India House

India House was an informal Indian nationalist organisation based in London between 1905 and 1910.^[1] Founded under the patronage of Shyamji Krishna Varma as a student residence in Highgate, North London, its main objective was to promote nationalist views among Indian students in Britain. India House became a hub for intellectual and political activism more generally, and a meeting place for radical Indian nationalists in Britain.^[2]^[3]^[4] It was one of the most prominent centres for revolutionary Indian nationalism outside India.^[5] The Indian Sociologist, published by India House, was a noted platform for anti-colonial writing and was banned in India during the Raj as a "seditious newspaper".^[6]

India House was the origin and support for a number of noted Indian revolutionaries and nationalists, most famously V.D. Savarkar. Other prominent figures associated with India House include V.N. Chatterjee, Lala Har Dayal, V.V.S. Iyer, M.P.T. Acharya and P.M. Bapat. These were key members of revolutionary conspiracies in India and, later, the founding fathers of Indian Communism and Hindu nationalism.^[5]^[7]^[8] In 1909 Sir W.H. Curzon Wyllie was assassinated by Madan Lal Dhingra, a member of India House; this marked the beginning of the group's decline. The organization was investigated by Scotland Yard and became the target of the Indian Political Intelligence Office's work against Indian revolutionaries. The assassination marked the beginning of the Metropolitan Police's crackdown on India House's activities; a number of its supporters, including Shyamji Krishna Varma and Bhikaji Cama, moved to Continental Europe and continued their activities. Some Indian students, including Har Dayal, moved to the United States. The network founded by the India House was key in the Hindu-German Conspiracy for nationalist revolution in India during World War I.^[9]

Background

Nationalism in India

The growth of the Indian middle class during the 18th century, amidst competition among regional powers and the ascendancy of the British East India Company, led to a growing sense of "Indian" identity.^[10] The refinement of this perspective fed a rising tide of nationalism in India in the last decades of the 1800s.^[11] Its speed was abetted by the creation of the Indian National Congress in India in 1885 by A.O. Hume. The Congress developed into a major platform for the demands of political liberalisation, increased autonomy and social reform.^[12] The nationalist movement became particularly strong, radical and violent in Bengal and Punjab, though notable, if smaller, movements also appeared in Maharashtra, Madras and other areas in the South.^[12] Within this growing unrest, the controversial 1905 partition of Bengal had a widespread political impact: it stimulated radical nationalist sentiments and became a driving force for Indian revolutionaries.^[13]

Indian nationalism in Britain

From its earliest days, the Congress sought to inform public opinion in Britain, seeking its support for Indian political autonomy.^[12]^[14] The British committee of the Congress published a periodical titled India, which provided a platform for moderate (or loyalist) opinion and demands, while informing the British public about the Indian situation.^[15] The British arm of the Congress also established an Indian parliamentary committee in the British Parliament with a view to influencing policy directly.^[16]^[17] However, the British organisation was largely unsuccessful, prompting socialists including Henry Hyndman to advocate more radical approaches.^[16] The committee also drew criticisms for its cautious approach, most prominently from Indian students in Britain.^[14] After the decline of the Congress and during the political upheaval caused by the partition of Bengal, a nationalist Indian lawyer named Shyamji Krishna Varma founded India House in London.^[18]

Krishna Varma was an admirer of Dayanand Saraswati's approach of Cultural nationalism and held respect for Herbert Spencer, believing in the latter's dictum that "Resistance to aggression is not simply justified, but imperative".^[19] A graduate of Balliol College, Krishna Varma returned to India in the 1880s and served as administrator (Divan) of a number of Princely states, including Ratlam and Junagadh. He preferred this position to working under what he considered service to the alien rule of Britain.^[19] However, a supposed conspiracy of local British officials at Junagadh, compounded by differences between Crown authority and British Political Residents regarding the states, led to Krishna Varma's dismissal.^[20] He returned to England, where he found freedom of expression more favourable. His views were staunchly anti-colonial, even supporting the Boers during the Second Boer War in 1899.^[19]

India House

Although the British committee was successful in bringing the issue of civil liberties in India to British attention, it was seen as disconnected from the emerging Indo-centric movement and matters of self-governance in India. The committee drew criticism from nationalist leaders in India (including Bipin Chandra Pal) and Britain.^[17]

Indian Home Rule Society

The India House was a large Victorian Mansion at 65 Cromwell Avenue, Highgate, North London, and provided accommodation for thirty students.^[2]. It was first established to house an organisation known as the Indian Home Rule Society (IHRS), founded by Shyamji Krishna Varma^[21]—in collaboration with notable expatriate Indians such as Bhikaji Cama, S.R. Rana and Lala Lajpat Rai.^[22]^[23]^[17] The Society was intended to be a rival organisation to challenge the British Committee.

