by A K Bhagwat
This appeal, therefore, was in the interest of the fair name of British justice and honour. In fact it was to preserve the eternal principle of justice that he took such a prominent part in the Crawford case. He wrote in the Kesari,11 “Crawford Saheb is to be with us for a few days only but we are connected with the Goddess of Justice throughout our lives. The stronger her rule the more we shall advance.” Referring to the advice given by some people that since Crawford was an Englishman and the rulers were also English an Indian interfering in the case would be unnecessarily crushed; he declares his faith in truth and justice: “We are young and vigorous. Our opinions are not tainted by adverse experience which lead to such disastrous results. We believe in the motto Truth Alone is Victorious’. We are fully convinced that in the end justice shall prevail.”12 This remark with its air of sullen defiance is characteristic of a public worker who has to encounter the usual opposition of the cynics and pessimists grumbling against every public-spirited effort. It also raises a topical and controversial issue to the realm of ideas and principles.
Petitions were submitted to the government on behalf of the mamlatdars requesting that the dismissed mamlatdars should be reinstated. At last the government of India passed a bill which was published on the 28th October 1889, and, as a result, part of the grievance was redressed and many of the mamlatdars were given amnesty, though in all twelve of them were dismissed. Tilak represented their case right up to Parliament though it did not serve much purpose. Tilak’s main aim in pleading the case of the mamlatdars was to expose the contradiction in government’s decision. His keen legal acumen and his persistent efforts made the mamlatdars feel assured and though Tilak did not accept a pie for all the work he had done, the mamlatdars, who came to be known as Crawford mamlatdars, presented him a wrist-watch and an ‘Uparane’ (upper garment) as a token of their gratitude. Crawford was greatly offended when all his malpractices were exposed by Tilak and, in 1898, he vented his feelings against the Poona-Brahmins through the columns of some British newspapers.
Bapat Commission
Tilak had helped the mamlatdars out of a sense of public duty. His next effort of a similar nature was to help a close friend in difficulties of a like character. Bapat, an intimate friend of Tilak, was an Assistant Commissioner in the Baroda State and was the right-hand man of Mr. Eliot, the Chief Officer of the Revenue Survey Settlement in Baroda. The Resident of Baroda, Col. Bidlny, received many complaints against the department of Mr. Eliot. Eliot, however, retired and the Resident decided to make Bapat a scapegoat in the matter. He encouraged people to lodge more complaints and used all unscrupulous means to collect evidence against Bapat. Bapat requested Tilak to help him in the difficulty and Tilak readily agreed to do so. Bapat was suspended and a commission was appointed on 13th August 1894 to make all the enquiries. Pherozshah Mehta and afterwards Branson, Bar-at-Law, aided by solicitors Bhaishanker Kanga appeared on behalf of the plaintiff, the Diwan of Baroda. Gokhale, a pleader of Baroda, appeared on behalf of Bapat. But as a matter of fact Tilak, who had gone to Baroda specially for the cause, did the work of preparing the case. He sifted through all the evidence, directed the cross-examination of witnesses and gave the defence of Bapat which came to 200 foolscap pages. A commission was appointed to make enquiries but it transgressed its terms of reference and convicted Bapat to six months’ imprisonment with a fine of Rs. 1,000. When the Maharaja of Baroda returned from England, he appointed two legal experts to consider all the evidence and at last Bapat was acquitted of all the charges. Tilak did not practise as a pleader any time in his life and yet the way in which he conducted the Bapat case, will sustain the belief that if he had persevered in his profession as a lawyer he would have been at the top. He must have felt that all his untiring efforts were rewarded when Bapat came out of the trial with his reputation untainted.
