History
Unit 1: Independence and National Identity
Case Study of the Indian National Movement for Freedom
Indian National Movement - Establishment of the Indian National Congress, Ideological differences and Split in the movement; Gandhian movements till 1942.
KC: Identity
RC: Ideology, Power, Conflict
Points/Concepts to Focus On for the Unit
You’ll be linking and structuring your responses in the exam around these keywords, especially the long-response answer questions.
- Identity: The state or fact of being the same. It includes defining features of the object, individual, or concept, and can be observed, constructed, asserted, and shaped by internal and external influence.
- Ideology
- Power
- Conflict
- Fairness and development: Inequality, differences, inclusion, power and authority, religion, freedom, privilege, and security.
Administrative Policies under the British
The Army
Maintaining an army was crucial for the British to conquer and subjugate new territories and protect existing ones. In India, they enlisted soldiers called “sepoys”, mainly from Bihar, Jharkhand, and Uttar Pradesh.
Revenue Collection from Agriculture
A large amount of money entered British coffers from agriculture. But not all administrative policies were created the same, with the British utilizing three separate policies for different regions throughout India:
- Permanent Settlement (Introduced by Lord Cornwallis)
- Mahalwari System
- Ryotwari System
Zamindars (landowners) had a hereditary right over the land, while farmers were treated as tenants.
- Farmers were made to pay a fixed land revenue of usually around 50% of all produce.
- Multiple villages were grouped into mahals. The head of the mahal collected revenue on behalf of the British.
- “Ryotwari” comes from the word for peasant, “ryot”. Farmers directly owned land but were still subject to the land revenue policy, which, when fixed, would be set for thirty years.
- Utilized in Bihar and Bengal.
- Utilized in Uttar Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh, and Punjab.
- Utilized in Bombay (Now Mumbai) and Madras (Now Chennai).
- The farmers were forced to cultivate cash crops (indigo and cotton) which devastated the soil instead of grains like wheat and rice.
- They benefitted from improved agricultural techniques.
- Farmers were exploited and oppressed.
- Farmers in Bengal eventually revolted in 1859, to protest the growth of indigo plants, which ruined the soil.
The British received loyalty from the zamindars, a reliable source of income from Bengal and Bihar, and a continuous flow of revenue.
After the revenue collection, and especially during lean years, farmers had very little money left to eat. After they died, the law dictated for the farmer’s land to be divided amongst his sons. The land became much smaller now, which led to even small individual earnings for each owner.
Farmers were often attached emotionally and socially to their ancestral land, and preferred to borrow money from moneylenders instead of selling the land. Moneylenders as a result would charge inflated interest rates, leaving farmers with little money to support their family.
Handicrafts
Indian exports of goods like jewellery, spices, and textiles were extremely popular, leading to competition with British machine-made goods. The British worked their way around this by imposing heavy import taxes on Indian goods and enforcing restrictive export policies, while British goods could be imported into India duty-free.
Industry
The British presence in India led to rapid industrialization taking place. The British especially invested in industries such as the coal industry, with there being around 100 coal mines by the late 19th century, the jute industry, the textile industry, and the sugar industry, with India becoming the largest producer of sugar internationally by the 20th century.
They also constructed railroads and canals as means to transport goods. The first railroad in India, which ran from Bombay to Thane, was inaugurated in 1853. They framed policies that favoured themselves over the Indians, and prioritized cheap labour and profits over paying living wages to labourers.
Meanwhile, the Tata family started iron and steel businesses in Jharkhand in 1907– industries which the Brits neglected. Rather, the latter chose to sanction loans and licenses for Indian industries and businesses.
In relation to this, the movement of “swadesh”, literally translating to “one’s own country”, began to emerge, where people were encouraged to purchase indigenous, Indian-made goods, similar to the Made in India movement that would follow in the modern day.
Dalhousie’s Expansion
1848: Dalhousie becomes new Governor-General, develops 2 ways to annex India: Doctrine of Lapse and misgovernment.
- Doctrine of Lapse: When the ruler of a kingdom under British protection (subsidiary state) dies without a biological heir, kingdom becomes part of British dominion, DOES NOT go to adopted heir unless British approve adoption.
- Misgovernment: Used by Brits to annex Awadh in 1856. Accused Nawab Wajid Ali Shah of misrule and not adding social reforms. Large no. of “sepoys” (Indian soldiers) from Awadh, contributed to First War of Independence later.
Administration of India under British
Aimed to increase trade profits, make territories more profitable, and solidify control over India. Established presidency cities of Bombay, Madras, and Bengal. Administration undertaken by army, police, judiciary, and civil service.
