Freedom Struggle Compendium — Sessions, Newspapers, Books & Personalities

Why This Chapter Matters

This is the marks chapter. When SSC or RRB sets a modern-history question, the odds are high it comes from exactly the lists collected here: which Congress session was held where and under whom, who founded which newspaper, who wrote which book, who gave which slogan, who founded which organisation, and the dates of the great martyrs. These are one-line facts, easy to set and easy to check, so paper-setters return to them every year. In a typical SSC CGL/CHSL GA section, 2 to 3 of the 4-5 modern-history questions come from this compendium material. RRB NTPC is even fonder of "who founded/who wrote/who said" questions.

The sub-topics that repeat most: the "firsts" among Congress presidents (first Muslim, first Englishman, first woman, first Indian woman), the Lahore 1929 and Karachi 1931 sessions, Tilak's Kesari, Gandhi's four papers, Bankim's Anandamath, the slogans of Tilak, Bose, and Bhagat Singh, founders of the Ghadar Party and the Servants of India Society, Bhikaji Cama's 1907 flag, and the execution date of Bhagat Singh. Do not try to reason these out in the exam hall. Memorise the tables, revise them weekly, and collect the marks.

1. INC Sessions and Presidents (1885–1948)

The Indian National Congress met every December (with special sessions in some years). Learn the full table once, then keep revisiting the starred "firsts". No session was held in 1930, 1935, 1941–1945, or 1947 (the next regular session after 1946 came at Jaipur in December 1948).

Year	Place	President	Point to remember
1885	Bombay	W.C. Bonnerjee	First session; 72 delegates; venue Gokuldas Tejpal Sanskrit College
1886	Calcutta	Dadabhai Naoroji	Merger with National Conference
1887	Madras	Badruddin Tyabji	First Muslim president
1888	Allahabad	George Yule	First English (European) president
1889	Bombay	William Wedderburn	—
1890	Calcutta	Pherozeshah Mehta	—
1891	Nagpur	P. Ananda Charlu	—
1892	Allahabad	W.C. Bonnerjee	Second term
1893	Lahore	Dadabhai Naoroji	Second term
1894	Madras	Alfred Webb	Irish member of Parliament
1895	Poona	Surendranath Banerjee	—
1896	Calcutta	Rahimtulla Sayani	Vande Mataram sung first time (by Rabindranath Tagore)
1897	Amraoti	C. Sankaran Nair	—
1898	Madras	Ananda Mohan Bose	—
1899	Lucknow	Romesh Chandra Dutt	—
1900	Lahore	N.G. Chandavarkar	—
1901	Calcutta	Dinshaw E. Wacha	Gandhi attended a Congress session for the first time
1902	Ahmedabad	Surendranath Banerjee	Second term
1903	Madras	Lal Mohan Ghosh	—
1904	Bombay	Sir Henry Cotton	—
