Canara Coast · Western Coastal Strip
Uttara Kannada was annexed late and administered oddly — taken with the rest of Kanara in 1799, held in the Madras Presidency for sixty years, and only moved to Bombay in 1862 — and its politics followed the presidency it ended up in. That is why the district's freedom movement reads like a Bombay Deccan movement rather than a coastal Madras one, and why it peaked in a single year. Ankola broke the salt law on 13 April 1930 before a crowd put at forty thousand, kept the satyagraha going for forty-five days, and then ran a no-tax campaign through the confiscations that followed; the taluk was called the Bardoli of Karnataka for it. Before that the district's record is thin and episodic — risings at Supa and Dandeli that coincided with the rebellion of 1857 — because the ghat forest was administered rather than governed and there were few local chiefships left to lose anything.
Risings and revolts
Risings in the Kali basin at Supa, in the present Joida taluk, and at Dandeli, coinciding with the rebellion in the north and belonging to the same cluster as Nargund, Bagalkot and Halagali.
Outcome: Suppressed with the rest of the Deccan risings; the district was reorganised into the Bombay Presidency four years later.
M. P. Nadakarni broke the salt law at Ankola before a crowd put at about forty thousand. Revu Honnappa Nayak and Honnappa Mangeshkar bought the first packet of the illegal salt at auction for thirty rupees. Among those on the platform were Karnad Sadashiva Rao, Basagoda Rama Nayak, Umabai Kundapur and N. S. Hardikar.
Outcome: The leaders were arrested at once; the satyagraha continued for forty-five days.
Ankola was one of four taluks chosen for the refusal of land revenue. Holdings were confiscated and auctioned, and the campaign was sustained through it.
Outcome: Ankola was afterwards called the Bardoli of Karnataka. More than fifteen hundred activists were arrested across the Karnataka districts during the civil disobedience years.
People
| Name | Years | Movement | Known for |
|---|---|---|---|
| M. P. NadakarniAnkola | — | Civil disobedience, 1930 | Broke the salt law at Ankola on 13 April 1930 in front of a crowd put at about forty thousand.Arrested immediately afterwards. |
| Hardekar ManjappaBorn at Banavasi; worked in Dharwad, Hubballi and Belagavi | 1886–1947 | Congress; social reform and temperance | Started the weekly Dhanurdhari on 2 September 1906, began public Basava Jayanti observances in 1913, helped organise the Belagavi Congress session of 1924 and opened an ashram school at Almatti in 1927. He gave more than a thousand public lectures on satyagraha and was called the Gandhi of Karnataka. |
| Umabai KundapurBorn at Mangaluru; active across the Kanara coast | born 1892 | Hindustani Seva Dal; civil disobedience | Born Bhavani Golikeri. She led the women's wing of the Hindustani Seva Dal and ran the Tilak Kanya School, and was among the leaders at the Ankola salt satyagraha of 1930. In 1942 her house was a shelter for workers who had gone underground.Arrested in 1932 and imprisoned four months at Yerawada; the Karnataka Press was seized and the school closed. |
| N. S. HardikarBorn at Dharwad; active at Ankola in 1930 | 1889–1975 | Congress; the Hindustani Seva Dal | Founded the volunteer corps that became the Seva Dal after the Kakinada Congress of 1923, and was on the platform at the Ankola salt satyagraha.The Seva Dal stayed proscribed after 1934 when other Congress bans were lifted. |
| Karnad Sadashiva RaoSouth Canara; active at Ankola in 1930 | 1881–1937 | Congress; non-cooperation and civil disobedience | One of the first from the Kannada country to take up Gandhi's satyagraha, and one of the leaders of the Ankola salt satyagraha. He founded a Mahila Sabha for widows and poor women and spent his property on the movement.Fell ill after the Faizpur Congress session of December 1936 and died on 9 January 1937, leaving nothing behind him. |
| Basagoda Rama NayakAnkola | — | Civil disobedience, 1930 | One of the organisers named in the accounts of the Ankola salt satyagraha of 13 April 1930. |
| Revu Honnappa NayakAnkola | — | Civil disobedience, 1930 | With Honnappa Mangeshkar, bought the first packet of illegally made salt at the Ankola auction on 13 April 1930 for thirty rupees. |
People from Canara Coast who resisted colonial rule, and the regional risings and revolts that shaped that resistance. (10)