The
Challenge: Quit India Resolution
On
my return from Kulu after a fortnight's absence I realized that the internal
situation was changing rapidly. The reaction from the failure of the last
attempt at a settlement had grown and there was a feeling that no hope lay in
that direction. British official statements in Parliament and elsewhere had
confirmed that view and angered the people. Official policy in India was
definitely aiming at the suppression of our normal political and public
activities and there was an all-round tightening of pressure. Many of our
workers had remained in prison throughout the Cripps negotiations; now some of
the nearest and most important of my friends and colleagues had been arrested
and imprisoned under the Defence of India Act. Rafi Ahmad Kidwai was arrested
early in May. Shri Krishnadat Palliwal, president of the United Provinces
Provincial Congress committee, followed soon after, and so did many others. It
seemed that most of us would be picked off in this way and removed from the
scene of action, and our national movement prevented from functioning and
gradually disintegrated. Could we submit to all this passively? We had not been
trained that way, and both our personal and national pride rose in revolt
against this treatment.
But
what could we do in view of the grave war crisis and possibility of invasion?
Yet inaction was no service even to this cause, for it was leading to the
growth of sentiments which we viewed with anxiety and apprehension. There were
many trends in public opinion, as was natural in such a vast country and at
such a time of crisis. Actual pro-Japanese sentiment was practically nil, for
no one wanted to change masters, and pro-Chinese feelings were strong and
widespread. But there was a small group which was indirectly pro-Japanese in
the sense that it imagined that it could take advantage of a Japanese invasion
for Indian freedom. They were influenced by the broadcasts being made by Subhas
Chandra Bose who had secretly escaped from India the year before. Most people
were, of course, just passive, dumbly awaiting developments. If unfortunately
circumstances so fashioned themselves that a part of India was under the
invader's control, then there would undoubtedly be many collaborators,
especially among the upper income groups, whose ruling passion was to save
themselves and their property. That breed and mentality of collaborators had
been cherished and encouraged by the British Government in India in the past
for its own purposes, and they could adapt them-selves to changing circumstances,
always keeping their own personal interests in view. We had seen collaboration
in full flood even in France and Belgium and Norway and many of the occupied
countries of Europe, in spite of growing resistance movements. We had seen how
the men of Vichy had (in Pertinax's words) 'racked their brains to palm off
shame as honour, cowardice as courage, pusillanimity and ignorance as wisdom,
humiliation as virtue, and wholehearted acceptance of the German victory as
moral regeneration.' If that had been so in France, that country of revolution
and fiery patriotism, it was certainly not unlikely among similar classes in
India, where the mentality of collaboration had flourished for so long under
British patronage and brought so many rewards. Indeed it was highly likely that
chief among those who might collaborate with the invader would be many of the
persons who had been collaborating with British rule and who proclaimed their
loyalty to that rule from the house tops. They had perfected the art of
collaboration and would find no difficulty in holding on to that basis even
though the superstructure changed. Arid if subsequently there was yet another
change of that superstructure, well they would readapt them-selves again as
others of their kind were doing in Europe. When necessity arose they could take
advantage of the anti-British feelings that had grown more powerful than ever
after the failure of the Cripps negotiations. So would others also, not for personal
and opportunist reasons but pushed on by different motives, losing all
perspective and forgetting the larger issues. These developments filled us with
dismay and we felt that the growth of enforced and sullen submission to British
policy in India would lead to all manner of dangerous consequences and the
complete degradation of the people.
There was a fairly
widespread feeling that in case of attempted invasion and occupation of some
eastern areas, there would be a breakdown of the civil administration over
larger areas else-where, leading to chaotic conditions. What had happened in
Malaya and Burma was before us. Hardly anyone expected any considerable part of
the country to be occupied by the enemy even if the chances of war favoured
him. India was vast, and we had seen in China that space counts. But space
counts only when there is a determination to take advantage of it and resist,
and not to collapse and submit. Apparently well-founded reports stated that the
Allied armed forces would probably withdraw to inner lines of defence, leaving wide
areas open to enemy occupation, though probably the enemy, as in China, might
not actually occupy them all. So questions arose as to how we should meet this
situation both in these areas as well as in other areas where the civil
administration might cease to function. We tried, as far as we could, to
prepare mentally and otherwise for such crises by encouraging local
organizations which could function and keep order, and at the same time by
insisting that the invader had to be resisted at any cost.
