Mahatma Gandhi organized the Rowlatt Satyagraha, a nationwide, non-violent protest against the repressive Rowlatt Act.

The British Colonial Government passed the “Rowlatt Act” (black act), officially known as the Anarchical and Revolutionary Crimes Act of 1919.

It replaced wartime emergency laws to suppress nationalist activities.

The Act allowed arrest without trial and detention for up to two years.

It permitted secret trials without a jury and denied the right to appeal.

Police were given powers for warrantless arrests and searches.

The Act was passed despite strong opposition from Indian leaders.

On 6 April 1919, Mahatma Gandhi launched a non-violent Rowlatt Satyagraha against the unjust Rowlatt Act passed by the British government.

The date of the hartal was first fixed on the 30th March 1919, but was later changed to 6th April.

The whole of India from one end to the other, towns as well as villages, observed a complete hartal on that day.

Protests against the Act led to the Jallianwala Bagh Massacre on 13 April 1919.

Gandhi later called the movement a “Himalayan miscalculation”(or blunder).

The Act intensified the freedom struggle and was repealed in 1922.
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