The Unflattering Tale Concerning the Genesis of the Congress

A Detailed Analysis

Introduction

“[It] was a product of Lord Dufferin’s brain... the Congress was started more with the object of saving the British empire from danger than with that of winning political liberty for India. The interests of the British empire were primary and those of India only secondary.”

- Lala Lajpat Rai [1]

Lala Lajpat Rai first expounded the imperialist historical origins of the Congress.

The British occupation of India provoked a passionate yet gradual struggle for freedom and self-governance among the Indian nationalists - beginning from the age of Raja Rammohan Roy’s early agitations against unequal laws against Indian British subjects, to Aurobindo’s firebrand efforts during the Swadeshi movement, to Mahatma Gandhi’s mass agitations which gained international renown.

However, when we look at the Indian freedom movement as a whole, the role of the Indian National Congress emerges as the prime force. Even before the arrival of Gandhi on the scene, veteran nationalists like BG Tilak and Surendra Nath Banerji were part of the Congress, and played important roles in India’s century-long struggle for independence. Indeed, the Congress wasn’t the only group or bloc in the struggle, but it was undeniably the predominant group.

However, the foundation of the Indian National Congress in 1885, effected by British ex-civil servant AO Hume - was not in itself as important an event as is often generally assumed. As an organization at the time, it was not unique, neither was it very forward-looking, and neither was it even benign - not just by our own, but even by contemporary standards. And this fact shall be the central thesis and theme of this essay.

In this piece, we would probe deeper into this question. First, we would briefly discuss the nationalist agitations in modern India preceding the work of the Congress; then we shall have a look at the most influential of such organizations - the Indian Association; then we would examine whether the Congress continued or was a rupture from this political tradition; and then we would observe when and by whom the Congress was integrated into this nationalist political tradition - before we finally conclude this write-up.

Nationalist Agitation before the Congress

Nationalism, in the modern sense, develops with the rise of modern education and print culture; and that was also so in India.

With all the halo that is justly associated with the later work of the Indian National Congress, it was neither the first nor the last organization of its kind - as is the popular understanding. At this point, therefore, we might have a general survey of nationalist political activities preceding the Congress.

The teacher at the prominent Hindu college in Calcutta, Henry Louis Vivian Derozio [2], championed the ideals of rationalism and patriotism. He saw himself as an Indian and wrote patriotic verses.

Nationalism among Indians emerged in the form of a nationalism of Hindus. Bhudev Mukherji [3] criticised the Anglicized nationalism of many of his contemporaries; and much of then Indian patriotism was based on the historical works describing the ancient achievements of the Hindus - by Max Muller, HH Wilson, Rajendra Lal Mitra et al. [4]

Other major figures who initially propunded an indigenized variant of Indian nationalism were Rajnarain Bose, and Nabagopal Mitra - who, inspired by the former, organized the nationalist institution of Hindu Mela. Especially relevant are later figures like Bankim Chandra Chattopadhyay, Bal Gangadhar Tilak, Mahadev Govind Ranade, and Swami Vivekananda; among many others.

These waves of nationalism, while initially confined to religious and cultural regeneration, eventually spilled into politics. The pioneering figure here was Surendra Nath Banerji, who instead of concerning himself with social or religious freedom, stressed prominently on the political aspect.

Much before the formation of the Congress, multiple leaders were working towards, and political organizations had been formed - for safeguarding Indian political interests.

This story begins with Raja Rammohan Roy, who carried out the first political agitations - one against the 1827 Press Ordinance and another against the 1827 Jury Act. His efforts were ultimately reflected in the 1833 Charter Act which was partially influenced by his efforts. [5]

Among organizations, the first was the Landholders’ Society, founded by Dwarkanath Tagore in 1838. As Dr Rajendra Lal Mitra said, “Ostensibly it advocated the rights of the Zamindars, but as their rights were intimately bound up with those of the ryots, the one cannot be separated from the other.” [6]

The Landholders’ Society’s outreach into Britain led to the foundation of the Bengal British India Society in 1843.

The efforts of these organizations led to the drafting of four India-friendly bills by Mr Bethune, the law member, in 1849; though these were withdrawn because of protests by Englishmen. [7]

The Landholders Society and the Bengal British India Society amalgamated to form the British Indian Association in 1851. The British Indian Association made many important demands, including a proper separation of powers in the government, inclusion of Indians in the legislative council, legal equality, and the holding of the civil services examinations in India.

Following this, an India League was formed in 1875. It is before this background that we must look at the Indian Association, which we shall have a more detailed look at.