The IHRS was open for membership "to Indians only", and found significant support among Indians—especially students—in Britain. It was a metropolitan organisation, with a written constitution modelled after Victorian public institutions,^[24] with a stated aim to "secure Home Rule for India, and to carry on a genuine Indian propaganda in this country by all practicable means".^[25] It recruited young Indian activists, collected money, and may have been collecting arms and maintaining contact with revolutionary movements in India.^[14]^[26] The group also professed support for Turkish, Egyptian and Irish republican nationalism; Krishna Varma quickly established close relationships with these movements. These connections later influenced the activities and alliances of India House, both in Britain and abroad.

1905 was also the beginning of the Paris Indian Society, a branch of the IHRS under the patronage of Madam Cama, Sardar Singh Rana and B.H. Godrej.^[27] A number of the India House's members who later rose to prominence—including V.N. Chatterjee, Har Dayal and Acharya and others—had their first brush with the IHRS through the Paris Indian Society. Cama herself was a resourceful woman, nurturing close links with the French Socialist Party and Russian socialists in exile in Paris.^[27] In 1907, Cama attended the Socialist Congress of the Second International at Stuttgart, with other associates of the IHRS. There, seconded by Henry Hyndman, she demanded recognition of self-rule for India and famously unfurled one of the first Flags of India.^[28]

The Indian Sociologist

With the foundation of the IHRS, Krishna Varma began offering scholarships to Indian students, in memory of Indian leaders of the 1857 uprising. The only condition attached to these scholarships was that recipients would not, upon return to India, accept any paid post or honorary office from The Raj.^[19] These were complimented by three more scholarships in memory of Rana Pratap Singh offered by S.R. Rana, each then worth Rs 2000.^[29] In 1904 Krishna Varma had founded The Indian Sociologist (TIS), a penny monthly (with Spencer's dictum as its motto^[19]), as a challenge to the British Committee's Indian.^[14] The name of The Indian Sociologist was possibly intended to convey Krishna Varma's conviction that the ideological basis of Indian independence was to be the discipline of sociology.^[30] TIS itself was critical of the moderate loyalist approach and its appeal to British liberalism, exemplified by the work of G.K. Ghokale; TIS advocated Indian self-rule. It was critical of the British committee, whose members—as ex-members of the Indian Civil Service—were, in Krishna Varma's view, complicit in the exploitation of India.^[14] The Indian Sociologist quoted extensively from the works of British writers, which Krishna Varma interpreted to support colonial exploitation and the Indian right to oppose it, by violence if necessary.^[14] However, Krishna Varma propounded his views and justifications of political violence in nationalist struggle as the last resort, and his support was initially intellectual.^[31] Freedom of the press and the liberal approach of the British establishment meant Krishna Varma could air views that would have been rapidly suppressed in India.^[14]

Still, the views expressed in TIS drew stinging criticisms from ex-Indian Civil Servants in the British press and Parliament, who suggested intellectual dependence on Britain by highlighting Krishna Varma's citation of British writers and lack of reference to Indian tradition or values. They argued that Krishna Varma was disconnected from the Indian situation and Indian feelings.^[4] Most famously, Valentine Chirol, editor of The Times, accused Krishna Varma of preaching "disloyal sentiments" to Indian students, and demanded his prosecution.^[32]^[3] Chirol later described the India House as "The most dangerous organisation outside India".^[33]^[16] Although John Morley, the liberal Secretary of State for India, refused to take action at the time, Chirol's tirade against TIS and Krishna Varma forced the Government to investigate.^[31] Detectives visited the India House and interviewed the printers of its publication. Krishna Varma saw these actions as the start of a crackdown on his work and, fearing arrest, moved to Paris in 1907; he never returned to Britain.^[3]^[20]

