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An Imperial Cocktail of Fear and Violence
There are few events more prominent in the Indian freedom movement than the Jallianwala Bagh massacre of 1919. The brutality of the killing is shown with accuracy in Richard Attenborough’s 1982 film, Gandhi: General Reginald Dyer moving resolutely to the meeting being held on Baisakhi day and, without a flinch, ordering his (Indian) troops to open fire at “the thickest part of the crowd,” as he told the Hunter Commission later.
There are few events more prominent in the Indian freedom movement than the Jallianwala Bagh massacre of 1919. The brutality of the killing is shown with accuracy in Richard Attenborough’s 1982 film, Gandhi: General Reginald Dyer moving resolutely to the meeting being held on Baisakhi day and, without a flinch, ordering his (Indian) troops to open fire at “the thickest part of the crowd,” as he told the Hunter Commission later.
In spite of its prominence in the freedom movement—or possibly because of it—the event is disseminated to Indians with limited detail. This is where Kim A Wagner jumps in with his thoroughly researched account Amritsar 1919: An Empire of Fear and the Making of a Massacre providing critical context to why the British Raj decided at that moment to crack down on the freedom movement with such a terrifying level of force.
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