1905	Benares	Gopal Krishna Gokhale	Supported Swadeshi and Boycott for Bengal
1906	Calcutta	Dadabhai Naoroji	Third term; word "Swaraj" used from Congress platform; four resolutions (Swaraj, Swadeshi, Boycott, National Education)
1907	Surat	Rash Behari Ghosh	Surat Split: Moderates vs Extremists
1908	Madras	Rash Behari Ghosh	—
1909	Lahore	Madan Mohan Malaviya	—
1910	Allahabad	William Wedderburn	Second term
1911	Calcutta	Bishan Narayan Dar	Jana Gana Mana sung first time
1912	Bankipore	R.N. Mudholkar	—
1913	Karachi	Nawab Syed Muhammad Bahadur	—
1914	Madras	Bhupendra Nath Bose	—
1915	Bombay	S.P. (Satyendra Prasanna) Sinha	—
1916	Lucknow	A.C. Majumdar	Lucknow Pact with Muslim League; Moderates and Extremists reunite
1917	Calcutta	Annie Besant	First woman president
1918	Delhi	Madan Mohan Malaviya	Special session at Bombay the same year under Syed Hasan Imam
1919	Amritsar	Motilal Nehru	Held in the shadow of Jallianwala Bagh
1920 (special, Sept)	Calcutta	Lala Lajpat Rai	Non-Cooperation resolution passed
1920 (Dec)	Nagpur	C. Vijayaraghavachariar	NCM confirmed; Congress constitution changed; linguistic PCCs
1921	Ahmedabad	C.R. Das (in jail; Hakim Ajmal Khan acted)	—
1922	Gaya	C.R. Das	Council-entry debate; led to Swaraj Party
1923	Kakinada	Maulana Mohammad Ali	Special session at Delhi the same year under Abul Kalam Azad (youngest president)
1924	Belgaum	Mahatma Gandhi	Only session Gandhi presided over
1925	Kanpur	Sarojini Naidu	First Indian woman president
1926	Gauhati	S. Srinivasa Iyengar	—
1927	Madras	M.A. Ansari	Independence resolution moved by Jawaharlal Nehru; Simon boycott decided
1928	Calcutta	Motilal Nehru	Nehru Report discussed
1929	Lahore	Jawaharlal Nehru	Purna Swaraj resolution; 26 January 1930 fixed as Independence Day; on the bank of the Ravi
1931	Karachi	Vallabhbhai Patel	Resolution on Fundamental Rights and National Economic Programme; endorsed Gandhi-Irwin Pact
1932	Delhi	Amrit Ranchhorddas Seth	Held despite the ban
1933	Calcutta	Nellie Sengupta	Third woman president
1934	Bombay	Rajendra Prasad	—
1936	Lucknow	Jawaharlal Nehru	Socialist ideas pressed
1936 (Dec)	Faizpur	Jawaharlal Nehru	First session in a village
1938	Haripura	Subhas Chandra Bose	National Planning Committee idea
1939	Tripuri	Subhas Chandra Bose	Defeated Pattabhi Sitaramayya; resigned after the Tripuri crisis; Rajendra Prasad took over
1940	Ramgarh	Abul Kalam Azad	Longest-serving president: continued till 1946 (no sessions during Quit India years)
1946	Meerut	J.B. Kripalani	President at the time of Independence
1948 (Dec)	Jaipur	Pattabhi Sitaramayya	First session after Independence

