20-LOAVES-A FORGOTTEN UPRISING

INDIA’S LAST FREEDOM STRUGGLE

SARASIJ MAJUMDER

In March, 1976 Mr. P.V.Chakraborty, former Chief Justice of Kolkata HC wrote a letter, where he described a correspondence between him and the British Prime Minister Clement Atlee in 1956.And during his visit, Atlee met Chakraborty, who was then acting Governor of West Bengal, and was asked “The Quit India Movement of Gandhi practically died out long before 1947 and there was nothing in the Indian situation at that time, which made it necessary for the British to leave India in a hurry. Why then did they do so?”. Atlee gave out several reasons, one was Netaji Subash Chandra Bose’s Indian National Army, which weakened British Indian  Army, and the other was the Royal Indian Navy UPRISING.

Royal Naval Ratings UPRISING, or what is often called the forgotten UPRISING in India’s history, an event which unlike the 1857 UPRISING or the Quit India movement, does not really strike much resonance, except among hard core historians. Or Leftists, since they were the only ones to have backed this UPRISING wholeheartedly.

ACTUALLY—THIS IS COMPARABLE TO NAVAL UPRISING OF CZARIST RUSSIA—Sergei Eisenstein immortalised that in the Movie—Battleship Potemkin.

Like the 1857 UPRISING, the 1946 Royal Naval ratings UPRISING had a rather mundane beginning. It was not an overnight event however, the resentment was building up among the naval ratings, and other Indian members of the Army. The INA was the most serious of all that really shook the faith of the British. Not that well known is something called the Royal Air Force UPRISING that also took place in 1946, over the working conditions, and demobilization of British troops after the end of the war.

The beginnings of the Naval Ratings UPRISING were in an event that occurred on Jan 16, 1946 when a contingent of Naval ratings arrived at the Castle Barracks in Mint Road of Mumbai’s Fort Area. This contingent was from the training ship HMIS Akbar, that was at Thane, and it was around evening 4 PM. On being informed of the arrival of the contingent, the galley cooks, took out 20 loaves of bread, casually added some water to the mutton curry as well as the dal, that was from the previous day and served it. The food was so tasteless and substandard that only 17 of the ratings took it, the rest of them went ashore. This was not a one-off incident, such neglect was quite common, and what was even worse, repeated complaints to senior officers of the working conditions, did not elicit any response. As the complaints became galore, the ratings were more and more frustrated, both with the conditions as well with the indifference of the higher ups.

On Feb 18, 1946, Naval Rating M.S.Khan led the revolt on HMS Talwar, and a strike committee was formed. In Karachi, ratings began the revolt on HMIS Hindustan, anchored off the Manora Island. M.S.Khan and another naval rating Madan Singh, had by now taken control of the UPRISING, and it began to spread. By Feb 19, ratings from Castle and Fort Barracks had joined the revolt. Ratings left their posts, and began to go around in Bombay on trucks carrying pictures of Netaji Subash Chandra Bose, who by now had become their inspiration.

And soon it spread, to Kochi, Vizag, Kolkata, officers who opposed the strike were thrown off ships, and the mutineers used radio sets to communicate among themselves. HMIS Talwar became the epicenter for the UPRISING as the strikers used the radio sets to send messages to and fro between themselves. It was a perfectly co-ordinated revolt, that was now striking back. And soon the other workers in the Navy too joined, from the sloops, the minesweepers and the offshore establishments in Mumbai, along Hornby Road, near CST, now the Dadabhai Naoroji Road. The White Ensign of the British was lowered from all the ships, and British officers were singled out for attack by Indian Sailors, using hockey sticks, crowbars and whatever else they could lay their hands on.

Sadly, the revolting Sailors got no support at all from the Indian National Congress as usual, in fact they were even condemned for their actions. One of the lone voices in the Congress who supported the mutineers was Aruna Asaf Ali, who said she would rather unite Hindus and Muslims on the barricades. The Muslim League too denounced the Sailors, arguing that unrest on the streets was not the best way to deal with grievances and it should be through constitutional methods only. One reason could be that spontaneous uprisings like these threatened the centralized political authority of both Congress and Muslim League, and affected the dealings with the British Govt. The only political party that supported the mutineers was the Communist Party of India then, all others just left them in the lurch. Both Sardar Patel and Md.Ali Jinnah were united in their condemnation of the mutineers actions, and Aruna Asaf Ali was the lone voice from Congress in support of them. The mutineers faced court martial and imprisonment on surrender, and what was worse even after independence, they received no support from either the Govts of India or Pakistan.

The Royal Naval Ratings UPRISING lasted only for 4 days and was put down swiftly, however the impact went much beyond. The British were now fully convinced, that they could no longer trust the Armed forces to maintain their control over India. So far, the British managed to hold on to India, through the Armed forces, but when they began to revolt, they knew their time was up.

However, legendary UTPAL DUTTA immortalized the UPRISE in a PLAY titled " KALLOL", which ran in Minerva theater for many days. Mr. Dutta was jailed for this play, considered "ANTI ESTABLISHMENT"  but later released.

 

SOURCES for further reading:

1.0 1946 Royal Indian Navy Mutiny: Last War of Independence (466 PAGES) By Pramod Kapoor—e Book.

2.0 Research Paper—I have downloaded, can share.

3.0 There are also other references I used—Hard Copy

Image:-- Internet.

Disclaimer:-- Th information from sources are adopted purely for sharing information.