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Chapter 1:
The First Major Challenge: The Revolt of 1857
In this Session we will be discussing:
• Storm Centres and Leaders of the Revolt
• Suppression of Revolt of 1857
• Causes of Failure of Revolt of 1857
• Nature of the Revolt
Storm Centres and Leaders of the Revolt
Bahadur Shah Zafar
• Bahadurshah was recognised as an emperor by all the rebel leaders.
Civilians, nobility and other dignitaries took an oath of allegiance.
The British, who had long ceased to take the authority of the Mughal
Emperor seriously, were astonished at how the ordinary people
responded to Zafar's call for war.
Bakht Khan
• Bahadur Shah Zafar remained only the symbolic leader of the revolt.
The real command of the rebellion, at Delhi, lay in the hands of
General Bakht Khan. He was a Subedar in the army of the East India
Company and had led the revolt of sepoys in Bareilly and brought
them to Delhi.
• The administration of Delhi was run by a Court of rebels, headed by
General Bakht Khan. The court consisted of ten members, six from
the army and four from the civilians. The court conducted its affairs
in the name of the emperor.
Nana Sahib
• At Kanpur, the revolt was led by Nana Sahib, the adopted son
of the last Peshwa, Baji Rao II.
• He was refused the family title and pension by the British.
However, the company stopped the pension after the death
of Baji Rao II and banished him from Poona, on the grounds
that He was not a natural born heir.
• On persuasion of the rebels, Nana sahib assumed the
leadership of the revolt in Kanpur, proclaimed himself the
Peshwa and acknowledged the suzerainty of the Mughal
emperor, Bahadur Shah Zafar. Nana Sahib's childhood
associates included Tantya Tope and Azimullah Khan.
• He forced the British garrison in Kanpur to surrender, and
then executed the survivors, gaining control of Cawnpore
(Kanpur) for a few days. At the end of 1858, when the
rebellion collapsed, Nana Sahib escaped to Nepal. The story
of his escape added to the legend of Nana Sahib’s courage
and valour.
Begum Hazrat Mahal
• In areas like Awadh where resistance during 1857 was
intense and long lasting, the fighting was carried out
by taluqdars and their peasants.
• Many of these taluqdars were loyal to the Nawab of
Awadh, and they joined Begum Hazrat Mahal (the
wife of the Nawab) in Lucknow to fight the British.
• She soon seized control of Lucknow and proclaimed
her son, Brijis Qadir, as the Nawab of Awadh. Her
administration included both Hindus and Muslims.
• The British residency in Lucknow was besieged by the
rebels and Sir Henry was killed during the siege. The
City was finally recovered by the British in March
1858. Begum Hazarat Mahal had to retreat to Nepal
where she finally found asylum.
Khan Bahadur khan
• The command of the rebellion in Bareilly rested with
Khan Bahadur khan, a descendant of the former ruler of
Rohilkhand. He resented the British and was not
enthusiastic with the pension granted to him by the
latter.
• Kunwar Singh
• In Bihar, the fight against the British was led by Kunwar
Singh. He was a local zamindar in Arrah in Bihar. He was
popularly known as Veerk Kunwar Singh. He resented the
British for depriving him of his estates.
• He was in his early eighties when he joined the war but
he fought valiantly and remained invincible till the end.
He was an expert in the gureilla warfare. His tactics left
the British puzzled and clueless.
Rani Lakshmi bai
• Rani Lakshmi bai was the queen of the Princely
state of Jhansi. Her real name was Manikarnika
Tambe.
• Lord Dalhousie, the governor general, had refused
to allow her adopted son to succeed to the throne
after her husband Raja Gangadhar Rao died and
annexed her state under the infamous doctrine of
lapse.
She resented the British and was soon persuaded by the rebels to assume the leadership
of the rebellion in Jhansi. She was an outstanding warrior and one of the leading figures
of the Indian Rebellion of 1857. She became a symbol of resistance to the British Raj for
Indian nationalists.
General Hugh Rose, who defeated her, paid high tribute to his enemy when he said that
‘here lay the woman who was the only man among the rebels.’
She was aided by Tantia tope, a close associate of Nana Sahib, after the loss of Kanpur.
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Suppression of Revolt of 1857
• The suppression of these civil rebellions is a major reason why the revolt of
1857 did not spread to south India and most of Eastern and Western India.
• The Mutiny of 1857 lasted for almost one year. By 1859, the British rule was
once again established in India. However, the British did not have an easy time
in putting down the rebellion.
• Martial Law
• Before sending out troops to reconquer North India, the British passed a series
of laws to help them quell the insurgency. By a number of Acts, passed in May
and June 1857, not only was the whole of North India put under martial law but
military officers and even ordinary Britons were given the power to try and
punish Indians suspected of rebellion.
• Divide and conquer : The British used military power on a gigantic scale. But this
was not the only instrument they used. In large parts of present-day Uttar Pradesh,
where big landholders and peasants had offered united resistance, the British tried to
break up the unity by promising to give back to the big landholders their estates. Rebel
landholders were dispossessed and the loyal rewarded.
• Capture of Delhi: They, like the rebels, recognised the symbolic value of Delhi. The
British thus mounted a two-pronged attack. One force moved from Calcutta into North
India and the other from Punjab which was largely peaceful to reconquer Delhi.
• British attempts to recover Delhi began in earnest in early June 1857 but it was only
on 20 September 1857 that the city was finally captured. The fighting and losses on
both sides were heavy. One reason for this was the fact that rebels from all over North
India had come to Delhi to defend the capital.
• Bahadur Shah Zafar was taken the prisoner and deported to Burma and royal princes
were captured and shot dead in public. The great house of Mughals was completely
extinguished. Rebels were executed.
• Fall of other centres of rebellion and end of the revolt
• The fall of Delhi struck a heavy blow to the rebels. It now became clear why the
British concentrated with so much attention on retaining Delhi at all cost and for
this, they suffered heavily both in men and material.
• One by one, all the great leaders of the revolt fell.
• Nana Sahib was defeated at Kanpur after which the escaped to Nepal early in
1859.
• Tatya Tope escaped into the jungles of central India where he carried on bitter
guerrilla warfare until April 1859 when he was betrayed by a Zamindar friend and
captured while asleep. He was hurriedly tried and put to death on 15th April
1859.
• The Rani of Jhansi died on the field of battle on 17th June 1858. By 1859, Kunwar
Singh, Bakht Khan, Khan Bahadur Khan of Bareilly, Maulavi Ahmadullah were all
dead, while the Begum of Awadh escaped to Nepal. By the end of 1859, the
British authority over India was reestablished, fully and firmly.
Causes of Failure of Revolt of 1857
• The Revolt or uprising of 1857 was a valiant effort by disgruntled Indian sepoys to
overthrow the colonial power from Indian shores, however, it ended in failure.
Following are the reasons for the failure of the 1857 Revolt.
• Disunity among Indians:- Many of the rulers and Zamindars, due to fear of
Britishers, remained neutral. many others like Sindhia of Gwalior, the Holkar of
Indore, the Nizam of Hyderabad, the Nawab of Bhopal and more helped the
Britishers to suppress the revolt. The zamindars of Bengal remain loyal to the
Britishers as they were the creations of Britishers.
• Modern Educated Indians:- They did not support the revolt. That didn't mean
they were anti national but they wanted to remove the backwardness of the
country. They thought that Britishers would help to modernize them.
• Short of Modern weapons:- the rebels were short of modern weapons. They
used to fight with swords and pikes. They got easily defeated by Britishers with
guns.
• Poorly organised rebels:- The rebels were poorly organised and ill disciplined
without a leader. They behave more like a notorious mob.
• No future motives:- The rebels lacked the forward looking programme and any
vision for future society and economy. They didn't knew what to do next, what
type of political power would come next.
• Among the reasons, the disunity among the Indians was the major one.
• Lord Canning later remarked that the rulers and chief who supported them in
revolt of 1857 were "acted as the breakwaters to the storm which would have
otherwise swept them in one great wave.“
Nature of the Revolt
• Despite the sepoys’ limitations and weaknesses, their effort to emancipate the
country from foreign rule was a patriotic act and a Progressive step. If the
importance of a historical event is not limited to its immediate achievements the
Revolt of 1857 was not a pure historical tragedy.
• Even in failure it served a grand purpose: a source of inspiration for the national
liberation movement and Hindu Muslim unity among Indians which later
achieved what the Revolt could not.
• Hence, proved to be a historic landmark.
BY GAUTAM LAKHANI

