The woman who played an important role in the Indian freedom struggle and the Quit India Movement, who participated in the Mumbai session of the Congress after the arrest of all the Congress leaders including Mahatma Gandhi, Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru, the very next day Congress flag at Gowalia Tank Maidan (Azad Maidan) Hoisted.
Aruna Asaf Ali was a teacher, political activist, and publisher who actively participated in the Indian independence movements. She also went to jail several times.
When an arrest warrant was issued during the Quit India Movement of 1942, she continued the movement by remaining underground for four years. When the British police could not arrest him, her property was confiscated and sold.
She edited the magazine 'Inquilab' with Ram Manohar Lohia and broadcast from a secret radio station of the Congress with Usha Mehta.
After independence, she remained active in politics. In 1958, Aruna Asaf Ali became the first Mayor of Delhi.
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Early Life
Aruna Asaf Ali was born on 16 July 1909 in a Bengali Brahmin family in Kalka, Punjab (now Haryana), British India. Her name was Aruna Ganguly.
Her father Upendranath Ganguly was from Barisal district of East Bengal (now Bangladesh), who immigrated to the United Province. Her father was a restaurant owner. Her mother Ambalika Devi was the daughter of Trailokyanath Sanyal, a famous Brahmo leader who wrote many Brahmo hymns.
Her father, Dhirendranath Ganguly (DG), the younger brother of Upendranath Ganguly, was one of the early film directors. One of her brothers, Nagendranath, was a university professor whose wife was Mira Devi, the only surviving daughter of Nobel laureate Rabindranath Tagore.
Aruna ji's sister Purnima Banerjee was a member of the Constituent Assembly of India.
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Education and Marriage
Aruna Ji received her education from Sacred Heart Convent, Lahore. Later she received an education from All Saints College, Nainital.
After graduation, she worked as a teacher at Gokhale Memorial School, Calcutta.
In Allahabad, he met Congress Party leader Asaf Ali. Asaf Ali was a Muslim and was 21 years older than Aruna ji. Based on religion and age, the family needed more time to be ready for marriage.
Aruna Ji and Asaf Ali got married in November 1928.
At the time of her marriage, her father was not there and her uncle Nagendranath Ganguly was her guardian. After this marriage, her uncle considered her dead in front of all her relatives and friends.
When she came to live in Delhi after marriage, she found it very difficult to adapt to the Indian Muslim lifestyle and traditions there. She was shocked by the domestic life confined to the kitchen and the isolation of women.
For Aruna Ji, who grew up with modern Western facilities, Asaf Ali's ancestral home was like ancient times. In the initial days after marriage, she lived in purdah.
After some time she joined the Indian National Congress. During the Salt Satyagraha, she participated in public processions.
Her husband Asif Ali was an Indian independence activist and renowned lawyer. He was the lawyer of Bhagat Singh. He was the first Indian Ambassador to the United States. He later served as the Governor of Odisha. And then was appointed Indian Ambassador to Switzerland.
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Contribution to the Indian Independence Movement
Aruna Ji played a major role in the Indian independence movement. She was arrested for actively participating in the Salt Satyagraha.
After the Gandhi-Irwin Pact in 1931, it was decided to release all political prisoners, but Aruna Ji was not released.
The other co-women also refused to leave the premises unless Aruna Ji was released. She accepted defeat only after Gandhiji's intervention. And a public movement secured her release.
In the year 1932, she was imprisoned in Tihar Jail. Where she went on a hunger strike to protest against the bad treatment of political prisoners and the useless food. Her efforts improved the conditions of jail inmates. But she was taken to Ambala and kept in solitary confinement there.
After her release, she was not very active politically.
On 8 August 1942, the All India Congress Committee passed the Quit India Resolution in the Bombay (Mumbai) session.
The British government responded by arresting the leading leaders of the Congress and all the members of the Working Committee and thus tried to stop the movement.
On August 9, Aruna Ji presided over the agitation session and hoisted the Congress flag at Gowalia Tank Ground. During the meeting, the police started firing but fearless Aruna Asif Ali was not afraid.
For her bravery in the face of danger, Aruna ji was named the heroine of the 1942 movement and in later years she was called the Grand Old Lady of the freedom movement.
She continued to naturally protest and demonstrate to awaken the curiosity for freedom among the Indian youth.
An arrest warrant was issued in her name by the British government. To avoid arrest, she went underground and started the movement by staying underground.
