1) In June 1911, the collector of Tirunelveli, Robert Ashe, was shot dead at Maniyachi Railway station by Vanchinathan. Born in the Travancore state in 1880, he was employed as a forest guard at Punalur in the then Travancore state.
2) He was one of the members of a radical group called Bharata Mata Association. The aim of the association was to kill the European officers and inspire Indians to revolt, which they believed would eventually lead to Swaraj.
3) Vanchinathan was trained in the use of a revolver, as part of the mission, by VV.Subramanianar in Pondicherry.

1) The Swadeshi movement in Tamil Nadu came to national attention in 1906 when V.O.C 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.
3) The initial response of the British administration was to ignore the Swadeshi company.
4) As patronage for Swadeshi Company increased, the European officials exhibited blatant bias and racial partiality against the Swadeshi steamship.

1) The local public, angered over the arrest of the prominent swadeshi leaders, reacted violently. Shops were closed in a general show of defiance.
2) The municipality building and the police station in Tirunelveli were set on fire. More importantly, the mill workers came out in large numbers to protest the arrest of swadeshi leaders.
3) After a few incidents of confrontation with the protesting crowd, the police open fired and four people were killed.
4) On 7 July 1908, V.O.C and Subramania Siva were found guilty and imprisoned on charges of sedition.
5) Siva was awarded a sentence of 10 years of transportation for his seditious speech whereas v.o.c got a life term (20 years) for abetting him. V.O.C was given another life sentence for his own seditious speech.

1) A conspiracy was hatched there to kill Douglas Kingsford, notorious for his cruel ways of dealing with the swadeshi agitators.
2) Two young revolutionaries - 18-year-old Khudiram Bose and 19-year-old Prafulla Chaki were entrusted with the task of carrying out the killing.
3) On 30 April 1908, they mistakenly threw a bomb on a carriage, that, instead of killing Kingsford, killed two English women.
4) Prafulla Chaki committed suicide and Khudiram Bose was arrested and hanged for the murder.
5) Aurobindo Ghose, along with his brother Barinder Kumar Ghose and thirty-five other comrades, were arrested Chittaranjan Das took up the case. It came to be known as the Alipore Bomb case.

1) In 1908, the abject working and living conditions of the Coral Mill workers attracted the attention of V.O.C and Siva.
2) 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.
3) The strike of the mill workers was fully backed by the nationalist newspapers. The mill owners, however, did not budge and was supported by the government which had decided to suppress the strike.
4) To further increase the pressure on the workers, the leaders were prohibited from holding any meetings in Tuticorin.
5) Finally, the mill owners decided to negotiate with the workers and concede their demands.

1) The samitis were engaged in a range of activities such as physical and moral training of members, philanthropic work during the famines, epidemics, propagation of Swadeshi message during festivals, and organization of indigenous arbitration courts, and schools.
2) By its very nature boycott was passive action and its aim was to refuse to cooperate with the British administration.

1) The apolitical constructive programmes had little acceptance among the youth who was growing impatient under the repressive foreign rule.
2) The failure of the militant nationalists to lead the young people into a long-term mass movement also contributed to the growth of individual action.
3) The revolutionary action was part of an effort towards the symbolic recovery of Indian manhood, which the revolutionaries believed was often challenged and looked down upon by the British.

1) The session of Congress was originally planned to be held in Poona, considered to be a stronghold of the militants.
2) Fearing a repeat of the Calcutta session, the moderates shifted the venue to Surat. The militants proposed Lala Lajpat Rai's name for the next Congress presidency opposing the moderate's candidate Rash Behari Ghosh. Lala Lajpat Rai, however, turned down the offer to avoid the split.
3) The matter finally boiled down to the question of retaining the four resolutions that were passed in the Calcutta session in 1906.
4) The Pherozeshah Mehta group sought removal of those items from the agenda In order to counter Mehta's manoeuvering, the militants decided to oppose the election of Rash Behari Gosh as president. The session ended in chaos.
5) The Indian National Congress, born in December 1885, was now split into two groups militant and moderate.

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) As pointed out earlier, thanks to the campaigns conducted by Bal Gangadhar Tilak Bipin Chandra Pal and Lala Lajpat Rai, often referred to as the Lal-Bal-Pal triumvirate, Maharashtra, Bengal, Punjab, emerged as the epicentres of militant nationalism during the Swadeshi phase.
2) Aurobindo Ghose was another influential figure in the militant leadership. The nationalism of this form was more assertive compared to the early Indian nationalism.
3) Both the groups, moderate and militant, were well aware of the evils or the wrong doings of the British rule.
4) The moderates, however, worked under the belief that the British rule in India could be reformed by convincing the rulers through representation and petitioning.
5) The militant nationalist, on the other hand, was of the opinion that the colonial rulers would never be amenable to reason, as they would not like to give up the advantages of an empire.
6) Militant nationalism also changed the nature of political pressure from the earlier force of public opinion of educated Indians to the protesting masses.
7) Despite these changes, the militant nationalism phase retained a continuity from the moderate phase.
8) This continuity was evident in the inability to transcend the peaceful method of struggle and for the most parts militant nationalism remained tied to the idea of non-violence. However, they appealed to the patriotic sentiments of the people using the religious symbols.
Swaraj or Political Independence
1) One of the common goals of the militant leaders was to achieve Swaraj or Self Rule. However, the leaders differed on the meaning of Swaraj.
2) For Tilak, Swaraj was restricted to the Indian control over the administration or rule by the natives, but not total severance of relation with Britain.
3) In Bipin Chandra Pal's view, Swaraj was the attainment of complete freedom from any foreign rule.