1. Haiti, earlier known as Saint-Domingue was the richest French colony in the Caribbean Sea.
2. The storming of the Bastille was followed by armed defiance of the royal governor.
3. Vincent Oge, who had lobbied with the Parisian assembly for colonial reforms.
4. He was led to revolt at the end of 1790. But the rebellion was suppressed and he was hanged.
5. In the late 1790s, Toussaint L Ouverture, gained control of several areas.
6. Napoleon sent a fleet of 12,000 troops to seize control from Toussaint L Ouverture s forces.
7. Napoleons forces were defeated by the Dessalines, even though Toussaint was killed.
8. Saint Domingue became the independent black state of Haiti in 1804.

Circumstances for the establishment of a fascist state in Italy:
1. The breakdown of the parliamentary government which had proved unable to cope wi the disorders following the end of the First World War.
2. The inability of the Democratic Party leaders to combine and act decisively facilitated Mussolini s triumph.
3. The dispute between the communist and their opponents led to the conditions for civil.
4. It ended with the march of the Fascists on Rome.
5. Impressed by the show of force, the King Immanuel III invited Mussolini to form a government. Circumstances for the establishment of a fascist state in Germany:
6. Republican government in Germany fell, as the Communists refused to collaborate with the Social Democrats.
7. In the wake of this, industrialists, bankers and the people of the royal family, who had the background, wanted to subordinate Hitler to their control.
8. They approached President von Hindenburg and appointed Hitler as Prime Minister.
9. The Nazi regime then put an end to parliamentary democracy in Germany.

1. On 5 November 1956, British and French troops landed at the Egyptian town of Port Said.
2. The General Assembly, at the initiative of the US, called for an emergency session and condemned the invasion.
3. So Israel, Great Britain and France stopped fighting and decided to withdraw their forces from Egypt.
4. ImriNegi introduced a multiparty system and established a coalition in Hungary.
5. Emaged by the development, Soviet Russia sent its army into Hungary and crushed the rebellion.
6. The UN has repeatedly tried to hold the International Peace Conference in its support to resolve the Israeli-Palestinian conflict completely.
7. On the above issues, the Security Council's permanent states have used their veto power and extend the issue.
8. Moreover, the lJN was a silent observer, as the permanent members of the Security Council were involved in the issues.

(i) Portugal led the way first in exploration, discovering the Canaries, Madeira and the Azores.
(ii) Sailors sent out by Prince Henry, the Navigator reached Guinea Coast of Africa.
(iii) Later Bartholomew Diaz rounded the Cape of Good Hope. In 1492 Columbus came to a land of America.
(iv) Vasco da Gama reached the island of Mozambique.
(v) Later, he reached part of India and opened avenues for direct trade.
(vi) Cabral sailed to India, following the route of Vasco da Gama, and reached Kozhikode.
(vii) These new maritime discoveries, led t< ; >the direct trade of Europeans to the countries of the East.

(i) Major parts of Spain like Aragon and Castile were under the control of the Moors.
(ii) Together King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella worked hard to drive away the Moors and unite Spain.
(iii) The king and queen took power in their hands and controlled the nobles by eliminating them from the royal councils.
(iv) This made Spain to emerge as a nation-state. England emerged as nation-states.
(v) There was conflict between two royal houses in England namely the House of york and House of Lancaster for the throne.
(vi) In this civil war, Henry Tudor emerged victorious and he started a new line of monarchy in England.
(vii) He entered into matrimonial alliance with Elizabeth of York family. This made England to emerge as a nation-state. France emerged as nation-states.
(viii) Burgundy and western parts of France was for long in English possession.
(ix) At the end of the hundred years war, Louis XI Burgundy returned, after he had driven the English out of the country.
(x) Finally brought under control and Burgundy became part of France in about 1483. This made France to emerge as a nation-state.

1. Bismarck, transformed into a powerful state with the objective of uniting the Germanic states under its leadership.
2. He adopted a "blood and iron policy to achieve the unification".
3. He realised that the unification of Germany was not possible without an armed conflict with Austria and France.
4. He sparked conflict with Austria and France through diplomatic moves.
5. He also got the support of Piedmont-Sardinia which wanted to drive Austria out of Venetia.
6. With the victory of the Austrian-Prussian War, he formed the Northern German Federation under the leadership of Prussia.
7. Bismarck his attention to create a rift between Prussia and France to unite the southern German states.
8. At the end of the Franck-Prussian War, Germany combined the unification of Northern and southern Germany.