Savarkar

After Krishna Varma's departure, the organisation found a new leader in Vinayak Damodar Savarkar. Savarkar was an admirer of Mazzini, a protégé of Tilak, and a law student who had arrived in London in 1906 on a scholarship from Krishna Varma.^[4]^[34]^[35] He had a strong history of associations with the nationalist movement in India, and had founded the Abhinav Bharat Society (Young India Society) while still a student at Fergusson College in Pune. He had met (then relatively unknown) Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi in 1906.^[36]^[37]^[4] In London, his "firebrand" nationalist views initially failed to endear him to the India House residents—most prominently to V.V.S. Iyer. However Savarkar gradually grew to be the central figure in the organisation.^[38] His efforts at the time were devoted to nationalist writings, organising public meetings and demonstrations,^[22] and initiating the secret society of Abhinav Bharat Mandal.^[39] He kept in touch with the movement in India through his brother Babarao Ganesh Savarkar, and through him, Savarkar's work found its way in India to the extremist Congress leaders of the time, including Bal Gangadhar Tilak. Impressed and influenced by the history of the Italian wars of Independence, Savarkar's thoughts turned towards directing an armed revolution in India, for which he was prepared to seek arms and help from Germany. He proposed at the time the indoctrination of the army as the Young Italy movement had indoctrinated Italians soldiers of the Austrian Army.^[40] In London, Savarkar founded the Free India Society (FIS), and in December 1906 he opened a branch of Abhinav Bharat Society.^[41]^[42] This organisation drew a number of radical Indian students, including P.M. Bapat, V.V.S. Iyer, Madanlal Dhingra, Virendranath Chattopadhyaya.^[43] Savarkar had lived in Paris for sometime, and visited the city often.^[44] By 1908, he was able to bring to the folds of his organisation Indian businessmen then residing in the city. During one of his many visits, he was able to acquire a copy of a bomb manual given by the Russian revolutionary Nicholas Safranski to Hem Chandra Das, a Bengali revolutionary in Paris.^[45] Savarkar is further known to have met Gandhi while in London, and his hardline views may have influenced Gandhi's opinion on nationalist violence.^[46]

Transformation

Under Savarkar, the Abhinav Bharat Society and the relatively benign front of the Free India Society rapidly developed into a radical meeting ground quite different from the IHRS. It was wholly self-reliant and under Savarkar's influence, it drew its inspiration and ideology from the Indian revolutionary movement, from religious scriptures such as the Bhagavad Gita, and from Savarkar's own studies in Indian history including The Indian War of Independence.^[24] Savarkar translated Giuseppe Mazzini's autobiography into Marathi and extolled the virtues and efficacy of secret societies.^[32] The FIS had a semi-religious oath of initiation, and served as a cover for the Abhinav Bharat Society's meetings on Sunday evenings.^[43]

India House was soon transformed into the headquarters of the Indian revolutionary movement in Britain.^[2] Its members at this time were drawn from the young Indian diasporas in London who came from all over India.^[47] Nearly seventy names were known to have been regular attendees to the meetings. A large number, almost a quarter each, were from Bengal and Punjab, while a significant but smaller group came from Bombay and Maharashtra.^[47] Most were students in their mid-twenties, and belonged more often than not to the social elite of India, including those from families of millionaires, mill owners, lawyers and doctors. A few women were also known to have been members of the group. The members were predominantly Hindus. The Sunday night meetings were selected for lectures by Savarkar on topics ranging from the philosophy of revolution to bomb-making and assassination techniques.^[2] Only a small proportion of these recruits to the society were known to have previously engaged in political activity and the Swadeshi movement in India.^[47]

As the number of its members swelled, Savarkar's group began work with dilligence. Abhinav Bharat Society had two fold aims, first of all to engage in propaganda in Britain, Europe and America in support of Indian independence and to create an Indian public opinion and spirit in favour of nationalist revolution and insurrection; and secondly to raise funds for arms and acquire technology and knowhow to sustain a revolution.^[8] It emphasised actions of self-sacrifice by its members which were to be directed towards India. These were to be activities which the masses could emulate, but which did not require an advance mass-movement to be in place.^[47] The outhouse of India House was converted to a "war workshop" where chemistry students attempted to produce explosives and manufacture bombs, while the printing press was used to print "seditious" literature, including bomb-making manuals and pamphlets expounding violence and assassination of Europeans in India. In the house was an arsenal of small-arms that were intermittently dispatched to India through different avenues and couriers.^[2] Savarkar was at the heart of these, spending a great deal of time in the explosives workshop and emerging on some evenings, according to a fellow revolutionary, "with telltale yellow stains of Picric acid on his hands".^[48] The residents of India House and members of Abhinav Bharat practiced shooting at a range in Tottenham Court Road in central London, and rehearsed assassinations they planned to carry out.^[48]

Through various emissaries, arrangements were made to ship arms to India. These included, among others, a number of shipments of Browning Pistols sent through Chaturbhuj Amin, Chanjeri Rao, and through V.V.S. Iyer when he returned to India. Sympathetic Europeans may have served as couriers on afew occassions.^[49] Revolutionary literature was shipped under false covers and from different addresses to prevent these from being traced by Indian postal authorities.^[48] Further, Savarkar's The Indian War of Independence was published (in 1909) and was seen as inflammatory enough that it was removed from the catalogue of the British Library to prevent Indian students from accessing it.^[50]

By 1908, the India House group had managed to take over the London Indian Society, established in 1865 by Dadabhoi Naoroji. In the annual general meeting, the members of the India House packed the meeting and ousted the old-guard of the society which till then was the main association of London Indians.^[51]

