Indian Independence Movement - Revolutionary Activities

Revolutionary Activities

Apart from a few stray incidents, the armed rebellion against the British rulers was not organized before the beginning of the 20th century. The Indian revolutionary underground began gathering momentum through the first decade of 20th century, with groups arising in Bengal, Maharastra, Orissa, Bihar, Uttar Pradesh, Punjab, and the then Madras Presidency including what is now called South India. More groups were scattered around India. Particularly notable movements arose in Bengal, especially around the Partition of Bengal in 1905, and in Punjab. In the former case, it was the educated, intelligent and dedicated youth of the urban Middle Class Bhadralok community that came to form the "Classic" Indian revolutionary, while the latter had an immense support base in the rural and Military society of the Punjab. Organisations like Jugantar and Anushilan Samiti had emerged in the 1900s (decade). The revolutionary philosophies and movement made their presence felt during the 1905 Partition of Bengal. Arguably, the initial steps to organize the revolutionaries were taken by Aurobindo Ghosh, his brother Barin Ghosh, Bhupendranath Datta etc. when they formed the Jugantar party in April 1906. Jugantar was created as an inner circle of the Anushilan Samiti which was already present in Bengal mainly as a revolutionary society in the guise of a fitness club.

The Anushilan Samiti and Jugantar opened several branches throughout Bengal and other parts of India and recruited young men and women to participate in the revolutionary activities. Several murders and looting were done, with many revolutionaries being captured and imprisoned. The Jugantar party leaders like Barin Ghosh and Bagha Jatin initiated making of explosives. Amongst a number of notable events of political terrorism were the Alipore bomb case, the Muzaffarpur killing tried several activists and many were sentenced to deportation for life, while Khudiram Bose was hanged. The founding of the India House and The Indian Sociologist under Shyamji Krishna Varma in London in 1905 took the radical movement to Britain itself. On 1 July 1909, Madan Lal Dhingra, an Indian student closely identified with India House in London shot dead William Hutt Curzon Wylie, a British M.P. in London. 1912 saw the Delhi-Lahore Conspiracy planned under Rash Behari Bose, an erstwhile Jugantar member, to assassinate the then Viceroy of India Charles Hardinge. The conspiracy culminated in an attempt to Bomb the Viceregal procession on 23 December 1912, on the occasion of transferring the Imperial Capital from Calcutta to Delhi. In the aftermath of this event, concentrated police and intelligence efforts were made by the British Indian police to destroy the Bengali and Punjabi revolutionary underground, which came under intense pressure for sometime. Rash Behari successfully evaded capture for nearly three years. However, by the time that World War I opened in Europe, the revolutionary movement in Bengal (and Punjab) had revived and was strong enough to nearly paralyse the local administration. in 1914, Indian revolutionaries made conspiracies against British rule but the plan was failed and many revolutionaries sacrificed their life and others were arrested and sent to the Cellular Jail (Kalapani) in Andaman and Nicobar Islands. During the First World War, the revolutionaries planned to import arms and ammunitions from Germany and stage an armed revolution against the British.

The Ghadar Party operated from abroad and cooperated with the revolutionaries in India. This party was instrumental in helping revolutionaries inside India catch hold of foreign arms. After the First World War, the revolutionary activities began to slowly wane as it suffered major setbacks due to the arrest of prominent leaders. In the 1920s, some revolutionary activists began to reorganize.

Hindustan Socialist Republican Association (HSRA) was formed under the leadership of Chandrasekhar Azad. Kakori train robbery was done largely by the members of HSRA. Bhagat Singh and Batukeshwar Dutt threw a bomb inside the Central Legislative Assembly on 8 April 1929 protesting against the passage of the Public Safety Bill and the Trade Disputes Bill while raising slogans of Inqulab Zindabad, though no one was killed or injured in the bomb incident. Bhagat Singh surrendered after the bombing incident and a trial was conducted. Sukhdev and Rajguru were also arrested by police during search operations after the bombing incident. Following the trial (Central Assembly Bomb Case), Bhagat Singh, Sukhdev and Rajguru were hanged in 1931. Allama Mashriqi founded Khaksar Tehreek in order to direct particularly the Muslims towards the independence movement.

Surya Sen, along with other activists, raided the Chittagong armoury on 18 April 1930 to capture arms and ammunition and to destroy government communication system to establish a local governance. Pritilata Waddedar led an attack on a European club in Chittagong in 1932, while Bina Das attempted to assassinate Stanley Jackson, the Governor of Bengal inside the convocation hall of Calcutta University. Following the Chittagong armoury raid case, Surya Sen was hanged and several others were deported for life to the Cellular Jail in Andaman. The Bengal Volunteers started operating in 1928. On 8 December 1930, the Benoy-Badal-Dinesh trio of the party entered the secretariat Writers' Building in Kolkata and murdered Col. N. S. Simpson, the Inspector General of Prisons.

On 13 March 1940, Udham Singh shot Michael O'Dwyer(the last political murder out side India), generally held responsible for the Amritsar Massacre, in London. However, as the political scenario changed in the late 1930s — with the mainstream leaders considering several options offered by the British and with religious politics coming into play — revolutionary activities gradually declined. Many past revolutionaries joined mainstream politics by joining Congress and other parties, especially communist ones, while many of the activists were kept under hold in different jails across the country.