PERSPECTIVE

when his right hand got tired he used his Gandhi’s Swaraj left hand. That physical tiredness did not d iminish Gandhi’s powers of concentra- tion was evident from the fact that the Rudrangshu Mukherjee manuscript had only 16 lines that had been deleted and a few words that had This essay briefl y traces Gandhi’s “I am a man possessed by an idea’’ – Gandhi been altered.3 to Louis Fischer in 1942. The ideas presented in that book grew ideas about swaraj, their “I made it [the nation] and I unmade it” out of Gandhi’s refl ection, his reading and articulation in 1909 in Hind – Gandhi to P C Joshi in 1947. “I don’t want to die a failure. But I may be a his experiences in South Africa. It is sig- Swaraj, the quest to actualise failure” – Gandhi to Nirmal Bose in 1947.1 nifi cant that when he wrote Hind Swaraj, these ideas, the turns that history Gandhi had not immersed himself in Indi- gave to them, and the journey n the midnight of 14-15 August an society and politics. His experiments in that made Mohandas 1947, when Jawaharlal Nehru, the India still lay in the future. In fact, Hind Ofi rst prime minister of India, Swaraj served as the basis of these experi- Karamchand Gandhi a lonely coined the phrase – “tryst with destiny”– ments. Gandhi’s purpose in writing the man in August 1947. that has become part of India’s national book was, he wrote, “to serve my country, lexicon, and India erupted in jubilation, to fi nd out the Truth and to follow it”. He Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi was far also believed that the views he had pre- away from the celebrations. He was in a sented in the book were held not by him slum in eastern Calcutta. When asked by a alone but were, in fact, “the views…held journalist for a message on the day of by many Indians not touched by what is India’s independence, he said it was a day known as civilisation”. He asked his rea- for fasting and prayer. ders to believe him when he said that the The Father of the Nation was not present views “are also held by thousands of at the birth of the independent Indian na- Europeans”.4 Gandhi’s use of the phrase, tion. On the same day, 15 August 1947, in “what is known as civilisation’’, is worth the city of Karachi someone placed a fez fl agging at this point since I will have on Gandhi’s statue.2 The signifi cance of the o ccasion to come back to it very soon. Hind act is open to interpretation: it could have Swaraj remained the touchstone of his be- been a symbol of unity or a sign of mock- liefs and actions throughout his life, it was ery. It would not be an exaggeration, even the fountainhead of his inspiration: he from just these two pieces of evidence, to never changed his views on the funda- suggest that what India had achieved on mental principles he set out in this text, 15 August, was not something that Gandhi even though he was open to the possibility had visualised as swaraj. By August 1947, of his views being proven wrong. It is he had become India’s prophet outcast. worth noting that Hind Swaraj is the only In this essay I want to trace briefl y work that Gandhi himself translated from Gandhi’s ideas about swaraj, his quest to Gujarati to English. Even his auto- actualise these ideas and the turns that his- biography, The Story of My Experiments tory gave to them and to his journey that with Truth, was translated by his secretary, made him a lonely man in August 1947. Mahadev Desai. Gandhi’s ideas about swaraj were arti- culated most cogently and most powerfully Only Way to a Swaraj in that remarkable text called Hind Swaraj, In May 1919, just before he embarked on which he wrote in 1909 in Gujarati and his fi rst major mass movement in India, published in English in 1910 in South Africa Gandhi wrote, commenting on Hind after the government of Bombay proscribed Swaraj, “After years of endeavour to put the G ujarati version. It was written in 10 into practice the views expressed in the days between 13 and 22 November 1909 following pages, I feel that the way shown on board Kildonan Castle, a ship that therein is the only true way to swaraj’’.5 Gandhi took to return to South Africa from And towards the end of his life in October Rudrangshu Mukherjee (rudrangshu@hotmail. L ondon. It was written on the ship’s sta- 1945, he wrote emphatically to Jawaharlal com) is with The Telegraph, Kolkata. tionery. Gandhi wrote at a furious pace and Nehru, “I fully stand by the kind of

