Cambridge

Hsiao Ch'ien

About: 

Hsiao Ch'ien was born into a sinicized Mongolian family in Beijing, China, in 1910. His father died before his birth and his mother died when he was seven. In 1931, he enrolled at Furen University where he and a young American named William Allen founded the English magazine China in Brief. In 1933, he entered the Faculty of English at Yenching University but switched to the Faculty of Journalism later that year before graduating in 1936.

In 1939, just before the Second World War broke out, he travelled to England to teach Chinese at the School of Oriental and African Studies and serve as a foreign correspondent for Takung Pao. After the outbreak of war, he also served as a war correspondent. SOAS relocated to Cambridge during the Second World War so, after spending one night in London, Hsiao Ch'ien went to Cambridge. He was classified as an 'enemy alien' by the Home Office but this changed after the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor and the Chinese became members of the grand alliance.

The BBC chose Hsiao Ch'ien to report back to China about the European war and the war effort of the English. Around this time, he became good friends with Mulk Raj Anand and supported the Indian call for independence. He voiced his support for the Indian cause in his weekly BBC broadcast but the censors deleted it before it went on air. Later George Orwell, who was head of the BBC's Far Eastern Division, invited him to do several special broadcasts to the Indians and Americans, but strictly on the subject of literature.

SOAS moved back to London in July 1940 and Ch'ien took up residence in a house that catered especially to Asians; he shared the ground floor flat with a Tamil named Rajarantu, who later became the first deputy premier and foreign minister of Singapore. In wartime London, Hsiao Ch'ien socialized with Bloomsbury Group affiliates like Bertrand Russell, Leonard Woolf and E. M. Forster, with whom he became close friends. According to his autobiography, he first met Forster at the PEN Club memorial meeting for Rabindranath Tagore held on 9 May 1941. However, according to India Office files, this meeting was hosted by Krishna Menon and the India League. The speakers were Edward Thompson, Hewlett Johnson (Dean of Canterbury), Nagendranath Gangulee (Tagore's nephew), Beatrix Lehmann (actress), Bhicoo Batlivala, Helen Kirkpatrick (Chicago Daily Tribune) and M. Maisky (Soviet ambassador). Other attendees included Mulk Raj Anand, Tahmankar, Sunder Kabadia, Krishnarao Shelvankar, Alagu Subramanian, Iqbal Singh, Sasadhar Sinha and Asha Bhattacharya led the singing of Tagore's songs.

In June 1944, Hsiao Ch'ien became a journalist for Dagongbao and set up an office in Fleet Street, London. Soon afterwards he was sent to France and other parts of Western Europe as a war correspondent; he covered the meeting of the United Nations in San Francisco, and attended the Potsdam Conference in July 1945.

Hsiao Ch'ien returned to Shanghai in 1946 and took up writing. He was considered right-wing by the Chinese government and banished to the countryside but later received redress. He died in 1999 in Beijing.

Published works: 

Etching of a Tormented Age: A Glimpse of Contemporary Chinese Literature (London: George Allen & Unwin, 1942)

China but not Cathay (London: The Pilot Press, 1942)

'China's Literary Revolution', in E. M. Forster, Ritchie Calder, Cedric Dover, Hsiao Ch'ien and others, Talking to India: A Selection of English Language Broadcasts to India, ed. and with an introduction by George Orwell (London: G. Allen & Unwin, 1943), pp. 27-34

The Dragon Breads versus The Blueprints: (Meditations on Post-War Culture) (London: The Pilot Press, 1944)

A Harp with a Thousand Strings: A Chinese Anthology (London: Pilot Press, 1944)

The Spinners of Silk (London: Allen & Unwin, 1944)

British Graphic Arts (Shanghai: Zung Kwang Publishing Co., 1947)

(as Qian Xiao) How the Tillers Won Back Their Land (Peking: Foreign Languages Press, 1951)

(as Qian Xiao) Chestnuts and Other Stories (Beijing: Chinese Literature, 1984)

