Quit India Movement

The Quit India Movement (Hindi: भारत छोड़ो आन्दोलन Bhārat Choddo Āndolan), or the August Movement (August Kranti) was a civil disobedience movement launched in India in August 1942 in response to Mohandas Gandhi's call for immediate independence. The All-India Congress Committee proclaimed a mass protest demanding what Gandhi called "an orderly British withdrawal" from India. The call for determined, but passive resistance appears in his call to Do or Die, issued on 8 August at the Gowalia Tank Maidan in Bombay.

The British were prepared to act. Almost the entire Indian National Congress leadership, and not just at the national level, was imprisoned without trial within hours after Gandhi's speech--at least 60,000. Most spent the rest of the war in prison and out of contact with the masses. The British had the support of the Viceroy's Council (which had a majority of Indians), of the Muslims, the Communist Party, the Indian Army, and the Indian Civil Service. Many Indian businessmen were profiting from heavy wartime spending and did not support Quit India. Many militant students paid more attention to Subhas Chandra Bose, who was supporting the Axis. The only outside support came from the Americans, as President Franklin D. Roosevelt pressured Prime Minister Winston Churchill to give into Indian demands. Churchill refused and threatened to resign, so Roosevelt backed down. The Wuit India campaign was effectively crushed

The British refused to grant immediate independence, saying it could happen only after the war ended.

Procession view at Bangalore

Sporadic small-scale violence took place around the country but the British arrested tens of thousands of leaders, keeping them imprisoned until 1945, and suppressed civil rights, freedom of speech and freedom of the press. In terms of immediate objectives Quit India failed because of heavy-handed suppression, weak coordination and the lack of a clear-cut programme of action. However, the British government realized that India was ungovernable in the long run, and the question for postwar became how to exit gracefully while protecting Britain's allies, the Muslims and the princes.

World War II and Indian involvement

In 1939 Indian nationalists were angry that the British Governor-General of India, Lord Linlithgow, had without consultation with them brought India into the war. The Muslim League supported the war, but Congress was divided.

Public lecture at Basavanagudi, Bangalore with Late C.F.Andrews*

At the outbreak of war, the Congress Party had passed a resolution during the Wardha meeting of the working-committee in September 1939, conditionally supporting the fight against fascism, but were rebuffed when they asked for independence in return. Gandhi had not supported this initiative, as he could not reconcile an endorsement for war (he was a committed believer in non-violent resistance to tyranny, used in the Indian Independence Movement and proposed even against Adolf Hitler, Benito Mussolini, and Hideki Tojo). However, at the height of the Battle of Britain, Gandhi had stated his support for the fight against racism and of the British war effort, stating he did not seek to raise a free India from the ashes of Britain. However, opinions remained divided.

After the onset of the war, only a group led by Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose took any decisive action. Bose organized the Indian National Army with the help of the Japanese, and, soliciting help from the Axis Powers, conducted a guerrilla war against the British authorities.

Cripps' Mission

In March 1942, faced with an increasingly dissatisfied sub-continent only reluctantly participating in the war and deterioration in the war situation in Europe and South East Asia and with growing dissatisfaction among Indian troops -especially in Europe- and among the civilian population in the sub-continent, the British government sent a delegation to India under Stafford Cripps, in what came to be known as the Cripps' Mission. The purpose of the mission was to negotiate with the Indian National Congress a deal to obtain total co-operation during the war, in return of progressive devolution and distribution of power from the crown and the Viceroy to elected Indian legislature. The talks failed, having failed to address the key demand of a timetable of self-government and of definition of the powers to be relinquished, essentially portraying an offer of limited dominion-status that was wholly unacceptable to the Indian movement.

Resolution for immediate independence

The Congress Working Committee meeting at Wardha (14^th July, 1942) passed a resolution at demanding complete independence from the British government. The draft proposed massive civil disobedience if the British did not accede to the demands.

However, it proved to be controversial within the party. A prominent Congress national leader Chakravarti Rajgopalachari quit the Congress over this decision, and so did some local and regional level organizers. Jawaharlal Nehru and Maulana Azad were apprehensive and critical of the call, but backed it and stuck with Gandhi's leadership till the end. Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel,Dr. Rajendra Prasad and Dr Anugrah Narayan Sinha openly and enthusiastically supported such a disobedience movement, as did many veteran Gandhians and socialists like Asoka Mehta and Jayaprakash Narayan.

