Glimpses of World History

by Jawaharlal Nehru

  And yet the Indian Civil Service has had many good and honest and capable people in it. But they could not change the drift of policy or divert the current which was dragging India along. The I.C.S. were, after all, the agents of the industrial and financial interests in England, who were chiefly interested in exploiting India.

  This bureaucratic government of India grew efficient wherever its own interests and the interests of British industry were concerned. But education and sanitation and hospitals and the many other activities which go to make a healthy and progressive nation were neglected. For many years there was no thought of these. The old village schools died away. Then slowly and grudgingly a little start was made. This start in education was also brought about by their own needs. The British people filled all the high offices, but obviously they could not fill the smaller offices and the clerkships. Clerks were wanted, and it was to produce clerks that schools and colleges were first started by the British. Ever since then this has been the main purpose of education in India; and most of its products are only capable of being clerks. But soon the supply of clerks was greater than the demand in government and other offices. Many were left over, and these formed a new class of educated unemployed.

  Bengal took the lead in this new English education, and therefore the early supply of clerks was very largely Bengali. In 1857 three universities were started—in Calcutta, Bombay, and Madras. A fact worth noticing is that the Muslims did not take kindly to the new education. They were thus left behind in the race for clerkships and government service. Later this became one of their grievances.

  Another fact worth noticing is that even when the government made a start with education, girls were completely ignored. This is not surprising. The education given was meant to produce clerks, and men-clerks were wanted, and only they were available then, owing to backward social customs. So girls were wholly neglected, and it was long afterwards when some little beginning was made for them.

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  The Reawakening of India

  December 7, 1932

  I have told you of the consolidation of British rule in India and of the policy which brought poverty and misery to our people. Peace certainly came, and orderly government also, and both were welcome after the disorders which followed the break-up of the Moghal empire. Organized gangs of thieves and dacoits had been put down. But peace and order were worth little to the man in the field or the factory, who was crushed under the grinding weight of the new domination. But again, I would remind you, it is foolish to get angry with a country or with a people, with Britain or the British. They were as much the victims of circumstances as we were. Our study of history has shown us that life is often very cruel and callous. To get excited over it, or merely to blame people, is foolish and does not help. It is much more sensible to try to understand the causes of poverty and misery and exploitation, and then try to remove them. If we fail to do so, and fall back in the march of events, we are bound to suffer. India fell back in this way. She became a bit of a fossil; her society was crystallized in old tradition; her social system lost its energy and life and began to stagnate. It is not surprising that India suffered. The British happened to be the agents to make her suffer. If they had not been there, perhaps some other people might have acted in the same way.

  But one great benefit the English did confer on India. The very impact of their new and vigorous life shook up India and brought about a feeling of political unity and nationality. Perhaps such a shock, painful as it was, was needed to rejuvenate our ancient country and people. English education, intended to produce clerks, also put Indians in touch with current Western thought. A new class began to arise, the English-educated class, small in numbers and cut off from the masses, but still destined to take the lead in the new nationalist movements. This class, at first, was full of admiration for England and the English ideas of liberty. Just then people in England were talking a great deal about liberty and democracy. All this was rather vague, and in India England was ruling despotically for her own benefit. But it was hoped, rather optimistically, that England would confer freedom on India at the right time.

  The impact of Western ideas on India had its effect on Hindu religion also to some extent. The masses were not affected and, as I have told you, the British Government’s policy actually helped the orthodox people. But the new middle class that was arising, consisting of government servants and professional people, were affected. Early in the nineteenth century an attempt to reform Hinduism on Western lines took place in Bengal. Of course Hinduism had had innumerable reformers in the past, and some of these I have mentioned to you in the course of these letters. But the new attempt was definitely influenced by Christianity and Western thought. The maker of this attempt was Raja Ram Mohan Roy, a great man and a great scholar, whose name we have come across already in connection with the abolition of sati. He knew Sanskrit and Arabic and many other languages well, and he carefully studied various religions. He was opposed to religious ceremonies and pujas and the like, and he pleaded for social reform and women’s education. The society he founded was called the Brahmo Samaj. It was, and has remained, a small organization, so far as numbers go, and it has been confined to the English-knowing people of Bengal. But it has had considerable influence on the life of Bengal. The Tagore family took to it, and for long the poet Rabindranath’s father, known as Maharshi Debendra Nath Tagore, was the prop and pillar of the Samaj. Another leading member was Keshab Chander Sen.

  Later in the century another religious reform movement took place. This was in the Punjab, and the founder was Swami Dayananda Saraswati. Another society was started, called the Arya Samaj. This also rejected many of the later growths of Hinduism and combated caste. Its cry was “Back to the Vedas”. Although it was a reforming movement, influenced no doubt by Muslim and Christian thought, it was in essence an aggressive militant movement. And so it happened, curiously, that the Arya Samaj which, of many Hindu sects, probably came nearest to Islam, became a rival and opponent of Islam. It was an attempt to convert the defensive and static Hinduism into an aggressive missionary religion. It was meant to revive Hinduism. What gave the movement some strength was a colouring of nationalism. It was, indeed, Hindu nationalism raising its head. And the very fact that it was Hindu nationalism made it difficult for it to become Indian nationalism.