(as Qian Xiao) Semolina and Others (Hong Kong: Joint Publishing Co., 1984)

Traveller without a Map, translated by Jeffrey C. Kinkley (London: Hutchinson, 1990)

(as Qian Xiao) 'Letters from Cambridge'

(as Qian Xiao) 'Symphony of Contradictions'

(as Qian Xiao) 'Bloody September'

(as Qian Xiao) 'Three Days in London'

(as Qian Xiao) 'London under Silver Kites'

Date of birth: 
27 Jan 1910
Connections: 

Mulk Raj Anand (friend), Bhicoo BatlivalaZ. A. Bokhari, E. M. Forster (friend), Margery Fry (stayed at Fry's cottage in Aylesbury), John Lehmann (PEN Club), George Orwell (BBC), Bertrand Russell (attended tea parties with Russell), Stephen Spender (PEN Club), M. J. Tambimuttu, H. G. Wells (PEN Club), Leonard Woolf (met at Monk's House).

Contributions to periodicals: 

New Statesman and Nation (1939)

Daylight: Volume I: European Arts and Letters Yesterday: Today: Tomorrow ('The New China Turns to Ibsen', 1941, pp. 167-74)

Life and Letters Today, 81, May 1944, pp. 102-10, 110-19 ('Epidemic' and 'The Galloping Legs', published under the title 'Two Chinese Stories')

Reviews: 

O. M. Green, International Affairs Review Supplement 19.11, 1943 (China But not Cathay)

Mulk Raj Anand, Life and Letters Today 43.86, 1944, pp. 52, 54 (The Spinners of Silk)

 

Secondary works: 

Chen, Theodore Hsi En, Thought Reform of the Chinese Intellectuals (Hong Kong: Hong Kong University Press, 1960)

Gittings, John, 'The Scholar Who Went Back Home', obituary, Guardian (18 February 1999)

Hsia, Chih-Tsing and Wang, David D., A History of Modern Chinese Fiction (Indianapolis: Indiana University Press, 1999)

Involved in events: 

China Campaign Committee, organized by Victor Gollancz, Kingsley Martin, Margery Fry, Harold Laski (the society lobbied on behalf of China's resistance against Japan in the war)

City of birth: 
Peking
Country of birth: 
China
Current name city of birth: 
Beijing
Other names: 

Qian Xiao

Xiao Bingqian

Date of death: 
11 Feb 1999
Location of death: 
Beijing
Date of 1st arrival in Britain: 
01 Jan 1939
Precise 1st arrival date unknown: 
Y
Dates of time spent in Britain: 

1939-44

Location: 

Milton Village, Cambridge

School of Oriental and African Studies, Christ College, Cambridge

King's College, London

Dilip Roy

About: 

Dilip Kumar Roy was a prominent Indian musician. He was the son of playwright and musician, Dwijendra Lal Roy. He is known for synthesizing western and Indian classical music.

Roy studied at Fitzwilliam Hall, Cambridge, at the same time as his friend Subhas Chandra Bose. He took the mathematics tripos but also took music options. He then studied German and Italian music on the continent. He met Romain Rolland in Switzerland who was a great admirer of him. He was also admired by many Indians including M. K. Gandhi.

In 1928, Roy joined Sri Aurobindo's ashram in Pondicherry and stayed there until 1950. In 1959, he founded the Hari Krishna mandir in Pune where he died in 1980.

Published works: 

Among the Great (Bombay: Nalanda, 1945)

The Subhas I Knew (Bombay: Nalanda, 1946)

Eyes of Light (Bombay: Nalanda, 1948)

Pilgrims of the Stars (New York: Macmillan, 1953)

Date of birth: 
22 Jan 1897
Connections: 

Subhas Chandra Bose, G. Lowes Dickinson, Aurobindo Ghose, Herman Hesse, S. Radhakrishnan, Romain Rolland, Bertrand RussellRabindranath Tagore.

