Indian National Congress

India

About: 

India was the journal produced by the British Committee of the Indian National Congress. It began as a monthly journal and then became a weekly digest. The British Committee of the Indian National Congress was made up of British men interested in India and some Indians who were based in London. They sought to organize sympathizers to Congress in Britain, write and distribute Congress annual reports and literature, and raise Congress petitions in Parliament through the Indian Parliamentary Committee, chaired by William Wedderburn. The journal was used for some of these purposes and to give an accurate account of events in India to British readers.

It was edited by British individuals: William Digby (1890-92), Morse Stephens (1893), Gordon Hewart (1893-1905), J. Muirhead (Prof.) (1905-6), H. E. A. Cotton (1906-19), H. S. Polak (1919-20).

Other names: 

India: A Journal for the Discussion of Indian Affairs
India: A Record and Review of Indian Affairs

Secondary works: 

Kaul, Chandrika, Reporting the Raj: The British Press and India c.1880-1922 (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 2003)

Owen, Nicholas, The British Left and India: Metropolitan Anti-Imperialism, 1885-1847 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2007)

Date began: 
01 Jan 1890
Precise date began unknown: 
Y
Date ended: 
01 Jan 1921
Precise date ended unknown: 
Y
Tags for Making Britain: 

League Against Imperialism

About: 

The roots of the League Against Imperialism (LAI) lay in the Second Congress of the Communist International (Comintern) in July 1920, which considered the formulation of a colonial policy, and included a debate between Lenin and Manabendra Nath Roy, founder of India’s Communist Party. Some years of debate over the viability of an international union to fight imperialism followed. A joint meeting of the Workers’ International Relief and the Committee Against Atrocities in Syria in February 1926 resulted in the formation of a League Against Colonial Oppression, a precursor to the LAI.

In Brussels in 1927 the LAI was officially founded in the presence of key international political figures, including Jawaharlal Nehru, General Secretary of the Indian National Congress. Shapurji Saklatvala had attended the meeting in the House of Commons to decide on the British delegation, but was not himself present in Brussels, although his name was added to the minutes. Messages of support for the LAI were sent by Albert Einstein, Victor Margueritte and M. K. Gandhi. A Sino-Indian declaration of solidarity, drafted by Nehru, was signed at the congress. The League’s stated aim was to ‘deter imperialist governments from oppressing weak nations’.

Just two months after the Brussels Congress the Government of India banned LAI literature from entering India, but the All-India Congress Committee recommended in May 1927 that the Indian National Congress (INC) seek membership of the LAI, ratified in December 1927. Controversies over the exact political affiliation of the LAI continued for some years, and by 1931 many members had left or been expelled from the League. In April 1930, Nehru, stung by condemnation of the Delhi Manifesto by members of the LAI, directed Congress to cease all correspondence with the LAI; Nehru was expelled from the LAI the following year.

The LAI in Britain consistently exploited the Labour Party’s uncertain commitment to the anti-imperialist cause, offering a practical alternative to socialist rhetoric. Furthermore, the LAI claimed that economic troubles in England including rising unemployment were directly related to capitalist investment and involvement in Empire. The British Section of the LAI was held to be one of the most active, particularly in its India operations. These included streams of resolutions, petitions and articles as well as demonstrations and meetings. One such meeting in October 1928 in Limehouse Town Hall protested against the Labour Party’s participation in the Simon Commission, and was attended by Tarini Sinha, member of the Indian Office of the ILP, Sarojini Naidu and Maulana Mohammed Ali, members of the INC.

Ultimately, suspicions of the LAI’s Communist affiliation brought about its downfall, alongside the difficulties of aligning various nationalist movements with different forms of socialism. In December 1931 the LAI’s headquarters in Berlin were raided, and the League then moved to Paris for some months before settling in London. By the mid-1930s, however, the League was barely an international organization, membership had fallen in most countries, and the decision to cease activities was taken early in 1937.

Published works: 

Report of the National Conference of the League Against Imperialism, British Section, February 1931. (London: The League against Imperialism, 1931).

Example: 

Report of the National Conference of the League Against Imperialism, British Section, February 1931 (London: The League against Imperialism, 1931), p. 13

Other names: 

Precursor: League Against Colonial Oppression
Original title: League Against Imperialism and For National Independence

Secondary works: 

Bush, Barbara, Imperialism, Race and Resistance: Africa and Britain, 1919-1945 (London and New York: Routledge, 1999)

Haithcox, John Patrick, Communism and Nationalism in India: M. N. Roy and Comintern Policy, 1920-39 (Princeton, N. J.: Princeton University Press, 1971)

Hargreaves, John D, ‘The Comintern and Anti-Colonialism: New Research Opportunities’, African Affairs 92.367 (Apr. 1993), (Oxford University Press on behalf of The Royal African Society), pp. 255-61.

Howe, Stephen, Anticolonialism in British Politics: The Left and the End of Empire, 1918-1964 (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1993)

Jones, Jean, The League Against Imperialism, Socialist History Society Occasional Pamphlet Series No. 4, (Preston: Lancashire Community Press, 1996)

Saville, John, ‘Reginald Bridgeman,’ in Joyce M. Bellamy and John Saville (eds.) Dictionary of Labour Biography, VII (London: 1984), pp. 40-50.

Content: 

A snapshot of the attitudes and motivations of the British Section of the LAI. This extract is on contemporary interpretations of the movement towards independence in India

Date began: 
10 Feb 1927
Extract: 

In the discussion… a delegate from the Indian Freedom League said that Labour Party leaders in Britain had deserted the struggle against imperialism, but that in India Gandhi had created a psychology of revolt which will never die, even if Gandhi and the leaders of the Indian National Congress were to betray the struggle by compromise with the British Government. Other speakers showed that the great movement of mass revolt in India had arisen not because of Gandhi, but in spite of his policy and that Jawaharlal Nehru, who had said that Indian should not discuss conditions of self-government while British troops remained in India, was now supporting Gandhi in negotiations with the Viceroy. The Congress leaders had done nothing to establish the League in India, although this was proposed at Brussels in 1927.