Civil Service
Started by Lord Cornwallis. Till 1853, civil servants dominated by EIC directors. Post-1853, civil servants chosen through exam. Rigged against Indians because examination was held in London, exam had to be answered in English, and maximum application age was very low.
Education in British India
Initially, India lacked a formal system of education. Pathshalas and madrasas were educational institutions that held only small classes. The curriculum was flexible and not fixed, nor were there any exams or formal textbooks. Knowledge was delivered orally, and there was an absence of classes on science and geography, with teachers instead focusing on languages like Persian and Sanskrit, and, oddly enough, mathematics.
Then came the British: British educational reforms in India were centered around 2 goals: civilizing the natives by introducing Indians to Western ideals so they could be admitted into administrative-level tasks, and the downward filtration theory, which ignored the need for mass education in India and believed that by educating the middle- and upper-classes, the knowledge would “trickle down” to the rest.
The majority of the heavy lifting was done by the Wood’s Despatch of 1854. The legislation led to:
- The establishment of educational institutions across the country.
- The demand for at least one government school in each district.
- Government aid to private schools.
- Education at the primary level in the vernacular, but higher-level education being conducted solely in English.
- The formal training and recruitment of teachers.
- Increased support for female education (though this came with many obstacles due to traditional Indian norms surrounding purdah).
However, the despatch failed to address the need for mass education, and an education in the sciences.
Indian Education Reforms
Eventually, educated Indians began taking things into their own hands, desiring that their own countrymen, too, receive modern education. Rabindranath Tagore especially wanted to combine both Indian and Western education. Sir Syed Ahmed Khan established the Jamia Millia Islamia, which is now the Aligarh Muslim University. Meanwhile, Mahatma Gandhi supported the ideal of Nai Talim (New Education), which not only promoted basic education for all, but also encouraged Indians to take pride in their culture and manual labour and become self-reliant.
The Sepoy Mutiny (1857)
…also known as the First War of Independence, The Indian Rebellion of 1857, and the Revolt of 1857.
Causes
Economic
- Strict Revenue Collection Policies: Systems such as the Mahalwari System, the Ryotwari System, and the Permanent Settlement system designed to collect revenue from peasants were incredibly harsh even in the face of crop failure, which led to dissatisfaction with the British.
- Forced Competition for Artisans: Traditional handicraft industries in India were displaced and forced to compete with cheap, machine-made British goods imported to India. Handicraft works were also often heavily taxed and suffered a high export duty, pissing off the artisans.
Political
- Displacement of Ruling Classes: Dalhousie’s Doctrine of Lapse, alongside the Subsidiary Alliances system, got rid of a lot of the native rulers of India– at least those that weren’t slain or defeated in direct combat with the British.
Social
- Racism: Indians weren’t allowed into first-class train compartments, which Gandhi experienced firsthand. Educated Indians, too, were denied promotions.
- Social Reforms: Extremist Indians felt that British laws banning sati, promoting widow remarriage and female education were encroaching on their cultural norms and trying to extinguish Hinduism. Criminals of different castes were also held in the same jail cell, which angered extremists due to the norm of “untouchability”.
- Fear of Forced Conversion: The introduction of Christian missionaries into India led to a fear of religious persecution and being forcibly converted to Christianity. This was further aggravated by the passing of a law that allowed Christian converts to inherit ancestral land from their Hindu parents.
Military
- The Annexation of Awadh/Oudh: The majority of sepoys hailed from the Kingdom of Awadh, hence the annexation of their homeland angered them. Furthermore, Awadh was conquered under falsified and exaggerated charges of incompetence against the Indian ruler.
- Unfair Treatment of Sepoys: Sepoys were paid less than their British counterparts and could not ascend to ranks higher than a subedar. They weren’t allowed to wear religious symbols or caste identifiers, were forced to fight overseas, and had their foreign service allowance revoked.
Immediate Causes – The Greased Cartridges Incident
A new type of rifle called the Enfield rifle was introduced to sepoys, which utilized bullet cartridges covered in greased paper wrapping. Sepoys had to bite off the paper to load the cartridge. Rumours arose that the grease was made from cow and pig fat, offending both Hindu and Muslim sepoys.
The culmination of all these causes led to the revolt.
On March 29th, a sepoy named Mangal Pandey fired at a British officer and encouraged others to join him in the revolt, before being hanged.
In April, sepoys in Meerut refused to fire and were jailed. Their fellow soldiers broke them out, killed British officers, seized weapons, and burned British properties. The rebellion spread to Delhi, where Bahadur Shah Zafar was declared emperor of India.
