The Revolutionaries: Bengal, Punjab, Maharashtra, UP, Madras Presidency, Outside India

The Revolutionaries: Bengal, Punjab, Maharashtra, UP, Madras Presidency, Outside India

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Revolutionary terrorism emerged as a distinct current within the Indian national movement — an alternative to both the constitutional agitation of the Moderates and the mass-struggle strategy of the Extremists, neither of which had managed to translate their aspirations into practical results.

Rooted in the secret societies and physical-culture akharas of late 19th-century Bengal and Maharashtra, the movement passed through three broad phases between 1897 and 1938 — from the Alipore Bomb Case and the assassinations of the Deccan, through the transnational Ghadar conspiracy of the First World War years, to the Marxist-inflected Hindustan Socialist Republican Army and Surya Sen’s Chittagong uprising of the interwar period.

Along the way, it drew Indian revolutionaries into networks stretching from London and Berlin to San Francisco and Kabul — a movement whose direct political gains remained modest, but whose spirit of sacrifice left a lasting imprint on the wider freedom struggle.

The Emergence of the Revolutionaries: An Alternative Political Trend

• The rise of the revolutionaries represented an alternative political trend and line of action — a departure both from Moderate constitutional agitation and from Extremist mass struggle and direct action.
• This shift was rooted in the visible shortcomings of both existing currents.
  • Moderate politics had already lost much of its relevance as an effective strategy, and had come under sustained criticism from the Extremists themselves.
  • The Extremists, in turn, had reached something of a political dead end by the end of 1907: their programme found no practical expression, their aims and objectives remained unfulfilled, and an ideology that had once seemed promising and inspiring never moved beyond the realm of ideas, leaving them unable to give the movement any positive direction.
• The British attitude offered little encouragement for any other course. Official arrogance and repression continued unabated, the prospects of any demands being met seemed remote, and the Partition of Bengal remained unrevoked despite prolonged protest.
  • This bred a growing tendency toward meeting force with force — stimulated by the elements of direct action, radicalism, and youthful self-sacrifice already inherent in militant ideology.
• The groundwork for the new generation of revolutionaries who emerged in the 1920s was laid by these earlier Revolutionary Terrorists: their secret societies, anti-establishment journals, and heroic actions together built the platform on which the later movement could grow.

The Non-Cooperation Movement and the Turn to Revolutionary Action

• The revolutionary movement of the 1920s was, in significant part, an outcome of the Non-Cooperation Movement. Almost all its important members had themselves participated in Non-Cooperation, sharing the immense exhilaration generated by the movement’s unprecedented popular upsurge and the high hopes raised by Gandhi’s promise of independence within a year.
  • Its abrupt suspension therefore came as a genuine shock. Idealistic, radical youth could see nothing objectionable in Chauri Chaura, and had little patience for Gandhi’s insistence on integrating politics with morality — the very principle that had brought the movement to a standstill. Their reaction crystallised into deep dissatisfaction and disillusionment, a mood further darkened by the simultaneous breakdown of Hindu-Muslim unity.
• Neither of the alternative political paths on offer — the parliamentary politics of the Swarajists, nor the Constructive Programme under Gandhian leadership — held any real appeal for this disillusioned youth.
  • A deepening sense of pessimism and despair instead pushed them toward two intertwined alternatives: socialism on one hand, and revolutionary terrorism on the other — a fusion that gave rise to a revolutionary terrorism with a distinct socialist tinge.
• The Russian Revolution proved a powerful source of inspiration in this period, marking as it did the triumph of socialist ideas and the birth of a new political system built along socialist lines. It stood as living proof that revolution by the masses could succeed against heavy internal odds and even a powerful enemy — and it stirred Indian youth into action accordingly.
• The contemporaneous upsurge of the working class, though its influence remained somewhat vague, was also felt by the revolutionaries, who recognised its revolutionary potential and hoped to harness it in service of the national revolution.