Why had the Chinese
fought so stoutly for many years? Why, above all others, had the Russians and
other peoples of the Soviet Union fought with such courage, tenacity, and
whole-heartedness? Elsewhere people fought bravely also because they were moved
by love of country, fear of aggression, and desire to pre-serve their ways of
life. And yet there appeared to be a difference in the whole-heartedness of the
war effort between Russia and other countries. Others had fought magnificently
as at the time of Dunkirk and after, but there had been some moral slackening
of effort when the immediate crisis was past; it seemed as if there were some
doubts about the future, though the war had anyhow to be won. In the Soviet
Union, so far as one could judge from the material available, there seemed to
be no doubt or debate (though it was true that debate was not encouraged), and
there was a supreme confidence in both the present and the future.
In India? There was a
deep-seated dislike of the present and the future seemed equally dark. No
patriotic urge to action moved the people, only a desire to defend themselves
against invasion and a worse fate. A few were moved by international
considerations. Mixed up with all these feelings was resentment at being
ordered about, suppressed and exploited by an alien and imperialist power.
There was a fundamental wrongness in a system under which everything depended
on the wishes and whims of an autocrat. Freedom is dear to all, but most of all
to those who have been deprived of it, or those who are in danger of losing it.
Freedom in the modern world is conditioned and limited in many ways but those
who do not possess it, do not realize these limitations, and idealize the
conception till it be-comes a passionate craving and an overwhelming and
consuming desire. If anything does not fit in with this longing or seems to go
counter to it, that thing must inevitably suffer. The desire for freedom, for
which so many in India had laboured and suffered, had not only received a check
but it seemed that the prospect of it had receded into some dim and distant
future. Instead of tack-ing that passion on to the world struggle that was
going on, and drawing upon the vast reservoir of energy in the cause of Indian
and world freedom and for India's defence, the war had been isolated from it,
and no hope was centred in its issue. It is never wise to leave any people,
even enemies, without hope.
There were some of
course in India who looked upon the war as something far bigger and vaster than
the petty ambitions of the statesmen of the various countries involved in it;
some who felt its revolutionary significance in their bones and realized that
its ultimate issue and the consequences that would flow from it would take the
world far beyond military victories and the pacts and utterances of
politicians. But the number of these people was inevitably limited and the
great majority, as in other countries, took a narrower view, which they called
realistic, and were governed by the considerations of the moment. Some,
inclined to opportunism, adapted themselves to British policy and fitted
them-selves into it, as they would have collaborated with any other authority
and policy. Some reacted strongly against this policy and felt that a
submission to it was a betrayal not only of India's cause, but the world's
cause. Most people became just passive, static, quiescent: the old failing of
the Indian people against which we had struggled for so long.
While this struggle
was going on in India's mind and a feel-ing of desperation was growing,
Gandhiji wrote a number of articles which suddenly gave a new direction to
people's thoughts, or, as often happens, gave shape to their vague ideas.
Inaction at that critical stage and submission to all that was happening had
become intolerable to him. The only way to meet that situation was for Indian
freedom to be recognized and for a free India to meet aggression and invasion
in co-operation with the allied nations. If this recognition was not
forthcoming then some action must be taken to challenge the existing system and
wake up the people from the lethargy that was paralyzing them and making them
easy prey to every kind of aggression.
There was nothing new
in this demand, for it was a repetition of what we had been saying all along,
but there was a new urgency and passion in his speech and writing. And there
was the hint of action. There was no doubt that he represented at the moment
the prevailing sentiment in India. In a conflict between the two, nationalism
had triumphed over internationalism, and Gandhiji's new writings created a stir
all over India. And yet that nationalism was at no time opposed to
internationalism and indeed was trying its utmost to find some opening to fit
in with that larger aspect, if only it could be given an opportunity to do so
honourably and effectively. There was no necessary conflict between the two
for, unlike the aggressive nationalisms, of Europe, it did not seek to
interfere with others but rather to co-operate with them to their common
advantage. National freedom was seen as the essential basis of true
internationalism and hence as the road to the latter, as well as the real
foundation for co-operation in the common struggle against fascism and nazism.
