Gandhi

by Ramachandra Guha

  Perhaps the most remarkable of all the letters that Gandhi wrote during his second term in an Indian prison was to a complete stranger. This was Pyare Lal Govil, a sub-judge in the United Provinces town of Muzaffarnagar, who had lost his only child, a daughter, to complications following pregnancy.

  Govil’s parents were long dead, and his only sister had also died prematurely. His daughter’s death shook him deeply. He concluded that it was due to his own ‘culpable mistakes’. What had he done wrong, he now asked Gandhi. Should he have taken the sick girl to another doctor? Now that she was dead, how could he atone (prayaschitta) for his sins? How could he ‘in any way help her soul to get rest and stay in Heaven’?

  Gandhi replied to Govil that he was ‘quite right’ in trusting the doctor he went to; Gandhi did not believe ‘in constant change of doctors and hakims. No prayaschitta was required because ‘there was no carelessness on your part’. Other doctors may not have been able to save her; indeed, ‘in spite of the ablest expert help kings have to die’. No one could give rest to another soul; Govil’s daughter’s ‘rest will come from herself’. Finally, the best way for survivors to ‘help their departed dear ones’ was ‘by weaving into our own lives all that was good in them’.

  To his own sons Gandhi could be harsh, even cruel. And yet, he could be extraordinarily compassionate to strangers. In its nobility and generosity, this letter to a grief-stricken father was very special indeed.7

  II

  In the days following Gandhi’s arrest, the Bombay government received a series of unusual requests. A Parsi schoolteacher from Khandwa in the Central Provinces asked for permission to spend his summer vacation ‘as companion reader’ to Gandhi in jail. He wished to read to him ‘Persian and Urdu literature which contains many philosophical principles which if followed by the people, administration and statesmen will change the world for the better’. A Muslim artist from Bombay wanted the government ‘to find out from Gandhiji if he would be willing to give me a few sittings’. He would come up to Poona at times convenient to Gandhi, and ‘not impose on him any particular pose or cause him any worry’. Neither request was forwarded by the government.

  However, some religious books posted or hand-delivered by admirers were passed on to the prisoner. So was a basket of fruits sent from Ahmedabad by the wife of Ambalal Sarabhai.8

  In late July 1930, the Bombay Chronicle reported that while on occasion Gandhi had used the Singer sewing machine, he had not yet ‘mastered its technicalities’. This prompted the company which made these machines to write to the jail authorities, asking for permission to send one of their experts to teach Gandhi ‘the thorough and efficient use of the Sewing Machine’. Some Congress activists in Bombay had campaigned against the Singer machine on the grounds that it was British-made. By persuading Gandhi to like it even more than he did presently, Singer hoped to counteract this propaganda.

  Singer assured the British government of their loyalty. Any employee ‘effecting an anti-Government feeling or joining the Political Extremist Party’, the company wrote, ‘will be immediately dropped from service’. However, they added, since ‘Mr. Gandhi does not have any prejudice against the Singer Sewing Machine, and that he uses one, or attempts to, for his personal use and pastime, we thought that if we might be allowed to extend to Mr. Gandhi the same courtesies that we do, in fact, extend to any other person desirous of learning the art of sewing this would help us materially in holding our large Organization contented and satisfied, to keep out of political activity’.9

  The request was cleverly crafted, but the government turned it down. Perhaps they were short-sighted in not recognizing the propaganda value of a rebel against the Raj, a proponent of swadeshi, perfecting the use of a (non-violent and economically productive) British-made machine.

  III

  In July 1930, the novelist Arthur Conan Doyle died. Even if Gandhi read about it in the papers, it is unlikely he took much notice. However, an admirer of the creator of Sherlock Holmes now wrote to Gandhi from Banaras, saying that since Conan Doyle had spent time in South Africa during the Anglo-Boer War, ‘you must have had some acquaintance, if not intimate friendship, with him. Thus I feel impelled to crave your indulgence to write a short article on the life and work of this great man and forward the same on to me so that I may have it published in [the] papers. I hope you have sufficient time these days to devote a few minutes to this all important piece of business. I trust I voice the feelings of untold novel-reading millions in both the hemispheres.’