Ideology and Programme of the Revolutionaries

• Revolutionary extremism was, at its core, the nationalist youth’s response to colonial challenges — an alternative line to both Moderate constitutional agitation and Extremist direct action, both of which had failed to fulfil popular aspirations. The resulting pent-up emotion of the youth found expression in acts of individual and group heroism of a terrorist character, driven by the firm conviction that British rule could be overthrown through force, terror, and a willingness to defy death.
• The cult of violence — of bomb and pistol — formed the fundamental constituent of this terrorist ideology, with striking terror among the British as its central objective.
  • A further dimension lay in removing fear from the minds of the Indian people and arousing revolutionary and patriotic sentiment. Convinced that only force could drive out British power, the revolutionaries’ activities typically took the form of assassinating unpopular British officials and organising swadeshi dacoities to raise funds — a cult evolved, enacted, and popularised by ardent nationalist youth who placed heroism and self-sacrifice on a high pedestal.
• Secret societies formed the organisational backbone of this movement, serving as the focal points of revolutionary activity and playing a central role in training and organising terrorist action.
  • Newspapers and journals formed a second key organ, overtly anti-establishment in character — the chief channels through which revolutionary ideas and propaganda were disseminated, and important vehicles for arousing anti-imperialist sentiment more broadly.
• The Revolutionary Terrorists of the early 20th century drew heavily on religion and mysticism for inspiration and ideology, yet were notably free of any communalist approach or thinking.
  • For them, religion served as a source of inner strength rather than a basis for politics — inspiring them to fight for the liberation of all Indians, not to organise communal politics or foment hatred against other sections of Indian society. In essence, their religious and mystical convictions were channelled into the fight against imperialism itself.

The 1920s Shift: Toward a Broader, Socialist Ideology

• The 1920s brought a distinct change in the revolutionaries’ overall approach and outlook — a shift away from mere action and a loose assortment of ideas, toward a realm of definite, concrete aims and ideology.
  • The movement acquired a wider content and a broader dimension. This new generation of terrorist revolutionaries displayed a deeper political consciousness, and — at least at the programmatic level — extended the movement’s base toward the masses: workers, peasants, and ordinary people. The result was a revolutionary programme with an advanced social outlook, even as it continued to incorporate individual or group armed action of a terrorist character.

Principal Ideological Features of the 1920s Revolutionaries

• The revolutionary terrorists of this period, particularly in North India, exhibited a distinct socialist tinge.
  • They were no longer content with the mere prospect of national independence; the creation of a new social order, resting on socialist principles, emerged as its necessary complement — one committed to ending exploitation and establishing genuine egalitarianism.
  • To them, socialism represented a new correlation of class forces in society — a new state structure in which power rested with workers and peasants. Their growing socialist consciousness led them to recognise the close links between capitalism and modern imperialism: British rule was understood as, in essence, a form of class rule — the rule of foreign capitalists — which socialism alone could dismantle in order to bring about true independence.
  • At a purely intellectual level, they envisioned the development of a mass movement of the exploited, aimed at reconstructing society and establishing a socialist system founded on the abolition of class distinctions and class domination.
• Revolution itself was central to their ideology, commanding their total commitment. For them, the term carried a wide connotation — standing for change, progress, order, and regeneration; a living, dynamic spirit capable of rescuing society from decay; and a struggle that was both total and aimed unambiguously at victory.
  • Revolution, in their conception, carried a wider social content — capable of regenerating and restructuring society, eliminating injustice, and ending exploitation. In broader terms, it was the expression of people’s aspirations to transform their social and economic condition. This expansive definition, though inherited from the earlier revolutionary upsurges of 1901–1910, was particularly characteristic of this later period.
  • One especially discernible change was their embrace of secular nationalism: the religious tinge of the movement’s first phase was now conspicuously absent, and the revolutionaries stood explicitly opposed to communal forces as well.
• Their most important form of propaganda was propaganda through action — even action that meant accepting death — fostered through terrorist and other heroic acts.
  • To them, this was not an end in itself but a prelude to revolution: action was meant to generate revolutionary consciousness among the masses, arouse their revolutionary spirit, disseminate revolutionary ideas, and ultimately build a platform on which revolution could eventually be waged.
• The youth were conceived as the vanguard of this revolution — the conveyors of its socialist message and its direct fighters, uniquely possessed, in the revolutionaries’ view, of the capacity for sacrifice and heroism needed to popularise revolutionary ideas. Hence the primacy given to youth in the movement’s preparatory phase, and their firm belief in their own capacity to suffer, sacrifice, and accept martyrdom.
• A genuinely new element of 1920s ideology and programme was the recognition of the revolutionary potential of the masses themselves — a belief that successful struggle could ultimately be waged on the strength of workers, peasants, and ordinary people, with the organisation of workers and peasants, and the conduct of revolutionary work among them, becoming an explicit part of the political agenda.

