Chapter 2 - Nationalism in India

Notes
Indian nationalism developed as a concept during the Indian independence movement
fought against the colonial British Raj.
The First World War, Khilafat and Non-Cooperation

 The war created a new economic and political situation in the years after 1919.
 Income tax introduced and the prices of custom duties were doubled between 1913
and 1918 which led to a very difficult life for common people.
 In 1918-19 crops failed in India, resulting in shortage of food accompanied by an
influenza epidemic.
 At this stage, a new leader appeared and suggested a new mode of struggle.
The Idea of Satyagraha

 In January 1915, Mahatma Gandhi returned to India from South Africa and started
the movement Satyagraha.
 Satyagraha emphasised the power of truth and the need to search for truth.
 According to Mahatma Gandhi, people can win a battle without non-violence which
will unite all Indians.
 In 1917, he travelled to Champaran in Bihar to inspire the peasants to struggle
against the oppressive plantation system.
 In the same year, he organised satyagraha to support the peasants of the Kheda
district of Gujarat.
 In 1918, Mahatma Gandhi went to Ahmedabad to organise a satyagraha movement
amongst cotton mill workers.
The Rowlatt Act

 In 1919, Mahatma Gandhi launched a nationwide satyagraha against the proposed

Rowlatt Act.
 The Act gives the government enormous powers to repress political activities and
allowed detention of political prisoners without trial for two years.
 The British government decided to clamp down on nationalists by witnessing the
outrage of the people.
 On April 10th, police in Amritsar fired on a peaceful procession, which provoked
widespread attacks on banks, post offices and railway stations.
 Martial law was imposed and General Dyer took command.
 On 13th April Jallianwala Bagh incident took place. A large crowd gathered in the
Jallianwala Bagh where a few people came to protest against the government’s new
repressive measures, while some came to attend the annual Baisakhi fair.
 General Dyer blocked all the exit points and opened fire on the crowd killing
hundreds.
  After the Jallianwala Bagh massacre, people became furious and went on strikes,
clashes with police and attacks on government buildings.
 Mahatma Gandhi had to call off the movement as it was turning into a violent war.
 Mahatma Gandhi then took up the Khilafat issue by bringing Hindus and Muslims
together.
 TheFirst World War ended with the defeat of Ottoman Turkey. In March 1919, a
Khilafat Committee was formed in Bombay. In September 1920, Mahatma Gandhi
convinced other leaders of the need to start a non-cooperation movement in
support of Khilafat as well as for swaraj.
Why Non-cooperation?

 According to Mahatma Gandhi, British rule was established in India with the
cooperation of Indians.
 Non-cooperation movement is proposed in stages. It should begin with the
surrender of titles that the government awarded, and a boycott of civil services,
army, police, courts and legislative councils, schools, and foreign goods.
 After much hurdles and campaigning between the supporters and opponents of the
movement, finally, in December 1920, the Non-Cooperation Movement was
adopted.
Differing Strands within the Movement

 In January 1921, the Non-Cooperation-Khilafat Movement began. In this movement,

various social groups participated, but the term meant different things to different
people.
 The Movement in the Towns Middle-class started the movement and thousands of
students, teachers, headmasters left government-controlled schools and colleges,
lawyers gave up their legal practices.
 In the economic front, the effects of non-cooperation were more dramatic. The
production of Indian textile mills and handlooms went up when people started
boycotting foreign goods. But this movement slowed down due to a variety of
reasons such as Khadi clothes are expensive, less Indian institutions for students and
teachers to choose from, so they went back to government schools and lawyers
joined back government courts.
Rebellion in the Countryside

 The Non-Cooperation Movement spread to the countryside where peasants and

tribals were developing in different parts of India.
 The peasant movement started against talukdars and landlords who demanded high
rents and a variety of other cesses. It demanded reduction of revenue, abolition of
begar, and social boycott of oppressive landlords.
 Jawaharlal Nehru in June 1920, started going around the villages in Awadh to
understand their grievances. In October, he along with few others set up the Oudh
Kisan Sabha and within a month 300 branches have been set up. In 1921, the
 peasant movement was spread and the houses of talukdars and merchants were
attacked, bazaars were looted, and grain boards were taken over.
 In the early 1920s, a militant guerrilla movement started spreading in the Gudem
Hills of Andhra Pradesh. The government started closing down forest areas due to
which their livelihood was affected. Finally, the hill people revolted which was led by
Alluri Sitaram Raju who claimed that he had a variety of special powers.
Swaraj in the Plantations

 For plantation workers in Assam, freedom means right to move freely in and out and
retaining a link with the village from which they had come.
 Under the Inland Emigration Act of 1859, plantation workers were not permitted to
leave the tea gardens without permission. After they heard of the Non-Cooperation
Movement, thousands of workers left the plantations and headed home. But,
unfortunately, they never reached their destination and were caught by the police
and brutally beaten up.
Towards Civil Disobedience

 In February 1922, the Non-Cooperation Movement was withdrawn because

Mahatma Gandhi felt that it was turning violent.
 Some of the leaders wanted to participate in elections to the provincial councils.
 Swaraj Party was formed by CR Das and Motilal Nehru. In the late 1920s Indian
politics again shaped because of two factors.
 The first effect was the worldwide economic depression and the second effect was
the falling agricultural prices.
 The Statutory Commission was set up to look into the functioning of the
constitutional system in India and suggest changes. In 1928, Simon Commission
arrived in India and it was greeted by the slogan ‘Go back Simon’.
 In December 1929, under the presidency of Jawaharlal Nehru, the Lahore Congress
formalised the demand of ‘Purna Swaraj’ or full independence for India. It was
declared that 26 January 1930 would be celebrated as Independence Day.
The Salt March and the Civil Disobedience Movement

