Ghadar Movement, History, Objectives, Ghadar Party Founder

Ghadar Movement

Indian immigrants who had immigrated to the United States of America established the Ghadar Movement, a political revolutionary group. Sikhs played a major role in the Ghadar Party’s creation. The foundation for an Indian political organisation in the United States and Canada was set by prominent leaders like Sohan Singh, Kartar Singh, Abdul Mohamed Barakatullah, and Rashbehari Bose. An important turning point in the history of the Indian freedom fight was the Ghadar Movement. The Ghadar Movement will be covered in this article, which will be beneficial for UPSC exam preparation.

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Ghadar Movement History

At the turn of the 20th century, the burgeoning Indian Independence Struggle spurred a surge in nationalist feelings among students and emigrants from the Indian subcontinent all over the world as well as within the Indian subcontinent itself. Revolutionary intellectuals tried to organise these pupils while instilling nationalist beliefs in them, such as Lala Har Dayal and Taraknath Das.

In order to conduct revolutionary activities, activists in the past founded the “Swadesh Sevak Home” in Vancouver and the “United India House” in Seattle. Eventually, the Ghadar was established in 1913. The Ghadar Movement was established on July 15, 1913, in the United States by Lala Har Dayal, Sant Baba Wasakha Singh Dadehar, Baba Jawala Singh, Santokh Singh, and Sohan Singh Bhakna. Originally called the Pacific Coast Hindustan Organization. Among Indian expatriates in the United States, Canada, East Africa, and Asia, the Ghadar party attracted sizable support.

Gadar Party Formation

Sohan Singh Bhakna served as the organization’s president when the Ghadar Party, formerly known as the Pacific Coast Hindustan Association, was established in 1913 in the United States under the direction of Har Dayal. It attracted participants who were mostly Punjabi Indian immigrants. Many of its members, including Dayal, Tarak Nath Das, Kartar Singh Sarabha, and V.G. Pingle, attended the University of California, Berkeley. Indian expatriates quickly supported the party, particularly in the United States, Canada, and Asia. Los Angeles, Vienna, Washington, D.C., and Shanghai all hosted Ghadar Party.

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Gadar Party Significance

The Ghadar Party was a predominantly Indian-founded rebel group. The party included Sikh, Hindu, and Muslim members, but Sikh officials predominated. The party was multiethnic but primarily Punjabi. In Bengal, terrorist and revolutionary actions started to happen more frequently in the first decade of the 20th century.

However, a small number of terrorists were active in Madras and the Poona area prior to the 1915 planned uprising in Ghadar. Bengal gained notoriety as the key hub of revolutionary action. The bhadralok, Bengal’s elite population of Western-educated people, were the group who were most drawn to the movement.

The Ghadar party, which had its headquarters in San Francisco and its origins in the rural Californian Punjabi immigrant population, was also dedicated to bringing about the independence of India through revolution. Unlike in Bengal, the inspiration for terrorism and revolutionary violence in Punjab came from Punjabi peasants who had immigrated to the United States and Canada rather than a disgruntled and underemployed educated class.

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Ghadar Movement Activities

The Ghadar program sought to coordinate official assassinations, print anti-imperialist and revolutionary literature, collaborate with Indian troops stationed overseas, acquire weapons, and incite a simultaneous uprising in all British colonies. Some Ghadar Party members travelled to Punjab in 1914 when the First World War broke out in an effort to spark an armed uprising for India’s freedom. Additionally, they were effective at smuggling weapons and stirring up mutiny among Indian troops serving in the British Army.

The British brutally put down the ensuing rebellion, which is now known as the Ghadar Mutiny, and executed 42 mutineers after the Lahore Conspiracy Case trial. But from 1914 to 1917, the Ghadar Party resisted colonialism with the backing of Imperial Germany and the Ottoman Empire, two Central Powers hostile to the British.

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Gadar Party Founder

Angrezi Raj Ka Dushman was the masthead caption of the weekly daily The Ghadar, around which the party was, planned (an enemy of British rule). The Ghadar stated that he “wanted brave troops to incite rebellion in India.” In order to force the British out of India, thousands of Indians residing in the United States sold their businesses and homes after the Komagata Maru Incident in 1914, which was a direct challenge to Canadian anti-Indian immigration laws. This boosted the numbers of the Ghadar Party.

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Ghadar Movement Objectives

The ultimate objective of Ghadar was the armed overthrow of British colonial authority in India. It regarded the Congress-led mainstream drive for dominion status as modest and the latter’s constitutional methods as soft. The main plan of Ghadar was to incite the Indian soldiers to rebel. In order to achieve this, Ghadar established the Yugantar Ashram press in San Francisco in November 1913. The Hindustan Ghadar newspaper and other nationalist periodicals were created by the press.

The party made communication with well-known revolutionaries in India, such as Rash Behari Bose, towards the end of 1913. The Hindustan Ghadar’s Indian edition basically adopted anarchist and revolutionary terrorism philosophies in opposition to British interests in India.

As political unrest and violence increased in Punjab, the British Raj considered the Ghadarite publications that had travelled from California to Bombay to be seditious and outlawed them. The British government forced the American State Department to suppress Indian revolutionary activities and Ghadarite literature, which was mostly produced in San Francisco, as a result of these events and proof of previous Ghadarite incitement in the Delhi-Lahore Conspiracy of 1912.

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Ghadar Movement Causes of Failure

Before they even arrived in India, many Ghadar officials were detained, and after they disembarked, they were imprisoned. Kartar Singh Saraba, Pandit Kanshi Ram, and G. Pingale were among those who managed to avoid capture and assembled in Punjab to carry out the uprising. At the time, Michael O’ Dwyer served as the Lieutenant-General of Punjab.

Ghadar commanders in Punjab employed a variety of tactics. Both the native Punjabi people and the British referred to them as dacoits, and neither group welcomed them. The founders of the Ghadar were referred to as apostates by some Punjabi Sikhs. At the time, Sikhs were the most devoted soldiers in the British Army, and they had already received enough rewards from these positions. The Ghadar chiefs were horrified by how devoted to the British their people were. Gaining support from native Punjabis became crucial to the success of the movement.

They employed a variety of tactics to conduct operations inside of India, including enlisting Indian troops in the British Army. They were able to do this by covertly navigating through cantonments and having conversations with skilled troops in the lines. The 19-year-old Kartar Singh Saraba was most heavily engaged in this operation. The British-Indian government, headed by Michael O’Dwyer, launched an aggressive crackdown on the bombings after they sparked widespread unrest. O’Dwyer mandated that all Ghadar members, whether they were doing so lawfully or illegally, be imprisoned.

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Ghadar Movement Evolution

The success of the Ghadr movement was in the area of philosophy. While staying wholly secular, it preached virulent nationalism. It was lacking organised and consistent leadership, underestimated the amount of preparation needed on every level—organizational, ideological, financial, and tactical strategic—and perhaps Lala Hardayal was unsuited for the role of an organiser, which is why it failed to accomplish much politically and militarily.

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Ghadar Movement UPSC

The Ghadarites believed that India would be equally enthusiastic about revolution as it had been about their successful attempts to recruit Indians in the United States, but they soon realised that this was not the case. The Party was harshly condemned by the Indian National Congress, the priests of several significant Sikh gurdwaras, and numerous other nationalist figures in India.

The interconnectedness of colonisation, racial subjugation, and economic exploitation helped Ghadarites in North America mobilise thousands along the Pacific Coast, but they were unable to convince their Indian peers to join them. Everything you need to know about the Gadar Movement for UPSC Exam Preparation is covered in this article.

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