Anushilan Samiti
By 1902, Calcutta had three secret societies working toward the violent overthrow of British rule in India. One was founded by Calcutta student Satish Chandra Basu with the patronage of Calcutta barrister Pramatha Mitra, another was led by Bengali woman Sarala Devi and the third was founded by Aurobindo Ghosh. Ghosh was one of the strongest proponents of militant Indian nationalism at the time. By 1905 the work of Aurobindo and his brother, Barin, enabled Anushilan Samity to spread throughout Bengal. Nationalist writings and publications by Aurobindo and Barin, including "Bande Mataram" and "Jugantar", had a widespread influence on Bengal youth. The 1905 partition of Bengal stimulated radical nationalist sentiments in Bengal's Bhadralok community, helping Anushilan acquire a support base of educated, politically-conscious and disaffected members of local youth societies. Its program emphasized physical training, training its recruits with daggers and "lathis" (bamboo staffs used as weapons). The Dhaka branch of Anushilan was led by Pulin Behari Das, and branches spread throughout East Bengal and Assam. More than 500 branches were opened in eastern Bengal and Assam, linked by "close and detailed organization" to Pulin's headquarters at Dhaka. It absorbed smaller groups in the province, soon overshadowing its parent organisation in Calcutta. Branches of Dhaka Anushilan emerged in Jessore, Khulna, Faridpur, Rajnagar, Rajendrapur, Mohanpur, Barvali and Bakarganj. Estimates of Dhaka Anushilan Samiti's reach indicate a membership of 15,000 to 20,000. Within two years, Dhaka Anushilan devolved its aims from the Swadeshi to that of political terrorism.
Indian independence movement
Within a short time of its inception, these organisations became the focus of an extensive police and intelligence operations. Operations against "Anushilan Samiti" saw founding of the Special branch of Calcutta Police. The intelligence operations against India House saw the founding of the Indian Political Intelligence Office which later grew to be the Intelligence bureau in independent India. Heading the intelligence and missions against Ghadarite movement and India revolutionaries was the MI5(g) section, and at one point invokved the Pinkerton's detective agency. Notable officers who led the police and intelligence operations against Indian revolutionaries, or were involved in it, at various time included John Arnold Wallinger, Sir Robert Nathan, Sir Harold Stuart, Vernon Kell, Sir Charles Stevenson-Moore and Sir Charles Tegart, as well as W. Somerset Maugham. The threat posed by the activities of the "Samiti" in Bengal during World War I, along with the threat of a Ghadarite uprising in Punjab, saw the passage of Defence of India Act 1915. These measures saw the arrest, internment, transportations and execution of a number of revolutionaries linked to the organisation, and was successful in crushing the East Bengal Branch. In the aftermath of the war, the Rowlatt committee recommended extending the Defence of India Act (as the Rowlatt act) to thwart any possible revival of the "Samiti" in Bengal and the Ghadarite movement in Punjab. In the 1920s, Alluri Sitarama Raju led the ill-fated Rampa Rebellion of 1922–24, during which a band of tribal leaders and other sympathisers fought against the British Raj. He was referred to as "Manyam Veerudu" ("Hero of the Jungles") by the local people. After the passing of the 1882 Madras Forest Act, its restrictions on the free movement of tribal peoples in the forest prevented them from engaging in their traditional "podu" (Slash-and-burn) agricultural system, which involved shifting cultivation. Raju led a protest movement in the border areas of the Godavari Agency in Madras Presidency (present-day Andhra Pradesh). Inspired by the patriotic zeal of revolutionaries in Bengal, Raju raided police stations in and around Chintapalle, Rampachodavaram, Dammanapalli, Krishna-devi-peta, Rajavommangi, Addateegala, Narsipatnam and Annavaram. Raju and his followers stole guns and ammunition and killed several British army officers, including Scott Coward near Dammanapalli. The British campaign lasted for nearly a year from December 1922. Raju was eventually trapped by the British in the forests of Chintapalli then tied to a tree and shot dead with a rifle.