a) Drain of Wealth Theory

The constant flow of wealth from India to England for which India did not get an adequate economic, commercial or material return has been described as drain of wealth from India. Dadabhai Naoroji gave ‘drain of wealth theory’ in his book ‘Poverty and Un-British Rule in India’.  Scholars estimate drain of wealth to be around 9% of India’s GDP in 18th century and 6% of GDP in 19th century.

b) Swaraj is my birth Right

‘Swaraj is my birthright and I shall have it’  slogan was coined by Bal Gangadhar Tilak. Bal Gangadhar Tilak, was also referred to as Lokamanya Tilak was a leader of the Indian independence movement and belonged to the extremist faction. He was also known as the ‘Father of Indian Unrest’.

c) Separate Communal electorate

The Lucknow Pact, 1916  

Background to Lucknow Pact

• When the Muslim League was formed in 1906, it was a relatively moderate organisation with a pro-British stance.
• After the First World War, the Viceroy Lord Chelmsford had solicited reform suggestions from Indians in return for the Indian support to the British war effort.
• The Muslim League led by Mohammed Ali Jinnah wanted to use this opportunity to press for constitutional reforms through a joint Hindu-Muslim platform.
• Jinnah was then a member of both the parties and he was largely responsible for the Pact.
• This was the first time that leaders of both the INC and the Muslim League were meeting for a joint session.
• At the meeting, the leaders consulted with each other and drafted a set of demands for constitutional reforms.
• In October 1916, 19 elected Indian members of the Imperial Legislative Council addressed a memorandum to the Viceroy seeking reforms.
• In November 1916, leaders from both the parties met again in Calcutta and discussed and amended the suggestions.
• Finally, at their respective annual sessions held at Lucknow in December 1916, the INC and the League confirmed the agreement. This came to be known as the Lucknow Pact.
• For his efforts, Sarojini Naidu gave Jinnah the title ‘the Ambassador of Hindu-Muslim unity.

Reforms suggested in the Lucknow Pact

• Self-government in India.
• Abolition of the Indian Council.
• Separation of the executive from the judiciary.
• Salaries of the Secretary of State for Indian Affairs to be paid from British coffers and not the Indian funds.
• 1/3rd representation to be given to Muslims in the Central Government.
• The number of Muslims in the provincial legislatures to be laid down for each province.
• Separate electorates for all communities until a joint electorate is demanded by all.
• Introduction of a system of weightage for minority representation (it implied giving minorities more representation than their share in the population).
• Increasing the term of the Legislative Council to 5 years.
• Half the members of the Imperial Legislative Council to be Indians.
• All elected members to be elected directly on the basis of adult franchise. 4/5th of the members of the provincial legislatures to be elected and 1/5th to be nominated.
• Members of the Legislative Council to elect their President themselves.

d) Entry into legislation

Gandhi and most of the Congress party rejected the provincial and central legislative councils created by the British to offer some participation for Indians. They argued that the councils were rigged with un-elected allies of the British, and too un-democratic and simply “rubber stamps” of the Viceroy.

In December 1922, Chittaranjan Das, Narasimha Chintaman Kelkar and Motilal Nehru formed the Congress-Khilafat Swarajaya Party with Das as the president and Nehru as one of the secretaries.

Taluqdari System

• The term ‘taluqdar’ has different meanings in different parts of India. In Oudh, taluqdar is a great landholder.
• But in Bengal, a taluqdar is next to zamindar in extent of land control and social status.
• The big zamindars themselves had created many taluqs under several denominations, such as, junglburi taluq, mazkuri taluq, shikimi taluq, and so on.
• These were created partly as a strategy of zamindari management and partly as a fiscal policy measure for raising zamindari funds for specific purposes.
• After the Permanent Settlement, new varieties of taluqs were created by zamindars.
• Under the pressure of the Permanent Settlement, many zamindars were creating dependent taluqs denominated as pattani taluq, noabad taluq and osat taluq.

• In 1905, in Benaras session of the Congress, Gopal Krishana Gokhale (presiding the session)supported the Swadeshi and Boycott Movements in Bengal only.
• But they were against the all India extension of Swaraj, Boycott & Swadeshi Movements to the national level.
• This led to the creation of two groups within the Congress – Moderates & Extremists. 

The Komagata Maru incident involved the Japanese steamship Komagata Maru, on which a group of people from British India attempted to immigrate to Canada in April 1914, but most were denied entry and forced to return to Calcutta (present-day Kolkata). There, the Indian Imperial Police attempted to arrest the group leaders. A riot ensued, and they were fired upon by the police, resulting in the deaths of 20 people.

Gurdit Singh Sandhu, a 1906 Indo-Canadian immigration pioneer), was a Singaporean businessman who was aware that Canadian exclusion laws were preventing Punjabis from immigrating there. He wanted to circumvent these laws by hiring a boat to sail from Calcutta to Vancouver. His aim was to help his compatriots whose previous journeys to Canada had been blocked.

Viceroys in India from 1858 to 1947

Ambika Charan Majumdar presided over the 1899 Bengal Provincial Conference at Burdwan as well as the 1910 Conference in Calcutta. He had served as the president of the 31st session of the Indian National Congress in 1916 where the famous Lucknow Pact was signed between the Congress and the Muslim league and also moderates and extremists of the Congress party came together once again.

CHAMPARAN SATYAGRAHA

At Champaran, the British landlords forced all the tenants to plant 15 per cent of their holding with indigo and then surrender the entire harvest as rent. This increased the misery of the poor tenants. But when synthetic indigo was developed and indigo plantation was no longer profitable, the landlords obtained fresh agreements from sharecroppers to pay them compensation for releasing them from the 15% arrangement. Gandhiji came in at this time and through non-violent civil disobedience he forced the landlords to refund 25 per cent of the compensation money to the peasants.

Gandhiji had asked the indigo planters for a 50 percent refund to the farmers but they offered only 25 percent. Gandhiji still agreed to their offer because for him the amount of the refund was of less importance. More important was the fact that the planters had been forced to surrender part of their rights. So he agreed to their settlement.

Lord Linlithgow  was Viceroy of India from 1936 to 1944 and this eight years period was longest reign as Viceroy of India. During this period, parts of Government of India Act 1935 came into force in 1937. Other events included – Resignation of Congress Ministries to protest the involvement of Indians in world war-II; Start of World War-II (1939), resignation of Subhash Chandra Bose and foundation of “Forward Block”; Escape of SC Bose from India, Jinnah’s two nations theory; Atlanta Charter; August Offer (1940); Foundation of Indian National Army; Cripps Mission (1942); Launch of Quit India Movement; Demand of divide and quit; Bengal Famine of 1943).

Gopal Hari Desmukh (1823-92), popularly known as “Lokahitawadi”, was a product of the Western learning in India. He was a judge and a member of the Governor-General’s Council in 1880. As a votary of national self-reliance, he attended the Delhi Durbar in 1876, wearing handspun khadi.

A great social reformer and rational thinker, “Lokahitawadi” urged the people to be self-reliant and seek Western learning. These were, in his view, tools for cultivating a rational outlook and for solving the country’s pressing problems.

He believed that if religion sanctions evil then religion should be changed as it’s a product of man. He said “If religion does not sanction social reform, then change religion.” He advocated humanitarianism and social service as the two driving forces in India. A profound scholar, he wrote hundreds of articles on social issues and volumes on history. In his essays, “Lokahitawadi” deplored the prevalent ignorance, the hold of outdated social values, the dominance of religion in social life, and the selfishness of the upper classes. He supported the cause of women and advocated female education.