Reviews: 

Fredoon Kabraji, Life and Letters 59 (1948-9), pp. 249-50 (Among the Great)

Secondary works: 

Fay, Peter Ward, The Forgotten Army: India's Armed Struggle for Independence (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1995)

Indira Devi, Fragrant Memories (Bombay: Bharatiya Vidya Bhavan, 1983)

Patel, Amrita Paresh, Dilip Kumar Roy: A Lover of Light among Luminaries (Ahmedabad, L. D. Institute of Indology, 2002)

City of birth: 
Calcutta
Country of birth: 
India
Current name city of birth: 
Kolkata
Current name country of birth: 
India
Other names: 

Dilip Kumar Roy

Location

Fitzwilliam Hall Cambridge, CB2 1RB
United Kingdom
52° 10' 21.3528" N, 0° 6' 40.3992" E
Date of death: 
06 Jan 1980
Location of death: 
Pune, India
Date of 1st arrival in Britain: 
01 Jan 1919
Precise 1st arrival date unknown: 
Y
Dates of time spent in Britain: 

1919-22

Location: 

Fitzwilliam Hall, Cambridge

Tags for Making Britain: 

M. Kumaramangalam

About: 

Mohan Kumaramangalam was born in London in 1916 to Paramasiva and Radhabhai Subbarayan. He studied at Eton and then at King's College, Cambridge University. He became President of the Cambridge Majlis in Lent 1937 and President of the Cambridge Union in Michaelmas 1938. He was also a member of the Federation of Indian Students' Societies and an active socialist. He was called to the Bar at the Inner Temple and went to India in 1939.

Mohan Kumaramangalam was a member of the Communist Party of India (CPI) until 1966 when he joined the Indian National Congress.

Published works: 

Indians Fight for Equality in South Africa (Bombay; People's Publishing House, 1946)

India's Language Crisis (Madras: New Century Book House, 1965)

Democracy and Cult of Individual (New Delhi: National Book Club, 1966)

Constitutional Amendments (New Delhi: All India Congress Committee, 1971)

Coal Industry in India (New Delhi: Oxford & IBH Pub. Co., 1973)

Communists in Congress (New Delhi: D. K. Publishing House, 1973)

Judicial Appointments (New Delhi: Oxford & IBH Pub. Co, 1973)

Steel Holding Company (New Delhi: Mainstream, 1973)

Date of birth: 
01 Nov 1916
Connections: 

Indira Gandhi (served in her cabinet), M. K. Gandhi, Khushwant Singh.

Cambridge Union

Secondary works: 

Haksar, P. N., Premonitions (Bombay: Interpress, 1979)

Kiernan, V. G., 'Mohan Kumaramangalam in England', Socialist India, 23 February 1974

Archive source: 

Cambridge Majlis minute book, Wren Library, Trinity College, Cambridge

L/PJ/12/4, India Office Records, Asian and African Studies Reading Room, British Library, St Pancras

City of birth: 
London
Country of birth: 
England
Other names: 

Mohan Kumaramangalam

Surendra Mohan Kumaramangalam

Locations

King's College Cambridge, CB2 1ST
United Kingdom
52° 12' 15.588" N, 0° 7' 2.064" E
Eton College SL4 6DW
United Kingdom
51° 28' 59.628" N, 0° 36' 20.6352" W
Date of death: 
30 May 1973
Location of death: 
India
Tags for Making Britain: 

George Arundale

About: 

George Arundale was a Theosophist. He was tutored by Charles Leadbeater and went to St John's College, Cambridge in 1895. In 1902, he moved to Benares and became principal of the Central Hindu College. Arundale became involved with the All-India Home Rule League and was imprisoned, with Annie Besant, in 1917, under the Defence of India Act, 1917.

In 1920, he married a Brahmin girl, Rukmini Devi, which caused some controversy in India. In 1926, he became Regionary Bishop of the Liberal Catholic Church in India. In 1934, he became President of the Theosophical Society. He edited the Theosophist. He died in 1945 in Adyar at the Theosophist headquarters.