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Chapter 1:
The First Major Challenge: The Revolt of 1857
In this Session we will be discussing:
• Background
• Causes: Social, Economic, Political, Military and Immediate
• 11 May 1857 - A band of Sepoys from Meerut, who had defied and killed the European
officers the previous day, crossed the Jamuna, set the toll house on fire and marched to
the Red Fort.
• They entered the Red Fort through the Raj Ghat gate, followed by an excited crowd, to
appeal to Bahadur Shah II, the Mughal Emperor— a pensioner of the British East India
Company, who possessed nothing but the name of the mighty Mughals — to become
their leader, thus, give legitimacy to their cause.
• Bahadur Shah was neither sure of the intentions of the sepoys nor of his own ability to
play an effective role. He was however persuaded, if not coerced, to give in and was
proclaimed the Shahen shah-e- Hindustan.
• The sepoys, then, set out to capture and control the imperial city of Delhi. Simon Fraser,
the Political Agent and several other Englishmen were killed; the public offices were
either occupied or destroyed.
• The Revolt of an unsuccessful but heroic effort to eliminate foreign rule, had begun. The
capture of Delhi and the proclamation of Bahadur Shah as the Emperor of Hindustan
gave a positive political meaning to the revolt and provided a rallying point for the rebels
by recalling the past glory of the imperial city.
Why did the sepoys revolt?
Background
• Significant part of the British rule over India. Transformed the ruling system of
Britain in India. No other event contributed greater in terms of Britain’s
changing policy.
• From 1757-1857, the EIC established strong colonial footings in India. But during
this time the EIC was involved in the ‘visible’ aspects of colonialism and that
exploitation greatly hampered the prospects of Indians- in terms of the social,
political, economical and military scenario of India.
• Thus, the exploitation carried out by the East India Company in 100 years, found
reactions in various revolts.
• But the scale of the revolt of 1857 was much larger and unprecedented. This
revolt prompted the British Parliament to take direct control over India.
Causes of Revolt
Social Causes Economic Causes
Political Causes Military Factors
Immediate Causes
Social Causes
• The civil rebellion had a broad social base, embracing all sections of society — the
territorial magnates, peasants, artisans, religious mendicants and priests, civil servants,
shopkeepers and boatmen. The Revolt of the sepoys, thus, resulted in a popular
uprising.
• Racial discrimination was the prime factor. Indians suffered badly in the hands of the
Europeans. There was visible racial exploitation wherein Indians were not allowed to
mix with the Europeans. There was discrimination that was also carried out at the
public places. This generated gross discontentment against the domination of the
whites in India.
• Until 1800, the British were thus not keen to interfere in the social and religious
affairs of Indians. But, in the beginning of the 19th Century, when some entrepreneurial
Indians came forward, the British began to support their bid of social reforms by the
methods of legislation.
• Thus, it can be summarized that Indians began to doubt the objectives of the British
since the advent of these legislations.
• Some glaring examples of this period are the 1813 Charter Act had conceded the
right of unrestricted entry of the Christian missionaries to India which conservative
Indians viewed as an imposition of Christianity over them. Therefore, they sharply
reacted.
• At the same time, British passed many acts in India to bring about reforms in the
age-old socio-religious practices among Hindus and Muslims so some of the social
legislations were passed, like, the abolition of Sati, 1829 was passed by Lord
William Bentinck (which was implemented across all presidencies across British
India), Prohibition of human sacrifice, and abolition of child marriage, widow
remarriage, and Religious Disabilities Act, 1856 etc. which modified Hindu customs
and practices. These were all understood by Indians as a bid to impose Christianity
over them.
• Therefore, in the first half of the 19th Century, the British proposal of social reform
through the means of legislation- although it was directed towards the
acceptability of British rule over India, but conservative sections viewed this as an
imposition of Christianity over them.
Political Causes
• While the war of 1857 was a reaction of different sections of Indian society against
policies of the British which included various aspects viz. social, economic,
administrative, military etc., the political grievances against the British Raj played the
most important role in an outbreak of 1857 revolt.
• Due to the British expansionist policies, most of the Raja’s, Nawab’s and the zamindar’s,
were either dispossessed from their state or became subsidiary to the British.
• The East India Company (EIC) had a planned way of expansionism and many Indian
states easily fell prey to the policies of the East India Company.
• Subsidiary Alliance a system devised by Lord Wellesley in 1798. All those who entered
into such an alliance with the British had to accept certain terms and conditions such as
the rulers had to disband their military force, allow the British to position their troops
within the kingdom, and act in accordance with the advice of the British Resident who
was now to be attached to the court.
• The subsidiary alliance was often forced on the local rulers who lost all their powers
and prestige under the said arrangement.
• Dalhousie s Aggressive Policy of annexation: It is believed by many historians that
Lord Dalhousie laid the foundations of the Indian Rebellion of 1857. He was
driven by conviction to bring all the Indian states ruled by local rulers into the fold
of British administration. For which he started to use doctrine of lapse.
• Under the doctrine of lapse, the British annexed any Indian state where the ruler
did not have a male heir. Under this spurious doctrine, he annexed Satara,
Sambalpur, Jhansi and Nagpur etc. which angered the local ruler, who had to now
live in the looming fear of annexation of their state by the British.
• By depriving them of their right and by forcibly annexing their states British made
many enemies out of these local rulers who ultimately became leaders of 1857
revolt. E.g. Rani Laxmibai, Nana Sahib etc.
• So the political objective of the 1857 uprising was to overthrow British rule and
replace it with an alternate order. The discontent and disaffection of Indians
ultimately manifested in the form of the Great Rebellion of 1857.
Economic Causes
• Destruction of Agriculture was a vital factor as it affected a large section of
Indian society. Ever since the grant of Diwani was made to the British in 1765,
land revenue became an issue of much burden.
• British Government had imposed ‘pocket area transformation’, that means,
introduction of Permanent Settlement in Bengal, Mahalwari settlement in
Central India, and Ryotwari settlement in southern India.
• These three settlements were highly exploitative, and in particular, the
Permanent settlement had created a devastating impact.
• But the high rates of land revenue, ruined the prospects of Indian peasantry.
Thus the peasants were greatly encouraged to overthrow the British
Government from India.
• The ‘Drain of Wealth’ impoverished peasants and they thus participated actively
in the revolt of 1857. Under the burden of excessive taxes the peasantry became
progressively indebted and impoverished.
• Annexation of Indian states and the removal of the local rulers led to the
dissolution of the court which resulted in the loss of patronage to musicians,
dancers, artisans, administrative officials, and so on. These people lost their
source of livelihood.
• Britishers used their political power to destroy Indian trade and industries with a
policy of discrimination in tariff and import and export policies, which ultimately
destroyed Indian economy and caused economic impoverishment of India and its
people.
• The economic policies of the British were mainly exploitative and led to the
severe destruction of the Indian economy. British rule had adversely affected the
interest of almost all sections of society and severely affected the way of life in
India.
• As a result, there was an increase in dissatisfaction and hatred against British rule
among different sections of Indian society. This disaffection ultimately led to a
mass uprising which we know today as the revolt of 1857.
Military Causes
• The great revolt of 1857, also known as Sepoy rebellion as the most important
causes of the revolt of 1857 was the discontent among Sepoys.
• The soldiers in the East India Company s army came from peasant families-they
were just peasants in uniform which were deeply affected by
the governments policies.
• Thus every impact on peasantry had large repercussions in the form of military
discontentment.
• The terms and conditions of service in the company’s army increasingly came into
conflict with the religious and castes beliefs of the Sepoys.
• The religious sentiments of the sepoys were hurt in 1806 in the Madras
presidency which led to the Vellore Mutiny in 1806. The Hindus were asked to
remove their caste marks from their foreheads and the Muslims were asked to
trim their beards.
• In the 1840s, the officers developed a sense of superiority and started treating the
sepoys as their racial inferiors, riding roughshod over their sensibilities. Abuse and
physical violence became common and thus the distance between sepoys and officers
grew.
• The Indian sepoys were made to feel a subordinate and inferior at every step and were
discriminated against racially and in matters of pay and promotions. They were paid
salaries less than their English counterparts. As a result, the morale of the Indian
sepoy was very low and they started distrusting their officers.
• During the time of Lord Canning, two important laws were passed: Both these acts
were passed in 1856, i.e. on the eve of revolt.
• General Service Enlistment Act: This act meant that if Indian military personnel were
posted abroad, they wouldn’t be entitled to get extra allowances.
• Religious Disabilities Act: For Indian soldiers, the belief was that if they crossed the
ocean, they would lose their religion. They would thus be socially ostracized. Thus,
Hindu soldiers skipped appointments that involved serving in a foreign land. But, after
the passing of the “Religious Disabilities Act”, they would have to compulsorily take
the appointment, otherwise, they would lose their job.
Immediate Cause
• The immediate factor was the introduction of the ‘Enfield’ rifle. It was said that the
cartridge of this rifle was wrapped in the fat of cow and pig.
• The cartridge had to be bitten off before loading it into the gun. Thus the Hindu and
Muslim soldiers were reluctant to use the ‘Enfield’ rifle.
• At Barrackpore (Bengal), the soldiers of the 34th Native Infantry, refused to obey the
commander. MangalPandey who led the uprising, wanted to kill Lt. Baugh and finally he
was overpowered and he was hanged. He was the first rebel who was hanged in the
revolt of 1857. This sparked a collective uprising in the form of the revolt of 1857.
• After the event of Barrackpore, on 10th May, 1857 General Bakht Khan who was posted
in Meerut, along with the contingent of troops from Meerut and Bareily, marched to
Delhi, and then the context of the revolt was set, when he declared Bahadur Shah Zafar
as the leader of the revolt.
• So, 11th May, 1857, was regarded as the beginning of the revolt. The revolt spread to
different parts of India from Delhi, i.e. Jhansi, Kanpur, Lucknow, Bareily, Awadh, Assam,
Bihar, etc.
BY GAUTAM LAKHANI

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Chapter 2:
Civil Rebellions and Tribal Uprisings
Introduction
• After the battle of Plassey in 1757, the political control of the East India Company
increased and by the end of the eighteenth century, the British emerged as the main
power in India.
• As the Company gained in political sphere it became imperative to introduce and
implement policies in the fields of land revenue, law and order, and set-up an
administration. Implementation of such policies created turmoil in the Indian society
and led to changes.
• Moreover, Company’s main aim was to utilize the resources of India for the
development of England. These changes led to dislocation in the socio-cultural,
economic and political life of the people.
• The Revolt of 1857 was the most dramatic instance of traditional India’s struggle against
foreign rule. But it was no sudden occurrence. It was the culmination of a century long
tradition of fierce popular resistance to British domination.
• The establishment of British power in India was a prolonged process of piecemeal
conquest and consolidation and the colonialization of the economy and society.
• This process produced discontent, resentment and resistance at every stage. This
popular resistance took three broad forms:
Civil Tribal Peasant

