The Modern Period
Part III

The Nagpur revenue assessment was enhanced by the Residents right from 1830. The revenue system under the Bhosles through crude and elementary left the farmers with a surplus that was enough for their maintenance and future agricultural operations.

The activities of the Christian Missionaries began to be felt in Nagpur since 1845. In that year Stephen Hislop arrived in Nagpur and soon founded the Scottish Mission. One of the associates of Hislop. Mr. Voss was belaboured by the Nagpur mob for his proselytising activities. The Nagpur people stoutly resisted the missionary activities. However the missionaries in course of time further divided the Indian society which was already subjected to the divide-and-rule policy of the British.

In sum. In Nagpur as in other parts of India the alien rulers set the police against the people, the landlords against their cultivators, the Muslims against the Hindus, one caste against the other and even one sub-caste against another sub-caste. The socio-political repercussions of the dissensions nurtured by the British are felt by the people even today. In its trail, it has created problem which are difficult of solution.

Within less than a hundred years of the British rule the indigenous economy was killed in the interest of Great Britain. No wonder that Nagpur should have fallen a prey to this general economic devastation. The cotton and silk textile industries of Nagpur which were carefully built by the Bhosles had once great demand in the markets of Egypt and Europe. With the advent of machine-made cloth imported free of duty these industries were totally ruined.

Lord Lytton's unblessed regime (1876-80) left sad memories in the people's mind. The oppressive Vernacular Press Act, the huge expenditure incurred during the Second Afghan War, the lowering of age-limit for admission of Indians to the I.C.S. and the opening of the Muhammedan Anglo-Oriental College at Aligad roused public feelings throughout India. Nagpur was not slow to react against these measures.

Nagpur was moved when Vasudev Balavant Phadke of Sirdhon, the first revolutionary, tried to overthrow the British rule. He failed in his attempt and was deported to distant Aden. Nagpur was quick to receive new ideas from Poona, which led to the formation of nationalism. Soon after the foundation of the Sarvajanik Sabha of Poona, the Loka Sabha was established in Nagpur with its branches in the principal towns of the Madhya Pradeshh. The educated well-to-do middle class formed the back bone of these public activities.

For the second Session of the Congress which met at Calcutta, B.K. Bose of Madhya Pradesh was invited but could not attend. However, his friends Bapurav Dada Kinkhede, Gangadharrav Citnavis and Gopal Hari Bhinde of Nagpur were present at the session. Abdul Aziz of Kamptee, near Nagpur, made a fine speech in Urdu at Calcutta. The Calcutta meeting imparted fresh vigour to the efforts of Krsnarav Pathak to establish a Sabha on the lines of the Sarvajanika Sabha of Poona. Gangadharrav Citanvis was the President of the Nagpur LokSabha and Bapurav Dada Kinkhede its secretary. In 1886, a similar Sabha was founded at Amravati with the efforts of Vinayak Digambar Devras of Akola, Khaparde, Mudholkar, Joshi and Kazi Badruddin of Malkapur.