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News India Times August 21, 2015
Independence Special
– that’s all you need to know
I-Day
Special
activists based on the Pacific Coast,
including Har Dayal and Sohan Singh
Bhakna, were organizing migrant
laborers (most of whom were Punjabi
Sikhs) and helped found what would
later be known as the Gadar Party.
The Gadar Party published a newspa-
per titled Gadar in Urdu, and soon the
newspaper and the party’s pamphlets
were disseminated throughout the
world, including Japan, China, Hong
Kong, Burma and the Philippines.
(The Gadar Party received consider-
able support from the German
Foreign Office, which arranged funds
and armaments in a plot to incite a
pan-Indian revolution (later known as
the “Annie Larsen affair”) in 1915. The
conspiracy was discovered by British
and American intelligence, and led to
the Hindu-German Conspiracy Trial
of 1917, in which 29 party members
were convicted in the District Court in
San Francisco.)
Har Dayal
Described as an anarchist and “an
idealist of a strange type,” Har Dayal
arrived in the United States in 1911,
where he played an influential role in
the founding of the San Francisco-
based Gadar Party. During this time,
in the U.S. he connected with Indian
students, laborers, and radicals of all
stripes, eventually founding the
Bakunin Institute of California. He
served for a short time as a lecturer at
Stanford University, eventually forced
to resign because of his anarchist
activism. Dayal also published widely
during this period, including editori-
als that advocated the overthrow of
British colonialism and that highlight-
ed the mistreatment of Indian labor-
ers in North America. In
1914, he was arrested for
spreading anarchist liter-
ature, and fled to Berlin
and eventually Sweden.
He returned to the U.S.
in 1938, residing in
Philadelphia where he
died the next year on
March 4, 1939.
TaraknathDas
In 1905, Taraknath Das
arrived in the U.S. at the
young age of twenty-one. For the
next forty years, he would become
one of the most important Indian
expatriates, involved in the efforts
against British colonialism in India.
After studying at UC-Berkeley, Das
worked at the US Immigration Service
inVancouver, where he eventually
founded The Free Hindusthan, the
only publication of its kind in North
America that advocated political,
social, and religious reform in India.
In 1908 he matriculated to Norwich
University inVermont, the oldest pri-
vate military university in the U.S.
Despite being an excellent student
and popular amongst his peers, Das
was suspended from Norwich
University for his anti-British organiz-
ing.
He thereafter returned to Seattle
and became involved in the growing
revolutionary activities of the Gadar
Party. Das was arrested along with
dozens of others in the infamous
Hindu-German Conspiracy Trial.
Kartar Dhillon
“I had dreams of becoming an artist; I
planned to work actively for India's
freedom from British rule. I looked
upon marriage as a prison. But even
though I abhorred the idea of mar-
riage, the same year, right out of high
school, I got married.” So wrote Kartar
Dhillon in her autobiographical essay,
“The Parrot’s Beak.” Kar (as she was
known) was born on April 30, 1915 in
California’s Simi Valley. Her father,
Bakhshish Singh, immigrated to the
U.S. in 1897 and her mother, Rattan
Kaur, arrived in 1910.
One of the first South Asian fami-
lies in the U.S., the Dhillon family was
involved in both the Gadar Party, agi-
tating for India’s independence from
British rule, and with labor organizing
through the Industrial Workers of the
World. When her brother Bud Dillon
was just 12 years old, he volunteered
to join a mission for
India’s freedom, which
took him around the
world. Kar was herself an
activist and writer,
involved with India’s
freedom struggle, and
later supporting organi-
zations like the Black
Panthers and helping
organize farm workers in
California. She passed
away on June 15, 2008.
About SAADA
SAADA is the South Asian American
Digital Archive, the only organization
that digitally documents, preserves,
and shares stories of South Asian
Americans, giving voice to overlooked
histories and creating a more inclu-
sive society.
Learn more and visit the archive at
The American
Connection
O
n the occasion of the 69th
Independence Day of the Republic of
India, I extend my warm greetings and
best wishes to Indian nationals, members of the
Indian community and well-wishers of India.
On this historic day, we recall with reverence
and respect the courage and sacrifices of our
freedom fighters who paved the way for realiza-
tion of a great nation which we all cherish
today. India occupies a distinct place in the
comity of nations by being the largest democra-
cy that exemplifies unity in diversity and peace-
ful co-existence with a flourishing multi-cultur-
al society. India is making great strides in vari-
ous fields including economy, science & tech-
nology, education and in empowerment of its
people.
Hailed as the defining partnership of the 21st
century in the world, India and the US are
enhancing their
relationship not
only at the bilateral
level, but also at
the regional and
global levels. With
the historic visits of
Prime Minister
Narendra Modi in
September 2014
and President
Barack Obama in
January 2015, the
leaders of both
countries have
given a great impe-
tus to the momen-
tum of this rela-
tionship. Our bilat-
eral trade and
investment, which
are reaching new
heights, are
encouraging us to
aspire for higher goals. Our cooperation has
deepened in the established sectors while new
fields are continuously added to widen our
relationship. People-to-people contact is one of
the strongest pillars of this growing relation-
ship.
I take this opportunity to thank Indian
nationals and Indian American community for
their dynamic, substantial and continuous con-
tribution to strengthening the relationship
between the largest democracy and the oldest
democracy.
Jai Hind.
(Arun K. Singh)
Ambassador of India to the US
Ambassador's Message
