5.         Activities of the successors of Guru Ram Singh.:-  Guru Ram Singh was deported to Rangoon in Burma where he was kept as a state prisoner. His brother, Hari Singh was also not allowed to move out of village Bhaini. Nevertheless, desperate efforts were made from time to time by the Kukas to contact their imprisoned Guru. Many secret dispatches of Ram Singh were  occasionally captured from the persons of ‘Kukas’ who risked long journeys merely to have a look at their spiritual leader. 96

 

96. M. M. Ahluwalia freedom struggle in India, 1858, 1909. pp. 250-52.

 

From Bhaini, Hari Singh also strove to send his secret emissaries to the Russians on the one side and Guru Ram Singh at Rangoon  on the other. Some of these secret communications were intercepted by the British authorities. They arrested Gurcharan Singh97 (inhabitant of Chak Ram Dass in Sialkot District) in 1880, because he, along with Shankar Rai, Maya and Badh Singh was the carrier of letters between Russians and Hari Singh.98  The authorities also removed Guru Ram Singh from Rangoon to an island prison at Mergui, where he was kept under heavy guard.  The Kuka contacts were, therefore, snapped, although not totally.99

 

97.          G.S.Chhabra, The Advanced History of Punjab, Vol. II . p.375

98.          Shakuntla, Miss, A Brief Account of Namdharis, P. 15.

99.          Department of Home (Judicial-B), Progs. 142-46 of April, 1881, Letter No. 1.        

 

            The last days of Guru Ram Singh’s imprisonment were tragic.  His prolonged detention and solitary confinement, at last exhausted the patience with which at first he bore it.  Weakened by old age and after suffering repeatedly from dropsy, general debility and dysentery, the State prisoner Guru Ram Singh was said to have died on November 29, 1885, at 4-30 p.m..100.

 

100.        Department of Home (Judicial-B), Progs.236-40 of June 1882 (M.M. Ahluwalia Freedom Struggle in India, 1858-1909, pp. 253, 385-87).

 

Guru Ram Singh disappeared from the political scene in 1885, but his work and inspiration continued among his numerous followers.  He was succeeded by Guru Hari Singh, who was not allowed to move out of his house in village Bhaini for 21 years till his death in 1906.  Guru Hari Singh was succeeded by Guru Partap Singh.  Throughout the period until the attainment of the Independence in 1947, the ‘Kukas’ remained active fighters against the alien rule.  Their hostility and non-co-operation with the ‘Farangi’ never subsided, although the baits offered to them were substantial and the oppression practiced on them extremely trying.  During the World War I (1914-18), the British Government tries to appease them by land grants and through some other means, but failed to entice them and had to use to tyrant’s rod.

 

When Gandhi started the non-co-operation movement, the Namdharis responded to his call and zealously supported the national struggle.  Gandhi ji himself is said to have borrowed certain features from the Namdharis to reorientate the Congress campaign for the liberation of the country.

 

Today, the Namdharis form a distinctly cohesive group among the Sikhs.  Two thing immediately mark them off from the latter-the style of their hand-gear and their adherence to the personality of their leader.  Appareled in immaculate white home-spun, they wind round their heads mull or long cloth without any semblance of embellishment and without giving it any sharp, emphatic lined101.

 

101.        Harbans Singh, The Heritage of the Sikhs, p. 137.

 

 

IV.       New Phase of Freedom Movement

 

The Great Revolt of 1857 was ruthlessly suppressed and the unsuccessful participants were subjected to merciless repression and reprisals in the form of indiscriminate executions, imprisonments, confiscation of property and withholding of pensions, etc.  The atrocities committed by the British in the name of restoration of order left behind a trail of smouldering bitterness.

 

“The members of the revolution, however, were not altogether extinguished ; they lay smouldering and some one would arise here and there, to kindle them into a flame102".  This was amply borne out by the persistent opposition to British rule carried on by the Namdharis under Guru Ram Singh and his successors, who with their puritanical way of living, and their determined faith in the nationalistic ideals had become the precursors of freedom struggle in the country.

 

102.        Gulab Singh, Under the Shadow of Gallows, pp. 1-2.

 

            The active participation of the famous maulvi family of Ludhiana in the Great Uprising of 1857 and the presence of some other prominent nationalist-minded Muslim families at Ludhiana as also the existence of the headquarters of the Namdhari Movement at Bhaini Sahib (near Ludhiana) produced far reaching effects upon the political and social life of Ludhiana district.  Under the influence of these patriotic forces, the atmosphere in the district remained free from narrow communal feelings.  Later on, Ludhiana became the chief centre of the Ahrar Movement among the Muslims. The Ahrars agitated against the British imperialism in collaboration with the Congress.  An active body of freedom fighters, the Ahrars propagated nationalistic ideas among the Muslims in the teeth of opposition from their co-religionists.  It is, therefore, no wonder that the nationalist forces have all through remained ascendant, and right uptil the achievement of Independence, the district enjoyed almost complete communal harmony.

