Santi Ghose

Santi Ghose
Born 22 November 1916
Calcutta, India
Died 1989
Alma mater Bengali Women's College
Known for Assassinating a British magistrate at age 15

Santi Ghose (also known as Santi Ghosh,[1] 22 November 1916 – 1989) was an Indian nationalist who, along with Suniti Choudhury, assassinated a British district magistrate when she was 15 years old[1][2][3] and is known for her participation in an armed revolutionary struggle.[2]

Early life

Ghose was born on 22 November 1916 in Calcutta, India.[2] She was the daughter of Debendranath Ghose, a nationalist and a professor of philosophy at Victoria College of Comilla in eastern Bengal.[2]

In 1931, Ghose was a founding member of the Chhatri Sangha (Girl Students Association) and served as its secretary.[2] Ghose was inspired by Profullanandini Brahma, a student at Faizunnesa Girls' School in Comilla, and joined the Jugantar Party,[2] a militant revolutionary organization which "used murder as a political technique to dislodge British colonial rule."[4] She trained in self-defense with swords, clubs, and firearms.[2]

Assassination of Charles Stevens

On 14 December 1931, Ghose, then 15, and Suniti Chowdhury, who was 14, walked into the office of Charles Geoffrey Buckland Stevens, a British bureaucrat and the district magistrate of Comilla, under the pretense that they wanted to present a petition to arrange a swimming competition amongst their classmates.[2] While Stevens looked at the document, Ghose and Chowdhury removed automatic pistols which were hidden under their shawls and shot and killed him.[2]

Trial and sentence

The girls were taken into custody and imprisoned in the local British jail.[2] In February 1932, Ghose and Chowdhury appeared in court in Calcutta, and were sentenced to transportation for life (lifelong banishment).[4][5] In an interview, they stated, "It is better to die than live in a horse's stable."[4][5] Ghose said that she was disappointed that she had not been sentenced to hanging and would thus not be able to achieve martyrdom.[2]

Ghose was subjected to humiliation and physical abuse in prison and was treated as a "second-class prisoner."[2] In 1939, after having served seven years of her sentence, she was released because of the amnesty negotiations between Gandhi and the British Indian government.[2]

Public and media response

Contemporary Western periodicals portrayed the assassination as a sign of "Indians' outrage against an ordinance by the Earl of Willingdon that suppressed the civil rights of Indians, including that of free speech."[2] Indian sources characterized the assassination as Ghose and Chowdbury's response to the "misbehaviors of the British district magistrates" who had abused their positions of power to rape Indian women.[2]

After the verdict was announced, a flyer was found by the intelligence branch of police in the Rajshahi district praising Ghose and Chowdbury as nationalist heroines.[4] The poster read, "THOU ART FREEDOM'S NOW, AND FAME'S" and displayed photographs of the two girls alongside lines from Robert Burns' poem Scots Wha Hae:

"Tyrants fall in every foe!
Liberty's in every blow!"[1]

  1. ^ Cite error: The named reference :2 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).

Later life and death

After her release, Ghose attended the Bengali Women's College and participated in India's Communist movement.[2] She later joined the Indian National Congress.[2] In 1942, Ghose married Professor Chittaranjan Das.[2] She served on the West Bengal Legislative Council from 1952–62 and 1967–68.[2] She also served on the West Bengal Legislative Assembly from 1962–64.[2] Ghose wrote and published a book entitled Arun Bahni.[2]

Ghose died in 1989.[2]

References

  1. 1 2 Forbes, Geraldine. Indian Women and the Freedom Movement: A Historian's Perspective.
  2. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 Smith, Bonnie G. (2008). The Oxford Encyclopedia of Women in World History. Oxford University Press, USA. pp. 377–8. ISBN 978-0-19-514890-9.
  3. ↑ Smith, Bonnie G. (2005). Women's History in Global Perspective, Volume 2. University of Illinois Press.
  4. 1 2 3 4 The Bangladesh Reader: History, Culture, Politics.
  5. 1 2 "INDIA: I & My Government". Time. 1932-02-08. ISSN 0040-781X. Retrieved 2016-04-12.
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