Connections: 

Indian Delegation, 1927 Brussels Congress:

Virendranath Chattopadhyaya, J. Naidu (Association of Indians in Central Europe), A. C. N. Nambiar (Association of Indian Journalists), Jawaharlal Nehru (member of Executive Committee of LAI), Bakar Ali Mirza (Indian Oxford Union), Tarini Sinha (Indian Office of the ILP),

English Delegation, 1927 Brussels Congress (selected members):

Reginald Bridgeman, Shapurji Saklatvala (member of LAI)

LAI in Britain: Ben Bradley (secretary 1934-40), Bhabani Bhattacharya, Fenner Brockway (chairman, 1928), Clemens Palme Dutt (member of the executive committee of the British Section of the LAI)

Date ended: 
01 Jan 1937
Archive source: 

The International Institute of Social History, Amsterdam. Their main website, http://www.iisg.nl/index.php, gives a list of materials relating to the LAI

Precise date ended unknown: 
Y

1942 Quit India Movement

Date: 
08 Aug 1942
Event location: 

Gowalia Tank Maidan, Bombay, India

About: 

On 8 August 1942 at the All-India Congress Committee session in Bombay, Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi launched the 'Quit India' movement. The next day, Gandhi, Nehru and many other leaders of the Indian National Congress were arrested by the British Government. Disorderly and non-violent demonstrations took place throughout the country in the following days.

By the middle of 1942, Japanese troops were approaching the borders of India. Pressure was mounting from China, the United States and  Britain to solve the issue of  the future status of India before the end of the war. In March 1942, the Prime Minister dispatched Sir Stafford Cripps, a member of the War Cabinet, to India to discuss the British Government's Draft Declaration. The draft granted India Dominion status after the war but otherwise conceded few changes to the British Government Act of 1935. The draft was unacceptable to the Congress Working Committee who rejected it. The failure of the Cripps Mission further estranged the Congress and the British Government.

Gandhi seized upon the failure of the Cripps Mission, the advances of the Japanese in South-East Asia and the general frustration with the British in India. He called for a voluntary British withdrawal from India. From 29 April to 1 May 1942, the All India Congress Committee assembled in Allahabad to discuss the resolution of the Working Committee. Although Gandhi was absent from the meeting, many of his points were admitted into the resolution: the most significant of them being the commitment to non-violence. On 14 July 1942, the Congress Working Committee met again at Wardha and resolved that it would authorise Gandhi to take charge of the non-violent mass movement. The Resolution, generally referred to as the 'Quit India' resolution, was to be approved by the All India Congress Committee meeting in Bombay in August.

On 7 to 8 August 1942, the All India Congress Committee met in Bombay and ratified the 'Quit India' resolution. Gandhi called for 'Do or Die'. The next day, on 9 August 1942, Gandhi, members of the Congress Working Committee and other Congress leaders were arrested by the British Government under the Defence of India Rules. The Working Committee, the All India Congress Committee and the four Provincial Congress Committees were declared unlawful associations under the Criminal Law Amendment Act of 1908. The assembly of public meetings were prohibited under rule 56 of the Defence of India Rules. The arrest of Gandhi and the Congress leaders led to mass demonstrations  throughout India. Thousands were killed and injured in the wake of the 'Quit India' movement. Strikes were called in many places. The British swiftly suppressed many of these demonstrations by mass detentions; more than 100,000 people were imprisoned.

The 'Quit India' movement, more than anything, united the Indian people against British rule. Although most demonstrations had been suppressed by 1944, upon his release in 1944 Gandhi continued his resistance and went on a 21-day fast. By the end of the Second World War, Britain's place in the world had changed dramatically and the demand for independence could no longer be ignored.

Organizer: 
Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi
People involved: 

Maulana Abul Kalam Azad, Subhas Chandra Bose, Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi, Mohammed Ali Jinnah, Asoka Mehta, Jaya Prakas Narayan, Jawaharlal Nehru, Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel, Dr Rajendra Prasad, Chakravarti Rajgopalachari.

Published works: 

Gandhi, Mahatma, Quit India, ed. by R. K. Prabhu and U. R. Rao (Bombay: Padma Publications, 1942)

Secondary works: 

Bakshi, Rakesh Ranjan, Quit India Movement in U. P.: Sabotage, Bomb, and Conspiracy Cases (Sitapur: NP Publishers, 1992) 

Bakshi, S. R., Congress and Quit India Movement (New Delhi: Criterion Publications, 1986)

Basavapunnaiah, M., Quit India Call and the Role of the Communists: A Reply to Arun Shourie (New Delhi: National Book Centre, 1984)

Bhaskaran, Krishna, Quit India Movement: A People's Revolt in Maharashtra (Mumbai: Himalaya Publishing House, 1999)

Bhuyan, Arun Chandra, The Quit India Movement: The Second World War and Indian Nationalism (New Delhi: Manas Publications, 1975)

Chakrabarty, Bidyut, Local Politics and Indian Nationalism: Midnapur, 1919-1944 (New Delhi: Manohar, 1997)

Chakravarty, Shachi, Quit India Movement: A Study (Delhi: New Century Publications, 2002)

Chaudhari, K. K., Quit India Revolution: The Ethos of Its Central Direction (Mumbai: Popular Prakashan, 1996)

Chopra, P. N., Historic Judgement On Quit India Movement: Justice Wickenden's Report (Delhi: Konark Publishers, 1989)

Chopra, P. N., Quit India Movement: British Secret Report (Faridabad: Thomson Press, 1976)

Congress Responisibility for the Disturbances, 1942-43 (Delhi: Manager of Publications, 1943)

Desai, Sanjiv P., Calendar of the 'Quit India' Movement in the Bombay Presidency (Bombay: Department of Archives, Government of Maharashtra, 1995)

