Indian Freedom Fighters
History is familiar with the saint Mahatma Gandhi who nonviolently contributed immensely to achieving India's independence and is not only admired worldwide but was emulated in several independence movements and is still mirrored in democratic struggles. His movement, however, was purely a political and sociopolitical movement not giving importance to Hinduism. He was at times overgenerous for his own good and unnecessarily conceded to demands that only pampered divisive forces (Muslim separatists.) This created the appeasement problem that India still faces. This is also termed 'pseudo-secularism' wherein Hindu tolerance is abused to unfairly benefit institutions that are antithetical to democracy and equality.
Today, historical Hindu activist freedom fighters are purposely overshadowed to only perpetuate liberal parties' appeasement agendas.
Subhas Chandra Bose, who militarily championed the Indian independence movement, credited Veer Savarkar for advising him to escape his house arrent in India by emigrating and then forging alliances with Axis powers during World War II (WWII.) “Leave India, go to Germany or Japan, raise an army.” Bose later wrote: “Savarkar’s advice was the turning point.” In Jan 1941, Bose escaped from house arrest, and later formed the Indian National Army (Azad Hind Fauj) or INA, which received training from the Japanese Empire. Savarkar cleverly played both sides, supporting Indian freedom on the one hand and collaborating with the British imperialists in acts, such as raising a volunteer army to fight Axis powers in WWII. Bose once again praised Savarkar for having done so, because these returning soldiers or soldiers-in-training were in many instances convinced by Bose into defecting towards INA. He said, "When due to misguided political whims and lack of vision almost all the leaders of the Congress Party are decrying all the soldiers in the Indian Army as mercenaries, it is heartening to know that Veer Savarkar is fearlessly exhorting the youth of India to enlist in the Armed Forces. These men will learn modern warfare and return to India as trained soldiers to free their motherland."[1]
Reconciling militarism as a Hindu[edit]
A question that would arise to someone studying the life of a Hindu warrior is, "How could a Hindu justify using violence, which clearly goes against the Vow of Ahimsa (Nonviolence)?"
Although living nonviolently is crucial to avoid bad karma and accomplish Moksha, it can be necessary to save lives. For example, due to British PM Churchill's policy of confiscating Indian agricultural produce, millions in India starved to death. Violence against a few thousand or event tens of thousands would have been justifiable to prevent the deaths of Indians.
In the Mahabharata as well, Krishna only after all alternatives to war turned down by the Kauravas, advised Arjuna Pandava to do secure his kingdom and uphold righteousness (i.e., Kauravas were spoiled royals that lived in materialism and even attempted to disrobe Draupadi.) Rama too, engaged in combat only when threatened or to save the life of Sita. For these reasons, both Krishna and Rama are worshipped even by Jains and Bauddhs, who historically have gone at extreme lengths to remain nonviolent.
Bose himself said, "Non-violence is a great ideal, but when a nation is enslaved, the first duty is to secure freedom-by any means."[2]
Savarkar had said in 1941, "Hindus should not be afraid of war...Enlist in the army in large numbers The more Hindus join the army, the better for us...This war is a golden opportunity to militarize Hindu society." Savarkar's strategy was to utilize free military training to implement it against the British in the future to obtain independence. He said in 1941, "An Indian army wherein millions of Hindus occupy the dominant position...must prove the most effective factor not only to defend our country...but also to further the cause of the political emancipation of our motherland in the long run."
Indian National Congress' Hindu activist roots[edit]
The party was founded by ethnically-British Allan Octavian Hume (1829-1912), born in England. He was a member of the Hindu-based Theosophical Society for a while, and even after leaving he remained a vegetarian and the group had inspired him to give up killing birds for their specimens. He was influenced by freedom fighter Gopal Krishna Gokhale.
Annie Besant (1847-1933):
As the Theosophical Society's prominent member, she later joined the Congress as well, and became its president in 1917. Though born ethnically British in England, she adopted India as her homeland. She mobilized support through her platforms like New India and Commonweal. She co-founded the All-India Home Rule League with Lokmanya Tilak.
Rao Bahadur Mahadev Govind Ranade (1842-1901):
He founded the Prarthana Samaj (Prayer Society), a spiritual organization devoted to worshiping God and living ethically while attempting to uplift social outcasts. Followers saw themselves as a part of the Marathi Sant-Mat tradition to which saints like Namdev and Tukaram belonged.