Published works: 

Various works on theosophy include:

Bedrock of Education (Adyar: Theosophical Publishing House, 1924)

Thoughts of the Great (Adyar: Theosophical Publishing House, 1924)

You (Adyar: Theosophical Publishing House, 1935)

Gods in the Becoming (Adyar: Theosophical Publishing House, 1936)

Education for Happiness (Adyar: Theosophical Publishing House, 1938)

Adventures in Theosophy (Adyar: Theosophical Publishing House, 1941)

Date of birth: 
01 Dec 1878
Connections: 
Secondary works: 

Dixon, Joy, Divine Feminine: Theosophy and Feminism in England (London: John Hopins, 2001)

Lutyens, Mary, Krishnamurti: The Years of Awakening (London: John Murray, 1975)

Lutyens, Mary, The Life and Death of Krishnamurti (London: John Murray, 1990)

Meduri, Avanthi (ed.), Rukmini Devi Arundale (1904-1968): A Visionary Architect of Indian culture and the Performing Arts (Delhi: Motilal Banarsidass, 2005)

Archive source: 

Theosophical Archives, Adyar, India

City of birth: 
Wonersh, Surrey
Country of birth: 
England
Other names: 

George Sydney Arundale

Date of death: 
12 Aug 1945
Location of death: 
Adyar, India
Tags for Making Britain: 

Cambridge Majlis

About: 

The Cambridge Majlis was founded around 1891 for Indian students at the university. In its early days it met at the home of Dr Upendra Krishna Dutt. The society became a debating organization where Indian students at Cambridge could reason and practise debates, as well as socialize and discuss political matters. It was named after the Persian word for assembly. A number of Indian nationalist politicians came to Cambridge to address the Majlis. The Cambridge Majlis had close links with its Oxford counterpart, founded in 1896, with various joint dinners and debates.

Secondary works: 

Deshmukh, C. D., The Course of My Life (Bombay: Orient Longman, 1974)

Khosla, G. D., Memory’s Gay Chariot: An Autobiographical Narrative (New Delhi: Allied Publishers, 1985)

Kiernan, V. G., ‘Mohan Kumaramangalam in England’, Socialist India, (23 February 1974), pp. 5-7, 36; (2 March 1974), pp. 13-17, 24

Lahiri, Shompa, Indians in Britain: Anglo-Indian Encounters, Race and Identity, 1880-1930 (London: Frank Cass, 2000)

Mukherjee, Sumita, Nationalism, Education and Migrant Identities: The England-Returned (London: Routledge, 2009)

Visram, Rozina, Asians in Britain: 400 Years of History (London: Pluto Press, 2002)

Date began: 
01 Jan 1891
Precise date began unknown: 
Y
Connections: 

Members included: Subhas Chandra Bose, K. L. Gauba, Aurobindo Ghose, Fazl-i-Husain, Mirza Abol Hassan Ispahani, Mohan Kumaramangalam, Jawaharlal Nehru, Rajni Patel, Shankar Dayal Sharma.

Notable speakers included: C. F. Andrews, E. M. Forster, M. K. Gandhi, Gopal Krishna Gokhale, Mohammed Ali Jinnah, Sarojini Naidu, Lala Lajpat Rai.

Archive source: 

Cambridge Majlis Minute Book, 1932-7, Wren Library, Trinity College, Cambridge

Programme cards and menus, Saroj Kumar Chatterjee Collection, King’s College, Cambridge

L/PJ/12/4, India Office Records, Asian and African Studies Reading Room, British Library, St Pancras

Tags for Making Britain: 

John Maynard Keynes

About: 

John Maynard Keynes was a Cambridge-based economist after whom a branch of macroeconomic theory is named. He was educated at Eton and then King's College, Cambridge, where he became a member of the Apostles and became friends with the Bloomsbury circle including Lytton Strachey and Leonard Woolf who had recruited him. Keynes competed for the Indian Civil Service and worked for the India Office in London from 1906 to 1908. He then took up a post lecturing in economics at Cambridge. His first book, published in 1913, was called Indian Currency and Finance. As a Cambridge tutor, Keynes often met and taught Indian students.

