THE FORMATION OF THE FORWARD BLOC

****The Forward Bloc of the Indian National Congress was formed on 3 May 1939 by Netaji Subhash Chandra Bose, who had resigned from the presidency of the Indian National Congress on April 29 after being outmaneuvered by Mohandas K. Gandhi.
**** The formation of the Forward Bloc was announced to the public at a rally in Calcutta.
**** Bose said that who all were joining, they had to never turn their back to the British and must fill the pledge form by cutting their finger and signing it with their blood.
****First of all, seventeen young girls came up and signed the pledge form.
****Initially the aim of the Forward Bloc was to rally all the leftwing sections within the Congress and develop an alternative leadership inside the Congress.
****Bose became the president of the Forward Bloc and S.S. Cavesheer its vice-president.
****A Forward Bloc Conference was held in Bombay in the end of June.
****At that conference the constitution and programme of the Forward Bloc were approved.
****In July 1939 Subhas Chandra Bose announced the Committee of the Forward Bloc.
**** It had Subhas Chandra Bose as president, S.S. Cavesheer from Punjab as its vice-president, Lal Shankarlal from Delhi, as its general secretary and Pandit B Tripathi and Khurshed Nariman from Bombay as secretaries.
**** Other prominent members were Annapurniah from Andhra Pradesh, Senapati Bapat, Hari Vishnu Kamnath from Bombay, Pasumpon U. Muthuramalingam Thevar from Tamil Nadu and Sheel Bhadra Yajee from Bihar. Satya Ranjan Bakshi, was appointed as the secretary of the Bengal Provincial Forward Bloc.

****In August the same year Bose began publishing a newspaper titled Forward Bloc. He travelled around the country, rallying support for his new political project