Video: '13th April 1919: British troops commit the Amritsar Massacre'

(Sunday, April 13, 1919, 5:37 p.m. India Standard Time; during the Jallianwala Bagh massacre) — British Indian Army soldiers under Brigadier-General Reginald Dyer, the military commander of Amritsar, opened fire at an unarmed gathering of men, women and children today in the Jallianwala Bagh (garden) near the Golden Temple in northwestern British India.

Dyer’s force entered the garden, blocking the main entrance after them, took up position on a raised bank, and on Dyer’s orders fired on the crowd for about ten minutes, directing their bullets largely towards the few open gates through which people were trying to flee, until the ammunition supply was almost exhausted.

According to official British Raj sources, 379 people were killed. According to other sources, there were over 1,000 deaths, with more than 2,000 wounded, and Civil Surgeon Dr. Smith said that there were 1,526 casualties.

The civilians had assembled for the traditional festival of Baisakhi and a peaceful protest to demand the release of two popular leaders of the Indian Independence Movement, Satya Pal and Saifuddin Kitchlew, who had been earlier arrested by the government and moved to a secret location. Both were proponents of the Satyagraha movement led by Gandhi.

Video: 'Jallianwala Bagh massacre (movie gandhi)'