Rebellions Uprisings Movements
Social base of the Rebellions

• At a time when the newly created class of urban intelligentsia was reaping the benefits
of the British rule, it were the traditional sections of society whose lives had been
almost completely changed for the worse, who rebelled.
• The series of civil rebellions were often led by deposed rulers or their descendants,
uprooted and impoverished zamindars, landlords and poligars (landed military magnates
in South India) and ex-retainers and officials of the conquered Indian States.
• The backbone of the rebellions, their mass base and striking power came from the rack-
rented peasants, ruined artisans and demobilized soldiers.
Causes of the Rebellions
• The major cause of all these civil rebellions taken as a whole was the rapid changes
the British introduced in the economy, administration and land revenue system.
These changes led to the disruption of the agrarian society, causing prolonged and
widespread suffering among its constituents.
• Above all, the colonial policy of intensifying demands for land revenue and
extracting as large an amount as possible produced a veritable upheaval in Indian
villages.
• In Bengal, for example, in less than thirty years land revenue collection was raised to
nearly double the amount collected under Mughals.
• The pattern was repeated in other parts of the country as British rule spread and
aggravating the unhappiness of the farmers was the fact that not even a part of the
enhanced revenue was spent on the development of agriculture or the welfare of
the cultivator.
• Zamindars: Thousands of zamindars and poligars lost control over their land and
its revenues either due to the extinction of their rights by the colonial state or by
the forced sale of their rights over land because of their inability to meet the
exorbitant land revenue demanded.
• The proud zamindars and poligars resented this loss even more when they were
displaced by rank outsiders —government officials and the new men of money —
merchants and moneylenders.
• Peasants and artisans, as seen earlier, had their own reasons to rise up in
arms and side with the traditional elite.
• Increasing demands for land revenue were forcing large numbers of peasants into
growing indebtedness or into selling their lands.
• The new landlords, bereft of any traditional paternalism towards their tenants,
pushed up rents to ruinous heights and evicted them in the case of non-payment.
• The economic decline of the peasantry was reflected in twelve major and numerous
minor famines from 1770 to 1857.

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General Studies I Objective 100 200 2 hours Yes (⅓)

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Chapter 2:
Civil Rebellions and Tribal Uprisings
Background
• The Revolt of 1857 was the most dramatic instance of traditional India’s struggle
against foreign rule. But it was no sudden occurrence. It was the culmination of a
century long tradition of fierce popular resistance to British domination.
• The establishment of British power in India was a prolonged process of
piecemeal conquest and consolidation and the colonialization of the economy
and society.
• This process produced discontent, resentment and resistance at every stage. This
popular resistance took three broad forms: civil rebellions, tribal uprisings and
peasant movements.
• The series of civil rebellions were often led by deposed rulers or their
descendants, uprooted and impoverished zamindars, landlords and poligars
(landed military magnates in South India) and ex-retainers and officials of the
conquered Indian States.
• The backbone of the rebellions, their mass base and striking power came from the
rack-rented peasants, ruined artisans and demobilized soldiers.
• The major cause of all these civil rebellions taken as a whole was the rapid changes
the British introduced in the economy, administration and land revenue system.
• These changes led to the disruption of the agrarian society, causing prolonged and
widespread suffering among its constituents.
• Another major cause of the rebellions was the very foreign character of British rule.
This feeling of hurt pride inspired efforts to expel the foreigner from their lands.
• The civil rebellions began as British rule was established in Bengal and Bihar, arid
they occurred in area after area as it was incorporated into colonial rule.
• There was hardly a year without armed opposition or a decade without a major
armed rebellion in one part of the country or the other.
• From 1763 to 1856, there were more than forty major rebellions apart from
hundreds of minor ones.
Civil Rebellions
Classification of the popular uprisings
• Political-religious Movements -Fakir Uprising, Sanyasi Uprising ,PagalPanthis,
Wahabi Movement, Faraizi Movement, KukaMovement and Moplah Rebellions
• Movement by deposed rulers and Zamindars-VeluThampi and Polygar Rebellions
• Movements by the dependents of the deposed ruler- Ramosi Uprising, Gadkari
Revolt and Sawantwadi Revolt
• Socially, economically and politically, the semi-feudal leaders of these rebellions were
backward looking and traditional in outlook they still lived in the old world. Its basic
objective was to restore earlier forms of rule and social relations.
• The British succeeded in pacifying the rebel areas one by one.
• They also gave concessions to the less fiery rebel chiefs and zamindars in the form of
reinstatement, the restoration of their estates and reduction in revenue assessments so
long as they agreed to live peacefully under alien authority.
• The more recalcitrant ones were physically wiped out.
Sanyasi Uprising (Bengal, 1770-1820s)
• The Hindu Naga and Giri armed Sanyasis once formed a part of the armies of the
Nawabs of Awadh and Bengal, and also of the Maratha and Rajput chiefs.
• The immediate cause of the rebellion was the restrictions imposed on the pilgrims
visiting the holy places. The Sanyasis raided the English factories and collected
contributions from the towns, leading to a series of conflicts between the large bands
of Sanyasis and the British forces.
• After nearly half –a-century long strife, the Sanyasi Uprising ended in the second
quarter of the nineteenth century.
VeluThampi (Travancore, 18089-09)
• In 1808-09, Velu Thampi, the Dewan of Travancore, rose up in rebellion against the
British attempt to remove him from the Dewanship and the heavy burden imposed on
the state through the Subsidiary Alliance System.
• In one of the ensuing skirmishes VeluThampi was injured and died in forest. However,
even though dead, he was publicly hanged as an example to the fate of those who rose
against the British.
Gadkari Revolt (1844)
• The revolts in and around Kolhapur region of Maharashtra state, were led by Gadkaris.
They were hereditary servants attach to Maratha forts, were disbanded.
• That is the reason; there was revolt, led by Daji Krishna Pandit.
Ramosi Uprising (1822, 1825-26)