Culmination

India House's activities did not go unnoticed. In addition to questions raised in official Indian and British circles, Savarkar's unrestrained views and correspondences were published in newspapers such as Daily Mail, Manchester Guardian and Dispatch. By 1909, India House was coming under surveillance from Scotland Yard and Indian intelligence, and its activities were considerably curtailed.^[52] Savarkar's elder brother Ganesh Savarkar was arrested in India in June that year, and was subsequently tried and transported for life for publication of seditionist literature.^[53] Savarkar's speeches grew increasingly virulent and called for revolution, wide-spread violence, and murder of all Englishmen in India.^[53] The culmination of these events was the assassination of Sir William H. Curzon Wyllie, the political aide-de-camp to the Secretary of State for India, by Madanlal Dhingra on the evening of 1 July 1909, at a meeting of Indian students in the Imperial Institute in London.^[53] Dhingra was arrested and later tried and executed. In the aftermath of the assassination, the India House was rapidly liquidated. The investigations into the assassination were expanded to look for broader conspiracies originating from India House and although Scotland Yard stated that none existed, Indian intelligence sources suggested otherwise.^[54] It was further suggested that Dhingra's intended target was John Morley, the Secretary of State for India himself. A number of sources suggested the assassination was in fact Savarkar's brainchild, and that he planned further action in Britain as well as India.^[54] In March 1910, Savarkar was arrested upon his return to London from Paris and later deported to India.^[55] While he was held at Brixton Prison during the deportation hearing, an attempt was made in May 1910 by the remnant of India House to storm his prison van and rescue Savarkar. This plot was coordinated with help from Irish republicans led by Maud Gonne. However, the plan failed when the ambush stormed an empty decoy van while Savarkar himself was transported secretly through a different route.^[56] In the year that followed, Police and political sources brought pressure on the residents to leave England. While some of its leaders like Krishna Varma had already fled to Europe, others like Chattopadhyaya moved to Germany. Many others moved to Paris.^[57] The Paris Indian Society gradually grew to take the India House's place as the power house of Indian nationalism in the continent.^[58]

Counter measures

Although the content of The Indian Sociologist made the aims of India House abundantly clear, initially the threat arising from India House was not considered serious enough for either Indian intelligence or British Special Branch to pursue the matter with any urgency.^[50]^[59] This was compounded by a lack of clarity and communication from the Department of Criminal Intelligence operating in India under Charles Cleveland, and Scotland Yard's Special Branch.^[50] Lack of direction and information from Indian political intelligence, compounded with reluctance on part of Lord Morley to engage in postal censorship,^[60] led to Special Branch severely underestimating this threat.^[60]

Scotland Yard

In spite of this initial underestimation, and added the fact that Special Branch was wholly inexperienced in dealing with political crime,^[59] the first observations of India House by Scotland Yard had begun as early as 1905. Detectives attended Sunday meetings at India House in May 1907 where they acquired access to seditious literature.^[60] It was the visit of one such agent to Krishna Varma, under the guise of an Irish-American by the name of O'Brien, that convinced Krishna Varma of the need to decamp to Paris.^[60] It was not until June 1908 that concrete plans for cooperation between Indian and British police was decided between India Office and Scotland Yard and the decision made to place an ex-Indian policeman for surveillance of India House.^[61] The arrival of B.C. Pal and G.S. Khaparde in London in 1908 further stirred the matter since both were known to be "extremists" in India. By September 1908, an agent had been put in place within India House who was able to invite detectives to the Sunday night meetings of the Free India Society (attendance for Europeans was by invitation only).^[61] The agent passed on some additional information, but was not able to infiltrate into Savarkar's inner circle. Savarkar himself did not come under special scrutiny as a dangerous suspect till November 1909, when this agent passed on information about discussions of assassinations at Indian House. The agent may have been a young Maharashtrian by the name of Kirtikar, who had arrived at India House as an acquaintance of V.V.S. Iyer, ostensibly to study Dentistry in London but actually as an informer. Kirtikar was discovered after Iyer made enquiries at the London Hospital where he was supposed to be training, and was one night forced by Savarkar to confess at gun-point.^[62] After this, Kirtikar's reports are believed to have been regularly screened by Savarkar before they were passed on to Scotland Yard. It is believed that M.P.T. Acharya was at this time instructed by V.V.S. Iyer and V.D. Savarkar to set himself up as an informer to Scotland Yard, which they reasoned would allow them to carefully feed information to the police and help provide a corroboration to the versions of reports that were being sent by Kirtikar.^[38] Although it pursued Indian students and shadowed them quite avidly, the Scotland Yard drew severe criticisms at this time for its incapability to penetrate the organisation. Further the Viceroy's secretary, William Lee-Warner, was assaulted twice in London, once slapped in the face in his very office by a young Bengali Student of the name Kunjalal Bhattacharji, and subsequently assaulted in a London park by another Indian student. The Yard's perceived inefficiency was blamed for these events.^[61]

