Revolutionary Movements During British Period | History Notes

Revolutionary Movements During British Period

Even though there was little to no violence during the post-1857 Indian freedom struggle, many young Indian men and women participated in a revolutionary movement in India that sought India’s independence. They thought the only way to free India from British control was by an armed rebellion against the authorities.

Several internal and external pressures acting on the minds of the youth led to the birth of the revolutionary movement in India in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. They used forceful tactics. Although the British authorities primarily destroyed them, they successfully motivated many Indians to join the liberation struggle. Their tales of bravery and sacrifice for the motherland have inspired people to live and die for the nation.

The revolutionary movement in India began in the provinces of Bengal, Maharashtra, Punjab, U.P., Orissa, Bihar, and Madras, although it was primarily active in Bengal, Maharashtra, and Punjab due to these areas’ higher political activity than other parts of the nation. We will cover all significant revolutionary activities in this post, which are crucial for success on competitive exams like UPSC, SSC, Banking, Railway and Other Competitive Exam.

Rise and Growth of Revolutionary Movement in India

The deeds of the Indian revolutionaries were a byproduct of fervent nationalism. The first phase of the revolutionary movement in India was a reaction to the government’s oppressive approach to extremists after the Congress split at Surat after the Swadeshi movement.

The causes of the Revolutionary movement in India are as follows:

• Although they urged youngsters to make sacrifices, the extremist leaders were unable to organise effectively or develop new ways to engage in politics to harness these revolutionary forces.
• The rich tradition of sacrificing for the nation served as an inspiration for the revolutionaries.
• Among young people, the economic exploitation of Indians by the British Government and the Partition of Bengal were two of the most important factors that boosted nationalism and became a reason for the rise and growth of the revolutionary movement in India.
• Failure of the moderate and extreme congress: After the national militancy phase subsided, the younger portion was unprepared to retreat.

Impact of Revolutionary Movement in India

As soon as the Revolutionary movement in India started, very quickly secret clubs of the revolutionaries appeared all over the nation. With its headquarters in Calcutta, the Anusilan Samiti, India’s most well-known and enduring secret society, established revolutionary centres all around the country.

• They engaged in two types of activity: killing tyrannical authorities, traitors, and informers and engaging in dacoities to generate cash for the acquisition of weapons, etc.
• As a result of their sacrifices, the Indian people’s emotions were stirred, which aided in the development of national consciousness and undoubtedly helped India achieve freedom.
• The death of Surya Sen put a stop to terrorism in Bengal. The revolutionaries were imprisoned in jails, and Andaman began a process of rethinking.

Important Revolutionary Movement in India

Revolutionaries supported using large-scale protests to topple the British Empire in India. They intended to organise an uprising against the government, even manipulating the army and resorting to guerrilla warfare to topple the foreign authorities. The table below lists the significant revolutionary movements in India.

Year	List of Revolutionary Movement in India
1897	Chapekar Brothers
1908	Alipore Bomb Conspiracy Case
1909	Curzon Whllie’s Assassination
1910	Howrah Gang Case
1912	Delhi Lahore Conspiracy Carse
1925	Kakori Conspiracy
1930	Chittagong Armoury Raid
1929	Central Assembly Bomb Case
1931	Lahore Conspiracy Case

Revolutionary movements, including the Alipore conspiracy case, the Lahore conspiracy case, the Muzaffarpur conspiracy case, the Howrah conspiracy case, the Meerut conspiracy case, and revolutionary freedom fighters raised from various parts of the nation, were part of India’s struggle for independence. All the revolutionary movements of India have been explained in detail below.

Chapekar Brothers (1897)

This was the first case under the revolutionary movement in India. The killing of a British officer for political reasons after 1857. Vasudev Chapekar, Damodar, and Balkrishna all fired shots at WC Rand, the Special Plague Committee’s chairman. The brothers opposed the atrocities carried out by the British during the Pune plague outbreak. The government ended up persecuting Indians and taking drastic measures to stop illnesses from spreading. The brothers Chapekar were hung.

Alipore Conspiracy Case (1908)

Alipore Conspiracy case is also known as Muraripukar Conspiracy or Manicktolla bomb conspiracy by the Revolutionaries Movements in India.

• The British Chief Magistrate Douglas Kingsford was the target of the bomb detonated in Muzaffarpur. Instead, two ladies riding in the cart that the magistrate thought was travelling perished.
• Khudiram Bose and Prafulla Chakki threw the explosive. Prafulla Chakki killed himself after the incident.
• Thirty additional Anushilan Samiti members, including Barin Ghosh, Kanailal Dutt, and Aurobindo Ghosh, were also tried in the case.
• Nationalists like Aurobindo Ghosh and his brother Barindra Ghosh served as the Anushilan Samiti members. most of Samiti’s members were young pupils who received instruction in martial arts, boxing, swordplay, and other forms of fitness.
• Due to a lack of evidence, Aurobindo Ghosh was declared innocent, while others received different life sentences.