Dwivedi, Surendranath, Untold Story of August Revolution (Delhi: Ajanta Publications, 1993)

Goyal, P. K., Battle of India's Freedom Movement (Delhi: Vista International Publishing House, 2005)

Hutchins, Francis G., India's Revolution: Gandhi and the Quit India Movement (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1973)

Hutchins, Francis G., Spontaneous Revolution: The Quit India Movement (Delhi: Manohar Book Service, 1971)

Jana, Anil Kumar, Quit India Movement in Bengal: A Study of Contai Subdivision (Delhi: Indian Publishers' Distributors, 1996)

Kamath, Suryanath U., Quit India Movement in Karnataka (Bangalore: Lipi Prakashana, 1988)

Kamtekar, Indivar, What Caused the 'Quit India' Movement? (Calcutta: Indian Institute of Management, 1990)

Kumar, Ravindra, Champaran to Quit India Movement (New Delhi: Mittal, 2002)

Limaye, Madhu, The August Struggle: An Appraisal of Quit India Movement (Bombay: Sindhu Publications, 1993)

Limaye, Sirubhau, Nau Ogasta (Pune: Manasanmana Prakasana, 1996)

Maity, Pradyot Kumar, Quit India Movement in Bengal and the Tamralipta Jatiya Sarkar (Tumluk, Purba Medinipur: Purvadri Prakasani, 2002)

Malhotra, S. L., From Civil Disobedience to Quit India: Gandhi and the Freedom Movement in Punjab and Haryana, 1932-1942 (Chandigarh: Punjab University Publication Bureau, 1979)

Mathur, Y. B., Quit India Movement (Delhi: Pragati Publications, 1979)

Mehta, Chitra P., I Fought for My Country's Freedom: Being an Inspiring and Instructive Story of the Part Played by a Young Non-Violent Soldier in the Historic Indian Struggle for Freedom of 1942-44 (Bombay: Hamara Hindoostan Publications, 1946)

Naidu, C. M., Mahatma Gandhi's Leadership and Quit India Movement in Coastal India (Visakhapatnam: C. M. Naidu, 1996)

Nimbkar, Krishnabai, Pages from a Quit India Freedom Fighter's Diary (1944-45) (Bombay: Bharatiya Vidya Bhavan, 1996)

Pandey, Gyanendra, The Indian Nation in 1942 (Calcutta: Centre for Studies in Social Sciences, Calcutta & K. P. Bagchi, 1988)

Panigrahi, D. N., Quit India and the Struggle for Freedom (New Delhi: Vikas, 1984)

Pati, Biswamoy, Turbulent Times, India, 1940-44 (Mumbai: Popular Prakashan, 1998)

Patil, V. T., Gandhi, Nehru and the Quit India Movement (Delhi: B. R. Pub. Corp., 1984)

Pattanayaka, Jagannatha, Landmarks of Quit India Movement in Orissa (Cuttack: Orissa State Freedom Fighters' Samity, 1992)

Ramu, P. S., Gandhi-Subhas and 'Quit India' (Delhi: S. S. Publishers, 1995)

Ramu, P. S., Prelude to 'Quit India': Home Rule to Satyagraha (Delhi: S. S. Publishers, 1996)

Rath, Bijay Chandra, Quit India Movement in Orissa (Cuttack: Arya Prakashan, 1994)

Roy, Pankaj Kumar, The Quit India Movement in Bihar: The Special Reference to the Old Division of Bhagalpur (Delhi: Capital Publishing House, 1991)

Sarkar, Kalyan Kumar, The 'Quit India' Movement in the District of Nadia (Calcutta: Barnali, 1988)

Sengupta, Syamalendu, and Gautam Chatterjee, Secret Congress Broadcasts and Storming Railway Tracks during Quit India Movement (New Delhi: Navrang, 1988) 

Sharma, Alka, History of Modern India: The Quit India Movement (Delhi: H. K. Publications, 1992)

Shourie, Arun, 'The Only Fatherland': Communists, 'Quit India', and the Sovjet Union (New Delhi: ASA Publications, 1991)

Shukla, Vivekananda, Rebellion of 1942: Quit India Movement (Delhi: H. K. Publishers and Dsitributors, 1989)

Thomas, Anthony, Mahatma Gandhi and the Communal Problem: From the Khalifat Movement to Quit India (New Delhi: Indian Social Institute, 1983)

The Transfer of Power, 1942-7 (London: H. M. S. O., 1971)

Venkataramani, M. S., Quit India: The American Reponse to the 1942 Struggle  (New Delhi: Vikas, 1979)

Wolpert, Stanley, Shameful Flight: The Last Years of the British Empire in India (New York; Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2006)

Zaidi, A. M., Defying a Distant King: A Study of the Quit India Movement (New Delhi: Publications Department, Indian Institute of Applied Political Research, 1986)

Zaidi, A. M., The Way Out to Freedom: An Enquiry Into the Quit India Movement Conducted by Participants (New Delhi: Orientalia, 1973)

Alfred Webb

About: 

Alfred Webb was an Irish nationalist. He was elected MP for West Waterford in 1890 for the Irish Parliamentary Party. Waterford West was a UK parliamentary constituency for Ireland from 1885 to 1918. Webb was elected again in 1892 on an anti-Parnell ticket. He became a member of the Indian parliamentary party set up by William Wedderburn following the election of Dadabhai Naoroji.

Webb resigned from Parliament in 1895 but remained involved in Irish and Indian nationalist politics. During a visit to India in 1898 he was elected President of the Indian National Congress.