Department of Criminal Intelligence

Unknown to Scotland Yard,^[63] the Indian Department of Criminal Intelligence (DCI) had made covert efforts to infiltrate India House by the beginning of 1909, with more success. An agent designated "C" had by this time been residing in India House for nearly a year, and after convincing the residents that he was a genuine patriot, begun reporting back to India.^[63]^[64] Reasons suggested why DCI did not inform the Yard include an intention not to interfere with the local police investigations in London, not to lose the full control that it had over C, and lastly not to stand accused of "deviousness" by the Yard.^[63]

However, Cs initial reports in early 1909 were of little value. It was not until the months immediately preceding the Curzon Wyllie's assassination that his reports outlined the hitherto unknown goings-on at India House. In June, he described the shooting practice at Tottenham Court range and rifle-practice with air-rifles at a range in the back of India House. This was followed by reports of V.V.S. Iyer and Savarkar's advice to M.P.T. Acharya on acts of martyrdom.^[63] Following the arrest and subsequent transportation of Savarkar's elder brother Ganesh Savarkar in India on 9 June 1909,^[53] Cs reports note that Savarkar's speeches grew increasingly virulent and called for revolution, wide-spread violence, and murder of all Englishmen in India.^[53]^[63] In the following weeks, Savarkar was barred from joining the bar due to his political activity. These were the events that led up to the assassination of Sir Curzon Wyllie. Although it was believed that Savarkar may have personally instructed or trained Dhingra, Metropolitan police was unable to bring a prosecution against the former since he had an alibi for the night.^[65]

Indian Special Branch

In July 1909, in the aftermath of Curzon Wyllie's assassination, Special Branch was reorganised following a meeting between India Office and the Commissioner of Police Sir Edward Henry. This led to the opening of the Indian Special Branch which, by the end of July, had a strength of 38 officers.^[66] It committed considerable resources over the course of the investigation of Curzon Wyllie's assassination, which at the end satisfied the demands and expectations of Indian Criminal Intelligence from Scotland Yard with regards to checking the Indian seditionist movement in Britain.^[66] The police brought strong pressure on India House and began active surveillance and intelligence gatherings on Indian students in London, including through landladies and through paid informants. These, along with threats to their careers was enough to rob India House of its support base of students. It slowly began to disassemble, and—as Thirumal Acharya described bitterly—the residence was treated akin to a "leper's home" by the Indian students in the city.^[67] In addition, although student political activism could not be curtailed too heavily for fear of accusations of repression, the British Government at the time successfully implemented censorship and custom laws to curtail the publication and distribution of nationalist and seditious material from Britain. Among these was Bipin Pal's Swaraj, which was forced to close down, an event which ultimately drove Pal to penury and mental collapse in London.^[67] The India House gradually ceased to be a potent organisation in Britain.

Influence

The India House's political activities were chiefly aimed at young Indians, especially the Indian student in Britain. Political discontent was at the time growing steadily amongst this group, especially those who were touch with Indian professionals and studied in depth the concepts and philosophies of European politics and liberalism.^[68] This discontent was noted amongst British academic and political circles quite early on, with some voicing fear that these students would take refuge in extremist politics.^[68]

Nationalist movement

Gradually after its foundations in 1905, the India House's influence among this student group grew considerably even while it was still under the stewardship of Shyamji Krishna Varma. Indian students who provided insights into the community at the time confessed to a growing influence of the India House—especially in the scenario of the 1905 partition of Bengal—and attributed to this the decrease in the number of Indian applicants for Government posts and the Indian Civil Service. The Indian Sociologist is believed to have attracted considerable attention amongst London newspapers.^[69] Others however disagreed with these views, and described the India House's appeal as limited. S.D. Bhaba, president of the Indian Christian Union, once described Krishna Varma as a man "whose bark was worse than his bite".^[69] It was under Savarkar that the organisation grew to be the center of the Indian revolutionary movement abroad and one of the most important and dangerous links between revolutionary violence in India and Britain.^[53]^[55]^[65] The organisation welcomed not only those of extremist views, but moderatists as well among its residents. The former nonetheless outnumbered the latter.^[69] Significantly, a number of the residents, especially those who were noted to have agreed with Savarkar's views, did not have any history of nationalist movement behind them in India, indicating they were indoctrinated during their stay at India House.^[47]