• The Ramosis, who served in the lower ranks of the Maratha army and police, revolted in
Satara in 1822, under the leadership of Chittur Singh in protest against heavy assessment
of land revenue and the harsh methods of its collection.
• The Ramosis plundered the regions around Satara and attacked the forts.
• In 1825-26, they again rose up in rebellion under the banner of Umaji on account of acute
famine and scarcity in Pune. For three years they ravaged the Deccan.
• Finally, the British Government pacified them not only by condoning their crimes but also
by offering them land grants and recruiting them in the Hill Police.
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Tribal Uprisings
• The tribal people, spread over a large part of India, organized hundreds of militant
outbreaks and insurrections during the 19th century.
• These uprisings were marked by immense courage and sacrifice on their part and
brutal suppression and veritable butchery on the part of the rulers.
• The tribals had cause to be upset for a variety of reasons.
• Imposition of Land revenue Settlement: The colonial administration ended their
relative isolation and brought them fully within the ambit of colonialism. It
recognized the tribal chiefs as zamindars and introduced a new system of land
revenue and taxation of tribal products.
• Work of Christian Missionaries: brought about further changes in the socio
economic and cultural equation of the tribals and the mainstream society plus in
turbulent times, the tendency of the missionaries to refuse to take up arms or in
discouraging people from rising against the government made the missionaries to be
viewed as extension of colonialism and were often attacked by the rebels.
• Increasing demand for goods: from early nineteenth century-first for the royal navy
and then railways, led to increasing control of government over forest land.
• The establishment of the Forest department in 1864, Government Forest Act(1865) and
Indian Forest Act in 1878 together established complete government monopoly over
Indian forest land. Shifting Agriculture, a wide spread practice amongst the various
tribal communities was banned from 1864 onwards on the reserved forest.
• Some of the tribal uprising took place in reaction to the effect of the landlords to impose
taxes on the customary use of timber and grazing facilities, police exaction, new excise
regulations, exploitation by low country traders and money lenders, and restrictions on
shifting cultivation in forest.
• Large number of moneylenders, traders arid revenue farmers as middlemen among the
tribals. These middlemen were the chief instruments for bringing the tribal people within
the vortex of the colonial economy and exploitation.
• The middlemen were outsiders who increasingly took possession of tribal lands and
ensnared the tribals in a web of debt. In time, the tribal people increasingly lost their lands
and were reduced to the position of agricultural labourers, share-croppers and rackrented
tenants on the land they had earlier brought under cultivation and held on a communal
basis.
Nature of Tribal Uprisings
• The Colonial intrusion and the triumvirate of trader, money lender and revenue
farmer in sum disrupted the tribal identity to a lesser or greater degree.
• In fact, ethnic ties were a basic feature of tribal rebellions. The rebels saw
themselves not as a discreet class but as having a tribal identity. At this level the
solidarity shown was of a very high order.
• Fellow tribals were never attacked unless they had collaborated with the enemy. At
the same time, not all outsiders were attacked as enemies. Often there was no
violence against the non-tribal poor.
• The rebellions normally began at the point where the tribals felt so oppressed that
they felt they had no alternative but to fight. This often took the form of
spontaneous attacks on outsiders, looting their property and expelling them from
their villages.
• All this led to clashes with the colonial authorities. When this happened, the tribals
began to move towards armed resistance and elementary organization.
• Often, religious and charismatic leaders — messiahs emerged at this stage and
promised divine intervention and an end to their suffering at the hands of the
outsiders, and asked their fellow tribals to rise and rebel against foreign authority.
• Most of these leaders claimed to derive their authority from God. They also often
claimed that they possessed magical powers, for example, the power to make the
enemies’ bullets ineffective.
• Filled with hope and confidence, the tribal masses tended to follow these leaders to
the very end.
• The warfare between the tribal rebels and the British armed forces was totally
unequal. On one side were drilled regiments armed with the latest weapons and on
the other were men and women fighting in roving bands armed with primitive
weapons such as stones, axes, spears and bows and arrows, believing in the magical
powers of their commanders.
• The tribals died in lakhs in this unequal warfare.
Important Tribal Uprisings
Santhal Rebellion:
• Among the numerous tribal revolts, the Santhalhool or uprising was the most massiveone.
With the introduction of permanent settlement in Bengal in 1793, the Santhals were
employed as labourers with the promise of wages or rent free lands.
• However they were forced to become agricultural surfs, exploited at will. The first rebellion of
messianic character erupted in 1854 under BirSingh of Sasan in Lachimpur.
• The second Santhal rebellion of 1855-56 was marked by some of the worst features of
elemental tribal passion and open denunciation of the british rule.
• The Santhal, who livedin the area between Bhagalpur and Rajmahal, known as Daman-i-koh,
rose in revolt; made a determined attempt to expel the outsiders-the dikus-and proclaimed
the complete ‘annihilation’ of the alien regime.
• The rebellion covering the districts of Birbhum, Singbhum, Bankura, Hazaribagh, Bhagalpur
and Monghyr in Orissa and bihar was precipitated mainly by economic causes.
• By 1854, the tribal heads, the majhis and parganites, had begun to meet and discuss the
possibility of revolting.
• Under the leadership of two brothers Siddhu and Khanu, more than 10000 santhals
assembled in June 1855, when a divide order was issued asking the santhals to break
the control of their oppressorsand “take possession of the country and set up a
government of their own.”
• With in a month a rebellion had assumed a formidable shape. The rebels cut-off the
postal and railway communication between Bhagalpur and Rajmahal, proclaimed the
end of the company’s rule and commencement of the santhal regime. They attacked the
houses of money-lenders, zamindars, white planters, railway engineers andBritish
officials.
• The open war with the British continued till 1856, when the rebel leaders were finally
captured and the movement was brutally suppressed.
• Three other major tribal rebellions: The Kols of Chhotanagpur rebelled from 1820 to
1837. Thousands of them were massacred before British authority could be re-imposed.
• The hill tribesmen of Rampa in coastal Andhra revolted in March 1879 against the
depredations of the government-supported mansabdar and the new restrictive forest
regulations. The authorities had to mobilize regiments of infantry, a squadron of cavalry and
two companies of sappers and miners before the rebels, numbering several thousands,
could be defeated by the end of 1880.
Munda Uprising:
• The rebellion (ulgulan) of the Munda tribesmen, led by Birsa Munda, occurred during
1899-19. For over thirty years the Munda sardars had been struggling against the
destruction of their system of common land holdings by the intrusion of jagirdar,
thikadar (revenue farmers) and merchant moneylenders.
• Birsa, born in a poor share-cropper household in 1874, had a vision of God in 1895. He
declared himself to be a divine messenger, possessing miraculous healing powers.
• Thousands gathered around him seeing in him a Messiah with a new religious message.
Under the influence of the religious movement soon acquired an agrarian and political
Birsa began to move from village to village, organizing rallies and mobilizing his
followers on religious and political grounds.
• On Christmas Eve, 1899, Birsa proclaimed a rebellion to establish Munda rule in the
land and encouraged ‘the killing of thikadars and jagirdars and Rajas and Hakims
(rulers) and Christians.’ Satyug would be established in place of the present-day Kalyug.
• Birsa gathered a force of 6,000 Mundas armed with swords, spears, battle-axes, and
bows and arrows. He was, however, captured in the beginning of February 1900 and he
died in jail in June. The rebellion had failed. But Birsa entered the realms of legend.
BY GAUTAM LAKHANI
Chapter 3:
Peasant Movements and Uprisings after 1857
Introduction
• Peasant movement is a social movement associated with the agricultural
policy.
• The history of peasant movements can be traced to the economic policies of
the Britishers, which have brought about many changes in the Indian agrarian
system.
• The consequences of the British colonial expansion affected the Indian
peasantry to a great extent and it rose in revolt from time to time.
• India is basically an agrarian economy with the bulk of rural population
following the occupation of agriculture.
• Peasants formed the backbone of the civil rebellions, which were often led by
zamindars and petty chieftains.
Peasantry Under Colonial Government
• The depletion of the Indian peasantry was a direct consequence of the
transformation of the agrarian structure due to colonial economic policies,
destruction of the handicrafts which lead to land overcrowding, the new land
revenue system, colonial administrative and judicial system.
• The peasants burdened with high rents, illegal levies, arbitrary evictions and
unpaid labour in zamindari areas.
• Government itself levied heavy land revenue in Ryotwari areas.
• The fear of losing only source of earning, the overburdened farmers were forced
to approach the local moneylender who used to make full use of the former’s
difficulties by extracting high rates of interests on the money lent.
• Many a times the farmer had to mortgage his land and cattle which was seized by
the money lenders when money was not returned on time.
• Gradually, over large areas, the actual cultivators were reduced to the status of
tenantsat- will, share-croppers and landless labourers, while their lands, crops
and cattle passed into the hands of landlords, trader-moneylenders and rich
peasants.
• The peasants often resisted the exploitation, and soon they realised that their
real enemy was the colonial state which led some of the desperate peasants to
take criminal path in order to come out of intolerable conditions.
• These crimes included robbery, dacoity and what has been called social banditry.
Indigo Revolt (1859-1860)
• The most militant and widespread of the peasant movements was the Indigo Revolt
of 1859-60. In Bengal, the indigo planters, almost all the Europeans, exploited the
local peasants by forcing them to grow indigo on their best lands instead of the
more paying crops like rice.
• Peasants were forced by the planters to take advance money and enter into
fraudulent contracts which were then used against the peasants.
• The planters used to frighten the peasants through kidnappings, illegal
confinements, flogging, attacks on women and children, seizure of cattle, burning
and breaking their houses and destruction of crops.
• In 1859, Digambar Biswas and Bishnu Biswas of Nadia district denied to grow indigo
under duress and resisted the physical pressure of the planters and their lathiyals
(retainers) backed by police and the courts. It was the first time that the anger of
peasants exploded.
• They also organised a counter force against the planter’s attacks who even tried
methods like evictions and enhanced rents.
• The ryots replied by going on a rent strike by refusing to pay the enhanced rents and
by physically resisting the attempts to evict them.
• They learned to use the legal machinery and initiated legal action supported by fund
collection. The Bengali intelligentsia and Missionaries played a vital role by supporting
the peasant’s cause through newspaper campaigns, organizing mass meetings,
preparing memoranda on peasants.
• Outstanding in this respect was the role of Harish Chandra Mukherji, editor of the
Hindoo Patriot. Din Bandhu Mitra’s play, Neel Darpan, was to gain great fame for
vividly portraying the oppression by the planters.
• An indigo commission was appointed by the government to inquire into the problems
of indigo cultivation.
• In November 1860, on the basis of recommendations given by the indigo commission,
the government issued a notification that the ryots could not be compelled to grow
indigo and that it would ensure that all disputes were settled by legal means.
• But, the planters were already closing down factories and indigo cultivation was
virtually wiped out from Bengal by the end of 1860.

