Introduction

Two phases of revolutionary movements
Phase I - Until the end of World War I (until 1918) and the primary reason was no result of Swadeshi/Boycott movement and its inspiration
Phase II - Post Non-cooperation movement (after 1920) and the primary reason was no result of non-cooperation movement

Phase I - Until 1918	Phase II - Post 1920
Individual Heroic actions	Initially individualistic later turned out to be group based
Militancy was the prime means	Initially militancy but later urged to be revolutionary in open stream
Ways are more Hindu oriented	Ways are more secular. Muslims are also involved
Failed to evolve socio-economic goals	Failed to evolve socio-economic goals
Lacks mass base
Inspired from the Irish nationalists or Russian nihilists	Inspired from Marxism Communists and Russian Soviet Union

Phase I - Until the end of World War I

Causes

Failure of leadership and Swadeshi movement

Extremist ways of activities such as Swadeshi movement shown no result
Leaders failed to tap revolutionary energies of youth in the movement
British repression failed to make them in open protest, hence turned militants

Inspired ideology

Inspired from the Irish nationalists or Russian nihilists
Assassinate unpopular officials and arouse people to expel British physically

Revolutionary Activities before World War I

		Bengal
1902	The Anushilan Samiti	First revolutionary group Calcutta. Founded by Promotha Mitter. Alipore Bomb Case.
1902	Under Jnanendranath Basu	In Midnapore
1906	Yugantar	Revolutionary Weekly Magazine started by Anushilan members Barindra Kumar Ghosh, Bhupendranath Dutta
1907		Yugantar group failed to kill Sir Fuller, unpopular X Governor of Eastern Bengal and Assam
1908	Alipore Conspiracy Case	Prafulla Chaki & Khudiram Bose [Anushilan Samiti] thrown bomb at white sadist Judge Kingsford in Muzzafarnagar. Whole group including Aurobindo Ghosh and Barindra Ghosh trailed
	Sandhya and Yugantar	Revolutionary literature
		Punjab
	Lala Lajapati Rai	Punjabee [motto - self-help at any cost]
	Ajit Singh[Bhagat Singh uncle]	Secret society Anjuman-i- Muhibhan-i-Watan in Lahore Bharat Mata - Journal
	Lalchand Falak	Radical Urdu poet
		Maharashtra
1879	Ramosi Peasants Force	Led by Vasudev Balwant Phadke
1890	Balagangadar Tilak	Propagated militant nationalist through Kesari and Maharatta and Ganesh and Sivaji festivals
1899	Mitra Mela	Secret society by Savarkar and his brother Later merged into Abhinav Bharat
		Abroad
1905	India House	By Syamji Krishnavarma in London an Indian Home Rule Society Journal- The Sociologist
	Madam Bhikaji Cama	Bande Mataram, Parsi revolutionist, Paris contacts
	Virendranath Chattopadhyaya	Berlin(Germany) as base
	United India House	Seattle
	Swadesh Sevak Home	Vancouver

Revolutionary activity during World War I

Nationalist response to World War I was three fold

Moderates	Supported British as matter of duty
Extremists	Supported that British would give Self-government after the war
Revolutionaries	Utilise Opportunity to wage a war on British and liberate country

Main activities by Ghadr party in North America, Berlin Committee in Europe, some scattered mutinies by Indian soldier as in Singapore

Ghadr party

1913, Revolutionary Group who published newspaper The Ghadr headquartered at San Francisco
Group mainly contains Ex-soldiers and peasants migrated to USA and Canada from Punjab for better opportunities
Prominent members are Lala Hardyal, Ramachandra, Bhagwan Singh, Kartar Singh Saraba, Barakatullah, Bhai Paramanand
Ideology

Assassinate officials
Publish revolutionary literature
Work among Indian troops abroad and raise funds
Bring simultaneous revolt in all colonies of Britain
Attempt to bring armed revolt in Britain
Secular party

Komagata Maru Incident 1914

Komagata Maru, name of ship carrying mainly Sikh and Muslims from Singapore to Vancouver(Canada) was blocked at Vancouver for nearly two months because of alleged British Persuasion and returned back to Calcutta
Ghadr leaders decided to launch violent attack on British rule in India led by Rashbehari Bose and Sachin Sanyal
Failed due to treachery
Suppressed by Defence of India Act 1915

