Lokmanya Tilak

by A K Bhagwat

  “Resolved that the paper India having been established as the representative organ in England of the Indian National Congress, and having been assisted at various times by the funds of the Congress on that understanding, the attention of the British committee and the proprietors be drawn to the fact that for some time past India has been conducted on lines of policy which are not in accordance with the resolutions of the Congress, and are inimical to the policy contained therein, and the British committee and the proprietors are hereby requested to give an assurance that the policy of India will in future definitely and unambiguously conform to that laid down in the resolutions of the Congress from time to time.”

  This resolution was duly communicated to all the directors and office-bearers of the India and members of the India committee. The three directors were Dr. Clark, Dr. Rutherford and Mr. Parekh with Mr. Polak as the editor. The deputation induced the British committee to adopt a new constitution by which the British Congress Committee was subordinated to the Indian National Congress. The paper India was made to accept the policy of the Congress. Polak resigned and N. C. Kelkar assisted Mrs. Normanton, who became the editor. Tilak thus succeeded but had to carry on ding-dong struggle under heavy odds and if he had stood on ceremonies when questioned about his bona fides, he would have achieved nothing.

  While he was absorbed in his work in England, Tilak was keenly aware of the political situation in India. The passing of the Rowlatt bill in 1919 led to great indignation and resentment all over India, and Gandhi wrote to the Viceroy “that the government’s action left me no other recourse except to resort to Satyagraha.” Tilak had written to Gandhiji that he wished that he were in India to participate in the Satyagraha. Gandhi gave a call for a nation-wide hartal and in accordance with his technique of Satyagraha, 30th March 1919 was observed by the people of Delhi as a day of fast and hartal. There was firing and eight persons were killed. Gandhi’s arrest on the 10th April caused tremendous excitement and people were infuriated. The bureaucracy, bewildered by the expression of public wrath, decided to strike terror. Sir Michael O’Dwyer, the Lt-Governor of Punjab, issued a threat to public leaders, arrested Drs. Satyapal and Kitchlew and when a peaceful protest meeting was held at the Jallianwala Bagh in Amritsar, Gen. O’Dwyer ruthlessly massacred over 1,000 people — men, women and children. This imperial atrocity was followed by a further naked display of power in the form of martial law. There was a national protest and Rabindranath Tagore, the greatest poet of India, wrote a dignified letter and renounced his knighthood. One can easily imagine the reactions of Tilak’s mind to the catastrophic happenings. An idea of Tilak’s numerous and incessant activities is given by the voluminous correspondence that he carried on while he was in London. Besides letters to friends in India, Tilak established contacts with outsiders. He also wrote newsletters to the Kesari and the Mahratta giving his views about the European situation, English politics and taking stock of the work he had done in England.

  Thus on the 23rd January 1919 he writes about Sir S. P. Sinha being made a Lord and says that though India had two seats in the Peace Conference, it was not of much use from the point of view of India’s cause. He was, however, trying his best to place the question of self-determination before the Peace Conference.

  One such attempt of his was to secure a passport for himself and other members of the deputation to attend the Peace Conference, but the India office refused him passports; he wrote to President Wilson, pressing India’s claim for self-determination and was assured by the president that the question would be considered by the proper authorities.

  After the general elections he wrote that whereas they had expected that at least a hundred members of the Labour Party would be returned, actually only 63 were elected but he expresses confidence that it was the Labour Party that would help them.

  He makes suggestions regarding the name of the president for the next session of the Congress and says that Tagore would not accept, but Vijayraghavachariar or Nehru would be useful. He wanted the Congress to place its views before the Peace Conference and advised Kelkar to sound Mrs Besant on the point. About the proposed deputation to England he wanted Rabindranath Tagore and the Raja of Mahamudabad to be included so that they would be useful for the highest classes. Das and Baptista, he suggested, would be useful for giving evidence before the Joint Parliamentary Committee. He wanted to form a Secretariat by having Kelkar in England. Mrs. Besant, he said, would be useful for propaganda among the labouring classes and women. Khaparde and Malaviya, being members of the Council, would be useful for talks with the officials.

