From 1857 to 1947, India’s freedom struggle fused revolution, intellect and sacrifice. From Anushilan Samiti to INA, Swami Vivekananda’s ideas silently shaped the minds that broke the Empire.
By Sourav Chakraborty, DIC, FRSA, FRAS, CEng (IET & IEI), CMgr (MCMI): It all started in 1857 with Mangal Pandey’s “Halla Bol”! The same year Late Raja Ram Mohan Roy’s attempts of Brahmo Samaj succeeded in establishing Calcutta University. Bankim Chandra Chatterjee became the first graduate.
The batch of 1879 had Ashutosh Mukherjee, P.C. Ray and Narendranath Datta (aka Swami Vivekananada). Ray travels to England, where he meets AJC Bose and they together return to become the academic honchos to teach and educate Indians back at Presidency college.
In 1902 Aurobindo Ghosh created Anushilan Samiti along with Barin Ghosh, Jatindranath Mukherjee (Bagha Jatin), Rashbehari Bose, Raja SC Mullick. The Dhaka branch of Anushilan came to be headed by Masterda Surya Sen. Anushilan grew bigger each hour.
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Aurobindo helped Dadabhai Naoroji to set up the Congress Motto of “Swaraj, Swadeshi, Boycott and National Education”. Aurobindo worked in close proximity with the REAL CONGRESS stalwarts Lala Lajpat Rai, Bipin Chandra Pal and Bal Gangadhar Tilak.
In 1908 Anushilan attracted the youth of Bengal and India to grow manifold. Prafulla Chaki and Khudiram Bose threw the bomb. The youngest revolutionary in the history of the world accepted martyrdom.
Aurobindo’s case at Alipore was well defended by Deshbandhu Chittaranjan Das and his hanging could be avoided.
Besides revolutionaries, Anushilan and Calcutta University had few of the best academic minds of the world back then who chose to revolt with the West-world with their minds, namely , Satyendranath Bose, CV Raman, PC Mahalanobis and Meghnad Saha. Mahalanobis later moves to Trinity Cambridge, where he could befriend Srinivasan Ramanujan. The world then got Einstein, but Einstein got his statistics from Satyendranath Bose. A year junior to these scholarly stalwarts at Calcutta University was the Chief Architect of Indian Independence, Subhash Chandra Bose.
Post WW1, Anushilan came to a temporary hiatus where Jugantar took the lead under Bagha Jatin. Rash Behari and Sachindranth Sanyal helped in the pan India spread of Anushilan. They got involved as allies to the Ghadar Party headed by Lala Har Dayal, VG Pingle and Kartar Singh Sarabha to liberate India.
Gandhi came to the scene for being kicked out of a train in South Africa.
S. Ramanujan becomes the first Indian to be elected Fellow of Trinity, Cambridge and Fellow of Royal Society.
Then came Jallianwala Bagh massacre. Chauri Chaura happened and Gandhi called off the Non cooperation movement. Deshbandhu quit Congress and formed Swarajya along with Moti Lal Nehru. Sachindranath Sanyal, Ram Prasad Bismil (of Matrivedi) and Ashfaqullah Khan formed the Hindustan Republican Association. Chandrashekhar Azad became its most efficient and valiant General.
Moulded by ideologies of Kartar Singh Sarabha, Bhagat Singh and Sukhdev Thapar of Nawjawan Bharat Sabha joined HRA. Post Kakori train robbery, and arrest of Bismil and Khan they reorganised HRA as Hindustan Socialist Republican Association. New recruitment continued. In 1928, Bhagat, Sukhdev, Azad and Shivaram Rajguru shot Saunders mistaking him to be James Scott in order to avenge Lala Lajpat Rai’s death. Jatin Das who learnt the art of bomb-making from Sachindranath Sanyal joined HSRA and helped them manufacture the same, that were to be thrown at the Assembly later in 1929. The slogan “Inquilab Zindabad” coined by Hasrat Mohani reverberated throughout the country and trampled “Ahimsa” on its way. In 1931, Azad kills himself with his famous colt Rifle instead of being captured alive, and Bhagat, Sukhdev and Rajguru repeats a Khudiram “Mother bid me farewell once, I will be back soon. Whole of India will watch me, While I smilingly wear the noose”
All this while the Architect, Subhash Bose, was a common household name in Bengal. The City Mayor in 1924 and Congress General Secretary in 1927. In 1928 he formed the Bengal Volunteers with Benoy Basu (of Mukti Sangha), Badal Gupta and Dinesh Gupta. The trio BBD attacked the Imperial Police at Calcutta Writers’ Building in 1930 killing Simpson the Inspector General. Badal accepted martyrdom consuming Potassium Cyanide while Dinesh and Benoy repeated an Azad. And CV Raman wins a Nobel in Physics for India. In the 1930s European leaders like Mussolini got acquainted with the Indian counterpart Subhash. The Brits banned his book The Indian Struggle fearing unrest. Subhash returned to India as its International Representative and National Hero. Subhash became Congress President much to the dismay of Gandhi, who was scared as any non-violent Khadi wearing British ambassador should. He opposed and advised Subhash to form his own cabinet. Subhash quits Congress and formed Forward Bloc in 1939. Subhash left for Russia to poach for the Indian prisoners of war, but could only manage his way to Germany instead. He met Hitler, the tallest leader against the Allied forces. The Fuehrer made way for Subhash to become Netaji. He formed Azad Hind Legion. Disillusioned by Hitler’s attack on Moscow, he sails underwater for Hideki Tojo’s Japan in 1943. With the PoW of Indian National Army and the support of Indian Independence League of expatriate and Anushilan leader Rash Behari Bose, Azad Hind Fauj. The Indian flag fluttered for the first time in Moirang, Manipur on 14th April 1944
On American Independence Day, 4th of July 1944, Azad Hind Radio broadcasted Subhash’s “Give me Blood, and I shall give you Freedom”. On 6th, in another broadcast Subhash Addressed Gandhi as “the Father of the Nation”. For our Motherland “Bapu” was Taken, so Jawaharlal Nehru became “Chacha”.
In 1945, the Plane crash theory. And Nehru came to be known as PANDIT Nehru henceforth.
By 1946, Netaji Subhash Chandra Bose’s stories, INA officers trials led to the Indian Naval mutiny and in 1947, the Brits left India as its Dominion and partitioning it Communally under the administrative powers of the PANDIT!
From Anushilan Samiti to INA, all the above mentioned leaders had a spiritual guidance and influence of the Patriotic Saint from Calcutta University’s class of 1879. An interestingly persistent and omnipresent influence to all, whom Subhash referred to as the “maker of Modern India”; Who wanted to:
"to set in motion a machinery which will bring noblest ideas to the doorstep of even the poorest and the meanest" - Swami Vivekananda
Happy Birthday to the Saptarishi incarnate, Swami Vivekananda.
(Sourav Chakraborty, DIC, FRSA, FRAS, CEng (IET & IEI), CMgr (MCMI), is an entrepreneur building for Indian GenZ, an alumnus of Imperial College London and Boston University, and a Sanatan & Indian history buff, political enthusiast, observer, and columnist.)
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