1. Etienne-Gabriel Morally, the Utopian thinker, proposed a communistic organisation of society.
2. The term "Utopian Socialism" was first used by Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels.
3. Utopian Socialists recommended the establishment of model communities.
4. Saint-Simon suggested that scientists take the place of priests in the social order.
5. Fourier believed that social conditions were the primary cause of human misery.
6. Robert Owen had developed a theory of Utopian Socialism based on social equality and cooperation.
7. Proudhon wanted to replace nation-state with federations of autonomous communes.
8. Louis Blanc argued that socialism cannot be achieved without state power.

1. In 1918 a Society for the Study of Marxism was formed in Peking University.
2. Among the students who attended was a young assistant librarian by the name of Mao Tse-tung.
3. In China, Kuomintang government became notorious for its corruption and gangsterism.
4. Mao knew that the Kuomintang grip on the towns was too strong. So concentrated his energies on organizing the peasantry.
5. He retreated into the wild mountains on the border between the provinces of Kiangsi and Hunan.
6. Later, Mao wanted to move out of Human for safer territory.
7. Therefore, the Communist anny set out on what came to be known as the Long March in 1934.
8. As a result of the Long Maffih, Mao became the ruler of the people in china.

1) Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi was born in the coastal town of Porbandar in 1869. When he returned to India in 1915 he had a record of fighting against inequalities imposed by the racist government of South Africa.
2) Gandhi certainly wanted to be of help to forces of nationalism in India. He was in touch with leaders India as he had come into contact, with Congress leaders while mobilizing support for the South African Indian cause earlier. Impressed by activities and ideas of Gopala Krishna Gokhale, he acknowledged him as his political Guru.
3) On his return to India, following Gokhale's advice, Gandhi, who was away from India for over two decades, spent a year travelling all over the country acquainting himself with the situation.
4) He established his Sabarmati Ashram at Ahmedabad but did not take active part in political movements including the Home Rule movement.
5) Champaran Movement (1917): It was not difficult for Gandhi to convince the committee of the difficulties of the poor peasants. The report was accepted and implemented resulting in the release of the indigo cultivators of the bondage of European planters who gradually had to withdraw from Champaran itself.
6) Gandhi's call for protest on the issues of Khilafat, and Rowlatt Act and as a response the British government's repressive measures leading to the Jallianwalla Bagh massacre prompted the Congress to launch non-cooperation movement.
7) The Congress boycotted the Sirmon Commission and the first Round Table Conference and intensified the struggle by launching civil disobedience movement, in the wake of fruitless outcome of Second Round Table Conference.
8) Gandhi's Dandi March and Rajaji's Salt March to Vedaranyam in Tamilnadu succeeded in mobilizing the masses 'for the nationalist cause.

1) Tilak Home RuleLeague was set up at the Bombay Provincial conference held at Belgaum in April 1916. It League was to work in Maharashtra (including Bombay city), Karnataka, the Central Provinces and Berar.
2) Tilak's League was organised into six branches and Annie Besant's League was given the rest of India.
3) Tilak popularised the demand for Home Rule through his lectures.
4) The popularity of his League was confined to Maharashtra and Karnataka but claimed a membership of 14,000 in April 1917 and 32,000 by early 1918.
5) On 23 July 1916 on his 60th birthday Tilak was arrested for propagating the idea of Home Rule.
Besant's Home Rule League
1) Finding no signs from the Congress, Besant herself inaugurated the Home Rule League at Madras in September 1916.
2) Its branches were established at Kanpur, Allahabad, Benaras, Mathura, Calicut and Ahmednagar.
3) She made an extensive tour and spread the idea of Home Rule. She declared that "the price of India's loyalty is India's Freedom". 
4) Moderate congressmen who were dissatisfied with the inactivity of the Congress joined the Home Rule League.
5) The popularity of the Le-ague can be gauged from the fact that Jawaharlal Nehru, Muhammad Ali Jinnah, B. Chakravarti and Jitendralal Banerji, Satyamurti and Khaliquzzaman were taking up the membership of the League.
6) As Besant's Home Rule Movement became very popular in Madras, the Government of Madras decided to suppress it. Students were barred from attending its meetings. 

