User:Rueben lys/Rewriting Anushilam Samiti
This page is for a rewrite of the wikipedia article on Anushilan Samiti. It is not the main article. Please visit Anushilan Samiti for the current wikipedia article on the organisation.
Anushilan Samiti (
Background
The growth of the Indian middle class during the 18th century, amidst competition among regional powers and the ascendancy of the British
Brief history
Political terrosism begun taking an organised form in Bengal at the beginning of the twentieth century. By 1902, Calcutta had three societies working under the umbrella of
In the meantime, Aurobindo and
Early phase
The Dhaka Anushilan Samiti embarked on a radical program of political terrorism. It broke with the Jugantar group due to differences with Aurobindo's approach of slowly building a base for a revolution with a mass base. The Dhaka group saw this as slow and insufficient, and sought immediate action and result. The two branches of Anushilan also engaged at this time in a number of notable incidences of political assassinations and
Western Anushilan Samiti in the aftermath of Manicktala Conspiracy found more prominent leader in Jatindra Nath Mukherjee which emerged distinclty as the Jugantar group. Meanwhile,
Nonetheless, the campaign by Anushilan continued. In 1911, Dhaka Anushilan shot dead two Bengali police officers, sub-inspector Raj Kumar and Inspector Man Mohan Ghosh, who had been investigating the unrest, were shot dead at
World War I
With the clouds of war gathering in Europe, Indian nationalists at home and outside India had decided to use the event of a war with Germany towards the nationalist cause. To these plans, a number of prominent Jugantar leaders became party. Through Kishen Singh, the Bengal revolutionary cell was introduced to
Meanwhile, in 1912, Jatin met in the company of
Post World War I
Between 1919 and 1922, the first of the noncooperation movement began with the
In 1923, another Anushilan-linked group, the
In 1927 the Indian National Congress came out in favour of complete independence from Britain. Bengal had quitened relatively within these four years and the government released most of those interned under the Act of 1925. There was an attempt, ultimately unsuccessful, to forge a Jugantar-Anushilan alliance at this time. Some of the younger radicals struck out in new directions, while many, young and old, took part in Congress activities, such as the anti-Simon agitation of 1928. Congress leader Lala Lajpat Rai succumbed to wounds received when police broke up a Lahore protest-march in October. Bhagat Singh and other members of the Hindustan Socialist Republican Association avenged his death in December. Later Bhagat Singh boldly threw a bomb into the Legislative Assembly. He and other HSRA members were arrested, and three of them attracted wide attention by going on a hunger strike in jail. Bengali bomb-maker Jatindra Nath Das persisted until his death in September 1929. The Calcutta Corporation passed a resolution of sorrow and condolence after his martyrdom, as did the Indian National Congress when Bhagat Singh was executed.
Last phase
As
Through the twenties and thirties, many Anushilan members began identifying with Communism and leftist ideologies. Former Jugantar leader Narendranath Bhattacharya, now known as
Organisation
Structure
Anushilan and Jugantar each were organised on different lines, reflecting their divergence. Anushilan Samiti was centrally organised, with a rigid discipline and vertical hierarchy. Jugantar, on the otherhand, was a more loosely organised alliance of groups acting under local leaders that occassionally coordinated their actions together. The prototype of Jugantar's organisation was the Barin Ghosh's organisation set up in 1907, in the run-up to the Manicktolla conspiracy. It sought to emulate the model of Russian revolutionaries that was described by Frost. An actual organisational document shows a primary division between the two active leaders, Barin Ghosh and Upendranath Bannerjee, and the rank-and-file. The higher leaders, including Aurobindo, were supposed to be known only to the active leaders. Each member was assigned to one or more of three circles: (1) collection of funds, (2) practical terrorist work, and (3) propaganda. In practice, the fundamental division was between ‘‘military’’ work (corresponding to the second circle) and ‘‘civil’’ work.
Members of the Maniktala and other groups often claimed that they were connected with a vast web of secret societies covering the whole of British India. In fact links between provinces were limited to contacts between a few individuals like Aurobindo, who had friends in West India. Within Bengal, the Maniktala society had links with other groups, such as the Anushilan and Atmannati Samitis, but relations were more often competitive than co-operative. There was also competition between groups in the Jugantar network, which took the place of the Maniktala society after its primary membership was jailed. According to Leonard Gordon, in the period between 1910 and 1915 each group or dal in the Jugantar network was a separate unit composed of a leader, known as the dada, and his followers. As the name implies, the dada was the elder brother of the revolutionary family. He was also a guru, teaching his disciples practical skills, revolutionary ideology and strategy. Gordon believes that the dada system developed out of pre-existing social structures of rural Bengal. He suggests that their activities – political murder and dacoity – may have grown out of a tradition of zamindar-sponsored violence in the Bengal countryside. Dadas both co-operated and competed with the each other for men, money and material.
It is possible to give a more detailed account of Anushilan, since the regulations of the central Dhaka organization were written down and were reproduced or summarised in government reports. But it is likely that it was impossible in practice to impose the formal structure on all the branches. According to one estimate, the Dacca Anushilan Samiti had at one point 20,000 members in 500 branches. Most branches were located in the eastern districts of Bengal. At a later stage branches were opened in the western districts, Bihar, and the United Provinces. There also were shelters for absconders in Assam and two farms in Tripura.