  A report on the 8th May 1919 describes a huge rally of the Labour Party on 1st May in which a resolution was passed protesting against the Rowlatt Act. Tilak was suffering from a foot-injury, but the organisers of the meeting insisted that he must be present. He spoke dierefore sitting. The lecture was a huge success and an unknown Englishwoman specially complimented Tilak, in a letter, on his well-reasoned speech.

  A newsletter on 5th June 1919 narrates that a lecture was delivered by Tilak at the Cambridge Majlis in which Tilak asked how many of them were prepared to dedicate themselves to the service of the motherland, after getting higher education and imbibing the spirit of freedom. Excepting a smart-looking Brahmin boy, who said that he would not enter service, though he was preparing for the Civil Service, no one had anything to say.

  A lecture was also delivered at Oxford, in which Tilak brought home to his youthful audience the need of keeping an ideal which would be acceptable to the people at a particular time but which was a step higher than popular opinion. While busy with this political work he was also giving Sanskrit lessons to a lady, Elizabeth Arnold. When he heard that a Purse Fund was being collected in India to help him after the Chirol case, he repeatedly wrote to D. V. Gokhale to stop it as he considered the Chirol case a personal affair. Thus from the 31st July 1919 to the 28th August he wrote five letters, in each one of which he made a reference to the Purse Fund and desired that it should be stopped.

  The most important part of Tilak’s activity in England was his idea of establishing foreign missions and foreign contacts. With this aim in view he had sent a British journalist, Edgar Wallace, to Paris at the time of the Peace Conference and was very enthusiastic when he was told of the activities of Lala Lajpat Rai and Dr. Hardikar in America. This propaganda he wanted to be carried on not merely on the political plane but also desired that it should have a wider cultural basis. His offer of Rs. 50,000 to Rabindranath Tagore to carry on a lecture tour in America is a clear instance of this. “After his return from England,” says Madanmohan Malaviya, “the thing that he pressed upon me most was to organise deputations to England, France, America, Germany, Japan and to raise sufficient funds to maintain them for at least five years.” To Vithalbhai Patel, he said, “We must have information and publicity bureaux not only in London, but also in Paris, New York and Tokyo.” He had also an idea of establishing an Indian News Service Agency between India and the important civilised countries of the world. When Patel asked him one day how far foreign propaganda would help India, he said: “Mr. Patel, I do not believe that our salvation will come from outside. I have no delusions on that score. But I do believe that a favourable opinion of the civilised world towards Indian aspirations is a valuable asset in our struggle for freedom. We cannot afford to neglect world opinion except at our peril. Every important country has its national organisations and its information bureaux in important world centres and if mighty governments do that, how much more necessary it is for a country like ours?”

  Tilak, in the meanwhile, devoted all his energies to the next task of enlisting support for India’s cause. He established contacts with prominent members of the Labour Party and here the spade-work done by Baptista, when he was in England, was of great value It was Baptìsta’s idea to enlist the support of the Labour Party and also donate to them a sum of money for their propaganda work. Accordingly, early i
n November 1918, Tilak presented a cheque of £2,000 to the Labour Party, and prominent Labour Party members like Henderson and Webb promised their whole-hearted support for India’s cause. The Labour Party Conference at Nottingham had pledged itself to assist India in every possible way on January 23rd, 1918, and they were considerably helped in getting themselves acquainted with India’s case first by Baptista and later by Tilak himself. In January 1919, Tilak issued an extremely well-written pamphlet on self-determination, of which thousands of copies were distributed and one of them was also sent to the Peace Conference at Paris. Carl Heath, the General Secretary of the National Peace Council, agreed to co-operate with Tilak. The well-got-out pamphlet on self-determination was highly appreciated by all and contained one of the most cogent and lucid cases for Indian freedom. It was written by Baptista at Tilak’s instance and he incorporated in it all the suggestions of Tilak. The pamphlet displays the superb drafting of Baptista and is an unequivocal statement of Tilak’s views on self-determination.