Weaknesses and Decline of the Revolutionaries

• The activities of the Revolutionary Terrorists were, in the final analysis, wedded more to idealism than to pragmatism — inspiring at the level of theory, but consistently falling short in practice.
  • Sharp contradictions ran through their ideology and their actual work: theoretically committed to socialism, they could not in practice move beyond nationalism; theoretically planning mass action, their activities remained restricted to terrorism and individual acts; and while the peasantry and working class were theoretically meant to form their social base, the movement in practice remained confined largely to the urban lower-middle class and petty bourgeois youth.
• They made little real effort toward waging a genuine mass revolution, undertook minimal political work among the masses, and remained largely cut off from them as a result — a direct negation of their own founding principle of revolution by the masses.
  • Operating instead at the individual and group level, without a genuine popular base, their activities remained comparatively weak, leaving them acutely vulnerable when the government finally struck back. A series of conspiracy cases, harsh laws, and severe penalties decimated their ranks.
• The revolutionaries stood in clear opposition to Gandhian leadership of the national movement, hoping to wean youth and the masses away from Gandhi’s ideological hegemony — yet they failed to offer any real substitute.
  • They could neither give the national movement a genuinely revolutionary turn, nor establish revolutionary-socialist hegemony over it, and remained, in the end, a comparatively weak force within the wider political struggle, gradually petering out.
• More broadly, the revolutionaries often worked at cross-purposes with each other, lacking effective organisation and a powerful central leadership, and at times drifting without clear direction — carefully prepared plans were few, and even these achieved little success.
  • Their strategy of “propaganda through action,” intended to generate revolutionary consciousness, more often generated nationalist sentiment instead — sentiment that ended up strengthening mainstream nationalist leadership rather than the revolutionaries’ own cause, a genuine irony given the scale of their sacrifices.
  • Internal dissension, conflict, and squabbling further divided and weakened the movement, while its intense religiosity — particularly among the first generation — proved a further negative factor: inspiring past examples and Hindu ideals of death-defying heroism stirred them into action and instilled a spirit of sacrifice, but simultaneously restricted the growth of organisation, leadership, and effective programmes, and became a factor in alienating Muslims from the movement.
• The movement’s relationship with the established political currents of its time was equally uneasy: the Moderates disapproved of both its ideology and its programme, while the Extremists, though more sympathetic, could not extend it open, all-out support. The revolutionaries thus worked largely as an independent force, deprived of backing from the era’s leading political groups on one hand and genuine mass support on the other.

