Transvaal Indian Congress

Last updated

The Transvaal Indian Congress (TIC) was a political organisation established in 1903 to fight discrimination against Indians in the Transvaal Colony, and later the Transvaal Province, of South Africa. Founded in 1903 as the Transvaal British Indian Association, [1] it was a member of the South African Indian Congress alongside its elder and larger sibling, the Natal Indian Congress. It fell dormant after the end of apartheid in 1994.

Contents

Origins

The TIC was generally a moderate organisation in its formative years. It was active in passive resistance campaigns organised by Mahatma Gandhi in 1908 and 1913, but at other times relied largely, like the NIC, on the moderate methods of petitions and deputations to authorities. [1] It adopted a more militant stance only from the 1930s, when Yusuf Dadoo and his peers – among them Molvi Cachalia – emerged as key progressive figures in the congress. [1] [2] [3] Dadoo was elected as TIC president in 1946, the year after his progressive counterpart in Natal, Monty Naicker, took office. [1]

Dadoo led the group through a campaign of passive resistance against the Asiatic Land Tenure and Indian Representation Act from 1946 to 1948. [1] It subsequently became active in opposing apartheid, including during the Defiance Campaign of 1952. In the late 1950s, the TIC, then based in Fordsburg, was generally more radical than the larger and older NIC, particularly in its support for Nelson Mandela's proposal to prepare for armed struggle against the apartheid regime. [2] However, during the 1960s and 1970s, the TIC fell into dormancy due to the extent of state repression against the Congress Alliance, with some leaders (such as Dadoo) living in exile and others (like Ahmed Kathrada) imprisoned. [1] [4]

Revival

The first signs of the TIC's revival were in 1981, when a community meeting in Lenasia agreed to form the Transvaal Anti-South African Indian Council Committee to advocate boycotts of elections to the South African Indian Council, a government advisory body. [1] After a successful boycott, the committee held a conference in January 1983, at which attendees decided to revive the TIC. [1] At the same conference, Reverend Allan Boesak made his famous call for the establishment of a "united front" against apartheid, which led later that year to the founding of the United Democratic Front (UDF). [5] [6]

Meanwhile, the TIC was formally relaunched in May 1983. [7] Essop Jassat was appointed president, with Ram Saloojee as his deputy. [7] Jassat was replaced by Cassim Saloojee at the next elective conference in August 1988. [7] The TIC was a founding affiliate of the UDF and was a prominent player in the campaign to boycott the 1984 elections and the new Tricameral Parliament, which purported to represent Indians through the House of Delegates. [1] [7]

Although the TIC was represented at the Convention for a Democratic South Africa in 1991, it did not restructure itself as a political party during South Africa's democratic transition. Instead, many leaders and members joined the African National Congress (ANC), and the TIC again fell into dormancy from around the time of the first post-apartheid elections in 1994. [6] Jassat, Kathrada, Ram Saloojee, and Cassim Saloojee were among the TIC stalwarts who went on to represent the ANC in Parliament.

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Defiance Campaign</span> Defiance campaign in 1952

The Defiance Campaign against Unjust Laws was presented by the African National Congress (ANC) at a conference held in Bloemfontein, South Africa in December 1951. The Campaign had roots in events leading up the conference. The demonstrations, taking place in 1952, were the first "large-scale, multi-racial political mobilization against apartheid laws under a common leadership."

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Ahmed Kathrada</span> South African politician (1929–2017)

Ahmed Mohamed Kathrada, sometimes known by the nickname "Kathy", was a South African politician and anti-apartheid activist.