  Self-Determination

  The pamphlet opened with arguments in favour of considering India as a nation. “It is argued that India is not a nation but a congeries of nations, not a country but a continent. These epigrams obscure the truth and delude the ignorant. What do we mean by a nation? Do the English, the French, the Poles severally constitute a nation? Then the Bengalis, the Punjabis, the Rajputs and the Mahrattas do also form a nation. The Bengalis inhabit the same region with a distinct name. Ethnologically they are descended from the same race. They have the same blood, the same language, the same civilisation, literature, customs and traditions. They are the essential elements that constitute nationality in the popular sense. Castes do not divide a nation any more than classes do in England. Creeds do not rend a nation in two. If it did religious toleration would be impossible.” The pamphlet advocated a Monroe Doctrine for India and went on to say that India was a nation even in the broad sense of the world. “The whole of India is one nation. India is said to be an epitome of the world, but there is unity in diversity.”

  About political trusteeship the pamphlet is of the opinion: “As a tree cannot grow in the shade, so a nation cannot really prosper under an over-shadowing trusteeship or overlordship.

  Englishmen do not realise the deep wound inflicted on Indian sensitiveness by insisting on such trusteeship. Trustees are appointed for minors. India is not an infant nation, not a primitive people, but the eldest brother in the family of man, noted for her philosophy and for being the home of religions that console half of mankind.”

  About the Reform Scheme which suggested the grant of responsibility step by step the pamphlet added that the Government of India was an exceedingly centralised autocracy. To think of granting autonomy step by step was an implied slur on India’s ability to govern herself.

  And so the conclusion drawn was:

  “Upon the principles we have discussed we claim that the British Parliament should enact a complete Constitution for India conceding autonomy within the British Commonwealth, with transitory provisions for bringing the whole Constitution into full operation within the tune specified by the Congress and the Muslim League. The autonomy we advocate may be briefly sketched as follows: The Peninsula of India should be divided into a number of provinces on the principles of nationality. The province should administer the internal affairs of the province and be entrusted with all powers requisite for the administration. The form of government should be democratic. The provinces should be federated to form the United States of India, with democratic Central Executive and Legislative bodies having powers to deal with the internal affairs of the whole of India. The United States of India should form a unit of the British Commonwealth with equal status with any other constituent unit thereof. There should be a supreme Commonwealth Executive and Legislature dealing with concerns common to the whole Commonwealth, such as war, peace, army, navy and foreign affairs. In this pyramid every part of the British Empire will be united with full freedom for self-development of the constituent parts. Such a system has received the benediction of Lord Acton, who says: Where different races inhabit the territories of one Empire composed of several smaller States, it is, of all possible combinations, the most favourable to the establishment of a highly developed system of freedom.... These are conditions necessary for the very highest degree of organisation which government is capable of receiving. In such a country as this liberty would achieve its most glorious results, while centralisation and absolutism would be destruction.’ Such a system embodies a higher and nobler ideal, viz. the ideal of a world-wide ‘Empire of a unity and not an Empire of enmity’ (Herbert Spencer). The problem of Ulster has brought the federal principle to the forefront in British politics. The refashioning of the British Commonwealth cannot be achieved by patchwork. It demands drastic changes on federal lines. We believe the autonomy we advocate would place the British Commonwealth on firmer foundation of the affection of peoples, destroying jealousies and promoting the happiness and welfare not only of India, but of all mankind. In this hope we appeal to all for sympathy and adequate measures.”