The Indian Association

While many demands were made by various Indian leaders before, but it was Surendra Nath Banerji who first and explicitly made the demand for representative government in India.

Following the formation of the India League, Surendra Nath laid the foundation of the ‘Indian Association’ at the Albert Hall, Calcutta, on 26 July, 1876. [8]

Indian Association had four declared objectives: (1) The creation of a strong body of public opinion in the country; (2) the unification of the Indian races and peoples upon the basis of common political interests and aspirations; (3) the promotion of friendly feeling between Hindus and Muhammadans; and, lastly, (4) the inclusion of the masses in the great public movements of the day. [9]

The Indian Association took up many issues, and unlike most other prior organizations, it did so on a pan-Indian scale.

Its nation-wide nature was first distinctly visible when the Association agitated against the reduction of the maximum age for eligibility in the ICS examination from 21 to 19, effected by Viceroy Lytton in 1877. Surendra Nath Banerji toured all parts of India extensively, and he also organized new political associations to act in concert with the Indian Association of Calcutta at Allahabad, Kanpur, Lakhnau, Meerut, and Lahore. So says RC Majumdar: “The foundation of concerted action was thus well and truly laid... For the first time within living memory, even historical tradition, there emerged the idea of India over and above the congeries of States and Provinces into which it was divided.” [10] Following this, a delegation under Lal Mohan Ghosh even addressed the British statesmen in the House of Commons, which led to the creation of the Statutory Civil Service.

Also against the Vernacular Press Act, promulgated in 1878, the Indian Association held a public meeting at the Calcutta Town Hall, which was attended by over 5,000 persons. [11] Due to the Association’s efforts, then-opposition leader WE Gladstone even moved a resolution against the act in the House of Commons.

In 1883, the famous Ilbert Bill controversy erupted, and caused a major uproar in the country, though it was mostly confined to Bombay and Bengal. Soon after this, a charge was brought against Surendra Nath Banerji for contempt of court on account of some comments he had made on the conduct of the Chief Justice of the Calcutta High Court who had ordered a Hindu to produce the image of his deity in Court. [12] He was found guilty by most of the judges during his trial, who were themselves English - and he was arrested.

His arrest caused a great uproar all over India than even the withdrawal of the Ilbert Bill had done. All sections of the people of Bengal were roused, and the meeting on the matter held by the Indian Association saw 20,000 people in attendance - it was the largest meeting yet held in Calcutta. So says RC Majumdar [13] -

“Not only the educated classes but even the masses were affected. No such upheaval was witnessed in Bengal before the days of the Swadeshi agitation in 1905.”

The imprisonment of Surendra Nath evoked sympathy in remote parts of India, and public meetings were held in Agra, Fyzabad, Amritsar, Lahore, Poona and various other towns all over India. Even a Pandit of Kashmir, ignorant of English, burst into tears crying, “What have they done with our dearest brother? Our Surendra Nath is in jail.” [14]

Resolved to formally inaugurate a pan-Indian organization dedicated to India’s political progress, and involving leaders of all provinces, the Association called the First Indian National Conference in Calcutta in late 1883. This Conference was attended by more than a 100 delegates, and they represented all of India. One Englishman, WS Blunt, who attended it, remarked that it marked the first stage towards a National Parliament. [15] The idea of the National Conference had come to Surendra Nath in 1877 itself, but it was realized only 6 years later. Therefore, it is clear that Surendra Nath’s National Conference, and not Hume’s Indian National Congress, was the first nationalist pan-Indian umbrella organization devoted to political agitation - unlike what popular mythology about the Congress would have a layman believe.

The Indian National Conference’s second session was held two years later, in late 1885. All kinds of politically relevant issues were discussed, and resolutions were passed on them. It was decided that another session would be held next year, and the venue would be changed annually.

Interestingly, sympathy was also expressed in this Conference to the “approaching Conference in Bombay” - which was to be the inaugural meeting of the Congress; and this takes us to the next section of the essay.

The INC Not a Part of this Nationalist Political Tradition

Let us now have a detailed look at the foundation of the Indian National Congress in juxtaposition with the Indian Association and the National Conference.

The person who founded the Indian National Congress, was not an Indian, but an Englishman - a British Indian ex-Civil Servant - Allan Octavian Hume. He did have genuine sympathies towards Indian grievances, but he was decidedly not an Indian nationalist - someone comparable to a Surendra Nath or a Naoroji, or even a Rammohan Roy. His interests in India were paternalistic, rather than patriotic. It is within this context that we must evaluate Hume’s activities.