The Congress Session, 1889
In 1889, Tilak attended the fifth session of the Indian National Congress at Bombay. This session was known as the Bradlaugh Congress as Charles Bradlaugh, M.P., popularly known as ‘Member for India’ for his championship of the Indian cause, attended and addressed this Congress. Tilak moved an amendment to a resolution putting forth a skeleton scheme for the reform and reconstitution of the Legislative Councils. The official Congress report adds a footnote to the page on which Tilak’s speech is reported, to the effect that he is “one of the ten gentlemen connected with the Fergusson College, Poona, who deliberately putting aside the prizes that the learned professions offer to such men, have settled down on the smallest pittance on which they can support themselves and their families to promote by their personal exertions die education of their countrymen.” This amendment, the report says, was ably put forth and supported. The supporter was none other than Professor G. K. Gokhale. This amendment of Tilak was “moved from a sense of duty to his province”. According to Tilak, “The question was whether we should have one electoral body or more than one.” His plea was that as indirect representation had been adopted in the Provincial Councils, the natural sequel was that the Provincial Councils should elect the Imperial Council. This amendment was however defeated on the ground that this delegation of the function of the electorate to the Provincial Legislatures would be illegal. In this Congress, Tilak was elected to the Subjects Committee for the session of 1890.
During the preceding four years the Congress had made the humble beginning of asking for a representation in the administration and had attracted the attention of the members of Parliament. It was suggested that Bradlaugh who attended this session of the Congress should bring in a bill in Parliament embodying the skeleton scheme proposed by the Congress, “for the reform and reconstruction of the Council of the Governor-General for making laws and regulations, and the Provincial Legislative Councils”. Bradlaugh promised to introduce this bill but also spoke of a possibility of the government introducing the bill itself. This was done and the India Councils Act of 1892 was passed at the initiative of Gladstone’s Liberal Government. Thus the government had yielded pardy to the persistent demand of the Indian people which was voiced ever since the foundation of the Congress in 1885. Propaganda was also carried on in England. A deputation of Congress representatives visited England, to press for the consideration of the British public, the political reform which it advocated. A journal called India was also started in London in 1890 “to place before the British public the Indian view of Indian affairs”.
Hume Agitation
“Hume, the founder of the Congress, carried on a vigorous propaganda of agitation among the masses on the model of the Anti-corn Law League. Hundreds of public meetings were held, many in country districts; pamphlets and leaflets were soon broadcast among the people with the object of enlightening them as to their rights as citizens and as to the demands made by the Congress and of arousing in them a strong determination to carry on agitation until those demands were conceded. Mr. Hume, in fact, resorted to the only effective method of constitutional action, viz. the stirring of the masses, a thing which was unknown since the days of the Mutiny and which the government had never thought of with equanimity.”13 By the year 1892 the Congress therefore survived a very serious crisis. The help and encouragement given by the government did not last long. Already in 1889 the fourth Congress at Allahabad had to encounter government opposition. In 1890 a circular was issued by the Bengal Government to all secretaries and heads of departments banning their attendance at the Congress session. In a Government of India Notification in 1891, the rights were restricted and a ban was imposed on the “publication of the newspapers containing public news or comments on public news without the written permission of the political agent”. The Muslims also had started opposing the Congress, obviously at government’s instigation. The Kesarì sounds a note of warning and quotes many examples of government oppression.
The Hume Circular
A number of articles refer to the Hume Circular of February 16th, 1892. In this
circular, which was marked private and confidential, Hume had sounded a note of warning that events in India were fast moving to a crisis. The existing system of administration was pauperising the people and was also preparing the way for “one of the most terrible cataclysms in the history of the world”. According to Hume, it was no consolation that the people were patient, mild and humble. So were the people of France before the Revolution but they were changed into an army of wolves almost overnight by hunger and misery. Hume, therefore, sounded a note of warning particularly to the rich and well-to-do: “Do not fancy that government will be able to protect you or itself. No earthly power can stem an universal agrarian rising in a country like this. My countrymen will be as men in the desert vainly struggling for a brief space against the simoom. Thousands of the rioters may be killed, but to what avail, when there are millions and millions who have nothing to look forward to but death, nothing to hope for but vengeance; as for leaders - with the hour comes the man, be sure, there will be no lack of leaders. This is no hypothesis it is a certainty.” Hume, therefore, urged the Congress committees to collect evidence and flood Britain with pamphlets and thus awaken the British public about the reality of the situation. Though Hume’s object was the very opposite of inciting people to violence, the Anglo-Indian press raised a hue and cry, when one of the Congress committees most wantonly published this confidential circular. The British Committee of the Congress passed a resolution regretting the publication of such a letter and repudiated the “unjustifiable conclusions” of Hume. A letter was sent to the Times, condemning Hume, to which even Dadabhai was one of the signatories.
