Suniti Choudhury and Santi Ghosh

Suniti Choudhury was fourteen. Santi Ghosh was fifteen. They walked into a British magistrate’s office carrying a fake petition, pistols hidden under their shawls. They remain among the youngest political prisoners of India’s entire freedom struggle.

Fourteen, Fifteen, Fearless

ModHist0167

1916–17

Born in Comilla

Santi Ghosh, then Suniti Choudhury

14 DEC 1931

Assassinate Stevens

Comilla’s District Magistrate, at ages 14 and 15

FEB 1932

Transportation for Life

Spared the gallows only because they were minors

1939

Released, Rebuild Lives

One becomes a doctor, the other an MLA

Youth wasn’t a barrier, it was cover: their age let them walk past security with a fake petition. It’s also the only reason they survived their own sentence.

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📑 Contents

1Timeline
2Must Know
3Good to Know
4Test Yourself
5Great to Know

Timeline

22 November 1916: Santi Ghosh is born in Comilla, Bengal Presidency.
22 May 1917: Suniti Choudhury is born, also in Comilla.
1931: Both join the Jugantar revolutionary group. Choudhury is named Captain of the Women’s Volunteer Corps in May 1931.
23 March 1931: Bhagat Singh, Rajguru, and Sukhdev are executed, intensifying revolutionary sentiment in Bengal.
14 December 1931: The two enter Magistrate C.G.B. Stevens’s office at Comilla, under the pretext of a petition, and shoot him dead.
February 1932: Tried in Kolkata, both are sentenced to transportation for life, as minors.
1939: Released after seven years, through amnesty negotiations involving Mahatma Gandhi.

Must Know

On 14 December 1931, Suniti Choudhury and Santi Ghosh assassinated C.G.B. Stevens, the District Magistrate of Comilla, at his own office in Bengal.
They were 14 and 15 years old respectively, making them among the youngest political prisoners of India’s entire freedom struggle.
They entered under the pretext of presenting a petition about a swimming competition. They then shot Stevens with pistols hidden under their shawls.
As minors, they were spared the gallows and instead sentenced to transportation for life, in February 1932.
Both were released in 1939, after serving seven years, through amnesty negotiations involving Mahatma Gandhi.

Good to Know

Both were students at the Nawab Faizunnesa Government Girls’ High School. Fellow student Prafullanalini Brahma inspired them to join the Jugantar Party.
Suniti Choudhury was named “custodian of firearms” for the Women’s Volunteer Corps, training other young women in lathi, sword, and dagger play.
Santi Ghosh reportedly expressed disappointment at not receiving a death sentence, given the movement’s ethos of martyrdom.
After release, Suniti Choudhury studied medicine, earned an M.B.B.S., and became a doctor. She married trade union leader Pradyot Kumar Ghosh in 1947, and died on 12 January 1988.
After release, Santi Ghosh joined the Communist movement and married Professor Chittaranjan Das in 1942. She later served in the West Bengal Legislative Council and Assembly, across multiple terms, and died in 1989.

Test Yourself

Great to Know

The Comilla assassination followed directly from the wave of anger after Bhagat Singh’s execution, a pattern seen across Bengal’s revolutionary groups in 1931. See ModHist0108 — Bhagat Singh: Martyr of the Revolutionary Current.
They were part of the same broader Jugantar network as Bagha Jatin, one of Bengal’s earliest revolutionary organisers. See ModHist0119 — Bagha Jatin.
For another teenage woman revolutionary of the same era and region, see ModHist0136 — Pritilata Waddedar.