Kartar Singh Sarabha: The Boy Bhagat Singh Idolised

Kartar Singh Sarabha was a student in California at 16. He was hanged in Lahore at 19.

Bhagat Singh later saw him as a hero. This lesson covers his life, the Ghadar Party, the failed 1915 mutiny plan and the exam traps.

1Who was Kartar Singh Sarabha?

He was a Punjabi boy who went abroad to study and came back to fight.

• He was born on 24 May 1896 in Sarabha village, Ludhiana district, Punjab.
• In 1912, at age 16, he sailed for San Francisco.
• He enrolled at the University of California, Berkeley.
• He went there to study chemistry.
• Many Indian migrants in North America faced racial bias and low pay.
• That anger pushed many of them toward the cause of Indian freedom.
• His whole public life ran barely three years, from 1912 to 1915.
• He was hanged at 19.

2What was the Ghadar Party?

It was a revolutionary party formed by Indians living abroad.

• The Ghadar Party was formed in 1913 among Indian migrants in North America.
• The group first used the name Hindustan Association of the Pacific Coast.
• Sohan Singh Bhakna was its first president.
• Lala Har Dayal was a key organiser and its general secretary.
• It started at Astoria, Oregon. Its headquarters were in San Francisco.
• The San Francisco office was called Yugantar Ashram.
• Its weekly newspaper, Ghadar, began in November 1913.
• The paper first came out in Urdu. Other languages followed, including Punjabi.
• The movement took its name from the paper.
• Sarabha was in charge of the Punjabi edition of Ghadar.
• In 1914 the Komagata Maru incident in Canada fuelled anger among Indians abroad.
• For the party’s president, see Sohan Singh Bhakna.

3What was the 1915 plan?

The plan was to use the First World War to start an army revolt.

• Britain was at war from August 1914. Its army was stretched thin.
• Ghadar members saw this as a chance and called members home.
• In late 1914 Sarabha returned to Punjab with many of them.
• They planned a pan-Indian army mutiny for 21 February 1915.
• Sarabha went into army cantonments in Punjab. He tried to win Indian soldiers over.
• Rash Behari Bose came to Punjab to help lead the plan.
• Vishnu Ganesh Pingle was another key plotter. He was also hanged later.
• A police informer named Kirpal Singh exposed the plot.
• Mass arrests began on 19 February 1915, two days before the date.
• The uprising never began.
• Rash Behari Bose escaped to Japan soon after.
• The government used wartime powers under the Defence of India Act, 1915 against the plotters.
• For the wider setting, see India’s Role in the First World War.

4How did the trial end?

The government tried the Ghadar members in Lahore.

• The case is called the First Lahore Conspiracy Case.
• The trial began in April 1915. The verdict came in September 1915.
• About 291 people were tried across the main and later proceedings.
• Sarabha was convicted and sentenced to death.
• He was hanged at Lahore Central Jail on 16 November 1915.
• Six others were hanged with him, so seven men died that day.
• His life shows how a short career can still inspire a later generation.
• Sohan Singh Bhakna was not executed. He got life imprisonment instead.
• Bhagat Singh is said to have carried Sarabha’s photograph as his own inspiration.
• For Bhagat Singh’s story, see Bhagat Singh: Martyr of the Revolutionary Current.

5What are the exam traps?

Exams swap place names and dates.

• Sarabha studied at Berkeley. The Ghadar Party’s headquarters were in San Francisco.
• Do not swap the two. Exams use them as wrong options.
• The plan was for 21 February 1915. Arrests began on 19 February.
• Sarabha was hanged on 16 November 1915, not in February.
• CDS I 2022 asked where the Ghadar Party’s headquarters were. The answer was San Francisco.
• CDS II 2025 asked three Ghadar facts together. All three were correct.
• Do not say Sarabha founded the Ghadar Party. Sohan Singh Bhakna was its first president.
• Do not mix him up with Vikram Sarabhai, the space scientist. The names look close but belong to different people.
• Do not say the mutiny took place. The plot was exposed before it began.
• Remember who edited what. Sarabha handled the Punjabi edition of the newspaper.