leftists in india

8/9/2019 Leftists in India

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Contents

Foreword by Stephen Cohen viii

Preface x

List of Abbreviations xiii

1 Historical Background 1

2 Ideologies and Orientations 26

3 Communism in India 42

4 Growth of the Congress Left Wing 136

5 Labour and Peasant Movements 166

6 The Growth of Other Leftist Parties 196

Appraisal 209

Notes 231

Bibliography 240

Index 247

vii


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1Historical Background

1

I

Prior to the dawn of the twentieth century the prospect of a revolution

in India figured in nationalist thinking primarily as an event that would

ensure a greater degree of Indian representation within the British system

of rule. In 1878, an editorial in theHindu Patriotobserved:

Our rulers may rest assured that the symptoms of dissatisfaction which

they notice among the princes and people of India are no symptoms

of a wish for a political revolution. Far from it. Both the princes and

people of India fully appreciate the order which the English have

introduced, the protection and security which they have given, and

the principles of progress which they have instilled into life.1

Romesh Chandra Dutt, President of the Indian National Congress in

1890, declared that the people of India were not fond of sudden changes

and revolutions. They wished to strengthen British rule and to bring it

more in touch with the people. Their most cherished desire, he said, was

to see some Indian members in the Secretary of States Council and in

the Viceroys Executive Council so that they could represent the inter-

ests of the Indian people in the discussion of every important adminis-

trative question. Ananda Mohan Bose, President of the 1898 Congress,

looked hopefully for the cooperation of the British rulers in the fight

against the evils of economic backwardness, obscurantism, ignorance

and administrative shortcomings of the bureaucratic system and declared

that the educated classes were the friends and not the foes of England

her natural and necessary allies. Even Surendra Nath Banerjee pleaded

for the permanence of British rule in India and proclaimed that the


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4 Leftism in India, 19171947

The extremist party which thus came into being under the leadership

of Aurobindo and Tilak differed in fundamental points from that which

had hitherto been followed by the moderate leaders of the Indian National

Congress. And as the Swadeshi Movementoutstripped its original limita-

tions and as eminent nationalists like Bipin Chandra Pal, Lala Lajpat Rai

and G.S. Khaparde joined its ranks, the extremist party soon became an

all-India revolutionary organization. It may be noted here that during

the last decade of the nineteenth century, Bipin Chandra Pal did not share

the extremist views of Aurobindo and Tilak. He held that the Indians were

loyal to the British because they believed that God himself had led the

British to India to help it in working out its salvation. Their loyalty,he declared, was so natural, unconscious and automatic that no effort was

needed on the part of the Government to train the Indians in the virtue

of allegiance. But when the British Government, in total disregard of the

popular will decided to partition Bengal, his illusions were destroyed and

he fell in line with Aurobindo and Tilak. The political changes and trans-

formations through which Bipin Chandra Pal himself passed were typical

of what was taking place all over India, and brought into sharp relief the

two political parties labelled as moderates and extremists.5

The main difference between the moderates and the extremists lay in

the concept of an Indian political goal and the method to be adopted for

achieving it. The old guard of the Congress, who had built their habita-

tion away on the horizon, were extremely moderate in their demands.

They were imbued with the spirit, principles and the methods of mid-

Victorian liberalism and bent on winning not complete self-government

but only piecemeal reforms. They were careful not to pitch their demandstoo high. Some of them might have cherished in their heart of hearts the

goal of self-government, but almost all of them wanted to work with least

resistance and therefore framed their demands for reforms on such moder-

ate and cautious lines as not to arouse any serious opposition. They were

confirmed believers in the British sense of justice and fair play and fol-

lowed the method of prayers, petitions and representations in order to

get their grievances redressed.The extremists, on the other hand, looked upon the British rule as an

unmitigated evil and believed that Swaraj (complete independence) was

the birthright of every Indian, not a sort of gift to be doled out by the

British Government. They were convinced that the method of political

mendicancy would never bring India near Swaraj. What India needed was

to create her own strength so that Britain could be compelled to part with

power. They approached the question of violence and non-violence purely

from the standpoint of political pragmatism and expediency. Aurobindo,


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for example, never mixed up ordinary ethics with politics, which he

believed had its own ethics the ethics of theKshatriya, not of theBrahmin.

He pointed out that to impose theBrahminical virtue of saintly sufferance

in politics was to preach Varnasankara or confusion of duties which was not

conducive to political advancement. Non-violence, he declared, was not

a speciality of Indian genius.6

II

The most significant development of the militant nationalist movement

was the activities of the revolutionaries who set out for different parts ofthe world with the aims of establishing international contacts, spreading

anti-British propaganda, explaining Indias aspirations and securing for-

eign help for the overthrow of British rule in India. That even the orthodox

nationalist leaders felt the necessity of such activities abroad was evident

from the fact that Dadabhai Naoraji, the veteran Congress leader who

once appealed to the British rulers not to drive the educated Indians into

opposition instead of drawing them to their side, placed the case of India

before the Congress of Socialists in 1904 at Amsterdam.

One of the earliest Indians to achieve concrete results in organizing

fellow revolutionaries abroad was Shyamji Krishna Varma who founded

the Indian Home Rule Society in London in 1905 and brought out a jour-

nal called theIndian Sociologist. Other prominent Indian revolutionaries

who collected round Shyamji were Vinayak Damodar Savarkar, Hardayal,

Madan Lal Dhingra, Sardar Singh Rana and Madam Bhikhaji Rustam

K.R. Cama.Madam Cama left India in 1902 and dedicated her life to the achieve-

ment of Indias freedom by means of revolutionary propaganda in Europe

and America. She represented India at the International Socialist Congress

at Stuttgart in August 1907, and delivered a brilliant speech highlighting

the evils of British rule in India. Describing the continuance of British

rule as positively disastrous and extremely injurious to the best interests of

India, she appealed to all lovers of freedom all over the world to cooperatein freeing India from the bondage of slavery. She concluded her address

by unfurling the national flag, a tricolour in green, yellow and red, and

earned the undying reputation as the Mother of Indian Revolution.

While Shyamji Krishna Varma and Madam Cama were busy in Europe,

their activities inspired the Indians in America who had migrated to that

country after being unable to earn the bare minimum of livelihood in

India to start the Ghadr Movement. They formed the Ghadr Partyin 1913 and

brought out a weekly journal, Ghadr, in Urdu, Marathi and Gurumukhi

Historical Background 5


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languages. The aims of the party, as proclaimed by its founders, were the

overthrow of British imperialism in India and the establishment of a

national republic based on freedom and equality. These aims, it was further

proclaimed, could be achieved only by an armed revolution.7

When the war broke out between England and Germany in 1914, the

Indian revolutionaries abroad seized the opportunity to enlist the sym-

pathy and support of the Germans for Indias freedom. The Germans were

equally anxious to exploit the Indian unrest and anti-British activities of

the Indian revolutionaries abroad. Assured of German sympathy and sup-

port, the Indian revolutionaries set up an organization in Berlin known

as the Indian Independence Committee. The committee lost no time ininviting all revolutionaries in India and abroad to formulate a common

plan of action and to send men and money to India to prepare the ground

for the overthrow of British rule in India.

Thus, with the outbreak of World War I, the Indian revolutionary move-

ment merged itself with the march of events all over the world and entered

into an era of great and far reaching changes. According to R. Palme Dutt,

it was the shock of World War I, with the lasting blow to the whole struc-

ture of imperialism, and the opening of the world revolutionary wave

that followed in 1917 and after, which released the first mass movement

of revolt in India.