He was a well-known social activist and his motto was, "Humanise, Equalise and Spiritualise."
His aliases were Nyayamurti Ranade and that name's meaning Justice Ranade.
He was from the Marathi community.
Romesh Chunder Dutt (1948-1909):
He translated the Rig Veda into Bengali in 1886. He also translated the Ramayana and Mahabharata into English portraying them as cultural treasures that embody Hindu ethics and nationalism.
His historical novels and economic critiques (i.e., The Economic History of India) wove Hindu revivalism into anti-colonial discourse, linking broader Hindu intellectual circles like those of Bankim Chandra Chatterjee.
Although sympathizing with the Brahmo Samaj, he never joined but admired their cause.
He was from the Bengali community.
Savalai Ramaswami Mudaliar (1840-1911):
He was knighted as Sir.
He was a philanthropist that funded temples and charities in line with Vaishnava traditions. S. Ramaswami Mudaliar Choultry in 1884 was established by him as a rest-house for pilgrims and travelers, supported temple-related charities, and it operated until the 1960s. He also funded the Women and Children Hospital in Kozhikode in 1903.
He was from the Tamil community.
Subbier Subramania Iyer (1842-1924):
He viewed Theosophy, as an extension of Brahmvidya (Knowledge of God.) He joined in 1884 and collaborated with Annie Besant on the Home Rule Movement.
He advocated for using temple funds for education and pilgrim welfare, balancing societal and spiritual support.
He pioneered the Hindu Religious Endowments Act in the 1920s, learning to the establishment of Hindu Religious Endowments Board to manage temple finances transparently.
He was from the Tamil community.
Surendranath Banerjee (1848-1925):
He founded the Indian Association in 1876.
He advocated for widow remarriage and raising the marriageable age for girls.
He was from the Bengali community.
Womesh Chunder Bonnerjee (1844-1906):
His maternal lineage traced to the Sanskrit scholar and philosopher Pandit Juggonath Turkopunchanun, linking him to the tradition of Hindu saints. He studied at Hindu School at Kolkata, a major institution for blending Western and Sanskrit learning. He authored Reform of the Hindu Marriage Laws (1868), which critiqued and proposed changes to Hindu marriage customs to be more ethical.
He was from the Bengali community.
Freedom fighters defecting to Hindu groups[edit]
It wasn't only Bose who grew tired of Congress and quit to fight for freedom through other institutions. Many Congressmen defected to the political parties Hindu Mahasabha (HM) or Bharatiya Jana Sangh (BJS, predecessor to BJP), while others to the RSS, which wasn't a political party.
| Name | Post | Background | Shift | Other Significance | Birth Region | Ethnicity |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Ashutosh Lahiri[1][2] | Bengal Congress MLA | Joined HM in 1948 amid post-Partition Hindu mobilization. | Resorted to violence against imperialists. | Bengal | Bengali | |
| Balraj Madhok | Active in Congress youth wings (1940s) | Joined RSS in 1942 (post-1947 consolidation) as a pracharak; later BJS founder. | Gilgit-Baltistan (Skardu) |
Punjabi | ||
| Balakrishna Shivram Moonje | Congress volunteer | Early Congress member; influenced by Tilak’s philosophy. | Pre-1947 HM leader who co-founded RSS (1925) with Hedgewar; post-1947, as RSS vice-president (1940–46), he mentored ex-Congress nationalists joining RSS shakhas. Post-1947 Relevance: Facilitated integration of Congress dissidents into RSS during its 1949 rehabilitation post-ban. |
Military leader | Chhattisgarh (Bilaspur), then Central Provinces |
Marathi |
| Deendayal Upadhyaya | Congress worker | Active in Congress-affiliated labor unions (1940s); influenced by Gandhi’s constructive program. | Joined RSS in 1942 (pre-1947), but post-1947, rose as RSS pracharak and BJS ideologue (general secretary 1952–67). His defection highlighted youth migration from Congress’ socialist wing. | Started monthly Rashtra Dharma publication. | U.P. (Mathura) then United Provinces |
Brajbhasha |
| Hemwati Nandan Bahuguna | UP Congress chief minister (1973–75) | Defected to BJP in 1987. | Uttarakhand (Bughani), then United Provinces |
