Role of the Arya Samaj in India

The statement that the contribution of the Arya Samaj to the freedom struggle in India was peripheral, stands not only opposed to recorded Indian history. It also contradicts Swami Vivekananda’s statement of facts. "It is an undoubted fact,” affirms the Swami, "that if there had not been the advent of Kabir, Nanak, and Chaitanya in the Mohammedan period, and the establishment of the Brahmo Samaj and the Arya Samaj in our own day, then, by this time, the Mohammedans and Christians would have far outnumber the Hindus of the present day in India.”

The ideal of that society, as proclaimed by its founder is an absolutely free and independent form of nation".  Swami Dayanand and the powerful organization he initiated, the Arya Samaj clearly unquestionably were the most potent factors in reforming, rejuvenating and rebuilding the institutions of India’s political emancipation. Describing Swami Dayananda’s contribution towards creating the national consciousness, Romain Rolland writes, “How great and uplifter of the people he was - the most vigorous force of the immediate and present action in India at the movement of the rebirth and re-awakening of the national consciousness. His Arya Samaj prepared the way in 1905 for the revolt of Bengal. He was one of the most ardent prophets of reconstruction and of national organization.

Speaking of the general causes which lead to political changes Swami Dayananda wrote, “When people acquire perfection in the military science and the art of war, and the army becomes so formidable that no one in the whole world can stand against it on a field of battle, pride and party spirit increase among them who then become unjust. Thereafter they lose all power either through mutual dissension, or a strong man from among families of little importance rises to distinction and is powerful enough to subjugate them, just as Shivaji and Govinda Singh rose against the Mohammedan rule and almost completely annihilated the Mussalman power in India". Arya Samaj sacrificed more members and followers in the freedom struggle than any other religious body. A review of all Mahatma Gandhi Satyragraha Movement clearly indicated that the Arya Samaj had contributed the most to the Freedom Struggle. In 1912 after conducting a survey of all the jails throughout the country, a special committee under the chairmanship of Nehru, presenting its report to the Indian National Congress disclosed that about 70 % of those undergoing extreme hardship in the jails of the British government are Arya Samajis. Most of the lawyers who boycotted the British courts to participate in the freedom struggle were also Arya Samajis. According to Mahavir Tyagi at the time of the Kilafat Movement 82% of all the men and 92% of all the women at Agra were all Arya Samajis. In 1931 a report presented to the congress committee by Molana Hasrat  revealed that about 80% of the Satyagrahis (peaceful participants in the independence movement of India) locked in jails throughout the country were Arya Samajis.

The Arya Samaj was undoubtedly the most dynamic socio-religious reform movement modem society has ever seen. "Among all the socio-religious reform movements, which tended to have a national scope and a program of reconstruction in the social and religious spheres" in the words of D. Pande, “the Arya Samaj was the most important". Though the Arya Samaj was primarily concerned with social and religious reforms, its political impact was most conspicuous. As early as 1905 an English monthly proclaimed "of all movements in India for the political regeneration of the country none is so potent as the Arya Samaj.