India under Gandhian Phase (Till 1947)

Statement 1 is correct. Maulana Abul Kalam Azad was twice elected President of the Indian National Congress, the first time in 1923 when he was only thirty – five years old, and the second time in 1940. He continued as the President of the Congress till 1946, for no election was held during this period as almost every Congress leader was in prison on account of the Quit India Movement in 1942.
Statement 2 is correct. Maulana Abul Kalam Azad served the country from 1947 to 1958 as the first Minister of Education in Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru’s cabinet.
# National Education Day is celebrated every year on November 11 to mark the birth anniversary of Maulana Abul Kalam Azad.

Statement 1 is incorrect. Acharya JB Kripalani was arrested in 1942 during the Quit India movement and released along with the other Congress leaders in 1945.
Statement 2 is correct. He was well-known as a Gandhian and a socialist. He became the Congress president in 1946 and resigned from his position in 1947, soon after Independence.
# In 1975, when Emergency was declared, Kripalani was among the first political leaders to be arrested.
# He earned the moniker ‘Acharya’ around 1922 when he was teaching at the Gujarat Vidyapith

Statement 1 is incorrect. On 14 July 1942, the Congress Working Committee met 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. C. Rajgopalachari, quit the Congress over this decision, and so did some local and regional level organizers.
Statement 2 is correct. 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 leadership of the movement went into hands of net generation leaders like Aruna Asaf Ali, Jayprakash Narayan, Usha Mehta, RamManohar Lohia, Biju Patnaik etc.

The Constituent Assembly met for the first time in New Delhi on 9 December, 1946 in the Constitution Hall which is now known as the Central Hall of Parliament House.
Mountbatten Plan was a declaration of the government of Great Britain on June 3, 1947, that provided for the partition of India into two states that were granted the rights of dominions.
The 1947 Indian Independence Act is an Act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom that partitioned British India; it received the Royal Assent on 18 July 1947.

Statement 1 is incorrect. Tilak never became the INC president while in March 1931, Sardar Patel presided over the 46th session of the Indian National Congress at Karachi which was called upon to ratify the Gandhi – Irwin Pact, which had just then been concluded.

Statement 2 is incorrect. In response to the inadequacy of the Simon Report, the Labour Government, which had come to power under Ramsay MacDonald in 1929, decided to hold a series of Round Table Conferences in London.
The first Round Table Conference convened from 12 November 1930 to 19 January 1931. Prior to the Conference, M. K. Gandhi had initiated the Civil Disobedience Movement on behalf of the Indian National Congress. Consequently, since many of the Congress’ leaders were in jail, Congress did not participate in the first conference.

Lord Irwin, the Viceroy, met with Gandhi to reach a compromise. The second Round Table Conference was held in London from 7 September 1931 to 1 December 1931 with the participation of Gandhi and the Indian National Congress.
The third Round Table Conference (17 November 1932 – 24 December 1932) was not attended by the Indian National Congress and Gandhi.

Gaidinliu a teenage girl took over the leadership of the civil disobedience movement.
• In March 1932, the entire village of Bopugoanrni in the Naga Hills was burnt down by the government forces, in retaliation to the attack on the Assam Rifles outpost by Gaidinliu’s followers.
• Finally the seventeen year old leader, called Rani Gaidinliu by’Nehru, was arrested on 17 October 1932, and sentenced to life imprisonment

Gandhi was requested by Rajkumar Shukla, a local man, to look into the problems of the farmers in context of indigo planters of Champaran in Bihar.
• The European planters had been forcing the peasants to grow indigo on 3/20 part of the total land (called tinkathia system).
• When towards the end of the nineteenth century German synthetic dyes replaced indigo, the European planters demanded high rents and illegal dues from the peasants in order to maximise their profits before the peasants could shift to other crops.
• Besides, the peasants were forced to sell the produce at prices fixed by the Europeans.
• When Gandhi, joined now by Rajendra Prasad, Mazharul- Haq, Mahadeo Desai, Narhari Parekh, and J.B. Kripalani, reached Champaran to probe into the matter, the authorities ordered him to leave the area at once.
• Gandhi defied the order and preferred to face the punishment.
• This passive resistance or civil disobedience of an unjust order was a novel method at that time.
• Finally, the authorities retreated and permitted Gandhi to make an enquiry.

