Usha Mehta

About Usha Mehta:

• She was born in a village named Saras, near Surat in Gujarat in 1920. She was a true Gandhian at heart and was popularly known as Ushaben.
• At the age of eight in 1928, she participated in a protest march against the Simon Commission.
• In 1942, she and her associates established the Secret Congress Radio during Quit India Movement. It played a crucial role in keeping the freedom movement leaders connected with the public.

Setting up an underground station:

• Background: At the advent of the War in 1939, the British had suspended all amateur radio licences across the Empire. Operators were supposed to turn in all equipment to the authorities, with severe punishment for those who failed to do so.
• Alongside Mehta, Babubhai Khakar, Vithalbhai Jhaveri and Chandrakant Jhaveri were key figures in organising Congress Radio.
• Congress Radio case:
  • The trial of the five accused in the— Mehta, Babubhai Khakar, Vithalbhai Jhaveri, Chandrakant Jhaveri, and Nanak Gainchand Motwane (who sold key pieces of equipment to the team) — generated a lot of excitement in Bombay.
  • Vithalbhai and Motwane were acquitted, Mehta, Babubhai and Chandrakant received stern sentences.
  • Usha Mehta was released from Pune’s Yerawada Jail in March 1946, and hailed in the nationalist media as “Radio-ben”.