Recalling Sir Surendranath Banerjea, India's First ‘National' Leader On His Death Centenary

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3 days ago

Banerjea, who personified the era of emergence of national consciousness in modern India, also left behind an eminently readable account of this transformation.
Political partisanship vitiating the dispassionate reading of history is not a new thing. Philosopher David Hume's The History of England (in Six Volumes), particularly its first volume on the House of Tudors, had to suffer the ire of the Whigs who controlled state apparatus in Britain in the mid-18th century. Nonetheless, it implied that the critics had chosen to actually read Hume's fat volume dealing with events that were already two centuries older.
In contemporary India, we find ignorance and confusion about events that are a century to two centuries old. This is possibly because it was the colonial era. However, grasping that period is vital, if we were to understand the institutional underpinnings of our republic. We often boast about, and for good reasons, India's social and cultural continuity, across the ages. However, we overlook political discontinuity due to disruptions in history.
The two prominent markers are establishment of Delhi Sultanate (1206) and the Regulating Act, 1773. The political institutions of medieval India did not evolve from those of ancient India, and similarly the political institutions of modern India did not emerge from those of medieval India. However, the political institutions and legal system of independent India could easily be traced to colonial India. Even the Constitution of India (1949) derived many of its provisions from the Government of India Act, 1935.
The biggest changeover that marked British rule was the establishment of an impersonal government. This distinguished it from the personal rule in Indian princely states whether they were Hindus, Muslims or Sikhs. Though the duopoly of Secretary of State based in England and Governor General based in India remained a constant feature between 1858 and 1947, the enlargement of legislative council (later bicameralism of Legislative Assembly and Council of States) and elections etc meant that there was planned progression whereas more power was delegated to the Indians. This was a result of a sustained campaign built by Indian leaders, which kept the pressure on the government.
We interpret the freedom movement as a struggle to get rid of British rule. This was the position of revolutionaries, who left the future ruling mechanism of India undefined. The Indian National Congress adopted this 'get rid of British' stance only in 1929 in the form of Purna Swaraj Resolution at the Lahore session. It is another thing that they re-entered participatory politics in 1934, and continued to play the game according to the rules of the game until India obtained independence in 1947. The only exception was Quit India 1942 that was provoked by apprehension of Japanese attack on India. The resignation of the Congress ministries in eight provinces in 1939 did not make a material difference.
The early leaders of the Congress had a different take on India's political emancipation. They aimed for 'Self-Rule", later called 'Swaraj", still later 'Home Rule", through attainment of representative government. Their method was political reforms (also called constitutional reforms) whereby more Indians were incorporated into the Governor General's Legislative Council (and provincial councils). Its impact would have been to gradually acquire more power over political decisions. This method had a two-fold advantage a) making the British rulers more accountable and responsive b) developing a politically mature public opinion in the country.
However, public outreach was as important as marshalling facts and figures to argue against and persuade the rulers. It was here that Surendranath Banerjea (1848-1925)—whose death centenary falls on August 6—played the foremost part. He might aptly be called India's first 'national" leader. He was the first political leader to take advantage of the growing railway network to reach out to different parts of India. His real USP was his oratorical skill, at a time when public meetings were becoming popular events. He was fittingly described as the 'trumpet orator of India".
There is a notion that the Indian National Congress (estd.1885) was founded by a foreigner viz. Allan Octavian Hume, the British civil servant and ornithologist. This fact is often invoked by its detractors to claim that the Congress could never be patriotic. The truth is the Indian National Congress, which until 1907 was an annual event rather than any organisation, was a natural culmination of various local associations founded in different parts of India viz. British Indian Association (Calcutta), Bombay Association (Bombay), Sarvajanik Sabha (Poona), Mahajan Sabha (Madras), Sindh Sabha (Karachi) and Indian Association (Calcutta) etc.
As the advent and growth of the railways resolved the problem of mobility, it became easier for them to converge on a national platform. The groundwork was actually laid by Surendranath Banerjea through his all-India tours in 1877-78 wherein he helped incubate several local branches of Indian Association for forging of mutual ties.
Banerjea, along with Ananda Mohan Bose, had founded the Indian Association at Calcutta in 1876. It was formed to agitate against the reduction of minimum age in civil services exam, which Banerjea felt was a ploy to exclude Indians from the civil services. The civil service agitation drew huge response from various parts of India. In 1879, the Indian Association sent Lal Mohun Ghose as its representative to Britain, who carried with him a bunch of petitions, received from all over India due to the campaign. Ghose's speaking tour of England was highly successful. He, in particular, emphasised that the absence of adequate and genuine representation of Indians in the Legislative Council hampered the resolution of India's grievances and optimal policy making.