An internal circular of circa 1908, probably written by Pulin Behari Das, notes that ‘‘it has become particularly necessary . . . to make some good arrangements for the present by dividing the whole of Bengal into divisions and sub-divisions and forming Central Samitis with a few small Samitis.’’ The whole structure, which largely followed British administrative divisions, required placing ‘‘the right person in charge of the right place and the right mission, in order to carry out in a thorough manner the entire work in an orderly way being bound by the tie of union.’’ Dals consisting of five or ten members led by a dalpati were grouped together in local samitis led by adhyakshas and other officers. These reported to district officers appointed by and responsible to the central Dhaka organization. This was commanded by Pulin Das and those who succeeded him during his periods of imprisonment. Samitis were divided into four functional groups: violence, organisation, keepers of arms, householder department. Communications were by special couriers and were written in secret code. This practice and many others were taken from literary sources and were in part a concession to the young men’s need to act out romantic drama.
Cadre
Impact
British India
The ascendancy of the Congress left-wing was demonstrated by Subhas Chandra Bose’s election as president in 1938 and again in 1939. His defeat of Gandhi’s candidate in the second election angered the Congress Working Committee, who forced him to resign. In April he formed the Forward Bloc as an ‘‘organized and disciplined Left Wing . . . to fight the Gandhi wing’’. Placed under house arrest in 1940, Bose escaped to Europe, met Mussolini and Hitler, and eventually became the leader of the Indian National Army in Southeast Asia. The INA’s military campaign was a failure, but the trial of its officers in Delhi electrified the country at a critical moment. Their acquittal amounted to a recognition by the court that a revolt by a disciplined army under a provisional government was not treason. A few months later, the revolt of the naval ratings in Bombay convinced the British that the loyalty of the armed forces could no longer be taken for granted. The next day the government announced the sending of the Cabinet Mission. Throughout the freedom struggle, acts of violent revolt forced the government to parley more seriously with the leaders of the legitimate movement. Gandhi was always aware of this. At the Round Table Conference of 1931, the apostle of non-violence declared that he held ‘‘no brief for the terrorists’’, but added that if the government refused to work with him, it would have the terrorists to deal with. The only way to ‘‘say good-bye to terrorism’’ was ‘‘to work the Congress for all it is worth’’. Little as they liked the Mahatma, the government followed his advice. He offered them a better way out of what had become an imperial mess than a prolonged battle with the forces of violent revolution.
Post-indepedence
Influences
European influences
1876 saw the foundation of The Indian Association in
Bankim
These were influenced by the writings of the Bengalee nationalist author
Nivedita
Counter efforts
References
- ^ Mitra 2006, p. 63
- ^ Desai 2005, p. 30
- ^ a b Yadav 1992, p. 6 Cite error: The named reference "Yadav6" was defined multiple times with different content (see the help page).
- ^ a b Sen 2006, p. 148
- ^ a b Popplewell 1995, p. 104
- ^ Heehs 1992, p. 6
- ^ Gupta 2006, p. 160
- ^ a b Roy 1997, p. 5
- ^ Popplewell 1995, p. 108
- ^ a b c Roy 1997, p. 6
- ^ Popplewell 1995, p. 111
- ^ a b Popplewell 1995, p. 114
- ^ Engineer 2006, p. 105
- M.N. Roy's Memoirs p3
- ^ Cite error: The named reference
Roy7
was invoked but never defined (see the help page). - ^ Roy 1997, p. 8
- ^ Desai 2005, p. 320
- ^ Popplewell 1995, p. 167
- ^ Terrorism in Bengal, Compiled and Edited by A.K. Samanta, Government of West Bengal, 1995, Vol. II, p625.
- ^ Popplewell 1995, p. 201
- ^ a b Popplewell 1995, p. 210
- ^ Cite error: The named reference
Bates118
was invoked but never defined (see the help page). - ^ Heehs 1992, p. 2
- ^ Heehs 1994, p. 534
- ^ Bandyopadhyaya 2005, p. 260
- ^ Heehs 1992, p. 3
- Bandyopadhyaya, Sekhar (2004), From Plassey to Partition: A History of modern India, Mumbai: Orient Longman, ISBN 8125025960.
- Desai, A.R (2005), Social Background of Indian Nationalism, Mumbai: Popular Prakashan, ISBN 8171546676.
- Heehs, Peter (1992), History of Bangladesh 1704-1971 (Vol I), Dhaka, Bangladesh: Asiatic Society of Bangladesh, ISBN 9845123376.
- Heehs, Peter (1994), "Foreign Influences on Bengali Revolutionary Terrorism 1902-1908", Modern Asian Studies, 28 (3), Cambridge University Press: 533–536, ISSN 0026-749X.
- Majumdar, Purnima (2005), Sri Aurobindo, Diamond Pocket Books (P) Ltd, ISBN 8128801945.
- Mitra, Subrata K (2006), The Puzzle of India's Governance: Culture, Context and Comparative Theory, New York: Routledge, ISBN 0415348617.
- Radhan, O.P. (2002), Encyclopaedia of Political Parties, New Delhi: Anmol Publications PVT. LTD, ISBN 9788174888655.