Meanwhile that internationalism, which was being so much talked about, was
beginning to look suspiciously like the old policy of the imperialist powers,
in a new, and yet not so new, attire; indeed it was itself an aggressive
nationalism which, in the name of empire or commonwealth or mandatory, sought
to impose its will on others.
Some of us were
disturbed and upset by this new development, for action was futile unless it
was effective action, and any such effective action must necessarily come in
the way of the war effort at a time when India herself stood in peril of
invasion. Gandhiji's general approach also seemed to ignore important
international considerations and appeared to be based on a narrow view of
nationalism. During the three years of war we had deliberately followed a
policy of non-embarrassment, and such action as we had indulged in had been in
the nature of symbolic protest. That symbolic protest had assumed huge
dimensions when 30,000 of our leading men and women were sent to prison in
1940-41. And yet even the prison-going was a selected individual affair and
avoided any mass upheaval or any direct interference with the governmental
apparatus. We could not repeat that, and if we did something else it had to be
of a different kind and on a more effective scale. Was this not bound to
interfere with the war on India's borders and encourage the enemy?
These were obvious
difficulties and we discussed them at length with Gandhiji without converting
each other. The difficulties were there and risks and perils seemed to follow
any course of action or inaction. It became a question of balancing them and
choosing the lesser evil. Our mutual discussion led to a clarification of much
that had been vague and cloudy, and to Gandhiji's appreciation of many
international factors to which his attention was drawn. His subsequent writing
underwent a change and he himself emphasized these international considerations
and looked at India's problem in a wider perspective. But his fundamental
attitude remained: his objection to a passive submission to British autocratic
and repressive policy in India and his intense desire to do something to
challenge this. Sub-mission, according to him, meant that India would be broken
in spirit and, whatever shape the war might take, whatever its end might be,
her people would act in a servile way and their freedom would not be achieved
for a long time. It would mean also submission to an invader and not continuing
resistance to him regardless even of temporary military defeat or withdrawal.
It would mean the complete demoralization of our people and their losing all
the strength that they had built up during a quarter of a century's unceasing
struggle for freedom. It would mean that the world would forget India's demand
for freedom and the post-war settlement would be governed by the old
imperialist urges and ambitions. Passionately desirous of India's freedom as he
was, India was to him something more than his loved homeland; it was the symbol
of all the colonial and exploited peoples of the world, the acid test whereby
any world policy must be judged. If India remained unfree then also the other
colonial countries and subject races would continue in their present enslaved
condition and the war would have been fought in vain. It was essential to
change the moral basis of the war. The armies and the navies and air forces
would function in their respective spheres and they might win by superior
methods of violence, but to what end was their victory? And even armed warfare
requires the support of morale; had not Napoleon said that in war 'the moral is
to the physical as three to one?' The moral factor of hundreds of millions of
subject and exploited people all over the world realizing and believing that
this war was really for their freedom was of immense importance even from the
narrower viewpoint of the war, and much more so for the peace to come. The very
fact that a crisis had risen in the fortunes of the war necessitated a change
in outlook and policy and the conversion of these sullen and doubting millions
into enthusiastic supporters. If this miracle could take place all the military
might of the axis powers would be of little avail and their collapse was
assured. Many of the peoples of the axis countries might themselves be affected
by this powerful world sentiment.
In India it was
better to convert the sullen passivity of the people into a spirit of
non-submission and resistance. Though that non-submission would be, to begin
with, to arbitrary orders of the British authorities, it could be turned into
resistance to an invader. Submissiveness and servility to one would lead to the
same attitude towards the other and thus to humiliation and degradation.
We were familiar with
all these arguments; we believed them and had ourselves used them frequently.
But the tragedy was that the policy of the British Government prevented that
miracle from taking place; all our attempts to solve the Indian problem, even
temporarily, during the course of the war had failed, and all our requests for
a declaration of war aims had been turned down. It was certain that a further
attempt of this kind would also fail. What then? If it was to be conflict,
however much it might be justified on moral or other grounds, there could be no
doubt that it would tend to interfere greatly with the war effort in India at a
time when the danger of invasion was considerable. There was no getting away
from that fact. And yet, oddly enough, it was that very danger that had brought
this crisis in our minds, for we could not remain idle spectators of it and see
our country mismanaged and ruined by people whom we considered incompetent and
wholly incapable of shouldering the burden of a people's resistance which the
occasion demanded. All our pent-up passion and energy sought some outlet, some
way of action.
