Indian National Movement-1
Indian National Movement-1
Indian National Movement-1
Structure
10.0 Objectives
10.1 Introduction
10.2 1857: The First War of Independence
10.2.1 Causes
10 2.2 Extent and intensity
10.2.3 Defeat
10.0 OBJECTIVES
No major development of modern India can be explained and understood without a reference to the Indian
National Movement. The Indian National Movement represented the Indian people's urge to be free from the
foreign yoke. After reading this Unit you will:
be able to explain the political objectives and the strategies of the early nationalist leadership,
understand the differences of approach between the moderates and militant nationalists,
understand the Swadeshi Movement and its implications for the Indian National
Movement,
10.1 INTRODUCTION
In this Unit we introduce you to the various aspects of Indian National Movement during its earlier phase.
Resistance to British rule had always been there, but it was in 1857 that large sections of Indian people in
various regions made a combined effort to overthrow the British. That is why it is often termed as the first
war of independence. Due to certain weaknesses the uprising was crushed by the British but as far as the
struggle was concerned there was no going back. This inspired a new kind of struggle. The intelligentsia,
which earlier believed in the benevolence of British rule now came forward to expose its brutality. Political
associations were formed and the Indian National Congress played a vital role in directing the freedom
struggle. We discuss in this Unit the role of moderates and militant nationalists and the efforts made during
the Swadeshi Movement to involve the masses into the freedom struggle.
This was also a period of cultural renaissance as far as Indian society was concerned. Many social and
religious reformers took up the battle against the social and religious evils that existed in our society. This
contributed immensely towards the making of a new India.
This Unit attempts to give you a glimpse of the issues that were undertaken by the Indian social reformers.
The scope of this Unit is however confined to the period just before the emergence of Gandhi on the Indian
political scene.
The revolt of 1857 was, however, to involve millions in large parts of the country and to shake the British
rule to its very roots.
1: Soldiers of 11th irregular cavalry being disarmed (1 August 1857)
10.2.1 Causes
The Revolts of 1857 started on 10 May when the Company's Indian soldiers (sepoys) at Meerut rebelled,
killed their European officers, marched to Delhi, entered the Red Fort and proclaimed the aged and
powerless Bahadur Shah 11 (who still bore the prestigious name of the Mughals) as the Emperor of India.
The Company's sepoys had many grievances against their employers, ranging from declining material and
other service conditions to religious interference and racial arrogance. But basically they reflected the
general discontent with British rule. They were after all a part of Indian society they were 'peasants in
uniform'. The hopes, desires, despair and discontent of other sections of Indian society they were
reflected in them. The sepoys' rebellion was a product of the accumulated grievances of the Indian people.
The most important underlying cause of the Revolt was the disruption of the traditional Indian economy and
its subordination to British economy and the intense economic exploitation of the country. Above all, the
colonial policy of intensifying land revenue demand led to a large number of peasants losing their land to
revenue farmers, traders and moneylenders. Destruction of traditional handicrafts ruined and impoverished
millions of artisans. The economic decline of peasantry and artisans was reflected in 12 major and numerous
minor famines from 1770 to 1857.
Thousands of zamindars and poligars lost control over their land and its revenues. Hundred of chieftains lost
their principalities. The interference by the East India Company was disliked by many Indian rulers. The
traditional scholarly and priestly classes lost their patronage from the traditional rulers, chieftains, nobles
and zamindars, and were impoverished.
A major cause of the Revolt was the very foreign character of British rule. The British remained perpetual
foreigners in the land. The Indian people felt humiliated in having to obey the orders of 'foreign
tresspassers'.