34 december 12, 2009 vol xliv no 50 EPW Economic & Political Weekly PERSPECTIVE g overnance which I have described in reject industrialisation; Gandhi made a gave was equally important and funda- Hind Swaraj.” He went on to add very critique in Hind Swaraj of the entire inte- mental. He said that to oppose modern signifi cantly, “If I were the only one left llectual scaffolding of modern civilisation civilisation in India through violence who believed in it, I would not be sorry”.6 – science, history, political and social would be to Europeanise India or to take The clarity of the exposition and Gandhi’s i nstitutions and so on. All that is asso- it along the path of modernity. Gandhi’s lifelong commitment to the ideas put ciated with modernity and modern civili- aim was exactly the opposite. Opposition forward in it have made one modern sation, Gandhi repudiated. to British rule would be non-violent. commentator describe the Hind Swaraj as G andhi gave a name to this form of “the point d’ appui of Gandhi’s moral and Alternative to Modern s truggle, s atyagraha. political thought”.7 Civilisation The term satyagraha has an interesting This might be the appropriate place to The alternative to modern civilisation thus origin. When Gandhi began his movement briefl y rehearse the views that Gandhi had to be located outside its domain and in South Africa, he fi rst used the term pas- presented in this text. In a preface to the among people who were untouched by sive resistance. As the struggle advanced Gujarati edition of Hind Swaraj written in modern civilisation and uninfl uenced by Gandhi found “passive resistance” to be 1914, Gandhi described himself as “an un- it. It was in this context that India, accord- inadequate to express the substance of his compromising enemy of the present day ing to Gandhi, was uniquely placed since movement. It also appeared to him civilisation in Europe”.8 It was this un- millions of Indians lived in the villages “shameful” that the Indian struggle should relenting hostility to European or western and were thus not tainted by modernity be known only by an English name. A civilisation that is manifest in Hind Swaraj. and its pernicious features. “Real or genu- small prize was, therefore, announced in He was referring to western/European ine civilisation”, in contrast to “what is Indian Opinion to be awarded to the reader civilisation when he used the words “what known as civilisation”, was to be found in who invented the best designation for the is known as civilisation”. Gandhi believed the villages of India. In the traditional vil- new struggle. Maganlal Gandhi suggest- that western civilisation was only one in lage world of India life was governed by a ed the word sadagraha meaning “fi rm- name. In the Hind Swaraj, he launched an common morality by which each member ness in a good cause”. Gandhi liked the attack on every aspect of western civilisa- performed his duty. This made it the exact word but as it did not fully represent the tion in order to prove how evil and how opposite of modern society whose mem- whole idea, he changed it to satyagraha, harmful it was. The text also contains bers chased their own self-interested and “the force which is born of truth and love Gandhi’s alternative to modern civili sation individualistic goals. He said in April 1945, or non-violence”.14 and a programme of action and behaviour “I know the European mind well enough that Indians must follow to make that to know that when it has to choose be- Satyagraha and Swaraj alternative a reality. tween abstract justice and self-interest, it Gandhi linked satyagraha to swaraj in two Gandhi equated modern civilisation will plump for the latter.”10 The challenge ways. In the Gujarati version of Hind with the western one because the west to modern civilisation in India would have Swaraj, Gandhi used swaraj to denote was the principal site of all that is consid- to come from the people who lived in the both self-rule and self-government.15 ered modern. What he actually attacked villages, the peasantry.11 Swaraj was an ideal for the individual and was a particular form of western civilisa- How was this challenge to be arti- for the nation. To be a devotee of satya- tion, the one that emerged with the culated? Gandhi was emphatic that it graha, Gandhi said, an individual had to Enlightenment and the Industrial Revolu- would have to be non-violent. He gave two be capable of self-rule: “Swaraj has to be tion. A year before writing the Hind reasons for this. One, since the peasantry experienced by each one for himself”.16 Swaraj, he had written, “Let it be remem- would be at the forefront of the resistance, Gandhi laid down a code of conduct that bered that western civilisation is only a it would be non-violent since the peasants would help individuals attain swaraj. hundred years old, or to be more precise, were essentially non-violent: in Hind E very individual who chose the path of fi fty”.9 Gandhi interpreted the industrial Swaraj, Gandhi wrote, “They [the peas- satyagraha would learn to regulate his revolution as having brought about a radi- ants] do not know the use of the sword, own life by observing perfect chastity, cal transformation in people’s lives and in and they are not frightened by the use of it adopting poverty, following truth and people’s attitudes to themselves and to the by others.” He believed, “In India, the na- cultivating fearlessness.17 A satyagrahi, world around them. Fundamental to this tion at large has generally used passive leading a disciplined and ethical