By early 1915, Annie Besant had launched a campaign to demand self-government for India after the war on the lines of white colonies.
• She campaigned through her newspapers, New India and Commonweal, and through public meetings and conferences.
• At the annual session of the Congress in 1915, the efforts of Tilak and Besant met with some success. It was decided that the Extremists be admitted to the Congress.
• Although Besant failed to get the Congress to approve her scheme of Home Rule Leagues, the Congress did commit itself to a programme of educative propaganda and to a revival of local-level Congress committees.
• Not willing to wait for too long, Besant laid the condition that if the Congress did not implement its commitments, she would be free to set up her own league-which she finally had to, as there was no response from the Congress

The Nehru Report confined itself to British India, as it envisaged the future link-up of British India with the princely states on a federal basis. For the dominion it recommended:
• Dominion status on lines of self-governing dominions as the form of government desired by Indians (much to the chagrin of younger, militant section-Nehru being prominent among them).
• Rejection of separate electorates which had been the basis of constitutional reforms so far; instead, a demand for joint electorates with reservation of seats for Muslims at the Centre and in provinces where they were in minority (and not in those where Muslims were in majority, such as Punjab and Bengal) in proportion to the Muslim population there with right to contest additional seats.
• Linguistic provinces.
• Nineteen fundamental rights including equal rights for women, right to form unions, and universal adult suffrage.
• Responsible government at the Centre and in provinces.
• Full protection to cultural and religious interests of Muslims.
• Complete dissociation of State from religion.

On November 2, 1929, a conference of prominent national leaders issued a ‘Delhi Manifesto’ which put forward certain conditions for attending the Round Table Conference:
• that the purpose of the Round Table Conference should be not to determine whether or when dominion status was to be reached but to formulate a constitution for implementation of the dominion status (thus acting as a constituent assembly) and the basic principle of dominion status should be immediately accepted;
• That the Congress should have majority representation at the conference; and
• There should be a general amnesty for political prisoners and a policy of conciliation; Gandhi along with Motilal Nehru and other political leaders met Lord Irwin in December 1929 (after the viceroy had narrowly escaped after a bomb was detonated meaning to hit the train he was travelling in).
• They asked the viceroy for assurance that the purpose of the round table conference was to draft a constitutional scheme for dominion status.
• That was not the purpose of the conference, said Irwin.
• Viceroy Irwin rejected the demands put forward in the Delhi Manifesto.

Prepared a formula for Congress-League cooperation in 1944. It was a tacit acceptance of the League’s demand for Pakistan. Gandhi supported the formula. The main points in the CR Plan were:
• Muslim League to endorse Congress demand for independence.
• League to cooperate with Congress in forming a provisional government at centre.
• After the end of the war, the entire population of Muslim majority areas in the North-West and North-East India to decide by a plebiscite, whether or not to form a separate sovereign state.
• In case of acceptance of partition, agreement to be made jointly for safeguarding defence, commerce, communications, etc.
• The above terms to be operative only if England transferred full powers to India.

The trade union movement was led by All India Trade Union Congress (AITUC) founded in 1920.
• Lala Lajpat Rai was its first president and Dewan Chaman Lal its general secretary. Tilak was also one of the moving spirits.
• The major strikes during the 1920s included those in Kharagpur Railway Workshops,Tata Iron and Steel Works (Jamshedpur), Bombay
• Textile Mills (this involved 1,50,000 workers and went on for 5 months), and Buckingham Carnatic Mills. In 1928, there were a number of strikes involving 5 lakh workers.
• In 1923, the first May Day was celebrated in India in Madras.
• Although the organization was originally formed to give Indian representation at the League of Nations’ International Labor Organization (ILO), it also met an increasing need for such a body for the rapidly expanding labor movement in India.

The differences over the question of council entry between the two schools of thought resulted in the defeat of the Swarajists’ proposal of ‘ending or mending’ the councils at the Gaya session of the Congress (December 1922).
C.R. Das and Motilal Nehru resigned from the presidentship and secretaryship respectively of the Congress and announced the formation of Congress-Khilafat Swarajya Party or simply Swarajist Party, with C.R. Das as the president and Motilal Nehru as one of the secretaries.