2: People and Soldiers in the Battle at Bareilly (5 May 1858)
10.2.3 Defeat
In the end, British imperialism, at the height of its power the world over, succeeded in ruthlessly
suppressing the Revolt. The reasons were many. Despite its wide reach, the Revolt could not embrace the
entire country or all sections of Indian society. Bengal, South India and large parts of Punjab remained
outside its reach since these areas had already exhausted themselves through prolonged rebellions and
struggle against the British. Most rulers of Indian states and the big zamindars remained loyal to the foreign
rulers. Thus, Scindhia of Gwalior, Holkar of Indore, the Nizam of Hyderabad, the Rajput rulers of Jodhpur
and many other Rajputana states, the Nawab of Bhopal, the rulers of Patiala and Kashmir, the Ranas of
Nepal, and many other rulers and chieftains gave active support to the British in suppressing the Revolt.
In general, merchants and moneylenders either supported the British or refused to help the rebels. The
modem educated Indians also did not support the Revolt. The leaders of the Revolt fought with courage, but
could neither coordinate their struggle nor evolve a unified high command. Instead, they indulged in
constant petty quarrels. The rebels were short of modern weapons and often had to fight with primitive
weapons such as swords and spikes. They were very poorly organised. The sepoys were brave
but at times there was lack of discipline which affected their military efficiency.
5: Rani Jhansi in Battle field.
Above all the rebels lacked a modern understanding of British colonialism or the nature of the state and
society which was to replace it. They were united by their hatred of the British rule and the desire to restore
pre-British economic, political and social relations, but shared no conception of the political or socio-
economic structure of free India. This was perhaps inevitable. Common all-India feeling and interests were
yet to evolve. Perhaps if the Revolt had lasted a few years, a common modern understanding and national
consciousness would have evolved in the course of the struggle, as it did later; but the rebels were given no
such time- their revolt was crushed by the end of 1858.
This first great struggle of the Indian people to win freedom from British domination was not in
vain. It left an indelible mark on the consciousness of the Indian people and served as a permanent
source of inspiration to the later struggle for freedom.
1) Write in about 100 words the main causes behind the Revolt of 1857.
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2) Which of the following statements are right or wrong ? Mark (9) or (X).
i) The Revolt of 1857 was the first effort at a national level to overthrow British rule.
ii) The revolt of 1857 was only a sepoy mutiny
iii) All the merchants and moneylenders supported the revolt of 1857.
3) i) Give the names of three Indians rulers who supported the British in 1857.
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ii) Give the names of three Indian leaders who opposed the British in 1857.
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Many factors were responsible for the rise of this powerful movement. But the decisive factor was the
gradual emergence of the contradiction between the interests of the Indian people as a whole and the
interests of the British rule, which was leading to the increasing underdevelopment of the Indian economy
and society. It was also hampering India's further economic, social, cultural, intellectual and political
developments. Let us briefly have a look at the factors that contributed towards the emergence of organised
nationalism.
They had believed that the restructuring of Indian society could occur under British rule because Britain was the most
advanced country of the time.
They hoped that the British would help India get rid of its past backwardness.
The intellectuals, attracted by modem industry and the prospects of modern economic development, hoped that, Britain
would industrialize India and introduce modern capitalism.
They believed that Britain, guided by the doctrine of democracy, civil liberties, and sovereignty of the people, would
introduce modern science and technology and modern knowledge in India, leading to the cultural and social
regeneration of its people.
The emerging unification of the Indian people was an added attraction. Consequently, they supported British
rule even during the Revolt of 1857 and described it as 'providential' or "ordained by Gods that be".
The second half of the 19th century witnessed the gradual disillusionment of the intellectuals, for experience
increasingly showed that that expectations were misplaced and based on a wrong understanding of the nature
and character of British rule. The intellectuals realised that:
In practice, British colonialism was disrupting Indian economy and preventing the rise of modern industry and
agriculture.
Instead of promoting democracy and self-government, British administrators were arguing for the imposition of
permanent benevolent despotism in India.
They neglected the education of the masses, curbed civil liberties and pursued a policy of divide and rule.