III

As the war came to a close and as mankind awaited the new years of peace,

a shadow lay across the Peace Conference at Versailles the shadow ofrevolution. In a memorandum to the Peace Conference Lloyd George

pointed out that there was a deep sense not only of discontent but also

of anger and revolt among workers against pre-war conditions. The whole

existing order in its political, social and economic aspects was being

questioned by the masses of the population from one end of Europe to the

other and the continent was filled with a spirit of revolution. Bolshevik

imperialism, he averred, did not merely menace the states on Russiasborders but threatened the whole of Asia and was as near to America as it

was to France. He warned that there could be no peace and security as long

as the scourge of Bolshevism threatened the world.8

A similar foreboding about the coming shadows of Bolshevism also

troubled the mind of President Woodrow Wilson during his journey to

France on board the George Washington. Bolshevism, he realized, was reac-

tion against the way in which the world had worked and it was to be the vic-

torious powers business at the Peace Conference to fight for a new order.



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Indeed, after the victory of the Bolshevik Revolution in Russia in 1917,

when the revolutionary wave began to extend in varying forms and degrees

to the countries of Asia and Europe, the entire programme of Wilsonian

principles to make the world safe for democracy seemed to recede into

the background. A choice of greater magnitude now confronted mankind,

the choice between Wilson and Lenin.

Wilson represented the path of bourgeois democratic reform while

maintaining the essence of imperialism and the class ownership of

the means of production . . . The path of Lenin was the path of the

mass revolution against imperialism, of the dictatorship of the pro-letariat in the imperialist countries and of the democratic dictatorship

of the workers and of peasantry in the colonial and backward coun-

tries, of the liberation of the colonial peoples, of the collective organi-

zation of societies . . . The issue of these paths was the issue of the post

war epoch.9

It was the beginning of the epoch marked by the awakening of the over-

whelming majority of the human race to revolution and an advance of

national revolutionary movements all over the world in Central and

South America, in the Near and Middle East, in Africa, in China and in

India.

In India, the aftermath of the war had not only brought into being new

forces which were to transform the struggle for freedom from the con-

cern of a minority group into a mighty national upheaval but had also

drawn her into the general maelstrom of the world revolutionary move-ment. And this was a phenomenon which was of profound significance

not to India alone but to the colonial world as a whole. Writing on the

significance of an Indian revolution, a Soviet commentator, Kerzhentsev,

observed that the liberation of India from British domination would be

a signal for all the Asian countries to take up the struggle against imperi-

alism. It would ignite revolutions throughout the entire colonial world

Mesopotamia, Syria, Arabia, South Africa, Egypt, China, Tibet, Persia allthese countries, he said, would follow the Indian example.10

But the prospect of a revolution in India had been the subject of dis-

cussion long before the outbreak of World War I. As early as 1853 Marx

and Engels began to evince such keen interest in India that between

1853 and 1857 as many as twenty-three articles by Marx and eight by

Engels were devoted to the exposure of the British imperialist misrule

which, Marx said, was laying the foundations of a socio-economic revolu-

tion in India. According to Marx, in causing this social revolution in India,



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had not only drawn India into the world revolutionary movement and

projected her into the company of other colonial countries, but had also

given the national movement a unique mass dimension and a revolution-

ary context, however diminutive. At the close of the war, while the world

was sitting on an anxious seat, India had been the scene of a great liber-

ation movement and a national awakening. To this movement, in com-

bination with the emergence of Gandhi on the one hand and with the

new ethos produced by the October Revolution on the other, Indian pol-

itics of the post-war years owed its most distinctive character. After the

war, nationalism in India emerged with a new character, giving rise to

new leaders who were to conduct the fight both against the British inIndia and the legislators in Westminster. The struggle for freedom was no

longer to be fought in the obscurity with which the nineteenth century

and Britains international prestige had cloaked India. It was now to take

place under the bright lights of a growing world interest.13

IV

By the time the war came to a close, Indian blood, said Annie Besant,

had soaked the soils of Flanders, Gallipoli, Egypt and Mesopotamia. The

England that had welcomed Garibaldi, the England that had sheltered

Mazzini, could not but give the same welcome to Indians who had fought

for the same cause.14

The war had brought about a truce in the nationalist movement and

India placed all her resources at the disposal of Britain in her hour of need.

The Indian soldiers bravery in various theatres of war in Europe, Africaand Western Asia won them the gratitude of Britain and the admiration

of the world. In fact, India incurred such an enormous cost in men and

material that she was now in an economic crisis of the most serious

magnitude. India had to incur this enormous economic burden largely

because of the fact that Indian policies at the time were determined

by the British. Moreover, Indians were tricked into believing that self-

determination for all people was the battle cry and the war was beingfought to make the world safe for democracy. They naively believed that

helping the Allies might lead to a victory, which would ultimately bring

some tangible reward for India. It was with this fond hope that Annie

Besant, presiding over the Calcutta Congress in 1917, secured the adop-

tion of a resolution expressing deep loyalty and profound attachment to

the Throne and firm resolve to stand by the British Empire at all hazards

and at all costs. Such expression of loyalty found another occasion when

a Congress delegation to London with Lala Lajpat Rai, Mohammed Ali



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Jinnah, Lord Satyendra Prasad Sinha and others as its members sent a

letter to the Secretary of State reiterating their conviction that Indians

would readily and willingly cooperate with the British and place all

resources of their country at His Majestys disposal for a victory in the

war against Germany. Thus, the Congress moderates, who were then in

control of the party machine, proclaimed their loyalty to the British and

support to the Allies in resolutions at each of the Congress sessions during

the war. And when the war came to a close in 1918, they congratulated

the British Government on its successful termination. Little did they real-

ize that protestations of self-government and democracy were not meant

to be applied to the Indians, that the Allies never intended self-governmentto anyone outside Europe, where the splitting up of the Austro-Hungarian

Empire demanded some high-flown justification.

At the Lucknow Congress in 1916, Surendra Nath Banerjee declared that

the object of the war was to vindicate the sanctity of treaty obligations

to uphold the sacredness of scraps and bits of paper. The moral law, he

said, did not work by latitudes and longitudes. In 1922, in a speech at his

trial, Gandhi also admitted that in all their efforts at service to the allied

victory, the Congress leaders were actuated by the belief that it would be

possible by such service to gain the status of full equality for their country.

But subsequent events were to make a mockery of such optimism.15

In the face of the German peril, the British Government, in order to

make sure of Indian cooperation, had held out specious promises of con-

stitutional reform and self-government for the Indians. It was clear, as

Charles Roberts admitted, that India was no longer a mere dependent of

but a partner in the Empire and as such the problems of the Governmentof India Act had to be looked at from an altogether different angle.

But with the termination of the war such professions of partnership in

spirit began to wear thin. Official British opinion now professed thanks

that by helping the Allies India had only expressed her heartfelt gratitude

to the King for the blessings of British rule in India.