Date of birth: 
10 May 1834
Connections: 
Secondary works: 

Legg, Marie-Louise (ed.), Alfred Webb: The Autobiography of a Quaker nationalist (Cork: Cork University Press, 1999)

O'Donoghue, D. J., ‘Webb, Alfred John (1834–1908)’, rev. Alan O'Day, Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (Oxford University Press, 2004) [http://www.oxforddnb.com/view/article/36793]

Regan-Lefebvre, Jennifer, Cosmopolitan Nationalism in the Victorian Empire: Ireland, India and the Politics of Alfred Webb (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2009)

Archive source: 

National Library, Ireland

Trinity College, Dublin

Religious Society of Friends, Dublin

City of birth: 
Dublin
Country of birth: 
Ireland
Other names: 

Alfred John Webb

Date of death: 
31 Jul 1908
Location of death: 
Shetland Islands
Tags for Making Britain: 

S. P. Sinha

About: 

Satyendra Prasanno Sinha was born in Raipur in Bengal in 1863. He entered Presidency College, Calcutta, in 1878, married Gobinda Mohini, with whom he had four sons and three daughters, in 1880, and left for England in 1881 without taking a degree.

In England he joined Lincoln's Inn where he won a scholarship of £50 a year for four years to study Roman Law, Jurisprudence, Constitutional Law and International Law. Later he also won the Lincoln's Inn scholarship of £100 for three years. Sinha was called to the Bar in 1886 and finished his education by touring the European continent. In 1886, he returned to Calcutta where he joined the City College as a lecturer in law and he also practised as a barrister.

In 1905 Sinha was appointed as advocate-general of Bengal, a post that was confirmed in 1908, and in 1909 Lord Morley appointed him legal member of the Governor-General's Executive Council, the first Indian in this position. In 1915 he was elected President of the Indian National Congress. In 1917, Sinha returned to England to work for Secretary of State, E. S. Montagu, first as an assistant, and later as a member of the Imperial War Cabinet and Conference along with the Maharaja of Bikanir. In London he stayed with William Wedderburn for a few days. He received the freedom of the City of London in 1917, took a place on the King's Counsel in 1918 (the first Indian to do so), and in 1926 was made a bencher of Lincoln's Inn. In 1919, he was made Under-Secretary of State for India, raised to the peerage of Baron Sinha of Raipur and saw the Government of India Act of 1919 through the House of Lords. He returned to India in 1920.

It is known that his third son, Sushil Kumar, studied at Colet Prepatory School in Hammersmith (1907-9), St Paul's School, London (1909-13) and Balliol College, Oxford (1913-7) and joined the Indian Civil Service but appeared to settle in England. In 1926, Sinha joined the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council in London but his health forced him to winter in India. He died in Berhampore, Bengal, on 4 March 1928.

Published works: 

The Future of India: Presidential Address to the Indian National Congress, 1915 (London: J. Truscott & Son, 1916)

The Insistent Claims of Indian Reform: Speeches at the Banquet in London to Lord Sinha on 7th March 1919 (London: P. L. Warner, 1919)

Speeches and Writings of Lord Sinha, with a Portrait and a Sketch (Madras: G. A. Natesan and Co., 1919)

Date of birth: 
24 Mar 1863
Connections: 

Maharaja of Bikanir (collegue in the Imperial War Cabinet and Conference Cabinet), E. S. Montagu, Lord Morley, Bhupinder Singh (Maharaja of Patiala), William Wedderburn.

Contributions to periodicals: 

The Bengalee (member of editorial board)

Secondary works: 

Cokayne, G. E., The Complete Peerage of England, Scotland, Ireland, Great Britain, and the United Kingdom, 8 vols. (1887–98); new edn, ed. V. Gibbs and others, 14 vols. in 15 (1910–98); microprint repr. (1982) and (1987)

FitzGerald, S. V., 'Sinha, Satyendra Prasanno, first Baron Sinha (1863-1928)', rev. Tapan Raychaudhuri, Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (Oxford University Press, 2004) [http://www.oxforddnb.com/view/article/36112]

Husainy, Abi, 'Pulling it all together: case study of Lord Satyendra Prasanna Sinha (1863-1928)', http://www.movinghere.org.uk/galleries/roots/asian/pullingittogether/casestudy.htm

Sen, S. P., Dictionary of National Biography (Calcutta: Institute of Historical Studies, 1972-74)

Sengupta, S., and Basu, A., Samsada Bangali Caritabidhana (Kalikata: Sahitya Samsad, 1976)

Sir S. P. Sinha: A Sketch of His Life and Career (Madras: Natesan, 1918)

Archive source: 

Official papers relating to the Paris peace conference, Mss Eur F 281, Asian and African Studies Reading Room, British Library, St Pancras

Letters to Lord Carmichael and W. R. Gourlay, Hardinge MSS, Cambridge University Library

National Archives of India, New Delhi

Nehru Memorial Library, New Delhi

City of birth: 
Raipur
Country of birth: 
India
Current name country of birth: 
India
Other names: 

Satyendra Prasanno Sinha

Satyendra Prasanna Sinha

Lord Sinha

Location

Lincoln's Inn London, WC2A 3TL
United Kingdom
51° 30' 52.6572" N, 0° 6' 40.3056" W
Date of death: 
04 Mar 1928
Location of death: 
Berhampore, Bengal, India
Date of 1st arrival in Britain: 
01 Jan 1881
Precise 1st arrival date unknown: 
Y
Dates of time spent in Britain: 

1881-6, 1917-20, 1926

Lalmohan Ghose

About: 

Called to the Bar.

Stood as Liberal Candidate for Deptford in 1885 General Election, but was defeated.

Member of Indian National Congress and President in 1903 Madras Session.