In March 1931, a special session of the Congress was held at Karachi to endorse the Gandhi-Irwin Pact.
Six days before the session (which was held on March 29) Bhagat Singh, Sukhdev and Rajguru were executed.
• Throughout Gandhi’s route to Karachi, he was greeted with black flag demonstrations by the Punjab Naujawan Bharat Sabha, in protest against his failure to secure commutation of the death sentence for Bhagat and his comrades.
• While disapproving of and dissociating itself from political violence, the Congress admired the ‘bravery’ and ‘sacrifice’ of the three martyrs.
• The Delhi Pact or Gandhi-Irwin Pact was endorsed.
• The goal of purna swaraj was reiterated.
• Two resolutions were adopted-one on Fundamental Rights and the other on National Economic Programme- which made the session particularly memorable

Hitler’s astounding success and the fall of Belgium, Holland and France put England in a conciliatory mood.
• As the war in Europe had undertaken a new turn, the dominant Congress leadership was again in a dilemma.
• Both Gandhi and Nehru strongly opposed the idea of taking advantage of Britain’s position. The Congress was ready to compromise, asking the
• British government to let it form an interim government during the war period but the government was not interested.

The government came up with its own offer to get the cooperation of India in the war effort. Linlithgow announced the August Offer (August 1940) which proposed:
• Dominion status as the objective for India;
• Expansion of viceroy’s executive council which would have a majority of Indians (who would be drawn from major political parties);
• Setting up of a constituent assembly after the war where mainly Indians would decide the constitution according to their social, economic and political conceptions, subject to fulfillment of the obligation of the government regarding defense, minority rights, treaties with States, all India services; and
• No future constitution to be adopted without the consent of minorities.

Gandhiji was requested by Rajkumar Shukla, a local man, to look into the problems of the farmers in context of indigo planters of Champaran in Bihar.
• The European planters had been forcing the peasants to grow indigo on 3/20 part of the total land (called tinkathia system).
• When towards the end of the nineteenth century German synthetic dyes replaced indigo, the European planters demanded high rents and illegal dues from the peasants in order to maximise their profits before the peasants could shift to other crops.
• Besides, the peasants were forced to sell the produce at prices fixed by the Europeans.

When Gandhi, joined now by Rajendra Prasad, Mazharul- Haq, Mahadeo Desai, Narhari Parekh, and J.B. Kripalani, reached Champaran to probe into the matter, the authorities ordered him to leave the area at once.
• Gandhi defied the order and preferred to face the punishment. This passive resistance or civil disobedience of an unjust order was a novel method at that time.
• Finally, the authorities retreated and permitted Gandhi to make an enquiry

On November 2, 1929, a conference of prominent national leaders issued a ‘Delhi Manifesto’ which put forward certain conditions for attending the Round Table Conference:
• that the purpose of the Round Table Conference should be not to determine whether or when dominion status was to be reached but to formulate a constitution for implementation of the dominion status (thus acting as a constituent assembly) and the basic principle of dominion status should be immediately accepted;
• That the Congress should have majority representation at the conference; and
• There should be a general amnesty for political prisoners and a policy of conciliation;
• Gandhi along with Motilal Nehru and other political leaders met Lord Irwin in December 1929 (after the viceroy had narrowly escaped after a bomb was detonated meaning to hit the train he was travelling in).
• They asked the viceroy for assurance that the purpose of the round table conference was to draft a constitutional scheme for dominion status

•That was not the purpose of the conference, said Irwin. Viceroy Irwin rejected the demands put forward in the Delhi Manifesto.

In March 1942, a mission headed by Stafford Cripps was sent to India with constitutional proposals to seek Indian support for the war.
Stafford Cripps was a left-wing Laborite, the leader of the House of Commons and a member of the British War Cabinet who had actively supported the Indian national movement.
The main proposals of the mission were as follows.
• An Indian Union with a dominion status would be set up; it would be free to decide its relations with the Commonwealth and free to participate in the United Nations and other international bodies.
• After the end of the war, a constituent assembly would be convened to frame a new constitution.
• Members of this assembly would be partly elected by the provincial assemblies through proportional representation and partly nominated by the princes.
• The British government would accept the new constitution subject to two conditions: (i) any province not willing to join the Union could have a separate constitution and form a separate Union, and (ii) the new constitution making body and the British government would negotiate a treaty to effect the transfer of power and to safeguard racial and religious minorities.
• In the meantime, defense of India would remain in British hands and the governor-general’s powers would remain intact.

The viceroy, Lord Minto, and the Secretary of State for India, John Morley, agreed that some reforms were due so as to placate the Moderates as well as the Muslims.
• They worked out a set of measures that came to be known as the Morley- Minto (or Minto-Morley) Reforms that translated into the Indian Councils Act of 1909.