Disillusionment was followed by discontent and unrest. The Indian

soldiers brilliant performance on the battlefield not only gave the people anunprecedented sense of national honour but the near collapse of the

Allies in the face of the German challenge also exploded the myth of the

invincibility of British arms. The Indian soldiers who had been hastily

demilitarized lest they turned their weapons against their British masters,

now came back to their villages carrying with them new grievances and

new ideas which they had picked up from foreign lands. Their experience

abroad taught them to shake off their traditional submissiveness. As a

result, the placidity of the countryside was disturbed and discontented



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peasantry began to rise in revolt against the intolerable conditions of

life.16

The termination of the war had also brought back the old administrators

and with them returned the worst features of British rule in India. These

administrators, who treated the war as an unhappy interlude in the happy

superiority of British life in India, once again decided to carry on the

administration by means of terror, internment and repression. But despite

the Sedition Acts, which followed the Rowlatt Report, terrorism and revolt

began to spread like wildfire.17

To roll back the tide of unrest among almost all sections of Indian people,

the Government adopted extremely repressive measures, resulting ina virtual reign of terror all over the country and culminating in the

Jallianwalabagh massacre and the barbarous enforcement of martial law

in Punjab. The Defence of India Act, which was passed on 18 March 1915

to meet the new situation arising out of the war, was now being abused to

terrorize the people and crush their normal political activities. To replace

the Defence of India Act, which was to cease to be operative at the end

of the war, two more bills were prepared by the Government on the basis

of the report of the Rowlatt Committee, which was appointed to investi-

gate the growing spate of revolutionary movement and to recommend

appropriate legislative measures to quell it. Of these bills only one was

actually passed into law, namely the Anarchical and Revolutionary Crimes

Act 1919, which provided for summary trial of political offences by a spe-

cial court empowered to meet in camera and take into consideration evi-

dence not admissible under the Indian Evidence Act. There could be no

appeal against the decisions of this court. The Act also empowered provin-cial governments to order any person, on mere suspicion, to furnish any

security or to notify his residence or to reside in a particular area or to

abstain from any specified act or finally to report himself to the police.

Provincial governments were also given wide powers to search any place

and to arrest any person without warrant and to keep detainees confined

in whatever place and under whatever conditions as it may specify. In

addition to these lawless laws numerous other restrictive measures weretaken by the Government to suppress the civil and political liberties of the

people. The extent of such repressive measures can be gauged from the

fact that by the end of 1919 as many as 350 printing presses had been

seized, 300 newspapers closed down, 500 books proscribed and thousands

of persons interned under the Defence of India Act. But despite such ruth-

less repression, which in the words of an Englishman, Mr Hyndman, stood

almost on a level with the outrages committed by Germany in Belgium,

France and Poland, popular unrest began to assume menacing proportions



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after another, only to withdraw whenever they actually threatened British

rule. According to Subhas Chandra Boses daughter Anita Bose Pfaff, Very

often Gandhi is portrayed as a saint, which he was not at all. He was a

lawyer who really knew how to work the system and manipulate people.20

Propaganda has always been the most effective tool of dictators, and

Gandhi was no exception. Nothing could be farther from the truth than

that he fought against Apartheid or racial oppression, although this was

what he wanted the people to believe. In fact he was all in favour of the

continuation of White domination and the oppression of Blacks in South

Africa. A hypocrite to the core, he appeared to share the living standards

of the typical Indian poor villager in his Sabaramati Ashram of which theannual expenditure was 100,000 rupees, which is a huge amount of money

even now, after more than fifty years. Gandhi was famous for his humility

in insisting on travelling third-class by train. To get a seat in a crowded

third-class carriage was difficult, so when Gandhi and his entourage

travelled, the whole train was paid for to ensure Gandhis comfort. For

the luxury of Gandhis travelling in third-class train compartments, the

Congress had to pay a huge amount of money for air-conditioning the

compartment, installing new furnishing, and decorating with luxurious

things like highly expensive Persian carpets. To put it bluntly, he was noth-

ing short of a British spy and a saboteur of Indian aspirations. Obviously

his British masters were more than pleased with their trusted agent and

whenever they arrested Gandhi, he was jailed in the monarchical palace

of the legendary Aga Khan. The whole history of the Bambata Rebellion

in South Africa reveals his barbarous war crimes; crimes of one who always

posed as an unwavering protagonist of the lofty ideals of non-violenceand truth. But, as has rightly been said by the father of the Indian

Constitution B.R. Ambedkar, If a man with Gods name on his tongue

and sword under his armpit deserved the appellation of aMahatma, then

Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi was aMahatma.21 Ambedkar also accused

Gandhi of exploiting social problems for political gain, while actually

preventing social change. George Orwell saw Gandhi as an enemy to a

nationalist. It is perhaps the greatest irony of Indian history that Indiacould have won freedom much earlier than 1947 had not the father of

the nation taken the reigns of Indias nationalist movement. No wonder

that the worthy disciple of the worthy master, Jawaharlal Nehru hailed the

arrival of his master in the following words:

He was like a powerful current of fresh air that made us stretch ourselves

and take deep breaths; like a beam of light that pierced the darkness

and removed the scales from our eyes; like a whirlwind that upset



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many things, but most of all the working of peoples minds. He did

not descend from the top; he seemed to emerge from the millions of

India speaking their language and incessantly drawing attention to their

appalling conditions. Get off the backs of these peasants and workers,

he told us, all you who live by exploitation; get rid of the system that

produces this poverty and misery. Political freedom took new shape

then and acquired a new content.22

The quintessence of Gandhis philosophy were Satyagraha, a vow to

hold to the truth andAhimsa, the abjuration of malice and hatred. His

weapons were non-violent non-cooperation, passive resistance andcivil disobedience the most drastic remedy in the pharmacopoeia of

Satyagraha. Out of these ethico-moral principles stepped forth a virile

fighter for freedom who used these weapons for political ends and this

was Gandhis prime contribution to the technique of revolution. With

Gandhis emergence, therefore, Indian politics became a strange mixture

of nationalism and religion and ethics and mysticism and fanaticism.23

Indias most celebrated intellectual of modern times Rabindranath Tagore

expressed his dismay about Gandhi, saying that liberating a country is

not the kind of adventure to be approached with the help of a mystical

power. He also said that the society that Gandhi wanted to establish in

India was primitive and uncivilized, and that the way he exploited India

was simply intolerable. Thus, Tagore emphasized that Gandhi may keep

flying high in the Indian sky with his image of a pretentious saint, but

that he should keep himself aside from politics.24 India is one of the worlds

earliest civilisations and its history can be traced to about 2000 BC. Indianphilosophy, culture, art and other civilisational achievements have been

eloquently applauded by Indologists all over the world since time imme-

morial. It is extraordinary that Gandhis cronies could elevate him to such

a position that India was Gandhi and Gandhi was India, that he could

become the father of the nation. Gandhis contributions to Indias

thousand-year-old rich heritage were practically nothing; to revere him

as father of the nation was a bizarre travesty of truth and a hithertounimaginable expression of a personality cult. This unpardonable sin was

perpetrated by his followers in the Indian National Congress. Noted

Indian historian of recent times, Ramachandra Guha rightly pointed out,

Mahatma Gandhi was not so much the Father of the Nation as the mother

of all debates regarding its future.25

The first opportunity to experiment with this unique technique as

a weapon of mass action was provided by theKhilafatagitation.Khilafat

was basically part of the romantic Pan-Islamic movement born of religious



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fanaticism, but it also involved a crosscurrent of rivalries political, eco-

nomic and strategic between the Turks, the Arabs and the Allied powers.

In fact, theKhilafatwas a moribund institution in which even the Turks

had little interest. The Indian Muslims, obviously ignorant of the fact that

the Pan-Islamic movement was politically motivated, were moved by the

religious fanaticism and angrily protested against the dismemberment

of Turkey and the consequent destruction of theKhilafat the traditional

symbol of Islamic unity. But in spite of the fact that the Sultan of Turkeys

claim as the supreme religious authority of the Islamic world had little

practical significance outside the Ottoman Empire and that the Pan-

Islamic movement based on the extraterritorial allegiance of the IndianMuslims cut at the very root of nascent Indian nationalism, Gandhi sought

to create out of this movement a united front against the British. Under

his leadership the Congress also lent its power, prestige and organization

to theKhilafatand sent a deputation to the Viceroy to impress upon him

the consequences if the just demands of the Muslims were not accepted.

