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them at Singapore and also to provide financial assistance to the destitute passengers.
But the first world war had disrupted the voyage. When the ship reached
Calcutta, a large group of police officers from Punjab, including David Patrie, were
already there to meet them. As a gesture of goodwill, the officers did not search the
ship in spite of the intelligence reports that there might be arms on board. The Sikh
passengers were told that they would not face punishment and would receive financial
assistance if they agreed to board a special train that would take them directly
back to Punjab. 26
When the Sikhs refused and tried to leave the ship, they were forced back. The
Ingress into India Ordinance, promulgated in September 1914, allowed the authorities
to restrict the movements of anyone entering India. When the officers tried to
identify Gurdit Singh and Harnam Singh who had organized the voyage from
Singapore, many passengers got agitated and opened fire with revolvers, wounding
Petrie and several others. At this point, troops came in to force the Sikhs into the
train, but Gurdit Singh, Harnam Singh and 28 others managed to escape. 27 The
incident and the subsequent intelligence operations revealed that the Ghadr organization
planned to systematically send revolutionaries into India to incite disturbances,
to carry out “violent deeds” of propaganda and to persuade Indian soldiers
to rebel mutiny. Official estimates said that between 1,000 to 3,000 immigrants
with active revolutionary connections had come into Punjab. According to Lieutenant-Governor
Michael O’Dwyer, these revolutionaries were able to impart seditious
sentiments to a large number of people in Punjab. He wrote: “I take it that
early this year there were from 6,000 to 10,000 men in the Punjab, who given the
arms, the direction and the opportunity, were ready to raise the standard of revolution.”
28
On 26 November 1914, the Ghadr revolutionaries made their first serious attempt
to provoke a mutiny in the Army. Having won over some troops from the 23 rd
Cavalry, stationed at Amritsar, Ghadr revolutionaries marched to seize the magazine
at Lahore. But their plans were leaked and all of them were arrested in a Lahore
village. Another attempt at Ferozepur also failed, but a sub-inspector of police was
killed. Soldiers of those regiments that had returned from the Far East were most
susceptible to revolutionary ideas. 29 But their organization had been deeply penetrated,
with close relatives of important revolutionaries themselves providing inside
information to the authorities. On 19 February 1915, the police raided the Ghadr
headquarters at Lahore and arrested 13 leaders of the organization along with their
arms, bombs, bomb-making materials, revolutionary literature, and rebel flags. 30
Harnam Singh was one of them.
The government believed that the Ghadr Party had been formed in consultation
with the German officials who wanted to instigate a rebellion in India even before
26
Telegrams from Viceroy to Secretary of State, 2 Oct. 1914, CUL Hardinge Papers. Vol. 98. Richard J.
Popplewell, ibid pp. 167-8.
27
Telegram from the Viceroy to the Secretary of State, 1 Oct. 1914. CUL Hardinge papers, Vol. 88. Ker,
Political Trouble in India, Reprint, Calcutta, 1973, pp. 239-42.
28
Letter from O’Dwyer to Hardings, 8 Nov. 1915. CUL Hardinge Papers; Printed Letters and Telegrams,
Vol. 90, p. 369.
29
Ker, ibid, p. 367, Richard L. Popplewell, ibid, p. 172.
30
O’Dwyer, op. Cit., p. 202.
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