Other uprisings followed, including those led by Rani Lakshmi Bai in Jhansi and Begum Hazrat Mahal in Lucknow. However, the British eventually recaptured Delhi, exiled Shah Zafar to Myanmar, and brutally suppressed the rebels.
Indians referred to the event as the First War of Independence, while the British called it the Sepoy Mutiny to minimize its significance and ignore civilian participation.
Failures of the Uprising
- Localized to Northern India
- Weak leadership and lack of a unified national goal
- Inferior arms and ammunition compared to the British
Consequences of the Rebellion
- Divide-and-Conquer Strategy: British policies began deliberately encouraging Hindu-Muslim divisions.
- The British Raj began in 1858, transferring control to the British Crown.
- Withdrawal of the Doctrine of Lapse.
- Withdrawal of social reforms.
- Increase in the ratio of Indian to European soldiers.
Social Reforms in India
Being a woman or someone belonging to a lower caste in colonial India sucked big-time. Practices such as sati, child marriage, female infanticide, polygamy, and denial of widow remarriage were widespread. Lower castes were treated as “untouchables” and denied basic rights.
Social reform movements began in the early 19th century. Raja Ram Mohan Roy founded the Brahmo Samaj in 1828, while the Veda Samaj and Prarthana Samaj promoted education, widow remarriage, and caste reform.
In 1856, Ishwar Chandra Vidyasagar’s efforts led to the Hindu Widows Remarriage Act. Jyotiba Phule and Savitribai Phule opened schools for girls of lower castes in 1848.
Lord Drinkwater Bethune (what the FUCK is that name bro) founded India’s first girls’ school in Calcutta in 1849. Kandukuri Veeresalingam supported girls’ education in Andhra Pradesh.
In 1929, the Child Marriage Restraint Act banned marriage of girls under 15 and boys under 18.
Reformers such as Raja Ram Mohan Roy, Dr. B. R. Ambedkar, and Mahatma Gandhi fought caste discrimination through education, publications, and nonviolent campaigns.
Indian National Movement
Nationalism spread due to British policies, improved connectivity, modern education, exposure to Western ideals, and the use of English as a common language.
Newspapers, patriotic literature, and policies such as the Vernacular Press Act, the Arms Act, and the withdrawal of the Ilbert Bill intensified resentment.
Political associations formed throughout the late 19th century but lacked mass support. Indians increasingly demanded a larger organization with clear political goals.
The Indian National Congress:
Surendranath Banerjea laid the foundations by forming the Indian Association of Calcutta in 1876, wanting to represent the rising educated middle class and inspire nation-wide action for independence.
The British, still recovering from the Revolt of 1857, believed in a “Safety Valve Theory”, where they assumed that by providing Indians a platform to air out their issues they could avoid another rebellion. This led to A. O. Hume, a British official, forming the Indian National Congress by holding its first session in Bombay, where Womesh Chandra Banerjee was voted to be its first president, in 1885. 72 delegates from all across the country arrived.
Though initially, the INC was under the supervision of the British, it came to be dominated by a group called the “moderate nationalists”, leading to the…
Moderate Phase
The moderates dominated the INC for the first 20 years of its existence, with the group composed of individuals such as Surendranath Banerjea, Dadabhai Naroji, and Mahadev Govinda. These individuals belonged to the educated middle class.
The main ideology of the Moderates was that Indian independence and progress could only be achieved by working with the British, whom they essentially saw the best in. They never truly desired COMPLETE independence, just to be treated as equals and not slaves by their colonizers.
Demands of the Moderates
- Abolition of the Salt Act and export duty on sugar.
- Separation of the judiciary government branch from the executive one.
- Increased power for local-level governments.
- Freedom of speech.
- Less military spending.
- The reformation and expansion of legislative bodies.
- Holding the Indian Civil Services exam in both India and England instead of just the latter, to allow Indians to also have the opportunity to work administrative jobs.
Achievements
- Popularizing democracy and nationalism.
- Expanding the legislative body with the 1892 Indian Councils Act.
- Exposing the exploitative colonial rule of the British.
Limitations
However, they failed to promote democracy to a greater degree, achieve universal voting rights, and didn’t include women in their campaigns. This was likely due to the fact that the British mostly turned a deaf ear to their petitions, and having a narrow social base consisting only of the educated middle class, which meant that their ideals didn’t reach the common masses.
“In order for non-violence to work, your opponent must have a conscience,” as goes the saying by Stokely Carmichael. The Moderates didn’t seem to understand that.