Yusuf Mohamed Dadoo was a South African Communist and an anti-apartheid activist. During his life, he was chair of both the South African Indian Congress and the South African Communist Party, as well as being a major proponent of co-operation between those organisations and the African National Congress. He was a leader of the Defiance Campaign and a defendant at the Treason Trial in 1956. His last days were spent in exile in London, where he is buried at Highgate Cemetery; a few metres away from the Tomb of Karl Marx.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">United Democratic Front (South Africa)</span> 1983–1991 anti-apartheid organisation

The United Democratic Front (UDF) was a South African popular front that existed from 1983 to 1991. The UDF comprised more than 400 public organizations including trade unions, students' unions, women's and parachurch organizations. The UDF's goal was to establish a "non-racial, united South Africa in which segregation is abolished and in which society is freed from institutional and systematic racism." Its slogan was "UDF Unites, Apartheid Divides." The Front was established in 1983 to oppose the introduction of the Tricameral Parliament by the white-dominated National Party government, and dissolved in 1991 during the early stages of the transition to democracy.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Natal Indian Congress</span> Civil rights organisation for Indians in South Africa (1894–1994)

The Natal Indian Congress (NIC) was a political organisation established in 1894 to fight discrimination against Indians in the Natal Colony, and later the Natal Province, of South Africa. Founded by Mahatma Gandhi, it later served an important role in opposing apartheid. It was the oldest affiliate of the South African Indian Congress.

Gangathura Mohambry Naicker was a medical doctor and a South African anti-apartheid activist of Indian Tamil descent.

The South African Indian Congress (SAIC) was an umbrella body founded in 1921 to coordinate between political organisations representing Indians in the various provinces of South Africa. Its members were the Natal Indian Congress (NIC), the Transvaal Indian Congress (TIC), and, initially, the Cape British Indian Council. It advocated non-violent resistance to discriminatory laws and in its formative years was strongly influenced by the NIC's founder, Mahatma Gandhi.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Internal resistance to apartheid</span> 1950–1994 social movement in South Africa

Internal resistance to apartheid in South Africa originated from several independent sectors of South African society and took forms ranging from social movements and passive resistance to guerrilla warfare. Mass action against the ruling National Party (NP) government, coupled with South Africa's growing international isolation and economic sanctions, were instrumental in leading to negotiations to end apartheid, which began formally in 1990 and ended with South Africa's first multiracial elections under a universal franchise in 1994.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Pravin Gordhan</span> South African politician

Pravin Jamnadas Gordhan is a politician and anti-apartheid activist who has held various ministerial posts in the Cabinet of South Africa. He served as Minister of Finance from 2009 until 2014 and again from 2015 until 2017, as Minister of Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs from 2014 until 2015, and as Minister of Public Enterprises since February 2018.

Martin Legassick (1940–2016) was a South African historian and Marxist activist. He died on 1 March 2016 after a battle with cancer. He was one of the central figures in the "revisionist" school of South African historiography that, drawing on Marxism, revolutionised the study of the social formation of Apartheid by highlighting the importance of political economy, class contradictions and imperialism. He was also a key figure in the independent left in South Africa from the 1970s, and a critic, from the left, of many of the analytical and strategic positions taken by the African National Congress and the South African Communist Party, as well as their understanding of South African history. The author of numerous books, mainly on the history of colonialism and capitalism, he collected many of his key political writings in his 2007 book Towards Socialist Democracy.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Moosa Moolla</span> South African activist and diplomat (1934–2023)

Moosa Moolla was an Indian South African activist and diplomat. A member of the African National Congress, Moolla was arrested and eventually found not guilty in the 1956 Treason Trial. In 1961, he was arrested and tried for incitement at the time of the May 1961 stay-at-home protest. In May 1963, he was arrested under the 90-day law. On 11 August 1963, Moolla and others escaped prison by bribing a young guard. He later served as the ANC representative to Asia while living in exile in India. Following independence, he became the first South African ambassador to Iran.

Amina Cachalia, OLB was a South African anti-Apartheid activist, women's rights activist, and politician. She was a longtime friend and ally of former President Nelson Mandela. Her late husband was political activist Yusuf Cachalia.

Ismail Ahmed Cachalia (1908-2003), popularly known as Moulvi, was a South African political activist and a leader of Transvaal Indian Congress and the African National Congress. He was one of the leaders of the Indian Passive Resistance Campaign of 1946 and the Defiance Campaign in 1952. The Government of India awarded the fourth highest Indian civilian honour of Padma Shri in 1977.

