Early life Djokosoedjono is thought to have been born in
Blora Regency,
Dutch East Indies in 1909. Little is known about his family background or education. He was
Javanese.
Political activity in the Dutch East Indies Djokosoedjono became involved in left-wing and
Indonesian nationalist politics in Surabaya by 1927, when he worked as an administrator for the (people's torch of Indonesia), followed by (public voice). He gravitated to the New
Indonesian National Party and became chairman of one of its affiliated unions P.B.K.I. (, Union of Railway Workers) in 1933. In 1934 he was also chairman of the (PSSI, association of Indonesian workers unions) which was also based in Surabaya. PKI leader
Musso returned from the USSR to Surabaya in November 1935, sent by the Soviets to rebuild an illegal PKI party since the party had been banned in the Indies and its leaders exiled. Djokosoedjono became one of the leaders of this new Surabaya-based Illegal-PKI cell along with Mas Ruskak, Pamudji and Achmad Soemadi. Having educated this small cadre in communist principles and
popular front planning, Musso left the Indies for Shanghai in May 1936. Twelve of the arrested PKI members, including Djokosoedjono, Roeskak and Achmad Soemadi were exiled to
Boven-Digoel concentration camp in
New Guinea in 1938, joining hundreds of PKI members who had been sent in the late 1920s. Their arrival in the camp somewhat revitalized the political situation there among older PKI exiles. Djokosoedjono was a key figure in the PKI central committee in exile in Australia alongside Ngadiman and Sabariman.
Political activity in Indonesia When the war ended, the exile of most of the former Digoel internees in Australia was annulled by the Dutch; Djokosoedjono returned to Indonesia. He became chairman of the railway union S.K.B.A again. In the fourth sitting of the
Central Indonesian National Committee (KNIP) in 1946, he was appointed to represent Yogyakarta in the non-partisan worker's bloc. Musso returned to Indonesia and reorganized communists and socialists under his leadership in the (democratic people's front, FDR); Djokosoedjono joined the new PKI worker's secretariat along with his former Digoel companions Hardjono and Achmad Soemadi. After the
Madiun Affair, Djokosoedjono was arrested along with many other party members, journalists, and so on. He denied any knowledge of the uprising and was not seriously punished. (Not to be confused with Colonel Djokosoedjono, who was the military leader of the Madiun uprising and who was executed alongside Amir Sjarifuddin and others.) Thereafter he remained in the leadership of the party under
Tan Ling Djie, alongside
Alimin and others. This group were quite critical of the
Dutch–Indonesian Round Table Conference and saw it as a capitulation to the Dutch. When the
Provisional House of Representatives was created in August 1950, he was appointed to its membership along with 45 other KNIP members, this time as a representative of the
Central All-Indonesian Workers Organization (SOBSI). Despite not formally representing the Communist Party, he made no secret of his ties to them and was openly pro-Soviet and anti-American. In August 1951, following communist unrest in
Tanjung Priok, the Indonesian military carried out
mass arrests of 950 political figures who it placed in
Preventive detention. Djokosoedjono was arrested along with nine leftist members of parliament which included
Siauw Giok Tjhan and journalists from
Sin Po; the offices of the PKI and SOBSI were also searched. The arrests caused a scandal in the House and led to criticism of the army's impunity and the violation of parliamentary immunity. He was a strong critic of both the
Wilopo Cabinet and the
Burhanuddin Harahap Cabinet.
D. N. Aidit took over the leadership of the Communist Party in 1951 and by 1953 had purged many leaders who were not in his clique, including Tan Ling Djie. Djokosoedjono was promoted to the central committee which also included Achmad Soemadi, Jusuf Adjitorop, Alimin,
Peris Pardede, and others. In the
1955 Indonesian legislative election he was elected to represent
Central Java for the Communist Party in the
House of Representatives. He continued to advocate for workers' causes, for example in updating workers' rights legislation in late 1956. In the PKI's sixth congress in September 1959 he was reelected to the party's Central Committee and to its Secretariat. Following the failed
30 September Movement, in which the Communist Party was implicated, Djokosoedjono was forced to go into hiding along with most of the party leadership. On 12 November 1965 his membership in the DPR-GR was frozen along with 55 communist and left-wing members. In the chaos and lawlessness of the
Transition to the New Order, it is unclear when exactly he was arrested. Some accounts say he was arrested in 1966, However, he must have been in captivity by July 1967 as he is known to have testified in the military tribunal of
Sudisman, another former PKI leader. By the time he was in prison, his health worsened due to untreated diabetes and he lost the ability to walk. He died in 1977. == References ==