When the British police could not arrest her, they confiscated Aruna Ji's property and sold it. Meanwhile, she along with Ram Manohar Lohia edited the Congress Party's monthly magazine Inquilab.
Amidst the issues of 1944, she encouraged the youth to forget the useless discussions of violence and non-violence and participate in the freedom revolution of the country.
The British government announced a reward of Rs 5,000 for Aruna ji's capture. Meanwhile, she fell ill and remained hidden in Dr Joshi Hospital in Karol Bagh.
Mahatma Gandhi at that time wrote a letter to her asking to surrender, so that the reward money could be used for the welfare of Harijan.
But she did not accept this and came out in 1946 when the warrant in her name was withdrawn.
She kept Mahatma Gandhi's letter very carefully and kept it in her drawing room.
Leaders like Aruna Ji and Jayprakash Narayan were called political children of Gandhi Ji. Also seen as a new student of Karl Marx.
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Naval Mutiny
Horrified by the conditions and mistreatment of Indians in the Navy, on 18 February 1946, approximately 1,100 Indian sailors and the Royal India Navy declared a hunger strike.
Commander FM King of HMIS Talwar reportedly addressed the sailors abusively, which escalated the situation into an aggressive one.
Gradually 20,000 sailors joined this strike. The strike spread to the ports of Karachi, Madras, Calcutta, Madapam, Visakhapatnam, and Andaman Islands and to the caste guards of Delhi, Thane, and Pune.
The sailors' demands included better food and equal pay as white soldiers, as well as the release of Azad Hind Fauj soldiers and political prisoners and the withdrawal of troops from Indonesia.
Workers protesting peacefully in support of the Marines were violently attacked by army and police units, in which 300 people were killed and 1700 were injured. On the same day, after heavy fighting in Karachi, the Hindustan ship surrendered.
Historians generally believe that the Naval rebels received the support of neither the Congress nor the Muslim League.
Unfortunately, this rebellion did not get importance in Indian history.
It is noteworthy that when the Communist Party called for a strike on 22 February, Congress socialists Achyut Patwardhan and Aruna Asaf Ali supported it, but other Congress leaders gave statements suppressing the spirit of rebellion.
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After Independence
Aruna Asif Ali was a member of the Congress Samajwadi Party. Disillusioned with the Congress Party's progress on socialism, she joined a new party, the 'Socialist Party', formed in 1948.
But she left that party along with Edatta Narayanan. Then both of them went to Moscow with Rajini Palme Dutt.
Both of them joined the Communist Party of India in the early 1950s.
On 2 April 1953, Aruna ji's husband Asif Ali died in Bern while serving as India's Ambassador to Switzerland. In 1989, India Post issued a postage stamp in honor of Asif Ali.
After his death, Aruna Ji became grief-stricken. In the year 1954, she assisted in the formation of the National Federation of Indian Women, the women's wing of the CPI. But she left the party after Nikita Khrushchev rejected Stalin.
Due to naval support, Aruna Ji also had to face criticism from Mahatma Gandhi.
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Delhi's first Mayor
In the year 1958, Aruna Asif Ali was elected the first Mayor of Delhi. She remained associated with social workers like Krishna Menon, Vimala Kapoor, Guru Radha Kishan, Premsagar Gupta, Rajni Palme, Sarala Sharma, and Subhadra Joshi for social welfare and development in Delhi.
In 1958 itself, she and Edatta Narayanan started Link Publishing House. In the same year published a daily newspaper Patriot and a weekly Link.
The publication became prestigious due to the patronage of leaders like Jawaharlal Nehru, Krishna Menon, and Biju Patnaik.
Later Aruna ji went out of publication due to internal politics. Despite objections during the Emergency, she was close to Indira Gandhi and Rajiv Gandhi.
She died in New Delhi on 29 July 1996 at the age of 87.
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Awards and honors
- Aruna Asif Ali was awarded the International Lenin Peace Prize in 1964.
- She was awarded the Jawaharlal Nehru Award for International Understanding in 1991.
- She was awarded the Padma Vibhushan, India's second-highest civilian honor, in 1992.
- She was posthumously awarded the Bharat Ratna, the highest civilian honour, in 1997.
- A postage stamp was issued in his memory in 1998.
- Aruna Asif Ali Marg in New Delhi was named in her honor.
- The All India Minorities Front annually distributes the Dr. Aruna Asif Ali Sadbhavna Award.
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