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UPSCY .
Pabna Agrarian Uprising
• During the 1870s and 1880s, large parts of Eastern Bengal witnessed agrarian unrest
caused by oppressive practices of the zamindars.
• The zamindars resorted to enhanced rents beyond legal limits and prevented the
tenants from acquiring occupancy rights under the Act of 1859.
• To achieve their ends, the zamindars resorted to forcible evictions, seizure of cattle
and crops and prolonged, costly litigation in courts where the poor peasant found
himself at a disadvantage.
• The peasants of Yusufshahi Pargana in Pabna district formed an agrarian league after
having enough of oppressive regime to resist the demands of the zamindars.
• The league organised a rent strike in which the ryots challenged the zamindars in the
courts by refusing them to pay the enhanced rents. Funds were raised by ryots to
fight the court cases. The struggles spread throughout Pabna and to other districts
of East Bengal.
• The main form of struggle was that of legal resistance. There was very little violence.
• Though the peasant discontent continued to linger on till 1885, most of the cases
had been solved, partially through official persuasion and partially because of
zamindar’s fears.
• Many peasants were able to acquire occupancy rights and resist enhanced rents.
• The Government also promised to undertake legislation to protect the tenants
from the worst aspects of zamindari oppression.
• In 1885, the Bengal Tenancy Act was passed. Again, a number of young Indian
intellectuals supported the peasants’ cause.
• These included Bankim Chandra Chatterjee, R.C. Dutt and the Indian Association
under Surendranath Banerjee.
Deccan Riots
• The ryots of Deccan region of western India suffered heavy taxation under the
Ryotwari system. Here again the peasants found themselves trapped in an endless
network with the moneylender as the exploiter and the main beneficiary.
• These moneylenders were mostly outsiders including Marwaris or Gujaratis.
• Crash in cotton prices after the end of the American civil war in 1864, the
Government’s decision to raise the land revenue by 50% in 1867, and a succession of
bad harvests even worsened their miserable condition.
• In 1874, the growing tension between the moneylenders, and the peasants resulted
in a social boycott movement organised by the ryots against the “outsider”
moneylenders. The movement included refusal to buy from their shops and to
cultivate their fields. The barbers, washermen, shoemakers denied to serve them.
• This social boycott spread rapidly to the villages of Poona, Ahmednagar, Sholapur
and Satara. Soon the social boycott was transformed into agrarian riots with
systematic attacks on the moneylender’s houses and shops.
• The debt bonds and deeds were seized and publicly burnt. The Government
succeeded in repressing the movement.
• The Deccan Agriculturists Relief Act was passed in 1879 in order to maintain peace
and harmony. This time also, the modern nationalist scholars of Maharashtra
supported the peasants’ cause.
• Already, in 1873- 74, the Poona Sarvajanik Sabha, led by Justice Ranade, had
organized a successful campaign among the peasants, as well as at Poona and
Bombay against the land revenue settlement of 1867. Under its impact, a large
number of peasants had refused to pay the enhanced revenue.
Changes in nature of Peasant Movements after 1857
• Peasants emerged as the main force in agrarian movements, fighting directly for
their own demands. The demands were almost completely focused on economic
issues.
• The movements were directed against the immediate enemies of the peasant which
included foreign planters, indigenous zamindars and moneylenders.
• The struggles were directed towards specific and limited objectives and redressal of
particular grievances. These movements did not targeted colonialism neither their
objective was to end the system of subordination or exploitation of the peasants.
• The peasants developed a strong awareness of their legal rights and asserted them
in and outside the courts.
• Soon, the peasant movements got integrated with the national movement due to
the rise of socialist ideas and leaders. The formation of All India Kisan Sabha was a
high point in the course of peasant movements as it firmly linked the peasants'
issues with the anti-colonial national movement which was emerging in the country.
BY GAUTAM LAKHANI
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Chapter 4:
Foundation of The Congress: The Myth
Introduction
• Indian National Congress was founded in December 1885 by seventy-two political
workers. It was the first organized expression of Indian nationalism on an all-India
scale.
• A.O. Hume, a retired English ICS officer, played an important role in its formation.
But why was it founded by these seventy- two men and why at that time?
• A powerful and long-lasting myth, the myth of ‘the safety valve,’ has arisen around
this question. Generations of students and political activists have been fed on this
myth. But despite widespread popular belief, this myth has little basis in historical
fact.
• The myth is that the Indian National Congress was started by A.O. Hume and others
under the official direction, guidance and advice of no less a person than Lord
Dufferin, the Viceroy, to provide a safe, mild, peaceful, and constitutional outlet or
safety valve for the rising discontent among the masses, which was inevitably
leading towards a popular and violent revolution.
Safety-Valve Theory
• The core of the myth, that a violent revolution was on the cards at the time and was
avoided only by the foundations of the Congress, is accepted by most writers; the
liberaIs welcome it, the radicals use it to prove that the Congress has always been
compromising if not loyalist vis-a-vis imperialism, the extreme right use it to show
that the Congress has been anti-national from the beginning.
• In his Young India published in 1916, the Extremist leader Lala Lajpat Rai used the
safety-valve theory to attack the Moderates in the Congress.
• Having discussed the theory at length and suggested that the Congress ‘was a
product of Lord Dufferin’s brain,’ he argued that ‘the Congress was started more
with the object of saving the British Empire from danger than with that of winning
political liberty for India.
• Even the Marxist historian’s ‘conspiracy theory’ was an offspring of the ‘safety valve’
notion. It was ‘an attempt to defeat, or rather forestall, an impending revolution.’
• The Congress did, of course, in time become a nationalist body; ‘the national
character began to overshadow the loyalist character.’ It also became the vehicle
of mass movements.
• But the ‘original sin’ of the manner of its birth left a permanent mark on its
politics. Its ‘two-fold character’ as an institution which was created by the
Government and yet became the organizer of the anti-imperialist movement ‘ran
right through its history.’
• It led the mass movements and when the masses moved towards the
revolutionary path, it betrayed the movement to imperialism.
• The culmination of this dual role was its ‘final capitulation with the Mountbatten
Settlement.’
• Earlier, in 1939, M.S. Golwalkar, the RSS chief, had also found the safety-valve
theory handy in attacking the Congress for its secularism and, therefore, anti-
nationalism.
• Before as well as after 1947, tens of scholars and hundreds of popular writers
have repeated some version of these points of view.
Historical proof of the safety-valve theory
• Historical proof of the safety-valve theory was provided by the seven volumes of
secret reports which flume claimed to have read at Simla in the summer of 1878
and which convinced him of the existence of ‘seething discontent’ and a vast
conspiracy among the lower classes to violently overthrow British rule.
• It was first mentioned in William Wedderburn’s biography of A.O. Hume
published in 1913. Wedderburn (ICS) found an undated memorandum in Hume’s
papers which dealt with the foundation of the Congress.
• According to Lajpat Rai, despite the fact that Hume was ‘a lover of liberty and
wanted political liberty for India under the aegis of the British crown,’ he was
above all ‘an English patriot.’ Once he saw that British rule was threatened with
‘an impending calamity’ he decided to create a safety valve for the discontent.
• As decisive proof of this Lajpat Rai provided a long quotation from Hume’s
memorandum that Wedderburn had mentioned along with his own comments in
his book.
• So deeply rooted had become the belief in Hume’s volumes as official documents
that in the 1950s a large number of historians and would-be historians, including
the present writer, devoted a great deal of time and energy searching for them in
the National Archives.
• And when their search proved futile, they consoled themselves with the thought
that the British had destroyed them before their departure in 1947.
• In 1878, Hume was Secretary to the Department of Revenue, Agriculture and
Commerce. How could the Secretary of these departments get access to Home
Department files or CID reports?
• Also he was then in Simla while Home Department files were kept in Delhi; they
were not sent to Simla.

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UPSCY .
WC Bannerjee’s Opinion
• Further proof offered for the safety-valve theory was based on W.C. Bannerjee’s
statement in 1898 in Indian Politics that the Congress, ‘as it was originally started
and as it has since been carried on, is in reality the work of the Marquis of
Dufferin and Ava.’
• He stated that Hume had, in 1884, thought of bringing together leading political
Indians once a year “to discuss social matters” and did not “desire that politics
should form part of their discussion.”
• But Dufferin asked flume to do the opposite and start a body to discuss politics so
that the Government could keep itself informed of Indian opinion.
• Clearly, either W.C. Bannerjee’s memory was failing or he was trying to protect
the National Congress from the wrath of the late 19th century imperialist
reaction, for contemporary evidence clearly indicated the opposite.
• All the discussions Hume had with Indian leaders regarding the holding of an
annual conference referred to a political gathering.
• Almost the entire work of earlier associations like the Bombay Presidency
Association, Poona Sarvajanik Sabha, Madras Mahajan Sabha and Indian
Association was political.
• Since his retirement from the Indian Civil Service in 1882, Hume had been
publicly urging Indians to take to politics. He had also been asking his Indian
friends not to get divided on social questions.
• When, in January 1885, his friend B.M. Malabari wrote some editorials in the
Indian Spectator urging educated Indians to inaugurate a movement for social
reform, Hume wrote a letter to the Indian Spectator criticizing Malabari’s
proposals, warning against the dangerous potential of such a move, and arguing
that political reforms should take precedence over social reform.’
• Neither Dufferin and his fellow-liberal Governors of Bombay and Madras nor his
conservative officials like Alfred and J.B. Lyall, D.M Wallace, A. Colvin and S.C.
Bayley were sympathetic to the Congress.
BY GAUTAM LAKHANI
UPSCYT
Chapter 5:
Foundation of The Congress: The Reality
Introduction
• In this chapter we resume the more serious part of the story of the emergence of
the Indian National Congress as the apex nationalist organization that was to guide
the destiny of the Indian national movement till the attainment of independence.
• The foundation of the Indian National Congress in 1885 was not a sudden event, or
a historical accident. It was the culmination of a process of political awakening that
had its beginnings in the 1860s and 1870s and took a major leap forward in the late
1870s and early 1880s.
• The year 1885 marked a turning point in this process, for that was the year the
political Indians, the modem intellectuals interested in politics, who no longer saw
themselves as spokesmen of narrow group interests, but as representatives of
national interest vis-a-vis foreign rule, as a ‘national party,’ saw their efforts bear
fruit.
• The all-India nationalist body that they brought into being was to be the platform,
the organizer, the headquarters, the symbol of the new national spirit and politics.
• On the surface, the nationalist Indian demands of those years — no reduction of
import duties on textile import no expansion in Afghanistan or Burma, the right
to bear arms, freedom of the Press, reduction of military expenditure, higher
expenditure on famine relief, Indianization of the civil services, the right of
Indians to join the semi-military volunteer corps, the right of Indian judges to try
Europeans in criminal cases, the appeal to British voters to vote for a party which
would listen to Indians — look rather mild, especially when considered
separately.
• But these were demands which a colonial regime could not easily concede, for
that would undermine its hegemony over the colonial people.
Establishment of New Political Associations
• The new political thrust in the years between 1875 and 1885 was the creation of
the younger, more radical nationalist intellectuals most of whom entered politics
during this period.
• They established new associations, having found that the older associations were
too narrowly conceived in terms of their programmes and political activity as well
as social bases.
• For example, the British Indian Association of Bengal had increasingly identified
itself with the interests of the zamindars and, thus, gradually lost its anti-British
edge. The Bombay Association and Madras Native Association had become
reactionary and moribund.
• And so the younger nationalists of Bengal, led by Surendranath Banerjea and
Anand Mohan Bose, founded the Indian Association in 1876.
• Younger men of Madras — M. Viraraghavachariar, G. Subramaniya Iyer, P. Ananda
Charlu and others — formed the Madras Mahajan Sabha in 1884.
• In Bombay, the more militant intellectuals like K.T. Telang and Pherozeshah Mehta
broke away from older leaders like Dadabhai Framji and Dinshaw Petit on political
grounds and formed the Bombay Presidency Association in 1885.
• Among the older associations only the Poona Sarvajanik Sabha carried on as
before. But, then, it was already in the hands of nationalist intellectuals.
• A sign of new political life in the country was the coming into existence during
these years of nearly all the major nationalist newspapers which were to
dominate the Indian scene till 1918 — The Hindu, Tribune, Bengalee, Mahraua
and Kesari.
• The one exception was the Amrita Bazar Patrika which was already edited by new
and younger men. It became an English language newspaper only in 1878.
• By 1885, the formation of an all-India political organization had become an
objective necessity, and the necessity was being recognized by nationalists all
over the country.