The Growth of Revolutionary Activity Outside India

• Revolutionary activity and propaganda were also carried on outside India — in Indo-China, Singapore, Siam, Afghanistan, the United States, and Germany.
• One of the earliest pioneers among Indian revolutionaries abroad was Shyamji Krishna Varma, who in 1905 founded the Indian Home Rule Society in London and launched the journal Indian Sociologist, gathering around him a group of revolutionaries centred at the India House, which he had himself established in London.
  • A close associate of Shyamji’s, Madam Cama, continued propaganda in favour of revolutionary activity and organised protest against the deportation of Lajpat Rai and Ajit Singh. Defending such activity, she declared: “Three years ago it was repugnant to me even to talk of violence as a subject of discussion; but owing to the heartlessness, the hypocrisy, the rascality of the Liberals, that feeling is gone. Why should we deplore the use of violence when our enemies drive us to it?”
  • Savarkar, Lala Hardayal, Madanlal Dhingra, and others were also members of this London-based revolutionary group. Dhingra assassinated William Curzon Wyllie in London on 1 July 1909, and in a statement made at the time of his execution declared: “Poor in wealth and intellect a son like myself has nothing else to offer to the Mother but his own blood. The only lesson required in India at present is to learn how to die and the only way to teach it is by dying ourselves. Therefore, I die and glory in my Martyrdom.”
• Raja Mahendra Pratap and Sardar Singh Rana were two other prominent Indian revolutionaries active abroad; Pratap went on to establish a provisional independent government of India at Kabul in 1915.
• In 1907, Taraknath Das and his associates formed the Indian Independence League in California, aimed at spreading revolutionary ideas among Indians living in the United States, with Lala Hardayal among its active members.
• In 1913, the Ghadar Party was founded in the United States by Indian workers and students, predominantly Punjabi, with the explicit aim of overthrowing British rule in India — the word “Ghadar” itself meaning revolution. The party’s organ, also called the Ghadar, became widely popular.
  • The movement remained highly active in the United States for some time, drawing considerable public attention, though its principal leader, Hardayal, soon incurred the displeasure of the U.S. Government and was forced to flee the country.
  • During the First World War, the Ghadar Party established contact with revolutionaries inside India and planned an armed revolt against British rule, seeking — unsuccessfully — to smuggle in large quantities of foreign arms and munitions for the purpose.
  • In 1916, Chandrakanta Chakravarty, banking on promised German support, planned a further uprising against British imperialism across Asia — an ambitious scheme that ultimately fizzled out. Group rivalries and personal animosities repeatedly undermined Indian revolutionary activity abroad more broadly.

The Ghadar Movement in Detail

• The Ghadar Party, founded in 1913 by Indians resident in America and Canada, drew most of its rank-and-file membership from Sikh jawans and peasants, while its leadership was largely composed of educated Muslims and Hindus. The party maintained branches well beyond North America — in Mexico, Japan, the Philippines, Malaya, Singapore, Thailand, and Indo-China — and was committed to waging a revolutionary war against the British Government.
• After the outbreak of the First World War, the party began sending workers, supporters, and weapons to revolutionaries inside India.
  • Hardayal, its organiser in the United States, published the Ghadar journal in multiple languages, and millions of dollars were raised in contributions — many supporters gave their life savings or sold valuable possessions, including ornaments, property, and land, to fund the cause.
• Ghadarites sent messages to Indian soldiers and servicemen at multiple locations, urging them to rise in revolt at the appropriate moment, and the party fixed 21 February 1915 as the date for launching a violent struggle from Punjab.
  • The British authorities, however, learned of these plans and acted swiftly: the disaffected regiments were disbanded, and their leaders either imprisoned or hanged.
  • Inspired by the Ghadar Party, some 700 men of the 5th Light Infantry in Singapore rose in revolt under Jamadar Chisti Khan and Subedar Dunde Khan, though this too ultimately failed — 37 of the rebels were publicly executed, while a further 41 were sentenced to life imprisonment.
• Among the party’s prominent workers were Barkatullah (active in Japan and Afghanistan), Raja Mahendra Pratap (active in Germany and Afghanistan), Jatin Mukherjee (popularly known as Bagha Jatin), Rash Behari Bose, Lala Hardayal, and Madam Cama — figures who carried on revolutionary activity and anti-British propaganda across several countries.
  • Their dream of a free India was not realised in their own lifetimes, but their example continued to inspire revolutionary activity long after them, leaving a lasting impression on Indian political consciousness.

