Post-War National Scenario - Election & INA Trials

Two Strands of National Upsurge

1. Tortuous negotiations involving the government, Congress and Muslim League.
2. Sporadic, localised and often extremely militant and united mass action by workers, peasants and states’ peoples which took the form of a countrywide strike wave. (INA Release Movement, Royal Indian Navy (RIN) revolt, Tebhaga movement, Worli revolt, Punjab Kisan Morchas, Travancore peoples’ struggle (especially the Punnapra-Vayalar episode) and the Telangana peasant revolt).

Change in Government’s Attitude

• Lifted the ban on the Congress and released the Congress leaders in June 1945.
• Wavell Plan backed by the Conservative government in Britain failed to break the constitutional deadlock.
• July 1945, Labour Party formed the government in Britain. Clement Attlee -  New PM, Pethick Lawrence - Secretary of state for India.
• August 1945, elections to central and provincial assemblies were announced
• September 1945, it was announced that a constituent assembly, working according to the spirit of the Cripps Offer.
• Following factors
1. End of the War - UK was no more a big power while the USA and USSR emerged.
2. New Labour government was more sympathetic to Indian demands.
3. Throughout Europe, there was a wave of socialist radical governments.
4. British soldiers were weary and tired.
5. Anti-imperialist wave in South-East Asia.
6. Feared another Congress revolt, a revival of the 1942 situation

Congress Election Campaign and INA Trials

• Election on winter of 1945-46.

Election Campaign for Nationalistic Aims

• Mobilise the Indians against the British, not just appeal to the people for votes.
• Expressed the nationalist sentiments against the state repression of the 1942 Quit India upsurge.
• Brave resistance of the leaderless people was lauded; martyrs’ memorials were set up; relief funds were collected for sufferers; the officials responsible for causing pain were condemned; and promises of enquiry and threats of punishment to guilty officials were spelt out, government failed to check such speeches.
• Mass pressure against the trial of INA POWs, sometimes described as “an edge of a volcano”.
• British had initially decided to hold public trials of several hundreds of INA prisoners besides dismissing them from service and detaining without trial around 7,000 of them.
• First trial at the Red Fort in Delhi in November 1945 and putting on dock together a Hindu, Prem Kumar Sehgal, a Muslim, Shah Nawaz Khan, and a Sikh, Gurbaksh Singh Dhillon.
• Use of Indian Army units in a bid to restore French and Dutch colonial rule in Vietnam and Indonesia.

Congress Support for INA Prisoners

• First post-War Congress session in September 1945 at Bombay, support for the INA.
• Defence of INA prisoners in the court was organised by Bhulabhai Desai, Tej Bahadur Sapru, Kailash Nath Katju, Jawaharlal Nehru and Asaf Ali.
• INA Relief and Enquiry Committee distributed small sums of money and food, and helped arrange employment for the affected.
• Fund collection was organised.

The INA Agitation - A Landmark on Many Counts

• High pitch and intensity for release of INA prisoners.
• Holding of public meetings and celebrations of INA Day (November 12, 1945) and INA week (November 5-11).
• Participation of diverse social groups and political parties, included fund contributions made by many people - from film stars, municipal committees, Indians living abroad and gurudwaras to tongawallas.
• participation in meetings; shopkeepers closing shops; political groups demanding release of prisoners; contributing to INA funds; student meetings and boycott of classes; organising kisan conferences; and All India Women’s Conference demanding the release of INA prisoners.
• Support cause in varying degrees, included the Muslim League, Communist Party, Unionists, Akalis, Justice Party, Ahrars in Rawalpindi, Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh, Hindu Mahasabha and the Sikh League.
• Government to abandon the trials for good Indo-British relations.

Three Upsurges - Winter of 1945-46

INA trials developed into violent confrontations

1. November 21, 1945 in Calcutta over INA trials
2. February 11, 1946 in Calcutta over seven-year sentence to an INA officer
3. February 18, 1946 in Bombay, strike by Royal Indian Navy Ratings

Congress did not support these upsurges because of their timing and tactics.