  Gandhi was not really a novel-reader, and even if he did occasionally read fiction, it was not murder mysteries. And there is no record of his having met Conan Doyle. So, it is unlikely that he would have complied with the request. But he surely would have written another article asked for by a correspondent, had that request been forwarded to him. This came from an admirer of Narayana Guru, living in the town of Alleppey. The correspondent was, he told Gandhi, aware that ‘it is the duty of every Indian to give you complete rest now’, but still, ‘the exigency of the matter’ compelled him to make this request, which was that Gandhi write and ‘send a short appreciation of Swamiji’ for inclusion in a planned pictorial book on Narayana Guru (who had died in 1928). Sadly, the request was withheld, thus depriving posterity of a printed assessment by one remarkable social reformer of another.10

  The American novelist Upton Sinclair wrote to the jail superintendent in Yerwada, enclosing copies of his books Mammonart and Mental Radio. The first he described as ‘a study of literature from the point of view of economics’, and the second as narrating ‘experiments conducted by my wife and myself in telepathy, or mind reading’. Sinclair hoped the authorities would pass on these novels to Gandhi, since ‘neither book contains any reference to India or Indian affairs’.11

  They did, and Gandhi read them almost at once, writing back to Sinclair that ‘I read your Mammonart with absorbing interest and Mental Radio with curiosity. The former has given me much to think, the latter did not interest me. Nobody in India would, I think, doubt the possibility of telepathy but most would doubt the wisdom of its material use.’12

  Another letter came from a certain M. Pels, the railway stationmaster of Pretoria in South Africa. He reminded Gandhi that they had been introduced to each other by Henry Polak back in 1907 or 1908, and had subsequently met several times at stations where Pels was posted. The stationmaster had recently read in the Rand Daily Mail that Gandhi had been ‘cured of an old remedy of yours, Viz. “Blood Pressure”’. The South African had been suffering from the same malady for years; even going on a vegetarian diet had not cured it. Would Gandhi, from his prison cell now perhaps ‘feel disposed to favour’ him with advice, for which he would ‘be extremely grateful’?13

  The letter was not forwarded to Gandhi by the jail authorities. Also kept from him was a letter by a Maharashtrian from Bombay named Jayaram Jadhav. This presented Muslims and Christians as enemies of Hindus. ‘Who can say,’ he told Gandhi, ‘that you are not aware that the dispute between the Hindus and the Musalmans is growing day by day? Besides, owing to the encouragement of the present rulers the number of Indian Christians has been increasing among us Hindus and the number of Hindus has been dwindling down. These are the two powerful communities which are snatching morsels of flesh among the Hindu community and you also know that their powers of digestion is sufficiently intensive to assimilate the snatched morsels of flesh.’

  The patriot from Bombay told Gandhi that ‘the English are sure to go sooner or later. Granting that they go from here or we drive them away, shall we be able to carry on the administration of India? I think internal dissensions will increase here and a civil war will commence. Hindus and Mussalmans will first fight for supremacy and if the Hindus are successful they will again fight amongst themselves and there will be terrible bloodshed….There is only one remedy if this is to be avoided and that is…to cause the Hindus to venerate one God, one Ved
and one caste, that is to say they must merge together. There should be no reservation of powers or places, they should freely interdine and intermarry. Even their language and dress should be common.’

  The letter writer told Gandhi that ‘if you desire to do permanent good to India, you had better follow the path indicated by me but if you simply wish that your name should be applauded by the people, then the tall talk about independence is sufficiently good’.14

  How might Gandhi have responded to this letter had he received it? He would have endorsed the opposition to caste discrimination, though perhaps not the wholesale uniformity in dress, language, and the like, that the correspondent advocated. And he would have disagreed with the demonization of Indians who were not Hindus. For Gandhi, Muslims and Christians were as much part of the nation-in-the-making as Hindus. Seeing them as foreigners, or as susceptible to foreign influences, was, so to say, ‘foreign’ to his way of thinking.