During the First World War, Keynes was recruited to the Treasury, through the influence of Edwin Montagu. He assisted with the British war-time economy in this war and the Second World War. During the inter-war period, Keynes wrote prolifically on economic matters. His most influential work was The General Theory of Employment, Interest and Money, which came out in 1936. Keynes argued that the economy could be stimulated by increased government expenditure in times of falling demand and rising unemployment. He died in 1946.

Published works: 

Indian Currency and Finance (London: Macmillan, 1913)

A Treatise on Probability (1921)

Revision of the Treaty (1922)

A Tract on Monetary Reform (1923)

The Economic Consequences of Mr. Churchill (1925)

Laissez Faire and Communism (1926)

A Treatise on Money, 2 vols. (1930)

The Means to Prosperity (1933)

The General Theory of Employment, Interest and Money (1936)

How to Pay for the War: A Radical Plan for the Chancellor of the Exchequer (1940)

Example: 

Letter to editor of Cambridge Review, 17 May 1909, in JMK/IC/1, King's College Archive Centre, Cambridge

Date of birth: 
05 Jun 1883
Content: 

A letter in response to an editorial on 'The Indian Student at Cambridge', 13 May 1909, which felt that with the rise of Indians at Cambridge that there were many Indian students who were not prepared for the degree and that they should not be allowed to hold or talk about revolutionary views when in Britain. Keynes contends that there should not be any restrictions on Indian students, but agrees with the plan to distribute Indians evenly among the colleges.

Contributions to periodicals: 

Economic Journal, Nation & Atheneum, Manchester Guardian Commercial, Reconstruction in Europe, The Listener, New Republic, New Statesman and Nation.

Extract: 

Since we fill up the Indian Civil Service and the Indian Medical Service through examinations held in England on the lines of English education, since qualifications for the higher posts in the scientific departments can only be obtained at a European University, and while a call to the English bar is thought to be an advantage in India, it is our duty to give full opportunity to all Indians whose ambitions lie most properly in these directions.

Secondary works: 

Cairncross, Alec, ‘Keynes, John Maynard, Baron Keynes (1883–1946)’, Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (Oxford University Press, 2008) [http://www.oxforddnb.com/view/article/34310]

Archive source: 

Correspondence and papers, King's College archive centre, Cambridge

Correspondence, Trinity College Archive, Cambridge

Official correspondence and papers, National Archives, Kew

Correspondence and miscellaneous papers, British Library of Political and Economic Science, London

Correspondence with Vanessa Bell and Kingsley Martin, University of Sussex, Brighton

City of birth: 
Cambridge
Country of birth: 
England
Other names: 

J. M. Keynes

Baron Keynes

Date of death: 
21 Apr 1946
Tags for Making Britain: 

Kumar Shri Duleepsinhji

About: 

Duleepsinhji, the nephew of the cricketer Ranjitsinhji, was also a cricketer who played for England. He was born into the Princely State of Kathiawar. He arrived in Britain in 1921 and was educated at Cheltenham College and Cambridge. Duleepsinhji played for the Cheltenham XI from 1921 to 1923. He played cricket for Cambridge from 1925 to 1927 (gaining a Blue), and for Sussex from 1926 to 1931. He was captain of Sussex in 1931 and 1932. He played for England in twelve test matches and scored a century on his debut against Australia. However, in 1929, Duleepsinhji was not selected to play against South Africa after the first test, an omission that he believed was because some South African politicians did not want to see their team to concede runs to a man of colour. His career was beset by illness and he was forced to retire in 1931.

Duleepsinhji joined the Indian Foreign Service in 1949 and served as India High Commissioner in Australia and New Zealand.

