How Many Really Died at Jallianwala bagh?

JUST HOW MANY PEOPLE DIED IN JALLIANWALA BAGH?

The Background

Amritsar, Sunday, 13 April 1919, afternoon. It was the Baisakhi festival. The place was an uneven ground, known as Jaillianwala Bagh. This was not a park, as the name suggests, it was merely a vacant lot surrounded by red brick buildings in the shape of a rough rectangle of 225m x 180m. There were a few small entrances but most of these were kept locked. The main entrance was a narrow alley a little more than 2 metres wide, which served as the main entrance and exit.

The Jallianwala Bagh a few months after the massacre

On this day the ground was filled with a crowd estimated to be between 12,000 to 15,000 Indians of all ages and major religions: Sikhs, Hindus and Muslims. Brigadier General Reginald Dyer came to this lot near the Golden Temple with sixty-five Gurkha and twenty-five Baloch soldiers and two armoured cars mounting machineguns. The soldiers were armed with fifty SMLE .303 (7.7mm) rifles. The rest of the troops, presumably Gurkha recruits, only had khukhries or perhaps sword type bayonets (it is not really clear because at that time rifle regiments called the bayonets "swords" and reports say they were armed with swords. Not that it matters here). The armoured cars were left outside, as they were unable to enter the Bagh through the narrow entrance. The main entrance was guarded by the troops backed by the armoured vehicles.

This passage offered the only open exit. But it was blocked by the troops and armoured cars

The Massacre

Dyer—without warning the crowd to disperse—blocked the main exits and ordered his men to fire into the crowd. He explained later that this act “was not to disperse the meeting but to punish the Indians for disobedience”.

The troops kept firing for about ten minutes in the direction where the crowd was densest. First this was the main body at the centre of the ground. Then firing was directed towards the sides where the panic stricken people were milling about, looking for an exit. The official count of rounds fired is 1,650.

Dyer left when he felt the ammunition was running out, and imposed a curfew. The rest is history, and discussed in detail in many books and articles.

How Many Died?

What has intrigued me is the number of casualties. How many people died? Official figures say 379 people were killed and 1,200 wounded. This figure of 379 is simply incredible – ridiculous.

How can you shoot into a confined mass of humanity at least 12,000 strong with SMLE rifles firing Mark VII rounds 1,650 in number, from a range of 100 metres or so, and kill only 379?

The Ballistics; Just the Basics

A WW1 pattern SMLE rifle

The Short Magazine Lee Enfield (SMLE) was a bolt action rifle with a box magazine holding ten rounds. The magazine could be filled in a matter of seconds by means of charger clips holding five rounds each. The SMLE bolt action was renowned for its rapid firing ability. A trained firer could get off twenty rounds in one minute.  The ammunition then in use was the Mark VII round; it couldn’t have been Mark VI, as stated on the board at Jallianwala. This had been phased out a decade ago. (This has an important bearing on the case, since Mk VII could kill more people).

This plaque wrongly mentions the type of ammo.

This round packs a terrific punch. It leaves the muzzle at a speed of about 743 metres per second. The spiral grooves inside the barrel – called the rifling – imparts a spin to the bullet. The bullet was so designed that most of the weight fell near the tail. So, when it met any resistance, as when it hit a person, the spinning bullet wobbled about its path. They call it yawing. This yawing bullet made a horribly big wound where it exited the body. But it still had enough kinetic energy left to go through two or three more bodies (depending on whether it hit bone or soft flesh). The yawing bullet rarely hit the secondary target head on. It can even travel in a different direction, especially if it has hit some hard bone. It more often than not hit the second person broadside and made an elongated wound, called a keyhole wound by experts. Meaning that the second or third victims of the same bullet didn’t have it so nice either. Probably worse.

Lethal. The Mark VII .303 round

Oh, and I forgot to add: this rifle and ammo can kill from a kilometre away (though it is altogether a different matter that it’s hard to aim and be accurate from so far). But if it hits, it can kill. Here we are talking about 100, or at most 150 metres range. A rookie can’t miss a human target from this range. And when they are bunched up, he can scarcely miss at all.

A Few More Incidentals Before We Crunch the Numbers

A cloth bandolier holds ten charger clips, making a total of fifty rounds per soldier.

Bullet holes. Nos. 1 and 2 are small round holes. Means they probably didn't hit anyone before striking wall.
Hole at No. 3 is a keyhole. This bullet had probably passed through a human body before hitting the wall.
Holes 4 & 5. The keyholes are very marked. In fact these were yawing wildly and struck sideways.
These are also most likely to have passed through one or more human bodies.