The elective principle was recognised for the nonofficial membership of the councils in India.
• Indians were allowed to participate in the election of various legislative councils, though on the basis of class and community.
• For the first time, separate electorates for Muslims for election to the central council was established—a most detrimental step for India.
• The number of elected members in the Imperial Legislative Council and the Provincial Legislative Councils was increased. In the provincial councils, non-official majority was introduced, but since some of these non-officials were nominated and not elected, the overall non-elected majority remained.
• One Indian was to be appointed to the viceroy’s executive council.

Nagpur Session (1920) of Indian National Congress (INC).
•The 1920 session was of course not the first one Nagpur hosted – the city did that
way back in 1891, only six years after the Congress’ formation. It was all set to do
that again in 1907 when a tense atmosphere here led to the venue being shifted to
Surat in Gujarat.
•A resolution calling for complete non-cooperation and boycott, virtually
amounting to a war cry against the British rule in India, was the hallmark of the
Nagpur session. It was also significant in many other ways.
•The Nagpur session is also a memorable for the new congress Constitution that
was adopted.

The Lucknow Session of the congress is memorable for it marked the reunion
of Moderate and Extremist parties after the Surat split (1907).
•Another noteworthy development was the Congress League Pact for acceptance of a
united scheme of Constitutional reforms.
•Ninteen elected members of the Governor-General’s Legislative Council
prepared a memorandum, popularly known as ‘Nineteen Memorandum’,
containing a different set of proposals and submitted it to the Viceroy in November
1916.
Their main recommendations were:
•all the Legislative Councils should have a substantial majority of elected members;
•the Legislative Councils should be large in size and enjoy larger powers in respect of
legislation and finance;
•fiscal autonomy should be conceded to India; the provincial governments should be
made autonomous;
•a full measure of Local-Self Government should be immediately granted.

Statement 1 is incorrect. Each year the International Day of Peace is
observed around the world on 21 September. The UN General Assembly has declared this
as a day devoted to strengthening the ideals of peace, through observing 24 hours of nonviolence
and cease-fire.
The International Day of Non-Violence is observed on 2 October, the birthday of
Mahatma Gandhi, leader of the Indian independence movement and pioneer of the
philosophy and strategy of non-violence [UN].
# International days designated by UN are occasions to educate the public on issues of
concern, to mobilize political will and resources to address global problems, and to celebrate
and reinforce achievements of humanity.
Statement 2 is correct. Mahatma Gandhi was nominated five times for the Nobel Peace
Prize in 1937, 1938, 1939, 1947 and 1948. He was never awarded with peace prize.

Chinnaswami Subramania Bharati (1882-1921) was an Indian writer of the
nationalist period and is regarded as the father of the modern Tamil style.
Bharati’s best-known works include Kaṇṇan pattu (1917), Panchali sapatham (1912;
Panchali’s Vow), and Kuyil pattu (1912). Many of his English works were collected in Agni
and Other Poems and Translations and Essays and Other Prose Fragments (1937).
As a working journalist, his writings in Swadesamitran and India made an important
contribution to Tamil political vocabulary. He wrote stories, commentaries, and was also the
pioneer of column writing in Tamil.
The exposure to political affairs led to his involvement in the extremist wing of the Indian
National Congress party, and, as a result, he was forced to flee to Pondicherry (now
Puducherry), a French colony, where he lived in exile from 1910 to 1919.

Tripuri session of the Congress was held from 8 to 12 March 1939.
Subhash Chandra Bose was re-elected the President of INC at the Tripuri Session in 1939
by defeating Gandhiji’s candidate Pattabhi Sitaramayya.
Forward Bloc was formed by Subhash Chandra Bose on 3 May 1939, after he resigned
from Congress President Ship on 29 April 1939.
World War II broke out on 1 September 1939 when Germany invaded Poland. Britain and
France went to Poland’s aid and declared war on Germany on 3 September 1939.