The Three Phases of the Revolutionary Movement

The revolutionary movement can usefully be divided into three broad phases, each with its own distinct character.

The First Phase (1897–1910)

Akharas and the Earliest Secret Societies

• Akharas — institutions promoting physical culture and an interest in militant politics — were set up across many parts of Bengal through the 1860s and 1870s, serving as precursors to the earliest secret societies that emerged in Bengal around 1902, three in Calcutta and one in Midnapore.
  • The Midnapore Secret Society was founded by the brothers Jnanendranath and Satyendranath Basu, along with Hemchandra Kanungo.
  • Sarala Ghoshal started a gymnasium for sword and lathi practice to train revolutionaries for action.
  • The Atmonnati Samiti was set up by Nibaran Bhattacharya, among others.
  • The Anushilan Samiti was founded by Satishchandra Basu.

The Swadeshi Movement and the Growth of Secret Societies

• It was the popular upsurge of the Swadeshi Movement in 1905 that triggered a sudden surge in the activities of these secret societies, along with the birth of many more.
  • The Dacca chapter of the Anushilan Samiti was founded by Pulin Behari Das in 1906, and in both Dacca and Midnapore, the Swadeshi movement was, to a significant extent, stage-managed by these secret societies.
  • In 1906, Hemchandra Kanungo travelled to Europe to train with revolutionaries there, while Aurobindo Ghosh and Charu Chandra Dutt launched a weekly called Yugantar.
  • The group also set up a religious school and bomb-making factory at Maniktala, drawing on Hemchandra’s newly acquired expertise from his European training.

The Alipore Bomb Case, 1908

• The movement’s first successful assassination attempt was undertaken by Khudiram Bose and Prafulla Chaki, two young members of the Samiti, who threw a bomb at a carriage they believed was carrying the magistrate Kingsford — but which instead killed the wife and daughter of a barrister, Pringle Kennedy.
  • Within 36 hours, nearly the entire group had been rounded up and arrested, with the exception of Aurobindo and Hemchandra; Prafulla Chaki shot himself rather than be captured, while Khudiram Bose was sent to the gallows. The incident was followed by a further series of retaliatory killings.
  • Around the same time, the Dacca Anushilan Samiti made its own presence felt through the Barrah dacoity of 1908.

Unrest in the Deccan

• Although Bengal remained the nerve centre of this kind of revolutionary activity, discontent was equally rife in the Deccan — particularly in the aftermath of the plague epidemic, during which the destruction of property and the forcible hospitalisation of the sick had generated deep resentment among Indians.
  • The westernised social reformers of Bombay also provoked angry reactions from those who viewed them as defilers of age-old Hindu norms.
• The Chapekar brothers had assassinated W.C. Rand, the Plague Commissioner of Pune, in 1897, for which they were hanged in 1898 — a martyrdom that deeply influenced V.D. Savarkar, who ran a group called the Mitra Mela, later reconstituted as Abhinav Bharat.

Revolutionary Activity from Europe

• A significant number of Indian revolutionaries worked for the cause from Europe during this period. In 1905, Shyamji Krishna Varma founded the India Home Rule Society, launched the Indian Sociologist journal, and established India House to help fund Indian students studying abroad.
  • India House became a meeting place for a wide circle of revolutionary leaders, including P.M. Bapat, Virendranath Chattopadhyay, Lala Hardayal, Bhai Parmanand, Madanlal Dhingra, V.V.S. Aiyar, Madame Cama, and Savarkar, who had himself left for London in 1906.
  • Savarkar’s elder brother, Ganesh Savarkar, was sentenced to life imprisonment in India; in retaliation, Jackson, the Collector of Nasik, was assassinated, and Madanlal Dhingra shot dead Curzon Wyllie, an officer connected with India House — Dhingra himself being hanged in May 1909.
• Those involved in the Muzaffarpur blast and the bomb factory uncovered at the Maniktala garden house were tried in 1910, with some hanged and others deported for life.
  • Savarkar was transported for life to the Andamans, and following Dhingra’s execution, his revolutionary associates in London — now under close police surveillance — were forced to leave for Paris, Berlin, and Geneva.
• These events collectively brought the intense first phase of revolutionary activity to a close.

