Proceedings of the Indian National Congress : Vol. 1: 1885-1889

From the Editor\'s Note: The first Indian National Congress was held in 1885, one year after the Marquess of Ripon left India : in that world of high mortality among political parties, for India\'s Congress party to have survived for a century is in itself no small achievement. But the party has done much more than survive. It successfully transformed itself from movement to party in order to change from protest to governance.

The same year, Henry Cotton, a British civil servant, published a book New India, or India in Transition. This book created quite a stir, and was highly spoken of by the times newspaper. It discussed the future that attends the Indian races and of the great Indian movement upon which, after the lapse of a quarter of a century public attention has been fixed but to which at that time men\'s eyes were blind.

These volumes are not just a record of Congress speeches and resolutions, but they also capture the mental, emotional and political life of late nineteenth century India. They are, furthermore , a gallery of some leading individuals who contributed, with infinite patience and tenacity, to the evolution of an Indian nationality.

Scores of books exist on the Indian National Congress. We have taken a different route to illuminate the birth of an idea that has captured the imagination of millions. This is probably the first authentic version of the Congress proceedings: earlier printed texts were either abridged or tampered with. Some reports were torn in parts: we have left those portion as they are. In some places the missing words have been added to make the text intelligible to the reader.

(This series is expected to be complete in 12 Volumes)