Allama Mashriqi (head of the Khaksar Tehrik) was called to join the Quit India Movement. Mashriqi was apprehensive of its outcome and did not agree with the Congress Working Committee's resolution. On July 28, 1942, Allama Mashriqi sent the following telegram to Maulana Abul Kalam Azad, Khan Abdul Ghaffar Khan, Mahatma Gandhi, Rajagopalachariar, Jawaharlal Nehru, Rajendra Prasad and Dr. Pattabhi Sitaramiyya. He also sent a copy to Sambamurty (former Speaker of the Madras Assembly). The telegram was published in the press, and it stated:

“I am in receipt of Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru's letter of July 8th. My honest opinion is that Civil Disobedience Movement is a little pre-mature. The Congress should first concede openheartedly and with handshake to Muslim League the theoretical Pakistan, and thereafter all parties unitedly make demand of Quit India. If the British refuse, start total disobedience...”

On August 8, 1942 the Quit India Resolution was passed at the Bombay session of the All India Congress Committee (AICC). In his Quit India speech that day at Gowalia Tank, Bombay, Gandhi told Indians to follow non-violent civil disobedience. He told the masses to act as an independent nation. His call found support among a large amount of Indians.

Opposition to Quit India

The Congress had little success in rallying other political forces under a single flag and program. Smaller parties like the Hindu Mahasabha opposed the call. The Communist Party of India strongly opposed the Quit India movement and supported the war effort because of the need to assist the Soviet Union, despite support for Quit India by many industrial workers. In response the British listed the ban on the party. The movement had less support in the princely states, as the princes were strongly opposed and funded the opposition.

Muslim leaders opposed Quit India. Muhammad Ali Jinnah's opposition to the call led to large numbers of Muslims cooperating with the British, and enlisting in the army. The Muslim League gained large numbers of new members. Congress members resigned from provincial legislatures, enabling the League to take control in Sindh, Bengal and Northwest Frontier.

The nationalists had very little international support. They knew that the United States strongly supported Indian independence, in principle, and believed the U.S. was an ally. However, after Churchill threatened to resign if pushed too hard, the U.S. quietly supported him while bombarding Indians with propaganda designed to strengthen public support of the war effort. The poorly run American operation annoyed both the British and the Indians.

Local activism

Although at the national level the ability to galvanize rebellion was limited, the movement is notable for regional success especially at Satara, Talcher, and Midnapore. In Tamluk and Contai subdivisions of Midnapore, the local populace were successful in establishing parallel governments, which continued to function, until Gandhi personally requested the leaders to disband in 1944. A minor uprising took place in Ballia, now the easternmost district of Uttar Pradesh. People overthrew the district administration, broke open the jail, released the arrested Congress leaders and established their own independent rule. It took weeks before the British could reestablish their writ in the district. Of special importance in Saurashtra (in western Gujarat) was the role of the region's 'baharvatiya' tradition (i.e. going outside the law) which abetted the sabotage activities of the movement there. In rural west Bengal, the Quit India Movement was fueld by peasants resentment against the new war taxes and the forced rice exports. There was open resistance to the point of rebellion in 1942 until the great famine of 1943 suspended the movement.

Suppression of the movement

Picketing in front of Medical School at Bangalore

One of the achievements of the movement was to keep the Congress party united through all the trials and tribulations that followed. The British, already alarmed by the advance of the Japanese army to the India-Burma border, responded by imprisoning Gandhi. All the members of the Party's Working Committee (national leadership) were imprisoned as well. Due to the arrest of major leaders, a young and till then relatively unknown Aruna Asaf Ali presided over the AICC session on August 9 and hoisted the flag; later the Congress party was banned. These actions only created sympathy for the cause among the population. Despite lack of direct leadership, large protests and demonstrations were held all over the country. Workers remained absent en masse and strikes were called. Not all demonstrations were peaceful, at some places bombs exploded, government buildings were set on fire, electricity was cut and transport and communication lines were severed.

