Akhatov U.A. Candidate of law sciences, associate professor

SEMBAY D. undergraduate student

Ibragimov O. undergraduate student

Al-Farabi Kazakh National University

T.Ryskulov about the nature and value of the policy pursued by the tsarist Russia

At the beginning of the ХХ  century Turkistan territory was subordinate land of the Russian empire. This was a very difficult time when Turkistan people suffered from national inequalities and injustice. Sacred concepts like «Freedom», «equality», «liberty» were not actual at that time.

After conquering Kazakhstan and Central Asia (Тurkistan), tsar administration began to strengthen colonial politics . Local people representatives had no right to be engaged in political power or management . In order to cultivate colonized lands and suppress political-social confrontation, Russian empire began to settle Russian peasants and Russian-kazak troops to the Turkistan area. Settlers were placed to the fertile lands of local people, but unfortunately old residents were dislocated to a very uncomfortable places with unfavorable weather conditions : mountainous areas, desserts. Only between 1906 and 1915 tsar power has taken 2462265 tithe land from Kazakh people inhabiting Zhetisu and Syrdaria regions and distributed to Russian settlers [1]. Colonizers tried much to turn this «...into real Russian land [2] . In 1917 the head of provisional government A.F. Kerensky said to Russian muslim people : «... you should treat colonized men like English and French people did [3].

The tsar power conducted colonial policy openly without disguising. It didn’t take into account national, ethnical peculiarities of local people, their ways of living and traditions, national culture , they considered them to be slaves and did their best to forget language, national conscious, forced them to be christians. General mayor of the Turkistan territory N. A. Kuropatkin wrote in his diary:

« we whole 50 years deprived outsiders of development, education and from Russian life , mainly of progressive culture» [4]. Missioners like Ostroumov and Lykoshin spent their whole life to christen and make Russian muslim people. They considered Russian settlers to be higher in all respects than local Kazakhs and fomented hatred between them. In their opinion local people were illiterate, wild, worthless . The worst thing which brought colonizers to the area was alcoholism . For example, in Aulie ata uyezd (larger administrative district, 200 Russian inhabitants of the Michailovka village drunk 5000 buckets or 50000 litres vodka in 1913 [5]. Drunk Russian peasants considered themselves more cultural than local people.

The imperial power also introduced administrative police system in the Turkistan territory: general – governor – regional governor –  uyezd ( territorial area executives. Only Russians were appointed to these high positions, as for local people, they “held” lower positions : bolys (chief of small rural district), kazy( muslim judge. Administration branch had social disease: bribery, abuse of authority. Simple people had to pay huge taxes. «Russian officials here (in Kazakhstan and Turkistan) criticised local people concerning their knowledge, respected values, always carried out the policy of making them Russian,- wrote with anger A. Bokeikhanov [6]. So, the beginning of the  ХХ century showed rotting of both colonial yoke and crises of tsar regime. The tsar regime was in crisis. Rebellion appeared everywhere.

Turar Ryskulov’s childhood and youth years were the years of hard time, when yoke and hardships suppressed simple people. T. Ryskulov was born in 1894, 26 th of December in the Zhetisu region, Verny uyezd eastern Talgar bolys in the family of nomad peasant who fought for freedom, liberty and equality. His father Ryskul Zhylkaydaruly couldn’t bear tsar administration regime, who lived in Syrdaria region, Chernyev uyezd in 80-s of the ХІХ century settled to Tulkibas region. In a new place he again suffered from injustice and in December 1904 he shot local chief of small rural district and was exiled to Siberia [7]. Deprived of his father’s support, but with the help of relatives 1907 he enters Russian primary school and finishes with honors. Such kind of mixed schools pursued missioner purpose. When he was in prison with his father in Verny city, prison supervisor Prikhodko tried to make young Turar christian [8], at Merke school teachers also forced him to cross himself.

