The Jallianwala Bagh massacre, also known as the Amritsar massacre, was a seminal event in the British rule

of India. On 13 April 1919, a crowd of non-violent protesters, along with

Baishakhi pilgrims, had gathered in the Jallianwala Bagh garden in Amritsar, Punjab to protest against the arrest of two leaders [Dr.Satyapal and Dr.Saifuddin] despite a curfew which had been
recently declared.[1] On the orders of Brigadier-General Reginald Dyer, the army fired on the crowd for ten minutes, directing their bullets largely towards the few open gates through which
people were trying to run out. The figures released by the British government were 370 dead and 1200 wounded. Other sources place the number dead at well over 1000. This "brutality
stunned the entire nation",[2] resulting in a "wrenching loss of faith" of the general public in the intentions of Britain. [3] The ineffective inquiry and the initial accolades for Dyer by the House of
Lords fuelled widespread anger, leading to the Non-cooperation Movement of 192022.[4]

On Sunday, 13 April 1919, Dyer was convinced of a major insurrection and he banned all meetings, however this notice was not widely disseminated. That was the day of Baisakhi, the main
Sikh festival, and many villagers had gathered in the Bagh. On hearing that a meeting had assembled at Jallianwala Bagh, Dyer went with fifty Gurkha riflemen to a raised bank and ordered
them to shoot at the crowd. Dyer continued the firing for about ten minutes, until the ammunition supply was almost exhausted; Dyer stated that 1,650 rounds had been fired, a number which
seems to have been derived by counting empty cartridge cases picked up by the troops. [5] Official British Indian sources gave a figure of 379 identified dead,[5] with approximately 1,100
wounded. The casualty number estimated by the Indian National Congress was more than 1,500, with approximately 1,000 dead. [6]