  This and other pamphlets and leaflets were brought out because Tilak failed to get into the British papers a small article that he had written with facts and figures culled from the blue books. He now flooded the polling booths with his leaflets as the general elections were approaching. St. Nihal Singh says:1

  “During the last general election, Mr. Tilak issued four leaflets for distribution among electors. Each consisted of a page, printed on one side only. Each was tastefully printed, and put India’s case in a nutshell. I reproduce one of them to indicate the sort of appeal that he made

  REMEMBER INDIA

  One-fifth of the human race are governed autocratically by the handful of Britons who cannot appreciate the mind of India, her Culture and Civilization, her Sense of Self-respect and National Aspirations.

  SELF - DETERMINATION FOR WHOM ?

  For Bohemians, Serbians, Poles, Yugoslavs, Czechoslavs Yes! Ay, even for the Germans and other Enemies.

  BUT WHAT ABOUT INDIA ?

  India has given over a million combatants, of whom nearly one-sixth are killed, missing or wounded.

  India has given several hundred thousand non-combatants, borne the cost of maintaining the Armies in efficiency, supplied munitions and foodstuffs, and made a gift of 100 million to the British Exchequer in spite of her great poverty.

  By her fidelity, service and sacrifice she has established her right to self-determination, but this is denied to her by Lloyd George-cum-Bonar Law Manifesto.

  Will Britons Deny to Faithful Friends What They Accord to Implacable Enemies?

  Will Britons Convert Loyal India Into Literally A Hundred Irelands in The East?

  Will Britons keep India alone in bondage in a free world for the sake of Bureaucrats and Capitalists?

  Can A World Be Freed For Democracy Without Freeing India I.E. One-Fifth of Mankind?

  NO NEVER!

  Give India Home Rule, Her Sons Demand And Deserve It.

  Question Candidates And Urge Them To Support Home Rule For India. Send For Literature From

  Home Rule For India League,

  1, Robert Street, London, WC. 8.

  These leaflets were not issued by the thousand but by the hundred thousand. For the first time an Indian had the political wisdom and the enterprise to do so.

  As a selected representative of British India, Mr. Tilak sent a memorial dated March 11th, 1919, to Mr. Georges Clemenceau, Senator, President of the Peace Conference, Paris, urging that conference to concede to India the right to be represented at its deliberations by representatives chosen by the people. He also asked the conference to declare that Indians are capable of governing themselves, that they were “entitled to the application of the principle of self-determination, and that in the exercise of the principle” they were also en
titled to determine the form of government founded upon accepted democratic lines, which they deem most suitable for self-development according to the genius of the people.

  Memorial to the Peace Conference

  The Memorial began:

  “From the point of view of the peace of Asia, and from the point of view of the peace of the world, it is absolutely necessary that India should be self-governed internally and be made the bulwark of liberty in the East....”

  “After this worldwide war for liberation of mankind from the menacing domination of Germany, and the dawn of a new order, it is superfluous for me to urge that no civilized nation should be governed by any other nation, without its consent, upon theories of trusteeship propounded ostensibly for the benefit of the ward. India, therefore, demands as her birth-right the application of the principle of self - determination for the purpose of empowering her people to tackle and solve the complex problem of India according to the genius of her people....”

  The memorial criticised diarchy as cumbersome and wasteful and demanded more power for the Legislature both in the provinces as also at the centre. The Indians did not want an immediate separation from the British, for the memorial said that: “In order to assure the British people that the Indians do not desire separation from or disruption of the Empire, they would consent that questions of war and peace, foreign affairs, the army or navy and military government be excluded from the Indian purview, provided commissions in the army and navy are open to all Indians on equal terms. These are limitations the people of India are willing to submit to, for a brief period, in order to assure the British Government of their bona fides in the hope that within fifteen years they would be placed on a status of political equality with the overseas dominions in all respects.” The memorial concluded: “I earnestly appeal to the Peace Conference, firstly to concede to India the same right of representation on the League of Nations, that is accorded to the British dominions, and secondly to declare that Indians are quite capable of governing themselves, that as a progressive nation they are entitled to the application of the principle of self-determination, and that in the exercise of the principle they are also entitled to determine the form of government, founded upon accepted democratic lines, which they deem most suitable for self-development according to the genius of the people...”