13

Aug

Aruna Asaf Ali: A Legend Who Was The Spirit of the Quit India Movement

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Aruna Asaf Ali: A Legend Who Was The Spirit of the Quit India Movement

Dr Satish Misra

As India celebrates the 83rd anniversary of the Quit India Movement this month, my memories go back to my days at New Delhi’s the Link House, where I worked for Patriot and contributed to Link weekly magazine. Founded by the indomitable Aruna Asaf Ali, the two journals were more than a routine publication they  were embodiment of fearless expression of truth, resistance to establishment and  unbridled nationalism. I had the rare fortune of interacting with Aruna ji during this period, a privilege I deeply cherish.

On August 8, 1942, at the Bombay session, the All-India Congress Committee passed the historic Quit India Resolution. In a swift reaction, the British colonial regime arrested major Congress leaders, including the entire Working Committee. The British aimed to crush the movement before it could spread. But they hadn't accounted for the grit of 33-year-old Aruna Asaf Ali.

The next day, August 9, Aruna defied the colonial crackdown by presiding over the remainder of the session and hoisting the Congress tricolour at the Gowalia Tank Maidan in Bombay—today’s August Kranti Maidan. With that symbolic act of defiance, she set the stage for a nationwide uprising and earned the title of Queen of the Quit India Movement.

The police cracked down on the gathering, Aruna went underground to avoid arrest and in retaliation, the British seized and auctioned off her property. But Aruna was undeterred. She continued the fight from the shadows, helping launch an underground movement and co-editing Inquilab, a Congress Party monthly, alongside Socialist leader Ram Manohar Lohia. She urged youth to discard debates over violence and non-violence and to join the revolution. The British government, alarmed by her influence, placed a bounty of ₹5,000 on her head.

Her role in India’s freedom struggle began well before 1942. Born Aruna Ganguli on July 16, 1909, in Kalka, Punjab, into a Bengali Brahmin family, she was educated in Lahore and in Nainital. Her father, Upendranath Ganguly, a restaurant owner, was originally from Barisal (now in Bangladesh). Her mother, Ambalika Devi, was the daughter of Brahmo Samaj reformer Trailokya Nath Sanyal.

Despite coming from a conservative family, Aruna married Asaf Ali, a prominent Congress leader and lawyer, in 1928, defying strong familial and societal opposition because of religious differences and a big age gap. Reflecting on it she  later wrote:

“My father was no more when Asaf and I married in September 1928. My paternal uncle Nagendranath Ganguly, who regarded himself as my guardian, said to relatives and friends that as far as he was concerned, I was dead and he had performed my Shradh.”

She joined the Congress Party after marriage and participated in the Salt Satyagraha. Arrested at age 21, she was denied release under the Gandhi-Irwin Pact because officials labelled her a vagrant. In solidarity, other women prisoners refused to leave without her. Only Gandhi’s intervention secured her release, highlighting the respect she commanded even in her early years.

By 1944, still underground, she had become one of the key faces of the resistance. Her health deteriorated while hiding in Dr. Joshi's Hospital in Karol Bagh, Delhi. Gandhi himself sent her a handwritten note asking her to surrender, suggesting the reward money could be used for the Harijan cause. Aruna ji emerged from hiding only after the warrant against her was withdrawn in 1946—and she kept that note from Gandhi as a treasured memento in her home.

Earlier in 1932, while imprisoned in Tihar Jail, she protested the poor treatment of political prisoners through a hunger strike, leading to improved conditions. For her defiance, she was transferred to Ambala and placed in solitary confinement.

Though she admired Gandhi, Aruna was never one to follow him blindly. She supported the 1946 Royal Indian Navy mutiny, a move Gandhi disapproved of, but which Aruna saw as a rare moment of Hindu-Muslim unity at the height of communal tensions.

After Independence, Aruna’s ideological journey continued. Disillusioned with Congress’s slow progress on socialism, she joined the Socialist Party and later the Communist Party of India (CPI). She visited Moscow with Rajni Palme Dutt and became a leading voice in women’s activism. In 1954, she helped found the National Federation of Indian Women, the CPI’s women’s wing, but quit the party in 1956 after Khrushchev denounced Stalin.

In 1958, she became the first woman Mayor of Delhi and collaborated with activists like Krishna Menon, Guru Radha Kishan, and Subhadra Joshi for Delhi’s development. Alongside fellow freedom fighter and journalist Edatata Narayanan, she founded the Link Publishing House and launched the Link weekly magazine. Following the Chinese aggression in 1962, they launched Patriot to defend Nehru against media attacks from business-controlled outlets. These publications became widely respected, shaping public discourse for decades.

After her husband Asaf Ali’s death in 1953, she threw herself even more deeply into public service. A bold thinker, visionary leader, and fierce patriot, Aruna Asaf Ali passed away on July 29, 1996, in New Delhi.

Today, it is unfortunate that towering figures like Aruna are being sidelined in public discourse, especially by the ruling RSS-BJP establishment. By neglecting her legacy, we risk denying new generations the chance to learn about the courage, sacrifice, and ideals of one of India’s greatest daughters.

Let us remember Aruna not just as a historical figure, but as a symbol of fearless conviction and commitment to justice—values that are timeless.

 (Dr Satish Misra is a senior journalist and political analyst.)

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