Jadugopal Mukherjee
Encyclopedia
Jadu Gopal Mukherjee (18 September 1886 - 30 August 1976) was an eminent Bengali
Bengali people
The Bengali people are an ethnic community native to the historic region of Bengal in South Asia. They speak Bengali , which is an Indo-Aryan language of the eastern Indian subcontinent, evolved from the Magadhi Prakrit and Sanskrit languages. In their native language, they are referred to as বাঙালী...

 India
India
India , officially the Republic of India , is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by geographical area, the second-most populous country with over 1.2 billion people, and the most populous democracy in the world...

n revolutionary who, as the successor of Jatindranath Mukherjee or Bagha Jatin
Bagha Jatin
Bagha Jatin , born Jatindranath Mukherjee was an Bengali revolutionary philosopher against British rule....

, led the Jugantar
Jugantar
Jugantar or Yugantar was one of the two main secret revolutionary trends operating in Bengal for Indian independence.This association, like Anushilan Samiti started in the guise of suburban fitness club. Several Jugantar members were arrested, hanged, or deported for life to the Cellular Jail in...

 members to recognise and accept Gandhi’s movement as the culmination of their own aspiration.

Early life

Jadugopal or Jadu was born at Tamluk
Tamluk
Tamluk is the district headquarters of Purba Medinipur district of West Bengal, India. Though there is some controversy, scholars have generally agreed that present day Tamluk is the site of the ancient city variously known as Tamralipta or Tamralipti...

 in the district of Medinipur on the bank of the Rupnarayan River
Rupnarayan River
The Rupnarayan River is a river in India. It begins as the Dhaleswari in the Chhota Nagpur plateau foothills northeast of the town of Purulia. It then follows a tortuous southeasterly course past the town of Bankura, where it is known as the Dwarakeswar river. Near the town of Ghatal it is...

 in West Bengal, where his father Kishorilal practised law and distinguished himself as a Kheyal singer. The family came from Beniatola in north Kolkata
Kolkata
Kolkata , formerly known as Calcutta, is the capital of the Indian state of West Bengal. Located on the east bank of the Hooghly River, it was the commercial capital of East India...

. Jadu’s mother Bhubanmohini hailed from a Vaishnava family and transmitted in her children a spirit of devotion. Jadu’s younger brother was to settle in the U.S.A. and to be known in the West the famous writer and cultural scholar Dhan Gopal Mukerji
Dhan Gopal Mukerji
Dhan Gopal Mukerji was the first successful Indian man of letters in the United States and winner of Newbery Medal 1928...

. As an upper class student of the Duff School
Scottish Church College, Calcutta
The Scottish Church College is the oldest continuously running Christian liberal arts and sciences college in India. It is affiliated with the West Bengal Board of Secondary Education , the West Bengal Council of Higher Secondary Education for the awarding of baccalaureate and post baccalaureate...

 in Kolkata, Jadu learnt to think patriotically, thanks to one of his teachers. He became a member of the Kolkata Anushilan
Anushilan Samiti
Anushilan Samiti was an armed anti-British organisation in Bengal and the principal secret revolutionary organisation operating in the region in the opening years of the 20th century. This association, like its offshoot the Jugantar, operated under the guise of suburban fitness club...

 Party in 1905, attracted by its physical culture and, on the foil of the Partition, by its political climate. He writes in his autobiography that the single-handed fight of Bagha Jatin
Bagha Jatin
Bagha Jatin , born Jatindranath Mukherjee was an Bengali revolutionary philosopher against British rule....

 with a Royal Bengal tiger thrilled him and his friends in 1906, and he had an impression of belonging to a heroic epoch. After the F.A. examination, in 1908, Jadu entered the Calcutta Medical College. Fond of observing and analysing the rising tide of patriotism and the Government measures to repress them, Jadu preferred remaining aloof, confining himself to a couple of close friends.

