India commemorates

a centenary

Tus year India is celebrat-
ing the centenary of the
Indian Rebellion of 1875,
wrongly called the Indian
Mutiny by British—and Can-
adian—historians. The rebel-
lion was the first serious up-
rising of the colonial people
the British ruling class had to
face. Not only did it chal-
leng British rule in India, but
it shook the whole British
Empire.

Most of the accounts of the
rebellion have been written by
British historians. Now sev-
eral volumes dealing with this
period of Indian history are
being published in India itself.
The following article is an ac-
count of the “Indian Mutiny”
—as Indian historians see it.

=

eo 29, 1857. The 34th

Regiment stationed at Bar-
rackspore in India is being is-
sued with new cartridges for
the latest Enfield rifle.

Sepoy Mangal Pandey steps -

out from the ranks and refuses
to accept them. A British of-
ficer lays hands on the sepoy
who turns like an animal at
bay and kills the officer.

Pandey is arrested and, after
a brief court martial, hanged
on April 8.

On May 10, the “Indian
Mutiny,” starting from the
military barracks at Meerut,
ignites the country in a blaze
of revolt against British rule.
In 1857 India was smoulder-
ing with anger at the cruelty
and humiliation of British rule.
Occasionally this smouldering
fire would burst into open
flame. In the first quarter of
the 19th century, there was
serious uprisings in Bareilly,
Delhi, Moradabad and Mee-
rut districts.

In 1826-27, the Ramosi up-
rising took place in Poona;
1831-32 witnessed the Kole up-
rising in Bihar; between 1831
and 1847 there were several
Indigo uprisings in Bengal.
There was a rebellion at Sa-
vantwadi in 1844; Mopla out-
breaks-in Matabar occurred in
1849, 1851, 1852 and 1855; fin-
ally there was the Santhal re-
bellion in 1855-56.

By 1857, all these separate
discontents converged as it
were into what is known as the
Sepoy Mutiny and it was its
cumulative character that pro-
vided the intensity and sweep
of the movement which shook
the British army of occupa-

tion.
*

The 1857 rebellion was na-

The 1857 Indian Mutiny’

was actually India’s
first national war
of liberation

tional in character, not -only
because it covered a vast area
from Calcutta to Peshawar,
the whole of northern India
and a large part of central In-
dia, but also because it was
joined by all classes of the
Indian people, landlords and
peasants, merchants and arti-
sans, soldiers and_ laborers,
Brahmins and Sudras, Hindus
and Muslims, men as well as
women.

It was pointed out by Ed-
ward Thompson, “an alliance
which included more diverse
forces than had ever united in
India against any conquerer
frorn outside.”

While, undoubtedly, the
leadership of the rebellion
contained elements fighting for
the restoration of Moghul ab-
solutism, the biggest Mahara-
jas and Nawabs of Hyderabad,
Mysore, Baroda, Indore, Gwa-
lior, Jaipur, Kashmir, Patiala,
Nabha Jind as well as of Nepal,
were not on the side of the
rebellion. On the contrary,
they helped the British to sup-
press it. ‘

Another kind of leadership,
most vigorous and competent
came from persons like the
Rani of Jhansi, Kunwar Singh
and General Tantia Topi, Gen-
eral Bakhtkhan, Ferozkhan
and others. Some of the lead-
ers belonged to the feudal
class, while some others were
persons of humbler origin. To-
day these leaders are the hon-
ored patriots of Indian history.

*

British historians refer to
the rebellion as the “Indian
Mutiny.” Even such a re-
nowned liberal historian as G.
M. Trevelyan calls it “a mut-
iny of troops, not a revolt of
the population.”

As a “mutiny” the British
rulers of India could justify
the measures they took to sup-
press it: But as a national
war of liberation it challeng-
ed every right they claimed
for themselves in. India.

Only partially and in a very
limited sense was the rebel-
lion a military mutiny — the
sepoys disobeyed their officers
and defied the, government.
A military mutiny generally
has a limited objective and
does not challenge: the regime.

But when soldiers make com-
mon cause..with the people,

as the sepoys did in 1857, it
is rebellion. And when they
want, in cooperation with the
people, to drive foreign armies
from their country, as the se-
poys did in 1857, it is a war of
liberation.

General Sir Robert Gard-
iner admitted this in a report
submitted to the British House
of Commons in 1858. He said:

“The revolt in India has
two characters; one a civil in-
surrection, the other a military
mutiny ... merged in a social
revolution; not having been
provoked by military causes
in itself, but instigated by in-
fluential emissaries of high
power, with a view of exter-
minating the English race in
India. ... That they were na-
turally imbued with a latent
instinctive feeling of inward
hatred generally borne to us
by the native population, is
made clear by the suddenness
with which it was awakened
and the vindictive fury with
which: it burst forth.”

*

India in the mid-nineteenth
century was seething with dis-
content.

Even before the mutinies
started at Behrampore, Bar-
ackpore and finally at Meerut
on May 10, there was wide-
spread anti-British agitation
in towns and villages as well
as among the sepoys.