 

            Lala Lajpat Rai. – Although Lala Lajpat Rai was born at Dhudike, a small village in tahsil Moga, district Ferozepore, on January 28,1865, the family had close associations with Ludhiana district because it originally hailed from Jagraon.  Lala Lajpat Rai was educated at his ancestral town where his father, Shri Radha Kishan, happened to be a teacher.  For these reasons, Jagraon.103 in Ludhiana district is considered to be the home town of Lala Lajpat Rai and the district, is, therefore, proud of the great son of the Punjab, who had played a pioneering role in the political awakening in the Punjab.

 

103.        To perpetuate the memory of the eminent political leader of the Punjab, the Lajpat Rai               Memorial College was started at Jagraon in 1959, by Radha Kishan Trust, which was founded by Lala Lajpat Rai himself at his home town.

 

            Bold Challenge to Sir Syed Ahmed Khan. – At the very birth of Indian National congress in 1885, Sir Syed Ahmed Khan raised his voice against it for its demand of a representative form of Government which meant rule of the majority.  He urged the Muslims to boycott the Congress which he declared to be a body of Hindus whose interests, he said, were diametrically opposed to those of Muslims.  To actively promote such views, he started the Aligarh movement.

 

            This grave challenge to the nationlist forces was boldly met by Maulana Abdul Aziz of Ludhiana who openly supported the Congress.  This brought forth fierce reaction from Syed Ahmed Khan who gave fatwa against Abdul Aziz.  The Maulana brothers of Ludhiana, Shah Muhammad and Abdul Aziz were not slow in nounting a counter offensive against it.  They issued, in 1888, a fatwa refuting all the views and injuctins of Syed Ahmed Khan and strongly urged the Muslims to join the Congress.  It was got signed by some 237 Ulemas (Muslim theologians) of Ludhiana, Jullundur, Kapurthala, Amritsar, Batala, Ferozepore, Kasur, Lahore, Multan, Gujrat, Pakpatan, Ambala, etc., in the Punjab, and several other places in India and even abroad.  This fatwa was published in a book form in the first week of December, 1888, and its copied were distributed at the fourth session of the Indian National Congress held at Allahabad in the third week of December, 1888, through Khwaja Ahad Shah,104 a delegate from Ludhiana.  It gave a blow to the progress of Sir Syed Ahmed Khan’s movement in the Punjab and U.P.  The Ludhiana Maulvis, thus, rendered a great service to the nationalist school of thought among the Muslims of India.105

 

104.       Khawaja Ahad shah was a disciple of Maulana Shah Muhammad of Ludhiana.  In 1888, he become a member of the Indian National Congress.

 

105.       Aziz-ur-Rehman, Raees-ur-Ahrar Maulana Habib-ur-Rehman Ludhianvi aur Hindostan ki jang-i-Azadi, pp. 17, 26-37, 40-41, 54, 60, 72.

 

            Calcutta Session of the Indian Natinal Congress, 1906. – Dr. Chander Bhan Satluj of Ludhiana attended the annual session of the Indian National Congress held at Calcutta in 1906, under the presidentship of Dadabhai Naoroji. He had been associated with the congress since December, 1893, when he was a student of the Medical College, Lahore, and had served as a volunteer during the Congress Session held there under the presidentship of Dadabhai Naoroji.  He also attended the Calcutta Session of 1911.

 

            Morley-Minto Reforms, 1909. – Under the Morely-Minto Reforms, Khawaja Ahah Shah of Ludhiana was elected to the Central Legislative Council in 1910 as a liberal Congreesite and remained its member for nine years till 1919. After the Jallianwala Bagh tragedy of April, 1919, his residence became an asylum for revolutionaries.  The Maratha leader Mangla and Dr. Saif-ud-din Kitchlew took shelter there during the period of underground political activities.106

 

106.        Ibid. pp. 72-73.

Khawaja Ahad Shah was a very popular figure.  He remained a member or the Ludhiana Municipal Committee for 26 years and died in 1923 at the age of 63.

 

V.     The Ghadar Movement, 1913-15

 

            The large number of Indian emigrants in other countries, especially in the U.S.A., were subjected to all sorts of humiliating disabilities and difficulties.  The treatment meted out to them at the hands of the Government and the people was both discriminatory and degrading.  In addition to the hardships which the emigrants were made to suffer, most of the Governments had proceeded to adopt legislative measures to squeeze them out of those countries.  The more intelligent among the Indians abroad felt that they were unnecessarily accorded an inferior status as compared to the ordinary citizens of those countries.  Efforts made to get their grievances redressed proved unsuccessful in the face of public indifference and official apathy.  The Indians realized that the main cause of their troubles was the political subjugation of the mother country and, unless India attained freedom, they could not expect honourable treatment from the inhabitants of the countries where they had settled.

