Chabilal Upadhyaya^[1] was born on 12 May 1882 at Budhigang (Undivided Darrang)^[1] present day Biswanath district, was the first (selected) president of the Assam Pradesh Congress committee.^[2] In 1919 Upadhyaya's family settled at Mazgaon (Gongmouthan), Behali Tehsil.^[3]

Political contributions

Chabilal Upadhyaya,^[4] popularly known as Chabilal Babu was a prominent leader of the Indian Freedom Movement from Assam.Upadhyaya joined the war of independence. On April 18, 1921, a meeting chaired by Upadhyaya was held in jorhat where the Assam Association was merged with Indian National Congress to form Assam Pradesh Congress Committee.^[5] He became the first (selected) president of the Assam Pradesh Congress committee.^[6] He was arrested by the British for joining the Congress and paid a jail term of six months by joining the Non-Cooperation movement under Gandhiji's leadership.

Upadhyaya played an important role in establishing various local schools in Gohpur Sub-division.^[7] Under his leadership, thirty thousand Nepali speaking people protested against Jinnah's proposal at the call of All India Gorkha League.^{[citation needed]}

Now, Government of Assam announced that an engineering college^[8] will be established in Behali, Assam^[9] which will be named after Chabilal Upadhyaya.