life, transformation was the premise that resistance in all departments of life”.12 would be an exemplar for other individu- through Reason and Science human be- Indians, especially the peasants, are als and the pursuit of such a life on the ings were capable of mastering nature and e ssentially non-violent. Gandhi wrote, part of all individuals would be the neces- thus fulfi lling their desires and wants. “We cease to cooperate with our rulers sary precondition for swaraj. Swaraj at the This, Gandhi believed, inevitably led to when they displease us. This is passive individual level where “each person will greed, to competition and fi nally to vio- resistance.”13 Thus modern civilisation in become his own ruler”18 would lead to lence. Therefore, violence was embedded India, represented by British rule, would swaraj for the nation. in modern civilisation and this made it be opposed passively, through non-violent In Gandhi’s philosophy, swaraj for the satanic and immoral. It was not enough to means. The second reason that Gandhi nation did not mean merely political

Economic & Political Weekly EPW december 12, 2009 vol xliv no 50 35 PERSPECTIVE i ndependence from British rule. Swaraj, c annot be measured by counting of heads or Letter” to his father in which he spelt out for Gandhi, was something more substan- raising of hands. I would not regard this as a what he thought were the principal rea- measure of public opinion…The rishis and tive, involving the freedom of each indi- sons for their separation and the ensuing munis after doing penance came to the con- vidual to regulate their own lives without clusion that public opinion is the opinion of bitterness. Harilal wrote, harming one another. Gandhi certainly people who practise penance and who have Our views about education are the main rea- did not want British rule to be replaced by the good of the people at heart.21 son for the difference of opinion of the last another form of rule where western insti- This was the ideal or the utopia, if you 10 years…You have suppressed us [sons] in a tutions of governance and civil society like, that Gandhi pursued in his private sophisticated manner…You have never en- couraged us in any way… You always spoke would be run by Indians instead of white and his public life. He admitted in a long to us with anger, not with love…You have men. That would be to have “English rule letter to Nehru in 1945 that he had made us remain ignorant…I asked to be sent without the Englishman”. He wrote that indeed idealised the Indian rural world. to England. For a year I cried. I was bewil- such a process “would make India English. He told Nehru dered. You did not lend me your ears…I am And when it becomes English, it will be You will not be able to understand me if you married with four children. I cannot…be- come a recluse.24 called not Hindustan but Englistan. This is think that I am talking about the villages of not the swaraj I want.”19 Swaraj from Gan- today. My ideal village still exists only in my Harilal felt that Gandhi had imposed imagination. After all every human being dhi’s perspective would have to be located lives in the world of his own imagination. In his own views on his children and had not only outside the domain of British po- this village of my dreams the villager will thus hindered their education and devel- litical suzerainty but also beyond the sa- not be dull – he will be all awareness. He will opment. The education Harilal referred to tanic touch of western civilisation. Gandhi not live like an animal in fi lth and darkness. was obviously western education that called this alternative Ramrajya, which he Men and women will live in freedom, pre- Gandhi had rejected. The life that Harilal pared to face the whole world. There will be rendered into English as “enlightened an- no plague, no cholera and no smallpox. refused to live was that of one living in an archy”. The word anarchy indicated that N obody will be allowed to be idle or to ashram following the vows of chastity and there would be no state, and the word en- w allow in luxury. Everyone will have to do poverty like a recluse. From this accu- lightened suggested that society would be body labour.22 satory letter of his eldest born, Gandhi composed of disciplined individuals regu- His many experiments with truth were emerges as a self-absorbed, if not selfi sh, lating their own lives. Elaborating on this concerned with taking himself and his individual who was more concerned with idea he wrote in January 1939, country closer to the goal of swaraj. We his own pursuit of Truth than with the The power to control national life through know from his remarkable autobiography feelings and lives of his sons. Harilal paid national representatives is called political that in his personal life, he chose to adopt the price of being the son of a satyagrahi. power. Representatives will become unnec- a life of chastity and simplicity. He opted Yet an unbreakable bond remained in the essary if the