Revolutionary Movement: HRA, HSRA and Bhagat Singh

Revolutionaries from the Punjab, the United Provinces, Bihar and Rajasthan met at Ferozeshah Kotla, Delhi, on 9-10 September 1928 and renamed the HRA the Hindustan Socialist Republican Association. Under the influence of Bhagat Singh, Sukhdev and Bhagwati Charan Vohra the group adopted socialism as its goal, and Chandrashekhar Azad became its military head. Ram Prasad Bismil had been hanged in December 1927 and could not have been present.

The HSRA chose the moment when the government was pushing through the Public Safety Bill and the Trade Disputes Bill, aimed at curbing radicals and the labour movement. From the visitors' gallery Bhagat Singh and B.K. Dutt threw bombs on empty benches, shouted 'Inquilab Zindabad' and scattered leaflets saying that it takes a loud voice to make the deaf hear. They did not try to escape, as they wanted to use the trial for propaganda. Both were sentenced to transportation for life.

Jatindra Nath Das (Jatin Das), a Bengal revolutionary who had made bombs for the HSRA, joined Bhagat Singh and others in a hunger strike in Lahore jail from July 1929, demanding that political prisoners be treated as such. He died on 13 September 1929. His body was taken to Calcutta, where huge crowds joined the funeral procession, and the event greatly increased the popularity of the revolutionaries.

On 9 August 1925 HRA members stopped the 8-Down train on the Saharanpur- Lucknow line at Kakori, near Lucknow, and took away government treasure to fund the organisation. In the conspiracy case that followed, Ram Prasad Bismil, Ashfaqulla Khan, Roshan Singh and Rajendra Lahiri were hanged in December 1927; Sachindranath Sanyal and others were transported or jailed. Chandrashekhar Azad escaped arrest and later led the HSRA.

Pairs 1 and 2 are correct. Chandrashekhar Azad died on 27 February 1931 in a gunfight with the police at Alfred Park, Allahabad (now Chandrashekhar Azad Park). Batukeshwar Dutt threw the Assembly bombs with Bhagat Singh. Rajguru joined the HSRA later and is known for the Saunders shooting at Lahore in 1928, not for Kakori. Yashpal was an HSRA member in the north, linked with the bomb under the Viceroy's train in 1929; the Chittagong raid was the work of Surya Sen's group in Bengal.

After the withdrawal of Non-Cooperation, young revolutionaries of the United Provinces and Bengal met at Kanpur in October 1924 and founded the Hindustan Republican Association. Its leaders were Sachindranath Sanyal, whose manifesto 'The Revolutionary' set out its aims, Ram Prasad Bismil and Jogesh Chandra Chatterjee. Its goal was a Federal Republic of the United States of India with adult franchise. Bhagat Singh joined later; the Naujawan Bharat Sabha was founded at Lahore only in 1926.

The Naujawan Bharat Sabha was set up at Lahore in March 1926 by Bhagat Singh, Bhagwati Charan Vohra, Sukhdev and others as an open youth organisation. It held public meetings, used lantern lectures on revolutionaries and preached secular, socialist ideas among youth, peasants and workers. It thus served as the open face of the young revolutionaries of the Punjab, while the HSRA of 1928 was their secret wing. It was banned in 1930 after the Lahore case.

To cut short a trial the accused were using for propaganda, Lord Irwin issued the Lahore Conspiracy Case Ordinance on 1 May 1930, setting up a tribunal of three High Court judges whose judgment was final, with no appeal in India. After the accused were manhandled in court, they boycotted the proceedings, and the trial went on largely in their absence. On 7 October 1930 the tribunal sentenced Bhagat Singh, Sukhdev and Rajguru to death and others to transportation; the Privy Council dismissed a challenge to the ordinance in February 1931. B.K. Dutt was not sentenced to death.