1) Swadeshi movement in Tamil Nadu, notably in Tirunelveli district, generated a lot of attention and support.
2) While the Swadeshi movement in Tamil Nadu had an all India flavour, with collective anger against the British rule remaining the common thread, it was also underpinned by Tamil - pride and consciousness.
3) There was a deep divide in the Tamilnadu congress between the moderates and the extremists.
Development of Vernacular Oratory.
1) Initially, the movement was more of a reaction to the partition of Bengal and regular meetings were held to protest the partition.
2) The speakers, in such meetings, spoke mostly in the vernacular language to an audience that included students, lawyers, and labourers at that time.
3) The shift from English oratory to vernacular oratory was a significant development of this time; which had a huge impact on the mass politics in Tamil Nadu
4) Swadeshi meetings at the Marina beach in Madras were a regular sight. The Moore Market complex in Madras was another venue utilised for such gatherings. During the period (1905-1907) there are police reports calling students dangerous and their activities as seditious.
V.O.C and Swadeshi Steam Navigation Company (SSNC)
1) The Swadeshi movement in Tamil Nadu came to national attention in 1906 when V.O.Chidambaram mooted the idea of launching a swadeshi shipping venture in opposition to the monopoly of the British in navigation through the coast.
2) In 1906, V.O.C registered a joint stock company called The Swadeshi Steam Navigation Company (SSNC) with a capital of Rs 10 Lakh, divided into 40,000 shares of Rs.25 each. Shares were open only to Indians, Ceylonese and other Asian nationals. V.O.C purchased two steamships, S.S. Gallia and S.S. Lawoe.
The Coral Mill Strike
1) After attending the session of the Indian National Congress at Surat, V.O.C on his return decided to work on building a political organisation.
2) While looking for an able orator, he came across Subramania Siva, a swadeshi preacher. From February to March 1907, both the leaders addressed meetings almost on a daily basis at the beach in Tuticorin, educating the people about swadeshi and the boycott campaign.
3) The meetings were attended by thousands of people. These public gatherings were closely monitored by the administration.
4) In 1908, the abject working and living conditions of the Coral Mill workers attracted the attention of V.O.C and Siva
5) In the next few days, both the leaders addressed the mill workers. In March 1908, the workers of the Coral Cotton Mills, inspired by the address went on strike. It was one of the earliest organised labour agitations in India
Subramania Bharati: Poet and Nationalist
1) The growth of newspapers, both in English and Tamil language, aided the swadeshi movement in Tamil Nadu. G. Subramaniam was one of the first among the leaders to use newspapers to spread the nationalist message across a larger audience.
2) Subramaniam, along with five others, founded The Hindu (in English) and Swadesamitran (which was the first ever Tamil daily).
3) Subramania Bharati became the sub-editor of Swadesamitran around the time (1904) when Indian nationalism was looking for a fresh direction. Bharati was also editing Chakravartini, a Tamil monthly devoted to the cause of Indian women.

1) Indian national movement dates its birth from the 1857 uprising. The outrages committed by the British army after putting down the revolt remained "un-avenged".
2) Even the court-martial law and formalities were not observed Officers who sat on the court martial swore that they would hang their prisoners, guilty or innocent and, if any dared to raise his voice against such indiscriminate vengeance, he was silenced by his angry colleagues.
3) Persons condemned to death after the mockery of a trial were often tortured by soldiers before their execution, while the officers looked on approvingly.
4) It is worth recalling what Elphinstone, Governor of Bombay Presidency, wrote to Sir John Lawrence, future Viceroy of India (1864) about the British siege of Delhi during June- September, 1857'. A wholesale vengeance is being taken without distinction of friend or foe. As regards the looting, we have indeed surpassed Nadirshah.'
Racial Discrimination
1) The English followed a policy of racial discrimination.
2) The systematic exclusion of the Indians from higher official positions came to be looked upon as an anti-Indian policy measure and the resultant discontent of the Indian upper classes led the Indians to revolt against the British rule.
3) When civil service examinations were introduced the age limit was fixed at twenty one. When Indians were making it, with a view to debarring the Indians from entering the civil services, the age limit was reduced to nineteen.
4) Similarly, despite requests from Indian educated middle class to hold the civil service examinations simultaneously in India, the Imperial government refused to concede the request.

