Encyclopedia of India–China Cultural Contacts v2.c14.s3.t4.4

v2.c14.s3.t4.4

After the suppression of their first attempt to launch an armed uprising in India, the Ghadar Party reorganised itself. A new phase of their activities was launched in China. In 1925, a group of Ghadar activists accompanied the exiled Indian revolutionary Raja Mahendra Pratap to China from North America. This group managed to set up active bases in Shanghai, Beijing, Hankou and other places. As the British authorities sought to harass and persecute them, they repeatedly had to shift their headquarters. In Shanghai, they set up their headquarters in the office of the General Labour Union in Zhabei, while in Beijing they set up a Ghadar Ashram. They also began publication of a fortnightly journal, ‘*Ghadar Dhandora*’, in the Gurmukhi script to reach out to the large number of Punjabis in China. The revolutionary upsurge in China in the 1925-27 period was very favourable for their activities. The Ghadar Party again strongly condemned the British attempts to use Indian forces to shoot down Chinese protesters. One of the articles in ‘*Ghadar Dhandora*’, entitled - The Duties of the Indian Army in China, explained to the Indian soldiers that - “The dutiful sons of China are fighting for the freedom of their country. The freedom of India and the freedom of China have a close connection with each other. With the freedom of China, the day of the freedom of India will draw near. It is the duty of Indians to help the Nationalist Party of China so that they may have the pleasure of seeing India free.” The propaganda of the Ghadar Party played a key role in the refusal of some detachments of Indian soldiers and policemen to fire on Chinese in this period.