Dandi March (12 Mar 1930 – 5 Apr 1930)

Dandi March  (12 Mar 1930 – 5 Apr 1930)

The Salt March, also known as the Salt Satyagraha, Dandi March and the Dandi Satyagraha, was an act of nonviolent civil disobedience in colonial India led by Mahatma Gandhi

The government made a new law. They imposed taxes on the use of salt. This was opposed by the people, as salt was the basic need of the people. But, no attention was paid to demands of the people. 

During March-April,1930, Gandhi marched from his Sabarmati Ashram to Dandi on the Gujarat coastfor the purpose of raiding the Government Salt. The violation of salt law was hisfirst challenge to

the government. It was a peaceful march. 

committed atechnical breach of the Salt Law on 6th April, 1930, when he picked up the scatteredsea salt from the coast to break this Law. In this movement farmers, traders and women took part in large numbers. The government arrested him in May 1930 andput him in Yervada jail at Poona. 

The campaign had a significant effect on Britishattitude toward Indian independence. Gandhi-Irwin Pact in 1931 was one of itsexamples. Gandhiji also went to London in 1931 and participated in the second roundtable conference as the sole representative of the Congress but no settlement couldbe arrived at. Although, Gandhi’s arrest removed him from the active leadership ofthe movement, this civil disobedience continued. Special stress was laid on boycottof foreign goods particularly clothes.

The Civil Disobedience Movement, though a failure, was a vital phase in the strugglefor the freedom. It promoted unity among Indians of different regions under theCongress banner. It provided an opportunity to recruit younger people and educatethem for positions of trust and responsibility in the organization as also in provincialadministration, which was captured in the 1937 elections. It gave wide publicity topolitical ideas and methods throughout the country and generated political awarenesseven in remote villages.

KEY FECTOR :

• The Dandi March, a ls also known as the Salt March and the Dandi Satyagraha was an act of nonviolent civil disobedience led by Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi.
• The march lasted from 12^th March, 1930 to 6^th April, 1930 as a direct action campaign of tax resistance and nonviolent protest against the British salt monopoly.
• On 12^th March, Gandhiji set out from Sabarmati with 78 followers on a 241-mile march to the coastal town of Dandi on the Arabian Sea. There, Gandhi and his supporters were to defy British policy by making salt from seawater.
• At Dandi, thousands more followed his lead, and in the coastal cities of Bombay and Karachi, Indian nationalists led crowds of citizens in making salt.
• Civil disobedience broke out all across India, soon involving millions of Indians, and British authorities arrested more than 60,000 people. Gandhiji himself was arrested on 5th May, but the satyagraha continued without him.
• On 21^st May, the poet Sarojini Naidu led 2,500 marchers on the Dharasana Salt Works, some 150 miles north of Bombay. The incident, recorded by American journalist Webb Miller, prompted an international outcry against British policy in India.
• In January 1931, Gandhiji was released from prison. He later met with Lord Irwin, the viceroy of India, and agreed to call off the satyagraha in exchange for an equal negotiating role at a London conference on India’s future.
  in August 1931, 
• in August 1931, Gandhiji traveled to the conference as the sole representative of the nationalist Indian National Congress. The meeting was a disappointment, but British leaders had acknowledged him as a force they could not suppress or ignore