But the Viceroy, while expressing his sympathy for the Muslim sentiment,

made it clear that the contention that Turkey should be allowed to pre-

serve in full the integrity, sovereignty and the dominions which she pos-

sessed before the war could not be recognized by the Allied powers. Turkey

could not expect, he said, any more than any other power which drew the

sword in the cause of Germany.26

Gandhi then decided to launch the Non-Cooperation Movement

against the Government. He had become convinced that non-cooperation

was the only effective remedy for both avoiding violence and healing

the wounds inflicted on the Indian Muslims. He also returned all the dec-orations awarded to him by the British Government for his war services.

He could not wear them, he wrote to the Viceroy, with an easy conscience

so long as the Indian Muslims had to labour under the wrong done to their

religious sentiment. The movement, however, took on a mass character

when to the original issue of theKhilafatwere added other questions of

wider national importance. According to Pattabhi Sitaramaya, the Triveni

(or the confluence of the three streams of the river) of the Khilafat, thePunjab wrongs and the invisible flow of inadequate reforms became full

to the brim and by their confluence enriched both in volume and content

the stream of non-cooperation.27

At a special session of the Congress held in Calcutta on 5 September

1920, Gandhi moved a resolution expressing the opinion that there could

be no contentment in India without redress of the wrong done to the

Indian Muslims and the Punjab and that the only effectual means to vin-

dicate national honour and to prevent repetition of similar wrongs in



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future was the establishment ofSwaraj. The resolution then declared that

there was no course left open for the Indian people but to adopt the policy

of non-violent non-cooperation until the said wrongs were righted and

Swaraj established. As to the programme of the movement, the resolution

advised: (a) surrender of titles and honorary offices and resignation from

nominated seats in local bodies, (b) refusal to attend Government func-

tions, (c) gradual withdrawal of children from schools and colleges owned,

aided and controlled by Government and the establishment of national

schools and colleges in the country, (d) a gradual boycott of British courts

by lawyers and litigants and the establishment of arbitration courts for the

settlement of private disputes, (e) refusal on the part of the military, cler-ical and labouring classes to offer themselves as recruits for service in

Mesopotamia, (f) withdrawal by candidates from the candidature for elec-

tion to the Reforms Councils and refusal on the part of the voters to vote

for any candidate who may, despite the advice of Congress, offer himself

for election, (g) boycott of foreign goods. The concluding part of the reso-

lution was of great importance inasmuch as it suggested measures by

which the economic ills of the country and hardships of the people were

to be removed. It advised the people to adopt Swadeshi in piece goods

and their manufacture on a large scale by means of reviving hand spin-

ning and hand weaving throughout the country.28

After an animated debate that lasted for three days the resolution was

adopted on 9 September 1920 and a demoralized, backward and divided

people suddenly straightened their backs and lifted their heads and took

part in disciplined, joint action on a countrywide scale. The Calcutta

Congress marked not only a turning point in Indian history but also apersonal victory for Gandhi; he not only captured the Congress but also

became the undisputed leader of Indias struggle for freedom.

In making common cause with theKhilafatagitation Gandhi was actu-

ated by his intense desire to bring about Hindu-Muslim unity, the absence

of which had always been a terrible scourge of Indian political life. Besides,

by stressing the non-violent character of the movement he wanted to

make the most spectacular political conquest in history through a meanshitherto unknown to any conqueror. But in the achievement of these

two goals the Non-Cooperation Movement was not a great success. As

the Congress Enquiry put it, the country was all agog to witness the final

triumph of the power of the soul over physical might. But the gods had

willed it otherwise. Gandhis dream of Hindu-Muslim unity was shattered

when the Moplahs, a band of fanatic Muslims settled on the Malabar

coast, rose in revolt against the British, but in their fanatical zeal per-

petrated bestial savagery upon the Hindus. According to contemporary



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labourers from decade to decade resulted in agrarian unrest which

expressed itself in such social maladies as petty thefts, rioting and loot-

ing. The pitiable condition of the people was revealed in a report of the

Directorate of Public Health in Bengal, which said that the diet of

the peasantry was such that even rats could not live on it for more than

five weeks.

But, as Nehru observed, while the problem of the peasantry was the

supreme problem of India, it was ignored by political leaders and Gov-

ernment alike. According to Nehru, the unending talk of constitutional

reform and Indianization of services was a mockery and an insult when

the manhood of India was being crushed and the inexorable and continu-ous process of exploitation was deepening the nations poverty and sap-

ping its vitality. India had become a derelict nation.30

The condition of the industrial proletariat was no better. Although

during the war, Indian industries, particularly the jute mills in Bengal

and cotton mills in Ahmedabad, produced enormous dividends 100 to

200 per cent the workers who had created these dividends lived at an

incredibly low level of existence.

The war had strikingly exposed Indias industrial backwardness and

made the Government realize that industrialization was important not

only from the economic point of view but also for political and military

considerations. From the political point of view, it was essential for the

Government to secure the cooperation of the Indian bourgeoisie and for

this purpose it was necessary to make certain concessions to them in the

economic field. From the military point of view it was also realized that

without some sort of industrial base in India there would always be thedanger of exclusive dependence for vital military needs on long-distance

overseas supplies.

These compelling reasons led the Government to proclaim a new policy

of industrialization in India. Soon after the announcement of this policy

a crash followed, resulting in a feverish boom and all round acceleration of

industrial activity throughout the country. The number of organized fac-

tories increased from 2936 in 1914 to 3436 in 1918. An industrial censustaken in 1921 showed that the number of workers in organized factories

employing 20 or more workers increased from 2.1 million in 1911 to 2.6

million in 1921. Moreover, encouraged by the Governments liberal policy,

British capital began to flow in and colossal profits were made by almost

all industrial establishments in the country. The phenomenal extent of the

profits made by Indian industries can be realized from the fact that during

the war, while the average earnings of industries in the UK and the USA



20/34

were 10.5 per cent and 10.6 per cent respectively, in India the average was

as high as 17.1 per cent.

A delegation of the Dundee Jute Trade Union to India reported in

1925 that in the jute industry the total profit to the shareholders during

191524 amounted to 300 million, that is, 90 per cent per annum of the

capital, whereas the average wage of the workers in the industry was only

12 per annum. According to another survey, the average dividend paid

by the jute mills was more than 140 per cent the highest being 420 per

cent. A leading jute mill, which paid a 250 per cent dividend in 1918, paid

420 per cent in 1919.31

In the cotton industry, the Tariff Board Enquiry Committee reportedthat in 1920, 35 companies comprising 42 mills declared dividends of

40 per cent and over, of which 10 companies comprising 14 mills paid

100 per cent and two mills paid over 200 per cent. According to Wadia and

Merchant, the average dividend paid by the cotton mills in 1920 was

120 per cent, the highest figure being 365 per cent. In some mills the share-

holders were not satisfied with 400 per cent dividends and demanded

500 per cent.

Against the background of such fantastic profitmaking by industrial

enterprises, the condition of the common people presented a wretched

spectacle. According to the official Simon Commission, the average per

capita income of the Indians during the post-war years was only 8 per

annum. This, however, was only the average gross income, not the actual

income of the teeming millions because, as pointed out by Indian econo-

mists K.T. Shah and K.J. Khambata, 1 per cent of the population got one-

third of the national income while 60 per cent of the population receivedonly 30 per cent of that income.32 In fact, the average Indian income

was just enough either to feed two out of three members of the population

or to give them all two instead of three meals a day provided they all

consented to go naked, live out of doors all the year round, had no

recreation and wanted nothing else but food the lowest, the coarsest

and the least nutritious.