- पर्

with Analysis

Sessions

Sessions Sessions
UPSCY .
Widespread Agitations in 1880s
• Since 1875, there had been a continuous campaign around cotton import duties
which Indians wanted to stay in the interests of the Indian textile industry.
• A massive campaign had been organized during 1877- 88 around the demand for
the lndianization of Government services. The Indians had opposed the Afghan
adventure of Lord Lytton and then compelled the British Government to
contribute towards the cost of the Second Afghan War.
• The Indian Press had waged a major campaign against the efforts of the
Government to control it through the Vernacular Press Act. The Indians had also
opposed the effort to disarm them through the Arms Act.
• In 1881-82 they had organized a protest against the Plantation Labour and the
Inland Emigration Act which condemned plantation labourers to serfdom.
• A major agitation was organized during 1883 in favour of the Ilbert Bill which
would enable Indian magistrates to try Europeans. This Bill was successfully
thwarted by the Europeans.
• The Indians had been quick to draw the political lesson. Their efforts had
failed because they had not been coordinated on an all-India basis. On the
other hand, the Europeans had acted in a concerted manner.
• Again in July 1883 a massive all-India effort was made to raise a National
Fund which would be used to promote political agitation in India as well as
England.
• It thus, becomes clear that the foundation of the Congress was the natural
culmination of the political work of the previous years.
Foundation of Congress: The Reality
• It thus, becomes clear that the foundation of the Congress was the natural
culmination of the political work of the previous years: By 1885, a stage had been
reached in the political development of India when certain basic tasks or
objectives had to be laid down and struggled for.
• The Congress leaders recognized that objective historical forces were bringing the
Indian people together.
• The promotion of national unity was a major objective of the Congress and later
its major achievement Among the three basic aims and objectives of the
Congress laid down by its first President, W.C. Bannerji, was that of ‘the fuller
development and Foundation of the Indian National Congress: The Reality
consolidation of those sentiments of national unity.’
• The Russian traveller, I.P. Minayeff wrote in his diary that, when travelling with
Bonnerji, he asked, ‘what practical results did the Congress leaders expect from
the Congress,’ Bonnerji replied: ‘Growth of national feeling and unity of Indians.’
• The making of India into a nation was to be a prolonged historical process.
Moreover, the Congress leaders realized that the diversity of India was such that
special efforts unknown to other parts of the world would have to be made and
national unity carefully nurtured.
• In an effort to reach all regions, it was decided to rotate the Congress session among
different parts of the country.
• The President was to belong to a region other than where the Congress session was
being held.
• The early national leaders were also determined to build a secular nation, the
Congress itself being intensely secular.
• The second major objective of the early Congress was to create a common political
platform or programme around which political workers in different parts of the
country could gather and Conduct their political activities, educating and mobilizing
people on an all-India basis.
• Many later writers and critics have concentrated on the methods of political struggle
of the early nationalist leaders, on their petitions, prayers and memorials.
Congress as Movement not as Party
• From the beginning, the Congress was conceived not as a party but as a
movement. It also did not try to limit its following to any social class or group.
• As a movement, it incorporated different political trends, ideologies and social
classes and groups so long as the commitment to democratic and secular
nationalism was there.
• To sum up: The basic objectives of the early nationalist leaders were to lay the
foundations of a secular and democratic national movement, to politicize and
politically educate the people, to form the headquarters of the movement, that
is, to form an all-India leadership group, and to develop and propagate an anti-
colonial nationalist ideology.
BY GAUTAM LAKHANI
Chapter 6:
Socio-Religious Reforms and the National Awakening
Introduction
• The urgent need for social and religious reform that began to manifest itself from
the early decades of the 19th century arose in response to the contact with Western
culture and education.
• The weakness and decay of Indian society was evident to educated Indians who
started to work systematically for their removal.
• They were no longer willing to accept the traditions, beliefs and practices of Hindu
society simply because they had been observed for centuries.
• The impact of Western ideas gave birth to new awakening. The change that took
place in the Indian social scenario is popularly known as the Renaissance.
• Although religion reform was the integral part of these movements none of them
were totally religious in character.
• They were humanist in aspiration and rejected salvation and otherworldliness as the
agenda. They focused on worldly existence.
Background and Causes of the Reform Movement
• Indian Society in the 19th century was caught in a vicious web created by religious
superstitions and dogmas. All religions in general and Hinduism in particular had
become a compound of magic, animism, and superstitions.
• The abominable rites like animal sacrifice and physical torture had replaced the
worship of God. The priests exercised an overwhelming and unhealthy influence on
the mind of people.
• The faithful lived in submission, not only to God, the powerful and unseen, but even
to the whims, fancies, and wishes of the priests.
• Social Conditions were equally depressing. The most distressing was the position of
women. The birth of a girl was unwelcome, her marriage a burden and her
widowhood inauspicious.
• Another debilitating factor was Caste. It sought to maintain a system of segregation,
hierarchically ordained on the basis of ritual status, hampering social mobility and
fostered social divisions.
• There were innumerable other practices marked by constraint, status, authority, bigotry
and blind fatalism. Rejecting them as features of a decadent society, the reform
movements sought to create a social climate for modernization.
• The conquest of India by the British during the 18th and 19th century exposed some
serious weaknesses and drawbacks of Indian social institutions.
• The response, indeed, was varied but the need to reform social and religious life was a
commonly shared conviction. It also brought in completely new sets of ideas and social
world. The exposure to post-Enlightenment rationalism that came to signify modernity
brought a change in the outlook of a select group of Indians.
• The introduction of western education and ideas had the far reaching impact on the
Indian Society. Through the glasses of utility, reason, justice, and progress, a select
group of individuals began to explore the nature of their own society.
• There was a gradual emergence of public opinion. The resultant cultural change led to
introspection about Indian traditions, institution, and culture.
• The socio intellectual revolution that took place in the nineteenth century in the fields
of philosophy, literature, science, politics and social reforms is often known as Indian
Renaissance.
Raja Ram Mohan Roy and Brahmo Samaj
• Ram Mohan Roy, the father of Indian Renaissance was versatile genius, who opposed
the idolatry, denounced Sati, polygamy and abuses of the caste system, favoured
remarriage of Hindu widows.
• He started the ‘AtmiyaSabha’ in 1815 and carried a consistent struggle against the
religious and social malpractices. As a reformist ideologue, Roy believed in modern
scientific approach and principles of human dignity and social equality. He put his
faith in monotheism.
• He wrote Gift to Monotheists and translated the Vedas and the five Upanishads into
Bengali to prove his conviction that ancient Hindu texts support monotheism. In
percepts of Jesus(1820), he tried to separate the moral and philosophical message of
the New Testament, which he praised, from its miracle stories.
• SambadKaumudi (founded in 1921) was a Bengali weekly newspaper published from
Kolkata by Raja Ram Mohan Roy. He regularly editorialised against Sati, denouncing it
as barbaric and unHindu. It was the main vehicle of Roy's campaign against Sati.
• In August 1828, Roy founded the BrahmoSabha which was later renamed
‘BrahmoSamaj’. It opposed idol worship and stayed away from practice of priesthood
and sacrifice. The worship was performed through prayers, meditation, and readings
from the Upanishads.
• Roy remained a devout Hindu till the end of his life and always wore the sacred thread.
From the beginning the appeal of BrahmoSamaj had remained limited to the
intellectuals and educationally enlightened Bengalis living in the towns.
• The orthodox Hindu led by Raja Radhakant Deb organised the ‘Dharma Sabha’ with the
object of countering the propaganda of BrahmoSamaj.
• The early death of Ram Mohan Roy in 1833 left the BrahmoSamaj without the guiding
soul and a steady decline set in. Debendranath Tagore, father of Rabindranath Tagore
founded the TatvabodhiniSabha in 1839 to propagate Rammohun Roy’s ideas.
• Keshubsen and his followers broke away from Brahmosamaj in 1866 and established
what was called the ‘BrahmoSamaj of India’. Debendranath’s more orthodox group
came to be known as the ‘AdiBrahmoSamaj’ .

