Ram Narayan Chaudhary (1 August 1895 – 4 April 1989) was a Gandhian social reformer, anti-colonial nationalist, writer, and publisher, from Rajasthan in India who contributed over three decades of his life to the Indian independence movement.
He employed protest techniques such as satyagraha, non-cooperation, and non-violent resistance during Indian independence movement and in his crusade to abolish taxes on landless labourers and farmers imposed by feudal lords in Rajputana region. Chaudhary was closely associated with Harijan Sevak Sangh and toured the southern parts of India with Gandhi in the latter's campaign to rid the evil of untouchability.
He spent almost six years in prison serving five different jail terms due to his civic rights activism in pre-independent India, including over two years during the Quit India movement.
Chaudhary wrote and edited 13 books, and translated over 65 canonical texts by Mahatma Gandhi and his close associates given his vast knowledge of languages viz. English, Hindi, Gujarati, Urdu, Persian, and Sanskrit. A renowned journalist, Chaudhary established and ran several newspapers in Hindi and English, including Rajasthan Kesari, Naveen Rajasthan, Navjyoti (weekly), and Naya Rajasthan during various phases in his lifetime.Rajasthan Swadhinta Sangram Ke Sakshi: Kuch Sansmaran (in Hindi). Rajasthan State Archives: Bikaner. 1992. pp. 109–110. Born into a family of privilege in present-day Rajasthan, Chaudhary, as a graduate student in Jaipur, was initially drawn towards revolutionary activities against British Raj inspired by the writings of Aurobindo Ghose, Giuseppe Mazzini, and Bal Gangadhar Tilak.
However, increasingly in his twenties, he adopted Gandhi's ideological repertoire in his political activism. He and his wife, Anjana Devi, gave up family wealth and settled for a life of self-austerity on the principles of aparigraha.Chaudhary, Ram Narayan (1954). Bapu: Meine Kya Dekha, Kya Samjha (in Hindi). Navajivan Prakashan Mandir: Ahmedabad. pp. 13–14. In the 1920s, Chaudhary was one of the leading figures of Bijolia Satyagraha demanding revocation of feudal taxes on farmers, labourers and bonded slaves in Rajputana princely states. His wife, Anjana Devi, too, was an equal partner in this endeavour, especially in mobilising women. Later, he worked to spread agricultural knowledge and formal education among the deprived Bhils, a tribal group in Rajasthan.
His social work took place on the direct advice and instructions of Gandhi. He stayed at Gandhi's Sabarmati Ashram in Ahmedabad a couple of times in the late-1920s and 1940s. At Gandhi's ashram at Wardha, where he resided for three years with his family, Chaudhary handled Gandhi's correspondence besides managing important administrative duties at the ashram as Gandhi's trusted aide.Chaudhary, Ram Narayan (1954). Bapu: Meine Kya Dekha, Kya Samjha (in Hindi). Navajivan Prakashan Mandir: Ahmedabad. pp. 108.
After India's independence, Chaudhary lived for a decade in Delhi working to remove social discrimination and promoting knowledge of governance among public servants and elected local-level leaders.Agrawal, Sita (2008). Shradhannjali: Swargya Ram Narayan Chaudhary Aur Anjanadevi Ek Vishishta Swatantra Senani Yugal (in Hindi). Navajivan Prakashan Mandir: Ahmedabad. pp. 133-139. In Delhi, he grew close to Jawaharlal Nehru, India's first Prime Minister, frequently interviewing him and exchanging letters. He lived the last two decades of his life in Ajmer in his home state of Rajasthan.
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Early life (1895–1914)
Birth and family background Ram Narayan Chaudhary was born on 1 August 1895 at Neem Ka Thana, a town in Sikar district of present-day Rajasthan state. His father, Muralidhar Chaudhary, served as the chief advocate estimating taxes on the farm produces in Sikar princely state. His mother, Chhotibai Chaudhary, was the daughter of Manikaran Harbhajanka, a panch of Shrimadhopur, a municipality in Rajasthan's Sikar district. Ram Narayan was third of his parents’ seven children, four of whom were boys and three girls. Durgaprasad, one of his younger brothers, was a Gandhian nationalist and publisher who was jailed during the Quit India movement.