First World War

Relief work during the 1913 Damodar
Damodar
Damodar can refer to:* Damodar Das Arora a famous Punjabi Poet* Damodar River in India* Damodar * Damodar * Damodar Pande - First Prime Minister of Nepal...

 floods brought Jadu close to Bagha Jatin
Bagha Jatin
Bagha Jatin , born Jatindranath Mukherjee was an Bengali revolutionary philosopher against British rule....

 and the latter’s important associates. Busy cementing the regional units for organising an armed insurrection during the forthcoming War, Jatin designated Rash Behari Bose
Rash Behari Bose
Rashbehari Bose was a revolutionary leader against the British Raj in India and was one of the key organisers of the Ghadar conspiracy and later, the Indian National Army.-Early life:...

 as the responsible for Upper India. Though jealous of Naren Bhattacharya’s proximity with Jatin, Jadu received the charge of developing the external links, mainly with Taraknath Das in California and Virendranath Chattopadhyay in Germany. With the failure of the Indo-German Plan and Bagha Jatin’s sudden death in 1915, finding Atulkrishna Ghosh
Atulkrishna Ghosh
Atulkrishna Ghosh was an Indian revolutionary, member of the Anushilan Samiti, and a leader of the Jugantar movement involved in Hindu German Conspiracy during World War I.-Early life:...

, the legitimate right-hand man of Jatin, plunged in a momentary despair, Jadu replaced him and asked the revolutionaries to disperse. During Jadu’s absence, Bhupendra Kumar Datta
Bhupendra Kumar Datta
Bhupendra Kumar Dutta was a Indian militant and revolutionary who fought for Indian independence from British rule...

 maintained the leadership till his arrest in 1917.

Absconding Leader comes Home

Hiding in the hilly forests of Assam-Burma and Tibeto-Bhutan frontiers, Jadu was informed about the impact of the revolutionaries’ activities on the Imperialists and about the question of a possible concession of constitutional reforms with the Rowlatt Act at the end of World War I. Returning home in 1921, Jadu obtained a special permission to sit for the Medical degree Examination and passed it with record results in 1922. After Gandhi’s first failure, according to their initial contract, the Jugantar
Jugantar
Jugantar or Yugantar was one of the two main secret revolutionary trends operating in Bengal for Indian independence.This association, like Anushilan Samiti started in the guise of suburban fitness club. Several Jugantar members were arrested, hanged, or deported for life to the Cellular Jail in...

 members worked under Deshbandhu Chittaranjan Das
Chittaranjan Das
Chittaranjan Das was an eminent Bengali lawyer and a major figure in the Indian independence movement.-Personal life:...

 to form the alternative Swaraj
Swaraj
Swaraj can mean generally self-governance or "self-rule", and was used synonymously with "home-rule" by Gandhi but the word usually refers to Gandhi's concept for Indian independence from foreign domination. Swaraj lays stress on governance not by a hierarchical government, but self governance...

 movement and they declared their new programme by celebrating the 8th anniversary of Bagha Jatin
Bagha Jatin
Bagha Jatin , born Jatindranath Mukherjee was an Bengali revolutionary philosopher against British rule....

’s self-giving on 9 September 1923, from Bengal to Punjab.

After receiving a message from Lala Har Dayal, Pandit Ram Prasad Bismil
Ram Prasad Bismil
Ram Prasad Bismil Ram Prasad Bismil Ram Prasad Bismil (Hindi: राम प्रसाद 'बिस्मिल', Gujarati: રામપ્રસાદ બિસ્મિલ, (Malayalam: രാം പ്രസാദ് ബിസ്മിൽ, Tamil: ராம் பிரசாத் பிஸ்மில், Born: 11 June 1897, Executed: 19 December 1927) was an Indian revolutionary who participated in Mainpuri Shadyantra of...

 went to Allahabad
Allahabad
Allahabad , or Settled by God in Persian, is a major city of India and is one of the main holy cities of Hinduism. It was renamed by the Mughals from the ancient name of Prayaga , and is by some accounts the second-oldest city in India. It is located in the north Indian state of Uttar Pradesh,...