Gandhiji
was getting on in years, he was in the seventies, and a long life of ceaseless
activity, of hard toil, both physical and mental, had enfeebled his body; but
he was still vigorous enough, and he felt that all his life work would be in
vain if he submitted to circumstances then and took no action to vindicate what
he prized most. His love of freedom for India and all other exploited nations
and peoples overcame even his strong adherence to non-violence. He had
previously given a grudging and rather reluctant consent to the Congress not
adhering to this policy in regard to defence and the state's functions in an
emergency, but he had kept himself aloof from this. He realized that his
half-hearted attitude in this matter might well come in the way of a settlement
with Britain and the United Nations. So he went further and himself sponsored a
Congress resolution which declared that the primary function of the provisional
government of free India would be to throw all her great resources in the
struggle for freedom and against aggression, and to co-operate fully with the
United Nations in the defence of India with all the armed as well as other
forces at her command. It was no easy matter for him to commit himself in this
way, but he swallowed the bitter pill, so overpowering was his desire that some
settlement should be arrived at to enable India to resist the aggressor as a
free nation.
Many of the
theoretical and other differences that had often separated some of us from
Gandhiji disappeared, but still that major difficulty remained—any action on
our part must interfere with the war effort. Gandhiji, to our surprise, still
clung to the belief that a settlement with the British Government was possible,
and he said he would try his utmost to achieve it. And so, though he talked a
great deal about action, he did not define it or indicate what he intended to
do.
While we were
doubting and debating, the mood of the country changed, and from a sullen
passivity it rose to a pitch of excitement and expectation. Events were not
waiting for a Congress decision or resolution; they had been pushed forward by
Gandhiji's utterances, and now they were moving onwards with their own momentum.
It was clear that, whether Gandhiji was right or wrong, he had crystallized the
prevailing mood of the people. There was a desperateness in it, an emotional
urge which gave second place to logic and reason and a calm consideration of
the consequences of action. Those consequences were not ignored, and it was
realized that whether anything was achieved or not the price paid in human
suffering would be heavy. But the price that was being paid from day to day in
torture of the mind was also heavy and there was no prospect of escape from it.
It was better to jump into the uncharted seas of action and do something,
rather than be the tame objects of a malign fate. It was not a politician's
approach but that of a people grown desperate and reckless of consequences; yet
there was always an appeal to reason, an attempt to rationalize conflicting
emotions, to find some consistency in the fundamental inconsistencies of human
character. The war was going to be a long one, to last many more years; there
had been many disasters and there were likely to be more, but the' war would
continue in spite of them till it had tamed and exhausted the passions which
gave rise to it and which it had itself encouraged. This time there would be no
half-success which are often more painful than failures. It had taken a wrong
turn not only in the field of military action but even more so in regard to the
more fundamental objectives for which it was supposed to be fought. Perhaps
such action as we might indulge in might draw forcible attention to this latter
failure and help to give a new and more promising turn. And even if present
success was lacking it might serve that saving purpose in the longer run, and
thus help also in giving powerful support in the future to military action.
If the temper of the
people rose, so also did the temper of the Government. No emotional or other
urge was required for this, for it was its natural temper and its normal way of
functioning —the way of an alien authority in occupation of a subject country.
It seemed to welcome this opportunity of crushing once for all, as it thought,
all the elements in the country which dared to oppose its will; and for this it
prepared accordingly.
