QUIT INDIA MOVEMENT

On 8th Aug 2021, India completed 79 years of Quit India Movement also known as August Kranti.

Important points:

  • On 8th August 1942, Mahatma Gandhi gave a clarion call to end the British rule and launched the Quit India Movement at the session of the All-India Congress Committee in Mumbai.
  • Gandhiji gave the call “Do or Die” in his speech delivered at the Gowalia Tank Maidan, now popularly known as August Kranti Maidan.
  • Aruna Asaf Ali popularly known as the ‘Grand Old Lady’ of the Independence Movement is known for hoisting the Indian flag at the Gowalia Tank Maidan in Mumbai during the Quit India Movement.
  • The slogan ‘Quit India’ was coined by Yusuf Meherally, a socialist and trade unionist who also served as Mayor of Mumbai.
  • Meherally had also coined the slogan “Simon Go Back”.

Causes:

  • The immediate cause for the movement was the collapse of Cripps Mission.
  • Under Stafford Cripps, the mission was sent to resolve the Indian question of a new constitution and self-government.
  • Japanese aggression in South-East Asia, keenness of British Government to secure the full participation of India in the war, mounting pressure from China and the United States, as well as from the Labour Party in Britain, led British Prime Minister Winston Churchill to send the Cripps Mission to India in March 1942.
  • It failed because it offered India not complete freedom but the Dominion Status to India, along with the partition.

Demands:

The demand was to end the British rule in India with immediate effect to get the cooperation of Indians in World War-II against fascism.

There was a demand to form a provisional government after the withdrawal of the Britishers.

The movement had three phases:

  • First Phase, urban revolt, marked by strikes, boy­cott and picketing, which were quickly suppressed.
  • There were strikes and demonstrations all over the country and workers provided the support by not working in the factories.
  • Gandhiji was soon imprisoned at Aga Khan Palace in Pune and almost all leaders were arrested.
  • In the second phase, the focus shifted to the countryside, which witnessed a major peasant rebellion, marked by destruction of communication sys­tems, such as railway tracks and stations, telegraph wires and poles, attacks on government buildings or any other visible symbol of colo­nial authority.
  • The last phase witnessed the formation of national governments or parallel governments in isolated pockets (Ballia, Tamluk, Satara etc.)

SOURCE: THE HINDU,THE ECONOMIC TIMES,MINT

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