Dissatisfaction with these sub-human conditions of life had alreadyproduced ferment among the agricultural and industrial proletariat and

with the outbreak of the war came a wave of peasant and labour move-

ments in various parts of the country. In the industrial field the unrest

assumed such serious proportions that very few industrial enterprises were

left unaffected by labour disputes or strikes. But these movements had an

entirely different character from those taking place before the war. Until

the war, these movements had been locally inspired and organized and



21/34

were completely devoid of any ideology or leadership. For this reason, as

B. Shiva Rao pointed out, they aroused no great interest among the polit-

ical leaders who looked upon industrial disputes with almost complete

unconcern. Speaking about the growing consciousness of the industrial

proletariat Nehru also observed that no strike could succeed in those days

because the workers were unorganized and helpless. Moreover, there were

millions of unemployed who could easily be drawn upon by the employ-

ers. Before the war, the numbers of the industrial proletariat were not

sufficient to affect the Indian political scene. But after the war, the voice

of Indian labour began to be heard. It might have been ignored, Nehru

pointed out, but for the fact that the Russian Revolution had forced theworking people to attach some importance to the industrial proletariat.33

The official Whitley Commission expressed a similar opinion when it

stated that prior to the war a strike was a rare occurrence in India because

the vast majority of workers not only lacked leadership and organization

but were also imbued with a passive outlook on life. It was the war that

brought about a radical change in the attitude of the industrial pro-

letariat. They began to realize the potentialities of strike action and this

was assisted by the emergence of trade union organizers and by the edu-

cation which the war had given to the masses.

Apart from dissatisfaction with the existing conditions of life, there were

other factors that also served to bring about a new outlook, a new con-

sciousness and militancy among the Indian peasants and workers.

In the first place, as already noted, Indian soldiers returning home from

the war brought with them new ideas and convictions that completely

dispelled their sense of inferiority and passivity. As these soldiers weredrawn mostly from the ranks of the peasantry, their experience had a pro-

found effect upon all villagers. The war almost completely destroyed the

notion that the superiority of the white men was unquestionable. This

was indeed a thrilling experience for the docile workers and peasants who

used to bear all kinds of insult without protest. It was also the most signifi-

cant change brought about by the war.

In the second place, when Gandhi appeared on the Indian political sceneand launched the Non-Cooperation Movement, the country was over-

taken by a tremendous awakening of the masses and the voices of workers

and peasants began to be heard for the first time in Indias struggle for

freedom. Many philanthropists, intellectuals and political leaders also

began to take an interest in the problems of workers and peasants. Indeed,

it was at this time that India witnessed the inauguration of the organized

and ideologically-inspired labour and peasant movements. The signifi-

cance of this new development was that it created that intellectual and



22/34

emotional atmosphere of fearlessness, defiance and revolt which became

an indirect factor in the origin of Left-wing movements in India.34

The workers and peasants were drawn to the mainstream of political

movement by Gandhis slogan for Swaraj and Swadeshi. But to sustain the

spirit of mass support it was necessary for the Congress to come up with

a concrete programme vindicating the grievances of the workers and

peasants. With this end in view, the Congress, at its Nagpur session in

1920, adopted resolutions soliciting the participation of workers, peasants

and students in the national movement. The resolution on labour upheld

the cause of the workers, expressed support for their trade union activities

and denounced the policy of exploitation and persecution of the workers.The resolution on peasants welcomed theKisans (or peasants) struggle

against exploitation and expressed satisfaction at their role in the boycott

movement.

But although the Congress expressed sympathy and support for the

demands of the workers and peasants, it was less enthusiastic about

identifying their class interests with its own. As pointed out by Narendra

Dev, the Congress sought the cooperation of theKisans (or the peasants) in

its own struggle but it was unwilling to fight for their economic demands.

According to Michael Edwardes, the Congress was opposed to any reform

in tenants rights because much of its financial support came from large

landed proprietors. Similarly, the Congresss attitude to industrial reform

also showed that its members were no friends of the workers.35

In the third place, the ideals of the British labour movement had a pro-

found influence upon intellectual and political leaders such as Lala Lajpat

Rai, N.M. Joshi, Bakhale and others who championed the cause of theworkers and peasants in India. They were impressed by the principles of

the British Labour Party and began to educate the people on Labour Party

lines and formulate measures which would secure real freedom for them.

Lala Lajpat Rai said, India will not be a party to any scheme, which shall

add to the powers of the Capitalists and the landlord and will introduce

and accentuate the evils of the expiring industrial civilization into our

beloved country.

36

In this connection it may be noted that the British and Indian working

classes were unconscious allies in at least one respect both were struggling

against privileges and exploitation. As long as loyal and quiescent India

remained a source of wealth and as long as enough surplus capital was

available in Britain for export to the colonial countries, the British working

people accepted the Empire as a symbol of national glory. But after the

war when the Empire lost its glamour, and colonies were looked upon as

a brake upon their own progress, a section of the British working class



23/34


24/34

industrialism, the people began to question the very raison d tre of these

social institutions.

The condition of the dclass middle classes, who received some meas-

ure of English education and joined the army of unemployed malcontents,

was perhaps worse. As Nehru rightly pointed out, they were frustrated and

had nowhere to turn. Neither the old nor the new could offer them any

hope. There was no adjustment to social purpose, no satisfaction in doing

something worthwhile, even though suffering came in the train. Custom

ridden, they were born old, yet they were without the old culture. Modern

thought attracted them, but they lacked its inner content, the modern

social and scientific consciousness. Unable to find their rightful placein society, these frustrated elements turned not only against the alien rulers

but also against the well-to-do upper-class social elites who monopolized

the countrys leadership and dominated the Congress. Their discontent

was therefore against both the British imperialists and the bourgeois

leaders whom they considered as nothing but lackeys of British imperi-

alism. Thus, feeling themselves betrayed by the moderate policy of the

bourgeois leadership, they were drawn to the cult of revolutionary vio-

lence. And it was from these discontented elements that a new type of

movement emerged, more militant and defiant and representing the broad

spectrum of the lower middle classes, workers and peasants as well as

students and unemployed youth.

The upper class, the social and political ideas of which provided

dynamism to the freedom movement before the advent of Gandhi, was

composed of the noblesse de la robe, professional prodigies, landed aristoc-

racy, captains of industry, leaders of thought and intellectuals who drankdeep of British liberalism. Many members of this class had been honoured

by the Government with offices, titles and dignities as it became scared by

the growing extremism of middle-class leaders who had little faith in the

efficacy of constitutional agitation against British rule in India. But the

upper-class intellectuals were imbued with the ideas of English nineteenth-

century liberalism freedom of the individual, parliamentary democracy,

evolutionary change of society, moral suasion as an instrument of polit-ical action and constitutionalism. Their concept of democracy was that

of an aristocracy of intellect and wealth. This attitude was well expressed

by Sir Ramesh Chandra Mitra in an address to the Congress in 1896:

The educated community represented the brain and conscience of the

country and were the legitimate spokesmen of the illiterate masses,

the natural custodian of their interests. To hold otherwise would be to

presuppose that a foreign administration in the service knows more



25/34

about the wants of the masses than their educated countrymen. It is true

in all ages that those who think must govern those who toil, and could

it be that the natural order of things was reversed in this country?38

But although these upper-class leaders were fervently patriotic and anxious

for the political emancipation and socio-economic advancement of India,

they suffered from a number of difficulties which rendered them incapable

of identifying themselves with the masses. They were so deeply influenced

by the aristocratic liberalism of Burke that they found it difficult to adjust

themselves to the doctrine of mass action which Gandhi advocated and

the poor mans paradise which he wished to see established in India. Theywere no doubt anxious to see the conditions of the workers and peasants

improved, but they could not reconcile themselves to the idea of political

rights for the oppressed classes. They were, in fact, isolated from the rest

of the community strangers in their own land. Essentially urban, they

were indifferent to the problems of the rural community. Cut off from the

masses whom they claimed to represent, they lived in a world of their own.

