B.G. Horniman

The Story

Horniman came to Bombay as a young journalist and worked on The Times of India, but he grew increasingly impatient with the paper's caution and with a Raj that treated reporting as a privilege it could revoke. In 1913 he helped launch The Bombay Chronicle, which became one of the sharpest anti-colonial voices in the Indian press.

He opposed the Rowlatt Act, defended the freedom of assembly and reporting, and wrote with a fury that the authorities found intolerable — he was deported and barred from India for years, a punishment that made him a hero of the very profession he had entered as a foreigner.

When he was finally able to return, he resumed journalism in Bombay and renounced British citizenship to become an Indian — a decision he announced at a time when the offer of British nationality was considered an honour. He kept writing, editing and mentoring young Indian journalists until the end.

He died in 1948, an Indian by choice, having helped build the tradition of a fearless Indian press. India's journalists still honour his name, and his life remains a rebuke to those who assume that love of freedom is passport-bound.