Atulkrishna Ghosh

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Atulkrishna Ghosh
British India
Died4 May 1966 (aged 75-76)

Atulkrishna Ghosh (

Hindu German Conspiracy during World War I
.

Early life

Atul was born in 1890, in a

Political background

Since 1906, with his cousin

Rasbehari Bose in Upper India." Atul's elder brother Aghorenath, a civil surgeon, often looked after the bullet wounds received by the patriots.[6]

Jatin Mukherjee's right-hand man

According to Nixon's Report, probably in about 1913, or perhaps a little before, certain of the old members of the Kolkata Anushilan Samiti who, in the meantime, had been members of various athletic clubs, formed themselves into a branch of the Seva Samiti under Atulkrishna Ghosh: "The ostensible object of this samiti was a benevolent one. The first centre was at the house of Atul Ghosh. During the Burdwan floods, in 1913, many members of this samiti went there for the purpose of affording relief to the afflicted people.".[7] Atul's efficiency and generosity as a leader became evident during this relief.

Nixon further informs that the headquarters of the samiti were later shifted to the house of

Taraknath Das : he and Satish Chakravarti arranged with various regional units of the Jugantar
to shelter them, before sending them to destinations in North India, fixed by Rasbehari. Furious to hear about the death of a jute-mill worker at Jagaddal, caused by the kick from a booted leg of an English supervisor, Atul was desperately looking for arms to avenge this atrocity.

In need of arms

"The outbreak of war revivified the vague ideas of revolution which had been floating about in the mind of young Bengal for the last ten years and the hopes of those who had throughout been waiting for the opportunity, and the possibility of a successful revolt seemed imminent," wrote Nixon. "It was probably some time in September 1914 that Jatin Mukherjee came to Calcutta in order to take such steps as England’s participation in a war with Germany seemed to call for in this direction.".

M.N. Roy: these are all duly catalogued in the Rowlatt Report. Successive emissaries returned from Europe and America with the good news of the arrival of arms obtained from German authorities by the Berlin Committee. Balasore was chosen by Germany to land a shipment. Jatin with a handful of associates took shelter there. Then Atul dispatched Harikumar Chakravarti, Dr Jatin Ghoshal, Satish Chakravarti and a batch of workers with boats, rifles and other requisites to the other selected port at Raymangal in the Sundarbans. When information came that the Police had discovered Jatin's hideout in Balasore, Naren Ghose Chaudhury proposed spontaneously to rush to the spot for a showdown; Jadugopal Mukherjee objected: "Dada is big enough to look after himself. Let us disperse." Atul was stunned by this cynical order. After the failure of the Indo-German conspiracy and after Jatin's untimely death, disheartened Atul and other Jugantar leaders went underground in 1915, remaining so for about seven years. Even then, for several years, the revolutionaries entertained the hope of smuggling arms for an insurrection. In June 1916, Atul sent through Ananta Haldar a letter for Bhavabhushan Mitra at Deoghar, "who was one of the trusted men of the party. Both Ananta and Bhava Bhushan were dealt with under the Defence Rules and interned in Bengal." (Sealy, p24). In the teeth of sporadic police attempts to arrest them, once, in Chandernagore, while nursing Charu Ghose, Atul with the ailing co-worker on his shoulders, scaled the hospital wall. Dr Govindin, the Civil Surgeon, narrated this to Bhupendrakumar Datta. According to Nixon: "Jatin Mukherjee had at this time gone to Balasore, and Atul Ghosh was a big figure in the arrangement for these outrages." In July 1916, "Atul Ghosh was still the prompting spirit of all these gangs, and in the Barisal party, too, he seems to have wielded some influence.".[10]

The last phase

After the end of the War,

Majilpur and took to business, dissociating himself completely from politics. They had no issues. In an interview with Prithwindra Mukherjee (Bagha Jatin's grandson), on 27 October 1963 - shortly before his death -, Atul sighed: "Dada was a magnet; we all, iron scraps, received our energy from him. When he was no more, we all became iron scraps. I still do not know whether my first allegiance went to Dada, or to the Motherland." Asked about the source of Jatindranath's tremendous force, Atul replied: "He was a very well trained wrestler and an all-round sportsman. But what characterised him was his soul force and his power of concentration. He could pin-point all his energy to a single part of his body, for instance his fist. A single blow from that fist was equivalent to an electric charge of God knows how many volts!"[11]

Atul died peacefully in his Kolkata residence, on 4 May 1966.

A tribute

Bhupendrakumar Datta, his young associate, recalled: "Instinctively liberal in idea, Atulkrishna hated caste and religious distinction. Democracy in the political sphere and justice in the social sphere were what he cherished most. During the last years he turned to spiritual life."[12]

References

  1. ^ ৪ মে: ইতিহাসের এই দিনে. Sahos 24 (in Bengali). 4 May 2017. Retrieved 24 July 2017.
  2. ^ Ghose, Atulkrishna in Dictionary of National Biography,[abbrev. DNB], Edited by S.P. Sen, Volume II, Calcutta, 1974
  3. ^ Terrorism in Bengal,[abbrev. Terrorism], Government of West Bengal, Volume V, 1995, p23
  4. ^ Notes given by Atulkrishna Ghosh and Nalinikanta Kar in sadhak-biplabi jatindranath, [abbrev. jatindranath], by Dr Prithwindra Mukherjee, West Bengal State Book Board, 1990, several references
  5. ^ biplabir jiban darshan, by Pratulchandra Ganguli, Calcutta, 1976, p23
  6. ^ DNB, II/p37
  7. ^ Nixon's Report in Terrorism, Volume II, p590
  8. ^ Nixon's Report, Terrorism, Vol. II, p590.
  9. ^ Terrorism, Vol. II, p627
  10. ^ Terrorism, Vol. II, p610
  11. ^ jatindranath
  12. ^ DNB, Vol. II, p37

Bibliography

  • Biplabi atulkrishna ghosh, by Bhupendrakumar Datta, Shri Sarasvati Library, Kolkata, 1966 (abbr. BKD)
  • "Ghosh, Atulkrishna (1890-1966)" by Bhupendrakumar Datta in Dictionary of National Biography, (ed.) S.P. Sen, Vol. II, 1973, pp37–38 (abbr. DNB)
  • J. C. Nixon's Report "On Revolutionary Organisation" in Terrorism in Bengal, ed. by Amiya K. Samanta, Vol II, 1995 (abbr. Nixon).
  • W. Sealy's Report, "Connections with Bihar and Orissa" in Terrorism in Bengal, ed. by Amiya K. Samanta, Vol V, 1995 (abbr. Sealy).
  • Sadhak biplabi jatindranath, by Prithwindra Mukherjee, West Bengal State Book Board, 1990
  • Biplabir jiban-darshan, autobiography, by Pratulchandra Ganguli, 1976
  • Amader Badi, Reminiscences, Chhanda Sen, Published by Jayanta Basu, Kolkata, November 2005