The Russian Revolution and India

Ilasai Manian, V. Rajesh, Ilasai Manian, V. Rajesh

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2020
• Print ISBN: 9780367642082
• eBook ISBN: 9781000264562
• Edition: 1
• Topic: History
• Subtopic: Asian History
• Index: History

The October Revolution undoubtedly produced a radicalising effect on the Indian situation from the very beginning. At the end of World War I, India was astir with workers' strikes and massive demonstrations against British repression. Peasant unrest was also growing. It was this awakened India, entering the mass phase of its fight for independence, which looked to the Russian Revolution and to its leader Lenin for inspiration and help.They further saw that Lenin and other leaders of Soviet Russia stood for a new social order in which exploitation of man by man is ended, an order based on brotherhood, equality and cooperation of men, and had established a society in which the working class and the toiling people had come into their own and taken over the reins of administration to build socialism.

This volume contains several articles and essays concerning the Indian national movement and the support extended by Russia. In particular, the essays related to the lives of the expatriate Indian revolutionaries in Europe and the meeting of Indian revolutionaries with Lenin are of interest in this volume. The views of Indian national leaders like M.K. Gandhi, Jawaharlal Nehru, B.G. Tilak among others on Russian Revolution are also included. In short, this volume will be useful to understand the support extended by Russia to the Indian national movement during the first half of the twentieth century.

Please note: This title is co-published with Aakar Books, New Delhi. Taylor & Francis does not sell or distribute the print edition in South Asia (India, Sri Lanka, Nepal, Bangladesh, Pakistan, Maldives or Bhutan)

1
India’s First Envoys to Revolutionary Russia

Irina Avchina

The October Revolution paved the way for real prospects for the national liberation movement in the colonial and dependent countries of the East. The first actions of the Soviet Government, the Decree on Peace, the Appeal to All Working Moslems of Russia and the East, the Declaration on the Rights of the Peoples of Russia, which proclaimed the basic principles of the new state’s national policy, received a wide response in the colonial countries. All the fighters for national independence ardently hailed the policy of the Soviet Republic.

Social and political organisations of many colonial and dependent countries desired to establish contact with Soviet Russia. From the end of 1918 Moscow played host to delegations of the revolutionary organisations of almost all countries of the East. The envoys of India also visited the capital of the new-born Soviet republic.

Recently in its archives has been discovered a document dealing with the sojourn of India’s first delegation in the Soviet capital.

The envoys of India reached Moscow in November 1918. In an attempt to throw the British intelligence service off the tracks, they used false names. They called themselves Muhammed Hadi and Ahmat Haris.

The Indian guests handed over to the People’s Commissar of Foreign Affairs in Moscow a message from the people of India. It hailed the lofty principles of the Soviet policy and appealed for support to the Indian people striving for independence.

Meeting with Lenin

On 23 November, 1918, the Indian delegation was received by V.I. Lenin in the Kremlin. A lengthy conversation took place. The proclamation issued soon afterwards stated: “In mid-November 1918 two representatives of Indian Moslems, of the inhabitants of the city of Delhi and the learned professions… arrived here and introduced themselves to our leader Lenin. They explained to him a great deal concerning India and the East.”

On 25 November the Indian guests attended the session of the All-Russian Central Executive Committee.

“Comrades and brothers, leaders of the Russian Revolution,” states one of the Indian delegates in his address of greetings, “India greets you from afar for the victory you have scored in the cause of world progress… India bows before the noble mission that fell to Russia. India prays and begs to providence that it should send you the strength to complete the work you’ve begun and that your ideas should spread all over the earth.” (From verbatim report of the session of the All-Russian Central Executive Committee, Central State Archives of the October Revolution.)

“We may derive confidence from the greetings we have just heard,” stated Y.M. Sverdlov, Head of the Soviet state, “that all the oppressed cast their eyes towards Soviet Russia. … If the revolution has been echoed in far-oft India then… not far oft is the time when the enslaved peoples of Asia will finally free themselves. … Permit me to send greetings… to the people of India.” (Modern and Current History, 1957 p. 121.)