Thus, in such a situation what were the intellectuals supposed to do? Gradually, the intelligentsia created
political associations to spread political education and to initiate political work in the country. Raja Ram
Mohan Roy was the first Indian leader to start an agitation for political reforms in India. The Bengal British
Indian Society and other associations were founded in 1840s and 1850s to promote general public interests.
But these associations were local in character and were dominated by wealthy and aristocratic elements.
However, in 1870s and 1880s more modern, explicitly political, and middle class based organizations like
Poona Sarvajanik Sabha in Maharashtra, the Indian Association in Bengal, Madras Mahajan Sabha, and
Bombay Presidency Association came up all over the country.
The Arms Act of 1878 disarmed the entired Indian people at one stroke.
The Vernacular Press Act of 1878 sought to suppress the growing Indian criticism of British rule.
The reduction of the maximum age for sitting in the Indian Civil Service Examination from 21 years to 19 further
reduced the chances of Indians entering the Civil Service.
The holding of a lavish imperial Durbar (in 1877) at a time when millions of Indians were dying of famine and the
waging of a costly war against Afghanistan at the cost of the Indian economy.
The removal of import duties on British textile imports threatened the existence of the newly rising Indian textile
industry.
All these were clear manifestations of the colonial character of British rule in India. In 1883, the new
viceroy, Lord Ripon, tried to assuage Indian feelings by removing a glaring instance of racial discrimination
by passing the IIbert Bill which would enable Indian district and session judges to try Europeans in criminal
cases. The Government was compelled to amend the Bill by a vehement, racialist agitation led by the
European in India. These factors created a congenial environment for the growth of Indian nationalism.
The early nationalist leaders believed that a direct struggle for freedom was not yet on the agenda of history.
Instead, they had first to lay the foundations of such struggle. Would you like to know what were then the
basic objectives of the early Indian nationalists ?
i) One of the basic objectives of the early nationalists was to promote the feeling of national
unity, to weld India into a nation, to help create an Indian people, to meet the imperialist
charge that Indians were not a people or nation but a mere grouping of hundreds of diverse
races, languages, castes and religions.
ii) The second basic objective was to create a national political platform or programme on
which all Indians could agree and which could serve as the basis for all-lndia political
activity.
iii) The third objective was the politicisation of the people and the creation of public interest in
political questions and the training and organization of pubic opinion in the country.
iv) Another important aim of the time was the creation of an all-lndia political leadership. No
movement without a headquarters, that is, a united leadership. Such a leadership on a
country-wide level did not exist in the 1880s. Allied to this was the need to train a common
band of political workers or cadre to carry on political work.
Thus, the basic objectives of the early nationalists can best be summed up as the creation of a broad-based
anti-colonial, nationalist movement on an all lndia basis.
1) Which of the following statements are right or wrong '? Mark (9) or (X).
i) After 1857 it became clear that new methods were needed to defeat imperialism.
ii) The Indian intellectuals always remained loyal to the British.
iii) The British encouraged civil liberties.
iv) Indian economy flourished under British rule.
2) What were the basic objectives of the early nationalists ? Answer in about 10 lines.
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The weakness of the early nationalists lay in the narrow social base of the movement. The movement did
not, as yet, have a wide appeal. It did not penetrate down to the masses. The Moderates' political work was
confined to the urban educated middle classes. Their programme and policies, however, were not confined
to the interests of the middle classes. They took up the causes of all sections of the Indian people and
represented the interests of the emerging Indian nation against colonial domination.
The Moderates believed in the methods of constitutional agitation within the tour walls of law. Thus, they
relied on agitation through public meetings and newspapers. They also sent numerous carefully prepared and
argued memorials and petitions to the Government. Though on the surface these memorials, etc., were
addressed to the Government, their real objective was to educate and politicise the Indian people. For
example, Justice Ranade explained to the young G. K. Gokhale in 1891:
You don't realize our place in the history of our country. These memorials are nominally addressed to
Government, in reality they are addressed to the people, so that they may learn how to think in these matters
because politics of this kind is altogether new in this land.