Events marched ahead,
and yet, curiously, Gandhiji, who had said so much about action to protect the
honour of India and affirm her right to freedom, and as a free nation to
co-operate fully in the fight against aggression, said nothing at all about the
nature of this action. Peaceful, of course, it had necessarily to be, but what
more ? He began to lay greater stress on the possibilities of an agreement with
the British Government, of his intention to approach it again and try his
utmost to find a way out. His final speech at the All-India Congress Committee
expressed his earnest desire for a settlement and his determination to approach
the Viceroy for this. Neither in public nor in private at the meetings of the
Congress Working Committee did he hint at the nature of the action he had in
mind, except in one particular. He had suggested privately that in the event of
failure of all negotiations he would appeal for some kind of non-co-operation
and a one-day protest hartal, or cessation of all work in the country,
something in the nature of a one-day general strike, symbolic of a nation's
protest. Even this was a vague suggestion which he did not particularize, for
he did not want to make any further plans till he had made his attempt at a
settlement. So neither he nor the Congress Working Committee issued any kind of
directions, public or private, except that people should be prepared for all
developments, and should in any event adhere to the policy of peaceful and
non-violent action.
Though Gandhiji was
still hopeful of finding some way out of the impasse, very few persons shared
his hope. The course of events and all the development that had taken place
pointed inevitably to a conflict, and when that stage is reached middle
positions cease to have importance and each individual has to choose on which
side he will range himself. For Congressmen, as for others who felt that way,
there was no question of choice; it was inconceivable that the whole might of a
powerful government should try to crush our people and that any of us should
stand by and be passive spectators of a struggle in which India's freedom was
involved. Many people of course do stand by in spite of their sympathies, but
any such attempt to save himself from the consequences of his own previous acts
would have been shameful and dishonourable for prominent Congressmen. But even
apart from this there was no choice left far them. The whole of India's past
history pursued them, as well as the agony of the present and the hope of the
future, and all these drove them forward and conditioned their actions. 'The
piling up of the past upon the past goes on without relaxation,' says Bergson
in his 'Creative Evolution.' 'In reality the past is preserved by itself,
automatically. In its entirety, probably, it follows us at every instant....
Doubtless we think with only a small part of our past, but it is with our
entire past, including the original bent of our soul, that we desire, will and
act.'
On August 7th and
8th, in Bombay the All-India Congress Committee considered and debated in
public the resolution, which has since come to be known as the 'Quit India
Resolution.' That resolution was a long and comprehensive one, a reasoned
argument for the immediate recognition of Indian freedom and the ending of
British rule in India 'both for the sake of India and for the success of the
cause of the United Nations. The continuation of that rule is degrading and
enfeebling India and making her progressively less capable of defending herself
and of contributing to the cause of world freedom.' 'The possession of empire,
instead of adding to the strength of the ruling power, has become a burden and
a curse. India, the classic land of modern imperialism, has become the crux of
the question, for by the freedom of India will Britain and the United Nations
be judged, and the peoples of Asia and Africa be filled with hope and
enthusiasm.' The resolution went on to suggest the formation of a provisional
government, which would be composite and would represent all important sections
of the people and whose 'primary function must be to defend India and resist
aggression with all the armed as well as the non-violent forces at its command,
together with its allied powers.' This government would evolve a scheme for a
constituent assembly which would prepare a constitution for India acceptable to
all sections of the people. The constitution would be a federal one, with the
largest measure of autonomy for the federating units and with the residuary
powers vesting in those units. 'Freedom will enable India to resist aggression
effectively with the people's united will and strength behind it.'
This freedom of India
must be the symbol of the prelude to the freedom of all other Asiatic nations.
Further, a world federation of free nations was proposed, of which a beginning
should be made with United Nations.
The Committee stated
that it was 'anxious not to embarrass in any way the defence of China and
Russia, whose freedom is precious and must be preserved, or to jeopardize the
defensive capacity of the United Nations.' (At that time the dangers to China
and Russia were the greatest.) 'But the peril grows both to India and these
nations, and inaction and submission to a foreign administration at this stage
is not only degrading India and reducing her capacity to defend herself and
resist aggression but is no answer to that growing peril and is no service to
the peoples of the United Nations.'
The Committee again
appealed to Britain and the United Nations 'in the interest of world freedom.'
But—and there came the sting of the resolution—'the Committee is no longer
justified in holding the nation back from endeavoring to assert its will
against an imperialist and authoritarian Government which dominates over it and
prevents it from functioning in its own interest and in the interest of humanity.
