonably’. Thus far it was
some progress. Then came the divisive characteristic. There
would be ‘equal proportions of caste Hindus and Moslems’, in
the Council. This meant that the Muslim League’s demand for
parity on a communal basis had been endorsed for the first time
in an official declaration of British policy. But the proposals
were ‘not an attempt to obtain or impose a constitutional
settlement’ but tvould be discussed at the Simla Conference.
224 FREEDOM STRUGGLE

There was an impression of hope and optimism when the

Conference started, but very soon it was clear that Jinnah’s
intransigence and rearguard action by the imperialists would
make it impossible for it to succeed. The negotiations broke
down because Jinnah insisted that all the Muslim members of
the Executive Council should be nominated only by the League.
Nor were the British willing to sign any agreement with the
Congress to which the Muslim League was not a party. The
policy of ‘Divide and Rule’ was at its zenith.

THE INDIAN NATIONAL ARMY

After the Revolt of 1942 had been crushed and put down, till
the end of the war in 1945 there was scarcely any political acti¬
vity in the country. The well-known leaders were all in prison
and the situation was not capable of throwing up a new leader¬
ship. There was a general spirit of ennui, though latent fires
continued to burn underneath. The war dragged on but the
national movement had come to a standstill.
Subhas Chandra Bose had left India secretly in March 1941 to
go to the Soviet Union and seek their help in India’s struggle
for freedom. But the Soviet Union was attacked by Germany
in June 1941 and had joined the Allies. Bose, therefore, went
to Germany to see if he could obtain help from there. After
receiving some assurances from the Germans, he went to Japan
to organize the liberation of India with Japanese help. Mean¬
while Japan had tried to raise an Indian National Army with
the help of the officers and men of the Indian Army who had
been left behind after the British withdrawal from Malaya and
Burma, others who had been taken prisoners — there were
60,000 of them in Malaya alone — and Indian civilians who
had been resident in the South-East Asian countries and were
now stranded there unable to return home. Subhas Bose took
 THE ACHIEVEMENT OF FREEDOM 225

charge of this array, which now joined the Japanese army

and began its march towards India. The officers and men
of the INA were inspired by a sense of patriotism and they
wanted to enter India as her liberators. Subhas Bose was
to be the head of the Provisional Government of Free
India.
The INA plans went awry with the defeat of Japan. Subhas
Bose was killed in a plane accident while on his way to Tokyo.
It is true that many leaders did not like the idea of India
winning freedom with the assistance of a country like Japan
and her Fascist allies. But, during the closing years of the
war, Subhas Bose and the INA served to hold up the drooping
spirits of the nationalist’ Indians at home, who were feeling
helpless and frustrated; they set before all sections of the
Indian people, including those serving in the army, an example
of courage and patriotism which was both inspiring and
ennobling.
Therefore, when the Government announced their decision
to prosecute some of the INA officers for treason because they
had broken their oath of loyalty to the British Crown, there was
a wave of nationalist protest. There were massive demonstra¬
tions all over the country. There were persistent demands
that the officers should be released. Not only the Congress,
but almost the entire political leadership of the country was
opposed to the trials and expressed themselves emphatically in
favour of releasing the INA officers. The Congress set up an
INA Defence Committee which consisted of such eminent law¬
yers as Bhulabhai Desai, Tej Bahadur Sapru, Kailashnath
Katju and Asa f Ali. Nehru also was a member of the Com¬
mittee. A great sense of drama gripped the nation as these
national leaders stood up to defend the INA officers in the
historic hall of Delhi’s Red Fort. The Court Martial held
all the accused guilty and they were convicted. But public
226 FREEDOM STRUGGLE

opinion was so emotionally charged that the Government had

to yield. The sentences were suspended and the INA officers
set free.

THE END OF THE STRUGGLE

With the cessation of hostilities it was clear that Indian inde¬

pendence could no longer be delayed. Various developments
abroad and at home were responsible for convincing Britain of
this. The war had completely changed the position and power
of Britain in the world. The Soviet Union and the United States
bad emerged as the big powers and both were in favour of
Indian independence. Though Britain was victorious in the war,
its economy and military strength had been seriously damaged
and she needed time for reconstruction and rehabilitation. .Her
people, especially the defence personnel, were war weary and
were not prepared to continue, to toil for the defence of the
empire. The Conservatives had been defeated in the elections
and the Labour Party which had assumed office was in favour
of acceding to the Indian demands. The most important con¬
sideration, however, was the fact that the situation in India had
completely changed and it was no longer possible for the
British to continue in power. The INA trials had proved
conclusively that the nation was no longer in a mood to put up
with repression or be satisfied with vague promises. The fight¬
ing spirit of India had been aroused and if the nationalist
demands were not adequately met the situation would become
explosive. There was ample evidence for reaching this conclu¬
sion. The revolt of the Indian naval ratings at Bombay in
Feburary 1946, widespread discontent and strikes in the Indian
Air Force, a strike by the Indian Signal Corps at Jabalpur, had
all proved this beyond doubt. Even the police and the
 THE ACHIEVEMENT OF FREEDOM 22'?

bureaucracy bad begun to reveal nationalist leanings. It would

be unsafe to try to use them to suppress or put down a
national movement. Furthermore strikes, hartals and demon¬
strations were increasing all over British India and were spread¬
ing to the Princely States also.
The British Government, therefore, decided to transfer power
to India and to work out the details, both long range and short
term, they sent a Cabinet Mission to India. After Song and
detailed discussions with various leaders representing all the
parties and organizations, the Cabinet Mission announced its
plan, which was accepted by both the Congress and the Muslim
League. But later, differences arose regarding the interpreta¬
tion of the scheme. But Waveli was anxious that an interim
government should be set up as soon as possible. Such a
government was finally formed by the Congress in September
1946 with Jawaharlal Nehru beading the Council of Ministers.
In October the Muslim League also joined the Cabinet, but
they decided not to participate in constitution making. The
British Prime Minister, Clement Atlee, announced on 20
February 1947 that the British would transfer power to India
latest by June 1948.
Lord Louis Mountbatten was sent to India as Viceroy to
arrange for the transfer of power. In spite of serious differ¬
ences that arose between the Congress and the Muslim League,
Lord Mountbatten worked out a compromise plan and also
brought forward the date for the transfer of power by
more than a year. India would become free on 15 August 1947.
But the country would be partitioned. The western areas
of the Punjab, the North West Frontier Province, Sind and
Baluchistan in the west and the eastern half of Bengal and
Sylhet district in Assam were to form the new independent
State of Pakistan, which would be inaugurated simultaneously
with India, There was provision, however, for a later plebiscite
228 FREEDOM STRUGGLE

in the NWFP and Sylhet district to ascertain the wishes of the

people.
The pride and joy in the achievement of freedom was diluted
by the pain and sadness of partition and the consequences of
partition. But the nation was not despondent. Freedom was
only the first step. With self-confidence, faith and hope India
began to march forward to meet the challenges of freedom and
democracy and social justice.
NATIONAL BOOK TRUST, INDIA