In 1910. Turar was admitted to the 1-st level agricultural school and in October  1914 he finished it and got a specialty of a gardener. In school-leaving certificate he had excellent marks. He witnessed injustice, violence, inequality, humiliation from very childhood. When he was to finish school, he wrote request application to the headmaster in Russian and one can admire his natural ability and diligence : « I could study better, I know I am capable, but human experiences good and bad moments in his life, because of hard times I couldn’t master what I wanted, didn’t get enough knowledge, but due to my stubbornness I started to study better from the III form» [9].  Further, he wrote that he was deprived of support, as far as father was in prison, he had to help his mother about housework and there left little time for doing lessons, but thanks to education he became strong and would like to continue it if possible. Besides this application in archive documents one can see Turar’s control works on mathematics and Russian literature.

His request was satisfied, he got a pass to specialized agricultural school, but school headmaster didn’t accept him and said: «kazakh – nomad, he doesn’t need knowledge to cultivate land» [10]. Distressed about this in 1915 Turar tried to enter newly opened pedagogical institute in Tashkent, but they refused to admit him, they considered him «illiterate». Finally, he complains education ministry gets permission to pass exam and enters the institute [11]. In order to survive, he works as a gardener in Krasnovodsk fieldship near Tashkent city.

Being a student, he participated in nation-liberation, revolutionary movements, secretly attended and took active part in political circles, thoroughly researched political literature. Diligent and industrious from very childhood he clearly understood that the path to gain independence and freedom will be very hard.

In summer 1916 nation- liberation rebellion against tsar administration took place in Kazakh steppe. This battle was natural result of the tsar administration’s colonial policy. The Tsar ukase of June 25 to gather and hire rough workers to the rebel was only pretext to start rebellion[12]. The charter was announced on the 8thof July. Having suspected that he might be in that list and witnessing rebels in the Tashkent city, T. Ryskulov left institute and went to Merke village of the Aulie ata uyesd ( large administrative- territorial unit) [13].

The tsar administration considered outsider to be obliging, easy-going «free» labour force compared with Russian workers. They quickly started to gather workers from Turkistan territory, because they were sure local people would do nothing against «Russian weapon» [14], - remembers T.Ryskulov in his work about the history of the rebellion. People expressed dissatisfaction everywhere.

General- governor N.A. Kuropatkin divided at his discretion 220000 people from Turkistan territory for the rough work in the following way by regions: Syrdaria region - 60000, Samarkand  – 32407, Fergana – 51233, Zhetisu – 43000 and Sakaspi – 13830.  In order to protect interests of the «Cotton growers» he reduced the number of people from Samarkand and Syrdaria to 40000, instead of them he ordered to hire additional workers from non cotton growing areas [15]. That is why the rebelion covered nomad regions and was of severe character.

It was supposed they should hire 22675 workers from Aulie ata uyezd. According to the instructions they were to release from rear works: bolys, сvillage administration staff, low police officials from outsiders, mosque staff, mosque pupils (they got religious education), middle level and using noble name outsiders, respected citizens from wealthy families and those who used the rank of a respected citizen. Under the leadership of the Aulie ata uyezd executive colonel Suplatov they started to gather workers from the regions. People were very angry and furious of this fact, they didn’t approve the tsar administration acts, so they decided to arm themselves and fight against it. Turkistan general-governor announced military situation in the territory. Rebellion was very severe. Kazakh troops attacked villages settled by Russians, armed confrontations accelerated. Shocked by this situation the head of the uyezd distributed arms to Russian peasants.

When Т.Ryskulov came back to Merke, people fought openly and armed confrontations reached its peak. There were many victims as far as people were not properly armed and they showed unorganized actions. T. Ryskulov had incredible organizing and leading qualities and soon local people trusted him much and asked him to lead them in the political battle against injustice. Having noticed that rebels often confront with punitive brigade of the tsar administration, he called people to be organized, advised them not to deal with small groups, not to fight with simple Russian peasants, just to express dissatisfaction to the tsar administration. “What I worried much, - wrote T. Ryskulov in his diary, that the tsar authority would provoke Russian peasants to attack Kazakh troops and they would suffer much [16]. He condemned the war between imperialist countries, conducted meetings in places where there were many rebels, explained unfairness of this battle, revealed the policy of tsar authority and of local executives, recommended to be very cautious from provocations. He highly appreciated rebel actions, where people’s hero Akkos Kosanuli was the leader, he said it was well organized and gave him political advice.