Coaching tip: exams almost never ask the obscure middle years. They ask 1885, 1887, 1888, 1896, 1906, 1907, 1911, 1916, 1917, 1924, 1925, 1929, 1931, 1937, 1938–39, and 1946. Master those rows first.

2. Newspapers and Journals — Founders and Years

The press question is a fixed guest in RRB papers. The pattern is always "X newspaper was started by ___" or a match-the-pair set.

Newspaper / Journal	Year	Founder / Editor	Language / Place
Bengal Gazette	1780	James Augustus Hicky	English, Calcutta; first newspaper of India
Sambad Kaumudi	1821	Raja Rammohan Roy	Bengali
Mirat-ul-Akhbar	1822	Raja Rammohan Roy	Persian
Rast Goftar	1851	Dadabhai Naoroji	Gujarati, Bombay
Hindoo Patriot	1853	Girish Chandra Ghosh; famous under editor Harish Chandra Mukherjee	English, Calcutta; backed indigo ryots
Somprakash	1858	Dwarkanath Vidyabhushan	Bengali
Amrita Bazar Patrika	1868	Sisir Kumar Ghosh and Motilal Ghosh	Bengali, later English overnight to dodge the Vernacular Press Act
Bangadarshan	1873	Bankim Chandra Chattopadhyay	Bengali magazine
The Hindu	1878	G. Subramania Aiyar	English, Madras
Kesari	1881	Bal Gangadhar Tilak	Marathi, Poona
Mahratta	1881	Bal Gangadhar Tilak	English, Poona
The Tribune	1881	Dyal Singh Majithia	English, Lahore
Sudharak	1888	Gopal Ganesh Agarkar	Poona
Indian Opinion	1903	M.K. Gandhi	South Africa
Yugantar	1906	Barindra Kumar Ghosh and Bhupendranath Dutta	Bengali, revolutionary weekly
Bande Mataram	1906	Bipin Chandra Pal; later edited by Aurobindo Ghosh	English, Calcutta
The Indian Sociologist	1905	Shyamji Krishna Varma	London
Talwar	1909	Virendranath Chattopadhyay	Berlin
The Leader	1909	Madan Mohan Malaviya	English, Allahabad
Comrade	1911	Mohammad Ali Jauhar	English; he also ran the Urdu Hamdard
Al-Hilal	1912	Abul Kalam Azad	Urdu, Calcutta; followed by Al-Balagh (1915)
Ghadar	1913	Ghadar Party (Lala Hardayal)	San Francisco; Urdu, Punjabi and other editions
Bombay Chronicle	1913	Pherozeshah Mehta	English, Bombay
New India and Commonweal	1914	Annie Besant	Madras
Young India	1919	M.K. Gandhi	English weekly
Navjivan	1919	M.K. Gandhi	Gujarati weekly
The Independent	1919	Motilal Nehru	Allahabad
Hindustan Times	1924	Founded with Akali support; K.M. Panikkar was an early editor	Delhi
Harijan	1933	M.K. Gandhi	Weekly, after the Poona Pact phase
National Herald	1938	Jawaharlal Nehru	Lucknow

Two press laws to tag to this list: the Vernacular Press Act, 1878 (Lytton; repealed by Ripon, 1882) and the Indian Press Act, 1910 (Minto's period). Tilak's Kesari articles brought him sedition trials in 1897 and 1908 (six years in Mandalay after the second).

3. Books and Authors

Book	Author	Point to remember
Neel Darpan (1860)	Dinabandhu Mitra	Play on the misery of indigo cultivators
Ghulamgiri (1873)	Jyotiba Phule	Attack on caste slavery
Satyarth Prakash (1875)	Swami Dayananda Saraswati	Text of the Arya Samaj
Anandamath (1882)	Bankim Chandra Chattopadhyay	Contains Vande Mataram; set against the Sanyasi rebellion
Poverty and Un-British Rule in India (1901)	Dadabhai Naoroji	Drain of Wealth theory
The Economic History of India	Romesh Chandra Dutt	Economic critique of British rule
The Indian War of Independence, 1857 (1909)	V.D. Savarkar	Called 1857 a war of independence; banned before publication
Hind Swaraj (1909)	M.K. Gandhi	Written on the ship from London; critique of modern civilisation
Gitanjali (1910; English 1912)	Rabindranath Tagore	Nobel Prize in Literature, 1913
Gita Rahasya (written 1910–11 in Mandalay jail)	Bal Gangadhar Tilak	Commentary on the Bhagavad Gita
Unhappy India (1928)	Lala Lajpat Rai	Reply to Katherine Mayo's Mother India
The Story of My Experiments with Truth (1927)	M.K. Gandhi	Autobiography, originally in Gujarati
Why I am an Atheist (1930)	Bhagat Singh	Written in Lahore jail
An Autobiography (1936)	Jawaharlal Nehru	Written in jail
The Indian Struggle	Subhas Chandra Bose	His account of the national movement
Glimpses of World History (1934)	Jawaharlal Nehru	Letters to daughter Indira from jail
The Discovery of India (1946)	Jawaharlal Nehru	Written in Ahmednagar Fort jail
India Divided (1946)	Rajendra Prasad	Against the two-nation theory
India Wins Freedom (1959)	Abul Kalam Azad	Memoir of 1935–48

4. Slogans — Who Said What

Attribute the slogan to the right person. Options in the exam will always include the two or three most confusable names.