Date of birth: 
01 Jan 1849
Precise DOB unknown: 
Y
Reviews: 

Kentish Mercury, 8 May 1885, 16 October 1885

Secondary works: 

Craig, F. W. S. (ed.), British Parliamentary Election Results 1885-1918 (London: Macmillan, 1974)

Dutt, R. C., Three Years in Europe (Calcutta: S. K. Lahiri & Co., 1890)

Mehrotra, S. R., The Emergence of the Indian National Congress (New York: Barnes and Noble, 1971)

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

Visram, Rozina, Ayahs, Lascars and Princes: Indians in Britain, 1700–1947 (London: Pluto Press, 1986)

City of birth: 
Krishnagar, West Bengal
Country of birth: 
India
Other names: 

Lal Mohun Ghose

Lal Mohan Ghose

Lalmohan Ghosh

Location

Deptford SE14 6AF
United Kingdom
51° 28' 27.3864" N, 0° 2' 43.4724" W
Date of death: 
18 Oct 1909
Date of 1st arrival in Britain: 
01 Jan 1869
Precise 1st arrival date unknown: 
Y
Dates of time spent in Britain: 

1869-72, 1879-80

Tags for Making Britain: 

Ananda Mohun Bose

About: 

Ananda Mohun Bose studied mathematics at the University of Cambridge from 1870. He earned a First Class degree and was the first Indian wrangler. While in Britain, Bose also studied to become a barrister and was called to the Bar in 1874.

Bose was a member of the Brahmo Samaj and had travelled to Britain in February 1870 with Keshub Chunder Sen. He formed a friendship with Sophia Dobson Collett and interested her in the Brahmo Samaj.

Upon his return to India in 1874, Bose joined the Calcutta High Court. He had become friends with Surendranath Banerjea in England in 1871. When Banerjea was unfairly dismissed from the ICS in 1874, Bose tried to help him. Together they formed the Indian National Association to campaign to raise the minimum age for Indian candidates in the Indian Civil Service. This organization is seen by some historians as a prototype nationalist organization. When the Indian National Congress was founded in 1885, Bose became a member. He was President of the 14th Session in 1898 at Madras.

Bose returned to Britain in 1897 to enrol his two sons into university. He took a tour of Britain delivering speeches about the Brahmo Samaj. He died in 1905, following the partition of Bengal.

Date of birth: 
23 Sep 1847
Secondary works: 

Gupta, V. P., and Gupta, Mohini, A Dictionary of Freedom Fighters (New Delhi: Radha Publications, 1999)

Sarkar, Hem Chandra, A Life of Ananda Mohan Bose (Calcutta: A. C. Sarkar, 1910)

Country of birth: 
India
Other names: 

Ananda Mohan Bose

Location

Christ's College, Cambridge CB2 3AR
United Kingdom
52° 10' 21.3528" N, 0° 6' 40.3992" E
Date of death: 
20 Aug 1906
Location of death: 
India
Date of 1st arrival in Britain: 
01 Jan 1870
Precise 1st arrival date unknown: 
Y
Dates of time spent in Britain: 

February 1870 - September 1874

M. R. Jayakar

About: 

M. R. Jayakar was a barrister, Federal Court Judge (1937-9) and member of the Bombay Legislative Assembly. He had been called to the Bar at Lincoln’s Inn in London in 1905. In the 1930s he sent his son, Jayapal, to study in Oxford, having failed to gain admission to Oxford in the early twentieth century himself.

Jayakar became heavily involved in nationalist politics in India. He was known for his sympathies with the Hindu Mahasabha, clashing with Mohammed Ali Jinnah. He was a member of the Hindu Missionary Society in Bombay and leader of the Swaraj Party for a short time, resigning in 1925. In 1930, Jayakar and Tej Bahadur Sapru were involved in negotiations between Congress and the Government when Motilal Nehru and other Congress members were imprisoned. These negotiations are said to have led to the Gandhi-Irwin Pact of March 1931 whereby Congress members were released from prison in return for the discontinuation of non-cooperation; the salt tax was removed and Congress members would be represented at the next Round Table Conference. Jayakar was a member of the Judicial Privy Council in London and attended the Round Table Conference in London in 1931.

Jayakar was known for his educationist and philanthropist work. He received an honorary DCL from Oxford University in 1938, upon the recommendation of E. J. Thompson. He was Vice-Chancellor of Poona University from 1948 upon its foundation, until his retirement in 1955.

Published works: 

Social Reform and Social Service (Madras: Theosophical Society, 1917)

(ed.) Kirtikar, V. J., Studies in Vedanta (Bombay: Taraporevala, 1924)

The Story of My Life (Bombay: Asia Publishing House, 1958)

Date of birth: 
01 Jan 1873
Connections: 

Isaac Foot, M. K. Gandhi, Lord Irwin, Jayapal Jayakar (son), M. A. Jinnah, George Lansbury, Sir Francis Low, Jawaharlal Nehru, Motilal Nehru, Lala Lajpat Rai, Tej Bahadur Sapru, E. J. Thompson, Sir Evelyn Wrench.

Contributions to periodicals: 

Letter to Times of India, 22 May 1931, criticising India Society and promotion of Bengal school of art

Precise DOB unknown: 
Y
Secondary works: 

Bakshi, S. R. (ed.), M. R. Jayakar (New Delhi: Anmol, 1994)

Brown, Judith M., Gandhi’s Rise to Power (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1972)

Dhanki, Joginder Singh (ed.), Perspectives on Indian National Movement: Selected Correspondence of Lala Lajpat Rai (New Delhi: National Book Organisation, 1998)

Israel, Milton, Communications and Power: Propaganda and the Press in the Indian Nationalist Struggle (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1994)

Kulkarni, V. B., M. R. Jayakar (New Delhi: Government of India, 1970)

Lahiri, Shompa, Indians in Britain: Anglo-Indian Encounters, Race and Identity, 1880-1939 (London: Frank Cass, 2000)

Mitter, Partha, The Triumph of Modernism (London: Reaktion, 2007)

Nehru, Jawaharlal, An Autobiography: With Musings on Recent Events in India (London: Bodley Head, 1936)

Archive source: 

Portrait (taken 8 September 1931 by Bassano) and portrait of son (1939-40), National Portrait Gallery, London