Special Memorandum

The same day the Indian guests presented to Y.M. Sverdlov a special memorandum which was published in the Soviet newspapers under the headline “The Voice of Enslaved India”.

“Leaders of the Russian Revolution, Comrades, Friends! Permit us to thank you for the happiness of talking with you personally and transmit to you the greetings on behalf of the Indian people and 70 million Indian Moslems. Permit us to convey greetings to the Russian Revolution, which has instilled new hope in us and showed us the new path of struggle.”

“The world does not know,” the memorandum stated, “what is taking place in India”. There followed the mournful story of the sufferings of the people of India.

The memorandum pointed out that the representatives of India who had wished to present their demands were prohibited from entering England; that the Indian representatives were put in prison both in the United States and France, and that they were expelled from Japan, Switzerland and Denmark under the pressure of British diplomats.

“The revolution in Russia,” it went on further, “created a tremendous impression on the psychology of the Indian people. Despite all the efforts of England, the slogan of self-determination of nations has penetrated into India.”

The memorandum wound up with the following words: “We hope that our brothers from the great, free Russia will stretch out a hand to us in the cause of the liberation of India and the whole world. We are convinced that all the freedom-loving people will see the day when 325 million Indians… will be freed from the bondage and slavery of foreign authorities.” (Izvestia, 26 November, 1918).

In accepting the memorandum, Y.M. Sverdlov said: “I have listened to all that has been said with great satisfaction. … We authorise the Indian representatives to convey the best wishes of the Executive Committee and our hopes for the earliest liberation of the Indian people.”

To this very day it is unknown who the first envoys of the Indian people were. Their real names are not known. And only 40 years later documents were found in Moscow in the archives of Kolchak’s counter-revolutionary Siberian government from which it followed that the British intelligence service did, after all, manage to get on their tracks. What happened to them? This question is still awaiting an answer.

(Press Release: Issued by the Information Department, USSR Embassy in India, October 1967)

2
The Story of a Telegram

A.V. Raikov

In October 1917, on the eve of the Great October Socialist Revolution, a telegram was received by the Petrograd Soviet of Workers’ and Soldiers’ Deputies from Indian democrats resident in Stockholm. It read as follows (text retranslated from Russian):

“Revolutionary Russia is striving to achieve a lasting peace on the basis of the principle of self-determination of people. The instructions to Mr. Skobelev, who is being sent to Paris, do not correspond to these aims, as the basic problems of India, Egypt and Ireland have been left out. The Indians, the Egyptians and the Irish are conscious of their natural right to complete self-determination. The liberation movement of these people has acquired such a scale that no stable peace is possible without a positive solution of their problems. In the name of fidelity to the ideals of the Russian Revolution and because of the great importance of the liberation of India for Russia and the whole world, we urge the Workers’ and Soldiers’ Soviet to continue fearlessly and unyieldingly fighting against the ruthless British imperialism both at the Paris conference and during peace negotiations.”

This telegram, published in the newspaper Novaya Zhizn, aroused a good deal of interest in the Russian press at that time.

But how had the Indian patriots found themselves in Stockholm? Why did they turn for assistance to the Petrograd Soviet and with what results?

Facts relating to this episode have only recently been brought to light through the efforts of Indologists in the USSR and the German Democratic Republic.

The presence of a group of Indian revolutionaries in Stockholm in 1917 was connected with the activities of the Berlin Committee of Indian Nationalists formed in Germany during World War I. At that time a number of Indian patriots had entertained the idea of liberating their country from the British rule with the help of Germany which was England’s enemy in the war. A group of prominent Indian revolutionaries had been active in Berlin. However, soon the Indian patriots became disillusioned about their “allies”. They realised that Germany’s aims in the war had little to do with the liberation of India. Virendra Chattopadhaya, well-known Indian revolutionary, wrote in one of his letters in 1918: “We are regarded as pawns in the German game to be used only when they need us.”

As a result and also on account of worsening relations with the German ruling circles, the Indian revolutionaries decided to build their own centre in a neutral country and chose Stockholm for this purpose. In May 1917, the Berlin Committee deputed Chattopadhaya there; he was soon followed by M.P.T. Acharya and other revolutionaries. Thus the Stockholm Bureau of the Berlin Committee of Indian Nationalists came into existence. The creation of this Bureau was a very timely step which proved more effective than had been expected.

