After the failure of 'Cripps Mission' and during the middle of the Second World War, Mahatma Gandhi decided to start another phase of movement, i.e., Quit India Movement. In this, he asked the British to leave the country immediately.

In Vardha on 14 July 1942, the session of Indian National Congress presented the historical Quit India' resolution, which was passed at the Bombay Session of the Congress on 8 August, 1942. Gandhiji thought that the British must Quit India without further delay. He raised the slogan 'Do or Die' which spread among the common mass very soon. But he warned the people not to be violent in any condition. The movement spread on larger scale. Workers went on strike, students, peasants, labourers and women joined the movement with full enthusiasm. Several leaders like Jaya Prakash Narayan, Ram Manohar Lohia, Aruna Asaf Ali, Matangini Hajra (from Bengal), Karkalta Barua (from Assam) and Rama Devi (from Orissa) participated actively in it.
Initially, the British responded with severe repression. All the major leaders were sent to jail. Thousands of people were killed in police firing. At the end, the government suppressed the movement, but the sheer scale of movement brought the British government down to its knees.