 

The ground was thus prepared for setting up a political organisation to give guidance and direction to the movement.  The outcome of the ferment was the formation of the Ghadar Party in 1913, with headquarters at San Francisco.  Its aim was to liberate India by force.  Munshi Karim Bakhsh of Ludhiana was one of its Organising Secretaries, Kartar Singh and 107 of village Saraba (tahsil Ludhiana) was a member of the Executive Committee.

 

107.        Kartar singh Saraba was the son of Sardar Mangal Singh, Zaildar of village Saraba,Ludhiana tahsil.  He was born in 1896.

 

He was one of the important members, who (besides the Editor Hardayal) worked in the press for the ‘Ghadar’, a weekly journal of the Ghadar Party, started on November 1,1913.

 

(G.S. Chhabra, The Advanced History of the Punjab, Vol. II, pp. 406-407)

 

 

The outbreak of World War I, 1914–18, was halied by the Indian revolutionaries living abroad as a favourable opportunity to free the country from British rule through armed uprising with foreign assistance.  The Ghadar Party tried to achieve the objective by sending Indians, mostly Punjabis, imbued with revolutionary ideas, back to their mother country to stir up rebellion there.  the Government of India were fully informed of the activities of the Ghadar Party and took necessary precautions. The Ingress Ordinance of September 5, 191, was purposely passed to deal with the Indian emigrants coming back to India.108

 

108.        R.C. Majumdar, History of the Freedom Movement in India, Vol. II, p. 447.

It is further stated that :-

“A serious problem arose for the authorities in the Punjab, when on September 27, 1914, S.S. Komagata Maru brought 400  Sikhs And 60 Muslims form the Far East in Hoogly.”

 

Scores of the Ghadarites, however, sneaked through enquiries under the Ingress Ordinance and contacted the local revolutionary leaders.  “There was not a village in the Punjab where ‘Ghadar’ did not reach to excite the passions of literate people and students and through them the illiterate masses.  The teachers, kisans and all sorts of labourers in the villages………………caught the spirit of Ghadar” 109

 

109.        Gulab Singh, Under the Shadow of Gallows,P. 13.    

 

Most important of all was the work in the army.  “The Sikhs and Punjabi Mohammadens dominated the Indian army, and these very communities were the backbone of the Ghadar movement.  They had, therefore, an immense capacity to spread disaffection in the Indian army and some of them infiltrated the army as recruits. The Ghadar revolutionaries were bold, fearless and defiant, and were altogether unlike the members of secret party organisation who usually worked underground.  Their plan were seldom kept secret from their followers and were in many cases carried to the Government authorities by their spies working among them. Railway stations, Police Posts, means of communications, such as telephone and telegraph wires were to be destroyed and military camps and check-posts was to be disorganised.  Government Treasuries were to be looted and Revolutionary Camps were to be established in jungles and border areas.  The British military and the administration were to be harassed and arms and ammunition were to be captured by carrying on raids on arsenals and military camps”.110

 

110.        Ibid.

 

Response from students, particularly at Ludhiana, was encouraging.  Dewa Singh, a sports goods dealer at Ludhiana, inspired revolutionary ideas among the students, prominent among whom was Sucha Singh.  They engaged themselves in collecting material for preparing bombs, publishing revolutionary literature, acting as messengers, carrying on propaganda among Indian military personnel, etc.  The room of Sucha Singh in the Islamia School Boarding House, Ludhiana, became a rendezvous of revolutionaries.111

 

111.        Pritam Singh Panchhi, Ghadar Party Ka Itihas, p. 129.

R.C. Majumdar, History of Freedom Movement in India, Vol. II, p. 453.