In short, they were aliens in India, strangers to their own people, and their

beliefs and ideas were shared only by a small class of educated people.

It is, therefore, no wonder that the ideas of these upper-class leaders did

not reach the hearts of the discontented lower-middle-class literates whose

condition was becoming increasingly desperate in the absence of any

avenue of fulfilment for them and who had little patience with the com-

fortable doctrines of gradual advance propagated by the moderate leaders

of the Congress. Unable to find their role in the national movement, they

found satisfaction either in individualistic anarchist terrorism or in exalteddoctrines of revolutionary idealism.

Of great significance in the eyes of the intellectuals of this class but of

little influence on the illiterate and politically inarticulate masses was

the October Revolution in Russia. The downfall of Czarism in Russia, in the

words of M.N. Roy, had electrified the democratic and liberal world and

galvanized the waning faith in the possibility of capturing power through

armed insurrection organized and led by a determined minority. Toa section of the Indian intelligentsia, the Russian Revolution, with its

dogma of proletarian internationalism, liberation of all dependent peoples,

racial equality and self-determination of all nationalities, heralded the tri-

umph of liberty over despotism, oppression and exploitation. To them,

Lenins declaration that the revolutionary movement of the people of the

East could develop effectively only in direct association with the revolu-

tionary struggle of the Soviet Republic against international imperialism



26/34

was an explosive statement and all the nations of Asia, struggling for lib-

eration heard it with a new hope.39

But despite the romantic appeal of the Russian Revolution, most of those

who were attracted by it in India had no clear conception of the forces

that had provided momentum to the Russian revolutionary movement,

the ideals and ideologies that stimulated it, the price that had to be paid

for the fulfilment of those ideals and above all, its relevance to the Indian

situation. In fact, it was only after the overthrow of the Czarist regime that

Russia began to interest Indian nationalists and Marxist literature was

finding its way to the bookshelves of the educated few. Besides, news

about the Soviet Union was so exiguous, distorted or full of legends thatit was almost impossible for the Indian people to examine and appreciate

the revolution in its true perspective.

The initial reaction of the Indian press, marked more by caution than by

optimism, clearly indicated that the voice of those who thought that the

Russian Revolution had ushered in a new era of hope for mankind was

indeed feeble. But there is no doubt that the overthrow of Czarist tyranny

in Russia raised the amour propre of the Indian people, smarting under

repressive British rule. As a result, as the political, economic and social

ideas of the revolution were beginning to be better understood by Indian

intellectuals, their conviction in radical ideas also began to gain strength

and a new voice, strident and zealous, was added to Indias cry for freedom.

More important still, the ideological monopoly so far exercised by the

worshippers of conservative liberalism was broken and a rival ideology

emerged instilling new socio-economic forces into the content of Indian

nationalism. And it was from among the followers of this new ideologicalcurrent that the Leftist movement in India was born.



27/34

Index

247

Adhikari, G.M., 89, 91, 1323Advance Guard, 140Ahimsa, 14Ahmad, Muzaffar, 5867, 72, 74, 78,

88, 115Ahmad, Qutubuddin, 61, 72

Ahmad, Rafique, 579Ahmed, Z.A., 102Ahmedabad Textile Workers Union

(1920), 169Al Bilagh, 61Al Hilal, 61Alexander, A.V., 127

Ali, Mohammad, 43Alipore Bomb Case, 42

Allison George, 69, 173All-India Congress Committee, 17,

62, 81, 98103, 106, 142, 149,197

All-India Kisan Congress, 1915

Meerut (1936), 191Lucknow (1936), 96, 191Comilla (1938), 195

All-India Kisan Sabha, 96, 1935

All-India Railwaymens Federation,179, 180

All-India Trade Union Congress, 74,96, 140, 158, 168, 169, 1702,

17683, 193, 199Jharia (1928), 172, 177Nagpur (1929), 96, 178

Calcutta (1931), 96, 179Cawnpore (1933), 176, 181

Lahore (1929), 140, 172Madras (1926), 176

Alve, A.A., 1734Ambedkar, B.R., 13Amrita Bazar Patrika, 141Ananda Math, 3

Anarchical and Revolutionary CrimesAct (1919), 11

Annie Larsen, 44

Ansari, Farid-ul-huq, 77

Anushilan Samiti, 201Arnot, Page, 75

Ashraf, K.M., 1023, 214Atlantic Charter, 116, 129Attlee, C.R., 127August Movement, 125, 162, 203

August Offer, 112, 116August Resolution, 1213, 132,

206

August Revolutionary Committee,50

Avasthi, Rama Shandar, 65Azad Hind Government, 124Azad Hind Fauj (Indian National

Army), 1247

Azad, Maulana Abul Kalam, 61, 111,197

B.N.W. Railway Union (1920), 169Bakhale, R.R., 21, 16970

Balabushevich, V.V., 134Bambata Rebellion, 13Bande Mataram, 3, 80Banerjee, Surendra Nath, 12, 10

Bangiya Krishak O Shramik Dal, 73Baptista, Joseph, 170Bari, Abdul, 147Barkatullah, Maulavi, 423

Barker, Maurice, 47Barrie, Abdul, 147Batlivala, S.S., 124

Beals, Carl, 47Bengal Labour Party, 205

Bennet, William, 91Bergarhatta, J.P., 656, 70

Berlin Indian IndependenceCommittee, 6, 43, 216

Besant, Annie, 9, 170Bhattacharjee, Tarapada, 147

Bhattacharya, Narendranath, 44Bihar Socialist Party, 147Blanquism, 40

Boer War, 1899, 12


28/34

Bolshevik, 115Bolshevik Leninist Party, 197,

2067

Bolshevik Party of India, 197,2056Bolshevism, 67, 38, 41, 4752,

66, 79, 90, 92, 141, 147, 210Bombay Chronicle, 124

Borodin, Michael, 489Bose Pfaff, Anita, 13Bose, Ananda Mohan, 1

Bose, Sarat Chandra, 97

Bose, Subhas Chandra, 13, 85, 979,106, 10913, 1236, 136, 138,1423, 1457, 152, 158, 168,

179, 193, 197200, 202, 205,209, 219

Boycott, 2, 3, 45Brandler, Heinrich, 50, 778

Bradley, Ben, 70, 91, 945, 1012, 174,178, 213, 218

Bradley, Benjamin F., 70Brahmin, 5, 22Brevli, S.A., 170British Labour Party, 213, 33, 163,

16970, 176

British Trade Union Congress, 169,177, 193

Burke, Edmund, 24

Cabinet Mission, 1278, 1312, 213,226

Cama, Madam, 5

Canadian, Bhag Singh, 73, 75Carranza, President, 49Central Asiatic Bureau, 55Chakravorty, Dr Chandra, 43, 46

Chamberlain Government, 107Chatterjee, Bankim Chandra, 3

Chatterjee, Bholanath, 45Chatterjee, Jogesh, 201

Chattopadhyaya, Kamaladevi, 147,191

Chattopadhyaya, Virendranath, 42,

54Chauri Chaura, 17, 33Chauri Chaura Case, 64Chettier, Malayapuram Singaravelu,

616, 172

Chittagong Armoury Raid, 80, 201Churchill, Sir Winston, 116Civil Disobedience Movement, 14,

818, 949, 103, 11213, 146,158, 178, 188, 196, 2001,2245

Clark, John Magnus, 901Clemenceau, Georges, 39

Comintern, 35, 69, 757, 8795,1012, 113, 139, 172, 2036,209, 21722

Commonwealth, 301

Communist International, 34, 38,535, 5867, 712, 779, 839,94, 102, 158, 172, 1878, 2037,