Fakirs and sanyasis went

Soviet

MOSCOW

HE SOVIET Union is to fur-

nish economic aid to Hun-
gary on terms and conditions
never before known in rela-
tions between a great country
and a small one.

Under this agreement con-
cluded between the Soviet and
Huhgarian governments during
Premier Janos Kadar’s visit to
Moscow last month, the Soviet
Union is to deliver to Hungary
this year goods to the value of
over $270 million. and Hun-

‘gary will.also receive a long-

term credit of $210. million, of
which .$60 million will be in
free currency.

The goods that Hungary will

from place to place asking 4
the people to rise against the

foreign enemies, Rajas sent
their emissaries to the sepoys
exhorting them to drive out
the Firinghees. Mysterious
chapatis and red lotuses went
from village to village carry-
ing the message of the com
ing revolution. :

At that time there was no
mass organization, political or
otherwise. The sepoys repre-
sented the only organized force
which, armed and trained to
fight, naturally became the
spearhead of the rebellion in
1857, played the most decisive
role in the various storm
centres and had to bear the
brunt of the British offensive.
Their failure lay in that they
could not organize a proper
military leadership which
could be equal or superior to
their enemy.

The most revolutionary as-
pect of the uprising of 1857
was its Hindu-Muslim solidar-
ity.

This was a development the
British rulers feared most.
They had conquered India by
exploiting the divisions among
the Indian people. To main-
tain their rule they fostered
these divisions- and their
divide-and-rule policy has
shaped the political boundaries
of the Republic of India.

The sepoys that revolted at
Meerut in 1857 were over-
whelmingly Brahmins and Raj-
puts (Hindus). When they
marched on to Delhi, they pro-
claimed Bahadur Shan, a Mus-
lim, to be the Emperor of
India. Bahadur Shah, of his
own accord, as a gesture of
goodwill to the Hindu com-
munity, forbade the slaughter
of cows in Delhi and strictly
enforced the measure.

Inside the rebel camp, the
‘British tried to break the
Hindu-Muslim solidarity by

all the means at their dis-
posal. From Lucknow, Sir
Henry Lawrence, the British
commander, reported to his
government, “I shall watch
for the differences of opinion
between the two communities.”
But the British rulers com-
pletely failed “to play off the
Mohammedan against the Hin-
du,” as Aitchison wrote in his
Life of Lord Lawrence.

@ To suppress the Rebellion

of 1857, the British had to
fight bitterly every inch of
ground.

When the British re-occu-
pied Delhi, the fight continued
in the surrounding villages:
“host of fortified villages with
a wide ditch and high mud
walls swarming with ‘thous-
ands of armed men.” After
losing Jhansi, Luxmi Bai
fought a series of guerilla en-
gagements until she was killed
on the battlefied. Khan Ba-
hadur Khan had to give up
Bareilly but the people went

* 5

The “Indian Mutiny” was
India’s first national war of
liberation. An indication of
the scale on which it was
fought is provided by compar-
ing the forces Britain employ-
ed to defeat it and those it
used only two years earlier in
the Crimean War. At Luck-
now Britain had an army of
36,000. In the seige of Sevas-
topol it used an army of
26,000.

To fight the rebels, Britain
had -to mobilise all its best
military talent, its seasoned
generals, and send a large and
well-equipped army to India.
In the course of innumerable
battles the British suffered tre-
mendous casualties, more than
in any war Britain had fought
up to that time.

on fighting.

In the end, the organized
might of the world’s greatest
military and industrial power
prevailed. But it was a costly
victory and, historically speak-
ing, a short-lived one.

Only a century later an in-
dependent India has emerged

as one of the leading powers

of the 20th century.

aid for Hungary

receive from the Soviet Union
this year include 450,000 tons
of wheat, 200,000 tons of cattle
‘fodder, 1,200,000 tons of iron
ore, 1,200,000 tons of coal, 500,-
000 tons of coke, 110,000 tons
of pig iron and 150,000 tons
of rolled metal. f

The Soviet Union will also
supply Hungary with 900,000
tons of oil, 400,000 tons of sawn
timber, 8,000 tons of copper,
8,000 tons of aluminum as well
as increased deliveries of crude
oil, lead; nickel and consumer
goods, :

The communique noted that
trade between Hungary and
the Soviet Union, now, as in
the past, is on the basis of
world prices. This refutes all

APRIL 5, 1957 —~

the allegations about Hungary
being exploited by the Soviet
Union through trade agree-
ments.

Both governments agreed on
the terms under which the So-
viet Union will assist in the
construction of a number of
atomic power stations in Hun-
gary. In return Hungary will
sell to the Soviet Union any
surplus of uranium ore which
it may have.

Talks are to be held later to
fix the size, composition and
location of Soviet troops tem-
porarily stationed on Hungar-

ian territory under the terms
of the Warsaw Pact.

PACIFIC TRIBUNE—PAGE 10

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