The people wanted active rebellion, and the British wanted to shut down the INC because instead of quelling Indian nationalism like they thought it would, it only aggravated it further. And the group that answered to this call were responsible for…
The Radical Phase
The Moderates failed to bring any real change, so the “radical nationalists”, a.k.a. Radicals took over. These included Lal-Bal-Pal (Lala Lajpat Rai, Bal Gangadhar Tilak, and Bipin Chandra Pal). They wanted strong political action: boycotts, strikes, and political demonstrations.
Critical of their Moderate predecessors, the Radicals wanted swaraj, or self-rule, which they believed could only be achieved via independent action and not cooperation with the British. This extremism was fuelled by worsening living conditions in India.
The Radicals were younger, consisting of young adults and college students, and included more women as well. Their strategies included boycotting British goods, outcasting those who sold and purchased them, and promoting swadeshi by encouraging Indian-made goods.
Brahmins didn’t perform religious rites in houses that used British-made salt and sugar, while matchbox labels advertised the movement using stickers with the icon of Bharat Mata, the personification of India as a woman, with the message of “Buy Swadeshi”.
In 1906, another political party arose known as the All-India Muslim League. Supposedly founded on the belief of a “loss of identity” if Muslims joined the Hindu-majority INC, the league was founded by Nawab Salimulla Khan and Aga Khan.
Partition of Bengal (1905)
The Partition of Bengal and the chaos that followed were driven by Viceroy Lord Curzon.
- 1899: Curzon introduced the Calcutta Corporation Act, increasing British representation in legislative bodies.
- 1904: Indian Universities Act placed universities under government control, and the Ancient Monuments Act made monument preservation a government responsibility.
Bengal included modern-day West Bengal, Bihar, Jharkhand, Odisha, and Bangladesh. Curzon proposed splitting Bengal into East Bengal (Muslim-majority) and West Bengal (Hindu-majority), claiming it was for administrative convenience (bet no one ever said that about him lmfao).
In reality, it was an attempt to divide Hindus and Muslims and weaken the strong nationalist movement in Bengal, which relied heavily on boycotts and picketing of foreign goods.
Curzon attempted to appease Muslims by promising Dhaka as the capital of East Bengal and establishing a university there. Indian leaders opposed this, with Rabindranath Tagore urging Hindus and Muslims to tie rakhis and consider each other brothers.
Lord Harding reunited Bengal in 1911, excluding Bihar and Odisha. Despite this, the partition created a lasting Hindu-Muslim rift, strengthening the Muslim League.
When Bengal was finally divided again in 1947, Tagore’s poem Amar Sonar Bangla became the opening lines of Bangladesh’s national anthem.
The Surat Split (1907)
Despite them coming together to protest the partition of Bengal, the Moderates and the Radicals split in the INC in 1907 at Surat, but eventually came back together in Lucknow in 1916.
The Morley-Minto Reforms
Organized by the British to promote their “divide-and-conquer” strategy and supposedly pacify the Muslim League. It established a separate electorate system, which divided people into voting constituencies based on religion, and only allowed people to vote for candidates of the same faith as themselves.
Enter: Gandhi
Full name Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi, the man would go on to become one of the most significant figures in the Indian Independence Movement. Gandhi practised four main ideologies:
- Satyagraha: Truthfulness in the face of everything, and nonviolence as well.
- Ahimsa: Nonviolent protests.
- Swadeshi: Self-reliance and the promotion of Indian-made goods over British ones.
- Mass Movements: Gandhi knew how to incorporate the Indian masses instead of confining the movement to the educated middle class.
Gandhi returned to India from South Africa in 1915 and founded Sabarmati Ashram. He protested against the notion of untouchability, and popularized khadi, a type of hand-woven white cloth, as a symbol of swadeshi.
He protested alongside peasants who refused to pay land taxes due to the crop failure that year in Kheda, Gujarat against mill owners.
He promoted various methods of non-violent resistance such as through boycotts, not paying taxes, picketing shops selling foreign goods, and peaceful protests.
The Jallianwala Bagh Massacre (1919)
On 13th April, 1919, a large group of people were gathered in Amritsar’s Jallianwala Bagh, a park in the area. The crowd contained civilians, including children. While some were peacefully protesting the arrests of two Indian freedom fighters, others were celebrating the festival of Baisakhi. The park had only one exit.
A ban had been placed on large public gatherings in response to a violent protest by a mob of Indians in response to the very same arrests.
The military commander of Amritsar, General Dyer, ordered the British Indian Army and British soldiers to block the entrance to the park and begin firing till their ammunition ran out. They fired.
Anywhere between 1200 and 1500 people were severely injured. 379 died. All of them peaceful protestors, innocent civilians, or children.
The Khilafat Movement (1920)
Turkey got the short end of the stick after WW1 (remember the Treaty of Sevres? Yeah, that.) This led to the division of the Ottoman Empire, and resulted in the Caliph losing his power. Now, the Caliph was both the head of Turkey, but also an influential figure in Islam.
