Correct Answer – Option 2 : Hindu Patriot

The Indigo revolt was a peasant movement and subsequent uprising of indigo farmers against the indigo planters that arose in Chaugacha village of Nadia in Bengal in 1859.

The Bengali middle class supported the peasants wholeheartedly.

• The Hindu Patriot, under the able editorship of Harish Chandra Mukherjee, became the mouthpiece of protest against imperial injustices.
• In the late fifties, the Hindu Patriot began to expose the oppression and atrocities on Indian peasants by the indigo planters.
• The latter used to force the peasants into cultivating indigo.
• In late 1875, when one Jagadananda Mukherjee invited the Prince of Wales to his residence and zenana, the Hindu Patriot commented that the national feeling had been outraged.
• After the initial editorship of Girish Chandra Ghosh and Harish Chandra Mukherjee, Krishnadas Pal was the editor of the paper for 23 years.
• During this period he opposed imperial laws like the Immigration Bill, the Vernacular Press Act, and the Ilbert Bill through the columns of the Hindoo Patriot.
• He protested against the oppression of tea workers and termed the Immigration Bill as ‘The Slave Law of India’.
• The press supported the revolt and played its part in portraying the plight of the farmers and fighting for their cause.

​Hence, the correct answer is Hindu Patriot.

Causes of the Indigo revolt:

• Indigo cultivation started in Bengal in 1777.
• Indigo was in high demand worldwide. European planters enjoyed a monopoly over indigo and they forced Indian farmers to grow indigo.
• The cultivators were forced to grow indigo in place of food crops.
• The farmers were given advance loans for this purpose. Once the farmers took loans, they could never repay them due to the high rates of interest.
• They were forced to sell indigo at non-profitable rates so as to maximize the European planters’ profits.
• If a farmer refused to grow indigo and planted paddy instead, the planters resorted to illegal means to get the farmer to grow indigo such as looting and burning crops, kidnapping the farmer’s family members, etc.
• The government always supported the planters who enjoyed many privileges and judicial immunities.