 

There was a general discontent among the soldiers because of the excessive loss of life among the Indian soldiers as compared with the British at the European front.  The Ghadarites were out to exploit their grievances, and, with their heads literally on the palms, they successfully infilterated into the military cantonments and went about preaching murder and mutiny everywhere.112 “19-years-old Karter Singh, Saraba,……………..stood out as the model revolutionary oorganiser.  Always on his bike, he would travel hundreds of miles at a stretch leaving in his wake the burning trail of revolt.  There was not a single cantonment from Bannu down to Benares that he had not visited and created revolutionary centres therein.  Brilliant and resourceful, with unfailing presence of mind he would go dressed as an officer and take the salute from unsuspecting guards.  ‘If you must die, why not die under the revolutionary flag, in your own country’s cause ? -  he would tell the discontented Indian soldiers, daily dreading to be sent abroad”.113

 

112.        Gulab Singh, Under the Shadow of Gallows, p. 15.

113.           Randhir Singh, The Ghadar Heroes, p. 16.

 

To equip themselves with necessary funds, the Ghadarites had to resort to looting or dacoities, a number of which were committed in Ludhiana district.  On January 23, 1915, ornaments were taken from the family of a Hindu shopkeeper at Sahnewal (tahsil Ludhiana).  On the 27th January, 10 or 15 dacoits attacked the house of a Hindu in village Mansuran (tahsil Ludhiana).  They took away a large amount of booty proclaiming to the assembled villagers that they were collecting money to turn out the British and would be assisted by the Germans.  Villages who opposed the robbers were fired at and bombed.  Some students from Ludhiana were implicated in this outrage.  Still another dacoity was committed on February 3, 1915, at Rabon Unchi (tahsil Ludhiana), where a woman was robbed of property worth Rs 4,198 which was devoted to revolutionary purposes.114

 

114.       R.C.Majumdar, Histrory of the Freedom Movement in India, Vol. II, pp. 403, 448-51.

 

            In the beginning of February, 1915, Sant Randhir Singh (of Narangwal) held a conference of about a hundred revolutionaries at Gujarwal (tahsil Ludhiana).  On the 14th of the month, there was Akhand Path, after which the Sant held a secret meeting on the roof of the house where he announced that the time for a general uprising had approached and the army units were ready for rebellion.  Funds were collected and it was given out that the date of the uprising would be intimated afterwards.115

 

115.       Pritam Singh Panchhi, Ghadar Party ka Itihas, p. 131.

 

The plans of the Ghadarites were going according to schedule.  The 21st February, 1915, was fixed for a general rising in the province ; but unfortunately, as so often happened in the case of the plans of the revolutionaries, the information leaked out.  As a safeguard the date for the revolt was advanced to the 19th February, 1915. Still the Government forestalled the move and struck in time.  The proposed uprising failed to come off. Instead, a hunt for the revolutionaries was launched.  For the next two weeks terror prevailed in the Punjab.  Everyone was suspect and very few escaped the wide net cast by the police.

 

The arrested men were to be tried ; but it was not done until the Government had made things secure for itself.  The Defence of India Act116 was hurriedly rushed through the Imperial Legislative Council.  Its most important provision was the appointment of ‘Special Tribunal’ for the trial of the revolutionaries.  Under the new Act, neither commitment proceedings to these Tribunals nor judicial appeals from their decisions were allowed.  A Tribunal of 3 was set up in the Punjab ; its only Indian member was Shri Shiv Narain Sharma.  On 27th March, 1915, the First Lahore Conspiracy Trial opened at Lahore.  Barrack Bo. 16 in the Central Jail at the station was specially improvised to serve as the court of trial.117

 

116.        On 19th March, 1915, the Defence of India Act (Act IV of 1915) was passed ; it was brought into force in sixteen districts of the Punjab three days later.

(M.S. Leigh, The Punjab and the War, p. 21).

117.       Randhir Singh, The Ghadar Heroes, p. 19.

 

Sardar Kartar Singh Saraba118, the 19-year old leader of the Ghadar Group, figured as the most prominent revolutionary in the trial.  Throughout the trial Kartar Singh displayed dauntless spirit of defiance to British Government, which in his words “meant poverty and degradation at home and humiliation abroad.”  He was bold enough to assert ; “I have committed no crime.  It is the right of the slave to revolt.”

 

118.       A small statue of the great patriot adorns the traffic island near the Clock Tower, Ludhiana.

 

            On September 13, 1915, the under-trials were marched out of Barrack No. 16 for the last time after the Special Tribunal had delivered it judgment.

 

Kartar Singh Saraba and Nand Singh, both of Ludhiana district, were among the twenty-four sentenced to death with confiscation of property.  Of these, the sentences of 17, including Nand Singh119 and Rulia Singh were later on commuted to transportation for life.120

 

119.       Nand Singh died in Andaman, under barbarous treatment meted out to the Ghadar prisoners sent there. (Ibid)., p. 27)

120.       Khushwant Singh and Satindar Singh, Ghadar 1915 (New Delhi, 1966), p. 72.

 

Gurmukh Singh of Ludhiana district was among another 26 who were sentenced to transportation for life with confiscation of property.

 

There could be no judicial appeal and very few agreed to appeal for mercy.

 

Early in the morning of November 19, 1915, Kartar Singh, alongwith his 6 comrades, was taken out.  They mounted the gallows singing and smiling.