Date of birth: 
13 Jun 1905
Connections: 
Contributions to periodicals: 

Interview in Daily Express, 2 December 1933

Reviews: 

Wisden

Secondary works: 

Bose, Mihir, A History of Indian Cricket (London: Deutsch, 1990)

Guha, Ramachandra, A Corner of a Foreign Field: The Indian History of a British Sport (London: Picador, 2002)

Kincaid, Charles, The Land of Ranji and Duleep (Edinburgh: Blackwood and Sons, 1931)

Williams, Jack, Cricket and Race (Oxford: Berg, 2001)

City of birth: 
Kathiawar
Country of birth: 
India
Other names: 

Duleep

Location

Cheltenham College
Bath Road
Cheltenham, GL53 7LD
United Kingdom
51° 53' 34.6776" N, 2° 4' 34.6512" W
Date of death: 
05 Dec 1959
Location of death: 
Mumbai, India
Date of 1st arrival in Britain: 
01 Jan 1921
Precise 1st arrival date unknown: 
Y
Tags for Making Britain: 

Jagadish Chandra Bose

About: 

Jagadis Chandra Bose was a Bengali scientist: a biologist, a physicist, a botanist and a writer of science fiction. He is considered the father of radio science as he was the first person in the world to demonstrate wireless transmission of electromagnetic waves after returning to India in 1885 (although he did not patent this invention, which was brought out by Marconi two years later). Bose then demonstrated how plants responded to various stimuli, demonstrating the electrical nature of this conduction. He is considered a pioneer in the field of biophysics.

Bose went to England in 1880 for his further education. Initially he had plans to compete for the ICS, and then to study medicine, but enrolled in the Natural Sciences tripos at Christ's College, Cambridge. He received his BA in 1884 and then obtained a DSc from the University of London. He later received an honorary degree from Aberdeen University.

Bose returned to India in 1885 with a position at Presidency College, Calcutta. He returned to Britain and Europe a number of times to lecture. For example in 1914, he lectured at Oxford, Cambridge and the Royal Institution. During this visit he had a private laboratory in Maida Vale, London, where various European scientists would visit Bose. He was founder and Director of the Bose Research Institute, Calcutta, in 1917. He was knighted in 1917, and made a Fellow of the Royal Society in 1920 (the first Indian to become a fellow for science as opposed to mathematics).

Published works: 

Response in the Living and Non-Living (London: Longmans, Green and Co., 1902)

Plant Response as a Means of Physiological Investigation (London: Longmans, Green and Co., 1906)

Researches in Irritability of Plants (London: Longmans Green and Co., 1913)

Plant Autographs & Their Revelations (Washington, 1915)

The Physiology of the Ascent of Sap (London: Longmans, Green and Co., 1923)

The Physiology of Photosynthesis (London: Longmans, Green and Co., 1924)

The Nervous Mechanism of Plants (London: Longmans, Green and Co., 1926)

Motor Mechanisms of Plants (London: Longmans, Green and Co., 1928)

Growth and Tropic Movements of Plants (London: Longmans, Green and Co., 1929)

Date of birth: 
30 Nov 1858
Connections: 

Francis Balfour, Ananda Mohun Bose, Francis Darwin, Patrick Geddes, Prafulla Chandra Ray, Boshi Sen, John Strutt (Lord Rayleigh).

Reviews: 

Obituary, The Times, 24 November 1937

Secondary works: 

Geddes, Patrick, The Life and Work of Sir Jagadis C. Bose (London: Longmans, Green and Co., 1920)

Sir Jagadis Chunder Bose: His Life and Speeches (Madras: Ganesh & Co., 1920)

City of birth: 
Mymensingh, Bengal
Country of birth: 
India
Current name country of birth: 
Bangladesh
Other names: 

Jagadis Chandra Bose

Jagadis Chunder Bose

Location

Christ's College, Cambridge, CB2 3AR
United Kingdom
52° 12' 11.2068" N, 0° 7' 26.9436" E
Date of death: 
23 Nov 1937
Location of death: 
Bengal, India
Date of 1st arrival in Britain: 
01 Jan 1880
Precise 1st arrival date unknown: 
Y
Dates of time spent in Britain: 

1880-5 (education); 1896-7; 1900-2; 1907; 1914-15.