Garhwali | ||
| Jagannathrao Joshi | Congress worker in Maharashtra | Defected to RSS in 1948, leading Goa liberation efforts. | Karnataka (Nargund) |
Kannadiga | ||
| Kewalram Ratanmal Malkani | Congress journalist and freedom fighter | Joined BJS in 1951, serving as its first general secretary. | Sindh (Hyderabad), then Bombay Presidency |
Sindhi | ||
| Lala Lajpat Rai ('Punjab Kesari') |
Congress leader | Key Congress figure; led Non-Cooperation in Punjab (1920–22) | In 1926, he resigned from the Congress-backed Swaraj Party and joined the Hindu Mahasabha, criticizing Congress’ “pro-Muslim” compromises (e.g., Lucknow Pact). While this occurred pre-1947, his faction influenced post-1947 HM continuity. Post-1947 Relevance: His legacy drew Congress dissidents to HM in the 1950s, though Rai himself predeceased independence. |
A British publication, the Punjab Disturbances Report (AKA Punjab Unrest Report or Aitken Report) printed: “The head and centre of the entire movement is Lala Lajpat Rai, a Khatri pleader— he is a revolutionary and a political enthusiast who is inspired by the most intense hatred of the British government.” He was martyred in a lathi charge by police in 1928 from lathi blows during Simon Commission protests. |
Punjab (Dhudike) |
Punjabi |
| Madan Mohan Malaviya ('Mahamana', 'Pandit') |
4-time Congress president | Moderate Congress leader; opposed Gandhi’s Non-Cooperation but supported Swaraj. | Dual affiliation pre-1947 (Congress and HM co-founder, 1915), but post-1947, his followers (e.g., in U.P. politics) bolstered HM against Congress’ “secular drift.” Malaviya died in 1946, but his network facilitated defections.
|
Saved lives in 1924 of 170 Non-Cooperation Movement participants sentenced to death for the Chauri Chaura Incident by securing acquittals for 155 and life sentences for the rest even though he had retired from law in 1911[3] Gandhi conferred him title 'Mahamana' Founded: 1) Banaras Hindu University 2) Bharat Scouts and Guides 3) Hindustan Dainik 4) The Leader |
U.P. (Prayag), then United Provinces |
Hindi |
| Narasimha Chintaman Kelkar ('Tatyasaheb') | Congress leader and Tilak’s associate | Defected in the 1920s (formalized post-1947) over Congress’s “soft” stance on communal issues; became HM general secretary. | Maharashtra (Miraj) |
Marathi | ||
| Dr. Sampurnanand | Congress leader | Briefly aligned with HM in 1947–1949 before shifting to BJS. | Achieved doctorate | U.P. (Varanasi) |
Hindi | |
| Dr. Syama Prasad Mookerjee | Congress minister, later HM president | Elected to Bengal Legislative Council under Congress (1937); served as India’s first Industry Minister (1947) under Nehru. | Resigned from Congress/HM in 1949 over ideological differences (opposed Article 370, Partition acceptance); founded BJS in 1951 with RSS support. RSS provided organizational backbone (e.g., volunteers for campaigns.)
|
He died in 1953 during Kashmir agitation. | Bengal (Kolkata) then Bengal Presidency |
Bengali |
Militant organizations offering alternate to Congress[edit]
Abhinav Bharat Society
Veer Savarkar formed this organization in 1904, as in his initial stages of the freedom struggle he aggressively wanted foreigners ruling India punished.
He founded the group on campus of Fergusson College at Pune, where he studied. On campus he smuggled arms and plotted against imperialist rule.
Anushilan Samiti (Secret Committee)
This was the first organization that utilized violence against British imperialists. It influenced freedom groups that formed afterwards. It was formed in 1902.
It was established by Satish Chandra Basu and Pramathanath Mitra (Theosophist and a barrister.) It drew from physical and spiritual training inspired by Bankim Chandra Chatterjee's novel Anandamath (1882) and Swami Vivekananda's emphasis on "muscular national" (building physical strength for national revival.) Initial meetings at Mitra's home focused on lathi (stick) training, yoga, and revolutionary literature. It had eventually forged ties to Irish revolutionary (also anti-Britain) groups for obtaining weapons.