 

On the eve of the execution, Kartar Singh was again asked to appeal for mercy.  “If I had to live more lives than one,” he boldly retorted, “I would sacrifice each of them for my country’s sake.”121

 

121.        Randhir Singh, The Ghadar Heroes, p.24.

For a list of revolutionaries belonging to Ludhiana District tried and convicted by Special Tribunals, See Appendix at pages 121-24.

 

Thus ended the efforts of the simple and in most cases uneducated people entirely in the foreign surroundings, to contribute their little bit in the fight for the freedom of their motherland.  At a time when the leaders of the Indian national movement were talking of “self-government on British Dominion model,” the heroes of the Ghadar Party had dared to raise the banner of complete independence, of armed revolt against imperialism122.  It was the most powerful revolt planned since the Mutiny of 1857123.  The Gahdar movement, which may be characterised as a ‘revolution’ in the Punjab, was in a way the first secular effort to liberate India by the use of arms.  The Ghadar Party, though composed of overwhelming numbers of Sikhs, had no pretentions of religious revival and sought to achieve a strictly political goal.  For this reason both Hindus and Muslims were drawn towards it and later several other revolutionary groups were greatly influenced by the new ideology which had shed all religious bias.  Thus Ludhiana district, as evidenced by the activities of some of the most prominent Ghadar Party members who hailed from there, occupied an honourable place in this phase of freedom struggle.

 

122.     Ibid., p. 25.

123.     Ibid., p. 18.

VI.     Between the two World Wars

 

Disturbances of April, 1919. – During World War I (1914-18), the Indians helped the British Government freely with men and money.  The people responded most enthusiastically to make the war effort a success.  After having done their best, they felt frustrated with what was offered to them by the Rowlatt Committee Report of 1918.  It is, therefore, no wonder that deep public dissatisfaction expressed itself in the form of strikes and other disturbances.  To combat seditious crimes, the Government, in spite of opposition from all quarters, passed in 1918 the Rowlatt Act, arming the Executive with special powers to deport individuals, to control the peace and set up special tribunals for the trial of political offenders without juries.

 

Agitation against the Rowlatt Act. – The prominent leaders in this agitation in the district were two advocates of Ludhiana, namely, Lala Bhagat Ram and Mian Abdul Haye.  On March 31, 1919, a metting of women, to protest against the Rowlatt Act, was held in the Arya Samaj Mandir at Ludhiana.

 

A second meeting for the purpose of protesting against the Rowlatt Act and urging upon the people the necessity of observing a hartal was held at the Qaisarganj grain market at Ludhiana on 3rd April, 1919.  A third meeting was held at the same place two days later on 5th April, 1919 and a general hartal was observed at Ludhiana and Sahnewal on 6th April.  At Ludhiana a public meeting was also held at the Budha Nala Ghat the same evening.

 

On April, 10, 1919, a public meeting was held at the Qaisarganj Market, Ludhiana, for promoting Hindu-Muslim unity, for considering the construction of National Hall in Ludhiana, and for inviting the holding of the next Punjab Provincial Political Conference at Ludhiana in 1920.

 

On his way from Bombay to the Punjab, Gandhi was arrested at Palwal on 9th April, and sent back from there by a special train to Bombay.  To protest against the arrest of Gandhiji, a public meeting was held at the Qaisarganj Market on 12th April, 1919.  A hartal was also observed at Ludhiana on 16th April, 1919.  At a public meeting held at the Budha Nala Ghat the same day resolutions were passed protesting against the externment of Gandhiji from the Punjab.

 

On April 17, 1919, Ludhiana district was proclaimed as disturbed under section 15 of the  Police Act of 1861.124

 

124.        Memorandum on the Disturbances in the Punjab, April, 1919, pp. 71-115.

 

Khilafat Movement, 1920-22. – Though started soon after the Amritsar sessions of the Indian National Congress.  Jamiat-ul-Ulma-I-Hind and the Muslim League, held towards the end of December, 1919, the Khilafat Movement was effectively started in the Punjab on January, 1, 1920, when for the first time the Punjab Khilafat Committee was formed on a provincial basis.

            On the same day, Khilafat Committee was also formed at Ludhiana with Maulana Habib-ur-Rehman125 as its President.  The membership of the Committee extended to all communities Hindus, Muslims and Sikhs.  The headquarters of the Khilafat Committee were located at the Masjid-do-Manzli in Mochpura, Ludhiana.

 

125.        Maulana Habib-ur-Rehman (a great-grandson of Maulana Shah Abdul Qadir, the great Punjab hero of the First War of Independence of 1857) was born on July 3, 1892, at Ludhiana, and died on September 2, 1956 at Delhi.  He served the country for full 42 years from 1914 onwards, and ranked among the prominent freedom fighters in the Punjab.

