When Jayaprakash Narayan was an Inter student, there was a movement going on in the country. Gandhiji appealed to the students, teachers, lawyers and other sections to boycott the British. JP's exam was about to take place and his preparation was also good. But on the call of Gandhiji, he jumped into the movement. Education was left in the middle. When the movement cooled down a bit, JP thought of going abroad for studies. After completing his studies at Bihar Vidyapeeth, in 1922, Jayaprakash Narayan left his wife Prabhavati in Mahatma Gandhi's Sabarmati Ashram and himself went to America to study at Berkeley University in California. When he returned from there, he jumped into the freedom movement.
In a documentary of RSTV, senior journalist Ram Bahadur Rai has told many such tales of JP. Today we are mentioning Jayaprakash Narayan because a film by Kangana Ranaut centered on the Emergency of 1975 is coming - Emergency . In this, Anupam Kher is in the role of Lok Nayak Jayaprakash Narayan.
The Emergency period was the second phase of JP's activism. In the first innings, where he was a freedom fighter in his youth and agitated against the British rule, in the second innings he led the student movement despite being an old man. This movement started from Bihar became nationwide and this movement shook the chair of Indira Gandhi.
Born on October 11, 1902, in Sitab Diyara village of Saran district in Bihar, JP was Marxist leaning while studying in America. He returned to India and became a Congressman and then the same JP overthrew the Congress government by launching a movement against the system. Senior journalist Ram Bahadur Rai, who was a member of the student committee that started the movement in 1974, says that the student movement led by JP was Was against inflation, unemployment, corruption, criminalization of politics prevailing in the country. These issues were related to the common man and this movement was spontaneous.
This was his second innings of activism. In the first innings, he was a freedom fighter and joined the movements and suppressed the British rule. All this happened on his return from America.
Wages in America, influenced by Karl Marx
JP lived in America from 1922 to 1929. Completed BA and MA, but could not do PhD. To meet the expenses of his studies, JP worked in America in farms, companies and hotels, and during this time he got to know the difficulties of the working class closely. According to Rai, Karl Marx had a clear influence in his thoughts when JP returned from America.
He returned to India due to the ill health of his mother. On his way back to India, he met many Communist leaders in London and in India. However, he did not support the communist leaders of India. He joined the Congress in 1929 at the behest of Jawaharlal Nehru. Civil disobedience movement was going on in the country. JP joined it under the leadership of Gandhiji and was arrested.
Left leaning again while in prison!
Rai tells that in 1932, when he was imprisoned in Nashik jail, during this time he became close to leaders like Ram Manohar Lohia, Achyut Patwardhan, CK Narayanaswamy. These meetings and closeness inspired him to join the Congress Socialist Party. It was a left-leaning group within the Congress party, headed by Acharya Narendra Dev. In December 1939, as the General Secretary of the Congress Socialist Party, he called upon the youth to raise their voice against the British Raj.
He was arrested again and this time went to jail for 9 months. He talked to both Mahatma Gandhi and Subhas Chandra Bose for his release. After his release, he also tried to bring friendship between the two leaders of the Moderate Dal and the Hot Dal. However they did not succeed.
escaped from prison and led the movement
His leadership came to the fore during the Quit India Movement, when after the arrest of Gandhiji and big leaders, he took over the movement along with Ram Manohar Lohia. However, later he was also arrested. He was lodged in Hazaribagh Jail. He planned to escape from prison with his companions and escaped from jail on 9 November 1942. Then he also worked underground. He also formed an independent squad in Nepal. In September 1943, he was once again arrested from Punjab while traveling in a train. Tortures were given. He was later released on April 1946 on the condition of Gandhiji to talk to the British rule.
Regarding the vision of both the leaders, Ram Bahadur Rai says that Mahatma Gandhi's movement was centered on 'British Quit India'. At the same time, the vision of JP was about complete independence. In his second innings, it appeared as a slogan for total revolution. Even after independence, JP, concerned for the poor, joined the Bhoodan movement of Binoba Bhave and showed a lot of activism.
Call for total revolution in second innings
JP was getting old. They had become old. There were problems in the country. In the 70s, the common man was suffering from corruption, unemployment, inflation. Ram Bahadur Rai says, JP was thinking then that how the movement should stand. Then some movements were taking place in other countries of the world as well. Especially in France, a student leader named Cannes Banded was leading millions of students and challenging Degel's authority on the streets of Paris. He had got the answer.
In 1974, when the youth requested the leadership of the Nav Nirman movement, JP immediately agreed. Starting a peaceful movement from Gandhi Maidan in Patna, he called for a total revolution. JP was never infatuated with power. He wanted to see the person who came out of the most oppressed society of the society at the peak of power. The movement which started from Bihar became nationwide on seeing and the result is known to all.
How JP's movement in the era of Indira is India and Indira is India shook the chair of Indira Gandhi, who is called Iron Lady. The panicked government imposed emergency in the country and then when elections were held, the Congress had to lose power. It was said that for the first time elections were held under the leadership of the people, not the leaders and then a non-Congress government was formed in the country.
However, JP was arrested during the Emergency. He was in jail again. But there his health started deteriorating. On 24 October 1976, his health became very bad. He was released on 12 November of the same year. Then in the investigation in Mumbai it was found that one of his kidneys was damaged. He breathed his last in Patna on 8 October 1979.
JP was given the Magsaysay Award for public service in 1965. At the same time, the Government of India posthumously honored him with the country's highest honor Bharat Ratna in 1999. It is being said that during the Emergency, the same story of JP will be shown in Kangana Ranaut's film.
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