When the rebel had reached its peak in Merke, the tsar authority arrested him, but not having found any guilt, had to release him, but prohibits him not to deal with political activity. After release from the prison, he was ill about one month and couldn’t help rebels. At this time the tsar authority suppressed rebels in most places, repressed people started to punish them severely. Local police having noticed, that T. Ryskulov again participates in political struggle, decided to search him, so Turar had secretly escape to Тashkent.

Nation- liberation movement of 1916 showed all secrets of bitter existence, he worried much about the future of his people and he firmly decided to devote all his life to nation liberation struggle.

So, his main objective was to research social-political, economic situation of his colonized people, to understand deeply the essence of colonial policy of the tsar authority.

Temporary government established after February revolution which overthrew Russian tsar authority in 1917, commissioned to rule temporary Turkistan territory to the Turkistan committee formed April 6. The members of the committee were:  N.N. Shepkin (chairperson),  A. Bokeikhanov, M. Tynyshpayev, S. Maksutov, V.S. Elpatevskyi, A. L. Lipovskyi, P.I. Preobrajensksy, О.А.Shkapsky and A. Dauletshin. Later the list was supplemented with new names. The temporary government inherited from the tsar authority how to humiliate , cheat and yoke simple, unprotected people used false slogans, promised unbelievable things. The Turkistan Committee didn’t make any changes into territory management system, just did insignificant works. For example, to the Syrdaria region military governor post,it appointed previous uyesd executive lieutenant colonel Trizna as a new regional commissar. Mainly previous tsar officials and judge staff were approved as uyezd commissars. In mountainous areas and villages the power was in the hands of bolys executives and elders. Nevertheless, some members of the Turkistan committee, personally: A. Bokeikhanov, М.Тynyshpayev and О. Shkapsky did much work in 1916 to improve the life of repressed people.

The relation between Т. Ryskulov and Turkistan Committee should be considered very attentively. We couldn’t find any documents which shows this relationship in archive materials, those found indirect documents are not base to express real opinion about those events. It should be summarized in the following way: In summer 1917 T. Ryskulov established contact with local nation representatives, they trusted him much and they decided to appoint him the leader of the Syrdaria region. Later he left the mentioned Committee and joined Bolsheviks and it has many objective reasons, one of them – the Turkistan Committee was unable to solve political, social- economic crisis, national problems of the territory. Т. Ryskulov understood clearly the nature of the Temporary Government and it wouldn’t bring freedom and equality to his people.

