Ghadar, Bagha Jatin and the Cellular Jail

Violent attacks on British officials continued:

• 1909: bombs thrown at Viceroy Minto's carriage;
• the same year, a district magistrate shot in Nashik by members of Abhinav Bharat;
• 1911: a district collector shot near Tirunelveli;
• 1912: a bomb thrown at Viceroy Hardinge as he entered Delhi on an elephant.

The ages are worth noting: Anant Kanhere, hanged for the Nashik killing, was 18.

The biggest attempt was the Ghadar Movement of 1914–15: a plan to start a mutiny across the British Indian Army while Britain was busy with World War I.

Behind it was the Ghadar Party, founded by Indian migrants in North America, including Lala Hardayal and Sohan Singh Bhakna, many of whom came back to India. Inside India, Rash Behari Bose, Sachindra Nath Sanyal and Kartar Singh Sarabha tried to win over soldiers in the army.

British intelligence uncovered the plot. Arrests followed, prison in the Cellular Jail, and executions, including Kartar Singh at 19. But Rash Behari Bose escaped to Japan, where years later he laid the foundation of the Indian National Army.

The Cellular Jail in the Andaman Islands, known as Kala Pani or 'Black Water', was built to cut revolutionaries off far from the mainland and designed for solitary confinement, to break their spirit. Prisoners pressed oil by hand, were brutally punished for the smallest disobedience, and many died or lost their minds. Those who tried to escape were hanged. It became a symbol of ultimate sacrifice.

Bagha Jatin ('Tiger Jatin', who had once fought a tiger with his bare hands) worked with Rash Behari Bose on the 'German Plot': a huge shipment of German arms to arrive by ship and start an armed rising.

The authorities found out. Hiding in the jungles of Balasore, Jatin and his companions were surrounded and fought a 75-minute gunbattle from behind an anthill. Badly wounded, he died the next day.

The Northeast had its own long struggle: the Khasi Revolt (1829–1833) led by Tirot Sing in Meghalaya; the Singpho Rebellion in eastern Assam; Maniram Dewan and Piyali Baruah hanged in 1857; and in Manipur, Rani Gaidinliu, who began fighting the British at the age of 13, urging people not to pay taxes or work for the colonial rulers. Later, in 1942, Kanaklata Barua and Kushal Konwar gave their lives.