In a number of articles14 Tilak upheld the contention of Hume and branded all attempts to dub Hume as seditìonist as acts of ingratitude, indifference and cowardice. He refers to the words of Maclean, who declared in Parliament that Hume should be shot. Any attempt to disrupt the Congress by attaching undue importance to the wanton attacks on the Congress, according to Tilak, would be worse than mischievous. These attacks were made by interested parties who were eager to hasten the death of the Congress. People in India, says Tilak, should rather rely on the encouragement they receive from people like Max Mūller and Gladstone.
Another article on the 6th December 1892, refers to an article published by D. E. Watcha, Secretary of the Congress, in which he very ably supported Hume’s contention by giving facts and figures culled from official reports. Tilak also quotes from an essay read by Ranade before the Deccan College gathering which lends support to Hume’s thesis and sounds a note of warning that in such difficult times unless something is done to better the condition of the peasantry it will certainly rise in revolt. “If any danger or calamity is to befall the English, it will neither be from the North nor the North-West. The government is strong enough to ward off such invasions; but if the whole population, robbed of its food, rises in revolt, the situation would be difficult and nothing would avail to avert it.” Tilak, therefore, seems to be equally apprehensive as Hume was about any possible recurrence of the agrarian riots and feared the consequences of the lawlessness that they would give rise to. He lends support to Hume’s plea for a countrywide agitation to make the British public realise the true situation in India. No support, however, was given to Hume except by Tilak and Agarkar and Hume returned to England in 1892. The reforms of 1892 diverted the attention of the Congress leaders thus averting the split between the extremists and the moderates which threatened to develop at this time.
Election of Dadabhai Naoroji
The year 1892 was memorable in another instance also, Dadabhai Naoroji was elected to the British House of Commons from Central Finsbury on a Liberal ticket. While congratulating Dadabhai Naoroji on his election to the British Parliament, Tilak refers to the fact that the bureaucracy in India broke all the pledges given in the Queen’s Proclamation and made invidious distinctions between the ruling race and the ruled.15 The electors of Finsbury, according to him, had however shown that “even among the English all are not black in mind. Thus the Central Finsbury electors have demonstrated to the whole world and have thus made themselves famous for ever. They have thus not only held the people of India eternally under their debt but have also stabilized the foundation of the structure of the British empire by their generosity, foresight and wisdom.”
Tilak also tries to remove the suspicion of certain people regarding the real advantage of sending only one member to the British parliament when even the 80 members from Ireland have not achieved much. “In our opinion such a doubt is totally wrong and thoughtless. It is foolish to regard that all the members of the British parliament will be Indians and then alone we shall get all the powers of government in India. The reforms that we are striving to get are of a totally different type. That we are the subjects of the Queen and that our country is a part of her vast kingdom and that our welfare is inextricably linked up with the British empire are facts which must be taken for granted.... If our demands are moderate then by agitating in England and not in India we shall surely find a way of getting them granted.”
Later on in the same article he admits, “The majority of people in England are indifferent about India; but they do not share the prejudice with which the minds of British officials in India are full. Indifference can be removed by ceaseless effort but prejudices never. We shall not get justice easily from the prejudiced English people in India, but the whole structure of the British rule is so strange that those who have the keys of any constructive authority are generally free from all prejudice. We have already said that there would be no changes in what are considered to be the permanent characteristics of the British rule however much we may pray for them; but leaving this aside, there are many things conducive to our welfare which are yet to be achieved. If we, therefore, continue our efforts and keep up our agitation all the aspirations of a national-minded person will be fulfilled as Dadabhai’s have been.”
