Definition of "dharna"

dharna

noun
countable and uncountable, plural dharnas
1. (India) A sit-in.
  Quotations
  ln December 1974, Morarji Desai, gave a threat of staging a dharna inside the Lok Sabha chamber. ln June 1975, Morarji Deshmukh, the Jana Sangh leader, stated that there had to be a Delhi Bandh to compel the Prime Minister to resign.
  2005, Je Varalakṣmi, Varalakshmi Jnapathy, Indira Gandhi: Woman of India's Destiny, Gyan Publishing House, page 115
2. (India, specifically) A fast undertaken at the door of an offender, especially a debtor.
  Quotations
  […] house-tax having been imposed on the natives during Lord Minto's government […] the Brahmins resolved to try the virtue of a dharna; […] The local government was exceedingly perplexed; for, besides the risk of hundreds perishing, there was the certainty of a famine, from the cessation of agricultural labour if the dharna continued.
  1854, William Chambers, Robert Chambers, Chambers's Miscellany of Useful and Entertaining Tracts‎, Edinburgh: W. and R. Chambers, page 30