national life becomes so perfect for poverty since as a barrister-at-law, both form of Kasturba, and Harilal would not as to be self-controlled. It will then be a state of enlightened anarchy in which each person in South Africa and in India, he could have let his father forget that the achievements will become his own ruler. He will conduct lived in relative affl uence in the style of a of the Mahatma had been possible because himself in such a way that his behaviour will westernised gentleman. His lifestyle was of the support that Kasturba had provided. not hamper the well-being of his neighbours. frugal in the extreme. Fearlessness or There is the account of a poignant meet- In an ideal state there will be no political in- a bhaya became a part of Gandhi’s life ever ing of the parents with their eldest son in a stitution and therefore no political power.20 since that night of 31 May 1893 when he railway station. I quote below from the In Gandhi’s ideal of swaraj there would was summarily ejected from a fi rst class recollections of Narayan Desai, son of be complete and continual reciprocity carriage of a train in Maritzburg in Natal, Mahadev, who witnessed the encounter: among and participation by every member South Africa. Gandhi had self-consciously 23 One day when our train stopped at a station of society. He elaborated thus: trained himself for satyagraha. on our way back to Wardha, we heard a cry from the crowd different from the usual: Swaraj and Ramrajya are one and the same Personal Anguish Mata Kasturba Ki Jai (victory to mother thing…We call a State Ramrajya when both K asturba). the ruler and his subjects are straight- The attempt to self-regulate his life and to It was Harilalkaka. He was emaciated… forward, when both are pure in heart, when live it according to his own precepts and From a pocket of his ragged clothes he took both are inclined towards self-sacrifi ce, ideals was no easy matter for Gandhi. It an orange and said, “Ba, I have brought this when both exercise restraint and self-control often caused him personal anguish and for you”. Breaking in, Bapu said, “Didn’t you while enjoying worldly pleasures, and, when made him appear cruel and dogmatic to bring anything for me?”. “No, nothing for the relationship between the two is as good you…All the greatness you have achieved is as that between father and son. It is because his dear ones, but this did not deter him only because of Ba. Don’t forget that!”. we have forgotten this that we talk of from continuing with his experiment to democracy or the government of the people. achieve swaraj. Two examples of this an- No amount of pleading on the part of Although this is the age of democracy, I do guish could perhaps be given here. One both parents could persuade Harilal to not know what the word connotes; however, concerns the complete alienation of Gan- come with them. The train left the plat- I would say that democracy exists where the people’s voice is heard, where love of the dhi from his eldest son Harilal, who took form. “Amidst the cries of Gandhiji ki jai”, people holds a place of prime importance. In to drink and became a complete wastrel. Narayan Desai continues, “we could still my Ramrajya, however, public opinion In early 1915, Harilal wrote a “Half-Open hear the faint cry, Mata Kasturba ki jai”.25

36 december 12, 2009 vol xliv no 50 EPW Economic & Political Weekly PERSPECTIVE Harilal, it would seem, wanted to contrast b etween Gandhi’s creed of non-violence Shahid Amin has noted that in Gorakhpur the selfl essness of his mother with the and the politics of popular protest was peasants spoke of Gandhiji’s swaraj or selfi shness of his father. One can only best exemplifi ed by what happened in Mahatmaji’s swaraj. Gandhi notes bearing i magine the pain that this relationship Chauri Chaura in February 1922 during a superfi cial resemblance to the one rupee caused all three. On Harilal’s life had the Non-Cooperation Movement. note circulated and its non-acceptance as fallen the shadow of Gandhi’s quest. What On 5 February 1922 in Chauri Chaura, legal tender was interpreted by the peas- is not known – and is also diffi cult to near Gorakhpur in eastern Uttar Pradesh, ants as opposition to Gandhi. What did conjecture – is if Gandhi felt that his a crowd of 4,000 Hindus and Muslims the local peasantry mean by swaraj? They quest for swaraj had done violence to his attacked a police outpost and burnt alive perceived it, the investigations into the son. H arilal was the fi rst victim of 22 policemen. The crowd chanted Mahat- Chauri Chaura incident revealed, “as a G andhi’s swaraj.26 ma Gandhi ki jai while it carried out the millennium in which taxation would be The other example relates to the death carnage. A shocked Gandhi owned re- limited to the collection of small cash con- of Kasturba. During the fi nal stage of her sponsibility for the violence – he called it tributions or dues in kind from fi elds and last illness, their youngest son, Devdas, “The Crime