  The Arya Samaj was far more widespread than the Brahmo Samaj, especially in the Punjab. But it was largely confined to the middle classes. The Samaj has done a great deal of educational work, and has started many schools and colleges, both for boys and girls.

  Another remarkable religious man of the century, but very different from the others I have mentioned in this letter, was Ramakrishna Paramhansa. He did not start any aggressive society for reform. He laid stress on service, and the Ramakrishna Sevashrams in many parts of the country are carrying on this tradition of service of the weak and poor. A famous disciple of Ramakrishna’s was Swami Vivekananda, who very eloquently and forcibly preached the gospel of nationalism. This was not in any way anti-Muslim or anti anyone else, nor was it the somewhat narrow nationalism of the Arya Samaj. None the less Vivekananda’s nationalism was Hindu nationalism, and it had its roots in Hindu religion and culture.

  Thus it is interesting to note that the early waves of nationalism in India in the nineteenth century were religious and Hindu. The Muslims naturally could take no part in this Hindu nationalism. They kept apart. Having kept away from English education, the new ideas affected them less, and there was far less intellectual ferment amongst them. Many decades later they began to come out of their shell, and then, as with the Hindus, their nationalism took the shape of a Muslim nationalism, looking back to Islamic traditions and culture, and fearful of losing these because of the Hindu majority. But this Muslim movement became evident much later, towards the end of the century.

  Another interesting thing to note is that these reform and progressive movements in Hinduism and Islam tried to fit in, as far as possible,
the new scientific and political ideas derived from the West with their old religious notions and habits. They were not prepared to challenge and examine fearlessly these old notions and habits; nor could they ignore the new world of science and political and social ideas which lay around them. So they tried to harmonize the two by trying to show that all modern ideas and progress could be traced back to the old sacred books of their religions. This attempt was bound to end in failure. It merely prevented people from thinking straight. Instead of thinking boldly and trying to understand the new forces and ideas which were changing the world, they were oppressed by the weight of ancient habit and tradition. Instead of looking ahead and marching ahead, they were all the time furtively looking back. It is not easy to go ahead, if the head is always turned and looks back.

  The English-educated class grew slowly in the cities, and at the same time a new middle class arose consisting of professional people—that is, lawyers and doctors and the like, and merchants and traders. There had been, of course, a middle class in the past, but this was largely crushed by the early British policy. The new bourgeoisie, or middle class, was a direct outcome of British rule; in a sense they were the hangers-on of this rule. They shared to a small extent in the exploitation of the masses; they took the crumbs that fell from the richly laden table of the British ruling classes. They were petty officials helping in the British administration of the country; many were lawyers assisting in the working of the law courts and growing rich by litigation; and there were merchants, the go-betweens of British trade and industry, who sold British goods for a profit or commission.

  The great majority of these people of the new bourgeoisie were Hindus. This was due to their somewhat better economic condition, as compared to the Muslims, and also to their taking to English education, which was a passport to government service and the professions. The Muslims were generally poorer. Most of the weavers, who had gone to the wall on account of the British destruction of Indian industries, were Muslims. In Bengal, which has the biggest Muslim population of any Indian province, they were poor tenants or small land-holders. The landlord was usually a Hindu, and so was the village bania, who was the money-lender and the owner of the village store. The landlord and the bania were thus in a position to oppress the tenant and exploit him, and they took full advantage of this position. It is well to remember this fact, for in this lies the root cause of the tension between Hindu and Muslim.

  In the same way the higher-caste Hindus, especially in the south, exploited the so-called “depressed” classes, who were mostly workers on the land. The problem of the depressed classes has been very much before us recently, and especially since Bapu’s fast. Untouchability has been attacked all along the front, and hundreds of temples and other places have been thrown open to these classes. But right down at the bottom of the question is this economic exploitation, and unless this goes, the depressed classes will remain depressed. The untouchables have been agricultural serfs who were not allowed to own land. They had other disabilities also.

  Although India as a whole and the masses grew poorer, the handful of people comprising the new bourgeoisie prospered to some extent because they shared in the country’s exploitation. The lawyers and other professional people and the merchants accumulated some money. They wanted to invest this, so that they could have an income from interest. Many of them bought up land from the impoverished landlords, and thus they became themselves landowners. Others, seeing the wonderful prosperity of English industry, wanted to invest their money in factories in India. So Indian capital went into these big machine factories and an Indian industrial capitalist class began to arise. This was about fifty years ago, after 1880.

  As this bourgeoisie grew, their appetite also grew. They wanted to get on, to make more money, to have more posts in government service, more facilities for starting factories. They found the British obstructing them in every path. All the high posts were monopolized by the British, and industry was run for the profit of the British. So they began agitating, and this was the origin of the new nationalist movement. After the revolt of 1857 and its cruel suppression, people had been too much broken up for any agitation or aggressive movement; it took them many years to revive a little.

