THE LION OF PUNJAB

Lala Lajpat Rai was born on (28 January 1865 – 17 November

1928) was an Indian Punjabi author and politician who is

chiefly remembered as a leader in the Indian Independence

movement. He was popularly known as Punjab Kesari. Lala

Lajpat Rai immensely contributed in attaining independence

of the nation from the clutches of the British. He helped in

establishing few schools in the country. He also initiated the

foundation of Punjab National Bank.

He sustained severe injuries in the protest against Simon

Commission and died less than three weeks later. His death

anniversary (17 November) is celebrated as Martyrs' Day in India.

His father was a great scholar of Persian and Urdu. His mother was a

strict religious lady who inculcated strong morals values in her

children. His family values allowed Lajpat Rai to have the freedom of

following different faiths and beliefs.

Lala Lajpat Rai in 1908

EARLY LIFE

Lajpat Rai was born in Dhudike  which is now in Moga

district, Punjab) on 28 January 1865.The word 'Lala' is an honorific

applied to prominent Hindu men of the time. His father was an

Aggarwal by caste .

Rai completed his initial education in Government Higher

Secondary School, Rewari(now in Haryana, previously in Punjab),

in the late 1870s and early 1880s, where his father, Radha Krishan

worked as an Urdu teacher. Rai was influenced by Hinduism and

created a career of reforming Indian policy through politics and

writing.When studying law in Lahore, he continued to practice

Hinduism.

He became a huge believer in the philosophy that Hinduism,

above nationality, was crucial upon which an Indian lifestyle must

be based.

His involvement with Hindu Mahasabha leaders gathered criticism

from the Bharat Sabha as the Mahasabhas were non-secular,

which did not conform with the system laid out by the Indian

National Congress.

BELIEVER IN HINDUISM

As an orthodox Hindu, Rai was thoroughly influenced by Hinduism and created a career of reforming Indian policy through politics and writing.

He ardently practised Hinduism.

He firmly believed that Hinduism paves way for the practices of peace to humanity. He opined that when nationalist ideas were added to this peaceful belief system, a secular nation could be formed. His involvement with Hindu Mahasabha leaders gathered criticism from the Bharat Sabha because the Mahasabhas were non-secular, which did not conform with the system laid out by the Indian National Congress. This focus on Hindu practices in the subcontinent would ultimately lead him to the continuation of peaceful movements to create successful demonstrations for Indian independence.

HIS CONTRIBUTION TO ARYA SAMAJ

He was a sincere devotee of Arya Samaj. He was editor of Arya Gazette, which

he set up during his student time.

After obtaining bachelor’s degree in law at the Government College in Lahore,

Lajpat Rai worked as a practising lawyer at Hissar and Lahore. This was where

he helped to establish the nationalistic Dayananda Anglo-Vedic School and

became a follower of Dayananda Sarasvati, the founder of the reformist Hindu

society Arya Samaj ("Society of Noble People").

In 1897, he founded the Hindu Orphan Relief Movement to keep the Christian missions

from securing custody of these children.

HIS ROLE IN PROMOTION OF EDUCATION

Lalaji was opposed to the recommendations of the University Education Commission. The commission recommended Government control of education and set forth difficult standards for starting private schools. Punjab was adversely affected by the commission because the Arya Samaj was extremely active in the field of education. After the commission, it became impossible for the people to have any say in their children's education. Lalaji declared that the Government by these new regulations has made it almost impossible for the Private Education Societies to start schools or improve them.

PARTICIPATION IN THE INDIAN NATIONAL CONGRESS AND HIS ROLE IN THE POLITICAL AGITATION IN THE PUNJAB

After joining the Indian National Congress, he soon took part in political agitation

in the Punjab. Lajpat Rai was deported to Mandalay, Burma (Myanmar), without

trial, in May 1907. The viceroy, Lord Minto, decided that there was insufficient

evidence to hold him for subversion and so Rai was allowed to return in

November.

Though Lajpat Rai's supporters attempted to secure his election to the presidency

of the party session at Surat in December 1907, but elements in favour of the

British refused to accept him. Thus the party split over the issues.

ELECTED AS PRESIDENT OF THE CONGRESS PARTY

He founded Bradlaugh Hall at Lahore as an alternative to British Institutions.

Graduates of the National College included Bhagat Singh. He was elected

President of the Congress party in the Calcutta Special Session of 1920.

In 1921, He founded Servants of the People Society a non-profit welfare

organization, in Lahore, which shifted based to Delhi after partition, and has

branches in many parts of India.

BONVOYAGE: AMERICA

Lajpat Rai travelled to the US in 1907. He returned during World War I. During his stay in US, he toured Sikh communities along the US West Coast. He visited Tuskegee University in Alabama; and met with workers in the Philippines.

His travelogue, The United States of America (1916), provides a detailed account of these travels and features extensive quotations from leading African American intellectuals, including W.E.B. Du Boisand Fredrick Douglass. The book also argues for the notion of "color-caste," suggesting sociological similarities between race in the US and caste in India. During World War I, Lajpat Rai lived in the United States, but he returned to India in 1919 . The following year he led the special session of the Congress Party that launched the non co-operation movement. He was imprisoned from 1921 to 1923. Soon after his release, he was elected to the legislative assembly.

