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Way back in 1895, In south Africa- ( volume 1 collected works) , Gandhi made a reference to 1858 declaration of queen Victoria and reminded the Indians in south Africa that they had the same rights as the British by virtue of that declaration. The same right of equality with the brtish was also being demanded by the Indian National Congress, since 1885.
The independent India has deliberated obliterated any memories wahabi movement /walliullah with reference to 1857. May be this is right and it was the sadhus who had organized the 1857 ( find the reference in Amresh Mishra). After all, some have said that wahabis were not supporters of 1857.
However we need to understand more in depth the silsila of walliullah and what was its relationship with various muslim and hindu sects of his time ( who were the hindus who were participating in 1818 jehad of Syed Barelvi, who were migrating to Afghanistan along with muslims during khilafat movement, how come that Shekhul Mehmud of deoband, made Raja Mahemdrapratap the head of Indian government in exile, ironically he was given over to British by the Saudis and was interned in Malta .
The British were finally able to suppress the jehad in 1871. Ali bandhu and others had links to wahabi andolan and same was with deoband ( check with them do we have authentic history on that?). The seeds of it always remained in North west frontier and the Waziristan becoming centre of Taliban has its roots in the same movement.
The Jalianwala bagh was incited by the wahabi’s and the memories of 1857 were haunting the general dwayer, just as they were haunting the British in first world war when they promised reforms – Montague -Chelmsford reform and self government to India. So wahabi, khilafat 1857, are intrinsically linked to promise of swaraj and change in national consciousness after jalainawalan bagh, forming a rebel of loyal Gandhi. We need to make another historical assessment of 1857- could we get independence from British without 1857?
The pressure of Gandhian non cooperation and civil disobedience needs to be seen in this context, as well as the pressure created by hindu school of violence.
Did Gandhi/Congress make an offer of compromise on behalf of Indian Big bourgeoisie, on the backdrop of the threat of violence. In 1947, February and many such occasions earlier, Gandhi was dropped, once the British were ready for compromise.
Ironically Gandhi always disowned the violence by the people- he said in 1947 that if people were completely non-violent in 1942, the country would not see such bad days. In 1930, Gandhi appealed to school of violence to give up their ways and give him a chance , in 1921 he withdrew the mass civil disobedience in the non-cooperation movement.
Even in hind swaraj, 1857 is taken as a negative example. What was taken by non-violence could only be maintained by violence. But same was said for south African struggle – if you cannot sustain satyagraha, you cannot sustain the results.
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