India House in Aldwych, the present-day building under the authority of the Indian government, has a very long history.
It is held on a long leasehold by the Indian government, surrounded by institutions steeped in traditions such as legal hubs for lawyers and barristers like Lincoln’s Inn or Gray’s Inn, the prestigious King’s College London, esteemed colleges for surgeons, the Royal Court of Justice and even the seats of power at the Palace of Westminster, Whitehall and Downing Street are nearby.
In 1928, during a discussion at the House of Commons in the British Parliament, on the Bardoli Satyagraha, brilliantly led by Vallabhbhai Patel (later known as Sardar Patel), a member of the House of Commons remarked, "What will happen if the whole of India is ‘Bardolised’, embracing the non-cooperation movement?"
The British realised that after the First World War, the UK was nearly equal to the USA as the world's leading power. They have a unique sense of innovation, a strong ability to correct themselves in necessary course, and the ability to continuously improvise.
In 1900, when the Labour Party was established, Shyamji Krishna Verma, a barrister from Mandvi, Kutch, Gujarat, who had recently settled in the UK, was one of its generous supporters. He contributed £1,000 at the time, which would be roughly 120 times more now. Shyamji also started an anti-colonialist newspaper, ‘The Indian Sociologist’ (a bilingual English and Gujarati publication).
In 1905, Shyamji Krishna Verma founded a student residence named "India House" at 65 Cromwell Avenue, Highgate, North London. This institution was established to promote nationalist views among Indian students in Britain and offered scholarships to Indian youths for higher studies in England. The building quickly became a hub for political activism and one of the most prominent centers for overseas revolutionary Indian nationalism. "India House" informally referred to the nationalist organisations that operated within it over time.
After Shyamji Krishna Verma's departure, the leadership of the organisation passed to Vinayak Damodar Savarkar, a law student who arrived in London in 1906 on a scholarship from Krishna Verma. Under Savarkar's leadership, India House was transformed into the headquarters of the Indian revolutionary movement in Britain. The members of this movement were young men and women from all over India, with significant numbers hailing from Bengal, Punjab, Bombay, and Maharashtra. Following the assassination of Sir William H. Curzon by Madanlal Dhingra in 1909, India House was swiftly shut down. (A century later, the Gujarat government commissioned a life-size replica of the London India House in Mandvi, known as Kranti Tirth, to honour its legacy).
The British perception was quite clear, they recognised the significance, reputation, and emotional attachment associated with the name "India House." It's likely that the India House in Aldwych was named with this historical background in mind. Like the new Consulate of India in Newcastle-upon-Tyne, inaugurated by Indian High Commissioner His Excellency Vikram K Doraiswami on 30 August is also named 'India House’ (for more see p9).
We should remember that India, a vast country nearly half the size of the Western Europe, was governed by the British through the Colonial Office and the Viceroy of India.
However, India House in Aldwych had no role in governing India, instead, it functioned as the purchasing hub for the Indian colonial government and all its provinces. When I arrived in the UK in 1966, I was informed that India House wasn't confined to just that building; there were additional premises where staff worked. At the time, around 700 people were employed there, and every import from India, from paper clips to railway engines, were supplied by Britain. This served to extend British economic dominance. After India's independence in 1947, the situation reversed, and V. K. Krishna Menon became the first High Commissioner of India after Independence.
Many of the High Commissioners appointed to London were stalwarts of the Indian independence movement, brilliant lawyers, and individuals with close connections to the Nehru and Gandhi families.
I had the privilege of knowing High Commissioner, M. C. Chagla, a brilliant lawyer from the Ismaili community who later became India’s Minister of Education.
Before Independence, Sir Zafarullah Khan, who later became Pakistan's Foreign Minister and served as President of the UN General Assembly and the International Court of Justice, represented Pakistan in the United Nations Security Council. V. K. Krishna Menon represented India at that time. During times when Western countries often aligned with Pakistan, it was only the Russian veto that helped to safeguard India.
Interestingly, Zafarullah Khan was an Ahmadiyya Muslim, a group not recognised as Muslims by the Pakistani government. Equally notable is that the founder of Pakistan, Muhammad Ali Jinnah, was born into an Ismaili Shia Muslim family but later converted to Shia Isnasheri.
To be continued next week...