of Chauri Chaura”30 – and threshing fl oors, and [in] which the culti- brought penicillin that he had imported, called off the Non-Cooperation Move- vators would hold their lands at little more Gandhi advised against using it on ment. How did this happen? How could than nominal rents”.33 The peasants of K asturba. He told Devdas, “Why don’t you people carry out an act of violence and Gorakhpur had thus reinterpreted Gan- trust god? Why do you wish to drug your brutality with the name of the apostle of dhi’s swaraj to suit their own world and its mother even on her death bed?” He was non-violence on their lips? The answer lies problems. There were other equally sig- not willing to compromise his position on in the manner Gandhi’s persona was per- nifi cant features of this reinterpretation. western medicine even when it meant the ceived and in the impact of his message. In the words of Amin death of his wife. He told one of his close Gandhi had visited Gorakhpur only …there was for the peasant volunteers of associates, “How God has tested my faith! once, addressed one meeting there and Chauri Chaura a transformation in the spirit If I had allowed you to give her penicillin, had returned to Benares but for months of that ubiquitous cry, ‘Gandhi Maharaj ki jai’…the jaikar of Gandhi had become a mili- it could not have saved her. But it would before his arrival, as Shahid Amin has tant avowal of the organised strength of have meant bankruptcy of faith on my shown in an outstanding essay, stories and peasant volunteers, a cry which mobilised part.” Yet the decision could not have been rumours about Gandhi had been circulat- and struck terror in the hearts of waverers easy for him. At the cremation of Kasturba, ing about him in the region.31 All these and enemies alike. For the peasants of north he was seen crying, the fi rst time his stories, reported in the local press, were India this had ceased in effect to be a Gan- dhian cry; it was now a cry with which an devoted disciple Mirabehn (Madeline about Gandhi’s pratap – power or glory. attack on a market or a thana was an- Slade) had seen him shed tears, and he Some related to individuals and families nounced. ‘Mahatma Gandhi ki jai’ had, in said, “The best half of me is dead. What receiving special boons because they had this context, assumed the function of such am I going to do now?”27 chosen to follow the Gandhian creed and traditional war cries as ‘Jai Mahabir’ or ‘Bam others to curses falling on those who Bam Mahadeo’…Thus a ‘jaikar’ of adoration Swaraj in Gandhi’s Public Life and adulation had become the rallying cry defi ed Gandhi’s orders or tested and for direct action. While such action sought to I turn now to the more public aspects of o pposed his power. Gandhi, in the eyes of justify itself by a reference to the Mahatma, Gandhi’s life where he tried to implement the common people of Gorakhpur, had the Gandhi of its rustic protagonists was not his ideas about swaraj. The great mass been cast as the traditional Hindu holy as he really was, but as they had thought 34 movements that he launched through the man and had become the object of wor- him up. Congress Party are the obvious embodi- ship. Women begged for alms in his name, The creed of Gandhi’s swaraj and the ments of this experiment. Here we fi nd and they performed vrat and aradhana way it was received and interpreted by the that Gandhi’s swaraj often stumbled when (fast and worship) for him. This percep- peasants were radically different. Neither faced with the hard realities of politics. tion was not unrelated to Gandhi’s chosen Gandhi nor the Congress had any control Again and again, the energy and enthusi- lifestyle and beliefs. In a very perceptive over the manner in which the masses asm of the people that he mobilised essay, M N Srinivas noted how Gandhi’s decoded the message of the Mahatma. through a non-violent movement spilled choice to be the renouncer in the tradi- Gandhi had somewhat anticipated this over into militancy. The politics of the tional Hindu mould, even though he when he had written in Hind Swaraj, people refused to respect the limits im- r efused to don the garb of a sanyasi, was “Those in whose name we speak we do not posed by Gandhi’s swaraj.28 This often intrinsic to his appeal and to his work.32 know, nor do they know us”.35 It was thus compelled Gandhi to call off the move- His life of abstinence and simplicity and not always possible to regulate the masses ment or to reduce its pace and momentum. his continuous emphasis on purity rein- and to keep the movements within the Gandhi would not compromise on the forced this popular image of Gandhi as the limits of satyagraha and non-violence. issue of violence. “Non-violence”, he was holy man, the Mahatma. This tension was embedded in the mass to say in his speech at his fi rst trial in 1923, The perception of Gandhi’s pratap also movements called by Gandhi and thus the “is the fi rst article of my faith. It is also the led to seeing him as an alternative source paradox of violent acts with the name of last article of my creed”.29 The clash of authority to the British government. Gandhi on the lips of the actors. Gandhi’s