Letter to Attlee, Attlee Papers, Bodleian Library, Oxford

Correspondence with E. J. Thompson, Thompson Papers, Bodleian Library, Oxford

Correspondence with George Lansbury, LSE Archives, London

Letter to Friends House, Mss Eur C170, Asian and African Studies Reading Room, British Library, St Pancras

Files relating to conversations with Congress leaders, and relating to the Round Table Conference, Asian and African Studies Reading Room, British Library, St Pancras

Papers, National Archives of India, Delhi
 

Involved in events: 
Country of birth: 
India
Other names: 

Mukund Ramrao Jayakar

Location

Dorchester Hotel W1K 1QA
United Kingdom
51° 30' 40.6872" N, 0° 8' 49.9128" W
Date of death: 
10 Mar 1959
Location of death: 
Bombay, India
Date of 1st arrival in Britain: 
01 Jan 1903
Precise 1st arrival date unknown: 
Y
Dates of time spent in Britain: 

1903-5, 1931, 1932, 1938

Location: 

London – Carlton Hotel and Dorchester Hotel (1931)

W. C. Bonnerjee

About: 

Woomes Chunder Bonnerjee was the son of Girish Chunder Bonnerjee, an attorney, and his wife, Saraswati Devi. He was educated at the Oriental Seminary and the Hindu School, Calcutta. Concerned at his negligence, his father removed him from school and in 1861 articled him to a local British solicitor. Bonnerjee won a government scholarship to study Law in England in 1864 and lodged at 108 Denbigh Street, St George's Road, London. He was admitted a student of  Middle Temple on 19 November 1864 and was called to the Bar on 11 June 1867. He was a founder and Secretary of the London Indian Society, and advocated representative and responsible government in India. He then became a member of the East India Association, which superseded the London Indian Society.

Bonnerjee left England in 1868, and on 12 November was enrolled as an advocate at the Calcutta High Court. He became involved with Calcutta University; he was a member of its syndicate, President of its Faculty of Law (1884), and its first representative on the Legislative Council (1894–5). Bonnerjee was one of the founder-members of the Indian National Congress in December 1885. Proposed by Allan Octavian Hume, he was unanimously elected the first President. In the meantime, Bonnerjee travelled between India and Britain: he sent his four-year old son Shelley, and young Nolini and Susie to be educated in Britain in 1874. He and his wife, Hemangini, travelled to and fro, bringing their children to be educated in Britain. In 1888 Hemangini settled permanently in London.

Wealthy from the Bar, Bonnerjee, in about 1890, bought a large house, 8 Bedford Park, Croydon, Surrey, which he named Kidderpore. Bonnerjee lived partly in England and partly in India until 1902, thereafter living mostly at Croydon and practising before the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council. He died at his home, Kidderpore, on 21 July 1906. Although Hemangini had converted to Christianity, W. C. Bonnerjee had remained a Hindu, but was given a non-religious burial in England, as according to his wishes. Hemangini returned to India after his death and died in 1910. Their descendents live in India and Britain.

Published works: 

Reform of the Hindu Marriage Laws: A Paper Read at a Meeting Held on the 26th of November 1867 and Reprinted from the Journal of the East India Association (London: Macmillan, 1868)

The Hindu Wills Act, Act Xxi of 1870 (Calcutta, 1871)

Indian Politics: A Collection of Essays and Addresses. With an Introduction by W. C. Bonnerjee (Madras: G. A. Natesan & Co., 1898)

Date of birth: 
29 Dec 1844
Connections: 

Surendranath Banerjea (Bonnerjee defended Banerjea in 1883), Hemangini Bonnerjee (wife), Janaki Agnes Penelope Majumdar (daughter), Kamal Krishna Shelley Bonnerjee (son), Ratna Krishna Curran Bonnerjee (son), Noline Héloise Bonnerjee (daughter), Pramilla Bonnerjee (daughter), Susila Anita Bonnerjee (daughter), Revd Pitt Bonarjee (cousin), Romesh Chunder Dutt, Allan Octavian Hume, Dadabhai Naoroji, Badruddin Tyabji.

Contributions to periodicals: 

Journal of the East India Association 1.1 (Jul. 1867) [transcripts of first EIA annual meeting in which W. C. Bonnerjee was involved]

Secondary works: 

Banerji, K. L., Life, Letters and Speeches of W. C. Bonnerjee (Calcutta: 1923) 

Bonnerjee, Sadhona, Life of W.C. Bonnerjee: First President of the Indian National Congress (Calcutta: Bhowanipore Press, 1944)

Craig, F. W. S., British Parliamentary Election Results 1885-1918 ([S. l.]: Macmillan, 1974)

Foster, Joseph, Men-at-the-Bar: A Biographical Hand-List of the Members of the Various Inns of Court, Including Her Majesty's Judges, Etc ([S.l.]: Reeves and Turner, 1885)

Ghose, Manmatha Nath, W. C. Bonnerjee - the First and Eighth President of Indian National Congress. Snapshots from His Life and His London Letters. Vol. 1 ... Revised by Manmatha Nath Ghose (Calcutta: Deshbandhu Book Depot, 1944)

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

Majumdar, Janaki Agnes Penelope, Family History, ed. and introduction by Antoinette Burton (New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 2003)

Mukherjee, Manicklal, W. C. Bonnerjee: Snapshots from his Life and his London Letters (Calcutta: Deshbandu Book Depot, 1944)

Sanyal, Ram Gopal, A General Biography of Bengali Celebrities, both living and dead (Calcutta: U. C. Chuckerbutty, 1889)

Stearn, Roger T., 'Bonnerjee, Woomes Chunder (1844–1906)', Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (Oxford University Press, 2004) [http://www.oxforddnb.com/view/article/76337]

Sturgess, H. A. C., Register of Admissions to the Honourable Society of the Middle Temple, from the Fifteenth Century to the Year 1944 (London: Published for the Honourable Society of the Middle Temple by Butterworth, 1949)

