Gandhi Enters the Freedom Struggle

By the end of the Swadeshi movement and the subsequent split of the Indian National Congress in 1907, the Indian freedom struggle had hit a roadblock. The Moderates were relying on polite petitions that the British largely ignored, while the Extremists faced severe government repression. The movement was fragmented, largely confined to the educated middle class, and desperately in need of a new direction.

Enter Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi.

When Gandhi returned to India in 1915, he did not immediately launch a nationwide rebellion. Instead, he spent his first few years quietly traveling, observing, and testing a radically new political weapon he had forged in South Africa. This chapter covers that crucial transitional period: how Gandhi introduced Satyagraha to Indian soil, how he won three back-to-back local victories, and how the horrific Jallianwala Bagh massacre transformed him from a loyal subject of the British Empire into its most formidable opponent.

The Return of the Mahatma (1915)

Gandhi arrived in Bombay on January 9, 1915, after spending 21 years in South Africa. (This day is now celebrated in India as Pravasi Bharatiya Divas).

In South Africa, Gandhi had gone from being a shy, struggling lawyer to a seasoned political organizer. He had successfully united a diverse Indian diaspora—Hindus, Muslims, rich merchants, and poor indentured laborers—to fight against the racist policies of the colonial government. It was there that he developed his signature methods of protest.

When he returned to India, he was already a respected figure among nationalist leaders, but he was largely disconnected from the ground realities of Indian village life. His political mentor, the veteran Moderate leader Gopal Krishna Gokhale, gave him a crucial piece of advice: spend one entire year touring India with your ears open and your mouth shut.

Gandhi obeyed. He traveled across the country in third-class railway compartments, witnessing the crushing poverty, the rigid caste divisions, and the daily humiliations suffered by ordinary Indians. He realized that for any freedom struggle to succeed, it could not just be a debate club for wealthy lawyers in cities. It had to become a mass movement of the peasants, the workers, and the poor.

The Twin Pillars: Satyagraha and Ahimsa

To mobilize the masses, Gandhi introduced a philosophy that would define the rest of the Indian freedom struggle. It rested on two inseparable concepts.

Many people mistakenly confuse Satyagraha with "passive resistance." Gandhi hated that term. To him, Satyagraha was intensely active. It required immense courage to stand unarmed before a charging police baton and refuse to strike back, yet refuse to run away.

Before applying this method to the whole of India, Gandhi tested it in three specific, localized disputes. These three early movements—Champaran, Ahmedabad, and Kheda—were his laboratory.

1. Champaran Satyagraha (1917): The First Civil Disobedience

In the Champaran district of Bihar, peasant farmers were trapped in a deeply exploitative system run by European indigo planters.

Under a system known as the Tinkathia system, the European planters legally bound the Indian peasants to grow indigo (a blue dye used in textiles) on 3/20th of their land. The problem? By the late 19th century, Germany had invented cheaper synthetic chemical dyes. Indigo was no longer profitable. To maintain their own profits, the European planters began illegally demanding heavy rents and arbitrary taxes from the peasants to release them from the obligation of growing indigo.

A local farmer named Rajkumar Shukla relentlessly followed Gandhi across India, begging him to come to Champaran and see the farmers' plight. In 1917, Gandhi finally agreed.

When Gandhi arrived in Champaran, the British authorities immediately ordered him to leave the district. Gandhi did something unprecedented: he politely refused. He stated that he would stay and was willing to go to jail for disobeying the order. This was India's first taste of Civil Disobedience under Gandhi.

Baffled by his calm defiance and fearing a massive public uprising, the government backed down and allowed him to conduct his inquiry.

Gandhi's Method: He didn't just give fiery speeches. He acted like the lawyer he was. He and his team (which included future President Dr. Rajendra Prasad) systematically recorded the detailed testimonies of over 8,000 peasants, building an undeniable mountain of evidence against the planters.

The Result: The government was forced to set up an inquiry commission, making Gandhi a member. The commission found the planters guilty, abolished the Tinkathia system, and ordered the planters to refund a portion of the illegally extracted money to the peasants. Gandhi had won his first battle in India.

2. Ahmedabad Mill Strike (1918): The First Hunger Strike

The following year, Gandhi intervened in a dispute in his home state of Gujarat, this time involving industrial workers rather than farmers.