This would be a convenient place to discuss the ‘safety-valve’ theory regarding the foundation of the Indian National Congress. It was first propounded as a historical explanation by Lala Lajpat Rai [16], and many historians later supported it. However, a few later historians also rejected this theory.

Let us discuss the arguments on both sides, before synthesizing them together.

The opponents of the safety-valve theory point out that that the idea of a pan-Indian political institution came to Hume from three sources - the great Durbar of 1877, the International Exhibition in Calcutta, and an 1884 Theosophical Convention of Madras - as has been narrated by the official historian of the Congress, Pattabhi Sitaramayya. [17]

Furthermore, as a retired Civil Servant and son of the founder of the Radical Party in England, Hume had a genuine sensibility about the political issues in India which concerned Indians. Before the meeting, Hume had discussed the formation of such an organization with prominent Indian leaders from Bombay, like Dadabhai Naoroji, Pherozshah Mehta, Badruddin Tyabji and KT Telang. [18]

Historian Sekhar Bandopadhyay points out - as we saw in the preceding sections of this essays as well - that political organizations and agitations in India were existent from before the Congress’s inception, and therefore it does not appear justified to regard the Congress as some British conspiracy to contain popular discontent, as the safety-valve theory suggests. [19]

However, upon careful consideration, we find that all these arguments hold little water.

While Pattabhi Sitaramayya mentions three sources of inspiration for the Congress, he does not address the most important of them all - the Indian Association and the Indian National Conference. We might only conjecture, but perhaps it was done by the Congress historian because this aids in adding to the Congress’s mythologized glory - although, based on falsehoods as it is - it must admittedly be discarded by us.

Moreover, the existence of older organizations and agitations does nothing to whitewash the foundation of the INC, because while the older organizations were organic organizations founded by nationalist Indians - the INC was qualitatively different, in that its initiative was from a paternalistic British ex-Civil Servant, AO Hume. Thus, the foundation of the Congress was not a continuation of the older nationalist political activities, but a profound rupture against them.

Regarding Hume’s intent, his biographer William Wedderburn tells us in explicit terms that the intent was not purely benign, but resolutely imperialist. [20] In a dramatic fashion, Wedderburn describes how a group of religious devotees came to Hume:

“[They approached him] because they feared that the ominous unrest throughout the country which pervaded even the lowest strata of the population, would lead to some terrible outbreak, destructive to India’s future, unless men like him, who have access to the government, could do something to remove the general feeling of despair, and thus avert a catastrophe.”

Then apparently Hume was shown seven large volumes as evidence of the popular discontent. This, according to Wedderburn, drove Hume to found the Congress. Moreover, later Hume met with Viceroy Dufferin and discussed the matter, who agreed with the former about the value of such an organization in containing unrest, and thus preserving British rule in India.

The dramatic account of Wedderburn has been questioned not only by the opponents, but even by the supporters of the safety-valve theory - among the latter, RC Majumdar was one who expressed doubts about its full veracity. But the opponents have very readily not only rejected the details, but even rejected the very substance of Wedderburn’s account as unworthy of attention - dismissing it as essentially a lie, manufactured in order to show Hume as a British patriot who wanted to save the empire. [21] While this is convenient, it is certainly not fair in the interests of the truth, as the intent of Hume is correctly and very plausibly depicted in the account - even while we may doubt its details.

Regarding the possibility of a revolutionary outbreak also - guarding against which the Congress was apparently created - the suggestion is not entirely baseless, given that 1883 and the immediately preceding years were politically tumultuous - with major controversies like the Civil Service agitations, Ilbert Bill agitations, imprisonment of Surendra Nath and so on.

In a similar ahistorical fashion - as about Wedderburn’s account - the opponents very readily dismiss the explicit admission by the first president of the Congress, WC Bonnerji, that the Congress was founded with the involvement of Viceroy Dufferin himself. [22] The counterargument is that Dufferin’s letters to Hume, as cited by historian Bipan Chandra, paint a different picture - that even in 1885, Dufferin regarded the Congress as a dangerous organization, which would herald the equivalent of the Irish Home Rule movement in India. [23]

If nothing else, it is highly incredulous to accept these letters at face value - if at all Chandra has accurately cited them, given how polemical and partisan in tone he is against the safety-valve theory while discussing these letters - for the simple reason that the Indian Association and the Indian National Conference were already much more radical than the Congress. Therefore, it makes very little sense why Dufferin would be alarmed by a relatively loyalist and moderate body like the Congress.

We may now look at its loyalist and moderate nature in more detail.