Tags for Making Britain: 

Sarath Kumar Ghosh

About: 

Sarath Kumar Ghosh was a writer and novelist who had been educated in Cambridge. He was the nephew of the Raja of 'Ghoshpara' according to publicity put out by his American publishers, J. B. Pond Lyceum Bureau.

Published works: 

1001 Indian Nights (London: Heinemann, 1904)

The Prince of Destiny: The New Krishna (London: Rebman, 1909)

The Verdict of the Gods (New York: Dodd Mead, 1905)

The Wonders of the Jungle (New York: D. C. Heath, 1915)

Example: 

Publisher's Preface to Prince of Destiny (1909)

Date of birth: 
01 Jan 1883
Contributions to periodicals: 

Cornhill Magazine

'The Romance of the Kohinoor', Harper's Magazine (March 1902)

'A Thousand Years After', Harper's Magazine (July 1903)

'The Chohan Bride', Harper's Magazine (April 1901)


Precise DOB unknown: 
Y
Reviews: 

The Manchester Guardian (17 November 1909)

The New York Times

Extract: 

When the author of this romance finished his education in Great Britain and began his literary career, his style and action were so pure as to cause an eminent English critic to say that many distinguished English novelists might well envy him his command of English prose. Nay a leading London review averred, 'We cannot be persuaded to believe that Sarath Kumar Ghosh is anything but an Englishman in masquerade'. In view of that the publishers of this romance deemed it expedient to present the author's portrait in the British edition in a dress representative of India, in order to convince readers that he is truly Indian.

Secondary works: 

Mukherjee, Meenakshi, The Perishable Empire: Essays on Indian Writing in English (Delhi: Oxford University Press, 2000)

Tickell, Alex, 'Writing the Nation's Destiny: Indian Fiction in English before 1910', Third World Quarterly, 26.3 (2005), pp. 525-541

Archive source: 

Correspondence regarding Ghosh's offer to write the official book on the Prince of Wales' tour of India, 1902-1903, L/PJ/6/610, Asian and African Reading Room, British Library, St Pancras

Other names: 

Sarath Kumar Ghose

Prince Sarath Ghosh

Location

28 Elgin Avenue
London, W9 2NR
United Kingdom
51° 31' 28.7256" N, 0° 11' 59.7156" W
Location: 

Cambridge

Tags for Making Britain: 

Subhas Chandra Bose

About: 

Having been schooled in Cuttack, Orissa, where his father worked as a lawyer, Subhas Chandra Bose went to Calcutta in 1913 and joined Presidency College. In 1916, Bose was expelled for his complicity in beating a college tutor, Professor Oaten, whom he had heard had manhandled some Indian students. Bose had been involved in student political groups in Calcutta and received much sympathy for his expulsion. He joined Scottish Church College and graduated in 1919 with a degree in philosophy.

Bose's father proposed to send him to England to study for the Indian Civil Service (ICS). Despite Bose's misgivings about accepting a job under the British Government, he set sail for England in September 1919. Upon arriving in Britain, Bose went up to Cambridge to gain admission. He managed to gain entry to Fitzwilliam Hall, a body for non-collegiate members of the University. Bose took the Mental and Moral Sciences Tripos and studied for the Civil Service exams. He attended the Cambridge Union Society debates and was a member of the Cambridge Majlis. He gave evidence to the Lytton Committee investigating Indian students in the UK, and appealed to the India Office to allow Indians to join the University Officers' Training Corps (without success).

In July 1920, Bose took the ICS exams in London and came fourth. Bose then faced a dilemma as to whether to take up this opportunity and sought advice from his family through correspondence to India. Finally in April 1921, Bose withdrew from taking up this post with the ICS and returned to India in the summer of 1921.

