Marathwada Mukti Sangram

Even after the independence, some regions of India had to fight again for freedom. This is the story of Marathwada's fight against the brutal Razakars and Nizam, and its integration to India in 1948

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India got independence on 15th August 1947, back then states were different from today, their boarders, names were different. Princely states were given the choice to join India or Pakistan, many joined India while some decided not to join either. One of them was Hyderabad state, which was ruled by Nizam want to stay independent. The state was consisting of present day Marathwada region of Maharashtra, Telangana state and some parts of Karnataka. Nizam signed a standstill agreement with India, and even appealed the united nation to grant and acknowledge its statehood. Indian government was trying hard to make Hyderabad state its part, but Nizam was not very cooperative and did not talk through. People certainly did not want another ruler, and were eager to join India. To handle people, a paramilitary volunteer force of Muslim nationalist party (MIM) called ‘Razakars’ took action; formed during the British Raj, it expanded during Indian Independence under Qasim Razvi’s leadership to crush any uprising in Hyderabad state. Razakars were brutal and targeted mainly Hindus and their sympathizers; even Muslim who want to join India and the communist trying to start the revolution of the state. So many atrocities were committed against Hindus, and their family; men were shot dead even on suspicion, their women were raped. People were moving out of the state to neighboring Indian provinces such as Bombay and Bezawada. India's government several times asked the Nizam to disband the Razakars, but he turned down.

Aurangabad division also known as Marathwada region was important part of Hyderabad state. Being the previous capital of it, Aurangabad was crucial in taking down Razakars and Nizam. After the city of Hyderabad, the largest numbers of Razakars were in Aurangabad. Therefore, when the final revolt began, Marathwada saw major uprising against Razakars and Nizam. Almost every village and town in Marathwada fought in this fight.

Main leaders of this revolt were Swami Ramanand Tirth, Govindbhai Shroff, Vijayendra Kabra and Ramanbhai Parikh and P H Patwardhan. When the revolt sparked, Razakars tortured the people even harshly. After that, even more people started joining the revolt. Kashinath Kulkarni, Digambarrao Bindu, Ravinarayana Reddy, Devisingh Chauhan, Bhausaheb Vaishmpayan, Shankarsingh Naik, Babasaheb Paranjape and Mohanappa Somnathpurkar and others joined. As well as Vithhalrao Katkar from Beed, Harishchandra Jadhav from Latur, Janardan Hortikar from Osmanabad, Suryabhan Pawar from Parbhani, Devrao Kavle from Nanded joined the forces with other independence fighters who came to rescue the state.

When Nizam responded to the revolt with more force, Indian government finally decided to take the police action on 13 September 1948. Then began probably the very first military operation of independent India, “Operation Polo”. Main armed forces started the attack from Solapur in the west; within 2 hours they captured parts of Naldurg, from the east they intruded from Vijayawada. And until the evening they captured Tuljapur, Parbhani to Manigarh, Kanergaon, Bonakal. Kannad and Daulatabad were captured by the forces who entered from Chalisgaon, while forces from Buldhana took Jalna city. When Indian forces successfully took Aurangabad on 15 September, that was when Nizam forces and Razakars started to lay down the weapons, back off and surrendered. On 17 September 1948 Nizam force leader and himself Nizam also surrendered, and finally Marathwada was liberated along with the whole Hyderabad state.

Marathwada was then become the part of Bombay state, later Maharashtra state. Since 1948, when Hyderabad annexed, 17 September has been celebrated as “Liberation day” by Maharashtra and Karnataka, also known as “Marathwada Mukti Sangram Din”.

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