(Aziz-ur-Rehman, Raees-ur-Ahrar Maulana Habib-ur-Rahman Ludhianvi aur Hindostan ki-Jang-i-Azadi, pp. 8, 54, 94)

 

 

            There were three other important centres of the Khilafat Movement in Ludhiana district at Balliawal (tahsil Ludhiana), Jagraon and Raikot.

 

            In 1921, ‘Bee Amman’, the mother of Ali brothers, visited Ludhiana, where she was taken out in a grand procession.126.

 

126.        Ibid., p. 72.

 

            Non-Co-operation Movement, 1920-22. – During his tour of the Punjab to create enthusiasm among the people for this movement, Gandhiji visited Ludhiana in February, 1921, alongwith Lala Duni Chand of Ambala.  Gandhiji spoke in a big public meeting held in the Daresi Grounds, after which he left for Ambala.

 

            On December, 8, 1921, Master Taj-ud-Din led a batch of non-co-operators, comprising Hindus, Muslims and Sikhs, through the bazaars of Ludhiana.  The agitators were arrested.

 

            Next day (December 9,1921), Muhammad Yahi, along with a batch of about 200 Satyagrahis, marched in a procession and was arrested.

 

            On the third day (December 10, 1921), about a hundred blind students of a Muslim school for the blind at Ludhiana, led by their teacher, Muhammad Yasin, also participated in the movement.  This created great excitement in the town.  It also alarmed the authorities who arrested only their leader and let the blind students, after having taken them to the Police Station, go away.

 

            In this way batches of people continued offering Satyagrah and getting arrested till 20th December, 1921.  During the twelve days, some three thousand persons were arrested and sent to jail.

 

            On the 20th December, 1921, a procession of burqa women marched through the town for offering Satyagrah, but the police dare not arrest them127.

 

127.      Aziz-ur-Rehman, Raees-ur-Ahrar Maulana Habib-ur-Rahman Ludhianvi aur Hindostan ki-Jang-i-Azadi, p.105.

 

On 21st December, 1921, Maulana Habib-ur-Rehman addressed a large gathering in connection with the civil disobedience movement programme.  Under his leadership, a large number of persons, young and old alike and even children, got ready for offering Satyagrah.  The police tried their best to arrest Maulana Habib-ur-Rehman but could succeed in their object after two days, on 22nd December, 1921.  As he was paraded through the town hand-cuffed, great excitement prevailed.  People in thousands offered to become volunteers for civil disobedience.  They had shed all fear and awe of the police and it became a problem for the authorities to keep the people under control. Habib-ur-Rehman 128 was sentenced to six months’ imprisonment and a fine of rupees one thousand.

 

128.       Maulana Habib-ur-Rehman remained in jails at Ambala, Mianwali and Dharamsala for about one year and eight months from December 21, 1921 till his release on August 16, 1923. (Ibid., pp. 107-15).

 

By this time, some three thousand volunteers had courted arrest and were put in jail.  Nearly one hundred and fifty volunteers were arrested and put in jail almost everyday.  The Ludhiana jail got overcrowded. However, the then Superintendent of the Jail, Col. Hakumat Rai, treated all the political prisoners very well, for which all of them were full of praise for him.129

 

129.        Ibid., pp. 105-107.

 

The district Congress Committee, Ludhiana, was formed about the year 1919.  Dr. Chander Bhan Satluj was its founder President from 1919 to 1926.  During the period, the prominent Muslim Congress members were Mian Abdul Haye, Advocate, Maulana Habib-ur-Rehman, Mian Ghulam Rasul and Mian Abdulla, Advocate.

 

Akali, Movement, 1920-25. – As a part of the general awakening in the Punjab produced by peaceful conditions under the British rule of over half a century, the Shromani Akali Dal was organised in 1920 to effect reform in the management of Gurdwaras.  The control of Sikh Shrines by certain individuals had led to all sorts of malpractices which were considered highly objectionable by the Sikh masses.  Since all efforts to improve the management of the Gurdwaras were athwarted by powerful vested interests with the Government support, a regular agitation was launched to achieve the objective.  The struggle for Sikh shrines, on the pattern of non-co-operation movement practised b y the Indian National Congress, assumed the form of a popular movement and after considerable suffering resulted in the passage of the Gurdwara Reforms Act, 1925, which placed all Gurdwaras under the control of the Shromani Gurdwara Parbandhak Committee.

 

The Akali movement produced powerful impact on the district.  Among the prominent persons thrown up by this movement from Ludhiana district, the name of Sardar mangal Singh130 deserves special mention.  Having joined the movement, he became Editor of the paper ‘Akali’, published from Amritsar.

