2018-04-13 Fri

On Sunday, 13 April 1919, a crowd of nonviolent protesters, who had gathered at Jallianwala Bagh, Amritsar, Punjab, were fired upon by troops of the British Indian Army under the command of Colonel Reginald Dyer.

Many innocent, unarmed, defenceless and unsuspecting Indians gathered in the heart of Amritsar, the holiest city of the Sikhs, on a day sacred to them as the birth anniversary of the Khalsa. On Dyer's orders, his troops fired on the crowd for ten minutes, directing their bullets largely towards the few open gates through which people were trying to flee. Thousands lost their life in the open fire and many people died in stampedes at the narrow gates or by jumping into the solitary well on the compound to escape the shooting and some succumbed to their injuries as a curfew was declared immediately.

Jallianwala Bagh Massacre or Amritsar massacre was an important incident in the history of the Indian freedom movement during the British Raj. The pain and cries of more than a thousand deaths in Amritsar “united Indians as never before and after”. This incident solidified the support for the Indian Independence movement.

Commemorative stamps were issued in honour of the martyrs on the 50th anniversary in 1969 (20 Paise) and on the 75th anniversary in 1994 (INR 1).