Non-Violent Resistance

by Mahatma K Gandhi

  "1. Adults use five pounds of salt per year, therefore, pay three annas per year as tax..........If Government removed the monopoly people will have to pay higher prices and in addition make good to the Government the loss sustained by the removal of the monopoly......The salt you take from the seashore is not eatable therefore, the Government destroys it."

  "2. Mr. Gandhi says that Government has destroyed hand-spinning in this country, whereas everybody knows that this is not true, because throughout the country, there is not a village where hand-spinning of cotton is not going on. Moreover, in every province cotton spinners are shown superior methods and are provided with better instruments at less price and are thus helped by Government."

  "3. Out of every five rupees of the debt that the Government has incurred rupees four have been beneficially spent."

  I have taken these three sets of statements from three different leaflets. I venture to suggest that every one of these statements is demonstrably false. The daily consumption of salt by an adult is three times the amount stated and therefore the poll tax, that the Salt tax undoubtedly is, is at least 9 as. per head per year. And this tax is levied from man, woman, child and domestic cattle irrespective of age and health.

  It is a wicked falsehood to say that every village has a spinning wheel, and that the spinning movement is in any shape or form encouraged or supported by the Government. Financiers can better dispose of the falsehood, that four out of every five rupees of the public debt is used for the benefit of the public. But those falsehoods are mere samples of what people know is going on in everyday contact with the Government. Only the other day a Gujarati poet, a brave man, was convicted on perjured official evidence, in spite of his emphatic statement that at the time mentioned he was sleeping soundly in another place.

  Now for instances of official inactivities. Liquor dealers have assaulted pickets admitted by officials to have been peaceful and sold liquor in contravention of regulations. The officials have taken no notice either of the assaults or the illegal sales of liquor. As to the assaults, though they are known to everybody, they may take shelter under the plea that they have received no complaints.

  And now you have sprung upon the country a Press Ordinance surpassing any hitherto known in India. You have found a short cut through the law's delay in the matter of the trial of Bhagatsingh and others by doing away with the ordinary procedure. Is it any wonder if I call all these official activities and inactivities a veiled form of Martial Law? Yet this is only the fifth week of the struggle!

  Before then the reign of terrorism that has just begun overwhelms India, I feel that I must take a bolder step, and if possible divert your wrath in a cleaner if more drastic channel. You may not know the things that I have described. You may not even now believe in these. I can but invite your serious attention to them.

  Any way I feel that it would be cowardly on my part not to invite you to disclose to the full the leonine paws of authority so that the people who are suffering tortures and destruction of their property may not feel that I, who had perhaps been the chief party inspiring them to action that has brought to right light the Government in its true colours, had left any stone unturned to work out the Satyagraha programme as fully as it was possible under given circumstances.

  For, according to the science of Satyagraha, the greater the repression and lawlessness on the part of authority, the greater should be the suffering courted by the victims. Success is the certain result of suffering of the extremest character, voluntarily undergone.

  I know the dangers attendant upon the methods adopted by me. But the country is not likely to mistake my meaning. I say what I mean and think. And I have been saying for the last fifteen years in India and outside for twenty years more and repeat now that the only way to conquer violence is through non-violence pure and undefiled. I have said also that every violent act, word and thought interferes with the progress of non-violent action. If in spite of such repeated warnings people will resort to violence, I must disown responsibility save such as inevitably attaches to every human being for the acts of every other human being. But the question of responsibility apart, I dare not postpone action on any cause whatsoever, if non-violence is the force the seers of the world have claimed it to be and if I am not to belie my own extensive experience of its working.

  But I would fain avoid the further step. I would therefore ask you to remove the tax which many of your illustrious countrymen have condemned in unmeasured terms and which, as you could not have failed to observe, has evoked universal protest and resentment expressed in civil disobedience. You may condemn civil disobedience as much as you like. Will you prefer violent revolt to civil disobedience? If you say, as you have said, that the civil disobedience must end in violence, history will pronounce the verdict that the British Government, not bearing because not understanding non-violence, goaded human nature to violence, which it could understand, and deal with. But in spite of the goading I shall hope that God will give the people of India wisdom and strength to withstand every temptation and provocation to violence.

  If, therefore, you cannot see your way to remove the Salt tax, and remove the prohibition on private salt-making, I must reluctantly commence the march adumbrated in the opening paragraph of my letter.

  I am,

  Your sincere friend,

  M. K. Gandhi

  Young India, 8-5-'30

  120. THE GREAT ARREST

  [The following is the account of Gandhiji's arrest at Karadi Camp (Dist. Surat) on the morning of 12th May, 1930, as given by Mirabehn.]

  At dead of night, like thieves they came, to steal him away. For, "when they sought to lay hold on him, they feared the multitudes, because they took him for a prophet."