 

130.        The father of Sardar Mangal Singh originally belonged to village Gil (tahsil Ludhiana), and had settled in Lyallpur district towards the close of the 19th century.

 

            Babbar Akali Movement, 1922-26. -  The repressive measures adopted by the Government to crush the Akali Movement compelled more radical among the Sikhs to resort to desperate action.  The Babbar Akali Movement was started in August, 1922, under the stress of prevailing political conditions.

 

            One of the valiant heroes of Babbar Akali Movement from Ludhiana district was Babu Santa Singh.  On Joining the revolutionary movement in 1922, he became its Secretary.  A big reward was announced for giving information regarding his whereabouts.  He was arrested on June 20, 1923.  For nearly two months (uptil August 8, 1923), the police tortured him in every way to make him disclose details about the Babbar Movement, but all in vain.  Cases were, however, started against Santa Singh, who, along with five companions, was sentenced to death.  He was hanged in the Central Jail, Lahore, on February 27, 1926.131

 

131.       Sukhpal Vir singh, Zila Ludhiana de Shahid (Punjabi), pp. 5-6.   (Published by the District Public Relations Officer, Ludhiana).

 

Babu Santa Singh was the son of Sardar Sobha Singh of village Haron Kalan, tahsil Samrala.  He was born in January, 1897.  He joined the army on February 25, 1920 and resigned on January 26, 1922, to engage himself in social work.

 

            Boycott of the Governor’s Darbar at Ludhiana. – The Governor of the Punjab, sir Malcolm Hailey, announced to hold a Darbar in Ludhiana in 1925.  Maulana Habib-ur-Rehman decided to boycott it, for which purpose he sent for Lala Lajpat Rai by telegram.  Lalaji reached Ludhiana by car at 8 in the morning at exactly the same time when the Governor was expected to arrive there.  Some half a lakh of people received Lalaji at Budha Nala bridge, from which place they started in a procession towards the city.

 

            Students of the local Khalsa School, Arya School and other private and government institutions had been prepared by authorities for the reception of the Governor.  But all of them joined Lalaji’s procession along with their respective bands.  The people surrounded the Asghar Ali Hall 132 of the Municipal Committee, where the Governor was to hold the Darbar.

 

132.       It was named after Sheikh Asghar Ali, Deputy commissioner, Ludhiana, from 30th April, 1918 to 29th March, 1919.

 

            Under the circumstances, the Governor could not visit the place.  Lala Lajpat Rai addressed the gathering from the stage actually prepared for the Governor. Consequently the Governor suspended the Ludhiana Municipal committee and disqualified all its members.

 

All India Muslim Kashmir Conference at Ludhiana. – The All India Muslim Kashmir conference was held at Ludhiana in 1928, under the chairmanship of Pt. Moti Lal Nehru.  On this occasion, some big Kashmiri Muslim businessmen drew the carriage of Pt. Moti Lal with their own hands.  About a lakh of persons, both Hindus and Muslims, attended it.

 

Civil Disobedience Movement, 1930. – The historic Dandi March launched by Mahatma Gandhi in connection with salt Satyagrah in 1930 was signal for a nation-wide mass movement.  In Ludhiana, the Satyagrahis, led by Maulana Habib-ur-Rehman, President of the District Congress Committee, started the civil disobedience movement on April, 11, 1930, by unlawfully preparing salt at a public meeting.  The local authorities used all kinds of repression to crush the movement.  The public meeting, held on the night of April 22, 1930, in the Municipal Gardens, was declared unlawful and lathi-charged. Hundreds of innocent men, women, children and aged persons were wounded . Sardar Kishan Singh, father of Sardar Bhagat Singh,  who was presiding, was mercilessly beaten on the stage, and was arrested and put in jail. Maulana Habib-ur-Rehman was also arrested from his house on April 23,1930 and put in jail.

 

Punjab Provincial Political Conference at Ludhiana.- The release of most of the political workers under the Gandhi-Irwin Pact (of March 5,1931) brought some respite. The Punjab Provincial Political Conference was held at Ludhiana on 16-17th March,1931. Most of the leading political leaders of the province ’including Dr.Satya Pal ,Dr.Kitchlew,DR.Muhammad Alam, L.Kidar Nath Sehgal,L.Pindi Das, Sardar Kishan Singh, L,Duni Chand of Ambala,L.Duni Chand, Bar at Law, of Lahore, Zutshi Sisters of Lahore, etc. attended it.

 

On Gandhiji  return to India on December 28,1931, after attending the second season of the Round Table Conference in London, the civil disobedience movement was resumed. Hartal was observed at Ludhiana and other places in the district on January 5,1932, on Gandhijis arrest in the early hours of the morning.

