CHANDRA SEKHAR AZAD

• Chandrashekhar Azad - fearless revolutionary and freedom fighter.

• He was born on July 23, 1906 to Sitaram Tewari and Jagrani Devi in Jhabua District, Madhya Pradesh.

• Chandrasekhar received his early education in a village school. After completing his elementary schooling, he went to Varanasi for further studies in Sanskrit Vidyalaya.

• At a young age of 15 in 1921, Chandra Shekhar joined Mahatma Gandhi in his Non-Cooperation movement. But he was detained and presented before the magistrate.

• When he was produced before the magistrate, he gave his name as 'Azad', his father's name as 'Swatantra' and his residence as 'prison'.

• The provoked magistrate sentenced him to fifteen lashes of flogging. The title of Azad stuck thereafter.

• Azad joined revolutionary organisation, Hindustan Republican Association and was introduced to Pandit Ram Prasad Bismil, who had formed HRA.He then became an active member of the HRA.

• Chandra Shekhar was involved in the Kakori Conspiracy (1925), in an attempt to blow up the Viceroy's train and at last the shooting of JP Saunders at Lahore in 1928 to avenge the killing of Lala Lajpat Rai.

• The Jallianwala Bagh Massacre deeply influenced young Azad and his contemporaries.

• Azad reorganised, Hindustan Republican Association (HRA) under the new name of Hindustan Socialist Republican Army (HSRA).

• In order to take revenge of Lala Lajpat Rai’s death, Azad, Bhagat Singh, Rajguru and other members of his party decided to murder Superintendent of police JP Saunders and on December 17, 1928 they killed him.

• On February 27, 1931, Azad was encircled by police party in Alfred Park, Allahabad, where he went to meet an old friend. He was not the one to surrender, he fought bravely, and when a single bullet remained,the born-free Azad shot himself.

• The British police was so terrified that after his death they watched his body for half an hour in a bid to confirm that he is dead.

ARUNA ASIF ALI

Aruna Asif Ali was an Indian independence activist. She is widely remembered for hoisting the Indian National Congress flag at the Gowalia Tank maidan in Bombay during the Quit India Movement, 1942. 

The turning point in Aruna's life was her participation in the Quit India movement launched by Mahatma Gandhi in August 1942.  Following the arrest of all the leaders of the Indian National Congress, on 9^th august 1942 Aruna presided over the historic Congress session in Bombay (Mumbai) and hoisted the national flag. This marked the commencement of the movement. The police fired upon the assembly at the session. Aruna was dubbed the Heroine of the 1942 movement for her bravery in the face of danger and was called Grand Old Lady of the Independence movement in her later years.

Outraged by the trampling of the flag by a British soldier, she renounced nonviolence and went underground to guide the movement, moving from city to city to escape arrest.  Along with Ram Manohar Lohia , she edited Inquilab, a revolutionary monthly of congress party.  The government announced an award of five thousand rupees for her capture, but she successfully remained underground until 1946, when the warrants against her were canceled.

She broke away from the Congress and later joined the Left Socialist Group; she also took an active interest in the trade union movement.  This group merged with the Communist Party of India (CPI) in 1955, and Aruna became a member of the central committee and vice president of the All India Trade Union Congress.  In 1954 she established the National Federation of Indian Women, the women's wing of the CPI. 

In 1958 she left the CPI and became Delhi's first elected mayor. She was a leading member of the Indo-Soviet Cultural Society and the All India Peace Council.

She was associated with two left-wing journals: Link, a weekly started in 1958, and Patriot, a daily founded in 1962.

Aruna was awarded several national and international awards

International Lenin Peace Prize 1964,

Indira Gandhi Award for National Integration

Jawaharlal Nehru Award for International Understanding 1991

Padma Vibhushan, 1992

Bharat Ratna (posthumously) 1997.

Aruna Asif Ali Marg in New Delhi was named in her honor. The all India Minorities distributes the Dr Aruna Asaf Ali Sadbhawana Award annually.