21617First Congress, 39, 118Second Congress, 516, 139, 187,

211

Third Congress, 49, 52, 60, 91,1728, 187

Fourth Congress, 70, 172, 187Fifth Congress, 60, 71Sixth Congress, 67, 756, 79, 83,

2034Seventh Congress, 934, 102

Communist Manifesto, 39Communist Party of China, 89Communist Party of Great Britain,

6772, 94, 102, 119, 122, 188,

216Communist Party of India, 42, 54,

58, 62, 6577, 8495, 10235,

1567, 179, 189, 190, 195, 202,2056, 21323, 2278

Communist Party of the Soviet Union,59, 89

Communist University of the Toilersof the East, 589

Congress, Indian National, 15, 910,1416, 21, 239, 34, 367, 54, 62,

65, 723, 75, 77, 7989, 93103,10513, 116, 11829, 1312,13441, 14556, 15965, 168,

171, 1768, 183208, 212, 214,216, 21821, 2239

Amritsar Congress (1919), 80Calcutta Congress (1907), 9, 80,

1423

248 Index


29/34

Calcutta Congress (1920), 1516Faizpur Congress (1936), 97Gaya Congress (1922), 140

Haripura Congress (1938), 97, 108,193, 197Karachi Congress (1931), 89, 1467,

189Lahore Congress (1929), 801,

1456, 188Lucknow Congress (1916), 10Lucknow Congress (1936), 96

Madras Congress (1927), 142

Nagpur Congress (1920), 21, 184Ramgarh Congress (1940), 109, 112,

161, 201

Tripuri Congress (1939), 97, 108,158, 196, 202, 205

Congress of Oppressed Nationalities,144

Congress of the Oppressed Peoples ofthe East, 56

Congress of Socialists (1904), 5Congress Socialists, 2833, 957,

100, 1034, 148, 149, 15265,197204, 2247, 229

Conspiracy cases

All India, Lahore (1929), 80Cawnpore (1924), 62, 64, 88, 172,

207Meerut (1929), 40, 69, 77, 79, 878,

158, 217Peshawar (1922), 59Rawalpindi (1951), 102

Criminal Law Amendment Act(1908), 91

Cripps Mission, 120Cripps, Sir Stafford, 127, 205

Congress Socialist Party, 959,1026, 110, 123, 14859, 161,

165, 1812, 1957, 202, 2046,2248

Dange, S.A., 604, 74, 115, 174Dantwala, M.L., 148

Das, Chitta Ranjan, 13742, 149, 168Das, Jatin, 80Defence of India Act (1915), 11Desai, Bhulabhai, 126

Deshpande, S.V., 878, 94, 179

Deutschland, 46Dev, Narendra, 21, 99, 1489,

1526, 15962, 164, 185,

189, 192, 194, 227Dev, Sukh, 146Dewan, Chamanlal, 16970, 179Dhingra, Madan Lal, 5Dimitrov, Georgi, 94

Draft Thesis on the Nationaland Colonial Question, 39,211

Druhe, David N., 59

Dubey, Biswanath, 205Dundee Jute Trade Union, 19Durant, Will, 2

Dutt, Batukeshwar, 80Dutt, Clemens, 76Dutt, R. Palme, 6, 34, 60, 678,

945, 1012, 115, 119, 122,

1312, 135, 213Modern India, 67

Dutt, Romesh Chandra, 1Dutta, Bhupendranath, 42, 50Dyakov, A., 129, 1334

Edwardes, Michael, 2, 212, 99,

101, 122Eka Andolan, 185El Socialista, 48Elahi, Fazal, 70

Engels, Frederich, 7

Fabian socialism, 32, 153, 210

Fabianism, 32, 171Fascism, 30, 92, 96, 989, 107,

11415, 117, 1223, 160, 206, 208Forward Bloc, 109, 114, 123,

197200, 206

Gale, Linn A.E., 47Ganavanee, 72Gandhi Seva Sangha, 198Gandhi, Mahatma, 910, 1217,

204, 26, 28, 334, 367, 53,

60, 77, 826, 89, 94, 969, 103,1069, 11113, 11923, 1245,13641, 143, 1457, 152, 1613,171, 178, 184, 196, 1989, 204,

21011, 2234, 2268

Index 249


30/34


31/34

Josh, Sohan Singh, 734Joshi, N.M., 21, 16970, 1779, 183Joshi, P.C., 34, 745, 102, 110, 113,

115, 119, 122, 1245, 133, 213Joshi, Pandit Janardan, 1856Joshi, S.M., 148Joshi, V.H., 65

Kabadi, Sundar, 88, 207Kadam, L.N., 75Kar, Surendranath, 42

Karnik, V.B., 207

Katju, Kailashnath, 77Kautsky, Karl, 8Kedarnath, 43

Kelker, N.C., 142Kemal, Mustafa, 56Kerzhentsev, V., 7Khambata, K.J., 19

Khan, Abdur Razzak, 61Khan, Aga, 13

Khan, Amir Haider, 91Khan, Gawhar Rahman, 60Khaparde, G.S., 4Khilafat, 1416, 578Kiplings Gunga Din, 12Kirti Kisan Party, 74Kirti, 74Kisan Sabha, 155, 193, 195, 199Kranti, 73, 87, 175

Krantikari, 74Krestintern, 188Kripalani, J.B., 227Kshatriya, 5Kun, Bela, 56Kuomintang, 69, 84, 219, 220Kuusinen, Otto Vilhelm, 756, 204

Kweit, William Nathan, 90

Labour Swaraj Party, 72Lahiri, Somnath, 87, 1323

Lakhanpal, P.L., 137Langal, 72Lawrence, Lord Pethick, 127

League Against Imperialism, 144,157, 1778, 218

Lenin, V.I., 7, 8, 24, 32, 3840, 49,515, 76, 115, 154, 157, 187,

212, 215, 216, 223

Leninism, 323, 38, 58, 75, 202,211, 215

Lloyd George, David, 6, 39

Lohani, G.K.A, 77Lohia, Rammanohar, 1056Lotvala, R.B., 60Lusitania, 46Lynd, Henry G., 90

MacDonald, Ramsay, 153Macmanus, Arthur, 188

Madras Labour Union (1918), 169

Majeed, Abdul, 656, 735Majumdar, R.C., 126, 146Marx, Karl, 7, 8, 345, 3840, 46,

54, 141, 143, 145, 157, 163, 223,227

Marxism, 256, 29, 315, 401, 44,48, 501, 53, 58, 602, 75, 878,

1023, 141, 143, 148, 15661,1701, 176, 187, 1967, 2012,

207, 21012, 215, 2267Masani, M.R., 22, 102, 1046, 108,

1478Maxwell, Sir Reginald, 114, 117, 124Mayekar, D.R., 173Mazdoor and Kisan Sangh, 74Mazdoor Mahajan, 171Mazumdar, N. Dutt, 205Meherally, Yusuf, 1478

Mehta, Asoka, 106, 148Melman, Sofia, 134Merchant, K.T., 19

Mexican Socialist Party, 48Mihnatkash, 74Ming, Wang, 935, 2201Minh, Ho Chi, 215

Mir Jaffer, 165Mirajkar, S.S., 73, 94, 115

Mitra, Sir Ramesh Chandra, 234Mohani, Maulana Hasrat, 656

Molotov, Vyacheslav, 129Monsoor, Firoz, 745Montagu Reforms, 168

Montagu, Edwin, 12Mountbatten, Lord, 163Mountbatten Plan, 133, 135, 208Muhajirs, 569