Slogan / Line	Given by	Context
"Swaraj is my birthright and I shall have it"	Bal Gangadhar Tilak	Home Rule phase, 1916
"Vande Mataram"	Bankim Chandra Chattopadhyay	Song in Anandamath (1882); war-cry of Swadeshi Movement
"Sare Jahan se Achha"	Muhammad Iqbal	Written 1904
"Inquilab Zindabad"	Coined by Hasrat Mohani; made famous by Bhagat Singh	HSRA phase, 1929
"Sarfaroshi ki tamanna ab hamare dil mein hai"	Written by poet Bismil Azimabadi; immortalised by Ram Prasad Bismil	Kakori prisoners
"Simon Go Back"	Yusuf Meherally	1928 Simon Commission boycott
"Quit India" (the phrase)	Coined by Yusuf Meherally	Adopted by Congress, August 1942
"Do or Die" (Karo ya Maro)	Mahatma Gandhi	Quit India speech, 8 August 1942, Gowalia Tank
"Give me blood, and I shall give you freedom"	Subhas Chandra Bose	INA address, 1944
"Dilli Chalo"	Subhas Chandra Bose	INA slogan
"Jai Hind"	Popularised by Subhas Chandra Bose and the INA	National salutation
"Satyameva Jayate" (popularised as national slogan)	Madan Mohan Malaviya	From the Mundaka Upanishad
"Swaraj in one year"	Mahatma Gandhi	Non-Cooperation promise, 1920–21
"Jana Gana Mana" (national anthem)	Rabindranath Tagore	First sung at Calcutta session, 1911

5. Organisations and Founders

Organisation	Year	Founder(s)	Place
Landholders' Society	1838	Dwarkanath Tagore and others	Calcutta; first political association
British Indian Association	1851	Radhakanta Deb (president), Debendranath Tagore (secretary)	Calcutta
Bombay Association	1852	Jagannath Shankarsheth	Bombay
East India Association	1866	Dadabhai Naoroji	London
Poona Sarvajanik Sabha	1870	M.G. Ranade and Ganesh Vasudeo Joshi	Poona
Indian Association	1876	Surendranath Banerjee and Ananda Mohan Bose	Calcutta
Madras Mahajana Sabha	1884	Viraraghavachariar, Ananda Charlu, Subramania Aiyar	Madras
Indian National Congress	1885	A.O. Hume	First session at Bombay
Anushilan Samiti	1902	Promotha Mitter and others	Calcutta; Dhaka branch under Pulin Behari Das
Abhinav Bharat	1904	V.D. Savarkar	Secret society
India House	1905	Shyamji Krishna Varma	London
Servants of India Society	1905	Gopal Krishna Gokhale	Poona
All-India Muslim League	1906	Nawab Salimullah, Aga Khan and others	Dacca
Ghadar Party	1913	Lala Hardayal; president Sohan Singh Bhakna	San Francisco
Hindu Mahasabha	1915	Madan Mohan Malaviya among founders	—
Home Rule Leagues	1916	Tilak (April, Belgaum) and Annie Besant (September, Madras)	—
All India Trade Union Congress (AITUC)	1920	First president Lala Lajpat Rai	Bombay
Swaraj Party	1923	C.R. Das (president) and Motilal Nehru (secretary)	—
Bahishkrit Hitakarini Sabha	1924	Dr. B.R. Ambedkar	Bombay
Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS)	1925	K.B. Hedgewar	Nagpur
Hindustan Socialist Republican Association (HSRA)	1928	Chandra Shekhar Azad, Bhagat Singh and comrades	Delhi (Feroz Shah Kotla meeting)
All India Women's Conference	1927	Margaret Cousins	—
Khudai Khidmatgar (Red Shirts)	1929	Khan Abdul Ghaffar Khan	NWFP
Congress Socialist Party	1934	Acharya Narendra Dev, Jayaprakash Narayan	Within Congress
All India Kisan Sabha	1936	First president Swami Sahajanand Saraswati	Lucknow
Independent Labour Party	1936	Dr. B.R. Ambedkar	Bombay
Forward Bloc	1939	Subhas Chandra Bose	After leaving Congress presidency
Azad Hind Government	1943	Subhas Chandra Bose	Singapore, 21 October 1943

6. Women of the Freedom Struggle

Exams love the woman-and-her-work pair. Learn the deed with the name.