Economic & Political Weekly EPW december 12, 2009 vol xliv no 50 37 PERSPECTIVE swaraj, in its public dimension, could not “there is a fundamental difference be- and I could not keep out of it”.43 The origi- quite rid itself of this baggage and Gandhi tween his [Gandhi’s] outlook on life gen- nal idea behind the Planning C ommittee for his own inner swaraj often had to en- erally and what might be called the mod- “had been to further industrialisation”44 gage himself in fasts to cleanse himself of ern outlook”.40 But Nehru also noted a since, according to N ehru, vintage 1946, the evil of violence committed by the peo- more profound divergence: “Gandhiji”, he “It can hardly be challen ged that, in the ple. Towards the end of his life Gandhi noted, “is always thinking in terms of per- context of the modern world, no country confessed that non-violent resistance sonal salvation and of sin, while most of us can be politically or economically inde- against British rule had not gone quite ac- have society’s welfare uppermost in our pendent…unless it is highly industrialised cording to his plan and vision. He wrote, minds”.41 The calling of the two men were and has developed its power resources to “People followed my advice and took to radically different, if not opposed. This the utmost”. It follo wed that “an attempt non-violent resistance against the British was refl ected in their world views and in to build up a country’s economy largely on government because they wanted to offer the vision they had for India. It surprised the basis of cottage and small-scale indus- some sort of resistance. But their non- no one that as prime minister of inde pen- tries is doomed to failure”.45 Thus Nehru violence, I must confess, was born of their dent India, Nehru inaugurated a pro- favoured industrialisation over the rural helplessness. Therefore, it was the weapon gramme of large-scale industrialisation in economy. What is equally important is his of the weak”.36 Gandhi’s swaraj became a which the State was a principal actor. This belief that a country has to develop its victim of the mass forces that Gandhi was not a project of which Gandhi would “power resources to the utmost”. Industri- himself unleashed. have approved. Within a few years of his alisation and the development of “power death, Gandhi’s swaraj was nothing more resources” would be carried out in Nehru’s Nehru’s Scepticism than an idea. programme under a strong and centrali- It would be simplistic to suggest that the Long before independence, the breach sing state in a position to allocate and obstacles to Gandhi’s swaraj came only between Gandhi’s swaraj and Nehru’s d istribute economic resources. This was from the masses and their tendency to politics was becoming apparent. In 1938, not exactly Gandhi’s vision of “enlight- turn violent while defying British rule. N ehru met Clement Attlee and Stafford ened anarchy” where the state had been Criticism was made and hurdles were Cripps in Goodfellows, Cripps’s house in rendered redundant.46 erected by people very close to Gandhi. the Cotswolds. This was perhaps the fi rst Take the case of Jawaharlal Nehru. As attempt to arrive at a negotiated transfer Drift of Congress from Gandhi early as 1936 Nehru had written in his of power in India. At the meeting, Attlee Nor was Nehru alone: the Congress was autobiography that the ideas of Hind and Cripps conceded the Congress’ de- itself moving away from the main thrust Swaraj represented an “utterly wrong and mand that India be allowed to decide on of Gandhi’s ideas. Nowhere was this more harmful doctrine, and impossible of its own constitution through a constituent explicit than in the manner in which Con- achievement’’. He added, assembly elected by universal suffrage. gress leaders grasped the poisoned chalice Personally, I dislike the praise of poverty and They, however, added a signifi cant caveat: of a negotiated transfer of power leading suffering…Nor do I appreciate the ascetic election to the constituent assembly would to independence with India partitioned. life as a social ideal…Nor do I appreciate in be subject to minority representation. As the second world war drew to a close, it the least the idealisation of the ‘simple peas- A nother condition was that after the mak- was clear that the British for their own in- ant life’. I have almost a horror of it, and in- stead of submitting to it myself I want to ing of a constitution, the government of terests would pull out of India. The time- drag out even the peasantry from it, not to free India would be required to sign a table and the manner of the withdrawal urbanisation, but to the spread of urban cul- treaty that would enable Britain to dis- were open to discussion. The Congress 37 tural facilities to rural areas. charge her obligations and protect