The Committee resolves therefore to sanction, for the vindication of India's
inalienable right to freedom and independence, the starting of a mass struggle
on non-violent lines under the inevitable leadership of Gandhiji.' That
sanction was to take effect only when Gandhiji so decided. Finally, it was
stated that the Committee had 'no intention of gaining power for the Congress.
The power, when it comes, will belong to the whole people of India.'
In their concluding
speeches Maulana Abul Kalam Azad, the Congress president, and Gandhiji made it
clear that their next steps would be to approach the Viceroy, as representing
the British Government, and to appeal to the heads of the principal United
Nations for an honourable settlement, which, while recognizing the freedom of
India, would also advance the cause of the United Nations in the struggle
against the aggressor Axis powers.
The resolution was
finally passed late in the evening of August 8th, 1942. A few hours later, in
the early morning of August 9th, a large number of arrests were made in Bombay
and all over the country. And so to Ahmadnagar Fort.
CHAPTER TEN
AHMADNAGAR FORT AGAIN The Chain of
Happening
AHMADNAGAR
FORT. AUGUST THIRTEENTH, NINETEEN FORTY-FOUR.
It
is just over two years since we came here, two years of a dream life rooted in
one spot, with the same few individuals to see, the same limited environment,
the same routine from day to day. Sometime in the future we shall wake up from
this dream and go out into the wider world of life and activity, finding it a
changed world. There will be an air of unfamiliarity about the persons and
things we see; we shall remember them again and past memories will crowd into
our minds, and yet they will not be the same, nor will we be the same, and we
may find it difficult to fit in with them. Sometimes we may wonder whether this
renewed experience of everyday living is not itself a sleep and a dream from
which we may suddenly wake up. Which is the dream and which is the waking ? Are
they both real, for we experience and feel them in all their intensity, or are
they both unsubstantial and of the nature of fleeting dreams which pass,
leaving vague memories behind ?
Prison and its attendant solitude and
passivity lead to thought and an attempt to fill the vacuum of life with
memories of past living, of one's own life, and of the long chain of history of
hu-man activity. So during the past four months, in the course of this writing,
I have occupied my mind with India's past records and experiences, and out of
the multitude of ideas that came to me I have selected some and made a book out
of them. Looking back at what I have written, it seems inadequate, disjointed
and lacking in unity, a mixture of many things, with the personal element
dominant and giving its colour even to what was intended to be an objective
record and analysis. That personal element has pushed itself forward almost
against my will; often I checked it and held it back but sometimes I loosened
the reins and allowed it to flow out of my pen, and mirror, to some extent, my
mind.
By writing of the past I have tried to
rid myself of the burden of the past. But the present remains with all its
complexity and irrationality and the dark future that lies beyond, and the
burden of these is no less than that of the past. The vagrant mind, finding no
haven, still wanders about restlessly, bringing discomfort to its possessor as
well as to others. There is some envy for those virgin minds which have not
been soiled or violated by thought's assault, and on which doubt has cast no
shadow nor written a line. How easy is life for them in spite of its occasional
shock and pain.
Events
take place one after the other and the uninterrupted and unending stream of
happenings goes on. We seek to under-stand a particular event by isolating it
and looking at it by itself, as if it were the beginning and the end, the
resultant of some cause immediately preceding it. Yet it has no beginning and
is but a link in an unending chain, caused by all that has preceded it, and
resulting from the wills, urges, and desires of innumerable human beings
coalescing and conflicting with each other, and producing something different from
that which any single individual intended to happen. Those wills, urges, and
desires are themselves largely conditioned by previous events and experiences,
and the new event in its turn becomes another conditioning factor for the
future. The man of destiny, the leader who influences the multitude, undoubtedly
plays an important part in this process, and yet he himself is the product of
past events and forces and his influence is conditioned by them.
The Two Backgrounds: Indian and
British
What happened in India in August,
1942, was no sudden development but a culmination of all that had gone before.
Much has been written about it, in attack, criticism or defence, and many
explanations given. And yet most of this writing misses the real meaning, for
it applies purely political considerations to something that was deeper than
politics. Behind it all lay an intense feeling that it was no longer possible
to endure and live under foreign autocratic rule. All other questions became
secondary—whether under that rule it was possible to make improvements or
progress in some directions, or whether the consequences of a challenge might
be more harmful still. Only the overwhelming desire to be rid of it and to pay
any price for the riddance remained, only the feeling that whatever happened
this could not be endured.