A large number of European social-democrats had gathered at Stockholm at the time, and the Indian revolutionaries looked towards them for help. They contacted prominent figures of the Second International regarding them as representatives of the European workers’ movement. But here also disillusionment awaited them. Virendra Chattopadhaya and the other Indian patriots soon saw for themselves that the Right-wing social-democrats did not show any interest in the struggle of the Indian people for independence. In another letter Chattopadhaya wrote bitterly: “We all have the feeling that the question of subject nations is being deliberately ignored or put off by the socialists.” Under these conditions, it was quite natural that the Indian patriots should turn their close attention to that international power which was consistently and resolutely raising the question of self-determination of nations and elimination of colonial oppression. This power was represented by the Russian Bolsheviks.

When Chattopadhaya arrived in Stockholm, the February Revolution had already taken place in Russia. Autocracy had been overthrown and a provisional bourgeois government had assumed office. The Bolshevik Party was preparing for a proletarian revolution. Party centres were active outside Russia also. In Stockholm there was a representation of the Central Committee of the RSDLP (B) which issued a Bulletin of the Russian Revolution published in German, as also another periodical—“Pravda’s” Russian Correspondent. They carried material concerning the revolutionary events in Russia, the strategy and tactics of the Bolsheviks and articles by V.I. Lenin. The Indian revolutionaries were acquainted with these papers and consequently with Lenin’s name. There are documents in archives in India which confirm this. Thus, for instance, the British Ambassador in Sweden, reporting on the arrival of Chattopadhaya in Stockholm, expressed his belief that his “intention was to get Lenin or other anti-British Russian extremists to work for the Indian independence movement in Russia”.

The ambassador was not far from the truth at least in one respect: Chattopadhaya was indeed anxious to meet Lenin. Speaking in 1934 at a conference of the Leningrad branch of the USSR Academy of Sciences he said that when early in May 1917 he had arrived in Stockholm he had found many emigres there from different countries and had asked whether Lenin was also among them. He had been greatly disappointed that he was not able to meet him.

The Indian patriots working in Europe no doubt knew of the Bolsheviks’ standpoint on major international problems, of their views on the national problem and of their principled opposition to the policy of the imperialists. Therefore, very soon they established direct contact with the Russian Bolsheviks in Stockholm, as they saw in them their true allies in the struggle for freedom. At the same time they carefully watched the position taken by the Provisional Government on the colonial question. A conference of the allied states of the Entente was to take place in Paris in 1917 at which the aims of the war under the new conditions were to be discussed. It became known to the Indian revolutionaries that the instructions given to Skobelev, the representative of the bourgeois Provisional Government in Russia, did not include the question of India’s independence. That is why they turned for help not to the Provisional Government, but to the Petrograd Soviet, conscious as they must have been that in the Bolshevik faction they would find support. And they were satisfied that their telegram elicited a positive response from the Bolsheviks who utilised it in their struggle against the opportunist and reactionary parties. The telegram also received publicity abroad, as it was published in the German press.

The Indian patriots were most keen to establish closer relations with revolutionary Russia, and on 1 November 1917, Chattopadhaya sent to Berlin a plan for the development of cooperation with revolutionary Russia which he drew up with the help of Troyanovsky, a Russian Bolshevik. Their contacts were so close that Chattopadhaya appended to the plan a memorandum entitled “Project of Russian-Indian Rapprochement” which contained some important ideas on the necessity of mutual action on the part of revolutionary people of Russia and the oppressed people of the East. Troyanovsky, on his part, laid special stress on the importance of an organised mass movement.

The contacts of the Indian emigres with the Bolsheviks became particularly strong after the victory of the Socialist Revolution in Russia, when they saw for themselves that the first socialist state in the world was a true ally in their struggle. The activity of the Stockholm centre increased after the October Revolution. The Indians helped to publish various information material in the Russian language. It was only natural, therefore, that the question of a representative of the Stockholm Bureau going to Petrograd should have come up.