In spite of their political mildness, they aroused intense hostility from the officials. British officials and
statesmen condemned them as disloyal and seditious elements. Lord Curzon, the Viceroy, declared in 1900
that it was his ambition to contribute to the death of the Congress. This was because the Moderate had, on
however small a scale, generated an anti-imperialist awakening in the country. Their powerful economic
critique of imperialism was to serve as the main plank of nationalist agitation in the later years of active
mass struggle against British Colonialism. They had, by their economic agitation, undermined the moral
foundations of British rule by exposing its cruel, exploitative character. Moreover, the political work of the
Moderates was based on a concrete study and analysis of the hard reality of the life of the people rather than
on shallow and narrow appeals to religion and mere emotion. Once a sound basis for a national movement
was laid, mass struggles could come, and did come, in time.
The social and economic conditions of the country also pointed in the same direction. Economic decay and
stagnation. the fruits of colonial underdevelopment, were beginning to surface by the end of the 19th
century. Symbolic in this respect were the famines that devastated the country from 1987 to 1900, and killed
millions.
Several international events at this time contributed to the growth of militant nationalism. The defeat of the
Italian army by the Ethiopians in 1896 and Russia by Japan in 1905 exploded the myth of European
superiority. Similar was the impact of the revolutionary movements in Ireland, Russia, Egypt, Turkey and
China: a united people, who were willing to make sacrifices, were surely capable of overthrowing foreign
despotic rule even if it appeared powerful on the surface.
A new political leadership now emerged on the scene. The most prominent in it were Bal Gangadhar Tilak,
known as the Lokmanya, Aurobindo Ghose, Bipin Chandra Pal and Lala Lajpat Rai. The new leadership
believed and preached that Indians trust rely on their own efforts, on their own political activity and on their
own sacrifices. Their political work and outlook encouraged self-reliance and self-confidence. Moreover,
they possessed deep faith in the strength of the Indian people and mass action. Once the masses took up
politics, they asserted, it would be impossible for the British to suppress the national movement. They,
therefore, pressed for political work among the masses. They also denied that British rule could be reformed
from within. Swaraj or independence was to be the goal of the resurgent national movement.
Political agitation was inaugurated by a general hartal and a day of fasting on 16 October in Calcutta. Huge
crowds paraded in the streets of Calcutta and a mammoth meeting of 50,000 was held in the evening. Entire
Bengal, from cities to villages, was reverberating with meetings, processions and demonstrations.
Soon a new form of political action was added. All foreign goods were to he boycotted and Swadeshi or
Indian-made goods along were to he used. In many places public burnings of foreign cloth were organized
and shops selling foreign cloth were picketed. The new leadership also gave a call for passive resistance to
the authorities. This was to take the form of non-cooperation with the Government by boycotting schools
and colleges, the courts, and government services. This part of the programme could not, however, be put
into practice on a significant scale. The new leadership also raised the slogan of independence from foreign
rule. One result was that Dadabhai Naoroji declared in his presidential address to the Congress in December
1906 that the goal of the Congress was "self-government or Swaraj".
The militant leadership succeeded in involving large sections of the rural and urban people in the movement.
In particular, students, women and urban workers participated enthusiastically in the movement. The slogans
of Swadeshi and Swaraj were soon taken up by other provinces. Boycott of foreign cloth was organized on
all-lndia scale. The entire country began to be united in a bond of' common sympathy and common politics.
The Government responded with quick repression. Meetings were banned, newspapers suppressed, political
workers jailed, several leaders deported, and students beaten up. Efforts were made to divide the Moderates
from Militants and Hindus from Muslims. At the same time, the new leadership failed to, discover or
implement new forms of organization and struggle which would correspond to their new and advanced
political understanding. For example, it failed to put passive resistance into practice. Consequently, the
Government succeeded to a large extent in suppressing the movement which did not survive the
imprisonment and deportation of Tilak for 6 years, the retirement from active politics of Bipin Chandra Pal
and Aurobindo Ghose and departare from India of Lala Lajpat Rai.
