Surat Split 1907
Congress Division The birth of the militant movement is seen only in the last years of the 19th century, however it reached its peak during the Swadeshi movement that started after the partition of Bengal. By this time the differences between the liberals and the extremists were also clearly emerging. Following were the main points of difference between the two regarding the partition of Bengal.
The liberals believed that the partition of Bengal was the problem of great Bengal. Therefore, the Swadeshi movement should be confined to Bengal, but the extremists considered the problem of partition of Bengal to be an all-India problem and wanted to expand it to the whole country.
The liberals wanted to limit the policy of boycott only to the boycott of foreign goods, while the extremists wanted to implementit in other areas as well.Further, the Calcutta session of 1906 saw great pressure from the extremists. The extremists proposed Tilak's name as Congress President, but the liberal group defeated the extremists by proposing the name of Dadabhai Naoroji and the militants could not oppose Naoroji's candidature, but under extremist pressure, the Congress was given Swaraj Swadeshi boycott and national Four important proposals like education had to be accepted.Thus the liberals were feeling humiliated in the Calcutta session.The 1907 session, which was earlier to be held in Nagpur, was shifted to Surat at the last minute, as Nagpur was a strong hold of the militants. At the same time, there was a rumor in the extremist group that the concessions that the extremists had obtained in the Calcutta session, the liberals were going to end them at the Surat session.That's why an extremist wanted his president at all costs.So once again. He proposed the name of Tilak, but nominated the name of Mehta-Gokhale faction liberal leader Ras Behari Ghosh. The militants did not accept this and revolt started in the Congress pandal. This culminated in the Surat partition. The Surat split had a profound impact on the national politics. It weakened the momentum of the national movement and created a void in the national politics, to fill it up with the emergence of a revolutionary movement in the form of bomb and pistol politics. On the other hand, the British tried to woo the moderates to some extent by introducing the Marley-Minto Reforms in 1909. Simultaneously attempted Muslim appeasement through separate electorates and fragmented the national movement. These condition spersisted for almost a decade and The integration between the two factions of 'Congress' became possible only in the Lucknow session of 1916.
