April 4, 1968- Martin Luther King Jr., the face of the civil rights movement in USA, was fatally shot at the Lorraine Motel in Memphis, Tennessee. He was a Nobel Peace Prize laureate who was known for his use of nonviolence and civil disobedience.
April 11, 1827- Birthday of Mahtama Jyotirao Govindrao Phule. His work extended to many fields, including the eradication of untouchability, caste system, agricultural reforms, and in educating women and oppressed caste people.
April 13, 1919- Jallianwala Bagh Massacre, also called Massacre of Amritsar, happened in which British troops fired on a large crowd of unarmed Indians in an open space known as the Jallianwala Bagh in Amritsar in the Punjab region, killing several hundred people and wounding many hundreds more.
April 14, 1891 marks the birthday of Dr. Bhimrao Ramji Ambedkar, a visionary Indian poltical leader, and social reformer, a champion of social justice for marginalised communities, especially, Dalits. He was also one of the chief architects of the Indian constitution.
April 16, 1889 – Birthday of comedian Charles Chaplin. He was born in London. Chaplin’s classics include The Kid, The Gold Rush, City Lights, Modern Times, The Great Dictator etc. exposing capitalism and imperialist wars.
April 17, 1961 – A U.S.-backed attempt to overthrow Premier Fidel Castro of Cuba failed disastrously in what became known as the Bay of Pigs fiasco. About 1,400 anti-Castro exiles invaded the island’s southern coast along the Bay of Pigs but were overrun by 20,000 Cuban soldiers and jailed.
“Never forget the 18th of April, 1930, the day of Eastern Rebellion in Chittagong. Keep ever fresh in your memory the fights of Jallalabad, Julia, Chandernagar and Dhalghat. Write in red letters in the core of your hearts the names of all patriots who have sacrificed their lives at the altar of India’s freedom… Long Live Revolution! Bandemataram!” –Excerpt from the last letter written by Masterda Surya Sen, from Chittagong Jail on 11th Jan, 1934 – a day before his hanging.
April 22, 1889 – birthday of Comrade Vladimir Ilyich Lenin (V.I. Lenin). He led the socialist revolution in 1917 which is celebrated as the great October Socialist revolution. On this day in 1969, the Communist Party of India (Marxist-Leninist) was founded by Charu Majumder and other comrades in the aftermath of the Naxalbari uprising, (Refer to the article on page 13)