Berlin Committee in Europe

1915, sent missions to Baghdad, Persia, Turkey, Kabul led by Virendranath Chattopadhyay, Bhupendranath Dutta, Lala Hardyal (also in Ghadr party)
Zimmerman plan
Aimed to mobilise the Indian settlers abroad to send volunteers and arms to India to incite rebellion among Indian troops and to even organise an armed invasion of British India to liberate the country

Mutiny in Singapore 1915

Punjabi Muslim 5th Light infantry
36th Sikh Battalion

Bagha Jatin organised revolutionary revolt in Bengal and died in an encounter in Balasore

Break in revolutionary activity post war

Temporary respite because of release of prisoners
Hope of Montagu statement of responsible Govt in India and constitutional reforms
Gandhi's presence in National movement

Phase II Revolutionary activity post Non-Cooperation movement

Causes

Under persuasion of Gandhi and CR Das, many revolutionaries� either agreed to join non-cooperation movement or temporarily suspended their activities to give non-cooperation movement a chance
Failure of non-cooperation movement and increased nationalistic fervour with the movement led some young nationalist who are neither attracted to parliamentary work nor interested in constructive work like increase in awareness , attracted to revolutionary activities
Inspired from Russian Revolution 1917 and success of young soviet union in consolidating itself
Upsurge of working class trade unionism
Marxism and socialism impact
Journals- Atmasakti, Sarathi, Bijoli; Books- Bandi Jiwan (Sachin Sanyal), Pather Dabi (Sharatchandra Chatterjee)

Revolutionary activities

Two areas - Punjab-UP-Bihar and Bengal
Dominated by Hindustan Republican Association/Army in Punjab-UP-Bihar and Chittagong group in Bengal

Hindustan Republic Association/Army or Hindustan Socialist Republican Association HSRA

Founded in Kanpur in 1924 by Ramprasad Bismil, Jogesh Chandra Chatterjee and Sachin Sanyal, Ashfaqullah Khan
Aim to organise armed revolt and dethrone British Govt
Kakkori robbery 1925

Looted railway cash of Kakkori village in UP
Govt repression, setback for HRA

Saunders murder 1928

HSRA adopted socialism and resolute to fight as a collective organised group
But the death of Lala Lajpat Rai due to lathi charges of police in anti-Simon commission led them to resort to individualistic action
Bhagat Singh, Chandrashekar Azad, Rajguru, shot dead Saunders, police official responsible for lathi charge

Bomb on Central Legislative Assembly 1929

Bhagat Singh and Batukeshwar Dutt, (Sukhdev Thapar) thrown nominal bomb(which would have no impact) on Central Legislative Assembly when session is passing the Trade Disputes Bill and Public Safety Bill that curtails the civil liberties
Aim was to get arrested and use the trail court to propagate their message

Chittagong group under Surya Sen

Surya Sen who participated in Non-cooperation movement decided to organised an armed rebellion
They succeeded in seizing two armouries in Chittagong , hosted National flag, claimed a provisional revolutionary Government
Large scale women participated- Pritilata Waddedar, Kalapana Dutt, Santi Ghosh, Suniti Chandheri, Bina Das

Ideological rethinking of revolutionaries after Phase II

Revolutionaries in the last days -late 1920- started moving away from individual heroic actions and violence to mass politics
Ramprasad Bismil(Founder of HRA) himself appealed to youth to work in open environment
Bhagat Singh moved away from violent movement to popular broad based movement alone can led to successful revolution
Redefined revolution from militancy and violence to national liberation and beyond that a new socialist orde r to be achieved

Summary

Alipore Conspiracy Case 1908	Prafulla Chaki & Khudiram Bose [Anushilan Samiti]
Komagata Maru Incident 1914	Rashbehari Bose and Sachin Sanyal [Ghadr party]
Zimmerman plan 1915 [Berlin Committee]	Virendranath Chattopadhyay, Bhupendranath Dutta, Lala Hardyal [Germany based]
Saunders murder 1928	Bhagat Singh, Chandrashekar Azad, Rajguru
Bomb on Central Legislative Assembly 1929	Bhagat Singh, Batukeshwar Dutt, (Sukhdev Thapar)
Chittagong armoury raid	Surya Sen, Pritilata Waddedar, Kala pana Dutt, Santi Ghosh, Suniti Chandheri, Bina Das

*16 May 2021

Militant Nationalism and Revolutionary Movements