Virabhadraravu, Adiraju, Jivita Caritavali = Lives of Great Men: Mudati Bhagamu (Madras: A. Virabhadraravu, 1913)

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

City of birth: 
Sonai, Kidderpore, Bengal
Country of birth: 
India
Other names: 

Woomes Chunder Bonnerjee

Womesh Chunder Bonnerjee

Locations

108 Denbigh Street
London, SW1V 2EU
United Kingdom
51° 29' 18.5676" N, 0° 8' 18.7152" W
'Kidderpore' House
8 Bedford Park
Croyden, CR0 2BS
United Kingdom
51° 22' 43.9104" N, 0° 5' 44.8764" W
Date of death: 
21 Jul 1906
Location of death: 
Croydon, London, England
Date of 1st arrival in Britain: 
01 Jan 1864
Precise 1st arrival date unknown: 
Y
Dates of time spent in Britain: 

1864-8, 1888, 1890-1902 (on and off), 1902-6

Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi

About: 

Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi was born in Porbandar, Kanthiawar, India, to father Karamchand Uttamchand Gandhi and his fourth wife Putlibai. In 1882 he married Kasturbai Makanji, with whom he had five children. Gandhi enrolled at Samaldas College, Bhaunagar, in 1887 but left after one term. However, he was encouraged to go to London to study law and he left for London on 4 September 1888.

Arriving on 29 September 1888, Gandhi immediately went to the Victoria Hotel before relocating briefly to the suburb of Richmond and eventually settling in a room in West Kensington for a year. At first, he tried to become an 'English gentleman' but after a few months realized that he had to cut his expenditures and gave up most of his new habits. Besides his law studies he passed the University of London matriculation examination in June 1890. Gandhi did not participate in the newly established British Committee of the Indian National Congress but did attend meetings of the London Indian Society. He also attended meetings of the Anjuman-e-Islam (after 1903 called the Pan-Islamic Society), the National Indian Association, and the Northbrook Indian Society. He passed his Roman law examination in March 1890 and passed the Bar finals in January 1891. Before leaving for London, Gandhi had promised his mother not to eat meat. He found it difficult at first but soon discovered vegetarian restaurants and joined the London Vegetarian Society. He often wrote for their journal the Vegetarian and became a member of the Executive Committee on 19 September 1890. Gandhi had also come into contact with the Theosophical Society in 1889, and was introduced to Annie Besant before he left London on 12 June 1891.

He lived in India until 1893 when he left for South Africa to practice law. It was here he raised his family, established himself as a lawyer and then a political activist fighting the discrimination of Asians in Africa. By 1906, he had emerged as the spokesman of Indians in Natal and Transvaal and in October that year he was once again in London to speak on behalf of the Indian community. In London he met with Lord Elgin to discuss the rights of Indians in South Africa, but upon his return in December 1906, Gandhi was disappointed. Imperial politics brought Gandhi to London again in July 1909. However, what concerned Gandhi the most this time was the status of highly educated Indians. In August, he visited Louth with his friend Pranjivan Mehta; later in August he visited George Allen in the Cotswolds, and on 7 November he spoke to the Indian students at Cambridge.  On his voyage back to South Africa, he wrote his powerful book Hind Swaraj, or Indian Home Rule, in which he wrote about his increasing discontent with the West, the power of non-violence and the vision of self-rule.

Between 1909 and 1914, Gandhi received several invitations to return to India, but before doing so he visited London again in August 1914, two days after the outbreak of the First World War. The purpose of his trip was to visit his friend and mentor G. K. Gokhale but he had already left for Paris. With Gokhale gone, Gandhi met the poetess Sarojini Naidu instead. On 8 August, a reception was held for him at the Hotel Cecil. In attendance were, among others, Charlotte Despard, Albert Cartwright, Bhupendranath Basu, Sacchidanand Sinha, Lala Lajpat Rai, Mohammed Ali Jinnah, Ananda K. Coomaraswamy, Amir Ali and J. M. Parikh. While in London he established the Indian Volunteer Corps before he left on 19 December 1914.

From 1919 Gandhi became highly politically active in India. It was his belief in satyagraha that made him the leader of the nationalist movement against the Raj. By 1931 he had become integral to Indian national life and the sole representative of the Indian National Congress at the second Round Table Conference (Gandhi was in prison during the first Conference in 1930). He arrived in September 1931 and gave his first speech at the Conference on 15 September. The Second Round Table Conference failed to yield independence for India, and Gandhi left London on 5 December 1931. Back in India Gandhi continued to promote satyagraha and led the Quit India Movement in 1942. On 30 January 1948, Gandhi was walking through the grounds of Birla House, New Delhi, when he was shot at point blank range by Nathuram Godse.

Published works: 

Hind Swaraj (1909)

Discourses on the 'Gita' (1926)

An Autobiography, or, the Story of My Experiments with Truth, trans. from the original in Gujarati by Mahadev Desai (Ahmedabad: Navajivan Publishing House, 1927)

Satyagraha in South Africa ... Translated ... By Valji Govindji Desai (Madras: S. Ganesan, 1928)

The Constructive Programme (1941)

(with Krishna Kripalani) All Men are Brothers: Life and Thoughts of Mahatma Gandhi as Told in His Own Words (Paris; Unesco, 1969)

The Collected Works of Mahatma Gandhi, 90 vols (New Delhi: Publications Division, Ministry of Information and Broadcasting, Govt of India, 1958-84)

Date of birth: 
02 Oct 1869
Connections: 

H. O. Ally, B. R. Ambedkar, C. F. Andrews, Annie Besant, Sir Mancherjee Bhownagree, Subhas Chandra Bose, Sir Henry Cotton, Charlotte Despard, G. K. Gokhale, Sir William W. Hunter, Mohammed Ali Jinnah, Aga Khan, Shyamaji Krishnavarma, George Lansbury, T. T. Mazmudar, Dr Pranjivan Mehta, Sarojini Naidu, Dadabhai Naoroji, Mansukhlal H. Nazar, Jawaharlal Nehru, Josiah Oldfield, V. D. Savarkar, Dalpatram Shukla, Rabindranath Tagore, E. J. Thompson, Sir William Wedderburn, Marquess of Zetland.

