Explain the response of the plantation workers to the Non-Cooperation Movement started by Gandhiji. What did freedom mean for them?
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(a) The response of the plantation workers to the Non-Cooperation Movement are :
(i) Under the Inland Emigration Act of 1859, plantation workers were not permitted to leave the tea gardens without permission.
(ii) When they heard of the Non-Cooperation Movement, thousands of workers defied the authorities, left the plantations and headed home.
(iii) They believed that Gandhi Rai was coming and everyone would be given land in their own village.
(iv) They, however, never reached their destination. Stranded on the way by a railway and steamer strike, they were caught by the police and brutally beaten up.
(b) For them, freedom meant the right to move freely in and out of the confined space in which they were enclosed.