He fought for people’s freedom and in spring 1917 he returned to Merke and formed « Revolutionary Union of the Kazakh Youth». He wrote about it: «The reason of our organizing this Union is that Kazakh people suffered much from 1916 nation-liberation movement, later from kulaks (wealthy Russians) and Kazakh youth needed organization which would put them on right revolutionary path, so we formed « Revolutionary Union of the Kazakh Youth». The members of the Union were those who took an active part in 1916 nation-liberation movement, has revolutionary vision, well up in politics 30 Kazakh, Tatar and Russian young people and their political leader was T.Ryskulov. They made contact with revolutionary intended soldiers of the Aulie Ata garrison and Merke military division. Bolsheviks ( soldiers against tsar army) had great influence on this garrison. « At that time, - says T. Ryskulov, the representative of Tashkent council, one Bolshevik visited Merke and explained bolshevik’s programs and objectives , the reason of their struggle. So, in 1917 we were close to bolshevik idea».  T. Ryskulov contacted with the well-known bolsheviks of the Aulie-Ata uyezd: N.I. Chernyshev,S.K. Khmelevsky, Fedorov- Savadsky and with their substantial help, conducted revolutional propoganda work among Kazakh workers. «Revolutionary Union of the Kazakh Youth» was different among the same organizations formed in the territory of Turkistan and Kazakhstan, because this Union had special programs and charter, clearly defined their aims of struggle. « At that period there were not many certain revolutionary parties and the strive and trying of Kazakh youth to join on the base of those programs was real advancement», - pointed out T. Ryskulov. It is seen from the program and charter that the Union members clearly understood the character, meaning and social difference of the February revolution. The "Union» members criticized Russian colonists and local executives for their deeds against local people and protected interests and expectations of simple people and stated their purpose: «... We chose the way to fight against violence and injustice of Temporary government’s local committees and Russian kulaks». The "Union» program openly condemned that the February revolution was really unable to eliminate social injustice and national yoke, on the contrary, local dominating class representatives were in concert with colonizers oppressed simple people. « Revolutionary Union of the Kazakh Turkistan Youth» was political well up school for T. Ryskulov. In summer 1917 Turkistan territory council of Kazakh deputies was formed in Tashkent.  One of the council leaders was T. Ryskulov. That year August 30, peasant and kazakh  deputy councils joined together and formed central executive committee. The members of the mentioned committee were 6 Russians and 6 Kazakhs, one of them was N.Ryskulov.

In September 1917 Т.Ryskulov became the member of RSDRP. The main reason of his joining authoritative bolshevik party: he really believed in bolshevik programs and ideas, he thought this is the only and right way which will bring his people their dreamed freedom and equality and besides his environment forwarded him to join this party without any doubt. We know, that he couldn’t join political «Аlash Orda» movement, of course, there were some reasons, mainly: being very distant, as far as political centre of the movement situated in Orynbor city and Arka area which were too far from the place where T. Ryskulov worked ( Turkistan territory), the movement functioned improperly in southern regions, T. Ryskulov didn’t have enough political experience, finally, his social view point differed much from «Аlash Orda» members. All these facilitated him to join bolshevik’s political party.

References:

1. Аrtykbayev Zh.О. The history of Kazakhstan : Textbook . Astana: 1994. P.84 2. Ryskulov T. Revolution and indigenous people of Turkestan (Collection of the major articles, reports, speeches and theses). Part-1. Tashkent, "Uzgosizdat", 1925.

3. Konyratbayev O. Turar Ryskulov. Almaty. "Kazakhstan", 1994, pp.119-120 .

4. Mynbayev D.", Requirement born on helter-skelter move of fate ". "Orken" 20 of April, 1991

5. Kamzabekula D. Мelody of People. "Culture" №14, 16-31 of July, 1992
6. O. Konyratbayev. T. Ryskulov “People’s congress" newspaper, 14th December, 1994. Almaty. "Kazakhstan" 1994., p.157

7. Mekhov V.I. Turar Ryskulovich Ryskulov// CPSU history questions.

8. Questions of a historiography of Kazakhstan. Alma - Ata. 1983, - page 77

9. Ryskulov T. Kazakhstan. Kyzylorda: "Kazmembas" 1927. p.83.

10. Menitsky I.O. About character of an event of 1916 in Turkistan

11. Ryskulov T. Kirgizstan. - Moscow, 1935.

12. Abdikadirovaof KH. T. Ryskulov in Mongolia //Madeniyet and Turmys 1988, No. 7

13. Beysembayev S., Kulbayev S. Turar Ryskulov. Alma-Ata, "Kazakhstan", 1974, p.40.

14. Ryskulov T. Revolution and indigenous people of Turkestan (Collection of the major articles, reports, speeches and theses). Part-1. Tashkent, "Uzgosizdat", 1925.p.3.

15. Bayzharasov R. Turar Ryskulov.//"Socialist Kazakhstan", 1960, 19 October, 3 16. Nurullin R. A. Turar Ryskulov (1894-1937).//- Called by the revolution. Biographic articles (Sost.: L.P.Zotova). Tashkent, "Uzbekistan", 1987, pp.185-191