According to Tilak,16 Dadabhai was a new preacher of political religion (Rajadharma). Dadabhai’s election, the election of a black man, is clear proof of the sense of justice, possessed by the British and one who has given us proof of this may be called, “a new preacher of political religion who has taught that India is our motherland and Goddess, that we are dwellers in India, in our common bond of brotherhood, and that our religion is to strive selflessly with single-handed devotion to ameliorate the political and social conditions of our country.” Tilak inclines to hope that this new political religion will spread throughout India, and the moral is “service with sincerity and integrity and do not pause till you achieve your objective and sooner or later the English people will not be hesitating in fulfilling your desire”.
Transition in Views
By the year 1890 or so Tilak’s opinions on religion were being crystallised. He had read the articles of Max Mūller, praising Hinduism. He was already impressed by Theosophy and had noted with very great admiration the success achieved by and the acclamation accorded to Swami Vivekananda in America. Right from the beginning of the Kesari the editors had noted the break-up of the old order and time and again they lamented the feeling of rootlessness shown by the English-educated generation in matters of religion. Tilak’s mind was not the mind of a faithful devotee as Ranade’s was. In the first year of the Kesari, the editors had announced that they were indifferent to religion. The Kesari was started not for religious or ethical propaganda but for pure secular and worldly matters. In the opinion of the Kesari, “There is a middle province between religious faith and atheism and the Kesari was unfortunately a dweller of this midland.”17 However, the Kesari had always condemned the Prarthana Samaj as being un-Hindu and merely imitative of Christianity. In his personal life Tilak followed all the orthodox practices and showed himself to be a conservative. In college, he was inclined towards agnosticism by a reading of Mill and Spencer, though he never gave up his orthodox practices. He had confessed later that by a mere reading of western philosophy the mind gets conf
used and so a comparative study of eastern and western philosophy was necessary.
By the year 1893, this comparative study seems to have progressed to an appreciable extent and Tilak was more and more inclined to favour the philosophy and practices of Hinduism. He upheld the Varna system by pointing out the defects of the western civilization founded on individual liberty and wanted to explore the possibilities of utilising the caste system for industrial progress. In two brief editorial notes that he wrote in the Kesari of 23rd February 1892, on “Our Religion”, he refers to a universally observed truth that people begin by believing in the religion and social customs of the rulers. “When western learning was first introduced to us some of our people were so daz2led by their scientific knowledge and method that they regarded our ancient learning as useless and rushed to the Western sciences. Little did they care to study the real nature of our religion or what it has to say about the relationship of man and God. They did not care to know what books we have on these subjects much less to know what was written in them. They could not find out the relationship between these thoughts and our conduct in everyday life. They, therefore, went after the prayers of an impersonal God and tried to found a good many sects and propagate them. This tendency did not, however, last long. Though these people did not approve of the discussions in our religious book regarding Knowledge, Action and Devotion (Jnana, Karma and Bhakti), the writings of Europeans who had studied these things were eye-openers. Sanskrit scholars like Max Mūller and institutions like the Theosophical Society once again brought into light the brilliant principles of Hinduism. ... It was realised that certain principles of philosophy were beyond the world of senses and after a comparative study of different religions the hope grew that the star of India would be on the ascendant. In short we knew what we had in our house only after the foreigner had directed us! And we also realised how futile all our efforts were during the last half a century or so. If the turn that is now being given to our religious ideas continues in the same direction our country is certainly going to be benefited.” These thoughts, he says, “have been occasioned by the lectures of Professor Max Mūller and these have attracted the attention of the Europeans towards Hindu religion and philosophy. Prof. Max Mūller is reported to have said that Hindu thought was neglected so far and it was only because the Hindus did not know how to kill others that they were now in their present dependent condition.... When people turned their attention to the physical sciences the world of spiritual sciences fell into the background and these are now being studied by Max Mūller who is showing to the world that the Hindu religion is the most tolerant and reasonable of the world religions.”