India’s First Radicals

Young Bengal and the British Empire

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In 1831, the editor of the India Gazette wrote a report about a group he called the ‘Radicals’, ‘Ultra-Reformers’ or ‘the Ultras’, who were responsible for an unprecedented upheaval in social, religious and political thinking centred in Calcutta. Later named ‘Young Bengal’, these students of Henry Derozio at the Hindu College had embarked upon a collision course with orthodoxy and authority, generating scandal and sensation in equal measure.

Focusing on their activities twelve years later in 1843, this book examines their achievements in a radical reassessment of their contribution. That year saw Young Bengal argue for the rights of the peasant, campaign against corruption in the police and judiciary, bring a legal case against a British magistrate for the mistreatment of labourers, and continue their fight against racial, gender and caste discrimination in society. It also marked their formation of the first Indian political party.

India’s First Radicals seeks to rethink the activities of Young Bengal, whose pioneering contributions to public discourse and the changes they wrought were among the earliest shifts to define modern India as we now know it.