More significantly, the India House was a source of arms, and seditious literature that was rapidly proscribed in India. In addition to The Indian Sociologist, pamphlets like Bande Mataram and Oh Martyrs! by Savarkar extolled revolutionary violence. Direct influences and incitements from India House were noted in a number of incidences of political violence and assassinations in India at the time.^[41]^[50]^[70] One of the two charges against Savarkar during his trial in Bombay was for abetment of the murder of the District Magistrate of Nasik A.T.M. Jackson by Anant Kanhere in December 1909, and the arms used were directly traced through an Italian courier to India House. Further, other activists such as M.P.T. Acharya and V.V.S. Iyer were noted in the Rowlatt report to have been directly involved and influenced other political assassinations including the murder of Robert D'escourt Ashe in the hands of Vanchi Iyer.^[41] The Paris-Safranski link was strongly suggested by French police to be involved in the 1907 attempt in Bengal to derail the train carrying the Lieutenant-Governor Sir Andrew Fraser.^[71] The activities of nationalists abroad is believed to have quite strongly shaken the loyalty of a number of native regiments of the British Indian Army.^[72]

The India House and its activities had some influence on the subsequent Nonviolent philosophy that was adopted by Gandhi.^[46] He had met some members of India House, including Savarkar, in London as well as in India, and disagreed with the adoption of nationalist and political philosophies from the west. Gandhi dismissively labelled this revolutionary violence as anarchist and its practitioners as "The Modernists",^[46] and some of his subsequent writings, including Hind Swaraj were in opposition to the activities of Savarkar and Dhingra and against the argument that violence was innocent if perpetrated under a nationalist identity or while under Colonial victimhood.^[46] It has been argued that it was against and in recognition of the consequences of this strategy of revolutionary violence that the formative background of Gandhian nonviolence was framed.^[46]

India Houses abroad

Following the example laid by the original India House, India Houses were opened in the United States and in Japan.^[73] Krishna Varma had been able to build close contacts with the Irish Republican movement and in the United States, articles from The Indian Sociologist were reprinted in the Gaelic American. In addition, with the efforts of the growing Indian student population and erstwhile members of the London India House, organisations mirroring the India House emerged. The first of these was the Pan-Aryan Association, modelled after the Indian Home Rule Society, that was opened in 1906 through the joint Indo-Irish efforts of Mohammed Barkatullah, S.L. Joshi and George Freeman.^[6] Barkatullah himself was closely associated with Krishna Varma during his previous stay in London, and his subsequent career in Japan later put him at the heart of Indian political activities there.^[6] The association at one time invited Madame Cama—who at the time was close to the works of Krishna Varma—to give a series of lectures in the United States. An "India House" itself was founded in Manhattan in New York in January 1908 with funds from a wealthy lawyer of Irish descent called Myron Phelps. Phelps admired Swami Vivekananda, and the Vedanta Society (established by the Swami) in New York was at the time under Swami Abhedananda, who was considered "seditionist" by the British.^[74] In New York, Indian students and ex-residents of London India House took advantage of liberal press laws to freely circulate The Indian Sociologist and other nationalist pamphlets and literature, which could also be shipped around the world.^[74] New York increasingly became an important centre for the Indian movement, such that Free Hindustan, a political revolutionary journal published by Taraknath Das closely mirroring The Indian Sociologist, moved from Vancouver and Seattle to New York in 1908. Das was able to establish extensive collaboration with the Gaelic American with help from George Freeman before Free Hindustan was proscribed in 1910 under British diplomatic pressure.^[75] From 1910, the activities began to decline in the East Coast but gradually shifted to San Francisco. The arrival of Har Dayal around this time bridged the gap between the intellectual agitators and the predominantly Punjabi labour workers and migrants, laying the foundations of the Ghadar movement.^[75]

An India House was opened in Tokyo as early as 1907.^[76] The city—like London and New York—had by the end of the 19th century a steadily growing Indian student population, with whom Krishna Varma kept a close contact. However, Krishna Varma was initially reluctant to spread his resources thin, especially since the Japanese centre did not have a strong leadership. He further feared interference from Japan, which was then on friendly terms with Britain.^[76] Nonetheless, the presence of revolutionaries from Bengal and close correspondence between London and Tokyo houses allowed the latter to gain prominence in The Indian Sociologist. The India House in Tokyo was a residence for sixteen Indian students in 1908 and accepted students from other Asian countries including Ceylon, aiming to build a broad foundation for Indian nationalism based on pan-Asiatic values. The movement gained new momentum after Barkatullah, on the directions from Krishna Varma and George Freeman, moved from New York to Tokyo in 1909.^[76] Taking up the post of Professor of Urdu at Tokyo University, Barkatullah was responsible for East Asian distribution of The Indian Sociologist and other nationalist literature emanating from London. His other works at this time includes the publication of Islamic Fraternity, which was financed by the Ottoman Empire. Barkatullah transformed it into an anti-British mouthpiece, invited contributions from Krishna Varma, and advocated Hindu-Muslim unity in India.^[77] He published at this time other nationalist pamphlets which found their way to the Pacific coast and East Asian settlements. Further, Barkatullah established links with prominent Japanese politicians including Okawa Shumei, who he won over to the Indian cause.^[77] British CID, aware of the threat that Barkatullah's work posed to the empire, ultimately exerted successful diplomatic pressure to have Islamic Fraternity closed down in 1912. Barkatullah was denied tenure and was forced to leave Japan in 1914.^[77]