1) The British destroyed the traditional basis of Indian land system. In the pre-British days, the land revenue was realised by sharing the actual crop with the cultivators.
2)  The British fixed the land revenue in cash without any regard to various contingencies, such as failure of crops, fall in prices and droughts or floods. Moreover, the practice of sale in settlement of debt encouraged money lenders to advance money to landholders and resorting to every kind of trickery to rob them of their property.
3) There were also two other major implications of the new land settlements introduced by the East India Company. They institutionalised the commodification of land and commercialisation of agriculture in India.
4) As mentioned earlier, there was no private property in land in pre-British era Now, land became a commodity that could be transferred either by way of buying and selling or by way of the administration taking over land from holders, in lieu of default on payment of tax/rent.
5) Land taken over in such cases was auctioned off to another bidder. This created a new class of absentee landlords who lived in the cities and extracted revenue from the lands without actually living on the lands.
6) In the traditional agricultural set-up, the villagers produced largely for their consumption among themselves. After the new land settlements, agricultural produce was predominantly for the market.
7) The commodification of land and commercialisation of agriculture did not improve the lives and conditions of the peasants. Instead, this created discontent among the peasantry and made them restive. These peasants later on turned against the imperialists and their collaborators.
Laissez Faire Policy and De-industrialization: Impact on Indian Artisans
1) The policy of the Company in the wake of industrial Revolution in England resulted in the de-industrialization of India This continued until the beginning of the World War 1. The British Government pursued a policy of free trade or laissez faire.
2) Raw materials like cotton, jute and silks from India were taken to Britain. The finished products made from those raw materials were then transported back to the Indian markets.
3) Mass production with the help of technological advancement enabled them to flood the Indian market with their goods. It was available at a comparatively cheaper price than the Indian handloom cloth.
4) Prior to the arrival of the British, India was known for its handloom products and handicrafts. It commanded a good world market.
5) However, as a result of the colonia policy, gradually Indian hand loom products and handicrafts lost there market, domestic as well as international. Import of English articles into India threw the weavers, the cotton dressers, the carpenters, the blacksmiths and the shoemakers out of employment.
6) India became a procurement area for the raw material and the farmers were forced to produce industrial crops like indigo and other cash crops like cotton for use in British factories. Due to this shift, subsistence agriculture, which was the mainstay for several hundred years, suffered leading to food scarcity.

1) Education and health constitute the social sectors, and the status of education and health indicators are yardsticks for assessing the level of social development in a country.
2) Sadly, India is far behind many less developed countries, especially on health indicators like maternal mortality and infant mortality, and education indicators with respect to school education.
3) These poor outcomes are a reflection of the low share of plan outlay set aside for the social sectors.
4) This hovered between 16 and 18% between 956 and 1990 (Second to the Seventh Plans). The outlay has increased only from the Eighth Pian onwards due to a greater emphasis on social justice and inclusive growth.
5) But it was still less than 30% of the total outlay.
6) It crossed the one-third mark only .in the Twelfth Plan. Expenditure on education as a percentage of total GDP has been less than 5% in India, and compares unfavourably with China and other Asian countries.
7) Literacy levels have increased in India from 18.3% in 1951 to 74% in 2011. Female literacy still lags behind the male literacy rate at 65% as compared to 82% among men.
8) There has been a great increase in the number of schools from the primary to senior high school level and in the growth of institutions of higher learning.
9) In 2014-15 there were 12.72 lakh primary and upper primary schools, 2.45 lakh secondary .and higher secondary schools, 38, 498 colleges and 43 Central Universities, 316 State Universities, 122 Deemed Universities and 181 State Private Universities in the country.
10)  Enrolment in primary schools stood at 96%, and 40% in the secondary and higher secondary schools. However, the drop-out rate is 51% in primary schools, and as high as 62% in secondary and high schools.
11) Children dropping out of school mostly belonged to the poorer families in rural and urban areas and socially backward castes (SCs and STs).
12) The drop-out rate is particularly high among girl children. This is because they are often withdrawn from school either because the family is not able to afford to keep all the children in school and more often because they have to assist in household chores and looking after younger children in the family.
13) There are great inter-regional variations in the drop-out and enrolment rates, so that backward states and regions have the poorest record on school education.
14) A further problem is that government schools at all levels are perceived to be functioning very badly.
15) Teachers are often absent and seem to show little interest in providing good education to the students.
16) This has resulted in most parents, including low income parents, opting to take their children out of government schools (which are free) and putting them in private schools, paying high fees, because these are supposed to give better education.
17) Since private schools are rarely set up in backward regions with high levels of poverty, the regional disparities in school education have become more accentuated.