 On 31 January 1930, Mahatma Gandhi sent a letter to Viceroy Irwin stating eleven
demands.
 Among the demands, the most stirring of all was the demand to abolish the salt tax
which is consumed by the rich and the poor.
 The demands needed to be fulfilled by 11 March or else Congress will start a civil
disobedience campaign. The famous salt march was started by Mahatma Gandhi
accompanied by 78 of his trusted volunteers.
 The march was over 240 miles, from Gandhiji’s ashram in Sabarmati to the Gujarati
coastal town of Dandi. On 6 April he reached Dandi, and ceremonially violated the
law, manufacturing salt by boiling seawater. This marked the beginning of the Civil
Disobedience Movement.
  The movement spread across the world and salt law was broken in different parts of
the country.
 Foreign cloth was boycotted, peasants refused to pay revenue and in many places
forest law was violated.
 In April 1930, Abdul Ghaffar Khan, a devout disciple of Mahatma Gandhi was
arrested.
 Mahatma Gandhi was arrested a month later which led to attack in all structures
that symbolised British rule.
 By witnessing the horrific situation, Mahatma Gandhi decided to call off the
movement and entered into a pact with Irwin on 5 March 1931. Gandhi-Irwin Pact,
Gandhiji consented to participate in a Round Table Conference in London. When the
conference broke down Mahatma Gandhi returned to India disappointed and he
relaunched the Civil Disobedience Movement, for over a year, it continued, but by
1934 it lost its momentum.
How Participants saw the Movement

 The Patidars of Gujarat and the Jats of Uttar Pradesh were active in the movement.
 They became enthusiastic supporters of the Civil Disobedience Movement. But they
were deeply disappointed when the movement was called off in 1931. So when the
movement was restarted in 1932, many of them refused to participate.
 The poorer peasants joined a variety of radical movements, often led by Socialists
and Communists.
 To organise business interests, the Indian Industrial and Commercial Congress in
1920 and the Federation of the Indian Chamber of Commerce and Industries (FICCI)
in 1927 was formed.
 The industrialists attacked colonial control over the Indian economy and supported
the Civil Disobedience Movement when it was first launched.
 Some of the industrial workers did participate in the Civil Disobedience Movement.
In 1930 and 1932 railway workers and dock workers were on strike.
 Another important feature of the Civil Disobedience Movement was the large-scale
participation of women. But, for a long time the Congress was reluctant to allow
women to hold any position of authority within the organisation.
The Limits of Civil Disobedience

 Dalits addressed as untouchables were not moved by the concept of Swaraj.

 Mahatma Gandhi used to call them as harijans or the children of God without whom
swaraj could not be achieved.
 He organised satyagraha for the untouchables but they were keen on a different
political solution to the problems of the community. They demanded reserved seats
in educational institutions and a separate electorate.
  Dr B.R. Ambedkar, who organised the dalits into the Depressed Classes Association in
1930, clashed with Mahatma Gandhi at the second Round Table Conference by
demanding separate electorates for Dalits. The Poona Pact of September 1932, gave
the Depressed Classes (later to be known as the Schedule Castes) reserved seats in
provincial and central legislative councils.
 After the decline of the Non-Cooperation-Khilafat movement, Muslims felt alienated
from the Congress due to which the relations between Hindus and Muslims
worsened.
 Muhammad Ali Jinnah was willing to give up the demand for separate electorates if
Muslims were assured reserved seats in the Central Assembly and representation in
proportion to population in the Muslim-dominated provinces. But, the hope of
resolving the issue at the All Parties Conference in 1928 disappeared when M.R.
Jayakar of the Hindu Mahasabha strongly opposed efforts at compromise.

The Sense of Collective Belonging

 Nationalism spreads when people begin to believe that they are all part of the same
nation.
 History and fiction, folklore and songs, popular prints and symbols, all played a part
in the making of nationalism.
 Finally, in the twentieth century, the identity of India came to be visually associated
with the image of Bharat Mata. Bankim Chandra Chattopadhyay created the image
and in the 1870s he wrote ‘Vande Mataram’ as a hymn to the motherland.
 Rabindranath Tagore painted his famous image of Bharat Mata portrayed as an
ascetic figure; she is calm, composed, divine and spiritual.
 In late-nineteenth-century India, nationalists began recording folk tales sung by
bards and they toured villages to gather folk songs and legends.
 During the Swadeshi movement in Bengal, a tricolour flag (red, green and yellow)
was designed which had eight lotuses representing eight provinces of British India,
and a crescent moon, representing Hindus and Muslims.
 By 1921, Gandhiji designed the Swaraj flag, a tricolour (red, green and white) and
had a spinning wheel in the centre, representing the Gandhian ideal of self-help.
Conclusion
In the first half of the twentieth century, various groups and classes of Indians came
together for the struggle of independence. The Congress under the leadership of Mahatma
Gandhi attempted to resolve differences, and ensure that the demands of one group did not
alienate another. In other words, what was emerging was a nation with many voices
wanting freedom from colonial rule.