The potato boycott of 1959 was a consumer boycott in Bethal, South Africa during the Apartheid era against slave-like conditions of potato labourers in Bethal, Transvaal. The boycott started in June 1959 and ended in September 1959. Prominent figures of the movement included Gert Sibande, Ruth First, Michael Scott and Henry Nxumalo.

Dr. Zainab Asvat was a South African anti-apartheid activist. Asvat was trained as a medical doctor, but was politically active most of her life.

The Pietermaritzburg Treason Trial was heard in the Supreme Court of South Africa from 21 October 1985 to 23 June 1986. In the largest political trial since the Rivonia Trial, the apartheid state pursued charges of high treason against 16 leaders of the United Democratic Front (UDF) and four affiliated organisations. State v Ramgobin and Others was generally regarded as a failure in both legal and political terms: the charges against 12 defendants were dropped in December 1985 and the remaining four were freed in June 1986, while the South African state received international criticism for having instituted the charges in the first place.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Vaal uprising</span> 1984–1986 protests in South Africa

The Vaal uprising was a period of popular revolt in black townships in apartheid South Africa, beginning in the Vaal Triangle on 3 September 1984. Sometimes known as the township revolt and driven both by local grievances and by opposition to apartheid, the uprising lasted two years and affected most regions of the country. The government of P. W. Botha did not succeed in curbing the violence until after it imposed a national state of emergency in June 1986.

Ebrahim "Cassim" Saloojee was a South African politician and former anti-apartheid activist. During apartheid, he was the treasurer of the United Democratic Front, a defendant in the Pietermaritzburg Treason Trial, and later the president of the Transvaal Indian Congress. He represented the African National Congress in the National Assembly from 1994 until his death in 2009.

Mawalal "Mewa" Ramgobin was a South African politician and former anti-apartheid activist. A stalwart of the Natal Indian Congress, he represented the African National Congress (ANC) in the National Assembly from 1994 to 2009.

Rashid Ahmed Mahmood "Ram" Salojee, often misspelled Ram Saloojee, was a South African politician, medical doctor, and former anti-apartheid activist. Between 1994 and 2009, he represented the African National Congress (ANC) in the Gauteng Provincial Legislature and both houses of Parliament.

References

  1. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 "Transvaal Indian Congress (TIC)". South African History Online. 30 March 2011. Retrieved 2 May 2023.
  2. 1 2 Landau, Paul S. (1 September 2012). "The ANC, MK, and 'The Turn to Violence' (1960–1962)". South African Historical Journal. 64 (3): 538–563. doi:10.1080/02582473.2012.660785. ISSN   0258-2473.
  3. ↑ Desai, Ashwin (2013). "The 1946–1948 Passive Resistance Campaign in Natal, South Africa: Origins and Results". Journal of Natal and Zulu History. 31 (2): 54–67. doi:10.1080/02590123.2013.11964195. ISSN   0259-0123.
  4. ↑ Bhana, Surendra (1 August 1997). "Indianness Reconfigured, 1944–1960: The Natal Indian Congress in South Africa". Comparative Studies of South Asia, Africa and the Middle East. 17 (2): 100–107. doi:10.1215/1089201X-17-2-100. ISSN   1089-201X.
  5. ↑ Spector, J. Brooks (22 August 2013). "The UDF at 30: An organisation that shook Apartheid's foundation". Daily Maverick. Retrieved 2 May 2023.
  6. 1 2 Desai, Ashwin; Vahed, Goolam (2 January 2015). "The Natal Indian Congress, the Mass Democratic Movement and the Struggle to Defeat Apartheid: 1980–1994". Politikon. 42 (1): 1–22. doi:10.1080/02589346.2015.1005788. ISSN   0258-9346.
  7. 1 2 3 4 "Transvaal Indian Congress (TIC)". The O'Malley Archives. Retrieved 2 May 2023.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.