Makers of Modern India

by Ramachandra Guha

  Meanwhile, the political awareness of Indians was being intensified by the growth of tertiary education and by a very active press. New colleges and universities were established, whose products compared and contrasted European ideals of liberty with conditions in the colonies. The interwar period also witnessed a massive expansion in the publication of newspapers and magazines. There were daily newspapers published in every city, and in every language, these read by the ever-growing numbers of literates. The better journals were very good indeed. Apart from on-the-ground reportage, they carried analytical editorials and paid close attention to popular culture.

  I have called this part of the book ‘Nurturing a Nation’. From 1917, when he organized his first campaign, to 1947, when his country finally became independent, one man was at the centre of debates about the nation-in-the-making, namely, Mohandas K. Gandhi. Naturally, he dominates the pages that follow, which juxtapose, against Gandhi’s writings on major questions of politics and social reform, the writings of his critics and contemporaries.

  * * *

  Chapter Seven

  The Multiple Agendas of

  M.K. Gandhi

  In January 1915 Mohandas K. Gandhi returned to his homeland after two decades in South Africa. Born on the west coast of India in 1869, Gandhi studied law in London and briefly practised as a lawyer in Bombay and Rajkot before leaving for Durban in 1893. He lived in that city and in Johannesburg, fighting cases for his Indian clients and increasingly being drawn into social activism. In 1896 he published a long pamphlet on the condition of Indian immigrants in South Africa. This was the first of many interventions against laws that restricted the freedom of movement and the freedom to trade for those who were not whites. Gandhi’s protests against racial discrimination took the form of newspaper articles and editorials, petitions to government, cases in court and mass campaigns of nonviolent protest, or satyagraha.

  In South Africa, Gandhi was a diasporic leader whose reach and influence was restricted to the hundred thousand or so Indians who lived there. Within four years of his return, however, Gandhi had become the most famous—as well as most controversial—person in a subcontinent whose population was in the region of 300 million. In 1917 and 1918 he led localized protests against specific grievances of peasants and workers; in 1919 he organized satyagrahas in the major cities of British India against a restrictive new legislation known as the Rowlatt Act; and in 1920 he launched a countrywide campaign of ‘non-co-operation’ against British colonial rule.

  Gandhi liked to refer to Gopal Krishna Gokhale as his ‘guru’. He had certainly been influenced by the Poona reformer, whose programmes of Hindu—Muslim unity and the uplift of the depressed castes he also made his own. Gokhale had taken a keen interest in Gandhi’s work in South Africa and even visited him in that country. Gandhi was suitably grateful; at the same time, he was keenly aware of the potential of the approach of Gokhale’s main rival, Bal Gangadhar Tilak. Fortuitously, Gandhi was in Bombay when Tilak died in 1920 and able to accompany the body to the cremation. This was seen by some, not unreasonably, as a passing of the baton. For his penchant for mass action was not unlike Tilak’s; and he was likewise a militant opponent of colonial rule.

  Gandhi was influenced, and possibly inspired, by both Gokhale and Tilak. Like them, he owed a close allegiance to the Indian National Congress. He borrowed from each, yet his own programme was by no means a mere mixture of Tilak’s and Gokhale’s. The theory and practice of satyagraha he developed wholly on his own. Again, where Gokhale and Tilak were essentially urban leaders from western India, Gandhi’s appeal cut across boundaries of caste, class, region and language. His adoption of a dress made of homespun cotton and his generally frugal lifestyle allowed him to come much closer to the peasants who formed the bulk of India’s population. At the same time, Gandhi also did far more than his predecessors to deepen the organizational base of the Congress, drawing in many new members, among them young men and women, and extending the party’s reach to virtually all parts of the country, the princely states not excluded. The democratization of the Congress was facilitated by a key innovation of Gandhi’s, which was to encourage regional committees based on language, such that the proceedings at the provincial level were conducted not in English but in the mother tongue.

  Gandhi led and organized three major campaigns against colonial rule. These were the non-cooperation movement of the 1920s, the civil disobedience movement of the 1930s (whose highlight was his march to the sea to make salt, then a state monopoly) and the Quit India movement of the 1940s. Through these campaigns, Gandhi came to spend extended periods in jail, the suffering and sacrifice further increasing his popularity. The movements were important, but not necessarily more so than Gandhi’s programmes of social reform and economic renewal. Among his abiding concerns were the abolition of untouchability; the promotion of Hindu—Muslim harmony; the uplift of women; and the revival of the village and artisanal economy. In his ashrams in Ahmedabad (where he was based between 1915 and 1930) and near Wardha (where he moved in 1934), he trained hundreds of men and women to take these programmes further.