The Second Phase (1910–1918)

Expansion to Other Parts of India

• The second phase was crucial in that centres of revolutionary activity now emerged across many different parts of the country.
  • Secret societies took root in Benaras and Dehradun under Rash Behari Bose and Sachindranath Sanyal; similar organisations were established in Punjab under Ajit Singh, Bhai Parmanand, and Hardayal, with the encouragement of Lala Lajpat Rai and Hansraj.
  • The Anushilan Samiti in Dhaka and the Yugantar group in Calcutta, under Jatindranath Mukherjee, expanded their operations, while the Bharat Mata Association emerged at Tirunelveli, in the Madras Presidency.
  • These secret societies continued to target British officials and carry out dacoities to raise funds, with their leaders establishing links with one another and seeking sympathy and arms from beyond India’s borders.

The Ghadar Conspiracy of 1915

• Revolutionaries based in Europe kept up attacks on the colonial government through their journals, but the most significant development of this second phase was the emergence of a movement along the Pacific coast of America and British Columbia, led by Punjabi traders, peasants, and workers who had emigrated from India.
  • This movement, centred at San Francisco and known as the Ghadar party after its popular publication, was established in 1913 under the leadership of Lala Hardayal and Sohan Singh Bhakhna, with a similar organisation, “Free Hindustan,” established at Vancouver, Canada.
  • Its aim was to exploit Britain’s wartime preoccupation to Indian advantage, link up with Britain’s enemies — notably Germany and Turkey — and organise an uprising in India by 1915, with the help of sympathetic sepoys.
    • Leaders inside India, including Rash Behari Bose, Jatindranath Mukherjee, Vishnu Ganesh Pingle, and Sachindranath Sanyal, were to coordinate with the diaspora leadership to ensure the uprising’s success.
• The Ghadar journal circulated widely among Indians across the world — in America, Canada, Shanghai, Hong Kong, Manila, Penang, and Singapore — with local “branches” springing up almost spontaneously in many of these locations to build sympathy and excitement for the revolution, even as Indian leaders simultaneously negotiated with the Germans, who were eager to cause trouble for Britain in its colonies, to secure arms and ammunition.
• The date for revolution in northern India was fixed at 21 February 1915, by which point almost 8,000 Ghadarites had entered Punjab and spread across the north, making contact with garrisons at Lahore, Rawalpindi, Ferozepur, Banaras, Danapur, and Fort William.
  • The plan ultimately ended in fiasco: the promised German arms shipment never arrived, and the British uncovered the conspiracy in time. In the crackdown that followed, 46 Ghadarites were executed, 64 transported for life, and hundreds more sentenced to life imprisonment.
  • Sachindranath Sanyal was deported for life, Jatindranath Mukherjee died in a gun battle with the police, and Rash Behari Bose managed to escape to Japan.

The Third Phase (1918–1938)

• The early years of this third phase were marked by a relative lull, as Gandhi’s entry onto the political stage had reinvigorated genuine mass support — visible in the sheer scale of participation in the Non-Cooperation Movement of 1920, which the revolutionaries themselves watched unfold with a degree of admiration.
  • This euphoria proved short-lived, however: Gandhi’s abrupt suspension of the movement in February 1922, at the very peak of its momentum, caused widespread dismay within the Congress and the country at large — a moment that directly precipitated this third revolutionary phase.
  • Revolutionary activity re-emerged with the explicit aim of tapping into the strength of mass agitation, but through methods diametrically opposed to Gandhi’s philosophy of ahimsa.

