Amidst COVID-19, India is set to celebrate its 72nd Republic Day this year on January 26th.
And while the country prepares for more subdued celebrations this year, Gujarat-based Professor of History, Hemant Dave talks about the specifics of the Republic status of India.
“Even before the 1857 Rebellion, our freedom fighters thought of only asking for voting rights and some other basic rights from the British Raj,” he says.
According to Professor Hemant, it began with Indians asking for better treatment and more rights from the colonisers.
British Soldiers Were Seen Fighting Their Way Through The Streets' (1908), from 'Our Empire Story,' by HE Marshall (Thomas Nelsom And Sons, London), c1920. Source: The Print Collector/Print Collector/Getty Images
They were fine with being recognised as British citizens, but they demanded at least some, if not all rights that a regular British citizen had at that time.
“A lot of organisations (like the Indian National Congress) were formed and they strived to prove complete loyalty towards the British Raj in order to win their confidence and support," he explains.
"Later on, these organisations planned to ask for more rights and they believed this would work with the Raj at that time.”
But as time passed, they realised that the Raj was not paying heed to these demands right away.
And the younger blood in parties such as the Indian National Congress, such as 'Lal, Bal and Pal' (three nationalist leaders, Lala Lajpat Rai, Bal Gangadhar Tilak and Bipin Chandra Pal) opted for more assertive ways to express their displeasure and demands.
“This led to a divide between the parties and also caused some parties to demand a dominion status for India,” Professor Hemant says.
was the term chosen to describe the position of the self-governing member states of Commonwealth. According to the 1926 imperial conference , they were to be regarded as autonomous communities within the British Empire who were entitled to separate representation in international organisations, they could appoint their own ambassadors and conclude their own treaties.
“When Bal Gangadhar Tilak said ‘Swaraj is my birth right and I shall have it’, he did not mean complete Independence, he meant Home rule.”
The Congress Party's general strike in Bombay in protest against the Constitutional reforms introduced in April. Source: Felix Man/Picture Post/Hulton Archive/Getty Images
And that is how Indian freedom fighters progressed from asking for voting rights to demands for dominion status.
Freedom fighter Motilal Nehru had prepared the Nehru Report stating that India should get dominion status.
But yet again, as time passed, the next generation came and demanded complete freedom.
India's first prime minister Jawaharlal Nehru with his family. Source: Keystone-France\Gamma-Rapho via Getty Images
Viceroy Linlithgow’s record for the British Cabinet of his conversation with Mahatma Gandhi, shows that Gandhiji said ", for her roots did not lie in England."
“Jawaharlal Nehru and Subhash Chandra Bose put their foot down and told the Britishers that they wanted sampurna swaraj and not just a dominion status. And during one of the Congress meetings in December 1939, it was decided that from that day onwards, India will fight for complete freedom from the British Raj.”
And the rest, as they say, is history.
“All thanks to the relentless efforts of the younger generations of the freedom fighters, we are able to celebrate our Republic Day today,” Professor Hemant states with pride.