Three-Stage Pattern

Stage I. When a Group Defies Authority and is Repressed

• Many groups, tied flags as a symbol of anti-imperialist unity, marched to Dalhousie Square - the seat of government in Calcutta.
• Refused to disperse and were lathicharged, retaliated by throwing stones and brickbats
• Police resorted to firing in which two persons died.
• Next day ((February 11, 1946), led by Muslim League students & Congress and communist students’ organisations joined.
• Rebellion by Naval Ratings - February 18, 1946 some 1100 Royal Indian Navy (RIN) ratings of HMIS Talwar
• Racial discrimination (demanding equal pay for Indian and white soldiers)
• Unpalatable food
• Abuse by superior officers
• Arrest of a rating for scrawling ‘Quit India’ on HMIS Talwar
• INA trials
• Use of Indian troops in Indonesia, demanding their withdrawal.
• hoisted the tricolour, crescent, and the hammer and sickle flags.
• Crowds brought food to the ratings and shop keepers invited them to take whatever they needed.

Stage II. When the City People Join In

• Virulent anti-British mood result in paralysis of Calcutta and Bombay.
• Meetings, processions, strikes, hartals, and attacks on Europeans, police stations, shops, tram depots, railway stations, banks, besides stopping of rail and road traffic by squatting on tracks and barricading of streets.

Stage III. When People in Other Parts of the Country Express Sympathy and Solidarity

• Students boycotted classes.
• Sympathetic strikes in military establishments in Karachi, Madras, Visakhapatnam, Calcutta, Delhi, Cochin, Jamnagar, Andamans, Bahrain and Aden.
• Strikes by the Royal Indian Air Force in Bombay, Poona, Calcutta, Jessore and Ambala.
• Patel and Jinnah persuaded the ratings to surrender on February 23 with an assurance that national parties would prevent any victimisation.

Evaluation of Potential and Impact of the three Upsurges

• Fearless action.
• Revolt in the armed forces.
• Royal Indian Navy revolt.
• Prompted the British to extend some concessions.
• December 1, 1946, government announced hat only those INA members accused of murder or brutal treatment of fellow prisoners would be brought to trial.
• Imprisonment sentences passed against the first batch were remitted in January 1947.
• Indian soldiers were withdrawn from Indo-China and Indonesia by February 1947.
• Decision to send a parliamentary delegation to India (November 1946).
• Decision to send Cabinet Mission was taken in January 1946.
• Upsurges were short-lived & confined to a few urban centres.
• Communal unity witnessed was more organisational than a unity among the people.
• Erosion of the morale of the bureaucracy, the British infrastructure to repress was intact.
• Maratha battalion in Bombay that rounded up the ratings and restored them to their barracks.

Congress Strategy

• Leftists claim that the Congress indifference to the revolutionary situation.
• Situation would go out of its control & disciplined armed forces were vital in a free India
• Different path to independence would have emerged, but actually upsurges were an extension of earlier nationalist activity.
• Upsurges were distinguishable, violent challenges to the authority while the earlier activity was a peaceful demonstration of national solidarity.
• Congress did not officially support these upsurges, Negotiations had been an integral part of the Congress strategy,
• Explored before a mass movement could be launched.

Election Results

Performance of the Congress

• 91 % of non-Muslim votes, capture 57 out of 102 seats.
• Provincial elections, got a majority except in Bengal, Sindh and Punjab.

Muslim League’s Performance

• 86.6 % of the Muslim votes.
• Captured the 30 reserved seats, majority in Bengal and Sindh.
• Unlike in 1937, now the League clearly established itself as the dominant party among Muslims.
• In Punjab A Unionist-Congress-Akali coalition under Khizr Hayat Khan assumed power.

Significant Features of Elections

1. Separate electorates
2. Limited franchise - provinces, less than 10 % of the population, Central Assembly, less than 1 per cent of the population