Quit India Movement

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The Quit India movement ( Hindi भारत छोड़ो आन्दोलन bhārat choṛo āndolan ) was a mass movement in British India proclaimed on August 8, 1942 by Mohandas Gandhi . The movement called for the complete withdrawal of British colonial rulers from India. The slogan "Quit India!" ("Give up India!"), However, did not come from Gandhi himself.

prehistory

India's entry into World War II in 1939

After the German invasion of Poland on September 1, 1939, the United Kingdom declared war on Germany on September 3, 1939. On the same day, the incumbent Viceroy of India, Lord Linlithgow, followed suit with a declaration for British India . Prior to his proclamation, the Viceroy had not consulted any of the elected representatives of the Indian provincial administrations. He was not constitutionally obliged to do so, but this unilateral act met with strong displeasure and sharp protests from the Indian National Congress . In a meeting of the Congress Working Committee (CWC), the highest governing body of the Congress, this decided against the vote of Gandhi to withdraw in protest from all provincial governments. The resolution passed by the CWC on September 14, 1939 stated that the question of war and peace must be decided by the Indian people and that no outside authority could make this decision in their place. The Indian people cannot accept that their resources are "exploited for imperialist purposes". They did not want to contribute to the war effort as long as India was not really an equal member of the British Empire . As a result, by October 1939, the Ministers belonging to the Congress in the provincial governments resigned from their offices. After the resignation of the Congress governments, other political groups that rivaled Congress saw their chance. In particular, the Muslim League under Muhammad Ali Jinnah , which pretended to be the representative of all Indian Muslims, but had performed rather disappointingly in the provincial elections and had not achieved a majority anywhere in the Muslim provinces, completely sided with the British war effort, which is why Jinnah is increasingly gained influence. On December 2, 1939, Jinnah called on the Indian Muslims to celebrate December 22, 1939 as the "Day of Deliverance" from congressional rule.

The years 1940 to 1942

On March 23, 1940, in the Lahore resolution , the Muslim League for the first time publicly proclaimed the goal of forming a Muslim state, later called "Pakistan", from the predominantly Muslim areas of British India. In June 1940 the Congress Working Committee of the Congress at its meeting in Poona ( Pune ) made the viceroy an offer to actively support the British war effort in the event of the formation of a national government for British India (the so-called "Poona Offer" , Poona Offer ). The offer was not linked to specific demands for immediate changes in the law (although such changes were of course expected in the later period). The Viceroy responded on August 8, 1940 with an explanation of the positions of the British government (so-called "August Offer", August Offer ). In it he announced an expansion of the Executive Council (an advisory body of the viceroy) to include some Indian representatives and proposed changes to the Government of India Act, 1935 after the end of the war. After practically all Indian political groups had rejected the “August offer” as insufficient, the viceroy withdrew it.

The first two years of the war were very unfavorable for the British. Especially after the military defeat and the occupation of the allied France in the summer of 1940, a British victory seemed increasingly unlikely, and a British defeat more and more likely. From mid-1940 to mid-1941 there was a real possibility of a German invasion of the British Isles . With the initial German military successes after the attack on the Soviet Union , a direct invasion of British India via the Middle East or Central Asia even appeared to be possible in the long term. Japan, on the other hand, had entered the war against the United Kingdom in 1941. On February 15, 1942, Singapore , the strongest British fortress in East Asia, fell into the hands of the Japanese and from January 1942, the Japanese invaded the British crown colony of Burma . On March 8, 1942, Rangoon , the capital of Burma, was captured by the Japanese army, and in May 1942 Japanese troops stood on the eastern border of British India.

The developments in the war gave a boost to Indian nationalists, who believed that the time had come to achieve India's independence in a struggle for freedom in this weak phase of the British Empire. There were currents within Congress that Gandhi's policies of peaceful compromise and passive resistance resisted. One exponent of this trend was Subhash Chandra Bose , who had been President of Congress in 1939. Bose called for active resistance against the colonial administration, eventually came into conflict with the congressional leadership under Gandhi and founded his own faction and later party, the All India Forward Bloc . Bose fled from the house arrest under which the colonial government had placed him, and went first to Germany and from 1942 to Japan, from where he built an Indian army abroad and an Indian government in exile that worked with the Axis powers .