First World War

The liquidation of India House through 1909 and 1910 gradually disseminated its members to different countries in Europe, including France and Germany, as well as the United States. The network that the India House founded was to be key in the efforts by the Indian revolutionary movement against the British Raj through World War I. During the war, the Berlin committee in Germany, Ghadar Party in North America, and the Indian revolutionary underground attempted to ship men and arms from United States and East Asia into India which were intended for a planned revolution and mutiny in the British Indian Army. During the conspiracy, the revolutionaries established extensive collaboration with the Irish Republican Brotherhood, Sinn Féin, Japanese patriotic societies, Ottoman turkey and most prominently the German Foreign Office. The conspiracy has since come to be called the Hindu-German conspiracy.^[78]^[79] Among other efforts, the alliance attempted to rally Afghanistan against British India.^[80] A number of failed attempts at mutiny were made in India through 1914-1915, of which the Ghadar conspiracy, the Singapore mutiny, and the Christmas day plot remain most notable. The threat posed by the conspiracy was key in the passage of the Defence of India act 1915, and suppression of the movement necessitated an international counter-intelligence operation on part of the British empire that lasted nearly ten years.^[81]^[82] Following the end of World War I, ex-members of India House and erstwhile members of Berlin Committee and the India revolutionary movement increasingly turned to the young Soviet Union, becoming closely associated with Communism. When the Communist Party of India was founded in Tashkent, in October 1920, a number of its founding members including M.P.T. Acharya, Virendranath Chattopadyaya, Champakaraman Pillai and Abdul Rab had in the past been associated with India House or the Paris Indian Society.^[83]^[84]^[85]

Indian political intelligence

The foundation of the counter-intelligence operation was an intelligence organisation established in London in 1910 under an Indian police officer by the name of John Arnold Wallinger. Wallinger had been the Superintendent of Police at Bombay and was seconded to the India Office, where in January 1910 he established the Indian Political Intelligence Office. He used his considerable skills to establish to establish contacts with police officials in London, Paris and throughout continental Europe, and established a network of informants and spies.^[86] Later during World War I this organisation, working with the French Political Police the Sûreté,^[87] was key in tracing the Indo-German conspiracy, and attempted to assassinate ex-members of the India House (among them V.N. Chattopadhyaya) who were at the time planning for nationalist mutiny in British India.^[88] Among Wallinger's recruits during the war was Somerset Maugham, who later mirrored some of his characters and stories on his experiences during the war.^[89] Wallinger's organisation itself was renamed Indian Political Intelligence in 1921, and subsequently grew to form the Intelligence Bureau in independent India.

Hindu nationalism

A branch of the nationalist and revolutionary philosophy that arose from India House, especially from the works of V.D. Savarkar, was to consolidate in India in the 1920s as an explicit ideology of Hindu nationalism. Exemplified by the Hindu Mahasabha, it was quite distinct from the Gandhian devotionalism,^[46] and acquired the support of a somewhat chauvinist mass movement.^[46] The Indian War of Independence is considered one of Savarkar's most influential works in developing and framing ideas of masculine Hinduism.^[90] Amongst Savarkar's work during his stay at India House was a history of the Maratha Confederacy which he described as an exemplary Hindu empire (Hindu Padpadshahi).^[46] Further, Spencerian evolutionism and functionalism that Savarkar was exposed to at India House were to have a strong influence on his social and political philosophy and in laying the foundations of early Hindu nationalism.^[8] It charted the latter's approach to State, Society and Colonialism, and Spencerian doctrines shaped Savarkar's philosophy and stress on "rationalist" and "scientific" approach to national evolution as well as extreme aggression and military strength for national survival. A number of Spencerian ideas featured prominently in Savarkar's works well into his political writings and works with the Hindu Mahasabha.^[8]^[91]