In Ahmedabad, a severe outbreak of the bubonic plague had caused textile mill workers to flee the city. To keep them working, the mill owners had introduced a "plague bonus," which was sometimes as high as 75% of their regular wages. When the plague subsided in 1918, the owners decided to withdraw the bonus. However, due to the ongoing First World War, the prices of basic goods (food, cloth, salt) had skyrocketed. The workers demanded a 50% wage hike to survive the inflation; the owners offered a mere 20% and threatened to fire anyone who refused.

Gandhi was invited to intervene by Anusuya Sarabhai, a social worker who was ironically the sister of Ambalal Sarabhai, the president of the mill owners' association.

Gandhi studied the living costs and advised the workers to demand a 35% wage increase—a fair middle ground. He organized peaceful strikes and daily prayer meetings. However, as the strike dragged on, the starving workers began to lose morale. Some threatened to return to work; others threatened violence against the owners.

To rally the workers and ensure they remained strictly non-violent, Gandhi took a drastic step: he declared a fast unto death.

This was Gandhi's first use of the hunger strike as a political weapon in India. The fast put immense moral and public pressure on the mill owners (who deeply respected Gandhi personally).

The Result: After just three days of Gandhi fasting, the mill owners caved. They agreed to submit the dispute to a tribunal, which ultimately awarded the workers the exact 35% wage increase Gandhi had calculated.

3. Kheda Satyagraha (1918): The First Non-Cooperation

Almost simultaneously with the Ahmedabad strike, a crisis unfolded in the Kheda district of Gujarat.

The farmers in Kheda were facing total ruin. A severe drought had destroyed their crops, and a plague epidemic was sweeping through the villages. According to the government's own revenue code, if the crop yield was less than one-fourth (25%) of the normal yield, the farmers were legally entitled to a total remission of their land revenue (taxes) for that year.

Despite the obvious crop failure, the British officials ruthlessly ignored the rule and demanded full tax payment, seizing the cattle and property of anyone who couldn't pay.

Gandhi, along with a rising young lawyer named Vallabhbhai Patel (who would later become the "Iron Man of India"), organized the farmers. Gandhi asked them to take a solemn pledge: they would not pay a single penny of tax, even if the government confiscated their land and threw them in jail.

This was the first instance of Non-Cooperation at a mass level. The farmers stood firm. They allowed their property to be seized without fighting back, but they absolutely refused to pay the tax.

The Result: Realizing they could not arrest an entire district, the government secretly issued orders to collect taxes only from those who could afford to pay, effectively suspending the tax for the poor farmers and returning the confiscated property. It was another resounding victory.

The Rowlatt Act (1919): The Black Act

By the end of 1918, Gandhi had proven that Satyagraha worked on a local level. But events in 1919 would force him to launch his first all-India movement.

During the First World War (1914-1918), India had contributed massively to the British war effort, sending over a million soldiers and millions of pounds in funding. Indian leaders, including Gandhi, had supported the British, expecting that in return, India would be granted significant political concessions and steps toward self-government.

Instead, the British rewarded India with betrayal. Fearing that the nationalist movement would surge after the war, the British government passed the Anarchical and Revolutionary Crimes Act of 1919, universally known as the Rowlatt Act (named after Sir Sidney Rowlatt, who chaired the committee that drafted it).

The Rowlatt Act was a draconian piece of legislation. It allowed the British colonial government to:

1. 1Arrest any Indian on mere suspicion of "treason."
2. 2Imprison them for up to two years without trial.
3. 3Deny the accused the right to legal representation or the right to know the evidence against them.

The Indian public was outraged. The popular slogan summarizing the sheer injustice of the act was: *"No Dalil, No Vakil, No Appeal"* (No arguments, no lawyer, no appeal).

Gandhi decided it was time to scale up his methods. He called for a nationwide Rowlatt Satyagraha. He asked the country to observe April 6, 1919, as a day of national fasting, prayer, and a total hartal (strike). Shops were closed, public transport stopped, and millions of Indians took to the streets in peaceful protest.

However, the masses were not yet fully trained in the strict discipline of Ahimsa. In several cities, protests turned violent, with clashes between the police and the public. Disturbed by the violence, Gandhi would soon call off the Satyagraha, but the chain of events had already been set in motion, leading to the darkest day in British Indian history.

