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The Revolutionary Movement in Bengal

In the events of the Midnapore conference and of the Surat Congress following one another in close succession, in the adoption of lawlessness and violence, so conspicuous in the break-up of the Surat Congress, as a method of political warfare, impartial observers could read the beginnings of a new development fraught with peril to the orderly and peaceful evolution of our national life. Here was a portent, the full significance of which soon manifested itself. On the morning of April 1, 1908, all Calcutta was startled to learn that on the previous evening a bomb outrage had been committed at Mozufferpore in Behar, and that the unhappy victims of it were two European ladies, mother and daughter, the wife and sixteen-year old child, of Mr. Pringle Kennedy, a leading pleader of the Mozufferpore Bar.

By a bitter irony of fate Mr. Pringle Kennedy was one of the few Europeans who had identified themselves with the Congress movement, and had on one occasion presided over a session of the Bengal Provincial Conference. The bomb was meant for Mr. Kingsford, District Judge of Mozufferpore, who, as Presidency Magistrate of Calcutta, had made himself unpopular by passing heavy sentences on young Bengalee Swadeshi workers. Especially odious had he become by inflicting corporal punishment upon more than one respectable young man. The sentences were believed to be unjust; and it was adding insult to injury to degrade their victims by the infliction of corporal punishment. The insult sank deep into the hearts of some of the young Swadeshi workers; and they vowed revenge. Two young men, Khudiram Bose and Profulla Chakie were charged with the execution of the mandate of the conspirators. Both lost their lives. One was hanged; and the other shot himself when about to be captured. It was a tragedy in the fullest sense—grim, futile and purposeless. It was immediately followed by the