The youth finding no effective outlet in mass political activity and responding emotionally and heroically to
government repression, increasingly adopted revolutionary terrorism and assassination of hated officials as a
style of politics. Anushilan and Jugantar were the two important revolutionary groups of this
period.However, revolutionary terrorists lacked a mass base and could not continue for long.
But they um made a valuable contribution to the growth of the national movement. As a historian has put it,
"they gave us back the pride of our manhood".
8: Annie Besant
The national movement was in a rather dormant state from 1909 to 1916. But it revived during the First
World War when Annie Besant, an English admirer of Indian Culture and the newly released Lokmanya
Tilak started a popular, all-lndia constitutional agitation under the auspices of the two Indian Home Rule
Leagues. Indian revolutionaries abroad were also very active during the War of special importance was the
establishment of a mass Ghadar (Rebellion) Party in U.S.A. and Canada which had branches in East Asia
and South-East Asia and which tried to organize armed uprisings in India.
1) Differentiate between the methods adopted by moderates and militant nationalists Answer in
about 10 lines.
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2) Why were the moderate nationalists condemned by the British as seditious elements'' Answer in
about 10 lines
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3) What do you understand by Swadeshi Movement? To what extent was this movement an advance
in terms of methods adopted by earlier nationalists? Answer in about 100 words.
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Even though the forces of religious and social reform and cultural renewal arose at different times and in
different forms and with differing content in different parts of the country, their general perspective was very
similar and they represented more or less a common consciousness and understanding of the ills of Indian
society and their remedies.
The religious reformers vigorously opposed religious dogmatism and blind faith, rigidity of caste, and
prevalence of meaningless religious rituals, ceremonies and superstitions. Some of them also opposed the
priesthood where it had become too rigid or corrupt. They stood for the reform of existing Hindusim, Islam
and Sikhism. The social reformers attacked the caste system, especially inequality and oppression based on
the caste system. In particular, they condemned the degraded and unequal position of women in Indian
society and argued that women and men were equal in intellect and moral sense. They fought for the
abolition of the practice of Sati; they attacked polygamy or the system of men having more than one wife;
they advocated widow remarriage and education of women; some of them, like Rammohan, argued that
women should have the right of inheritance and property.
The battle against the caste system was also in time taken up by intellectuals and reformers belonging to the
so called "lower castes". Jotiba Phule, Narayana Guru and Dr. B. R. Ambedkar were three of the most
outstanding fighters against the inequities of the caste system. Gandhi linked the struggle against colonialism
with the struggle against untouchability. He made it mandatory for a member of the Congress to refuse to
practise untouchability and to oppose its practice by others. He founded the All India Harijan Seva Sangh to
work for the social, cultural, economic and educational uplife of the harijans.
While the women's cause was taken up mainly by male social reformers in the 19th century, in the 20th
century the women themselves came forward to fight for their own social liberation. A number of women's
magazines, many of them edited by women, appeared and, in the 1930s the women's movement took an
organised form when the All-lndia Women's Conference was formed. The national movement, trade unions
and Kisan Sabhas too took up the cause of women's rights.
It was a result of these reformist efforts and social struggles that complete equality of sexes and a ban on any
discrimination on the basis of sex or caste were enshrined in the Constitution of free India.
All the reformers tried to apply the rational approach to religion and society. They wanted religious and
social thought and practices to be based not on faith but on human reason and the good of humanity.
Opposing blind adherence to authority, they were willing to modify and even abandon religious principles
and inherited social traditions if they contradicted reason or logic or were harmful to society. Swami
Vivekanand, for example, said:
Is religion to justify itself by the discoveries of reason through which every science justifies itself?
Are the same methods of investigation which apply to the sciences and knowledge outside, to be
applied of the science of religion? In my opinion, this must be so, and I am also of opinion that the
sooner this is done the better.