Chaudhary was born into a wealthy Marwadi with nobility background. His father, Muralidhar Chaudhary, inherited his aristocrat position in Sikar state from his elder brother, Chainsukhji, who had shifted from Kanwat to Neem Ka Thana to become a zamindar’s legal counsel. Due to their services to the princely state, they were endowed with the titular surname of Chaudhary, generally associated with the Jat caste in northern India. Muralidhar Chaudhary was also involved in agriculture and money lending business.
Education Chaudhary's formal education began at a maktab near his family home. At this maktab, he learnt Urdu under Mirza Rahim Baig, a strict disciplinarian.Rajasthan Swadhinta Sangram Ke Sakshi: Kuch Sansmaran (in Hindi). Rajasthan State Archives: Bikaner. 1992. pp. 105. Soon, his study of Sanskrit language began under a local Brahmin priest living in Neem Ka Thana.
At the age of eight, Chaudhary was sent to Jobner with his brother Chagganlal to study at a school run by Thakur Karni Singh, an Arya Samaj devotee. His study of languages, including English, continued at this school where he remained till class six. Due to his academic excellence, Chaudhary was double promoted and was able to skip classes at Jobner school.Bhandari, Mohanraj (2001). Rajasthan Mein Swatantra Sangram Ke Amar Purodha: Ramnarayan Chaudhary (in Hindi). Rajasthan Swarna Jayanti Samaroh Samiti: Jaipur, pp. 4.
After class six, Chaudhary was shifted to Maharaja High School, located next to the famous Hawa Mahal in Jaipur city. At sixteen, Chaudhary excelled with First Class in his matriculation examination. Consequently, in 1911, he joined Maharaja College in Jaipur, situated right next to his high-school, to study engineering.
Intellectual awakening At Maharaja College, Chaudhary could access and read newspapers for the first time in his life. He became curious about political history and national movements. His knowledge base expanded as he acquainted himself with not only the Indian movement for independence but also various nationalist struggles across the world, such as Japan's fight against Russian Empire in the early 1900s. He drew inspiration from the writings of Aurobindo Ghose, Lokmanya Tilak, and Swami Vivekananda.Sita Agrawal, Shradhannjali: Swargiya Ramnarayan Chaudhary Aur Anjana Devi Ek Vishistha Swatantra Senani Yugal (in Hindi), Navjivan Prakashan Mandir: Ahmedabad, 2008, preface iv.
On the advice of Arjun Lal Sethi, Chaudhary joined the Kranti Dal (Revolutionary Corps), to contribute to Indian nationalist movement, along with Chhotelal Jain and Gulab Singh Sogani circa 1912–13. It became his route to intellectual awakening and broadening of the mind. He read Bankimchandra Chattopadhyay's Anandmath, Lala Har Dayal's articles, Vinayak Savarkar's Indian War of Independence as part of his induction at Kranti Dal. In this time, he happened to appreciate the Italian nationalist Giuseppe Mazzini's memoirs and Morgan Schuster's Strangling of Persia. He also became interested in the work of the Theosophical Society. On his elder brother's advice, Chaudhary took and passed a few examinations, known as inter-science examinations, though he rejected a scholarship to study in Japan and also left Maharaja College in Jaipur to contribute to the nationalist cause.
During his college days, Chaudhary married Anjana Devi, daughter of a wealthy trader from Srimadhopur, through an arranged marriage.Rajasthan Swadhinta Sangram Ke Sakshi: Kuch Sansmaran (in Hindi). Rajasthan State Archives: Bikaner. 1992. pp. 107-08. She also donned the role of his associate in the Indian independence struggle.