  IV

  Despite the leader’s arrest, the civil disobedience movement continued. Gandhi had designated the respected former judge Abbas Tyabji his successor as ‘dictator’ of the Salt Satyagraha. Tyabji was arrested in turn, whereupon the leadership passed on to Sarojini Naidu.

  Gandhi had hoped to raid the major salt works run by the government in Dharasana. With him behind bars, Mrs Naidu went there instead. ‘The sudden and spectacular attack on the Dharasana Salt Works on the 21st of May,’ observed a police report, ‘was made by some 3,000 volunteers comprising satyagrahis from all parts of Gujarat and from Bombay encouraged by several thousand sight-seers.’ The satyagrahis were met at the venue by a large contingent of police—the two sides battling for several hours. In the evening, another large body of volunteers arrived and a fresh attempt was made to rush the salt works. Several hundred satyagrahis were injured, with even the police admitting that there was ‘universal condemnation of all Government measures in the press’.15

  And not just the Indian press. Among the journalists at Dharasana was Webb Miller of the United Press International. Miller arrived too late to see or meet the Mahatma, but he was able to witness the stoic determination of his followers. The report he cabled back was partly censored by the British authorities. But even this expurgated account conveyed the intensity of the protests and the savagery of the repression. As the satyagrahis proceeded towards the salt pans, wrote Miller: ‘The police kicked and prodded the non-violent raiders who swarmed the depot….The spectacle of them beating the unresisting volunteers was so painful [that] I was frequently forced to turn away from the crowd.’16

  Webb Miller’s reports brought other American journalists to India. Arriving in Bombay in June, Negley Farson of the Chicago Daily News witnessed a police attack on a demonstration whose leader and many participants were Sikh. ‘It was terrible,’ cabled Farson. ‘I stood within five feet of the Sikh leader as he took the lathi blows. He was a short heavily muscled man, like one of the old Greek gods.’

  ‘The blows came,’ continued Farson, but the Sikh

  stood straight. His turban was knocked off. The long black hair was bared with the round top-knot. He closed his eyes as the blows fell—until at last he swayed and fell to the ground.

  No other Sikhs had tried to shield him, but now, showing their defiance, and their determination to die rather than move, they wiped away the blood streaming from his mouth. Hysterical Hindus rushed to him bearing cakes of ice to rub the contusions over his eyes. The Sikh gave me a bloody smile—and stood up for more.

  For two long hours these unbelievable scenes went on. Then, at last, came the blessed rain, the monsoon like a healing balm.17

  The accounts by Miller and Farson of how Gandhi’s men and women bore beatings and courted arrest were printed around the world, garnering wide attention to, and sympathy for, the civil disobedience movement.

  V

  The movement was perhaps most successful in Gandhi’s native Gujarat. One indication was the widespread resignation of government-appointed officials, inspired or challenged by their fellows to sunder ties with the Raj. In Surat district, 334 out of 760 village headmen resigned. The figures for Broach were 160 out of 545; in Kaira, 222 out of 665. In Bardoli taluk of Surat district, 57 per cent of land revenue remained uncollected, the figure rising to 67 per cent in Kaira’s Mehmedabad taluk. In Bardoli, a police report grimly noted: ‘The hostile attitude of all the inhabitants is such that, even in cases of serious crimes such as murder, all assistance and information is refused to the authorities.’18

  Indians in other provinces were also active. A report from Madras in July noted that ‘certain Tamil districts still show signs of restlessness’. In Malabar and South Kanara, there was much picketing of liquor stalls. In Guntur, district officials resigned in large numbers, while peasants refused to pay forest-grazing fees.

  Other reports spoke of regular meetings, bandhs and hartals in Bombay, Karachi and Ahmedabad, with ‘bands of people who go round in small processions singing songs to encourage the movement’. In the Deccan, there was an ‘extensive outbreak’ of violations of the forest law, and the hoisting of the Congress flag on schools and offices.