As said earlier, Hume had consulted prominent moderate Bombay leaders before the Congress’s foundation. But he did not consult the leader who he should most importantly have approached - who had actual experience in founding and running a pan-Indian political organization, the Indian Association - Surendra Nath Banerji. [24] The exclusion was probably intentional. Bipan Chandra Pal pointed out that Hume had great dislike for Surendra Nath because of the latter’s advanced political views. [25] As RC Majumdar says:

“The Government of the day did not like the political advance made in Bengal, and Surendra Nath was definitely in their blacklist.”

Moreover, the choice for president was telling. The first president of the Congress, Womesh Chander Bonnerji, lived the life of an Englishman and not only kept himself aloof from, but almost ridiculed, all sorts of political agitation. He was not even a member of the Indian Association, despite being from Bengal. [26]

Interestingly, a meagre number of 72 delegates attended the inaugural meeting of the Congress, while - to compare - the Indian Association’s first meeting had more than 700 attendees back in 1876. [27] The 1883 Indian National Conference also had more than a hundred delegates. [28]

The above facts therefore bring out in bold relief that the Congress, far from an epochal nationalist organization, was loyalist and moderate even by the standards of its own time. Furthermore, it appears that it was quite deliberately designed in order to supersede the Indian National Conference and the Indian Association, intending to drown these organizations and their founder, Surendra Nath Banerji, in a sea of political irrelevance.

Banerji’s Seizure of the Congress and British Response

However, Surendra Nath anticipated and successfully defused the challenge.

The second session of the Congress was held in Calcutta, 1886, under Surendra Nath’s guidance, and his inspiration changed the tone of the Congress almost overnight. [29] Thus, the radicals had successfully infiltrated the moderate Indian National Congress. Almost all prominent leaders of the Indian Association had entered the Congress, and transformed its very nature, flouting imperialist expectations.

This the reason why, just two years later, in 1888, Viceroy Dufferin spoke against and denounced the Congress in public, as a “microscopic minority”, who had no right to speak on behalf of the people, despite having probably have had a hand in its very foundation. [30]

Conclusion

Therefore, from the evidence and arguments presented above, it is clear to us that the foundation of the Indian National Congress was not unique, neither very forward-looking, nor benign - as is the popular mythology. The truth is that it was designed as a safety-valve to forestall the actual progressive elements of the Indian national movement, and it was loyalist and moderate at its inception. Moreover, it was not very influential, neither was it the first pan-Indian political organization.

References

1. Lajpat Rai. ‘Young India’, 1916, pp. 112-16.

2. RC Majumdar. ‘History of the Freedom Movement in India’ Vol 1, 1971, p. 288.

3. ibid, p. 290.

4. ibid, pp. 290-291.

5. ibid, pp. 278-279.

6. Rajendra Lal Mitra. ‘Raja Rajendralal Mitra’s Speeches’, p. 25. (quoted in Majumdar)

7. RC Majumdar. ‘History of the Freedom Movement in India’ Vol 1, 1971, p. 282.

8. ibid, p. 325.

9. ibid, p. 326.

10. ibid, p. 327.

11. ibid, p. 328.

12. ibid, p. 331.

13. ibid, p. 332.

14. ibid, p. 332.

15. WS Blunt. ‘India Under Ripon’, p. 114, 116. (quoted in Majumdar)

16. Lajpat Rai. ‘Young India’, 1916.

17. Pattabhi Sitaramayya. ‘History of the Indian National Congress’, Vol 1, p. 11.

18. RC Majumdar. ‘History of the Freedom Movement in India’ Vol 1, 1971, p. 348.

19. Sekhar Bandopadhyay. ‘From Plassey to Partition and After’, 2015, chapter 4.

20. Sir William Wedderburn. ‘Allan Octavian Hume’, 1913.

21. Sekhar Bandopadhyay. ‘From Plassey to Partition and After’, 2015, chapter 4.

22. WC Bonnerji. ‘Indian Politics’, 1898.

23. Bipan Chandra. ‘India’s Struggle for Independence’, chapter 4.

24. RC Majumdar. ‘History of the Freedom Movement in India’ Vol 1, 1971, p. 348.

25. Bipin Chandra Pal. ‘Memoirs’, Vol II, pp. 13-14. (quoted in Majumdar)

26. RC Majumdar. ‘History of the Freedom Movement in India’ Vol 1, 1971, p. 348.

27. ibid, p. 324.

28. ibid, pp. 334-335.

29. ibid, p. 350.

30. Lord Dufferin. ‘Speeches Delivered in India’, 1890, pp. 237-44.