Congress The British were due to consider and announce another instalment of constitutional reforms some time in – . In preparation, it announced the setting up of Indian Statutory commission (known as ‘Simon Commission’ after its chairman). The commission had only whitemen as members and it was an insult to Indians. The Congress at it annual session in Madras in resolved to boycott the commission.
The Muslim league and the Hindu Mahasabha also supported the decision. A series of conferences were held and the consensus was to work for an alternative proposal. Most of the parties agreed to challenge the colonial attitude towards India and the result was the Motilal Nehru Report. However the All- Parties meet held in December at Calcutta failed to accept it on the issue of communal representation.
interests”. The Muslim fundamentalists similarly seized the space created by the lull in national struggle and started fanning communal feeling. Rise of Left Radicalism Gandhi was pained at the developments. To contain the communal frenzy he went on a day fast.
Left Movement Meanwhile socialist ideas and its activists also had filled some space through their work among peasants and workers. The labour and peasant movements were organized by the ‘leftists’. Marxism as an ideology to criticise colonialism and capitalism had gained ground. It manifested itself in the organization of students and youth apart from trade unions.
Jawaharlal Nehru and Subhas Chandra Bose contributed to the spread of leftist ideology. They argued that both colonial exploitation and the internal exploitation by the emerging capitalists should be fought. A group of youngsters with S A. Dange, M.N Roy, Muzaffar Ahmed along with elderly persons such as Singaravelu form Tamilnadu founded the peasants and worker’s parties.
The government came down heavily on the communist-socialists and the revolutionaries a series of ‘conspiracy cases’ such as Kanpur, Meerut, Kakori were booked. It was at this juncture Bhagat Singh, Chandrashekar Azad, Rajguru and Sukhdev emerged on the scene. The Naujawan Bharat Sabha, Hindustan Republican Association were started and thousands of youngmen and women became active anti-colonialists and revolutionaries. Youth and student