Struggle for Indian Independence (1914–1947)
From revolutionary activism to non-violence As part of Kranti Dal in his initial years of association with the Indian freedom movement, Chaudhary became a conduit for supplying messages and information to revolutionaries spread in parts of north India, including those associated with the Delhi conspiracy case - a plot to assassinate Lord Hardinge, the then Viceroy of India. Circa 1915, Chaudhary and Jaychand were selected to murder British Raj's Home member Sir Reginald Craddock. Chaudhary was assigned this task by Pratapsinh on the advice of Chhotelal Jain. However, Jaychand's reluctance made it impossible for Chaudhary to undertake the killing. Ultimately, Pratapsinh was selected to kill Craddock but as Craddock fell sick, it could not be carried out either.Mohanraj Bhandari, Rajasthan Mein Swatantra Sangram Ke Amar Purodha: Ramnarayan Chaudhary (in Hindi), Rajasthan Swarna Jayanti Samaroh Samiti: Jaipur, 2001, pp. 7.
In 1915, after a student killed a senior English police official in Calcutta, Gandhi who had arrived in India from South Africa denounced this violent act in a public address. This speech urging masses to adopt non-violent means to oppose colonialism profoundly impacted Chaudhary. Earlier, while studying at Jaipur's Maharaja College, he had already been introduced to Mahatma Gandhi's anti-colonial activism undertaken in South Africa through writings of prominent nationalists such as Krishnakant Malviya and Ganeshshankar Vidyarthi.Ramnarayan Chaudhary, Bapu: Maine Kya Dekha, Kya Samjha? (in Hindi), Navjivan Prakashan Mandir: Ahmedabad, 2000 (originally 1954), pp. 1.
Nevertheless, Chaudhary's faith in non-violent resistance was still not resolute as he was briefly wooed by Marxist thoughts, especially after the Russian revolution. But as Gandhi's influence in India began to increase in the late 1910s and early 1920s, Chaudhary took more interest in his philosophy and established contact with Gandhi. At this time, revolutionary anarchists such as Sethi and Pathik, who were the first mentors of Chaudhary, came to respect Gandhi and often sought his advice; Sethi had become the most crucial functionary of Congress in Rajasthan by 1921. Soon, Chaudhary renounced violent means for revolutionary activities and accepted the Gandhian idea of nonviolent resistance.Ramnarayan Chaudhary, Bapu: Maine Kya Dekha, Kya Samjha? (in Hindi), Navjivan Prakashan Mandir: Ahmedabad, 2000 (originally 1954), pp. 2-3.
Chaudhary taught in Ramgarh at an industrialist's school after leaving his college education. In mid-1917, he left this job to fully devote himself to the independence movement and contacted Jamnalal Bajaj, a well-known businessperson, a follower of Gandhi associated with Indian independence movement, and one of Chaudhary's life-long mentors.Ram Narayan Chaudhary, Bapu: Maine Kya Dekha, Kya Samjha? (in Hindi), Navjivan Prakashan Mandir: Ahmedabad, 2000 (originally 1954), pp. 4-5.
Soon, to his surprise, Gandhi personally wrote to Chaudhary a letter asking about his availability to work in Bihar's Champaran under Chhotelal Jain, a prominent student leader who had given up violence after his contact with Gandhi and whom Chaudhary already knew. In another letter, Gandhi wrote to Bajaj praising Chaudhary's teaching abilities. However, Chaudhary was unable to proceed to Champaran as he had committed to teaching at Wardha's Marwadi Education Society run by Bajaj and Krishnadas Jaju. Later, through Chhotelal Jain, Chaudhary found out that Gandhi was particularly impressed by his readiness to give up casteist norms of untouchability.Mohanraj Bhandari, Rajasthan Mein Swatantra Sangram Ke Amar Purodha: Ram Narayan Chaudhary (in Hindi), Rajasthan Swarna Jayanti Samaroh Samiti: Jaipur, 2001, pp. 9.