Balagangadhara Tilak
(1856-1920)
One of the important leaders of the first phase of India’s national freedom struggle, Balagangadhara Tilak known as Lokmanya Tilak was an educationist, editor, scholar, author, and a top leader of the Indian National Congress.
Balagangadhara was born in Ratnagiri, Maharashtra on 23 July 1856, a year ahead of the first armed move for India’s independence, to Gangadhara Ramachandra Tilak, a scholar in Sanskrit, and a deputy inspector of primary schools. When young Bala was 10, his mother died. When 17 he married 10-year old Satyabhama. And the next year, he lost his father. His grandfather was a sannyasin from whom he had learned a lot about the cruel British rule and the revolt of 1857 against the foreign rule. Bala was a brilliant student and he secured a degree in mathematics in 1976 and a degree in laws in 1979.
He entered into legal practice and made friends with a number of like-minded youngsters who shared with him their hatred for the British. One of them was Vishnukrishna, who started ‘Maratha’, a daily newspaper in English and ‘Kesari’, a daily in Marathi. When Vishnu died, Bala and Agarkar, another friend, took it up and ran it. They started a school in Poone, under what was called Deccan Educational Society. They followed it up with a series of educational institutions in different parts of Maharashtra. The famous Fergusson College of Pune was one among them.
One of the important leaders of the first phase of India’s national freedom struggle, Balagangadhara Tilak known as Lokmanya Tilak was an educationist, editor, scholar, author, and a top leader of the Indian National Congress.
Balagangadhara was born in Ratnagiri, Maharashtra on 23 July 1856, a year ahead of the first armed move for India’s independence, to Gangadhara Ramachandra Tilak, a scholar in Sanskrit, and a deputy inspector of primary schools. When young Bala was 10, his mother died. When 17 he married 10-year old Satyabhama. And the next year, he lost his father. His grandfather was a sannyasin from whom he had learned a lot about the cruel British rule and the revolt of 1857 against the foreign rule. Bala was a brilliant student and he secured a degree in mathematics in 1976 and a degree in laws in 1979.
He entered into legal practice and made friends with a number of like-minded youngsters who shared with him their hatred for the British. One of them was Vishnukrishna, who started ‘Maratha’, a daily newspaper in English and ‘Kesari’, a daily in Marathi. When Vishnu died, Bala and Agarkar, another friend, took it up and ran it. They started a school in Poone, under what was called Deccan Educational Society. They followed it up with a series of educational institutions in different parts of Maharashtra. The famous Fergusson College of Pune was one among them.