Curzon Wyllie’s Assassination (1909)

Madan Lal Dhingra killed army officer Curzon Wyllie in London on July 1, 1909 evening. The Indian House and Madan Lal Dhingra had a tight relationship. The India House was a London-based organisation that participated in the revolutionary movement in India primarily by recruiting Indian students studying in the UK. V.D. Savarkar and Shyamji Krishna Verma founded India House in London. Bhikaiji Cama and Shyamji Krishna Varma were supporters of this group. India House became the focal point of outside-of-India revolutionary movements for Indian independence.

Howrah Gang Case (1910)

The Howrah-Sibpur Conspiracy Case is another name for the Howrah Gang Case. 47 Bengali Indian Nationalists of the Anushilan Samiti were detained and put on trial due to Inspector Shamsul Alam’s murder in Calcutta. Alam looked into Samiti’s revolutionary activities while attempting to connect and combine the homicides and robberies into a single investigation. The case made Jatindranath Mukherjee’s groundbreaking work public.

Despite efforts, the case could not prove the connections, mostly because the Samiti was decentralised. Only Jatindranath Mukherjee and Narendranath Bhattacharjee received one-year prison terms from all the defendants.

Delhi Lahore Conspiracy Case (1912)

The Delhi Conspiracy Case is often referred to as the Delhi Lahore Conspiracy Case. Then-Indian Viceroy Lord Hardinge was the target of an assassination attempt. Rashbehari Bose served as the leader of the revolt. A bomb was placed in the viceroy’s carriage during the relocation of the British capital from Calcutta to Delhi. An Indian assistant was killed, and Lord Hardinge was hurt. Bose was caught but escaped, while others were found guilty of participating in the Lahore Conspiracy Case.

Kakori Conspiracy (1925)

Kakori Conspiracy Case is a train robbery in Uttar Pradesh close to Kakori. The youth of the Hindustan Republican Association, including Ashfaqulla Khan, Thakur Roshan Singh, Chandrashekhar Azad, Ram Prasad Bismil, and others, headed it. The train was thought to be carrying money bags from the British Government, leading to the Kakori attack.

Sachin Sanyal and Jogesh Chandra Chatterjee established the Hindustan Republican Army in Kanpur in 1924, intending to organise an armed uprising to topple colonial rule. The revolutionaries were taken into custody and put on a Kakori conspiracy trial. Roshan Singh, Bismil, Khan, and Lahiri received death sentences in the Kakori Conspiracy Case. Others received prison or deportation sentences.

Chittagong Armoury Raid (1930)

Chittagong Uprising is another name for the Chittagong Armory Raid. Raid attempt from Chittagong on the police and auxiliary troops’ armouries (now in Bangladesh). Surya Sen served as the group’s leader, and others included Loknath Bal, Kalpana Dutta, Ambika Chakraborty, and Subodh Roy. Despite being unable to raid the arsenal, they successfully cut the telephone and telegraph connections.

At the police armoury, Surya Sen hosted the Indian Flag following the Chittagong armoury raid. The government imposed severe punishment, including deportation to the Andaman Islands and a prison sentence. In this revolutionary movement in India, Surya Sen was tortured horribly and given a hanging death sentence.

Central Assembly Bomb Case (1929) and the Lahore Conspiracy Case (1931)

The Lahore Conspiracy Case (1931) and the Central Assembly Bomb Case (1929), two significant cases of the Revolutionary Movement in India, are the most frequently questioned and discussed cases. Bhagat Singh and Batukeshwar Dutt, two revolutionaries, threw a bomb and leaflets into Delhi’s Assembly House to call attention to their movement.

In opposition to the passing of the public safety law and the trade dispute bill, Batukeshwar Dutt and Bhagat Singh detonated a bomb in the central assembly. The goal was to spread awareness of the practices and ideas. They were arrested and sent to jail for the deed, even though they did not attempt to flee. They didn’t mean to damage anyone. Instead, they wanted to spread the word about their revolutionary ideas and actions.

In connection with the murder of General Saunders, Bhagat Singh was taken into custody. The Lahore Conspiracy Case was the name of this situation. Saunders was accidentally killed because James Scott, another police officer involved in the lathi charge that killed Lala Lajpat Rai, was the intended victim.

Bhagat Singh, Rajguru, and Sukhdev embarked on a hunger strike while detained to demand better conditions for jail inmates and other political prisoners. Following the trial, Bhagat Singh, Sukhdev, and Rajguru were hanged in March 1931. Chandrashekhar Azad also perished that year in Allahabad in February during a gunfight with the police.