The Anarchical and Revolutionary Crimes Act (Rowlatt Act) of 1919, was
a repressive legislation enacted in British India, following the report of a committee under
Justice Rowlatt. The report had recommended the continuation of special wartime powers
for use against revolutionary conspiracy and terrorist activity.
Statement 1 is correct. The Rowlatt Act entitled the British to arrest anyone found
suspicious of plotting against the British Raj. Under this act, those supposed to be involved
in revolt against the British could be sentenced to a term of up to 2 years in jail, without
any trial. It also placed severe restrictions on the freedom of the press.
The Act aroused opposition among Indian nationalists and this was channelled by
Mohandas Gandhi into a nationwide satyagraha, known as the Rowlatt agitation, which
ended with the Jallianwala Bagh Massacre.
Statement 2 is incorrect. Bhagat Singh and B.K. Dutt threw a bomb in the Central
Legislative Assembly on 8 April 1929 against the passage of the Public Safety Bill and the
Trade Disputes Bill which would reduce the civil liberties of citizens.
# Hindi Diwas is celebrated on 14th September. It was on this day in 1949 that the
constituent assembly adopted Hindi written in Devanagari as the official language of the country.

Dr. Rajendra Prasad, son of Mahadev Sahai, was born in Siwan, Bihar on December 3, 1884.
Statement 1 is correct. In September 1946 Prasad was sworn in as minister for food and agriculture in the interim government preceding full independence. From 1946 to 1949 he presided over the Indian Constituent Assembly and helped to shape the constitution.
He was unanimously elected president in 1950 and, after the first general election (1952), was chosen by an overwhelming majority of the new electoral college; in 1957 he was elected to a third term.
Statement 2 is correct. Subhash Chandra Bose resigned from the Congress presidentship after not getting much support within the party in 1939. Dr Rajendra Prasad became the INC President following the resignation of Subhash Chandra Bose.

Statement 1 is correct. Scheduled Castes Federation (SCF) was an organisation in India founded by B. R. Ambedkar in 1942 to campaign for the rights of the Dalit community.
Bahishkrit Hitakarini Sabha is a central institution formed by Dr. Babasaheb Ambedkar for removing difficulties of the untouchables and placing their grievances before government.
Statement 2 is correct. BR Ambedkar was conferred Bharat Ratna posthumously on March 31, 1990.
In 1956, Ambedkar converted to Buddhism. He completed the final manuscript of his book on Buddhism ‘The Buddha and His Dhamma’ in December 1956. Three days later, on 6 December, he passed away.

The Royal Commission on Labour or the Whitley Commission on Labour was set up in 1929 to inquire into the existing conditions of labour in industrial undertakings and plantations in India. The Commission was chaired by John Henry Whitley. The commission submitted its report in 1931

Islington Commission, 1912 a Royal Commission formed to recommend reforms in the Public Service of British India with Lord Islington as its chairman.

 A ten member commission, which included three Indians, was given the task of examining the Indian demand to increase the number of Indians in the Higher Civil Services and, most importantly, holding simultaneous examination in India.

 The commission was guided by three principal considerations: firstly, to maintain high standards of civil administration in British India; secondly, to safeguard the paramount interest of British rule; and thirdly, to satisfy the reasonable aspirations of Indians and promote friendly relations between Indians and Europeans for better governance.

 The commission completed its report in 1915, but owing to the outbreak of the First World War, the report was not published until 1917.

 The commission examined several important issues and made a number of recommendations in regard to the Higher Civil Services.

 It suggested that the services were to be reorganised into higher and lower branches on the basis of work and not on the basis of race or salary and that no other artificial distinction should be maintained.

 Excepting the case of ICS, all other civil servants, once promoted from a lower to a higher service, should enjoy equal benefits and should be treated identically with those directly recruited and should be considered as full members of the service.

 The Civil Services were divided into four categories- Imperial, Central, Provincial and Subordinate.

 The existing problems of recruitment to various services from the point of view of place, fixation of salary, and proportion of Indians were examined.

The crucial link between the founding of a military academy and the attainment of independence was acutely realized by a section of Indian leadership in the days of struggle for independence, whose concerted efforts resulted in the recommendations of the Montague Chelmsford Reforms Committee that enabled ten Indians for receiving training at Sandhurst for induction as commissioned officers;

 Setting up of the Skeen Committee in 1925 and later holding of Round Table Conference in London in 1930, which recommended the establishment of the Indian Sandhurst.

 As a follow up action, a committee was set up under the chairmanship of Field Marshal Sir Philip Chetwode, the then Commander-in-Chief of India, to work out modalities for establishment of an Indian Sandhurst.

 In Jul 1931, the committee recommended establishment of a military academy for induction of 40 Gentlemen Cadets (GC) in each term comprising 15 as Direct Entries, 15 from the ranks through Kitchner College, Nowgaon and 10 from princely states.

 The training span was initially envisaged for three years but later reduced to two and a half years.