Independence Day 2026: Radio jockey who rebelled, how a girl ran a secret radio station

On the night of 8 August 1942, as Mahatma Gandhi gave the call of "Do or Die" and launched the Quit India movement, few people in Bombay could have guessed that one of the most effective challenges to British authority would soon come not from a political leader but from a young student.

Usha Mehta was only 22. Within days, she and a small group of underground activists had assembled a clandestine radio station that slipped past colonial censorship and carried the message of resistance across India.

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For nearly three months, the British hunted the mysterious voice that opened every broadcast with the declaration: "This is the Congress Radio calling on 42.34 from somewhere in India." By the time the station was silenced, it had become one of the boldest communication experiments of the freedom struggle. A 2024 Hindi movie, 'Ae Watan Mere Watan', featuring Sara Ali Khan, was based on Mehta's life.