Toward a Broader Ideology of Socio-Economic Emancipation

• Preparation for armed struggle against the British continued much as before, through secret societies, bomb factories, assassinations, and “political dacoities.” Alongside this, however, emerged a genuine attempt to develop a broader ideology of socio-economic emancipation for the country’s poor through revolution.
  • The movement’s centres were now spread across Bengal, the United Provinces, and Punjab. In Bengal, a “New Violence Party” emerged in 1923, establishing links with the Hindustan Republican Association (HRA), which itself was centred in the United Provinces.
  • In 1925, HRA activists carried out a daring “dacoity” at Kakori, fourteen miles from Lucknow, holding up a train — an act for which many were later arrested.
• The most significant developments of this period unfolded in UP and Punjab. The HRA’s own ideology aimed not merely at overthrowing the British colonial state, but at replacing it with a “federal republic” in India, to be established through mass participation and universal suffrage, with the explicit purpose of ending the exploitation of the poor.
  • Important HRA members — Ashfaqullah Khan, Ram Prasad Bismil, Rajendranath Lahiri, and Thakur Roshan Singh — faced death fearlessly in 1927 for their role in the Kakori Conspiracy Case. Following their hanging, the movement’s remaining leaders, now under close police surveillance, met in Delhi in 1928 to establish the Hindustan Socialist Republican Army (HSRA).
• The young Bhagat Singh emerged as the HSRA’s principal ideologue, giving the movement a clear Marxist-Socialist orientation, with its efforts directed primarily at spreading revolutionary ideas among peasants, students, and workers.
  • In December 1928, Bhagat Singh, Sukhdev, and Rajguru killed the police official Saunders, in retaliation for the death of Lala Lajpat Rai during the lathi-charge on anti-Simon Commission protesters — an act that transformed the trio into national heroes.
  • In 1929, Bhagat Singh and Batukeshwar Dutt hurled deliberately harmless bombs inside the Central Legislative Assembly, intending, in their words, to “make the deaf hear,” and scattered HSRA leaflets before courting arrest. They were subsequently tried in the Lahore and UP Conspiracy Cases.
  • Turning their imprisonment into a political platform, they campaigned for the rights of political prisoners through prolonged hunger strikes; Jatin Das died in prison after an extraordinary 64-day fast, and the resulting public attention allowed the group to propagate its ideas and inspire the country to further action.

Surya Sen’s Chittagong Uprising

• In Bengal specifically, national independence — rather than socialist revolution as such — remained the more urgent and cherished goal.
  • Surya Sen, a revolutionary from Chittagong who had evaded police at Shovabazar, worked to reorganise revolutionary activity across Bengal, Bihar, Assam, and UP. In 1928, along with his associates, he established the Indian Revolutionary Association (IRA) at Chittagong, modelled explicitly on the Irish Sinn Féin.
  • The organisation planned a military insurrection aimed at seizing Chittagong and declaring it a republic; on 22 April 1930, it fought a fierce gun battle with the police, losing 13 of its members.
• Following this engagement, the IRA turned to a sustained campaign of “khanda juddha”, or guerrilla warfare, against the colonial state — a struggle that continued for some time, until Surya Sen’s own arrest in February 1933, followed by that of his closest aides, Tarakeswar Dastidar and Kalpana Datta, in May 1933.
  • Bhagat Singh and his associates, including Chandrashekhar Azad, had already been killed in 1931; Surya Sen and Tarakeswar Dastidar were sentenced to death, and Kalpana Datta to life imprisonment, in 1934.
• Some revolutionary activity continued sporadically thereafter, often intended to avenge these losses, though with diminishing impact. In 1938, the Yugantar group — the longest-lived of India’s revolutionary organisations — formally decided to dissolve itself, bringing this long chapter of the Indian freedom struggle to its symbolic close.