Woman	Contribution
Rani Lakshmibai	Led Jhansi in 1857; died fighting at Gwalior, June 1858
Begum Hazrat Mahal	Led the 1857 revolt at Lucknow for her son Birjis Qadr
Rani Chennamma of Kittur	Rose against the British in 1824, decades before 1857
Savitribai Phule	Pioneer of girls' education in Poona from 1848
Bhikaji Cama	Unfurled an early national flag at the Stuttgart Socialist Congress, 1907; ran Bande Mataram journal from Europe
Annie Besant	Home Rule League (1916); first woman Congress president (1917)
Sarala Devi Chaudhurani	Founded Bharat Stree Mahamandal (1910), an early all-India women's body
Sarojini Naidu	"Nightingale of India"; first Indian woman Congress president (Kanpur, 1925); led the Dharasana salt raid, 1930; first woman Governor (UP, 1947)
Kasturba Gandhi	Satyagrahas from South Africa onwards; died in detention at the Aga Khan Palace, 1944
Kamala Nehru	Led picketing during Civil Disobedience in Allahabad
Muthulakshmi Reddy	First woman legislator in India (Madras Legislative Council, 1927); social reformer
Rani Gaidinliu	Naga spiritual-political leader; jailed at 16 in 1932; named "Rani" by Jawaharlal Nehru
Pritilata Waddedar	Chittagong group; led the Pahartali European Club attack (September 1932) and died rather than be captured
Kalpana Dutta	Chittagong armoury raid group of Surya Sen
Bina Das	Fired at Governor Stanley Jackson at Calcutta University convocation, 1932
Durgawati Devi (Durga Bhabhi)	HSRA associate; travelled with Bhagat Singh in disguise after the Saunders shooting
Matangini Hazra	Shot dead leading a Quit India procession at Tamluk (Bengal), 29 September 1942, at age 73
Kanaklata Barua	Teenager shot carrying the flag at Gohpur, Assam, 1942
Aruna Asaf Ali	Hoisted the tricolour at Gowalia Tank Maidan, Bombay, 9 August 1942; ran the 1942 underground
Usha Mehta	Ran the secret Congress Radio during Quit India, 1942
Sucheta Kripalani	1942 underground; later first woman Chief Minister of an Indian state (UP, 1963)
Rajkumari Amrit Kaur	Gandhian; later first woman Cabinet minister of free India (Health)
Vijaya Lakshmi Pandit	First woman president of the UN General Assembly (1953); freedom fighter and diplomat
Captain Lakshmi Sahgal	Commanded the Rani of Jhansi Regiment of the INA

7. Important Martyrs and Their Dates

Dates here are hard marks. SSC has repeatedly asked the execution date of the Lahore trio and the Kakori martyrs.

