One hundred and one years after a handful of revolutionaries stopped a British train near a small town in Awadh and changed the course of India's freedom struggle, Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath stood in Lucknow on Sunday, August 9, 2026, to salute their memory — and to ensure a new generation carries it forward.

Attending the centenary commemoration of the Kakori Train Action — which he called a 'golden chapter of valour, self-respect, and love for the nation' — CM Yogi paid tribute to the revolutionaries of the Hindustan Republican Association who executed the daring heist on August 9, 1925. The date is not incidental: it is also the anniversary of the Quit India Movement of 1942, making it one of the most charged dates on India's revolutionary calendar.

Two Booklets, One Mission: Keeping the Memory Alive

The occasion saw the release of two publications. The first, titled 'Vande Mataram', is built around paintings by children — a deliberate choice to root the memory of 1925 in the imagination of the youngest citizens. The second, 'Kakori Train Action', draws on records related to the martyrs and official government documents, giving the event a historical-archival weight beyond ceremonial tribute.

Together, the booklets represent a pattern that has become familiar in Uttar Pradesh: state-led commemoration that pairs solemn remembrance with educational outreach, embedding revolutionary history into the public consciousness through schools, art, and published record.

Families of Martyrs and Soldiers Honoured

The ceremony went beyond remembrance. Families of the Kakori revolutionaries and families of soldiers who gave their lives in the defence of independent India were formally honoured at the event — a gesture that draws a deliberate line of continuity between the sacrifice of 1925 and the sacrifices of the armed forces today. It is the kind of symbolic bridge that state commemorations rarely make explicit, and it gave the Lucknow gathering a resonance that stretched well past the history books.

What the Kakori Train Action Was

On August 9, 1925, members of the Hindustan Republican Association — among them Ram Prasad Bismil, Ashfaqullah Khan, Roshan Singh, and Rajendra Lahiri — looted the British Indian Railways train at Kakori, near Lucknow, to fund their armed resistance against colonial rule. The British response was swift and severe: mass arrests, trials, and executions followed. Four revolutionaries were hanged; many others were transported to the Andaman Islands. The action became a defining episode of militant nationalism in northern India, and its leaders became icons of the independence movement.

A century later, the state that was once the theatre of that resistance is now the custodian of its memory. The 101st anniversary marks the first year after the centennial, but the scale of Sunday's event suggests the commemoration has acquired a momentum of its own — one unlikely to stop at a round number.