Under the Constitution of India, agriculture was a 'state subject', that is, each state had to pass laws relating to land reforms individually.
(a) Zamindari Abolition:
Zamindar - the class of landowners designated during British rule as the intermediaries who collected rent from peasants cultivating their land and paid that land revenue to the government under a Permanent Settlement.
1) Abolition of Zamindari was part of the manifesto of the Indian National Congress Party even before Independence.
2) Most provinces in India had enacted laws abolishing the zamindari system.
3) Land was taken away from the zamindars were distributed among the tenants.
4) The provincial legislatures also recommended the amount of compensation to be paid to the zamindars.
5) zamindars in various parts of the country challenged the zamindari abolition laws in court.
6) The government then passed two amendments to the Constitution, which removed the 'right to property' from the fundamental rights guaranteed under the Constitution and preempted the right of zamindars, to question the expropriation of their land or the value of the compensation.
7) Finally, zamindari abolition was completed by 1956, and was possibly the most successful of the land reforms.
8) In sum, however, the reform only achieved a very small part of the original objective. Thus, while the institution of zamindari was dismantled, many landowners continued in possession of vast tracts of land,
(b) Tenancy Reform:
Tenancy refers to an arrangement under which land was taken on lease from landowners by cultivators under specific terms.
1) Nearly half of the total cultivated land in India was under tenancy.
2) Not all tenants were landless peasants. Many small landowners, Some richer landowners also took additional land for cultivation on lease.
3) The rents received by the landowners generally amounted to about 50% or more of the produce from the land, which was very high.
4) Tenants could also be evicted at short notice, and tenants therefore always lived under some uncertainty,
Tenancy reform legislation was aimed at achieving three ends:
(i) to regulate the rent;
(ii) to secure the rights of the tenant;
(iii) to confer ownership rights on the tenants by expropriating the land of the land owners.
1) Legislation was passed in the states regulating the rent at one-fourth to one third of the produce. But this could never be implemented successfully.
2) The two Communist states, Kerala and West Bengal, were able to push through land reforms with greater success.
3)  In West Bengal, the programme to confer tenancy rights was called Operation Barga. This was quite successful, but the Communist government was criticized severely for giving official sanction to tenancy.
(c) Land Ceiling.
1) Land ceiling refers to the maximum amount of land that could be legally owned by individuals. Laws were passed after the 1950s to enforce it. In Tamilnadu it was implemented first in 1961.
2) Until 1972, there was a ceiling on the extent of land that a 'landholder' could own. After 1972, the unit was changed to a 'family'.
3) This meant that the landowners could claim that each member of the family owned a part of the land which would be much less than the prescribed limit under the ceiling.
4) Ultimately, only about 65 lakh hectares of land was taken over as surplus land. This was distributed to about 55 lakh tenants-an average of a little over 1 hectare per tenant.
5) Clearly, with their political power the dominant castes who were the big landowners managed to dilute and vitiate the entire legislation.
6) Efforts like Bhoodan started by Vinoba Bhave to persuade large landowners to surrender their surplus land voluntarily attracted much public attention.
7) But the end results were disappointing, since the land thus surrendered was usually unproductive land.
(d) Overall Appraisal:
1) Land reform legislation has overall not been a great success.
2) In economic terms, the dream of an agricultural sector prospering under peasant cultivators with secure, ownership rights has remained just that - a dream.
3) When agriculture has grown due to technological progress, a more efficient land market is 1 seen to be operating which is more conducive for long term growth.
4) In terms of social justice, the abolition of the semi-feudal system of zamindari has been effective.
5) The land reform measures have also made the peasants more politically aware of their rights and empowered them.