The Jallianwala Bagh Massacre (April 13, 1919)

The epicenter of the anti-Rowlatt protests was the province of Punjab. The British administration there, led by Lieutenant Governor Michael O'Dwyer, was notoriously harsh.

On April 10, 1919, the British police in Amritsar arrested two highly respected local leaders—Dr. Saifuddin Kitchlew and Dr. Satyapal—under the Rowlatt Act and deported them to an unknown location. This sparked massive, angry protests in Amritsar, leading to violence, the burning of town halls, and the deaths of a few Europeans.

In response, the city was handed over to the military commander, Brigadier-General Reginald Dyer. Dyer immediately imposed martial law, banning all public meetings and gatherings. However, this martial law was not widely announced to the general public.

The Day of Baisakhi

April 13, 1919, was the day of Baisakhi, a major harvest festival in Punjab. Thousands of men, women, and children from surrounding villages had come to Amritsar to celebrate the festival and visit the Golden Temple.

Unaware of General Dyer's ban on public meetings, a large crowd gathered in an enclosed ground called Jallianwala Bagh, located near the Golden Temple. While a portion of the crowd was there to peacefully protest the arrest of Dr. Kitchlew and Dr. Satyapal, the vast majority were simply families resting and celebrating the festival.

Jallianwala Bagh was surrounded on all sides by high walls and buildings, with only one narrow entrance.

The Massacre

At around 5:30 PM, General Dyer entered Jallianwala Bagh with a detachment of 50 armed soldiers. He did not order the crowd to disperse. He did not fire a warning shot.

He simply blocked the only exit and ordered his men to open fire directly into the dense, unarmed crowd.

Dyer then marched his men away, leaving the dead and wounded bleeding on the ground. Because of the strict curfew, families could not even enter the Bagh to rescue their dying loved ones that night.

The Aftermath and the Hunter Commission

The official British government figures claimed that 379 people died. The Indian National Congress's own inquiry estimated that over 1,000 innocent people were slaughtered, and more than 1,500 were severely injured.

The brutality shocked the conscience of the entire nation.

• Rabindranath Tagore, the great poet and Nobel laureate, renounced his British Knighthood in deep anguish, writing that "badges of honour make our shame glaring in their incongruous context of humiliation."
• Gandhi, who had spent his life believing in the fundamental sense of British justice, was shattered. He realized that the British Empire was fundamentally "satanic" and could not be reformed; it had to be removed.

To pacify the global and national outrage, the British government appointed the Hunter Commission to investigate the massacre. General Dyer appeared before the commission and showed absolutely no remorse. He proudly stated that his intention was not just to disperse the crowd, but to "produce a moral effect" and strike terror into the hearts of all Indians.

While the Hunter Commission mildly condemned Dyer and forced him to resign from the military, he was never subjected to any penal or legal action. Worse, when he returned to England, he was hailed as a hero by many British imperialists, and a large sum of money was collected as a reward for him.

This complete lack of justice for Jallianwala Bagh, combined with the betrayal of the Rowlatt Act, set the stage for Gandhi to launch his first truly massive, nationwide rebellion: The Non-Cooperation Movement.

Quick Revision

• Gandhi's Return: Arrived in India in 1915 from South Africa. Advised by Gokhale to tour the country for a year.
• Satyagraha & Ahimsa: The twin pillars of Gandhi's philosophy—active, non-violent resistance to injustice based on truth.
• Champaran (1917): Fought against the Tinkathia system (indigo farming). Marked the First Civil Disobedience in India.
• Ahmedabad Mill Strike (1918): Dispute over the plague bonus and inflation. Marked Gandhi's First Hunger Strike.
• Kheda Satyagraha (1918): Fought for tax remission during crop failure. Marked the First Non-Cooperation. (Remember the order: CAKE).
• Rowlatt Act (1919): Draconian law allowing arrest without trial ("No Dalil, No Vakil, No Appeal"). Sparked the first all-India Satyagraha.
• Jallianwala Bagh (April 13, 1919): Unarmed crowd gathered on Baisakhi. General Dyer blocked the exit and opened fire, killing hundreds.
• Key Arrests: The crowd at Jallianwala Bagh was partly protesting the arrest of Dr. Saifuddin Kitchlew and Dr. Satyapal.
• Aftermath: Rabindranath Tagore renounced his Knighthood. The British appointed the Hunter Commission, which let Dyer off with a mere resignation.