To protest this, brothers Mohammed and Shaukat Ali organized the Khilafat Movement to demand the return of Arab lands to the Caliph and the restoration of his power.
The INC also joined in to promote Hindu-Muslim unity and to have another opportunity to provoke the British.
The Non-Cooperation Movement (1920–22)
The events of World War I diverted British attention, allowing Indian nationalism to grow. In 1917, the British Secretary of State for India promised the country independence in exchange for the contribution of sepoys to British troops in the war.
However, they went back on their word, not only by dividing up Turkey, which angered a significant population of Indians, but also with the implementation of the Rowlatt Act.
The act was passed in the face of the growing threat of Indian rebellion, and essentially allowed the British government to restrict individual movements, arrest anyone without a warrant, and keep in camera trial, which was to say force people through torture to confess to crimes they hadn’t committed.
This, along with the horrific events of the Jallianwala Bagh Massacre, spurred Gandhi to begin the Non-Cooperation Movement.
The movement began with Indians giving up titles and honours bestowed on them by the British, like Gandhi giving up his title of “Kaiser-i-Hind”.
Schools, colleges, courts of law were boycotted. Foreign clothes were burnt in bonfires. Strikes were held.
The Simon Commission and “Go Back, Simon” (1927–28)
In 1927, the British government in India launched the Simon Commission, which consisted solely of British members that refused to accept Indian demands for self-governance.
This insulted several Indian parties fighting for swaraj such as the Hindu Mahasabha, the Muslim League, and the INC.
The commission was almost unanimously boycotted with the slogans, “Simon Go Back” and “Simon Wapas Jao”.
Purna Swaraj Resolution (1928–29)
In 1928, in response to the Simon Commission, multiple Indian political parties assembled at the All Parties Conference to frame the Nehru Report...
Quit India Movement a.k.a the Bharat Chhodo Andolan (1942–43)
When World War Two broke out in 1939, the British declared two things: that, number one, they were at war with Germany; and number two, so was India– without consulting the Indians, of course.
This decision was opposed by multiple Indian leaders as they believed the British forcing their subjects to fight their wars for them was unjust. Almost 3 million Indians had fought for the British up till now, though most of them had volunteered.
In comes Sir Stafford Cripps, a British official, with an offer for Indians to prevent more unrest in the war years to follow. The Cripps Offer promised India dominion status and more freedoms later if they cooperated with the British in the war.
Furthermore, they promised an “opt-out” policy for any states that did not want to join a united India. This pleased Mohammed Jinnah, the leader of the All-India Muslim League, as he desired the creation of a separate Muslim state called Pakistan. However, this angered Gandhi, who wanted nothing to do with a divided India.
In 1942, the INC passed the Quit India resolution, demanding the British leave India or face another non-violent movement led by Gandhi. He delivered his famous “Do or Die” speech.
“The mantra is ‘Do or Die’. We shall either free India or die in the attempt; we shall not live to see the perpetuation of our slavery.” – Mahatma Gandhi, 1942.
Several figures including Dr. B.R. Ambedkar and Mohammed Jinnah opposed the movement, fearing INC dominance would marginalize Dalits and Muslims.
The British responded by arresting leaders without trial and censoring the press. This backfired, leading younger activists to adopt more aggressive tactics while underground press flourished.
Nonviolent actions included strikes and marches, while violent actions included sabotage of British infrastructure.
The British retaliated with bombings, mass arrests, and military force. Despite failing to achieve independence immediately, the movement gained international sympathy.
The Muslim League expanded rapidly and strengthened its demand for a separate Muslim state, influencing the eventual Partition of India.
Bose and India in World War II (and an unexpected crossover?)
During WWII, Subhas Chandra Bose rose to prominence. Rejecting Gandhi’s nonviolence, Bose believed freedom required armed struggle.
He became leader of the Indian National Army (Azad Hind Fauj) in 1943, composed largely of Indian POWs and veterans.
Bose escaped house arrest, reached Nazi Germany, and sought help from Adolf Hitler and Benito Mussolini under the logic of “the enemy of my enemy is my friend.”
This is a real photo btw, Mussolini (left), Bose (centre), Hitler (right)
Germany declined major support, so Bose turned to Japan. With Japanese assistance, the INA captured the Andaman and Nicobar Islands.
Bose formed a provisional government of independent India in 1943 and created the Rani Jhansi Regiment, a women’s unit led by Captain Lakshmi Swaminathan.
Attempts to re-enter India failed, and Bose died in a plane crash.