The Cripps Mission

In March 1942, Labor politician Stafford Cripps , a member of Churchill's War Cabinet , traveled to India to negotiate with the leaders of Congress and persuade them to support the British war effort. As an offer, he made the granting of full Dominion status for India, but only after the end of the war. Gandhi met Cripps on March 27, 1942. The British government's proposals were rejected by Congress leaders. The main point of criticism remained the unspecified timing of India's future independence. Gandhi called Cripps' proposal a " post-dated check on a failing bank" . The Cripps proposals also contained the provision that each province or its elected representatives should decide for themselves whether to join the future Dominion India. Some congressional leaders saw this as an implicit recognition of the concept of Pakistan because the provinces with a Muslim majority could split off. The leaders of the Muslim League were more willing to accept the Cripps proposals. However, the idea that the provinces should freely decide whether they belong to India did not correspond to Jinnah's communal Pakistani idea, according to which all regions of British India with a majority Muslim population should belong to the newly created state of Pakistan regardless of their political will. Ultimately, the Cripps mission failed as Indian political leaders saw the British proposals as inadequate.

Quit India Resolution 1942

Nehru and Gandhi during the All-India Congress Committee meeting on August 8, 1942 in Bombay
Mass demonstration in Bangalore, South India, during the Quit India campaign

From April 27 to May 1, 1942, the All India Congress Committee (AICC) met in Allahabad and again on July 14, 1942 in Wardha and authorized Gandhi to proclaim a nonviolent mass movement. The AICC worked out a draft resolution that would later become known as the Quit India Resolution . The main points of this resolution were the following: (i) an invitation to the British colonial rulers to leave India, (ii) India had become a war zone as a result of British imperialism, (iii) no foreign aid was necessary for the freedom of India, (iv ) India has no conflicts with any other country, (v) if there were a Japanese invasion of India it would be met with non-violent resistance, (vi) the forms of non-cooperation were set out, and (vii) foreign soldiers on Indian soil are a great threat.

From August 7th to 8th, 1942, the All India Congress Committee (AICC) met in Bombay . Congressional leaders made brief speeches at a public event held at Gowalia Tank Maidan , a central park in Bombay where thousands of people had gathered. In his speech, Gandhi claimed that the members of the AICC spoke for the whole of India and all population groups, called on the British to withdraw from India and called for non-violent resistance to colonial rule.

The reaction of the British-Indian colonial administration was prompt, as the British were well informed about the activities of Congress through shop stewards and agents. On August 9, 1942, Gandhi was arrested along with members of the Congress Working Committee and other Congress leaders across the country under the Defense of India Rules . The number of people arrested was around 60,000 nationwide. The institutions of the Congress - Working Committee , All India Congress Committee and the four Provincial Congress Committees were declared illegal bodies under the Criminal Law Amendment Act, 1908 . The colonial government issued a general ban on assembly. Despite the repressive measures, there was unorganized resistance, and later organized resistance from the underground. The resistance was predominantly non-violent, but some were also violent with acts of sabotage, attacks on government facilities, arson, etc. Dozens of police officers and hundreds of civilians or resistance fighters died as a result of the unrest. The acts of sabotage were directed primarily against infrastructure facilities. Hundreds of railroad stations and post offices were attacked and in some cases destroyed, and thousands of telephone lines were cut. The provinces hardest hit by the actions were the eastern part of the United Provinces and Bihar, while the provinces of Punjab, Sindh, Assam, Orissa and the North-West Frontier Province were barely affected. The main phase of the actions were the months of August and September 1942.

The movement was taken very seriously by the British colonial government. In a letter to Churchill dated late August 1942, Viceroy Lord Linlithgow stated that the movement was "by far the most serious rebellion since that of 1857 ", the severity and extent of which had been hidden from the world for reasons of military secrecy.