That feeling
was no new sensation; it had been there for many years. But previously it had
been restrained in many ways and disciplined to keep pace with events. The war
itself was both a restraining and releasing factor. It opened out our minds to
vast developments and revolutionary changes, to the possibility of the
realization of our hopes in the near future; and it put a brake on much that we
might otherwise have done because of our desire to help, and certainly not to
hinder in any way, the struggle against the Axis powers.
But, as the war developed,
it became ever clearer that the western democracies were fighting not for a
change but for a
perpetuation of the old order. Before the war they had appeased fascism, not
only because of the fear of its consequences but also because of a certain
ideological sympathy with it and an extreme dislike of some of the probable
alternatives to it. Nazism and fascism were no sudden growths or accidents of
history. They were the natural developments of the past course of events, of
empire and racial discrimination, of national struggles, of the growing
concentration of power, of technological growth which found no scope for its
fulfillment within the existing framework of society, of the inherent conflict
between the democratic ideal and a social structure opposed to it. Political
democracy in western Europe and North America, opening the door to national and
individual progress, had also released new forces and ideas, aiming inevitably
at economic equality. Conflict was inherent in the situation; there would
either be an enlargement of that political democracy or attempts to curb it and
end it. Democracy grew in content and area, in spite of constant opposition,
and became the accepted ideal of political organization. But a time came when a
further expansion endangered the basis of the social structure, and then the
upholders of that structure became clamant and aggressive and organized
themselves to oppose change. In countries so circumstanced that the crisis
developed more rapidly, democracy was openly and deliberately crushed and
fascism and nazism appeared. In the democracies of western Europe and North
America the same processes were at play though many other factors delayed the
crisis and probably the much longer tradition of peaceful and democratic
government also helped. Behind some of these democracies lay empires where
there was no democracy at all and where the same kind of authoritarianism which
is associated with fascism prevailed. There also, as in fascist countries, the
governing class allied itself to reactionary and opportunist groups and feudal
survivals in order to suppress the demand for freedom. And there also they
began to assert that democracy, though good as an ideal and desirable in their
own home lands, was not suited to the peculiar conditions prevailing in their
colonial domains. So it was a natural consequence for these western democracies
to feel some kind of an ideological bond with fascism, even when they disliked
many of its more brutal and vulgar manifestations.
When they were forced
to fight in self-defence, they looked forward to a restoration of that very
structure which had failed so dismally. The war was looked upon and presented
as a defensive war, and this was true enough in a way. But there was another
aspect of the war, a moral aspect which went beyond military objectives and
attacked aggressively the fascist creed and outlook. For it was a war, as has
been said, for the soul of the peoples of the world. In it lay the seeds of
change not only for the fascist countries but also for the United Nations. This
moral aspect of the war was obscured by powerful propaganda, and emphasis was
laid on defence and perpetuation of the past and not on creating a new future.
There were many people in the west who ardently believed in this moral aspect
and wanted to create a new world which would afford some guarantees against
that utter failure of human society which the World War represented. There were
vast numbers of people everywhere, including especially the men who fought and
died on the field of battle, who vaguely but firmly hoped for this change. And
there were those hundreds of millions of the dispossessed and exploited and
racially discriminated against in Europe and America, and much more so in Asia
and Africa, who could not isolate the war from their memories of the past and
their present misery, and passionately hoped, even when hope was unreasonable,
that the war would somehow lift the burdens that crushed them.
But the eyes of the
leaders of the United Nations were turned elsewhere; they looked back to the
past and not forward to the future. Sometimes they spoke eloquently of the
future to appease the hunger of their people, but their policy had little to do
with these fine phrases. For Mr. Winston Churchill it was a war of restoration
and nothing more, a continuation, with minor changes, of both the social structure
of England and the imperial structure of her empire. President Roosevelt spoke
in terms of greater promise, but his policy had not been radically different.
Still many people all over the world looked to him with hope as a man of vision
and high statesmanship.
