Asoka founded the most powerful secret society on earth: that of the Nine Unknown Men. What can have been the aim of these men?
The Protest
As the Defence of India Act was to expire six months after the conclusion of
the war, a new set of emergency measures for the detention and containment of
'terrorists' to meet what was termed the 'continuing threat' were planned by the
Government of India. These measures were incorporated within the Anarchical and
Revolutionary Crimes Act, known to Indians as the Rowlatt Act after the name of
the chairman of the committee that recommended the institution of this
legislation. The government could not have known that the Rowlatt Act would
become the occasion for the most widespread movement of opposition to British
rule since the Rebellion of 1857-58 and indeed the springboard from which the
movement for independence would be launched until India was to become
irretrievably lost to the British. The Rowlatt Act provided for the trial of
seditious crime by benches of three judges; the accused were not to have the
benefit of either preliminary commitment proceedings or the right of appeal, and
the rules under which evidence could be obtained and used were relaxed. Other
preventive measures included detention without the levying of charges and
searches without warrants. As the Rowlatt committee noted in its report,
"punishment or acquittal should be speedy both in order to secure the moral
effect which punishment should produce and also to prevent the prolongation of
the excitement which the proceedings may set up."
The history of anti-terrorist legislation in colonial India by no means ends
with the Rowlatt Act, but such of it as is here narrated suggests that much in
the present legislation had already been anticipated.
Jallianwala Bagh Massacre
Jalianwala Bagh massacre of April 13, 1919 was one of the most inhuman acts
of the British rulers in India. The people of Punjab have gathered on the
auspicious day of Baisakhi at Jalianwala Bagh, adjacent to Golden Temple (Amritsar),
to lodge their protest peacefully against persecution by the British Indian
Government. General Dwyer apeared suddenly with his armed police force and fired
indiscriminately at innocent empty handed people leaving hundreds of people
dead, including women and children. General Dwyer, the butcher of Jalianwala
Bagh, was later murdered by Udham Singh to avenge this barbaric act.