Opposition to the Quit India movement

In addition to the colonial government, there were a number of political groups that spoke out against the movement proclaimed by Congress.

Muslim League

The Muslim League spoke out against the movement because it feared that if British India were to gain immediate independence, it would not achieve its political goals, particularly the creation of Pakistan. By consistently supporting the British war effort, she hoped to gain greater weight as a negotiating partner with the British, which it actually did. The Muslim League was accepted by the British side as practically the sole point of contact and lobbyist for Muslim affairs, although according to the election results so far it was not and, for example, many Muslims were active in Congress.

Communist Party

The Communist Party of India , founded in the 1920s, was officially banned until 1942. Since the German attack on the Soviet Union, it has unreservedly supported the British war effort and had already spoken out in favor of accepting the Cripps proposals. Accordingly, she also rejected the Quit India campaign. On July 24, 1942, the colonial government lifted the previous ban on communist associations and the communists stepped out of their previous illegality.

Hindu nationalists

The Hindu nationalist association Hindu Mahasabha and the cadres Association Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) declined to take part in the Quit India movement from - mainly of fundamental opposition to the Congress.

Princely states

The Indian princely states were in strict opposition to the Indian independence movement, as they rightly suspected that the independence of India would also end the princely rule. They supported the maintenance of the political status quo .

Further development

The British managed to largely suppress the independence movement until 1944. The arrested leaders of Congress were released at the end of the war. For example, Jawaharlal Nehru remained in custody until June 15, 1945. After that, it took another two years for India to finally gain independence.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ According to Gandhi's colleague Pyarelal , the movement got its name from an American press representative after an interview with Gandhi. The term 'Quit India' then quickly spread. Gandhi himself said in his Quit India speech on August 8, 1942 by a "withdrawal of British power" ( withdrawal of British power ). See Raj Kumar: Essays on Indian Freedom Movement . Discovery Publishing Pvt. Ltd., 2010, ISBN 978-81-7141-705-6 , Chapter 8: Quit India Movement, pp. 104-109 (English).
  2. ↑ 1942 Quit India Movement. The Open University, accessed November 3, 2016 .
  3. ↑ Devendra Panigrahi: India's Partition: The Story of Imperialism in Retreat . Routledge, London, New York 2004, ISBN 0-7146-5601-1 , pp. 113 (English).
  4. ^ Deepak Pandey: Congress-Muslim League Relations 1937-39: 'The Parting of the Ways' . tape 12 , no. 4 , October 1978, p. 629-654 , doi : 10.1017 / S0026749X00006351 (English).
  5. ↑ a b Sukanta Pramanik: Cripps Mission: the Beginning Process to the way of Indian Independence . In: IOSR Journal Of Humanities And Social Science (IOSR-JHSS) . tape 19 , no. 3 , March 2014, ISSN  2279-0837 , p. 1-7 (English).
  6. ^ SR Bakshi: Gandhi and the Mass Movements . Atlantic Publishers & Distributors, New Delhi 1988, chapter 8. Final Challenge to the Raj, p. 243 ff . (English).
  7. ^ A b c Ranbir Vohra: The Making of India - A Political History . 3. Edition. ME Sharpe, Armonk 2013, ISBN 978-0-7656-2367-6 , pp. 170-174 (English).
  8. ↑ John Glendevon: The Viceroy at Bay . Collins, 1971, ISBN 0-00-211476-3 , pp. 248-249 (English).
  9. ^ The time to quit India had come. rediff.com, August 9, 2002, accessed July 15, 2017 .
  10. ↑ Kiran Maitra: Marxism in India . The Lotus Collection, New Delhi 2012, ISBN 978-81-7436-847-8 , chapter 4. India accepts Marxism, p. 169 (English).
  11. ^ Anand Patwardhan: How the Sangh Parivar systematically attacks the very idea of ​​India. scroll.in, November 13, 2014, accessed on July 15, 2017 (English).
  12. ↑ Ninth Imprisonment: August 9, 1942 - June 15, 1945. nehruportal.nic.in, accessed on July 15, 2017 (English).