Bankovic, Andra

Born Oct. 27, 1857, in Jagodina, Serbia; died Nov. 18, 1911, in Belgrade. Figure in the Serbian workers’ movement. By trade he was a joiner.

While working abroad (in Austria-Hungary, France, Switzerland, and Russia), Banković became acquainted with socialist doctrines. He was expelled by the tsarist authorities from Poland (1886) and returned to his homeland, where with M. Cenic he founded the Handicraft Society (1887). In 1889 he led a strike by railroad workers in the city of Niŝ In 1896 he was a delegate to the fourth (London) congress of the Second International. In 1897 he was the initiator of the publication of Radničke novine, the organ of the Serbian social democratic movement. He was in exile from 1903. Returning to his homeland (in 1908 or 1909), he took part in the work of the Serbian Social Democratic Party. In 1909 he was a delegate to the first Balkan Social Democratic Conference.