Notes

^ Popplewell 1995, p. 125
^ ^a ^b ^c ^d ^e Hopkirk 1997, p. 44
^ ^a ^b ^c Owen 2007, p. 65
^ ^a ^b ^c ^d Owen 2007, p. 66
^ ^a ^b von Pochhammer 2005, p. 435
^ ^a ^b ^c Fischer-Tinē 2007, p. 334
^ Radhan 1997, p. 35
^ ^a ^b ^c ^d Bhatt 2001, p. 81
^ Abel 2005, p. 115
^ Mitra 2006, p. 63
^ Desai 2005, p. 30
^ ^a ^b ^c Yadav 1992, p. 6
^ Bose & Jalal 1998, p. 117
^ ^a ^b ^c ^d ^e ^f ^g Owen 2007, p. 63
^ Owen 2007, p. 37
^ ^a ^b ^c Yadav 1992, p. 7
^ ^a ^b ^c Owen 2007, p. 62
^ Abel 2005, p. 110
^ ^a ^b ^c ^d ^e Qur 2005, p. 123
^ ^a ^b Johnson 1994, p. 119
^ Majumdar 1971, p. 299
^ ^a ^b Innes 2002, p. 171
^ Joseph 2003, p. 59
^ ^a ^b Owen 2007, p. 67
^ Fischer-Tine´ 2007, p. 330
^ Parekh 1999, p. 158
^ ^a ^b "Two words about one Parsi", The Dawn Group of Newspapers, December 30, 2001
^ Parel 1997, p. xxviii
^ University of Calcutta 1921, p. 295
^ Parekh 1999, p. 159
^ ^a ^b Owen 2007, p. 64
^ ^a ^b Yadav 1992, p. 8
^ Chirol 2006, p. 148
^ Bhatt 2001, p. 80
^ Joseph 2003, p. 61
^ Jaffrelot 1996, p. 26
^ Puniyani 2005, p. 212
^ ^a ^b Yadav 1992, p. 11
^ Parel 2000, p. 123
^ Ghodke 1990, p. 139
^ ^a ^b ^c Yadav 1992, p. 4
^ Yadav 1992, p. 82
^ ^a ^b Yadav 1992, p. 9
^ Joesph 2003, p. 61
^ Yadav 1992, p. 300
^ ^a ^b ^c ^d ^e ^f ^g ^h Bhatt 2001, p. 83
^ ^a ^b ^c ^d ^e Owen 2007, p. 70
^ ^a ^b ^c Hopkirk 2001, p. 45
^ Jayakar 1958, p. 116
^ ^a ^b ^c ^d Hopkirk 2003, p. 46
^ Owen 2007, p. 72
^ Owen 2007, p. 71
^ ^a ^b ^c ^d ^e ^f Yadav 1992, p. 15
^ ^a ^b Popplewell 1995, p. 131
^ ^a ^b Hopkirk 2001, p. 46
^ McMinn 1992, p. 299
^ Yadav 1992, p. 22
^ Yadav 1992, p. 26
^ ^a ^b Popplewell 1995, p. 127
^ ^a ^b ^c ^d Popplewell 1995, p. 128
^ ^a ^b ^c Popplewell 1995, p. 129
^ Yadav 1992, p. 11
^ ^a ^b ^c ^d ^e Popplewell 1995, p. 130
^ Andreas & Nadelmann 2006, p. 74
^ ^a ^b Hopkirk 2001, p. 50
^ ^a ^b Popplewell 1995, p. 132
^ ^a ^b Owen 2007, p. 73
^ ^a ^b Lahiri 2000, p. 125
^ ^a ^b ^c Lahiri 2000, p. 126
^ Coward 2003, p. 135
^ Popplewell 1995, p. 135
^ Lahiri 2000, p. 126
^ Fischer-Tinē 2007, p. 333
^ ^a ^b Fischer-Tinē 2007, p. 333
^ ^a ^b Fischer-Tinē 2007, p. 335
^ ^a ^b ^c Fischer-Tinē 2007, p. 337
^ ^a ^b ^c Fischer-Tinē 2007, p. 338
^ Hoover 1985, p. 252
^ Brown 1948, p. 300
^ Strachan 2001, p. 788
^ Hopkirk 2001, p. 41
^ Popplewell 1995, p. 234
^ Radhan 2002, p. 120
^ Yadav 1992, p. 53
^ Strachan 2001, p. 815
^ Andreas & Nadelmann 2006, p. 75
^ Popplewell 1995, p. 216,217
^ Popplewell 1995, p. 234
^ Popplewell 1995, p. 230
^ Bannerjee 2005, p. 50
^ Bhatt 2003, p. 82

Contents

Background

Nationalism in India

Indian nationalism in Britain

India House

Indian Home Rule Society

The Indian Sociologist

Savarkar

Transformation

Culmination

Counter measures

Scotland Yard

Department of Criminal Intelligence

Indian Special Branch

Influence

Nationalist movement

India Houses abroad

First World War

Indian political intelligence

Hindu nationalism

Notes

References