So the future for India and the rest of the world, in so far
as the British ruling class could help it, would be in line with the past, and
the present had necessarily to conform to it. In that very present the seeds of
this future were being sown. The Cripps proposals, for all their seeming advance,
created new and dangerous problems for us, which threatened to become
insuperable barriers to freedom. To some extent they have already had this
result. The all-pervading autocracy and authoritarianism of the British
Government in India, and the widespread suppression of the most ordinary civil
rights and liberties, had reached their further limits during, and under cover
of, the war. No one in the present generation had experienced the like of these.
They were constant reminders of our enslaved condition and continuing
humiliation. They were also a presage of the future, of the shape of things to
come, for out of this present, the future would grow. Anything seemed to be
better than to submit to this degradation. How many people out of India's
millions felt this way is impossible to say. For most of those millions all
conscious feeling has been deadened by poverty and misery. Among the others
were those who had been corrupted by office or privilege or vested interest, or
whose minds had been diverted by special claims. Yet the feeling was very
widespread, varying in intensity and some-times overlaid by other feelings.
There were many gradations in it, from an intensity of belief and a desire to
brave all hazards, which led inevitably to action, to a vague sympathy from a
safe distance. Some, tragically inclined, felt suffocated and strangled at the
lack of air to breathe in the oppressive atmosphere that surrounded them;
others, living on the ordinary trivial plane, had more capacity to adapt
themselves to conditions they disliked.
The
background of the British governing personnel in India was entirely different.
Indeed nothing is more striking than the vast gulf that separates the mind of the
British and the Indians and, whoever may be right or wrong, this very fact
demonstrates the utter incapacity of the British to function as a ruling class
in India. For there must be some harmony, some common outlook, between the
rulers and the ruled if there is to be any advance; otherwise there can only be
conflict, actual or potential. The British in India have always represented the
most conservative elements of Britain; between them and the liberal tradition
in England there is little in common. The more years they spend in India, the
more rigid they grow in outlook, and when they retire and go back to England,
they become the experts who advise on Indian problems. They are convinced of
their own rectitude, of the benefits and necessity of British rule in India, of
their own high mission in being - the representatives of the imperial
tradition. Because the national Congress has challenged the whole basis of this
rule and sought to rid India of it, it has become, in their eyes, Public Enemy
No. 1. Sir Reginald Max-well, the then Home Member of the Government of India,
speaking in the Central Assembly in 1941, gave a revealing glimpse of his mind.
He was defending himself against the charge that Congressmen and socialists and
communists, detained without trial in prison, were subjected to inhuman
treatment, far worse than that given to German and Italian prisoners of war. He
said that Germans and Italians were, at any rate, fighting for their countries,
but these others were enemies of society who wanted to subvert the existing
order. Evidently, it seemed to him preposterous that an Indian should want
freedom for his country or should want to change the economic structure of
India. As between the two his sympathies were obviously for the Germans and
Italians, though his own country was engaged in a bitter war against them. This
was before Russia entered the war and it was safe then to condemn every
attempt to change the social order. Before World War II began,
admiration for the fascist regimes was frequently expressed. Had not Hitler
himself said, in his 'Mein Kampf' and subsequently, that he wanted the British
Empire to continue ?
The Government of
India certainly was anxious to help in every way in the war against the Axis
powers. But in its mind that victory would be incomplete if it was not
accompanied by another victory—the crushing of the nationalist movements in
India as represented mainly by the Congress. The Cripps negotiations had
perturbed it and it rejoiced at their failure. The way was now open to deal the
final blow at the Congress and all those who sided with it. The moment was
favourable, for at no previous time had there been such concentration of
unlimited power, both at the centre and in the provinces, in the hands of the
Viceroy and his principal subordinates. The war situation was a difficult one
and it was a feasible argument that no opposition or trouble could be
tolerated. Liberal elements in England and America, interested in India, had
been quietened by the Cripps affair and the propaganda that followed. In
England the ever-present feeling of self-righteousness in relation to India had
grown. Indians, or many of them, it was felt there, were intransigent,
troublesome persons, narrow in outlook, unable to appreciate the dangers of the
situation, and probably in sympathy with the Japanese. Mr. Gandhi's articles
and statements, it was said, had proved how impossible he was and the only way
left open was to put an end to all this by crushing Gandhi and the Congress
once for all.
daivam