Martyr	Date and manner	Linked event
Mangal Pandey	Hanged 8 April 1857 at Barrackpore	Fired on officers, 29 March 1857
Birsa Munda	Died 9 June 1900 in Ranchi jail	Munda Ulgulan
Khudiram Bose	Hanged 11 August 1908, aged about 18	Muzaffarpur bomb (Kingsford case); partner Prafulla Chaki shot himself when cornered
Madan Lal Dhingra	Hanged 17 August 1909 in London	Shot Curzon Wyllie, 1 July 1909
Bagha Jatin (Jatindranath Mukherjee)	Died of wounds, September 1915, after the Balasore encounter	German arms plot of 1915
Kartar Singh Sarabha	Hanged 16 November 1915, aged 19	Ghadar conspiracy; inspiration for Bhagat Singh
Rajendra Lahiri	Hanged 17 December 1927 (Gonda jail)	Kakori case
Ram Prasad Bismil	Hanged 19 December 1927 (Gorakhpur jail)	Kakori train action, 9 August 1925
Ashfaqulla Khan	Hanged 19 December 1927 (Faizabad jail)	Kakori case
Thakur Roshan Singh	Hanged 19 December 1927 (Allahabad jail)	Kakori case
Lala Lajpat Rai	Died 17 November 1928	Lathi blows in the Simon Commission protest, Lahore
Jatin Das	Died 13 September 1929 in Lahore jail after a 63-day hunger strike	Demand for political-prisoner status
Chandra Shekhar Azad	Shot himself when surrounded, 27 February 1931, Alfred Park, Allahabad	Kept his vow never to be taken alive
Bhagat Singh, Rajguru, Sukhdev	Hanged 23 March 1931, Lahore jail	Saunders shooting (17 December 1928) and Lahore Conspiracy Case; 23 March is Shaheed Diwas
Surya Sen (Masterda)	Hanged 12 January 1934, Chittagong	Chittagong armoury raid, 18 April 1930
Udham Singh	Hanged 31 July 1940 in London	Shot Michael O'Dwyer (Lt-Governor of Punjab in 1919) at Caxton Hall, 13 March 1940
Matangini Hazra	Shot 29 September 1942, Tamluk	Quit India procession
Hemu Kalani	Hanged 21 January 1943, Sukkur (Sindh)	Quit India sabotage attempt

Quick Revision — One-Line Facts

• The first INC session met at Bombay in 1885 under W.C. Bonnerjee with 72 delegates.
• Badruddin Tyabji (1887) was the first Muslim Congress president; George Yule (1888) the first English one.
• Vande Mataram was first sung at the 1896 Calcutta session; Jana Gana Mana at the 1911 Calcutta session.
• Dadabhai Naoroji presided thrice: 1886, 1893, 1906; at Calcutta 1906 the Congress used the word Swaraj.
• The Congress split at Surat (1907) and reunited at Lucknow (1916).
• Annie Besant (1917) was the first woman president; Sarojini Naidu (Kanpur, 1925) the first Indian woman.
• Gandhi presided over only one session: Belgaum, 1924.
• Purna Swaraj was declared at Lahore, December 1929, under Jawaharlal Nehru; 26 January 1930 was the first Independence Day.
• The Karachi session (1931) under Patel passed the resolution on Fundamental Rights and the National Economic Programme.
• Faizpur (December 1936) was the first Congress session held in a village.
• Abul Kalam Azad was Congress president from 1940 to 1946, the longest continuous tenure.
• India's first newspaper was Hicky's Bengal Gazette (1780).
• Tilak ran Kesari (Marathi) and Mahratta (English), both from 1881.
• Gandhi's papers: Indian Opinion (1903, South Africa), Young India and Navjivan (1919), Harijan (1933).
• Azad edited Al-Hilal (1912) and Al-Balagh (1915).
• Anandamath (1882) by Bankim Chandra Chattopadhyay contains Vande Mataram.
• Hind Swaraj (1909) was written by Gandhi on a ship voyage from London.
• Nehru wrote The Discovery of India in Ahmednagar Fort jail (published 1946).
• "Swaraj is my birthright" is Tilak; "Do or Die" is Gandhi (8 August 1942); "Give me blood..." is Bose.
• Both "Simon Go Back" and the phrase "Quit India" were coined by Yusuf Meherally.
• "Inquilab Zindabad" was coined by Hasrat Mohani and popularised by Bhagat Singh.
• Servants of India Society (1905) — Gokhale; Ghadar Party (1913) — Lala Hardayal.
• The Muslim League was founded at Dacca in 1906; the RSS at Nagpur in 1925 by Hedgewar.
• Bhikaji Cama unfurled a national flag at Stuttgart in 1907.
• Aruna Asaf Ali hoisted the flag at Gowalia Tank on 9 August 1942; Usha Mehta ran the secret Congress Radio.
• Kakori martyrs Bismil, Ashfaqulla and Roshan Singh were hanged on 19 December 1927.
• Bhagat Singh, Rajguru and Sukhdev were hanged on 23 March 1931; Azad died at Alfred Park on 27 February 1931.
• Jatin Das died on 13 September 1929 after a 63-day hunger strike in Lahore jail.
• Udham Singh shot Michael O'Dwyer in London on 13 March 1940 and was hanged on 31 July 1940.
• Surya Sen was hanged on 12 January 1934 for the Chittagong armoury raid.