  At twelve forty-five at night the District Magistrate of Surat, two Indian police officers, armed with pistols, and some thirty policemen, armed with rifles, silently and suddenly came into the peaceful little compound where Gandhiji and his Satyagrahis were sleeping. They immediately surrounded the party, and the English officer going up to the bed and turning a torch-light on to Gandhiji's face, said:

  "Are you Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi?"

  "You want me?" enquired Gandhiji gently, and added, "Please give me time for my ablutions."

  He commenced to clean his teeth and the officers, time-piece in hand, stood watching him. Gandhiji here asked if there was a warrant and the Magistrate forthwith read out the following order:

  "Whereas the Governor-in-council views with alarm the activities of Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi, he directs that the said Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi should be placed under restraint under Regulation xxv of 1827, and suffer imprisonment during the pleasure of the Government; and that he be immediately removed to the Yeravda Central Jail."

  The ablutions finished, his few little necessities packed up, and his papers handed over to one of his party, Gandhiji again turned to the officers and said, "Please give me a few minutes more for prayer." This was granted, and he forthwith stood and prayed with his companions, surrounded by the ring of police.

  As soon as the prayer was over, they hurried him away, put him into a motor-lorry and drove him off accompanied by the three officers and some eight policemen.

  All telephonic and telegraphic communications were cut off, and the police guarded the roads.

  Swift, silent secrecy.

  No trial, no justice.

  The Government is making its own statements and the accused lies buried in the silence of the prison cell.

  They may take his frail body and cast it into jail. They may stifle his pure voice with the heavy prison walls. But they cannot stifle the Great Soul. Its radiance will penetrate all earthly barriers. The more they strive to smother it, the brighter and brighter will it shine, filling not only India, but the whole world.

  Ah India, India, now is thy hour of greatest trial. May God lead thee on the path to Victory and Peace.

  He who loves and knows thee with a love and knowledge surpassing
all mortal words, has told thee that Freedom is now within thy reach if thou hast the strength and courage to stick to the Pure Path—the Path which he has shown thee of Truth and Non-violence. May God give thee that strength and fill thee with that courage.

  Young India, 8-5-'30

  121. MORE ABOUT THE SETTLEMENT

  [The Civil Disobedience Movement continued unabated till early in 1931, when Gandhiji was released to negotiate a settlement with the Viceroy. After the settlement had been made Gandhiji addressed a mammoth meeting on the 17th March, 1931 in Bombay. Extracts from that speech relating to Satyagraha are given below:—Ed.]

  For full twelve months we have developed a war mentality: we thought of war, we talked of war and nothing but war. Now we have to sing a completely different tune. We are in the midst of truce. With some of us, I know the very mention of the word truce sends a shiver through their bodies. That is because we had thought of nothing but war and had believed that there could be no compromise. But that was not a position becoming a true Satyagrahi. The Satyagrahi whilst he is ever ready for fight must be equally eager for peace. He must welcome any honourable opportunity for peace. The Working Committee of the Congress saw such an opportunity and availed itself of it. The essential condition of a compromise is that there should be nothing humiliating, nothing panicky about it. You may be sure that whilst I was being inundated with telegrams to make peace at any price, I was absolutely unmoved by them. I am inured to such things and I was absolutely firm that I must not allow any of these telegrams to make me flinch from whatever decision my inner voice gave me. Whilst however a Satyagrahi never yields to panic or hesitancy, neither does he think of humiliating the other party, of reducing it to an abject surrender. He may not swerve from the path of justice and may not dictate impossible terms. He may not pitch his demands too high, neither may he pitch them too low. The present settlement, I submit, satisfies all these conditions. One of the terms of the settlement seems to have caused some disappointment in certain quarters and some have rushed in to condemn the settlement on that account. They complain that we ought not to have entered into the settlement until we had secured the release of all political prisoners. I may tell you that we could not in justice make this demand. Not that there was any lack of will on our part, but the power to make the demand irresistible was lacking. That power will come as soon as we fulfil in letter and in spirit all the terms of the settlement that apply to us.

  I may inform you that local Governments have been remiss in fulfilling their part of the contract. Some prisoners who ought to have been released are still in jail, some prosecutions—like the Chirner firing case—that ought to have been withdrawn are still going on. It is a matter for sorrow. If the remissness or failure is deliberate it would be culpable. But it would add to our power and make our case for Swaraj more irresistible than ever. One would like to think however that such remissness would not be deliberate in view of the stupendous machinery of Government. There is likely to be unintentional delay and inadvertance. But if there is deliberate breach of faith, we have our sovereign remedy. If you look at the settlement the last clause empowers Government to set its machinery of law and order in motion in the event of failure on the part of the Congress to fulfil its part of the settlement. Need I tell you that the clause necessarily includes its converse? Even as it would be open to Government to set its machinery in motion, it is open to us also to resort to our infallible weapon as soon as we find that there is a deliberate breach.

  But the present delays need not agitate or irritate you. For there is no occasion for it. A Satyagrahi has infinite patience, abundant faith in others, ample hope.