 where he drafted the constitution of Hindustan Republican Association in the winter season of 1923 with the help of Dr. Jadugopal Mukherjee and Sachindra Nath Sanyal
Sachindra Nath Sanyal
Sachindra Nath Sanyal was a famous Indian revolutionary and the founder of Hindustan Republican Association that was created to carry out armed resistance against the British Empire in India. He was the mentor for revolutionaries like Chandrashekhar Azad and Bhagat Singh...

 both of these revolutionaries were from Bengal
Bengal
Bengal is a historical and geographical region in the northeast region of the Indian Subcontinent at the apex of the Bay of Bengal. Today, it is mainly divided between the sovereign land of People's Republic of Bangladesh and the Indian state of West Bengal, although some regions of the previous...

. The basic name and aims of the organisation were typed on a Yellow Paper in Allahabad.

Alerted by this, the British authorities immediately arrested the radicals; arrested for the first time, Jadu was detained under the State Prisoners’ Regulation for four years. Released in 1927, he was externed from Bengal. Settled in Ranchi, he earned an outstanding reputation in TB treatment. He married Amiyarani Chaudhuri in 1934 and had two sons. At this juncture, he succeeded in bringing together the Jugantar
Jugantar
Jugantar or Yugantar was one of the two main secret revolutionary trends operating in Bengal for Indian independence.This association, like Anushilan Samiti started in the guise of suburban fitness club. Several Jugantar members were arrested, hanged, or deported for life to the Cellular Jail in...

 and the Anushilan
Anushilan Samiti
Anushilan Samiti was an armed anti-British organisation in Bengal and the principal secret revolutionary organisation operating in the region in the opening years of the 20th century. This association, like its offshoot the Jugantar, operated under the guise of suburban fitness club...

 radicals, creating the short-lived federated Karmi-Sangha; under the pretext that Subhas Chandra Bose and the Jugantar
Jugantar
Jugantar or Yugantar was one of the two main secret revolutionary trends operating in Bengal for Indian independence.This association, like Anushilan Samiti started in the guise of suburban fitness club. Several Jugantar members were arrested, hanged, or deported for life to the Cellular Jail in...

 leaders were indifferent to their efficiency, the members of the Anushilan
Anushilan Samiti
Anushilan Samiti was an armed anti-British organisation in Bengal and the principal secret revolutionary organisation operating in the region in the opening years of the 20th century. This association, like its offshoot the Jugantar, operated under the guise of suburban fitness club...

 put an end to this fusion.

Jadu took the initiative, in 1938, and announced that the Jugantar
Jugantar
Jugantar or Yugantar was one of the two main secret revolutionary trends operating in Bengal for Indian independence.This association, like Anushilan Samiti started in the guise of suburban fitness club. Several Jugantar members were arrested, hanged, or deported for life to the Cellular Jail in...

 stopped existing as a Party distinct from the Congress, extending its full support to Gandhi. Arrested again for helping Gandhi to organise the Quit India movement, in 1942, he was released two years later. He disagreed with the Congress compromise on vital issues such as complete independence and partition of India, and he resigned in 1947. He died in 1976.

A Tribute

"Abstemious, generous, dignified, loving and lovable, Jadugopal’s popularity has been universal," wrote Bhupendra Kumar Datta
Bhupendra Kumar Datta
Bhupendra Kumar Dutta was a Indian militant and revolutionary who fought for Indian independence from British rule...

. "He scorns caste, communal and parochial narrowness. Holding secularism, scientific education, national unity, mass uplift through educational and economic progress as independent India’s ideals, the revolutionists’ fourfold programme, he continued to work…" In spite of containing valuable observations and factual details, his personal memoirs in Bengali, biplabi jibaner smriti, supposed to have been ghost written by people of various interests when his memory had started failing seriously, roused considerable indignation and disappointment. His Early Diagnosis of Tuberculosis became a reference book.
The source of this article is wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.  The text of this article is licensed under the GFDL.
 
x
OK