Memory Tables

Table A: Congress "Firsts" at a Glance

First	Person / Session	Year
First session and president	Bombay; W.C. Bonnerjee	1885
First Muslim president	Badruddin Tyabji (Madras)	1887
First English president	George Yule (Allahabad)	1888
First singing of Vande Mataram	Calcutta session	1896
First singing of Jana Gana Mana	Calcutta session	1911
First woman president	Annie Besant (Calcutta)	1917
Only session under Gandhi	Belgaum	1924
First Indian woman president	Sarojini Naidu (Kanpur)	1925
Purna Swaraj resolution	Lahore, under Jawaharlal Nehru	1929
First village session	Faizpur	1936
President at Independence	J.B. Kripalani (elected at Meerut, 1946)	1947

Table B: One Person → One Paper → One Book/Slogan

Person	Paper	Book / Slogan
Tilak	Kesari, Mahratta (1881)	Gita Rahasya; "Swaraj is my birthright"
Gandhi	Young India, Navjivan, Harijan	Hind Swaraj; "Do or Die"
Dadabhai Naoroji	Rast Goftar (1851)	Poverty and Un-British Rule in India
Abul Kalam Azad	Al-Hilal, Al-Balagh	India Wins Freedom
Annie Besant	New India, Commonweal	Home Rule League, 1916
Jawaharlal Nehru	National Herald (1938)	The Discovery of India
Bankim Chandra	Bangadarshan (1873)	Anandamath; Vande Mataram
Subhas Bose	—	The Indian Struggle; "Jai Hind", "Dilli Chalo"
Lala Lajpat Rai	—	Unhappy India; first AITUC president
Mohammad Ali	Comrade, Hamdard	Khilafat leadership

Table C: Martyr → Date → Case

Martyr	Date	Case
Khudiram Bose	11 Aug 1908	Muzaffarpur bomb
Madan Lal Dhingra	17 Aug 1909	Curzon Wyllie shooting
Kartar Singh Sarabha	16 Nov 1915	Ghadar conspiracy
Bismil, Ashfaqulla, Roshan Singh	19 Dec 1927	Kakori
Jatin Das	13 Sep 1929	Hunger strike, Lahore jail
Chandra Shekhar Azad	27 Feb 1931	Alfred Park encounter
Bhagat Singh, Rajguru, Sukhdev	23 Mar 1931	Lahore Conspiracy Case
Surya Sen	12 Jan 1934	Chittagong armoury raid
Udham Singh	31 Jul 1940	O'Dwyer shooting

Practice MCQs

Q1. Who was the president of the first session of the Indian National Congress in 1885? (a) Dadabhai Naoroji (b) W.C. Bonnerjee (c) Badruddin Tyabji (d) A.O. Hume

Q2. The song Vande Mataram was sung for the first time at which Congress session? (a) Calcutta, 1896 (b) Calcutta, 1911 (c) Benares, 1905 (d) Bombay, 1885

Q3. Who was the first Indian woman to become president of the Indian National Congress? (a) Annie Besant (b) Nellie Sengupta (c) Sarojini Naidu (d) Vijaya Lakshmi Pandit

Q4. The newspaper Kesari was started by: (a) Gopal Krishna Gokhale (b) Bal Gangadhar Tilak (c) M.G. Ranade (d) Lala Lajpat Rai

Q5. Who wrote the book Anandamath, which contains the song Vande Mataram? (a) Rabindranath Tagore (b) Sarat Chandra Chattopadhyay (c) Bankim Chandra Chattopadhyay (d) Dinabandhu Mitra

Q6. Bhagat Singh, Rajguru and Sukhdev were hanged on: (a) 27 February 1931 (b) 23 March 1931 (c) 19 December 1927 (d) 13 September 1929