  Nationalist ideas were soon spreading, and Bengal was taking the lead. New books came out in Bengali, and they had a great influence on the language as well as on the development of nationalism in Bengal. It was in one of these books, Ananda Matha, by Bankim Chandra Chatterji, that our famous song Vande Mataram occurs. A Bengali poem which created a stir was Nil Darpan—the mirror of indigo. It gave a very painful account of the miseries of the Bengal peasantry under the plantation system, of which I have told you something.

  Meanwhile the power of Indian capital was also increasing, and it demanded more elbow-room to grow. At last in 1885 all these various elements of the new bourgeoisie determined to start an organization to plead their cause. Thus was the Indian National Congress founded in 1885. This organization, which you and every boy and girl in India know well, has become in recent years great and powerful. It took up the cause of the masses and became, to some extent, their champion. It challenged the very basis of British rule in India, and led great mass movements against it. It raised the banner of independence and fought for freedom manfully. And today it is still carrying on the fight. But all this is subsequent history. The National Congress when it was first founded was a very moderate and cautious body, affirming its loyalty to the British and asking, very politely, for some petty reforms. It represented the richer bourgeoisie; even the poorer middle classes were not in it. As for the masses, the peasants and workers, they had nothing to do with it. It was the organ of the English-educated classes chiefly, and it carried on its activities in our step-mother tongue—the English language. Its demands were the demands of the landlords and Indian capitalists and the educated unemployed seeking for jobs. Little attention was paid to the grinding poverty of the masses or their needs. It demanded the Indianization of the services—that is to say, the greater employment of Indians in government service in place of Englishmen. It did not see that what was wrong with India was the machine which exploited the people, and that it made no difference who had charge of the machine, Indian or foreigner. The Congress further complained of the huge expenses of the English officials in the military and civil services, and of the “drain” of gold and silver from India to England.

  Do not think that in pointing out how moderate the early Congress was I am criticizing it or trying to belittle it. That is not my purpose, for I believe that the Congress in those days and its leaders did great work. The hard facts of Indian politics drove it step by step, almost unwillingly, to a more and more extreme position. But in the early days it could not have been anything but what it was. And in those days it required great courage for its founders to go ahead. It is easy enough for us to talk bravely of freedom when the crowd is with us and praises us for it. But it is very difficult to be the pioneer in a great undertaking.

  The first Congress was held in Bombay in 1885. W.C. Bonnerji of Bengal was the first president. Other prominent names of those early days are Surendra Nath Banerji, Badruddin Tyabji, Pherozeshah Mehta. But one name towers above all others—that of Dadabhai Naoroji, who became the Grand Old Man of India and who first used the word Swaraj for India’s goal. One other name I shall tell you, for he is the sole survivor today of the old guard of the Congress, and you know him well. He is Pandit Madan Mohan Malaviya. For over fifty years he has laboured in India’s cause, and, worn down with years and anxiety, he labours still for the realization of the dream he dreamed in the days of his youth.

  So the Congress went on from year to year and gained in strength. It was not narrow in its appeal like the Hindu nationalism of an earlier day. But still it was in the main Hindu. Some leading Muslims joined it, and even presided over it, but the Muslims as a whole kept away. A great Muslim leader of the day was Sir Syed Ahmad Khan. He saw that lack of education, and especi
ally modern education, had injured the Muslims greatly and kept them backward. He felt therefore that he must persuade them to take to this education and to concentrate on it, before dabbling in politics. So he advised the Muslims to keep away from the Congress, and he co-operated with the government and founded a fine college in Aligarh, which has since grown into a university. Sir Syed’s advice was followed by the great majority of the Muslims, who did not join the Congress. But a small minority was always with it. Remember that when I refer to majorities and minorities I mean the majority or minority of the upper middle class, English-educated, Muslims and Hindus. The masses, both Hindu and Muslim, had nothing to do with the Congress, and very few had even heard of it in those days. Even the lower middle classes were not affected by it then.

  The Congress grew, but even faster than the Congress grew the ideas of nationality and the desire for freedom. The Congress appeal was necessarily limited because it was confined to the English-knowing people. To some extent this helped in bringing different provinces nearer to each other and developing a common outlook. But because it did not go down deep to the people, it had little strength. I have told you in another letter of an occurrence which stirred Asia greatly. This was the victory of little Japan over giant Russia in 1904-5. India, in common with other Asiatic countries, was vastly impressed, that is, the educated middle classes were impressed, and their self-confidence grew. If Japan could make good against one of the most powerful European countries, why not India? For long the Indian people had suffered from a feeling of inferiority before the British. The long domination by the British, the savage suppression of the Revolt of 1857, had cowed them. By an Arms Act they were prevented from keeping arms. In everything that happened in India they were reminded that they were the subject race, the inferior race. Even the education that was given to them filled them with this idea of inferiority. Perverted and false history taught them that India was a land where anarchy had always prevailed, and Hindus and Muslims had cut each other’s throats, till the British came to rescue the country from this miserable plight and give it peace and prosperity. Indeed, the whole of Asia, the Europeans believed and proclaimed, regardless of fact or history, was a backward continent which must remain under European domination.