Similarly, Sayyid Ahmed Khan all his life opposed blind obedience to tradition and dependence on
irrationalism and advocated adoption of a critical approach "So long as freedom of thought is not developed,
there can be no civilized life". Even Swami Dayanand, the most conservative of religious reformers, while
holding that the Vedas were infallible, said that they were to be interpreted by normal human beings and not
by a priestly class. In other words, the Vedas meant what individual reason accepted and indicated. Swami
Dayanand, consequently, led a revolt against Hindu orthodoxy.
Similarly, Gandhiji's entire campaign for the "root and branch removal of untouchability" was based on
humanism and reason. While arguing that untouchability had no sanctions in the Hindu shastras, he declared
that shastras should be ignored if they went against human dignity. Truth, he said, could not be confined
within the convers of a book.
Apart from gains in the field of religious and social welfare, the reformers' work contributed to the growth of
patriotism. It enhanced their self-confidence and confidence in their own culture. Even while contributing to
the opening of their minds to the winds of change and modern ideas, it prevented blind copying of the West.
It was a part of what historian K.N. Panikkar has described as cultural defence against the colonialization of
the culture and ideology of the Indian people. As Jawaharlal Nehru was to put it:
The rising middle classes were politically inclined and were not so much in search of a religion; but
they wanted some cultural roots to cling on to, something that gave them assurance of their own
worth, something that would reduce the sense of frustration and humiliation that foreign conquest
and rule had produced.
After 1920, many nationalists and reformers applied the techniques of Satyagraha and mass agitation and
mobilization to fight for democratization of society and religious reform. This often brought them into
conflict with the colonial authorities, thus directly linking and even merging the reform movements with the
anti-imperialist struggle. Two prime examples of this were the Akali movement for the reform of
Gurudwaras or Sikh temples in Punjab during the early 1920s and Gandhi's struggle against untouchability
during the 1920s and early 1930s.
Though the colonial authorities initially, from 1830s to 1860s, encouraged modern education, they soon
began to drag their feet when they found that many among the newly educated Indians were taking to
nationalism. Indians now took to promoting schools and colleges on their own. During the Swadeshi
agitation and the Non-cooperation Movement (1920-22), the nationalists gave a call for a system of National
Education outside the colonial framework. Hundreds of National Schools and Colleges and several National
Universities came up at that time. But it was, in the main, through the Indian languages press and literature
that cultural renaissance and cultural struggle was carried on:
i) From the beginning of the 19th century nationalist and modern Indians, made Indian languages the
vehicle for the popularization of their reformist and nationalist ideas. To enable Indian languages to
play this role successfully, they undertook such humdrum tasks as preparation of primers, etc. For
example, both Ishwar Chandra Vidyasagar and Rabindranath Tagore wrote Bengali primers
which are being used till this day. From the 1860s, nationalist leaders agitated for inclusion of
Indian languages in the college curriculum and for a bigger role for them in the educational system.
In fact, the spread of modern ideas among the mass of people occurred primarily through Indian
languages. The most important role in this respect was that of the press; and once again pioneering
work was done by Rammohan Roy who brought out journals in Bengali, Persian and Hindi to spread
scientific, literary and political knowledge among the people. In Maharashtra, a similar role was
played by Gopal Hari Deshmukh, popularly known as Lokhitavadi. Hundreds of Indian language
newspapers and journals made their appearance during the 19th century. They were started not as
profit-making business enterprises, but as labour of love and social commitment with a view to
disseminate nationalist and reformist ideas among the people.