Muhammad, Ghulam, 59

Index 251


32/34

Mukherjee, Abani, 42, 578, 63Mukherjee, B.N., 75Mukherjee, Dhana Gopal, 46

Mukherjee, Jadu Gopal, 456Mukherjee, Jatin, 445Muslim League, 11820, 1269,

1312, 134, 165, 21314, 224Mussolini, Benito, 92

Naidu, Sarojini, 168Nambier, Suhasini, 87

Namboodiripad, E.M.S., 1023

Nanda, B.R., 80Naoraji, Dadabhai, 5Narayan, Jayaprakash, 99, 102, 1056,

113, 1478, 15565, 191, 227National Trade Union Congress, 182National Trade Union Federation, 180,

183Nava Yug, 61Naw Jawan Bharat Sabha, 74, 1478

Nehru, Jawaharlal, 13, 18, 20, 23,2831, 77, 801, 85, 89, 969,101, 108, 111, 116, 1256, 1325,137, 1425, 158, 168, 174, 1778,184, 185, 192, 211, 21719

Discovery of India, 143Nehru, Motilal, 1379, 142, 149, 170,

218New Spark, 206

Nimbkar, R.S., 656, 734, 174Non-Cooperation Movement,

1517, 20, 33, 37, 60, 7980,

1389, 173, 1845, 196, 201,203, 218, 224

North Western Railway WorkersUnion, 62, 169

Obeidullah, 43

October Revolution, 9, 24, 38, 39,187, 193, 229

Orwell, George, 13Ottoman Empire, 15Overstreet, Gene D., and Windmiller,

Marshall, 54, 128, 135, 141

Pakistan Communist Party, 102Pal, Bipin Chandra, 4

Pan Islamism, 15

Panchayat, 29Panikkar, K.M., 221Pant, Govind Ballabh, 978, 125

Parikh, G.D., 44Paripurananda, Swami, 147Patel, V.J., 142Patel, Vallabhbhai, 125, 146, 183, 191,

197

Patel, Vithalbhai, 170Patwardhan, Achyut, 99, 105, 1478Paver, V.M., 170

Peace Conference, 6

Philips, Charles Francis, 47Philosophy of Physical Realism, 207Piatnitsky, Ossip, 203

Pillai, K., 103Pole, Major Graham, 176Pollitt, Harry, 102, 117Prasad, Ajodhya, 65

Prasad, Rajendra, 197Pratap, Raja Mahendra, 43

Price, Morgan Philips, 61My Reminiscences of the Russian

Revolution, 61Pritt, D.N., 213Proudhon, 171

Provisional Government of India, 43Punjab Socialist Party, 147Purcell, A.A., 166

Quit India Movement, 1212, 164,183, 2036, 223, 225

Qureshi, Shuaib, 142

Radek, Karl, 56, 84Radical Democratic Party, 197,

2068Radical Humanist, 59Rai, Lala Lajpat, 4, 9, 21, 80, 139,

16870Rajagopalachari, Chakraborty, 111,

141Rajguru, Basabrao, 146Ramamurthi, P., 1023

Rana, Sardar Singh, 5Ranadive, B.T., 878, 115, 118, 132,

179Ranga, N.G., 186, 1912

Rao, B. Shiva, 20, 174

252 Index


33/34

Red International Labour Union, 69,75, 172, 1747

Red Trade Union Congress, 1578,

179, 1812Report on Indian ConstitutionalReforms, 12

Revolution in India, The, 206Revolutionary Communist Party of

India, 2035Revolutionary Socialist Party, 201Roberts, Charles, 10

Roosevelt, Franklin, 116

Rowlatt Committee, 11Rowlatt Report, 11Roy Group, 207

Roy, Ajit, 2056Roy, Evelyn, 33, 46, 49, 57Roy, M.N., 24, 337, 4490, 13940,

158, 172, 178, 183, 197, 201, 203,

2078, 216The Future of Indian Politics, 37, 67

India in Transition, 35, 50La India: su Passado, su Presente y su

Porvenir, 48Memoirs, 59My Crime, 78

Roy, Sisir, 205Royism, 207Revolutionary Socialist Party, 2023Ruikar, R.S., 179

Rusch, Thomas A., 33Ruskin, John, 28, 171Russian Revolution, 20, 245, 38, 52,

61, 143, 169, 187, 2289

Sabarmati Ashram, 13, 82Safarov, G.I., 55

Saklatvala, Sapurji, 69, 174Sampurnananda, Swami, 1479

Sankrityayan, Rahul, 147Sapru, Sir Tej Bahadur, 126

Saraswati, Swami Sahajananda, 96,106, 191

Sardesai, S.G., 107, 118

Sargent, Constance Mary, 91Sarkar, Hemanta Kumar, 72, 74Satyabhakta, 656Satyagraha, 14, 34, 103, 109, 112,

224

Satyamurti, S., 142Savarkar, Vinayak Damodar, 5, 45Sedition Acts, 11

Sehagal, K.N., 74Sen Gupta, J.M., 83Sen, Indra, 206Sen, Ranendra Nath, 87Sen, Sun Yat, 220

Seppasi, Muhammad, 90Shafiq, Muhammad, 578Shah, Dr Mani Lal, 63

Shah, K.T., 19

Shah, Mian Muhammad Akbar, 60Shankar, Gouri, 75Sharma, R.C.L., 62, 64

Sheik, Tayab, 88Shetty, S., 207Simon Commission, 19, 7980, 174Singh, Santokh, 73

Singh, Basanta, 43Singh, Bhagat, 80, 146

Singh, Prem Lal, 90Sinha, L.P., 150, 194Sinha, Lord Satyendra Prasad, 10Sitaramaya, Pattabhi, 15, 97Smedley, Agnes, 60

Social Gandhism, 202Socialist, 60Sokolnikov, Grigory, 55Somers, Harry, 90

Soviet-German War, 115Spratt, Philip, 40, 6971, 74, 178,

218SS Maverick, 445Stalin, Joseph, 389, 789, 159, 212Stalinism, 78Stanford University, 46

Sundaraya, P., 102, 108Swadeshi, 24, 1617, 21, 45, 185

Swaraj, 4, 1617, 21, 31, 37, 65,678, 72, 81, 83, 106, 1367,

1401, 174, 1845Swaraj Party, 1429, 153

Tagore, Rabindranath, 14, 98Tagore, Saumyendranath, 76, 78,

2034Tanaka, Baron, 92

Tariff Board Enquiry Committee, 19

Index 253


34/34

Thalheimer, August, 50, 77Tilak, Bal Gangadhar, 34, 212Times of India, 141

Tolstoy, Leo, 28, 171Trade Disputes Act, 174Trade Union Act (1926), 173Tripathi, Kamalpati, 147Trotsky, Leon, 78

Trotskyite, 123, 206, 226Tung, Mao Tse, 215

United Nations, 121, 129, 133

Usmani, Shaukat, 62, 64, 76

Vaishnava ethics, 28

Valia, 34Vanguard, 139Varma, Phulan Prasad, 147Varma, Shyamji Krishna 5Varnasankara, 5Vedanta, 3

Vivekananda, Swami, 3

Wadia, P.A., 19Wadia, B.P., 168, 1701Weiner, Myron, 196, 225

Westminster, 9, 12Whitely Commission, 20, 174Wilson, Woodrow, 67Windmiller, Marshall, 54, 128, 135,

141

World War I, 67, 27, 42, 46, 57, 62,136, 138, 154, 166, 184, 20910,217

World War II, 101, 108, 125, 159,

183, 200, 218, 228

Yagnik, Indulal, 106, 195Young India, 137

Yugantar, 45

Zaheer, Sajjad, 102, 119

Zahid, Fida Ali, 59Zhukov, E., 129, 1334

Zinoviev, Grigori E., 56, 60

254 Index

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