1) An important aspect of the making of independent India was the reorganisation of states on linguistic basis. The colonial rulers had rendered the sub-continent into administrative units, dividing the land by way of Presidencies or Provinces without taking into account the language and its impact on culture on a region.
2) Independence and the idea of a constitutional democracy meant that the people were sovereign and that India was a multi-cultural nation where federal principles were to be adopted in a holistic sense and not just as an administrative strategy,
3) The linguistic reorganization of states was raised and argued out in Constituent Assembly • between 1947 and 1949. The assembly however decided to hold it in abeyance for a while on the grounds that the task was huge and could create problems in the aftermath of the partition and the accompanying violence.
4) After the Constitution came into force it began to be implemented in stages, beginning with the formation of a composite Andhra Pradesh in 1956. It culminated in the trifurcation of Punjab to constitute a Punjabi-speaking state of Punjab and carving out Haryana and Himachal Pradesh from the existing state of Punjab in 1966.
5) The idea of linguistic reorganisation of states was integral to the national movement, at least since 1920. The Indian National Congress, at its Nagpur session (1920), recorded that the national identity will have to be necessarily achieved through linguistic identity; and resolved to set up the Provincial Congress Committees on a linguistic basis.
6) It took concrete expression in the Nehru Committee Report of 1928. Section 86 of the Nehru Report read: "The redistribution of provinces should take place on a linguistic basis on the demand of the majority of the population of the area concerned, subject to financial and administrative considerations."
7) This idea was expressed, in categorical terms, in the manifesto of the Indian National Congress for the elections to the Central and Provincial Legislative Assemblies in 1945, The manifesto made a clear reference to the reorganisation of the provinces: " ... it (the Congress) has also stood for the freedom of each group and territorial area within the nation to develop its own life and culture within the larger framework, and it has stated that for this purpose such territorial areas or provinces should be constituted as far as possible, on a linguistic and cultural basis ... "
8) On August 31, 1946, only a month after the elections to the Constituent Assembly, Pattabhi Sitaramayya raised the demand for an Andhra Province: "The whole problem" he wrote, "must be taken up as the first and foremost problem to be solved by the Constituent Assembly".
9) He also presided over a conference, on December 8, 1946, that passed a resolution demanding that the Constituent Assembly accept the principle for linguistic reorganisation of States. The Government of India in a communique stated that Andhra could be mentioned as a separate unit in the new Constitution as was done in case of the Sind and Orissa under the Government of India act, 1935.
10) The Drafting Committee of the Constituent Assembly, however, found such a mention of ~dhra was not possible until the geographical schedule of the province was outlined. Hence, on June 17, 1948, Chairman Rajendra Prasad set up a 3-member commission, called The Linguistic Provinces Commission with a specific brief to examine and report on the formation of new provinces of Andhra, Kerala, Karnataka and Maharashtra. Its report, submitted on December 10, 1948, listed out reasons against the idea of linguistic reorganisation in the given context. It dealt with each of the four proposed States - Andhra, Karnataka, Kerala and Maharashtra - and concluded against such an idea.
11) However, the demand for linguistic reorganisation of states did not stop. The issue gained centre-stage with Pattabhi Sitaramayya's election as the Congress President at the Jaipur session. A resolution there led to the constitution of a committee with Sardar Vallabhai Patel, Pattabhi Sitaramayya and Jawaharlal Nehru (also called the JVP committee).
12) The JVP committee submitted its report on April 1, 1949. It too held that the demand for linguistic states, in the given context, as "narrow provincialism" and that it could become a "menace" to the development of the country. The JVP committee also held out that "while language is a binding force, it is also a separating one". However, it stressed that it was possible that "when conditions are more static and the state of peoples' minds calmer, the adjustment of these boundaries or the creation of new provinces can be undertaken with relative ease and with advantage to all concerned. "
13)  The committee said in conclusion that it was not the right time to embark upon the idea of linguistic reorganisation of States. In other words, the consensus was that the linguistic reorganisation of states be postponed. There was provision for re-working the boundaries between states and also for the formation of new states from parts of existing states.
14)  The makers of the Constitution did not qualify the reorganisation of the States as only on linguistic basis but left it open as long as there was agreement on such reorganisation.
15) The idea of linguistic states revived soon after the first general elections were over. Potti Sriramulu's fast demanding a separate. state of Andhra, beginning October 19, 1952 and his death thereafter on December 15, 1952.
16) This led to the constitution of the States Reorganisation Commission, with Fazli Ali as Chairperson, and K.M. Panikkar and H.N. Husrau as members. The Commission submitted its report in October 1955. The Commission recommended the following States to constitute the Indian Union: Madras, Kerala, Karnataka, Hyderabad, Andhra, Bombay, Vidharbha, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, Punjab, Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, West Bengal, Assam, Orissa and Jammu & Kashmir. In other words, the Commission's recommendations were a compromise between administrative convenience and linguistic concerns.