There is hardly a major modern Indian political or social figure who did not edit or write for the
popular Indian language press. The Amrit Bazar Patrika, Som Prakash, and Sanjivani in Bengali;
Rast Goftar and Gujarat Samachar in Gujarati; Indu prakash, Dhyan Prakash , Kesari and
Sudharak in Marathi; Swadesmitra in Tamil; Andhra Prakasika, Andhra Patrika in Telugu;
Matrubhoomi in Malayalam; the Hindi Pradeep, Elindustani, Aj and Pratap in Hindi; Azad,
Akbar-i-Am and Koh-i-Noor in Urdu; and Utkal Dipika in Oriya, were some of the major
newspapers of the time.
ii) Modern literature in Indian languages in the form of poetry, novels and short stories, and essays was
the second form though which cultural renaissance and patriotic sentiments were manifested as well
as promoted. From about the middle of he 19th century, powerful literary trends emerged in nearly
all the Indian languages. Already by 1860s, patriotic poems and songs in Bengali and other
languages had made their appearance. These two genre of literature were to become major
instruments of mass political agitation and mobilization in the 20th century. Almost every Indian
language was to throw up major poets during the 10h and 20 the centuries. Rabindranath Tagore and
Kazi Nazrul Islam in Bengali; Bharatendu Harishchandra and Maithili Sharan Gupta in Hindi;
Muhammad Iqbal, Altaf Hussain Hali and Josh Malihabadi in Urdu; Subramaniya Bharati in Tamil;
Kumaran Asan, and Vallathol in Malayalam; Lakshminath Bezbarua in Assamese, were some of the
major poets of 19th and 20th centuries.
Nationalist drama had its beginnings in 1860 with Dinabandbu Mitra's play Nil Darpan which dealt with the
British indigo planters' oppression of the peasants. India also produced powerful novelists and short story
writers who took up nationalist and reformist themes, often dealing with class and caste oppression and the
sorry plight of women in Indian society. Bankim Chandra Chatterjee, Sarat Chandra, Rabindranath Tagore
and Prem Chand were some of the major writers whose novels and short stories were translated and
published in nearly all the Indian languages. Essays were another genre through which Indian nationalists
and reformers spread their ideas. Some of the major essayists of the 19th century were Gopal Hari
Deshmukh, Vishnushastri Chiplunkar and Viresalingam. Cultural renaissance was also manifested in music,
painting and other arts and later in films.
The person who strode the cultural scene for over 60 years was Rabindranath Tagore who left his mark on
almost every aspect of literature-poetry, novel, short story, drama and essays. In his old age he also took to
painting. He was a major inspiring figure of the Swadeshi Movement. In 1919, he renounced the title of a
Knight (sir) in protest against the Jallianwalla massacre. In 1913, he was awarded the Nobel Prize for
literature. He also founded the Vishwabharati University at Shantiniketan to promote Indian culture and to
impart national education.
1) Which of the following statements are right or writing. Mark (9) or (X).
iii) Struggle against untouchability was a matter of great importance for Gandhi.
iv) The Indian language newspapers contributed in the growth of nationalist feelings.
v) The play Nil Darpan dealt with the condition of emigrant Indians.
2) Discuss in about five lines the issues taken up by reformers in relation to upliftment of women.
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The British continued with their repressive policies, and the partition of Bengal gave a new turn to the
national movement. The Swadeshi Movement, though still not fully a mass movement, was a major step
towards mass mobilization. Another new trend was the emergence of revolutionary terrorism.
There was yet another aspect to the national movement. Many social and religious reformers, guided by
rationalism and humanism fought against the evils that existed in Indian society. The press and literature
contributed immensely towards a new awakening in India.
Mass Mobilization: Process of bringing mass of people together for a definite political objective.
Nationalism: An ideology which emerged in opposition to colonial domination, secondly it offered itself as
a social, political, economic alternative to colonialism. In contrast to Europe where it arose due to the need
of a united market, in India it arose as a specific need of Indian people to find an alternative to colonial rule.
Patriotism: Feeling of loyalty towards one's own nation.
Zamindars: Permanent holders of land in the countryside whose share of revenue was fixed by the British
Government.
10.9 ANSWERS TO CHECK YOUR PROGRESS/
EXERCISES
Check Your Progress I
Holkar of Indore
Nizam of Hyderabad
Kunwar Singh
Tantya Tope