  The anthologist of Gandhi’s writings is spoilt for choice. The Collected Works of Mahatma Gandhi run to more than ninety volumes, in a well-annotated series edited by a team of scholars headed by a former professor of English literature, K. Swaminathan. All his life, while he was thinking and acting, Gandhi was also writing. His first appearance in print was in the journal of the Vegetarian Society of London, which in 1890 published a six-part series by him on Indian food habits. In 1903 he founded his own journal, Indian Opinion, much of which he wrote himself. On his return to India he edited a journal called Young India (published between 1919 and 1932) and then another called Harijan, which he ran from 1933 until his death. Gandhi also wrote extensively in his mother tongue, Gujarati, and published several books, among them two volumes of autobiography. He replied to every letter he received, often at length. His speeches were transcribed verbatim and of course, the older and more famous he became, the more interviews he gave to the press.

  In both Gujarati and English, Gandhi wrote a clear, direct, unadorned prose. As his editor K. Swaminathan points out, ‘Gandhi’s literary style is a natural expression of his democratic temper. There is no conscious ornamentation, no obtrusive trick of style calling attention to itself. The style is a blend of the modern manner of an individual sharing his ideas and experiences with his readers, and the impersonal manner of the Indian tradition in which the thought is more important than the person expounding it. The sense of equality with the common man is the mark of Gandhi’s style and the burden of his teaching. To feel and appreciate this essence of Gandhi the man, in his writings and speeches, is the best education for true democracy.’

  Mohandas K. Gandhi was murdered by a Hindu fanatic on 30 January 1948.

  The Power of NonViolence

  In 1909 Gandhi wrote a critique of colonialism and Western civilization called Hind Swaraj (Indian Home Rule). Perhaps the most valuable and enduring parts of this polemic relate to the theory and practice of nonviolence. In the excerpt that follows, Gandhi is the editor, who answers the queries and doubts of a reader.1

  READER: Is there any historical evidence as to the success of what you have called soul-force or truth-force? No instance seems to have happened of any nation having risen through soul-force. I still think that the evil-doers will not cease doing evil without physical punishment.

  EDITOR: … The force of love is the same as the force of the soul or truth. We have evidence of its working at every step. The universe would disappear without the existence of that force. But you ask for historical evidence. It is, therefore, necessary to know what history means. The Gujarati equivalent [of the English word ‘history’] means: ‘It so happened.’ If that is the meaning of history, it is possible to give copious evidence. But, if it means the doings of kings and emperors, there can be no evidence of soul-force or passive resistance in such history. You cannot
expect silver-ore in a tin-mine. History, as we know it, is a record of the wars of the world, and so there is a proverb among Englishmen that a nation which has no history, that is, no wars, is a happy nation. How kings played, how they became enemies of one another, and how they murdered one another is found accurately recorded in history, and, if this were all that had happened in the world, it would have been ended long ago. If the story of the universe had commenced with wars, not a man would have been found alive today. Those people who have been warred against have disappeared, as, for instance, the natives of Australia, of whom hardly a man was left alive by the intruders. Mark, please, that these natives did not use soul-force in self-defence, and it does not require much foresight to know that the Australians will share the same fate as their victims. Those that wield the sword shall perish by the sword. With us, the proverb is that professional swimmers will find a watery grave.

  The fact that there are so many men still alive in the world shows that it is based not on the force of arms but on the force of truth or love. Therefore, the greatest and most unimpeachable evidence of the success of this force is to be found in the fact that, in spite of the wars of the world, it still lives on.

  Thousands, indeed tens of thousands, depend for their existence on a very active working of this force. Little quarrels of millions of families in their daily lives disappear before the exercise of this force. Hundreds of nations live in peace. History does not, and cannot, take note of this fact. History is really a record of every interruption of the even working of the force of love or of the soul. Two brothers quarrel; one of them repents and re-awakens the love that was lying dormant in him; the two again begin to live in peace; nobody takes note of this. But, if the two brothers, through the intervention of solicitors or some other reason, take up arms or go to law—which is another form of the exhibition of brute force—their doings would be immediately noticed in the press, they would be the talk of their neighbours, and would probably go down to history. And what is true of families and communities is true of nations. There is no reason to believe that there is one law for families and another for nations. History, then, is a record of an interruption of the course of nature. Soul-force, being natural, is not noted in history.

  READER: According to what you say, it is plain that instances of this kind of passive resistance are not to be found in history. It is necessary to understand this passive resistance more fully. It will be better, therefore, if you enlarge upon it.

  EDITOR: Passive resistance is a method of securing rights by personal suffering; it is the reverse of resistance by arms. When I refuse to do a thing that is repugnant to my conscience, I use soul-force. For instance, the government of the day has passed a law which is applicable to me. I do not like it. If, by using violence, I force the government to repeal the law, I am employing what may be termed body-force. If I do not obey the law, and accept the penalty for its breach, I use soul-force. It involves sacrifice of self…

  READER: You would then disregard laws—this is rank disloyalty. We have always been considered a law-abiding nation …

  EDITOR: … A man who has realized his manhood, who fears only God, will fear no one else. Man-made laws are not necessarily binding on him. Even the government do not expect any such thing from us. They do not say: ‘You must do such and such a thing’ but they say: ‘If you do not do it, we will punish you.’ We are sunk so low, that we fancy that it is our duty and our religion to do what the law lays down. If man will only realize that it is unmanly to obey laws that are unjust, no man’s tyranny will enslave him. This is the key to self-rule or home-rule …

  READER: From what you say, I deduce that passive resistance is a splendid weapon of the weak, but that, when they are strong, they may take up arms.