1) A considerably large contingent of the Indian Army was posted on the South East Asian countries that were part of the British Empire.
2)  Mohan Singh, an officer of the British Indian Army in Malaya, approached the Japanese for help and they found in this an opportunity.
3) Indians in the region saw the INA as saviours against Japanese expansionism as much as the commander and other officers held out that the army would march into India but only on invitation from the Indian National Congress.
4) Bose at Singapore, set up the Provisional Government of Free India on October 21, 1943.
5) This Provisional Government declared war against Britain and the other allied nations. The Axis powers recognised Bose's Provisional Government as its ally.
INA with Axis Powers in War
1) A battalion of the INA commanded by Shah Nawaz accompanied the Japanese army, in its march on Imphal.
2) The Axis powers, including the Japanese forces, did not succeed and the Japanese retreated.
3) Shah Nawaz and his soldiers of the INA were taken prisoners and charged with treason.
INA Trial
1) The INA trials were held at the Red Fort in New Delhi.
2) The INC fielded its best lawyers Nehru, in defence of the INA soldiers.
3) Even though the INA did not achieve much militarily, the trials made a huge impact in inspiring the masses.
4) The colonial government's arrogance once again set the stage for another mass mobilisation.
5)  The Indian National Congress, after the debacle at the Simla Conference plunged into reaching out to the masses by way of public meetings across the country.
6) The INA figured more prominently as an issue in all these meetings than even the Congress's pitch for votes in the elections that were expected soon
7) It was in this context that the colonial rulers sent up three prominent officers of the INA - Shah Nawaz Khan, P.K. Sehgal and G.S. Dhillon - to trial.
8) The press in India reported the trials with all empathy and editorials sought the soldiers freed immediately.
9) The INA week was marked by processions, hartals and even general strikes across the nation demanding release of the soldiers.
10) The choice of the three men to be sent up for trial ended up rallying all political opinion behind the campaign.
11) The Muslim League, the Shiromani Akali Dal and the Hindu Maha Sabha, all those who had stayed clear of the Quit India campaign, joined the protests and raised funds for their defence.
12) Although the trial court found Sehgal, Dhillon and Shah Nawaz Khan guilty of treason, the commander in chief remitted the sentences and set them free on January 6, 1946.
13) The INA trials, indeed, set the stage for yet another important stage in the history of the Indian National Movement in February 1946.
14) The ratings of the Royal Indian Navy (RIN) raised the banner of revolt.

1) The outbreak of Second World War and Britain's decision to involve India in the War without consulting Congress ministries in provinces, provoked the leaders of Indian National Congress and Gandhi.
2) The Congress ministers resigned in protest.
3) Gandhi launched the individual Satyagraha in October 1940 to keep up the morale of the Congress.
4) The election of Subash Chandra Bose as Congress President upset Gandhi this led to Bose's resignation.
5) The Cripps Mission's proposal of March 1942 bore no fruit.
6) Gandhi decided to embark on the Quit India Movement in August 1942.
Congress Meet at Wardha
1) The Working Committee of the Indian National Congress met at Wardha on July 14, 1942 to launch a mass civil disobedience movement.
2) C.Rajagopalachari and Bhulabhai Desai had reservations against launching a movement
3) Nehru, though not want a movement then bound himself with the majority's decision in the Working Committee.
'Do or Die':
1) The Cripps mission had turned both Gandhi and Nehru sour with the British than any time in the past.
2) Gandhi in a press interview said: 'Leave India to God. If that is too much, then leave her anarchy.
3) The Mahatma called upon the people to 'Do or Die' and called the movement he launched from there as a 'fight to the finish'.
Quit India
1) All the leaders of the Indian National Congress, including Gandhi, were arrested early in the morning on August 9, 1942 by the colonial government.
2) The immediate response by Indian people against the arrest was hartals, in which people from almost all the towns where clashed, often violently, with the police.
3) Industrial workers such as Tata Steel Plant, textile workers in Ahmedabad and across India went on strike.
Brutal Repression:
1) The colonial government responded with brutal repression.
2) police resorted to firing, The army was called in to suppress the protest. Totally 57 battalions were called in as a whole. Aircrafts were used.
3) It spread in its second phase into the villages.
4) A sixty-point increase in prices of food-grains recorded between April and August 1942 had laid the seeds of resentment. . ,
5) The leaders of the Congress, who had managed to escape arrest on August 9 organised the youth into guerrilla actions.
Outbreak of Violence:
1) Beginning late September 1942, the movement took the shape of attacks and destruction of communication facilities such as telegraph lines, railway stations and tracks and setting fire to government offices.
2) This spread across the country and was most intense in Eastern United Provinces, Bihar, Maharashtra and in Bengal.
3)The rebels even set up ·'national governments' in pockets they liberated from the colonial administration.
4) Gandhi's 21 day fast in jail, beginning February 10, 1943, marked a turning point and gave the movement (and even the violence in a limited sense) a great push. Spread and Intensity of the Movement
5) By the end of 1943, the number of persons arrested across India stood at 91,836.
6) The police shot dead 1060 persons during the same period.
7) 208 police outposts, 332 railway stations and 945 post offices were destroyed or damaged very badly.
8) At least 205 policemen defected and joined the rebels.
9) Collective fines were imposed on all the people in a village where public property was destroyed.
Clandestine Radio:
1) Yet another prominent feature of the Quit India movement was the use of Radio by the rebels.
2) The press being censored, the rebels set up a clandestine radio broadcast system from Bombay.
3) The transmitter was shifted from one place to 'another in and around the city. Usha Mehta was the force behind the clandestine radio operations and its broadcast was heard as far away as Madras.
4) The Quit India movement was the most powerful onslaught against the colonial state hitherto.
5) The movement included the Congress, the Socialists, and the Forward Bloc.
6) The movement witnessed unprecedented unity of the people and sent a message that the colonial rulers could not ignore.
Release of Gandhi
1) Gandhi's release from prison, on In health grounds, on May 6, 1944 led to the revival of the Constructive Programme.
2) Congress committees began activities in its garb and the ban on the Congress imposed in the wake of the Quit India movement was thus overcome.
3) The colonial state, meanwhile, put forward a plan for negotiation.
4) Lord Archibald Wavell, who had replaced Linlithgow as Viceroy in October 1943, had begun to work towards another round of negotiation.
The message was clear: The British had no option but to negotiate!