Banerjea should be acknowledged as the true founder of the Indian National Congress. Not only was the word 'Congress" used by him (as against Hume who used the word 'Union") but more importantly he created the ground-work for this national congregation. Banerjea, after his release from prison in a contempt case, had resolved to create a National Fund for political agitation on constitutional lines in India. Over ten thousand people attended a meeting in Calcutta on July 17, 1883 where he announced this idea. The Ilbert Bill controversy in 1883, wherein the British community in India opposed a progressive piece of legislation, mobilized the Indian opinion.
Banerjea organised the first National Conference in Calcutta during December 28-30, 1883. The issues raised therein e.g. representative councils or self government, general & technical education, separation from judicial from executive in the administration of criminal justice, and greater employment of Indians in public service anticipated those later espoused by the Congress. Two years later, the second National Conference was held at Calcutta during December 25-27, 1885. It drew delegates from Meerut, Benaras, Allahabad and Bombay in addition to Bengal. This, however, prevented him from attending the first session of the Indian National Congress at Bombay held during the same week. Banerjea's notes for the first National Conference (1883) were used in the preparatory meeting of the Congress that had taken place at Madras. However, thereafter, Banerjea attended all sessions of the Congress.
In 1890, Banerjea toured Britain as part of the five-member delegation for Congress' overseas outreach activity—everybody at his own cost. It was during this tour he clinched the Oxford Union Debate on May 22, 1890 (long before Shashi Tharoor in 2015!) defeating Lord Hugh Cecil on the motion 'That this House views with regret the non-recognition of the elective principles in Indian Council Bill now before Parliament". His speaking tour of England was highly successful. He advocated that the members of legislative councils should be chosen through election rather than nomination. On returning to India, his felicitation ceremony at Framji Cowasji Institute at Bombay on July 6, 1890 was mobbed leading to a minor stampede. The enactment of Indian Councils Act, 1892 made the legislative and provincial councils more representative besides giving members more right.
In 1895, Banerjea was chosen as the President of the Congress held at Poona (Pune). His Presidential Address lasted for more than four hours, during which he spoke without referring to any written note. He was again nominated as the President at the Ahmedabad session in 1902. In 1905, he played a leading role in organizing a protest against partition of Bengal by Lord Curzon. He initiated the Swadeshi vow of using only ingeniously produced goods. He was one of the founders of 'Banga Luxmi Cotton Mill' at Serampore (Hooghly district), which became an arm of Swadeshi production.
One of the memorable contributions of Banerjea was his memoirs viz. A Nation in Making: Being Reminiscence of Fifty Years in Public Life (1921). It is a must read for anybody wanting to understand the shaping of modern India and the beginning of the freedom movement in this country. While dedicating the book to the memory of the founders and early builders of the Indian National Congress, the author was apprehensive that the present generation was at a risk to forget their achievements. If that was the situation a 100 years ago, when Gandhi reigned supreme, the predicament today can be well-understood.
Banerjea belonged to the Moderate group inside the Congress. However, unlike other Moderate leaders like Dadabhai Naoroji, Pherozeshah Mehta and Gopal Krishna Gokhale etc, he espoused blazing patriotism. He attributes excellence in oratory to patriotism.
'Let no one aspire to be an orator", says Banerjea, 'who does not love his country, lover her indeed with a true and soul-absorbing love. Country first, all other things next is the creed of the orator" (A Nation in Making, P.140). Quite early in his career he popularised Mazzini, the prophet of Italian Unification, in India through his speeches. Yet, he was never an extremist or revolutionary.
In 1918, he had broken ranks with the Congress over Home Rule question, and formed the All India Moderates Conference. In his Presidential Address in Bombay on November 1, 1918, he explained his support to moderate principles as against revolution.
'We have witnessed nameless horrors of revolutions in France, in Russia, and in other countries, how too often they have followed by reaction and repression and enthronement of despotic authority". In describing the freedom movement, we tend to emphasise freedom from British clutches alone, but take the establishment of Parliamentary democracy in independent India for granted. Banerjea cautioned us that veering from the path of constitutionalism could also lead India to a slippery path of authoritarianism.
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Surendranath Banerjea's elucidation of the constitutional basis of India's freedom struggle explains how India not only became free but became a Parliamentary democracy.
The writer is author of the book 'The Microphone Men: How Orators Created a Modern India' (2019) and an independent researcher based in New Delhi. The views herein are his personal.
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New Delhi, India, India
First Published:
August 07, 2025, 16:15 IST
News opinion Opinion | Recalling Sir Surendranath Banerjea, India's First 'National' Leader On His Death Centenary
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