 

Ch. Muhammad Hassan, Advocate, Ludhiana, was the only Muslim Candidate in the whole of the Punjab, who succeeded on Congress ticket during the First General Elections to the Punjab Legislative Assembly, held in January,1937.  

 

In the District Board elections, held in Ludhiana district in July,1937, 13 members out of the total member of 30 were elected on Congress ticket. Among them,11 member were retuned uncontested.

 

Ludhiana District Political Conference,1938,- A district Political Conference  was held at village Gujarwal (tahsil Ludhiana) early in 1938. t was presided over by Maulana Hussain Ahmad Madni (of Deoband, district Saharanpur,U.P) and was attended among others by Shri Sri Krishan Sinha, the then Chief Minister of Bihar and Shri Mohan Lal Saxena, then member, Central Lagislative Assembly. Such a big conference had not so far been held in any rural area in Ludhiana district. The Government viewed with disfavour any political activity in the Gujarwal region which was the centre of the Grewals, who were generally employed in the army and other Government departments . The conference was, however, successfully organised through spontaneous public support.

 

State People’s Conference  at Ludhiana, 1938.- The State people’s conference was held at Ludhiana in  1938, under the chairmanship of Pt. Jawahar Lal Nehru.

 

Individual Satyagrah of 1940.- Ludhiana district also participated in the individual civil disobedience movement started by Gandhiji towards the end of 1940. a notice regarding  those intending to offer Satyagrah was given to the Deputy Commissioner and the Superintendent of Police, Ludhiana and the Chief Secretary to Government, Punjab, intimating the date, time and place of the Satyagrah. In some  cases, arrests were made before the Satyagrah but generally persons were arrested while actually offering Satyagrah. Nearly three Hundred individual Satyagrah were arrested in the district.

 

‘Quit India’ Movement, 1942.- The ‘Quit India” Resolution of August, 1942, and the strong measures adopted by the government to check the upsurge of popular felling all over the country produced good response to the mass struggle for independence in Ludhiana district as well. Great enhusiasm prevailed among the people. it increased in district proportion to the repression on the part of Government to crush the movement . About 475 persons were sent to jail.

 

VII. Goa Operation, 1961

 

Among the notable military personnel who distinguished themselves in the Goa operation in 1961, Major Shiv Dev Singh Sidhu and Lt. Vijay Kumar Sehgal ,who hailed from Ludhiana district, deserve special mention.

 

Major Shiv Dev Singh Sidhu

 

            Born in a progressive Sikh family of Sidhwan Khurd in 1926, Shiv Dev Singh showed inclination for military career from boyhood. Having received his early training at King Georg’s Military school, Jullundhur, and officers’  Training School, Mhow, he was commissioned in 1945. As an officer attached to the 7th Light Cavalry, Shiv Dev Singh accompanied the regiment to Japan  in 1946 and returned to India after a year. The incursions of Pakistani raiders into Kashmir in 1947 found Capt. Shiv Dev Singh and the regiment on active duty  in the State. Shiv Dev Singh distinguished himself as Squadron Officer, intelligence Officer and Adjutant of the regiment which played a prominent part during the operations against the tribal raiders in the Zojila pass and Successfully cleared it despite still resistance.

 

            In December 1961, Major Shiv Dev Singh was sent to Goa as officer Commanding of the Squadron of the 7th Light Cavalry. Through his daring and dash, troops under his command overcame all obstacles created y the enemy. The Squadron pushed twenty five miles into Goa and reached Betim ferry site, about 500 yards away from Panjim with the river in between. The sudden appearance of the Squadron under Major Shiv Dev Singh opposite Panjim made the Portuguese sue for the peace. In a letter written in Portuguese, Major Sidhu was requested to arrange foe talks to Finalize surrender to the Commander of  Indian forces. The communication was forwarded to the Commander of the Batallion and a reply thereto was required to be awaited.

 

            During reconnaissance of the surrounding area Major Shiv Dev Singh was informed about 50-60 nationalists held as captives by Portuguese in the nearby Aguada fort. In his desire to rescue the patriotic Goanses, Major Sidhu and Lt. V. K. Sehgal directed the Patrol to Aguada fort. The garrison refused to surrender and opened fire on the Indian party. Major Sidhu tried to cover Lt.Seghal wounded by a grenade near the gate. While he was engaged in this  hazardous operation to help. Lt. Sehgal, a mortar shell burst near Major Sidhu and killed him. The boldness and self-sacrifice of Major Sidhu saved the nationalist prisoners from being massacred. The action of Major Sidhu showed exception courage, leadership, disregard of personal safety and devotion to duty in the service of the country of which Ludhiana may well feel proud.

 

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