The empty canopy being India Gate – a reminder of the British Raj

8th September 2002 marks the day in history of India when Prime Minister Narendra Modi unveiled a 30 feet grand statue of Netaji Subhash Chandra Bose under the empty canopy along with inauguration of “Kartavya Path”. Before this lakhs of visitors to India Gate used to ask the question, why an empty canopy. Let us explore the history and story behind this canopy.

How the British entered India

During the industrial revolution the British entered India via the trade route. They came as traders selling finished goods and buying raw material. They were also interested in other produce like spices. A group of merchants formed the East India Company on 31 Dec 1600. The first of the company’s ships docked at Surat in 1608. Within the next few years they set up factories and trading posts in major port cities of India at that time. Unusually high profits earned by the East India Company gave them a further boost and they started signing treaties with the local rulers for trading agreements.

Very soon, the company started fighting the Portuguese and Spanish for controlling more territories while at the same time creating more factories. Their conflict nature also became bolder by the day so much so that in 1689, Aurangzeb had to attack and lay siege to Bombay. The company’s envoys had to beg for a pardon. East India Company was in India for pure profits. Their methods were questionable but till the time they earned profits for stockholders back in Britain, everything was forgiven and forgotten.

East India Company and it’s rule of 150 years

After victory in the Battle of Plassey in 1757 followed by Battle of Buxar in 1764, the East India Company realised that it can expand presence into more Indian territories. Anglo-Mysore wars and Anglo-Maratha wars allowed them more control over territories. That was followed up by Anglo-Nepalese war and Anglo-Sikh wars. Along with this they also started annexing the princely states by lies and deceit. By 1850, East India Company was practically ruling most of India. Officially though, the British government was still out of everything, while a registered company was governing India.

Before the British came, the Mughals had already established a hold in India and were ruling from Delhi. They themselves were proceeded by the Delhi Sultanate who began ruling from 1206 upto 1526. Mughals ruled from 1526 to 1720. The Maratha empire came into being in 1674 by the coronation of Shivaji Maharaj upto 1818 when the last Anglo Maratha was ended in 1818. Overlapping that the British East India Company began in 1612 and reached their peak in 1850.

British officially enter India

The first war of Independence began on 10th May 1857 and lasted for a year and half. The rebellion was met with a bloody response by East India Company. Rough estimates put 8 lakh people killed and much more in the aftermath. It officially gave a reason for the British Government to start governing India. The crown put into place a series of measures including the famed judiciary system, police, postal network, railways and telegraph. British assumed that through their policy of divide and rule and deceit which included bribery, they will be able to now rule India as a colony.

They were so wrong. The freedom struggle which began in 1206 continued with renewed effort. British rule lasted less than 100 years. For the later part of 1800s there was relative calm but with increased political awareness. However, two significant events in the same century quietly laid the seeds for the final struggle for independence.

Sarvajanik Ganesh Utsav and Dadhikando Mela

Allahabad (Now known as Prayagraj), the land of triveni sangam and Pune is separated by about 1400 kms. But there are linked together by two events which happened in the span of two years.

The year was 1890 and a time of relative but uneasy calm. British had clamped down an iron fisted administration on the entire country. Police were everywhere and laws were strict. People were wary of any revolutionary activity fearing British reprisals.

Ramkailash Pathak, Vijay Chandra and Sumitra Devi were huddled together discussing the problem of how to spark the spirit of freedom struggle. They decided to use religion as a unifying tool and used two of the most popular figures which would be accepted by all masses, Krishna and Balram. 1890 saw the first Dadhikando Mela organized in the by lanes of Prayagraj at night, a tradition which continues even today.

Two years later a similar event is organized in Pune, the Sarvajanik Ganesh Utsav where people come out in masses to celebrate with Ganesh idol as a unifying force. From that day on the days of British were numbered. In 1906, Lokmanya Balgangadhar Tilak roared “Swaraj is my birthright and I shall have it”. Forty years later, British had to leave India. Tilak died in 1920, not able to see free India. But his two contributions, his slogan of Swaraj and his starting of the Sarvajanik Ganesh Utsav provided the spark for the final freedom struggle.

Where does Netaji fit in all this

The British were mostly OK with non violence movement spearheaded by Mahatma Gandhi. That also gave them an excuse to crush any armed rebellion or struggle. They did that brutally and with all the might of the British Government. So by 1930s most of the extreme parties and groups had either disbanded or their top leaders imprisoned or murdered.

So when Netaji Subhash Chandra Bose raised an army, the British were shaken to the core. It was during that period that the British considered the possibility that they need to leave India. Any lingering doubts regarding their stay in India were squashed when Naval Sailors began a mutiny in Bombay which spread to the ports of the rest of the country. Historians agree that the unrest in the navy was triggered by the trails of personnel of Azad Hind Fauj at Red Fort.

British symbolically left India from the Gateway of India in Mumbai. Once a mighty British Empire where the sun would not set now leaving a colony. India finally gets freedom after 800 years of foreign rule.

The empty canopy

It once held the statue of King George V but was removed in 1968. That statue was erected under the canopy in 1936 after his death. After Independence it became a repeated target of nationalists. It was shifted to Coronation Park after being moved to a few places. Coincidently that marble statue is standing in the same place where the Delhi Durbar of 1911 was held marking the move of the capital from Calcutta to Delhi.

An empty canopy gave rise to a number of rumours, the most interesting being any ruler who occupies Delhi and creates a new settlement has to leave Delhi.

The statue of Netaji Subhash Chandra Bose

Standing at 30 feet and weighing 65 metric tons, the statue of Netaji Subhash Chandra Bose under the canopy is made entirely by hand. It was made out of a 280 metric ton of single block of granite in Khammam in Telangana from where it travelled about 1600 kms by road to Delhi on a 100 feet long truck.

Trivia – The team of sculptors was led by Arun Yogiraj who we all now know also created the sculpture of Ram Lalla.

Dadhikando Mela – A historic protest against the British rule going back more than 100 years ago