page_title: Indian independence movement
section_title: Rise of organised movements
hierarchical_section_title: Indian independence movement / Rise of organised movements
caption_attribution_description: (Image of the delegates to the first meeting of the Indian National Congress in Bombay, 1885.
context_page_description: The Indian Independence Movement was a series of activities with the ultimate aim of ending the British rule in India. The movement spanned from 1857 to 1947.
  The first nationalistic revolutionary movement for Indian independence emerged from Bengal. It later took root in the newly formed Indian National Congress with prominent moderate leaders seeking only their fundamental right to appear for Indian Civil Service examinations in British India, as well as more rights, for the people of the soil. The early part of the 20th century saw a more radical approach towards political self-rule proposed by leaders such as the Lal, Bal, Pal triumvirate, and Aurobindo Ghosh, V. O. Chidambaram Pillai.
  The last stages of the self-rule struggle from the 1920s was characterized by Congress's adoption of Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi's policy of non-violence and civil disobedience, and several other campaigns. Nationalists like Subhash Chandra Bose, Bhagat Singh, Bagha Jatin, Surya Sen preached armed revolution to achieve self-rule.
context_section_description: The decades following the Rebellion were a period of growing political awareness, the manifestation of Indian public opinion and the emergence of Indian leadership at both national and provincial levels. Dadabhai Naoroji formed the East India Association in 1867 and Surendranath Banerjee founded the Indian National Association in 1876. Inspired by a suggestion made by A.O. Hume, a retired Scottish civil servant, seventy-two Indian delegates met in Bombay in 1885 and founded the Indian National Congress. They were mostly members of the upwardly mobile and successful western-educated provincial elites, engaged in professions such as law, teaching and journalism. At its inception, Congress had no well-defined ideology and commanded few of the resources essential to a political organisation. Instead, it functioned more as a debating society that met annually to express its loyalty to the British Raj and passed numerous resolutions on less controversial issues such as civil rights or opportunities in government (especially in the civil service). These resolutions were submitted to the Viceroy's government and occasionally to the British Parliament, but the Congress's early gains were slight. "Despite its claim to represent all India, the Congress voiced the interests of urban elites; the number of participants from other social and economic backgrounds remained negligible. However, this period of history is still crucial because it represented the first political mobilisation of Indians, coming from all parts of the subcontinent and the first articulation of the idea of India as one nation, rather than a collection of independent princely states.
  The influence of socio-religious groups such as Arya Samaj, started by Swami Dayanand Saraswati, and Brahmo Samaj, founded by Raja Ram Mohan Roy and others, became evident in pioneering reforms of Indian society. The work of men like Swami Vivekananda, Ramakrishna, Sri Aurobindo, V. O. Chidambaram Pillai, Subramanya Bharathy, Bankim Chandra Chatterjee, Rabindranath Tagore and Dadabhai Naoroji, as well as women such as the Scots–Irish Sister Nivedita, spread the passion for rejuvenation and freedom. The rediscovery of India's indigenous history by several European and Indian scholars also fed into the rise of nationalism among Indians.
caption: The first session of the Indian National Congress in 1885. The Congress was the first modern nationalist movement to emerge in the British Empire in Asia and Africa.[40]
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