  EDITOR: This is gross ignorance. Passive resistance, that is, soul-force, is matchless. It is superior to the force of arms. How, then, can it be considered only a weapon of the weak? Physical-force men are strangers to the courage that is [required] in a passive resister … What do you think? Wherein is courage required—in blowing others to pieces from behind a cannon or with a smiling face to approach a cannon and to be blown to pieces? Who is the true warrior—he who keeps death always as a bosom-friend or he who controls the death of others? Believe me that a man devoid of courage and manhood can never be a passive resister.

  This, however, I will admit: that even a man weak in body is capable of offering this resistance. One man can offer it just as well as millions. Both men and women can indulge in it. It does not require the training of an army; it needs no Jiu-jitsu. Control over the mind is alone necessary, and, when that is attained, man is free like the king of the forest, and his very glance withers the enemy.

  Passive resistance is an all-sided sword; it can be used anyhow; it blesses him who uses it and him against whom it is used. Without drawing a drop of blood, it produces far-reaching results … It is strange indeed that you should consider such a weapon to be a weapon merely of the weak.

  READER: You have said that passive resistance is a speciality of India. Have cannons never been used in India?

  EDITOR: Evidently, in your opinion, India means its few princes. To me, it means its teeming millions, on whom depends the existence of its princes and our own.

  Kings will always use their kingly weapons. To use force is bred in them. They want to command, but those who have to obey commands, do not want guns; and these are in a majority throughout the world. They have to learn either body-force or soul-force. Where they learn the former, both the rulers and the ruled become like so many mad men, but, where they learn soul-force, the commands of the rulers do not go beyond the point of their swords, for true men disregard unjust commands. Peasants have never been subdued by the sword, and never will be. They do not know the use of the sword, and they are not frightened by the use of it by others. That nation is great which rests its head upon death as its pillow. Those who defy death are free from all fear. For those who are labouring under the delusive charms of brute force, this picture is not over-drawn. The fact is that, in India, the nation at large has generally used passive resistance in all departments of life. We cease to cooperate with our rulers when they displease us. This is passive resistance.

  I remember an instance when, in a small principality, the villagers were offended by some command issued by the prince. The former immediately began vacating the village. The prince became nervous, apologized to his subjects and withdrew his command. Many such instances can be found in India. Real home rule is possible only where passive resistance is the guiding force of the people. Any other rule is foreign rule.

  READER: From what you say, then, it would appear that it is not a small thing to become a passive resister, and, if that is so, I would like you to explain how a man may become a passive resister.

  EDITOR: To become a passive resister is easy enough, but it is also equally difficult. I have known a lad of fourteen years become a passive resister; I have known also sick people doing likewise; and I have also known physically strong and otherwise happy people being unable to take up passive resistance. After a great deal of experience, it seems to me that those who want to become passive resisters for the service of the country have to observe perfect chastity, adopt poverty, follow truth, and cultivate fearlessness.

  Chastity is one of the greatest disciplines without which the mind cannot attain requisite firmness. A man who is unchaste loses stamina, becomes emasculated and cowardly. He whose mind is given over to animal passions is not capable of any great effort. This can be proved by innumerable instances. What, then, is a married person to do, is the question that arises naturally; and yet it need not. When a husband and wife gratify the passions, it is no less an animal indulgence on that account. Such an indulgence, except for perpetuating the race, is strictly prohibited. But a passive resister has to avoid even that very limited indulgence, because he can have no desire for progeny. A married man, therefore, can observe perfect chastity … Several que
stions arise: How is one to carry one’s wife with one? What are her rights, and other such questions? Yet those who wish to take part in a great work are bound to solve these puzzles.

  Just as there is necessity for chastity, so is there for poverty. Pecuniary ambition and passive resistance cannot well go together. Those who have money are not expected to throw it away, but they are expected to be indifferent about it. They must be prepared to lose every penny rather than give up passive resistance.

  Passive resistance has been described in the course of our discussion as truth-force. Truth, therefore, has necessarily to be followed, and that at any cost. In this connection, academic questions such as whether a man may not lie in order to save a life, etc., arise, but these questions occur only to those who wish to justify lying. Those who want to follow truth every time are not placed in such a quandary, and, if they are, they are still saved from a false position.

  Passive resistance cannot proceed a step without fearlessness. Those alone can follow the path of passive resistance who are free from fear, whether as to their possessions, false honour, their relatives, the government, bodily injuries, death.