Call for Home Rule

Even during the war, as early as 1915, Jawaharlal Nehru began to call for Home Rule for India. This meant that India would be a selfgoverning Dominion, yet still considered a part of the United Kingdom, much like Canada or Australia.Nehru joined the All India Home Rule League, founded by family friend Annie Besant, a British liberal and advocate for Irish and Indian selfrule. The 70yearold Besant was such a powerful force that the British government arrested and jailed her in 1917, prompting huge protests. In the end, the Home Rule movement was unsuccessful, and it was later subsumed in Gandhis Satyagraha Movement, which advocated complete independence for India.Meanwhile, in 1916, Nehru married Kamala Kaul. The couple had a daughter in 1917, who would later go on to be Prime Minister of India herself under her married name, Indira Gandhi. A son, born in 1924, died after just two days.