Summary

● Revolutionary Activities

* Reasons for emergence

Younger elements not ready to retreat after the decline of open phase.

Leadership’s failure to tap revolutionary energies of the youth. Government repression left no peaceful avenues open for protest.

* Ideology

Assassinate unpopular officials, thus strike terror in hearts of rulers and arouse people to expel the British with force; based on individual heroic actions on lines of Irish nationalists or Russian nihilists and not a mass-based countrywide struggle.

● Revolutionary Activities

* Bengal

1902—First revolutionary groups in Midnapore and Calcutta (The Anushilan Samiti)

1906—Yugantar, the revolutionary weekly started

By 1905-06—Several newspapers started advocating revolutionary terrorism.

1907—Attempt on life of the former Lt. governor of East Bengal and Assam.

1908—Prafulla Chaki and Khudiram Bose attempt to murder Muzaffarpur Magistrate, Kingsford.

Alipore conspiracy case involving Aurobindo Ghosh, Barindra Kumar Ghosh and others.

1908—Burrah dacoity by Dacca Anushilan.

1912—Bomb thrown at Viceroy Hardinge by Rashbehari Bose and Sachin Sanyal.

Sandhya, Yugantar—newspapers advocating revolutionary activity.

Jatin Das and Yugantar; the German Plot during World War I.

* Maharashtra

1879—Ramosi Peasant Force by Vasudev Balwant Phadke. 1890s—Tilak’s attempts to propagate militancy among the youth through Shivaji and Ganapati festivals, and his journals Kesari and Maharatta.

1897—Chapekar brothers kill Rand, the plague commissioner of Poona and Lt. Ayerst.

1899—Mitra Mela—a secret society organised by Savarkar and his brother.

1904—Mitra Mela merged with Abhinav Bharat. 1909—District Magistrate of Nasik—Jackson—killed.

* Punjab

Revolutionary activity by Lala Lajpat Rai, Ajit Singh, Aga Haidar Syed Haidar Raza, Bhai Parmanand, Lalchand ‘Falak’, Sufi Ambaprasad.

● Revolutionary Activity Abroad

1905—Shyamji Krishnavarma set up Indian Home Rule Society and India House and brought out journal The Sociologist in London.

1909—Madan Lal Dhingra murdered Curzon-Wyllie; Madame Bhikaji Cama operated from Paris and Geneva and brought out journal Bande Mataram.

Ajit Singh also active.

Berlin Committee for Indian Independence established by Virendranath Chattopadhyay and others.

Missions sent to Baghdad, Persia, Turkey, Kabul.

* In North America, the Ghadr was organised by Lala Hardayal, Ramchandra, Bhawan Singh, Kartar Singh Saraba, Barkatullah, Bhai Parmanand.

The Ghadr Programme

Assassinate officials.

Publish revolutionary literature.

Work among Indian troops abroad and raise funds.

Bring about a simultaneous revolt in all colonies of Britain. Attempt to bring about an armed revolt in India on February 21, 1915 amidst favourable conditions created by the outbreak of First World War and the Komagata Maru incident (September 1914). The plan was foiled due to treachery.

Defence of India Act, 1915 passed primarily to deal with the Ghadrites.

Chapter 14

First World War and Nationalist Response

In the First World War (1914-1919), Britain allied with France, Russia, USA, Italy and Japan against Germany, Austria-Hungary and Turkey. This period saw the maturing of Indian nationalism. The nationalist response to British participation in the First World War was three-fold:

(i) the Moderates supported the empire in the war as a matter of duty;

(ii) the Extremists, including Tilak (who was released in June 1914), supported the war efforts in the mistaken belief that Britain would repay India’s loyalty with gratitude in the form of self- government; and

(iii) the revolutionaries decided to utilise the opportunity to wage a war on British rule and liberate the country.

The Indian supporters of British war efforts failed to see that the imperialist powers were fighting to safeguard their own colonies and markets.

The revolutionary activity was carried out through the Ghadr Party in North America, Berlin Committee in Europe and some scattered mutinies by Indian soldiers, such as the one in Singapore. In India, for revolutionaries striving for immediate complete independence, the War seemed a heaven-

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sent opportunity, draining India of troops (the number of white soldiers went down at one point to only 15,000), and raising the possibility of financial and military help from Germany and Turkey—the enemies of Britain. (Details of revolutionary activities of this period have been covered in the previous chapter.)