In Calcutta, Bose joined the Indian National Congress and worked with the Bengali leader C. R. Das. Bose was in and out of jail in the 1920s, 1930s and 1940s for his political action (often violent) against the British. In the meantime, he rose through the Congress ranks, working with Nehru, and became president of Congress in 1938. Successful again in 1939 against Gandhi's candidate, Bose then resigned over the selection of the working committee.

In 1941, Bose managed to leave India through Afghanistan. In 1943, Bose was in Japan and supported the Prime Minister's efforts to reconstitute the Indian National Army (INA) and set up the 'Azad Hind' or Free India provisional government. In 1944, the INA and Japanese invaded India but suffered a heavy defeat. Bose fled and was killed in a plane crash over Taiwan in August 1945 - although many of his followers remain(ed) doubtful as to the cause of his death, wondering if he had managed to escape the crash.

Published works: 

The Indian Struggle, 1920-1934 (London: Lawrence & Wishart, 1935)

Other works, unpublished in his lifetime, can be found in the Collected Works published by the Netaji Research Bureau (see below)

Example: 

Subhas Chandra Bose, An Indian Pilgrim (1937), ed. by Sisir K. Bose and Sugata Bose (Delhi: Oxford University Press, 1997), p. 207.

Date of birth: 
23 Jan 1897
Content: 

Letter to his brother, Sarat Chandra Bose, on 22 September 1920, from Leigh-on-Sea when on holiday.

Connections: 

Amiya Nath Bose (nephew), Sarat Chandra Bose (brother), K. L. Gauba (contemporary at Cambridge), George Lansbury, Dilip Kumar Roy (contemporary at Cambridge).

Indian National Army

Reviews: 

Daily Herald (The Indian Struggle, 1935)

Manchester Guardian (The Indian Struggle, 1935)

News Chronicle (The Indian Struggle, 1935)

Spectator (The Indian Struggle, 1935)

The Sunday Times (The Indian Struggle, 1935)

Extract: 

I am here as a paying guest of Mr Bates's family. Mr Bates represents English character at its very best. He is cultured and liberal in his views and cosmopolitan in his sentiments. He is altogether unlike the ordinary run of Englishmen - who are proud, haughty and conceited and to whom everything that is non-English is bad. Mr Bates counts among his friends Russians, Poles, Lithuanians, Irishmen and members of other nationalities. He takes a great interest in Russian, Irish and Indian literature and admires the writings of Romesh Dutt and Tagore.

Secondary works: 

Bose, Sisir K., and Bose, Sugata (eds), Netaji: Collected Works (Calcutta: Netaji Research Bureau, 1980-2007)

Gordon, Leonard A., Brothers Against the Raj: A Biography of Indian Nationalists Sarat and Subhas Chandra Bose (New York: Columbia University Press, 1990)

Gordon, Leonard A., ‘Bose, Subhas Chandra (1897–1945)’, Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (Oxford University Press, 2004) [http://www.oxforddnb.com/view/article/47756]

Roy, Dilip Kumar, The Subhas I Knew (Bombay: Nalanda, 1946)

Toye, Hugh, The Springing Tiger: A Study of a Revolutionary (London: Cassell, 1959)

Relevance: 

In this letter Bose is referring to the different types of Englishmen he has met in his time in Britain. He is particularly appreciative of Mr Bates's character. The references to Dutt and Tagore also reveal how Indian literature had been taken into the homes of many English households.

Archive source: 

Netaji Research Bureau, Kolkata

Nehru Memorial Museum and Library, New Delhi

City of birth: 
Cuttack, Orissa
Country of birth: 
India
Other names: 

Netaji

Location

Fitzwilliam Hall,
Turpington Street
Cambridge, CB2 1RB
United Kingdom
52° 12' 1.6632" N, 0° 7' 10.6284" E
Date of death: 
18 Aug 1945
Precise date of death unknown: 
Y
Location of death: 
Taiwan
Date of 1st arrival in Britain: 
25 Oct 1919
Dates of time spent in Britain: 

1919-21

Location: 

Fitzwilliam Hall, Trumpington Street, Cambridge

Tags for Making Britain: 

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