Contributions to periodicals: 

Indian Opinion

Secondary works: 

There are more than two thousand critical works on Gandhi. Below is a small selection of those: 

Arnold, David, Gandhi (Harlow: Longman, 2001) 

Bakshi, S. R., Gandhi and Concept of Swaraj (New Delhi: Criterion Publications, 1988)

Brown, Judith M., Gandhi's Rise to Power: Indian Politics, 1915-1922 (London: Cambridge University Press, 1972)

Brown, Judith M., Gandhi and Civil Disobedience: The Mahatma in Indian Politics, 1928-34 (Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1977)

Brown, Judith M., Gandhi: Prisoner of Hope (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1989)

Brown, Judith M., 'Gandhi, Mohandas Karamchand [Mahatma Gandhi] (1869–1948)', Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (Oxford University Press, 2004) [http://www.oxforddnb.com/view/article/33318]

Chandra, Bipan, Essays on Indian Nationalism (New Delhi: Har-Anand Publications, 1993) 

Chatterjee, Margaret, Gandhi's Religious Thought (Basingstoke: Macmillan Press, 1983)

Chakrabarti, Atulananda, Gandhi and Birla (Calcutta: General Printers and Publishers, 1955)

Dhar, Niranjan, Aurobindo, Gandhi and Roy: A Yogi, a Mahatman and a Rationalist (India: Minerva, 1986)

Gandhi, Mahatma, and Iyer, Raghavan, The Moral and Political Writings of Mahatma Gandhi, 3 vols (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1986-87)

Gupta, Manmath Nath, Gandhi and His Times (New Delhi: Lipi Prakashan, 1982)

Herman, Arthur, Gandhi and Churchill: The Epic Rivalry that Destroyed an Empire and Forged Our Age (New York: Bantam Books, 2008)

Hunt, James D., Gandhi in London (New Delhi: Promilla, 1978)

Krishnan, Asha, Ambedkar and Gandhi: Emancipators of Untouchables in Modern India (Mumbai: Himalaya Publishing House, 1997)

Majeed, Javed, Autobiography, Travel and Postnational Identity: Gandhi, Nehru and Iqbal (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2007)

Malhotra, S. L., From Civil Disobedience to Quit India: Gandhi and the Freedom Movement in Punjab and Haryana, 1932-1942 (Chandigarh: Punjab University Publication Bureau, 1979)

Mathur, D. B., Gandhi, Congress and Apartheid (Jaipur: Aalekh Publishers, 1986)

Mehrotra, S. R., Gandhi and the British Commonwealth (New Delhi: Indian Council of World Affairs, 1961)

Nanda, Bal Ram, Gandhi and His Critics (Delhi; Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1985)

Nehru, Jawaharlal, Jawaharlal Nehru: An Autobiography. With Musings on Recent Events in India, Etc. [with Plates, Including Portraits.] (London: John Lane: London, 1936)

Parekh, Bhikhu C., Colonialism, Tradition and Reform: An Analysis of Gandhi's Political Discourse (New Delhi; London: Sage, 1989)

Parekh, Bhikhu C., Gandhi's Political Philosophy: A Critical Examination (Basingstoke: Macmillan, 1989)

Patil, V. T., Gandhi, Nehru and the Quit India Movement (Delhi: B. R. Pub. Corp., 1984)

Ramakrishnan, Padma, Gandhi and Indian Independence (New Delhi: Blaze Publishers and Distributors, 1994)

Roberts, Elizabeth, Gandhi, Nehru and Modern India (London: Methuen, 1974)

Sharma, Shri Ram, Gandhi: The Man and the Mahatma (Chandigarh: Rajan, 1985)

Singh, G. B., Gandhi: Behind the Mask of Divinity (Lahore: Vanguard Books, 2005)

Swan, Maureen, Gandhi: The South African Experience (Johannesburg: Ravan Press, 1985)

Tidrick, Kathryn, Gandhi: A Political and Spiritual Life (London: I. B. Taurus, 2006)

Wadhwa, Madhuri, Gandhi Between Tradition and Modernity (New Delhi: Deep and Deep Publications, 1991)

Zakaria, Rafiq, Gandhi and the Break-Up of India (Mumbai: Bharatiya Vidya Bhavan, 1999)

Archive source: 

Gandhi National Museum and Library, New Delhi, India

Sabarmati Ashram, Ahmadabad, India

Home Department Mss, Government of India, National Archives of India, New Delhi

Nehru and Indian National Congress Mss, Nehru Memorial Museum and Library, New Delhi

Current affairs footage and documentaries, National Film and Television Archive, British Film Institute, London

News and documentary footage, Film and Video Archive, Imperial War Museum, London

Oral history interview and recorded talk, Sound Archive, Imperial War Museum, London

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

Mahatma Gandhi

Locations

Store Street
London, WC1E 7PL
United Kingdom
51° 31' 10.9056" N, 0° 7' 54.8688" W
60 Talbot Road
Bayswater, London, W2 5LJ
United Kingdom
51° 31' 2.208" N, 0° 11' 49.0848" W
20 Barons Court Road
West Kensington, London, W14 9DU
United Kingdom
51° 29' 23.3556" N, 0° 12' 30.4308" W
Date of death: 
30 Jan 1948
Date of 1st arrival in Britain: 
29 Sep 1888
Dates of time spent in Britain: 

1888-91, 1906, 1909, 1914, 1931

Location: 

20 Baron's Court Road, West Kensington

Store Street, London

Tavistock Street, London

52 St. Stephen's Gardens, Bayswater, London

88 Knightsbridge

60 Talbot Road, Bayswater, London

16 Trebobir Road, West Kensington, London

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