Q7. Match the following pairs. A. Al-Hilal — 1. Annie Besant; B. New India — 2. Abul Kalam Azad; C. Young India — 3. Motilal Nehru; D. The Independent — 4. M.K. Gandhi (a) A-2, B-1, C-4, D-3 (b) A-1, B-2, C-3, D-4 (c) A-2, B-1, C-3, D-4 (d) A-4, B-3, C-2, D-1

Q8. The phrase "Quit India" and the slogan "Simon Go Back" were both coined by: (a) Sarojini Naidu (b) Jawaharlal Nehru (c) Yusuf Meherally (d) Ram Manohar Lohia

Q9. The Servants of India Society (1905) was founded by: (a) M.G. Ranade (b) Gopal Krishna Gokhale (c) Dadabhai Naoroji (d) Surendranath Banerjee

Q10. Who unfurled an early version of the Indian national flag at the International Socialist Congress at Stuttgart in 1907? (a) Annie Besant (b) Sarojini Naidu (c) Bhikaji Cama (d) Sarala Devi Chaudhurani

Q11. Arrange the following events in chronological order: 1. Hanging of the Kakori martyrs, 2. Hanging of Khudiram Bose, 3. Death of Jatin Das, 4. Hanging of Surya Sen (a) 2, 1, 3, 4 (b) 1, 2, 3, 4 (c) 2, 3, 1, 4 (d) 2, 1, 4, 3

Q12. The only Congress session presided over by Mahatma Gandhi was held at: (a) Kanpur, 1925 (b) Belgaum, 1924 (c) Gaya, 1922 (d) Ahmedabad, 1921

Q13. Which of the following statements is NOT correct? (a) The Ghadar Party was founded in San Francisco in 1913 (b) Sohan Singh Bhakna was the president of the Ghadar Party (c) The Ghadar newspaper was published from London (d) Lala Hardayal was a leading founder of the Ghadar Party

Q14. During the Quit India Movement, the secret Congress Radio was run by: (a) Aruna Asaf Ali (b) Usha Mehta (c) Sucheta Kripalani (d) Kalpana Dutta

Q15. Consider the pairs: 1. The Discovery of India — Jawaharlal Nehru; 2. India Wins Freedom — Rajendra Prasad; 3. Unhappy India — Lala Lajpat Rai; 4. Hind Swaraj — M.K. Gandhi. Which pairs are correctly matched? (a) 1, 2 and 3 only (b) 1, 3 and 4 only (c) 2, 3 and 4 only (d) All four

Answer Key

Q	Answer	One-line reason
1	(b)	W.C. Bonnerjee presided at Bombay, 1885; Hume was the founder-organiser, not president
2	(a)	Vande Mataram was first sung at the Calcutta session of 1896
3	(c)	Sarojini Naidu, Kanpur 1925; Annie Besant (1917) was the first woman but not Indian
4	(b)	Tilak started Kesari (Marathi) in 1881
5	(c)	Bankim Chandra Chattopadhyay wrote Anandamath in 1882
6	(b)	The Lahore trio was hanged on 23 March 1931, observed as Shaheed Diwas
7	(a)	Azad — Al-Hilal; Besant — New India; Gandhi — Young India; Motilal Nehru — The Independent
8	(c)	Socialist leader Yusuf Meherally coined both expressions
9	(b)	Gokhale founded the Servants of India Society at Poona in 1905
10	(c)	Bhikaji Cama, Stuttgart, 1907
11	(a)	Khudiram 1908 → Kakori hangings 1927 → Jatin Das 1929 → Surya Sen 1934
12	(b)	Gandhi presided only at Belgaum, 1924
13	(c)	The Ghadar paper was published from San Francisco, not London
14	(b)	Usha Mehta operated the underground Congress Radio in 1942
15	(b)	India Wins Freedom is by Abul Kalam Azad, not Rajendra Prasad; the rest are correct