There were 50 rifles which (they say) fired a total of 1,650 rounds. That’s an average of 33 rounds per soldier, in about ten minutes. So this figure is probably correct.

Another fact, a bit curious, is that at least one or more soldiers fired to miss. It is mentioned in some book (in Butcher of Amritsar by Nigel Collet) that an officer under Dyer found it necessary to deny that any man was deliberately missing. The evidence is there on the Jallianwala walls. Some bullet holes are way too high up. And they are straight round holes, not keyholes. That means the bullet probably didn't hit anything before striking the brick wall. Some shots were no doubt fired at the windows of the houses, and also at onlookers on the rooftops. But some of the holes aren't near any window. This implies that at least one of the Gurkhas or Balochis still had a spark of humanity in him.

The Numbers and My Own Guesstimates

Total rounds fired		1650
Estimated primary hits (on the low side) should be at least 1/3 of them. (Multiple hits on same person counted as misses)		1/3 of 1650	=	550
Estimated immediate fatalities, at least 1/3 of those hit		1/3 of 550	≈	(dead) 183
That leaves injured		550 – 183	=	(injured) 367
Incapacitated injured hit again, trampled to death, or died of no medical attention (due to curfew) could be 1/3 at least of the injured 367		1/3 of 367	≈	(dead) 122
That makes dead, so far		183 + 122	=	305
That leaves injured, so far		367 – 122	=	245

As mentioned before, these bullets can hit 2 or 3 more persons. The first person hit was the primary target, the second is the secondary target, and the third hit by the same bullet would be the tertiary target.

Secondary hits, could be at least 1/4 of the primary hits, which were estimated at 550		1/4 of 550	≈	137
Deaths from secondary hits, at least 1/4 of hits		1/4 of 137	≈	(dead) 34
That leaves injured from secondary hits		137 – 34	=	(injured) 103
Incapacitated injured hit again or trampled to death, or died of no medical attention, could be 1/4 at least of the injured 103		1/4 of 103	≈	(dead) 25
That leaves injured from sec. hits		103 – 25	=	(injured) 78
Deaths now total 305 + 34 + 25			=	(dead) 364
Injured now total 245 + 78			=	323

Since these bullets were fired into a dense crowd, some of them found a third human target. The tertiary hits.

Tertiary hits, could be at least 1/5 of the secondary hits, which were estimated at 137		1/5 of 137	≈	27
Fatalities of tertiary hits, could be at least 1/4 of those hit		1/4 of  27	≈	(dead) 6
That leaves injured from tertiary hits		27 – 6	=	21
Deaths now total 364 + 6			=	(dead) 370
Injured now total 323 + 21			=	344

Now lets us assume that these injured have the capacity to still walk (though unlikely in all cases). So we will consider them with the others in the crowd. The crowd was estimated to be a minimum of 12,000. Of these we have already estimated that 370  have died in the shooting.

Crowd who survived the firing

12,000–370

=

11,630

Of these, a large number died in the stampede(s). Recent stampedes at places of pilgrimage can be a guide here. The children, elderly, otherwise weak or injured are the most vulnerable. About 5% (i.e 1/20) of the crowd may have died in this manner. There was no escape, remember.

Panic stricken people jumped into this well. 140 bodies are reported to have been taken out

140 bodies alone are said to have been recovered from the well in the ground. So the following estimate is very much on the lower side.

Killed in stampede, crowd of about 11,000	1/20 of 11000	=	550
Injuries in stampede; could be 4 times the deaths	550 x 4	=	2200

This makes a grand total of dead 370 + 550		=	(dead) 920
And a grand total of injured 344 + 2200		=	2544

So, What is the Guesstimate

According to my cold blooded reasoning, 920 should be the figure of the dead, and more than 2,500 injured, on that hot April day in 1919.

Madan Mohan Malaviya’s Figures

The Madan Mohan Malaviya Committee was appointed by the Indian National Congress to make a report on the Amritsar disturbances. After rigorous questioning of witnesses (Malaviya was a trained lawyer and could be relied on to discard tall tales) and sifting of evidence, his figures are: Dead 1000; Injured 1500.

Conclusion

The conclusion I can draw is that Malaviya’s figures are more accurate. The official figure of 379 dead needs to be dumped and discredited. We shouldn’t let the halo of antiquity give the least bit of respectability to this silly figure.