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Dayanand Saraswati & Arya Samaj
• AryaSamaj ("Noble Society") is a Hindu reform movement founded by Swami Dayananda on 7
April 1875. He was a sannyasi who promoted the Vedas.
• Dayananda emphasized the ideals of brahmacharya (chastity). Swami Dayananda wandered
as an ascetic for fifteen years (1845-60) in search of truth.
• The first AryaSamaj Unit was formally set up by him at Bombay in 1875 and later the
headquarters of the samaj were established at Lahore.
• Swami Dayanand gave the mantra, “Go back to Vedas” as he believed that priestly class and
Puranas had perverted Hindu religion. He wrote a book SatyarthPrakash which contains his
philosophical and religious ideas.
• He believed that every person had the right to have direct access to God. It started the
Shuddhi Movement to bring back those Hindus who had converted to Islam and Christianity.
Today, temples set up by AryaSamaj are found all over India.
• The organization also has played an important role in spread of education through its network
of schools known by name of Dayanand Anglo Vedic (DAV) schools in India. In bringing about
a national awakening in the country, the samaj played a dual role at once progressive and
retrogressive.
Ramakrishna Paramhansa and Swami Vivekananda
• Ramakrishna Paramhansa was a mystic who sought religious salvation in the
traditional ways of renunciation, meditation and devotion.
• He was saintly person who recognized the fundamental oneness of all religions and
emphasized that there were many roads to God and salvation and the service of man
is the service of God.
• Vivekananda founded Ramakrishna Mission in 1897, headquarters of which is at Belur
near Kolkata. He used Ramakrishna Mission for humanitarian relief and social work.
The mission stands for religious and social reform. The teaching of Ramakrishna
Paramhansa formed the basis of the Ramakrishna Movement.
• Vivekananda advocated the doctrine of service- the service of all beings. The service
of jiva( living objects) is the worship of Shiva.
• At the Parliament of Religions held at Chicago in 1893, Swami Vivekananda made a
great impression on people by his learned interpretations. The keynote of his opening
address was the need for a healthy balance between spiritualism and materialism.
M G Ranade and PrarthanaSamaj
• Justice Mahadev GovindRanade (1842 –1901) was a distinguished Indian scholar,
social reformer and author. He was a founding member of the Indian National
Congress and owned several designations as member of the Bombay legislative
council, member of the finance committee at the centre, and the judge of Bombay
High Court.
• During his life he helped establish the Poona SarvajanikSabha and the
PrarthanaSamaj, and would edit a Bombay AngloMarathi daily paper, the
Induprakash, founded on his ideology of social and religious reform.
• With his friends DrAtmaramPandurang, BalMangeshWagle and VamanAbajiModak,
Ranade founded the PrarthanaSamaj, a Hindu movement inspired by the
BrahmoSamaj, espousing principles of enlightened theism based on the ancient
Vedas.
• PrarthanaSamaj was started with inspiration from Keshav Chandra Sen, a staunch
Brahma Samajist, with the objective of carrying out religious reforms in
Maharashtra.
• The four point social agenda of PrathanaSamaj were: Disapproval of caste system,
Women education, Widow remarriage, Raising the age of marriage for both males
and females.
• The Main difference between the PrathanaSamaj and Brahma Samaj was that the
members of the Prathanasamaj remained Hindus and started progressive reforms
within Hinduism as Hindus whereas the Brahma Samaj assailed Hinduism by forming
an organization more or less outside the Hindu orbit.
• They were much attracted to the ideals of the modern west, and proceeded to
imitate Western methods of education.
Satyashodhak Samaj and Jyotiba Phule
• JyotibaPhule belonged to the Mali (gardener) community and organized a powerful
movement against upper caste domination and brahminical supremacy.
• Phule founded the SatyashodhakSamaj (Truth Seekers’ Society) in 1873, with the
leadership of the samaj coming from the backward classes, Malis, Telis, Kunbis,
Saris, and Dhangars.
• The main aims of the movement were: Social service, Spread of education among
women and lower caste people Phule’s works, SarvajanikSatyadharma and
Ghulamgin, became source of inspiration for the common masses.
• Phule used the symbol of Rajah Bali as opposed to the brahmins’ symbol of Rama.
• Phule aimed at the complete abolition of caste system and socio-economic
inequalities. This movement gave a sense of identity to the depressed communities
as a class against the Brahmins, who were seen as the exploiters.
Conclusion
• The cultural-ideological struggle, represented by the socioreligious
movements, was an integral part of the evolving national consciousness.
• This was so because it was instrumental in bringing about the initial
intellectual and cultural break which made a new vision of the future
possible.
• Second, it was a part of the resistance against colonial cultural and
ideological hegemony.
• Out of this dual struggle evolved the modern cultural situation: new men,
new homes and a new society.
BY GAUTAM LAKHANI
Chapter 7:
An Economic Critique of Colonialism
Introduction
• Of all the national movements in colonial countries, the Indian national movement
was the most deeply and firmly rooted in an understanding of the nature and
character of colonial economic domination and exploitation.
• Its early leaders, known as Moderates, were the first in the 19th century to develop
an economic critique of colonialism.
• This critique was, also, perhaps their most important contribution to the
development of the national movement in India — and the themes built around it
were later popularized on a massive scale and formed the very pith and marrow of
the nationalist agitation through popular lectures, pamphlets, newspapers, dramas,
songs, and prabhat pheries.
• Indian intellectuals of the first half of the 19th century had adopted a positive
attitude towards British rule in the hope that Britain, the most advanced nation of
the time, would help modernize India.
Process of Disillusionment
• Indian intellectuals of the first half of the 19th century had adopted a positive attitude
towards British rule in the hope that Britain, the most advanced nation of the time,
would help modernize India.
• In the economic realm, Britain, the emerging industrial giant of the world, was expected
to develop India’s productive forces through the introduction of modern sciences and
technology and capitalist economic organization.
• It is not that the early Indian nationalists were unaware of the many political,
psychological and economic disabilities of foreign domination, but they still supported
colonial rule as they expected it to rebuild India as a spit image of the Western
metropolis.
• The process of disillusionment set in gradually after 1860 as the reality of social
development in India failed to conform to their hopes.
• They began to notice that while progress in new directions was slow and halting; overall
the country was regressing and under developing; and they began to probe deeper into
the reality of British rule and its impact on India.
Moderate Leaders
• Three names stand out among the large number of Indians who initiated and carried
out the economic analysis of British rule during the years 1870-1905.
• 1. Dadabhai Naoroji, known in the pre-Gandhian era as the Grand Old Man of India.
Born in 1825, he became a successful businessman but devoted his entire life and
wealth to the creation of a national movement in India.
• 2. His near contemporary Justice Mahadev Govind Ranade, taught an entire
generation of Indians the value of modem industrial development.
• 3. Romesh Chandra Dutt, a retired ICS officer, published The Economic History of
India at the beginning of the 20th century in which he examined in minute detail the
entire economic record of colonial rule since 1757.
• These three leaders along with G.V. Joshi, G. Subramaniya lyer, G.K. Gokhale,
Prithwis Chandra Ray and hundreds of other political workers and journalists
analysed every aspect of the economy and subjected the entire range of economic
issues and colonial economic policies to minute scrutiny.
• They raised basic questions regarding the nature and purpose of British rule.
• Eventually, they were able to trace the process of the colonialization of the Indian
economy and conclude that colonialism was the main obstacle to India’s economic
development.
• They clearly understood the fact that the essence of British imperialism lay in the
subordination of the Indian economy to the British economy.
• They delineated the colonial structure in all its three aspects of domination through
trade, industry and finance.
• They were able to see that colonialism no longer functioned through the crude tools
of plunder and tribute and mercantilism but operated through the more disguised
and complex mechanism of free trade and foreign capital investment.

