Did you know?

It was because of the British that the original color of the uniform of Khudai Khidmatgar (Servants of God) movement became red from its original dark brown/chocolate color.

What could have inspired the British to name the movement #RedShirts? - Thread. https://twitter.com/ANPMarkaz/status/1329815483298754560

Khudai Khidmatgar Organisation and Movement was founded exactly 91 years ago, in Nov 1929, to accommodate illiterate and senior people who could not become part of Zalmo Jirga, an organization formed on the lines of Young Turks that recruited only literate youth as members.

However, it was not named Khudai Khidmatgar at that time, it had actually no name. It was only when Bacha Khan wanted to attend the Lahore Congress that he asked his friends to come up a with name for the organization.

They came up with an Arabic name, the Arabic translation for volunteer but Bacha Khan thought it was a difficult name, so he himself proposed the name Khudai Khidmatgar.

But how did Khudai Khidmatgar became known to be as RedShirts in India and abroad?

Since most members of the movement were poor and couldn’t afford any uniform they were asked to dip their shirts in dark brown or chocolate color, something that was easily and cheaply available.

The British could have referred to them as BrownShirts but they called them #RedShirts because this name was very much known to them. They knew about similar but very popular European volunteer movement that had actually carried the name #RedShirts, or Camicie Rosse in Italian.

#RedShirts were the volunteers and followers of the famous Italian patriot Guiseppe Garibaldi, they fought multiple wars and took part in the military campaigns in Uruguay, Italy, Greece (Greco-Turkish war 1897), Balkans etc.

Guiseppe Garibaldi was an Italian patriot, a follower of the Young Italy movement. He escaped death sentence as result of a failed rebellion and went into exile to South America for 14 years where he raised the Italian legion and participated in wars in Brazil and Uruguay.

The Italian Legion was given red shirts, destined for the workers of slaughterhouse. Their success in various battles earn them a name and fame as RedShirts, derived from the color their shirts.

Later, Giuseppe Garibaldi came to Europe and led various military campaigns/wars that led to the creation of a unified kingdom of Italy. Given the roles he played in Uruguay and Italy, he is known as the hero of the two worlds, America and Europe.

RedShirts gained a lot of popularity afterwards, and it inspired fashion trend in women, many novels, movies and armies as well e.g., American Civil War, the Garibaldi Guard and their Confederate counterpart Garibaldi Legion, wore red shirts as a part of their uniforms.

There was a good deal of similarities between the Guiseppe Garibaldi’s Camicie Rosse and Bacha Khan’s Khudai Khidmagar. Both movements were of the volunteers who were well-disciplined, organized and committed to the cause of freedom except the fact that the former was master

of warfare while the latter preached and practiced(?!) non-violence. Based on all of this, it could well be the case that the British referred to Khudai Khidmatgar movement as #RedShirts Movement.