A banquet given in honour of Lala Lajpat Rai by the California Chapter of the Hindustan Association of America at Hotel Shattuck in Berkeley on 12 February 1916.

PROTEST AGAINST SIMON COMMISSION

In 1928, the British government set up the Commission, headed by Sir John Simon. The commission has to report on the political situation in India. The Indian political parties boycotted the Commission because it did not include a single Indian in its membership. This resulted in country-wide protests.

When the Commission visited Lahore on 30 October 1928, Lajpat Rai led silent march in protest against it. The superintendent of police, James A. Scott, ordered the police to lathi charge the protesters and personally assaulted Rai. In this attack, he was severely injured. Later, Rai addressed the crowd and said that "I declare that the blows struck at me today will be the last nails in the coffin of British rule in India"

DEMISE

He did not fully recover from his injuries and soon died on 17 November 1928 of heart failure. Doctors thought that Scott's blows had hastened his death. However, when the matter was raised in the British Parliament, the British Government denied any role in Rai's death.

REVENGE OF BHAGAT SINGH

Although Bhagat Singh did not witness the event, he vowed to take revenge, and joined other revolutionaries, Shivaram Rajguru,Sukhdev Thaparand Chandrashekhar Azad, in a plot to kill Scott.

However, in a case of mistaken identity, Bhagat Singh was signalled to shoot on the appearance of John P. Saunders, an Assistant Superintendent of Police. Rajguru and Bhagat Singh while leaving the District Police Headquarters shot the (ASP) , John Saunders in Lahore on 17 December 1928.

Azad opened fire on the Head Constable, Chanan Singh who was chasing them. Subsequently, he was fatally injured by Azad's covering fire.

This case of mistaken identity did not stop Bhagat Singh and his fellow-members of the Hindustan Socialist Republican Association from claiming that vengeance had been exacted.

LEGACY

Rai has been described as "a pillar of extremist nationalism in India“.The Lala Lajpat Rai Trust was formed in 1959 on the eve of his Centenary Birth Celebration, to promote education. The trust was founded by a group of Punjabi philanthropists (including R.P Gupta and B.M Grover) who have settled and prospered in the Indian State of Maharashtra.

The Lala Lajpat Rai University of Veterinary & Animal Sciences in Hisar, Haryana, is a state university was created in memory of Lajpat Rai. A statue of Lajpat Rai stands at the central square in Shimla, India (having been originally erected in Lahore and moved to Shimla in 1948). The statue of Rai at

Shimla, Himachal Pradesh.

In 1927, Lajpat Rai established a trust in her memory of his mother, Gulab Devi who died of Tuberculosis which came to be known as the Gulab Devi Chest Hospital which was opened on 17 July 1934.

Lajpat Nagar and Lajpat Nagar Central Market in New Delhi, Lajpat Rai Market in Chandani Chowk, Delhi; Lala Lajpat Rai Hall of Residence at Indian Institutes of Technology IIT) in Kanpur and Kharagpur; as well as the Lala Lajpat Rai Institute of Engineering and Technology, Moga are named in his honour. Also many institutes, schools and libraries in his hometown of Jagraon, district Ludhiana are named after him.

The bus terminus in Jagraon, Punjab, India is named after Lala Lajpat Rai. Lala Lajpat Rai Hospital, Kanpur is also named in his honour. Further, there are several roads named after him in many metropolis and other towns of India.

Lala Lajpat Rai was also head of the "Lakshmi Insurance Company," and commissioned the Lakshmi Building in Karachi, which still bears a plaque in remembrance of him.

WORKS

Rai's writings include:

The Story of My Deportation (1908)Arya Samaj (1915)The United States of America: A Hindu’s Impression (1916)Young India (1916)Unhappy India (1928)England's Debt to India (1917)Autobiographical Writings

YOUNG INDIA

Young India was written just after World War I broke out in Europe. Lajpat Rai was travelling in the United States when Franz Ferdinand was assasinated. Rai wrote the book to exclaim his people's desire to help the British, who had been ruling in India since the mid-1700s, fight against the Germans. Rai wishes to have complete sovereignty from all foreign rule, but he needs to gain the support of America, his only true hope for an ally against Britain. Young India gives an actual account of one of the primary freedom fighters in India in the early 1900s. By writing an account outlining the history of India, showing that the Indian people are better than the stereotype given by the West, willing and able to govern themselves, and attempting to gain American support against the Colonial British. Thus Rai allows his readers to understand what is actually happening in India and why India should become an independent nation.

The book, Young India makes the Indian people sound good, saying that they were rushing en masse to volunteer for war, one must take what Rai says with a grain of salt:•to gain American support in India against British colonialism•makes many parallels to the American fight for independence against the British•convey his idea of an independent India, free from the viceroys and rule of the English Parliament.

REFERENCES

1. Wikipedia

2. Lalalajpat Rai retrieved 4 May 2012

3. Lala Lajpat Rai. Encyclopaedia Britannica

4. www.culturalindia.net