The dawn of freedom over India in August 1947, after a long and bitter struggle against British imperialism, was one of the seminal developments of the twentieth century. Small wonder, then that this struggle has aroused substantial scholarly interest over the past decades. Yet, despite the enormous body of literature upon the manner in which India won freedom, at the same time as the subcontinent was partitioned into two sovereign states, various facets of this historical phenomenon still remain unexplored. To stimulate new scholarly research on the struggle for freedom in India, the Nehru Memorial Museum & Library organized a symposium at which social scientists and humanists could collectively take a look at the past, not only for antiquarian reasons, but also to illumine the present.

Most of the 17 essays incorporated in this volume were presented by distinguished scholars at the symposium held in 1984.

The well known historian Prof. Ravinder Kumar, the then Director of NMM&L has contributed an Introduction to the volume.

The volume is being made available again in response to the demand from the scholarly community/scholars.