ISSN 1039-3498 | no. 58| August 2002
Letters of an Indian Independence Leader
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| Professor
and Mrs Low presenting the Sapru Papers to the National Library of Australia |
Visitors to the recent Treasures from the World’s Great Libraries exhibition will recall seeing an original letter written by modern India’s most revered leader, Mahatma Gandhi (1869–1948). This was lent for Treasures by the National Library of India. The recipient of Gandhi’s letter was another major figure in the Indian independence movement, Sir Tej Bahadur Sapru (1875–1949).
As it happens, the National Library of Australia has just received an important gift of Sapru’s papers and related materials from the eminent Australian scholar, Professor Anthony Low. The collection consists largely of photocopies of Sapru’s correspondence. The originals are housed at the National Library of India in Calcutta. In Professor Low’s words the Sapru Collection ‘constitutes one of the major collections for the study of the Indian national movement for independence, especially between 1920 and 1950.’
Sapru was India’s most distinguished constitutional lawyer and played a major role in efforts to fashion constitutional reforms towards an independent India. Although he broke away from the main Indian National Congress in 1917 and disagreed with Gandhi’s civil disobedience tactics towards the colonial rulers, he was greatly respected by Gandhi and other Congress leaders as well as by the British. He played a crucial role in mediating between the two sides between the 1920s and 1940s.
The original Sapru Papers in Calcutta run to 105 volumes in two series, arranged by alphabetical order of correspondent. These volumes have also been microfilmed. Professor Low’s gift consists of photocopies from the microfilm version reordered chronologically, as being a more useful arrangement for historians.
The donation also includes other Indian materials, in particular copies of
private papers from some of Sapru’s Indian and British contemporaries and Low’s
own copies and notes for the period 1916 to 1944 from the records of the Home
Department, Political Branch, which was the key colonial government department
confronting the Indian national movement.
—Andrew Gosling
Please address any comments and enquiries to The Editor, Gateways: gateways@nla.gov.au