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FREEDOM MOVEMENT
Eternal India
encyclopedia
Kamaladevi Chattopadhyaya also took
part in the political struggle and suffered
imprisoflment. She along with some others
founded the All India Congress Socialist
Party.
Latika Ghose founded the Mahila Rashtras-
angha. The members of this organisation
picketed foreign liquor shops and courted
arrest. Urmila Devi founded the Nari
Satyagraha Committee whose programme
included boycott of foreign goods, propagat-
ing the cult of Swadeshi, starting women’s
societies (Mahila Samities) to bring about
communal amity and calling upon women to
join the National Congress etc.
Bengali women took part not only in
non-violent activities but were initiated into
the cult of revolutionary activities.
*
Pritilata Wadedar and a group of women
revolutionaries attacked the Pahartali
European Club in Chittagong.
*
On December 14,1931 two girl students
of Comilla, Santi Ghosh and Sunity
Chowdhury, shot dead C.G.B. Stevens,
the District Magistrate, in his bungalow.
BENGAL GOVERNOR SHOT
AT BY GIRL STUDENT
SIR STANLEY'S
MIRACULOUS ESCAPE
Hindustan Times
8, February, 1932.
*
On February 8, 1932 while. Stanley
Jackson, Governor of Bengal and Chan-
cellor of the Calcutta University, was
attending the annual convocation, Bina
Das (later Bhowmik) fired at him with a
revolver but failed to hit him.
*
On May 8, 1934 there was an abortive
attempt to kill the Governor, Anderson,
on the Lebong race course near Darjee-
ling. Ujjala Majumdar (later Rakshit)
was arrested for her complicity in the
offence and sentenced to rigorous im-
prisonment for 14 years.
There were other women who gave shel-
ter to the revolutionaries in their houses
unmindful of the consequences.
*
Sabitri Devi of Dhalghat. a village near
Chittagong, gave shelter to Masterda
(Surja Sen), who was an absconder from
justice, along with his followers, Nirmal
Sen, Apurba Sen and Pritilata Wadedar
in her house.
Madam Bhikhaji Rustam Cama, who has
been called the Mother of the Indian
Revolution, left India for Europe (Paris) in
1902 and dedicated her life to the service of
her motherland by means of revolutionary
propaganda in Europe and America. She was
the first Indian woman revolutionary at a time
when women did not participate in public life.
She represented India at the International
Socialist Congress at Stuttgart in 1907. She
moved there the following resolution: “That
the continuance of British rule in India is
positively disastrous and extremely injurious
to the best interests of India, and lovers of
freedom all over the world ought to co-
operate
in freeing from slavery the fifth of the human
race inhabiting that oppressed country, since
the perfect social state demands that no
people
should be subject to any despotic or
tyrannical
form of Government.” She made a fiery
speech enumerating the evils of British rule
in India and concluded her address by
unfolding the National Flag designed by
herself, a banner of three horizontal bands -
green, golden yellow and red. The British
delegation opposed the resolution and left the
conference in protest. The resolution was not
allowed to be put to vote by the President on
the ground that it was not submitted to the
International Bureau. Cama went to London
in 1908 to meet Bipin Chandra Pal and join
forces with other revolutionaries living there.
In 1909 she went to Paris. Following the
entente between Britain and France in 1914
the
Bande Mataram
which she edited in Paris
was suppressed by the French authorities.
When Indian troops arrived in France, Madam
Cama tried to instigate them with
revolutionary
ideas and even proceeded to Marseilles for the
purpose. The British Government took strong
objection to her activities and tried to get her
deported to England. But the French
Government did not agree to this proposal and
interned Cama, along with an associate, in
French territory. She returned to India in 1935
when 74 and died a year later in Bombay with
no one to recall her sacrifices and
achievements.
During the Non-co-operation Movement,
and even more in the Civil Disobedience
movement, women came out of their homes to
risk their lives, suffer blows, injuries, insults
and go to prison. Many women ‘dictators’
ably conducted the Civil Disobedience
Movement on behalf of the Congress ‘war
councils’ at the city and district levels. In the
Resolution of Remembrance (January 26,
1931) the Congress recorded its ‘homage and
admiration for the womanhood of India who,
in the hour of peril for the motherland....
stood
shoulder to shoulder with their menfolk in
the
frontline of India’s national army to share
with
them the sacrifices and triumphs of the
struggle.’
Statue of Kanakalata Barua - shot dead while
trying
to
hoist
National flag on Gohpur Police Station 25th
Sept. 1942.
In the last phase of the struggle which
began with the Quit India movement women
freedom fighters like Matangini Hazra, Ka-
nakalata Barua and others were shot dead
while leading the movement. Matangini, an
old lady of 73, led a procession in Midnapore,
with the national flag firmly in her hands.
"The Government troops fired,
hitting her on both hands; her hands
dropped but not the national flag which
she held tightly. She advanced
requesting Indian troops to cease
firing, give up their jobs and join the
freedom movement. Only a bullet she
received in reply which ran right
through her forehead ami she fell dead.
‘As she lay in the dust sanctified by
her blood, the national flag was still in
her grip, yet lying unsullied. A soldier
ran and kicked the flag to the ground.'
{Rebel India
, Ed Bejam Mitra and
Phani Chakraborty, 1946).
Among the multitudes imprisoned in the
Quit India movement in 1942 was Mahatma
Gandhi's wife, Kasturba, who was interned
along with her husband and died during im-
prisonment.
Many women like Aruna Asaf Ali and
Usha Mehta remained underground for years
to continue the struggle. The women of
South-
East Asia responded to
Subhas Bose’s call for
forming the Rani of Jhansi regiment of the
Indian National Army. Many other women
like
Dr
Muthulakshmi
Reddy,
Radhabhai
Subbaroyan,
Vijayalakshmi
Pandit,
Hansa
Mehta,
Rukmani
Lakshmipathi
and
Ammu
Swaminathan
worked
for
the
cause
of
India’s
freedom in the legislatures.