  And now a word of warning. The settlement is obviously provisional. But it necessitates a change in our method of work. Whilst civil disobedience and jail going, or direct action was the method to be followed before the settlement, the way of argument and negotiation takes its place. But let no one forget that the settlement is provisional and the negotiations may break down at any stage. Let us therefore keep our powder ever dry and our armour ever bright. Failure should not find us napping, but ready to mobilize at the first command. In the meanwhile let us carry on the process of self-purification with greater vigour and greater faith, so that we may grow in strength day by day.

  Young India, 19-3-'31

  122. THE CONGRESS

  The Congress will be upon us in a few days from now. The broken-up organizations will hardly have been put together by that time. The delegates, half of whom will be ex-prisoners, will hardly have had time to collect themselves. And yet, it will meet with a greater prestige than ever before, and with a consciousness of its new strength born of a knowledge of suffering undergone by tens of thousands of men, women and children, and perhaps unparallelled in history in the sense that the sufferers suffered without retaliation.

  But it would be wrong to brood over the sufferings, to exaggerate them, or to be puffed up with pride. True suffering does not know itself and never calculates. It brings its own joy which surpasses all other joys. We shall, therefore, be guilty of suicide if we live upon the capital amassed during the past twelve months. Whilst we must try always to avoid occasions for needless suffering, we must ever be ready for them. Somehow or other, those who will walk along the right path cannot avoid suffering notwithstanding the attempt to avoid it. It is the privilege of the patriot, the reformer and, still greater, of the Satyagrahi.

  The settlement, provisional though it is, has come through God's grace. During the negotiations there were times when breakdown seemed a certainty. Beyond doubt, the suffering would have been ten times multiplied if a breakdown had taken place. And yet, I would have been obliged to ask the nation to go through it, had an honourable peace proved impossible. But I am not sure that it will be possible to reach the goal without further, wider and deeper suffering. The measure of our purification seems hardly equal to the prize to be won. We have not yet consciously, and on a national scale, got rid of the curse of untouchability, we have not shed distrust of one another. Great though the awakening has been among the rich, they have not yet made common cause with the poor; their life bears no resemblance to that of the poor. Though much progress has been made in the case of drink and drugs, much more yet remains to be done; the progress made is still uncertain. The drunkard has yielded to pressure of public opinion. He has not yet definitely given up the habit. He knows the evil but has not been taught to shun it as poison. The word taught has been used advisedly. The workers have confined their attention to the drink and drug shops, they have not made a serious attempt to touch the heart of the addict. We have not shed the desire for foreign cloth and fineries, nor have the cloth merchants fully realized the magnitude of the wrong they have done to the nation by their trade. Many of them still parade the doctrine of individual freedom. These and several other evils that can be easily recalled show how much still remains to be done in the matter of self-purification. And so, it is little wonder if we do not find the atmosphere of Purna Swaraj pervading us. How far, therefore, the method of consultation and conference will succeed, it is difficult to forecast. This much is certain that argument is not what will carry conviction. The British conviction will be in exact proportion to the strength we have developed. And since the nation has decided that we will acquire strength only through self-purification, if we have not attained the wisdom during these good months of grace to rid ourselves of the evils I have enumerated, then we must go through a fiercer fire of suffering than ever before. Let us, therefore, approach the Congress with a humbled spirit and with a will bent on removing every form of weakness from our midst. We must not give undue weight to conferences and the like. The past twelve months have made it clear for us that Swaraj will come when it does, from within, by internal effort, not as a free gift from above or by simple argument.

  Young India, 19-3-'31

  123. LET US REPENT

  "But the hatred which was created and which has been shown in words and actions has been so i
ntolerable that it must set one to think whether release of such mighty forces of hatred all round the country is advisable. From morning till late night one heard through talks, songs, through slogans and felt such mighty torrents of hatred that it was sickening to find such a degradation in large masses of people. I use the word degradation with full responsibility. It appeared that speaking lies was a matter of full licence and liberty. To attack Government officers, police officers, men who disagreed, for something which was entirely untrue, for something which never happened, was a daily common event seen on the roads and everywhere. More than words can express the cruelties and the injustice inflicted on the traders of British goods especially, and some other foreign goods, were wide, intolerable, and unbearable. To request a man not to deal in one article and to request another not to purchase an article is one thing, but to force a man by all possible means, by abusing him, by obstructing him, by making his life miserable in every way is another thing, and there, I must admit, non-violence has miserably failed. I am certain in my mind that the hatred created and the cruelties inflicted were far from non-violence and against all principles and teachings of Mahatmaji. It was a common practice to obstruct and inflict with all kinds of tactics to make persons' lives miserable whenever one disagreed with the general movement. In every province there were different types of activities and it appears that either one had to accept such dictation of somebody or one had to go through whatever was inflicted upon him by any small or large band of children, ladies or full grown up men. According to them, to differ in any way was pro-British, pro-Government or unfaithfulness to the country, and today one can see clearly mental victims of these forces of hatred in several houses.