Hindu nationalism:
1) In the Punjab communalism as a powerful movement had set in completely. In 1924 Lala Lajpat Rai openly advocated the partition of the Punjab into Hindu and Muslim Provinces.
2) The Hindu Mahasabha, represented the forces of Hindu revivalism in the political domain, raised the slogan of' Akhand Hindustan' against the Muslim League's demand of separate electorates for Muslims.
3)  Ever since its inception, the Mahasabha's role in the freedom struggle has been rather controversial. While not supportive of British rule, the Mahasabha did not offer its full support to the nationalist movement either.
4) Since the Indian National Congress had to mobilize the support of all classes and communities against foreign domination, the leaders of different communities could not press for principle of secularism firmly for the fear of losing the support of religious minded groups.
5) The Congress under the leadership of Gandhi held a number of unity conferences during this period, but to no avail.
Muslim nationalism
1) One great outcome of the efforts at unity, however, was an offer by the Conference of Muslims, which met at Delhi on March 20, 1927 to give up separate electorates if four proposals were accepted.
1. the separation of Sind from Bombay
2. Reforms for the Frontier and Baluchistan
3. Representation by population in the Punjab and Bengal and
4. Thirty-three per cent seats for the Muslims in the Central Legislature.
Indian nationalism
1) The nationalism of the Indian National Congress was personified by Mahatma Gandhi, who rejected the narrow nationalism exemplified by the Arya Samaj and the Aligargh movement and strove to evolve a political identity that transcended the different religions.
2) Notwithstanding the state-supported communalism of different hues, the Indian National Congress remained a dominant political force in India.
3) In the 1937 elections, Congress won in seven of the eleven provinces and fonned the largest party in three others. The Muslim League's performance was dismal. It succeeded in winning only 4.8 per cent of the Muslim votes.
4) The Congress had emerged as a mass secular party. Yet the Government branded it a Hindu organisation and projected the Muslim League as the real representative of the Muslims and treated it on a par with the Congress.
5) Hindu nationalism, Muslim nationalism and secular nationalism competed with each other to politicise the people in their fight against British colonialism.

1) The Indian National Congress, in contrast to the violent actions of revolutionaries, mobilised the masses for non-violent struggles. The Congress under the leadership of Gandhi gave priority to the problems of peasants.
2) In the context of great agrarian distress, deepened by world-wide economic depression, the Congress mobilised the peasantry. The Congress adopted a no-rent and no-tax campaign as a part of its civil disobedience programme. Under the pressure of Great Depression, socio-economic demands were sharply articulated in its Karachi Session of the Indian National Congress.
3) The freedom struggle was taking a new shape. Peasants organised themselves into Kisan Sabhas and industrial workers were organized by the trade unions, made their presence felt in a big way in the freedom struggle. The Indian National Congress had become a mass party during the 1930s. The Congress leadership, which was now taking a left turn under Nehru's leadership, began to talk about an egalitarian society based on social and economic justice.
4) The Karachi session held in March 1931, presided over by Sardar Vallabh Bhai Patel, adopted a resolution on Fundamental Rights and Duties and provided an insight into what the economic policy of an independent India. In some ways, it was the manifesto of the Indian National Congress for independent India. These rights and the social and economic programmes were derived from a firm conviction that political freedom and economic freedom were inseparable.
5) Even a cursory look at the fundamental rights solution will tell you that all the basic rights that the British denied to the Indians found a prominent place in the Resolution. The colonial government curtailed civil liberties and freedom by passing draconian acts and ordinances. Gandhian ideals and Nehru's socialist vision also found a place in the list of rights that the Indian National Congress promised to ensure in free India.