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Amristar Massacre
A massacre of unarmed supporters of Indian self-government by British troops in the city of Amritsar, Punjab. Indian discontent against the British had been mounting as a result of the ROWLATT ACT. The massacre in Amritsar followed the killing, three days before, of five Englishmen and the beating of an Englishwoman. Gurkha troops under the command of Brigadier R. H. Dyer fired on a crowd gathered in the Jallianwala Bagh, an enclosed park, killing 379 and wounding over 1200 -
Salt march
Gandhi and his followers set off on a 200-mile journey from Ashram Ahmedabad to the Arabian Ocean where Gandhi wanted to pick up a few grains of salt. This action formed the symbolic focal point of a campaign of civil disobedience in which the state monopoly on salt was the first target. -
Quit India Movement
The Indian National Congress at its Bombay session (August 1942) passed the famous Quit India resolution, calling for a mass struggle under the leadership of Mahatma Gandhi. "Do or Die" was the mantra which Gandhiji gave to the people of India. However, even before the Congress could start the movement, the British administrative machinery came down heavily on the protesters -
Formation of Pakistan
Britain agreed to the formation of Pakistan as a separate dominion within the Commonwealth in Aug. 1947, a bitter disappointment to India's dream of a unified subcontinent. -
Indian Independence
In the March of 1947 Lord Mountbatten came to India and recommended a partition of Punjab and Bengal in the face of civil war. Gandhi was very opposed to the idea of partition and urged Mountbatten to offer Jinnah leadership of a united India instead of the creation of a separate Muslim state. But this arrangement was not acceptable to many nationalist leaders, including Nehru. In July Britain's Parliament passed the Indian Independence Act. According to it August 14 and 15 were set for partitio -
Ghandi Assassination
Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi was assassinated on January 30, 1948, shot at point-blank range by Nathuram Godse, an activist. Since 1934, there had been five unsuccessful attempts to kill Gandhi.