Neil statue Satyagraha was an agitation that took place in Madras Presidency

Madras Presidency

The Madras Presidency , officially the Presidency of Fort St. George and also known as Madras Province, was an administrative subdivision of British India...

, British India during the Indian Independence Movement

Indian independence movement

The term Indian independence movement encompasses a wide area of political organisations, philosophies, and movements which had the common aim of ending first British East India Company rule, and then British imperial authority, in parts of South Asia...

. It took place in 1927 demanding the removal of the statue of Colonel James Neil

James George Smith Neill

Brigadier-General James George Smith Neill was a British soldier.Neill was born near Ayr, Scotland and educated at the University of Glasgow. Entering the service of the British East India Company in 1827, he received his lieutenant's commission a year later...

 situated at Mount Road (now Anna Salai) in Madras.

James Neil of the Madras Fusileers regiment played a major role in putting down the Indian Rebellion of 1857

Indian Rebellion of 1857

The Indian Rebellion of 1857 began as a mutiny of sepoys of the British East India Company's army on 10 May 1857, in the town of Meerut, and soon escalated into other mutinies and civilian rebellions largely in the upper Gangetic plain and central India, with the major hostilities confined to...

. He was killed during the Siege of Lucknow

Siege of Lucknow

The Siege of Lucknow was the prolonged defense of the Residency within the city of Lucknow during the Indian Rebellion of 1857. After two successive relief attempts had reached the city, the defenders and civilians were evacuated from the Residency, which was abandoned.Lucknow was the capital of...

 and was reviled as the "Butcher of Allahabad" by the Indians. A statue of him was placed at Mount Road, Madras. In 1927, it became the target of the Indian nationalists. The Madras Mahajana Sabha and the Madras provincial committee of the Indian National Congress

Indian National Congress

The Indian National Congress is one of the two major political parties in India, the other being the Bharatiya Janata Party. It is the largest and one of the oldest democratic political parties in the world. The party's modern liberal platform is largely considered center-left in the Indian...

 passed a resolution demanding its removal. They started a series of demonstrations in Madras. The agitators came from all over the Madras Presidency and were lead by Somayajulu of Tirunelveli. Several agitators were arrested and sentenced to prison terms ranging from a few weeks to a year of rigorous imprisonment. After the major leaders - Somayajulu and Swaminatha Mudaliar were arrested, K. Kamaraj

K. Kamaraj

Kumarasami Kamaraj better known as K. Kamaraj was an Indian politician from Tamil Nadu widely acknowledged as the "Kingmaker" in Indian politics during the 1960s. He was the chief minister of Tamil Nadu during 1954-1963 and a Member of Parliament during 1952-1954 and 1969-1975...

 became the leader of the agitation (September 1927). Mahatma Gandhi

Mahatma Gandhi

Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi , pronounced . 2 October 1869 – 30 January 1948) was the pre-eminent political and ideological leader of India during the Indian independence movement...

 who visited Madras during the same time, gave his support to the agitation. The Madras legislature

Madras Legislative Council

Tamil Nadu Legislative Council is the upper house of the bicameral legislature of the Indian state of Tamil Nadu. It began its existence as Madras Legislative Council, the first provincial legislature for Madras Presidency. It was initially created as an advisory body in 1861, by the British...

 also passed resolutions demanding the removal of the statue. The agitation lost steam after a few months and was dropped to make way for the Simon Commission

Simon Commission

The Indian Statutory Commission was a group of seven British Members of Parliament that had been dispatched to India in 1927 to study constitutional reform in Britain's most important colonial dependency. It was commonly referred to as the Simon Commission after its chairman, Sir John Simon...

 boycott.

Neil's statue remained in the same place and was moved to the Ripon Building

Ripon Building

Ripon Building is the seat of the Chennai Corporation in Chennai , Tamil Nadu. This is a fine example of Indo-Saracenic style of architecture, a combination of three types of architectural styles - Gothic, Ionic and Corinthian....

 campus for a few years. In 1937, when the newly elected Congress government (under the 1935 act

Government of India Act 1935

The Government of India Act 1935 was originally passed in August 1935 , and is said to have been the longest Act of Parliament ever enacted by that time. Because of its length, the Act was retroactively split by the Government of India Act 1935 into two separate Acts:# The Government of India...

) of C. Rajagopalachari

C. Rajagopalachari

Chakravarti Rajagopalachari , informally called Rajaji or C.R., was an Indian lawyer, independence activist, politician, writer and statesman. Rajagopalachari was the last Governor-General of India...

 moved it to the Madras museum after a resolution demanding its removal was passed in the Madras Corporation. As of 2011, it still remains in the Anthropology section of the museum.