The British swiftly responded with mass detentions. Over 100,000 arrests were made, mass fines were levied and demonstrators were subjected to public flogging. Hundreds of resisters and innocent people were killed in police and army shootings. Many national leaders went underground and continued their struggle by broadcasting messages over clandestine radio stations, distributing pamphlets and establishing parallel governments. The British sense of crisis was strong enough that a battleship was specifically set aside to take Gandhi and the Congress leaders out of India, possibly to South Africa or Yemen but ultimately did not take that step out of fear of intensifying the revolt.

The Congress leadership was cut off from the rest of the world for over three years. Gandhi's wife Kasturbai Gandhi and his personal secretary Mahadev Desai died in months and Gandhi's health was failing, despite this Gandhi went on a 21-day fast and maintained his resolve to continuous resistance. Although the British released Gandhi on account of his health in 1944, Gandhi kept up the resistance, demanding the release of the Congress leadership.

By early 1944, India was mostly peaceful again, while the Congress leadership was still incarcerated. A sense that the movement had failed depressed many nationalists, while Jinnah and the Muslim League, as well as Congress opponents like the Communists sought to gain political mileage, criticizing Gandhi and the Congress Party.

Media

Video footage of the days during Quit India Movement

Further reading

• Hutchins, Francis G. India's Revolution: Gandhi and the Quit India Movement (1973)
• Patil, V. I. Gandhiji, Nehruji and the Quit India Movement (1984)

Primary sources

• Mansergy, Nicholas et al., eds. Constitutional Relations between Britain and India: The Transfer of Power 1942-47: "Quit India", April 30-Sept.21 1942 volume 2 (1971)

See also

• British Raj
• C. F. Andrews
• Indian Independence Movement
• Non-Cooperation Movement
• Indian Nationalism
• Government of Azad Hind
• Mutiny of the Royal Indian Navy
• Mahatma Gandhi
• Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel
• Jawaharlal Nehru

External links

• Rejected 'Quit India' resolution drafted by Mohandas K. Gandhi 27 April 1942

Further reading

• Akbar, M.J. Nehru: The Making of India (Viking, 1988), popular biography
• Chakrabarty, Bidyut. "Political Mobilization in the Localities: The 1942 Quit India Movement in Midnapur," Modern Asian Studies (1992) 26#4 pp. 791–814 in JSTOR
• Chakrabarty, Bidyut. "Defiance and Confrontation: The 1942 Quit India Movement in Midnapur," Social Scientist (1992) Vol. 20, No. 7/8 {http://www.jstor.org/stable/3517569 in JSTOR]
• Chopra, P. N."'Quit India' Movement of 1942," Journal of Indian History, (1971) Vol. 49 Issue 145/147, pp 1-56
• Clymer, Kenton J. Quest for Freedom: The United States and India's Independence (Columbia University Press, 1995) online edition
• Greenough, Paul R. "Political Mobilization and the Underground Literature of the Quit India Movement, 1942-44," Modern Asian Studies, (1983) 17#3 pp. 353-386 in JSTOR
• Hutchins, Francis G. India's Revolution: Gandhi and the Quit India Movement (1973)
• Panigrahi; D. N. India's Partition: The Story of Imperialism in Retreat (Routledge, 2004) online edition
• Read, Anthony, and David Fisher; The Proudest Day: India's Long Road to Independence (W. W. Norton, 1999) online edition; detailed scholarly history
• Venkataramani, M. S.; Shrivastava, B. K. Quit India: The American Response to the 1942 Struggle (1979)
• A. Moin Zaidi (1973). The way out to freedom: an inquiry into the Quit India Movement conducted by participants. Orientalia (India). p. 85.

Primary sources

• Mansergh, Nicholas, and E. W. R. Lumby, eds. India: The Transfer of Power 1942-7. Vol. II. 'Quit India' 30 April-21 September 1942 (London: Her Majesty's Stationery Office, 1971), 1044pp
  • Muni, S. D. "The Quit India Movement: A Review Article," International Studies, (Jan 1977,) 16#1 pp 157–168,
• Pran Nath Chopra (1986). Quit India Movement: British secret documents, Vol. 1. Interprint. p. 17. ISBN 8185017328. {{cite book}}: Unknown parameter |coauthors= ignored (|author= suggested) (help)