This group blended Hindu cultural promotion with anti-colonial militancy, viewing anti-imperialist violence as dharma (spiritual duty) that was needed in the circumstances. Members took oaths to assassinate imperialist officials and disrupt the British Raj.
Its key violent actions include 1907-1908 assassination attempts on imperialist officials, including plots against magistrates. Mentionable is the 1908 bomb-making and distribution of pistols, and they were linked to the Muzaffarpur Bomb Case wherein member Khudiram Bose (then 18) threw a bomb at an imperialist judge's carriage in April 1908, killing 2 British women by mistake. Khudiram was hanged and became a martyr and inspiration for further violence against imperialism. The Alipore Bomb Case of 1908 is noteworthy and the accused was the-then leader Aurobindo Ghosh. In the 1910s when the group expanded to branches in Dhaka and other cities, and Sri Aurobindo was acquitted for conspiracy.
During World War I, it collaborated with German agents in the Hindu-German Conspiracy (1914-1917) for uprisings. The British Raj government banned the organization. It only splintered into the successor Jugantar by 1914.
Bose met Aurobindo in 1920s and admired his early revolutionary phase (1905-1910) and Bande Mataram newspaper. Aurobindo's armed resistance in Bengal became a model to Bose. Mahatma Gandhi had condemned the group for using "sinful" violence.
This group ended up influencing not only Bose and his INA but also Bhagat Singh and his HSRA. It further influenced Congress to seek Purna Swaraj (Complete Self-Rule) from previously seeking only Home Rule or Dominion Status within the British Empire.
Other organizations offering alternate to Congress[edit]
Arya Samaj
Dayananada Saraswati (born Mool Shankar Tiwari) was the first vocal activist for Swaraj.
This group influenced freedom fighters Chaudhary Charan Singh, Pandit Lekh Ram, Swami Shraddhanand, Shyamji Krishna Varma, Veer Savarkar, Bhai Parmanand, Lala Hardayal, Madan Lal Dhingra, Ram Prasad Bismil, Justice Ranade, Mahatma Hansraj, Lala Lajpat Rai, Yogmaya Neupane, and Vallabhbhai Patel and others. A Sikh freedom fighter it influenced was Kishan Singh. It also influenced Bhagat Singh (former Sikh.)
Lala Lajpat Rai became a member and also joined the Congress.
Deccan Education Society & Fergusson College
The DES was formed in 1884 by Lokmanya Tilak, Gopal Ganesh Agarkar, and Vishnushastri Chiplunkar and others. Its prime focus was utilizing Western-tyle education to uplift the-then generation of children and train them in to become freedom fighters. So it established the Fergusson College (named after the-then Governor of the Bombay Presidency) in Pune.
It advocated assertive nationalism, mass mobilization, Swadeshi (boycott of British goods), and Swaraj.
Savarkar studied here, and being influenced by Tilak, he too sought independence for India. India's PM PVNR, who would later participate in protests against the Hyderabad Nizam, studied here. Vishwanath Pratap Singh too. K.C. Kelkar and Acharya J.B. Kripalani are noteworthy.
Tilak would revive Shivaji Jayanti and Ganesh Chaturthi as platforms for anti-imperialist speeches, turning religious events into freedom activist opportunities.
In 1905 its students protested against the Bengal Partition and organized boycotts too.
Hindu Mahasabha
It formed in 1915 and in its 1920s-1930s stages was highly political and supportive of the freedom struggle.
Savarkar joined this organization in 1937, as he was banned from politics as a condition of his prison-release. He stated in 1937, "Hindus must organize politically to secure Swaraj."
He would seize the opportunity of WWII to enlist Hindus for become militarized to eventually overthrow the imperialists and have an independent India.
Ramakrishna Mission
Swami Vivekananda was Bose's primary spiritual and nationalist inspiration. He read Vivekananda's works as a teenager and joined the organization briefly. Vivekananda's call for "man-making," muscular Hinduism, and national regeneration through strength deeply shaped Bose's view that India needed physical courage and martial spirit. Bose later said, "Vivekananda was the first prophet of Indian nationalism."
Sanatan Sabha
It formed in the 1890s.
Servants of India Society
This group formed in 1905 by Gopal Krishna Kokhale and it openly supported the freedom struggle. Its prime focus was reforming society to modernize. It's political ideology was 'constitutional nationalism'.