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Consequences of Colonialism
• The essence of 19th century colonialism, they said, lay in the transformation of India
into: a supplier of food stuffs and raw materials to the metropolis, a market for the
metropolitan manufacturers, and a field for the investment of British capital.
• The early Indian national leaders simultaneously organized powerful intellectual
agitations against nearly all the important official economic policies. They used these
agitations to both understand and to explain to others the basis of these policies in the
colonial structure.
• They advocated the severance of India’s economic subservience to Britain in every
sphere of life and agitated for an alternative path of development which would lead to
an independent economy.
• An important feature of this agitation was the use of bold, hard- hitting and colourful
language. The nationalist economic agitation started with the assertion that Indians
were poor and were growing poorer every day.
• According to the early nationalists, a major obstacle to rapid industrial
development was the policy of free trade which was, on the one hand,
ruining India’s handicraft industries and,
• On the other, forcing the infant and underdeveloped modern industries into
a premature and unequal and, hence, unfair and disastrous competition with
the highly organized and developed industries of the West.
• The tariff policy of the Government convinced the nationalists that British
economic policies in India were basically guided by the interests of the British
capitalist class.
• On the expenditure side, they pointed out that the emphasis was on serving
Britain’s imperial needs while the developmental and welfare departments
were starved.
• In particular, they condemned the high expenditure on the army which was
used by the British to conquer and maintain imperialist control over large
parts of Asia and Africa.
Drain Theory
• The focal point of the nationalist critique of colonialism was the drain theory.’ The
nationalist leaders pointed out that a large part of India’s capital and wealth was
being transferred or ‘drained’ to Britain in the form of
• Salaries and pensions of British civil and military officials working in India,
• Interest on loans taken by the Indian Government,
• Profits of British capitalists in India, and
• The Home Charges or expenses of the Indian Government in Britain.
• The drain took the form of an excess of exports over imports for which India got no
economic or material return.
• According to the nationalist calculations, this drain amount to one-half of government
revenues, more than the entire land revenue collection and over one-third of India’s
total savings.
• It was in May 1867 that Dadabhai Naoroji put forward the idea that Britain was
draining and ‘bleeding’ India. The drain, he declared, was the basic cause of India’s
poverty andthe fundamental evil of British rule in India.
• Other nationalist leaders, journalists and propagandists followed in the foot-steps of
Dadabhai Naoroji. The drain theory incorporated all the threads of the nationalist
critique of Colonialism, for the drain denuded India of the productive capital its
agriculture and industries so desperately needed.
• Indeed, the drain theory was the high watermark of the nationalist leaders’
comprehensive, interrelated and integrated economic analysis of the colonial
situation.
• Through the drain theory, the exploitative character of British rule could be made
visible. By attacking the drain, the nationalists were able to call into question in an
uncompromising manner, the economic essence of imperialism.
Impact of their work
• The work of the economists and the moderates eroded the people belief in the
benevolence of the British rule.
• The nationalist raised that development of India would happen only when the
political power would be in the Indian hands.
• The moderate leaders who till now professed loyalty to British rule began sowing
seeds of disaffection and discontent and even sedition. This period 1875-1905
became a period for growing national consciousness and the seed time for the
modern Indian national movement.
• At the end of 1905 even prominent leaders like Dadabhai Nauroji asserted self
government or Swaraj as the main political demand.
• Due to the firm foundation laid by the economic critique the later nationalist could
launch powerful mass agitations and movements. They didn’t waver in their anti
imperial efforts due to this firm foundation.
BY GAUTAM LAKHANI
Chapter 8:
The Fight to Secure Freedom of Press
Chapter 8:
The Fight to Secure Freedom of Press
Introduction
• Almost from the beginning of the 19th century, politically conscious Indians
had been attracted to modern civil rights, especially the freedom of the Press.
• As early as 1824, Raja Rammohan Roy had protested against a regulation
restricting the freedom of the Press.
• In the period from 1870 to 1918, the national movement had not yet resorted
to mass agitation through thousands of small and large maidan meetings, nor
did political work consist of the active mobilization of people in mass
struggles.
• The main political task still was that of politicization, political propaganda and
education and formation and propagation of nationalist ideology.
• The Press was the chief instrument for carrying out this task, that is, for
arousing, training, mobilizing and consolidating nationalist public opinion.
• Even the work of the National Congress was accomplished during these years
largely through the Press. The Congress had no organization of its own for
carrying on political work.
• Its resolutions and proceedings had to be propagated through newspapers.
Interestingly, nearly one-third of the founding fathers of the Congress in 1885
were journalists.
Early Regulations
Censorship of Press Act, 1799:
• Lord Wellesley enacted this, anticipating French invasion of India. It imposed almost
wartime press restrictions including pre-censorship. These restrictions were relaxed under
Lord Hastings, who had progressive views, and in 1818, pre-censorship was dispensed with.
Licensing Regulations, 1823:
• The acting governor-general, John Adams, who had reactionary views, enacted these.
According to these regulations, starting or using a press without licence was a penal
offence. These restrictions were directed chiefly against Indian language newspapers or
those edited by Indians. Rammohan Roy’s Mirat-ul-Akbar had to stop publication.
Press Act of 1835 or Metcalfe:
• Act Metcalfe (governor- general—1835-36) repealed the obnoxious 1823 ordinance and
earned the epithet, “liberator of the Indian press”. The new Press Act (1835) required a
printer/publisher to give a precise account of premises of a publication and cease
functioning, if required by a similar declaration. The result of a liberal press policy was a
rapid growth of newspapers.
Licensing Act, 1857:
• Due to the emergency caused by the 1857 revolt, this Act imposed licensing restrictions in
addition to the already existing registration procedure laid down by Metcalfe Act and the
Government reserved the right to stop publication and circulation of any book, newspaper
or printed matter.
Registration Act, 1867:
• This replaced Metcalfe’s Act of 1835 and was of a regulatory, not restrictive, nature. As per
the Act, (i) every book/newspaper was required to print the name of the printer and the
publisher and the place of the publication; and (ii) a copy was to be submitted to the local
government within one month of the publication of a book.

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Important Newspapers
• Many newspapers emerged during these years under distinguished and fearless
journalists.
• These included Hindu and Swadesamitran under G. Subramaniya Aiyar, The
Bengalee under Surendranath Banerjea, Voice of India under Dadabhai Naoroji,
Amrita Bazar Patrika under Sisir Kumar Ghosh and Motilal Ghosh, Indian Mirror
under N.N. Sen, Kesari (in Marathi) and Maharatta (in English) under Balgangadhar
Tilak, Sudharak under Gopal Krishna Gokhale, and Hindustan and Advocate under
G.P. Verma.
• Other main newspapers included, Tribune and Akbhar-i-am in Punjab, Gujarati,
Indu Prakash, Dhyan Prakash and Kal in Bombay and Som Prakash, Banganivasi and
Sadharani in Bengal.
• In fact, there hardly existed a major political leader in India who did not possess a
newspaper or was not writing for one in some capacity or the other.
Impact of Newspapers and Press
• These newspapers were not established as profit-making business ventures
but were seen as rendering national and public service. They were often
financed as objects of philanthropy.
• In fact, these newspapers had a wide reach and they stimulated a library
movement. Their impact was not limited to cities and towns; these
newspapers reached the remote villages.
• Where each news item and editorial would be read and discussed thoroughly
in the ‘local libraries’ which would gather around a single newspaper.
Gradually library movements sprung up all over the country.
• In this way, these libraries served the purpose of not only political education
but also of political participation.
• In these newspapers, government acts and policies were put to critical
scrutiny. They acted as an institution of opposition to the Government.
• The Government on its part had enacted many strident laws, such as Section
124 A of the Indian Penal Code which provided that anyone trying to cause
disaffection against the British Government in India was to be transported for
life or for any term or imprisoned ” upto three years.
• But the nationalist-minded journalists had evolved many clever strategems to
subvert these legal hurdles.
• For instance, writings hostile to the Government used to be prefaced with
sentiments of loyalty to the Government or critical writings of socialists or Irish
nationalists from newspapers in England used to be quoted.
• This was a difficult task which required an intelligent mix of simplicity with
subtlety. The national movement, from its very beginning, stood for the
freedom of press.
• The Indian newspapers became highly critical of Lord Lytton’s administration
especially regarding its inhuman treatment to victims of the famine of 1876-77.
The Government struck back with the Vernacular Press Act, 1878.
Vernacular Press Act, 1878
• A bitter legacy of the 1857 revolt was the racial bitterness between the ruler and the
ruled. After 1858, the European press always rallied behind the Government in political
controversies while the vernacular press was critical of the Government.
• There was a strong public opinion against the imperialistic policies of Lytton,
compounded by terrible famine (1876-77), on the one hand, and lavish expenditure on
the imperial Delhi Durbar, on the other.
• The Vernacular Press Act (VPA) was designed to ‘better control’ the vernacular press and
effectively punish and repress seditious writing.
The provisions of the Act included the following:
1. The district magistrate was empowered to call upon the printer and publisher of any
vernacular newspaper to enter into a bond with the Government undertaking not to
cause disaffection against the Government or antipathy between persons of different
religions, caste, race through published material; the printer and publisher could also be
required to deposit security which could be forfeited if the regulation were contravened,
and press equipment could be seized if the offence re-occurred.
2. The magistrate’s action was final and no appeal could be made in a court of law.
3. A vernacular newspaper could get exemption from the operation of the Act by
submitting proofs to a government censor.
• The Act came to be nicknamed “the gagging Act”. The worst features of this Act
were—(i) discriminator between English and vernacular press, (ii) no right of appeal.
• Under VPA, proceedings were instituted against Som Prakash, Bharat Mihir, Dacca
Prakash and Samachar.
• Incidentally, the Amrita Bazar Patrika turned overnight into an English newspaper to
escape the VPA.
Opposition to VPA
• There was strong opposition to the Act and finally Ripon repealed it in 1882.
• In 1883, Surendranath Banerjea became the first Indian journalist to be
imprisoned. In an angry editorial in The Bengalee Banerjea had criticised a
judge of Calcutta High Court for being insensitive to the religious sentiments
of Bengalis in one of his judgements.
• Balgangadhar Tilak is most frequently associated with the nationalist fight
for the freedom of press.
• Tilak had been building up anti-imperialist sentiments among the public
through Ganapati festivals (started in 1893), Shivaji festivals (started in 1896)
and through his newspapers Kesari and Maharatta.
• He was among the first to advocate bringing the lower middle classes, the
peasants, artisans and workers into the Congress fold.
• In 1896, he organised an all Maharashtra campaign for boycott of foreign cloth in
opposition to imposition of excise duty on cotton.
• In 1896-97 he initiated a no-tax campaign in Maharashtra, urging farmers to
withhold the payment of revenue if their crop had failed. In 1897, plague
occurred in Poona.
• Although Tilak supported government measures to check plague, there was
large-scale popular resentment against heartless and harsh methods such as
segregation and house searches.
• The popular unrest resulted ‘in murder of the chairman of the Plague Committee
in Poona by the Chapekar brothers.
• The government policies on tariff, currency and famine were also behind this
popular resentment.
• The Government had been looking for an opportunity to check this militant
trend and hostility in the press. They decided to make Tilak a victim to set an
example to the public.
• Tilak was arrested after the murder of WC Rand on the basis of the publication of
a poem, ‘Shivaji’s Utterances’, in Kesari, and of a speech which Tilak had
delivered at the Shivaji festival, justifying Afzal Khan’s murder by Shivaji.
• Tilak’s imprisonment led to widespread protests all over the county Nationalist
newspapers and political associations, including those run by Tilak’s critics like
the Moderates, organized a countrywide movement against this attack on civil
liberties and the fiefdom of the Press.
• Overnight Tilak became a popular all-India leader and the title of Lokamanya
(respected and honored by the people) was given to him.
• In 1898, the Government amended Section 124A and added another Section
153A which made it a criminal offence for anyone to bring into contempt the
Government of India or to create hatred among different classes, that is, vis-a-vis
the English in India.
• This also led to nation-wide protests. During Swadeshi and Boycott Movements
and due to rise of militant nationalist trends, several repressive laws were
passed.
BY GAUTAM LAKHANI

Bipan Chandra 1-8

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