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Critical Summary of "The Komagata Maru and Ghadr Party: Past and Present of a

historic Challenge to Canada's Exclusion of Immigrants from India" by Hugh J.M.

Johnston.

Introduction

In this article, Johnston provides a detailed outline of the Komagata Maru event. His

analysis is based on official accounts from both Canadian and Indian sources as well as live

interviews with witnesses both in Canada and India. He explains the lives of many key

players before, during and after the events of the Komagata Maru and Ghadr Party and how

the two were linked (Johnston, June 2013).

Background

The Komagata Maru incident involved a Japanese steamship, Komagata Maru, which

sailed to Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada carrying 376 passengers in 1914, from

Punjab, British India. 24 of them were admitted to Canada, but the rest were forced to return

to India with the ship as an incident involving exclusion laws in Canada designed to keep out

immigrants of only Asian origin. Upon return to India, the ship was docked at Budge Budge

and the passengers were placed under guard in Calcutta. The British government wanted to

arrest the men of Komagata Maru. They resisted, shots were fired, 19 passengers killed while

some escaped. The remaining passengers were imprisoned after arrest, to their villages under

a village arrest for the duration of World War I. The incident at Budge Budge became known

as Budge Budge Riot. Ghadr Party as an organization started by Punjabi Indians in Canada

and United States with the aim of gaining India’s independence from British rule.

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Summary

First, Johnston says that the stories had a reflection of British Empire’s state in the

early twentieth century. The expectation of the empire was loyalty from subjects of many

nationalities and races, but it had philosophical and organizational inability to treat all

subjects equally. The Empire had self-governing colonies with legal regimes that did not

offer shared citizenship rights.

Second, he says that the primary objective of the Komagata Maru was to open

Canada for South Asian immigrants and that the Ghadr Party was an anti-British party with

revolutionary aims. It is true, he writes, that there were personal links between the Ghadr

Party leadership and the organizers of the Komagata Maru; Ghadr literature found its way

into the ship and some men onboard later became active Ghadrites. He explains the founding

of Ghadr Party. The principal propagandist was the Punjabi Hindu scholar and activist, Har

Dyal. He carried the vision of a far-future armed struggle for freedom that took place nearly

by circumstance due to Word War I, and simultaneously with the planning of the Komagata

Maru voyage.

Third, he documents the collective experience and context of the major Punjabi Sikh

men involved with the two events. For example, Gurmukh Singh Lalton was a passenger on

the Komagata Maru who later became active in the Ghadr Party. Puran Singh (a classmate of

Gurmukh from Ludhiana) was a leader on the Komagata Maru, as stores keeper throughout

the voyage. Johnston claims to have interviewed Katar Singh Mehli – an ordinary passenger

of the Komagata Maru, who was a village confine after he escaped imprisonment by going

back to Punjab. He had determined to get to Canada or the United States to farm wheat – that

reflected the initial ambition of most of the men on the ship as acquiring land in Canada.

Gurdit Singh Sarhali chartered the Komagata Maru. He was the leader on board who

incidentally turned the ship to a religion and political classroom by installation of a Sikh

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temple onboard. Ghadr Party sympathizers – Balwant Singh Khurdpur, Professor Maulana

Barkatullah, and Bhagwan Singh Jakh spoke from that temple.

Major Criticisms

Johnston seems to support the South Asian’s cause. He claims that the Punjabi

passengers of the immigrant ship made a valiant, but futile bid for legal admission to Canada –

viewing the event from the Punjabi’s perspective only. He does not account the economic and

cultural experiences of contemporary Canadians in the time the Ghadr Party uprising was in

play. He writes about public apologies made by politicians currently but doesn’t seem to

support any reason the apologies should not be made.

Conclusion

He presents an all-inclusive report on how the two events affected all the parties

involved. He included the present-day political memorials carried out in both Canada and

India and explained their impact and or perspective; both in the eyes of the politician and the

public. His research is convincing. He discussed the Ghadr movements activities and reasons

why it is kept silent in the current political society.

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Works Cited

Immigration. (n.d.). Retrieved from BC Studies.:

http://www.bcstudies.com/?q=keyword/immigration