  On 5 July, some four hundred people marched towards Yerwada jail to pay their respects to Gandhi on the completion of his second month in prison. The marchers were stopped by the police at the Bund Bridge, a mile away from the jail. They refused to turn back, squatting on the road in protest. Word of the impasse spread, with many more people gathering in support. When the crowd swelled, to what the police considered alarming proportions (estimates varied from two to ten thousand), they were dispersed with lathis.19

  In 1920–22, the people of the princely states had stayed out of the non-cooperation movement. This time, as a government report noted in alarm, ‘there are signs of sympathy with the agitation in British India spreading amongst the people in the larger States, and a great deal of seditious literature is finding its way into them’. In Rajkot’s King Alfred High School, where Gandhi had once studied, the students ‘continue[d] to give a lot of trouble’, observing ‘hartals on every possible occasion’ and urging students of other schools in the town to likewise boycott classes.20

  In 1920–22, women had also stayed out of the struggle. This time, they participated in large numbers. Throughout India, college girls made and sold contraband salt, picketed liquor stores, and organized processions known as prabhat pheries where patriotic songs were sung. Housewives and women professionals also joined them. Hundreds of women were arrested during the various breaches of the Salt Act, some signing the jail register simply as ‘Miss Satyagrahi’. An intelligence bureau officer reported on 10 July that ‘the awakening among women is something that I am told has taken Congressmen themselves by surprise’.21

  VI

  In the middle of July 1930, the Moderate politicians Tej Bahadur Sapru and M.R. Jayakar wrote to the viceroy asking for permission to see Gandhi in prison. The Labour government now in power was convening a round table conference in London to discuss India’s constitutional future. Sapru and Jayakar were to attend; they hoped to persuade Irwin to release Gandhi so that he could come too.

  The viceroy had seen how he had grievously underestimated Gandhi’s popularity among his fellow Indians. The publicity garnered by Gandhi in America had also found its way back to the Viceregal Palace. So, Irwin now granted Sapru and Jayakar permission to visit Yerwada prison. They did, in the last week of July, and had long conversations with Gandhi, who said he would agree to attend the Round Table Conference only if the viceroy accepted full self-government as a goal, removed the penal application of the salt tax, and freed all political prisoners.

  On 14 and 15 August, a further discussion took place in Yerwada, with Sapru and Jayakar on one side and Gandhi, the Nehrus, Vallabhbhai Patel and several other senior Congressmen (all transported by the government from their respective prisons) on the other. Afterwards, the Congress leaders wr
ote to Sapru and Jayakar saying that ‘the time is not yet ripe for securing a settlement honourable for our country’. They took issue with the viceroy’s description of the Salt Satyagraha as ‘ill-timed’ and ‘unconstitutional’, for it had been entirely peaceful. ‘The wonderful mass response to the movement’, insisted Gandhi and his colleagues, was ‘its sufficient justification’.

  In early September, Sapru and Jayakar travelled again to Poona, where they had three days of conversations with Gandhi. The discussions went nowhere, for, as Gandhi put it, there was ‘no meeting ground between the Government and the Indian National Congress’.22

  Other Indian leaders were keen to attend the Round Table Conference. Among them was M.A. Jinnah, who, before leaving for London, called on the viceroy. Irwin wrote later to Stanley Baldwin that he had ‘met very few Indians with a more acute intellect or a more independent outlook—not of course that he always sees eye to eye with Government! But he is not lacking in moral courage, has been outspoken against civil disobedience and is genuinely anxious to find the way to settlement.’23

  The Round Table Conference began in London on 12 November 1930. In attendance were leaders of the Liberals, the Muslim League, the Hindu Mahasabha, the Depressed Classes and the princes. Among the subjects discussed were the rights of minorities, the creation of a federation in which British India would be partnered by princely India, and the question of whether India was ready for adult suffrage.24

  The conference was a flop. One reason was the absence of any representative from the Congress, the most important political party in India. A second was the reactionary attitude of some British politicians, who seemed to rely ‘for their policy towards India on the knowledge of that country possessed by Rudyard Kipling’.25 A third was the failure to find any common ground between India’s two major religious communities. As the undersecretary of state for India wrote to the viceroy: ‘Both Hindus and Muslims at present appear to regard their differences as irreconcilable.’26