Troyanovsky invited Chattopadhaya to visit the dty, and he readily accepted the invitation as he had long wished to meet Lenin and see for himself the revolutionary changes which had taken place in Russia. However, the German government was decidedly against it. An official German report of that period stated that Chattopadhaya had completely identified himself with the Bolsheviks. Very indignant, Chattopadhaya wrote:

“It is true that Troyanovsky is an opponent of German imperialism, as well as of every other imperialism. But there is really no reason why he cannot work for the Indian cause and in this way against England. Are we ourselves not against every form of imperialism?”

When Troyanovsky returned to Russia, the People’s Commissariat of Foreign Affairs with his assistance sent through the Soviet diplomatic representative in Stockholm another invitation to Chattopadhaya to visit Russia, but the latter could not avail of it either. It was only after the defeat of Germany that Chattopadhaya and his comrades from the Stockholm Bureau and the Berlin Committee at last managed to visit Soviet Russia.

The above facts add considerably to our knowledge of early contacts between Indians and the Russian Bolsheviks. It would now seem that the first to establish friendly relations with the Bolsheviks were the Indian patriots in Stockholm.

(Soviet Land, October 1967)

3
The First Russian Revolution and India

P. Shastitko

The Russian Revolution of 1905 was the first revolution of the epoch of imperialism and the first also of the 20th century. It gave a mighty impetus to mankind’s revolutionary development and became a new milestone in its history. The period of short-term relative sodal peace was over. Capitalism entered, a phase of severe crises.

The peculiarity of the Russian revolution was that it set before itself bourgeois-democratic tasks. The proletariat assumed the leadership of the struggle and drew into that struggle broad lower strata of society. “The peculiarity of the Russian revolution”, said V.I. Lenin, “is that it was a bourgeois-democratic revolution in its social content, but a proletarian revolution in its methods of struggle.” The revolution started in Petersburg and Moscow, where the streets were blocked by barricades set up by the fighting workers. Then it spread to other industrial centres of Russia, where mass-scale strikes broke out. The sweep and tempo of the struggle increased. The poor peasants were drawn into its vortex and they started destroying the landlords’ estates; the revolution spread to the outlying regions of Russia inhabited by oppressed nationalities: Poland, Finland (then parts of the Russian Empire), Transcaucasia and Central Asia. Importantly, the advanced ranks of the proletariat, the poorest sections of the peasantry and the nationalities oppressed by tsarism unitedly fought the common enem...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Contents
• Preface
• 1. India’s First Envoys to Revolutionary Russia
• 2. The Story of a Telegram
• 3. The First Russian Revolution and India
• 4. Tilak and the 1905–1907 Revolution in Russia
• 5. Mahatma Gandhi on the Russian Revolution of 1905
• 6. Non-Violence: Gandhi and Lenin
• 7. Tolstoy, Gandhi and India
• 8. Galvanising Impact of the October Revolution on India’s National-Liberation Movement
• 9. Lenin and the Liberation Struggle in India
• 10. India’s Response to Lenin
• 11. Lenin and the Indian Patriots
• 12. Lenin and Indian Revolutionaries
• 13. New Light on Bombay Events of 1908
• 14. New Light on Old Indian Revolutionary
• 15. Progressive Indians and Our Country
• 16. Pioneers of India’s Liberation Movement Acclaimed the October Revolution
• 17. October Revolution and Indian Immigrants in Germany
• 18. Indian Emigre Revolutionaries in Soviet Russia
• 19. Bhikaji Rustomji Cama and the Russian Revolutionaries
• 20. A Russian Revolutionary and His Indian Friends
• 21. First Mention of Marx in Indian Writings
• 22. Indian Revolutionaries’ Pamphlets in Soviet Libraries
• 23 A Find in the Archives (Documents About an Unknown Indian Mission to Russia in 1859)
• 24. Visit of Motilal and Jawaharlal Nehru to the USSR in 1927
• 25. India’s National-Liberation Movement and Socialism at the Start of the 20th Century
• 26. Recalling the Grim Tragedy of Amritsar
• 27. Lenin and India’s Liberation Movement after the October Revolution
• 28. Early Contacts Between India and Russia
• 29. Maxim Gorky and the National Liberation Movement in India