her in- leadership never challenged this notion of It will not be an exaggeration to say that terests for an interim period of 15 years.42 a transfer of power that would be achieved what Gandhi was rejecting, Nehru was In this fi rst parley, already some of Gan- through parleys across a table. Such an embracing. If Gandhi considered a civili- dhi’s basic principles – non-acceptance of “escape from empire” – one scholar’s tell- sation based on industrial production and minority representation and rejection of ing phrase – created conditions in which, science to be satanic, Nehru was its una- British or western interests – were being according to James Grigg, the fi nance bashed admirer. In The Discovery of India, surrendered or compromised by none member of the government of India, “Birla he wrote, “There is something very won- other than his cup-bearer. and Bentham [could] hunt together for derful about the high achievement of sci- Nehru’s drift away from Gandhi’s quick profi ts”.47 Gandhi could not see him- ence and modern technology”.38 He said swaraj was also evident in the enthusi- self as being part of this process. Gandhi he was “all for tractors and big machinery asm with which he went about forming attended the Congress Working Commit- and I am convinced that the rapid indus- the National Planning Committee in tee at the end of June 1946. At the meet- trialisation of India is essential to relieve 1938. He was the chairman of the com- ing, he asked Pyarelal, his secretary, to the pressure on land, to combat poverty mittee, a post he accepted, he was to read out the letter he had written to and raise standards of living, for defence, r ecall later, “not without hesitation and Cripps, and left immediately. and a variety of other purposes”.39 Nehru misgiving”. The acceptance came be- Pyarelal writes, “The fi nal phase of ne- underlined the obvious conclusion that cause “the work was after my own heart gotiations with the Cabinet Mission

38 december 12, 2009 vol xliv no 50 EPW Economic & Political Weekly PERSPECTIVE marked the beginning of that cleavage and had forgotten the time for his prayer e very activity will be conducted on the coopera- tive basis”. Penguin Gandhi Reader, p 80. between Gandhiji and some of his closest meeting, despite the best efforts of Manu 23 This incident is recollected in Gandhi’s auto- colleagues which in the fi nal phase of the and Abha, his timekeepers as he affection- biography, The Story of My Experiments with Truth transfer of power left them facing differ- ately called them. As he walked to the (Delhi, repr, 2007), pp 113-14. 24 Quoted in Rajmohan Gandhi, Mohandas, p 197. 48 ent ways”. He stayed away from negotia- prayer ground, he chided them, “I am late 25 Ibid, p 400. tions, choosing instead to travel to places by 10 minutes. I hate being late.”54 These 26 Gandhi admitted this when he wrote in 1940, “My Eldest Son Was the Direct Victim of My Experi- affected by communal violence. On 20 were his recorded last words before he ments…’’: CWMG, Vol 72, p 355; cited in February 1947 – the day Attlee announced embraced eternity with the name of Rama Gopalkrishna Gandhi (compiled and edited), The Oxford India Gandhi, p 457. in the House of Commons that the British on his lips. “I hate being late” – the man 27 Gandhi’s comment to Devdas Gandhi will be would leave India latest by June 1948 – who said this moments before his death found in The Oxford India Gandhi, p 520; the statement about “Bankruptcy of Faith” in N ehru complained to Gandhi, “You are too was perhaps too early for India’s swaraj. S Nayyar, Kasturba: A Personal Reminiscence far away for consultation and you refuse (Ahmedabad, 1960), p 101; for Mirabehn’s recol- lection about Gandhi’s tears, see E Morton, to move out of East Bengal”.49 Gandhi’s Notes Women behind Mahatma Gandhi (London, 1954), p 241; for the statement, “The Best Half of Me” see alternative to the negotiations and his 1 These three statements of Gandhi will be found A Gandhi, Kasturba: A Life (Delhi, 2000), p 302. on pages 478, 664 and 615, respectively of The Ox- vehement opposition to the partition of ford India Gandhi: Essential Writings, edited and 28 This point is made by Ranajit Guha, “Discipline India in any form were clear from his compiled by Gopalkrishna Gandhi (Delhi 2008). and Mobilise’’ in P Chatterjee and G Pandey (ed.), Subaltern Studies: Writings on South Asian History 2 This incident is narrated in R J Moore, Escape statements. On 2 May 1947, he told three and Society, Vol VII (Delhi, 1992), pp 69-120. from Empire: The Attlee Government and the India young socialists, Aruna Asaf Ali, Achyut Problem (Oxford, 1983), p 356. 29 This speech is reproduced in Rudrangshu Mukher- jee (ed.), Great Speeches of Modern India (Delhi, 3 The text of Hind Swaraj is available in The Patwardhan and Asoka Mehta: “In my 2007), pp 80-85. Collected Works of Mahatma Gandhi (CWMG) opinion, the Congress should in no circum- 90 Vols (New Delhi, 1958), Vol 10; it is also reprint- 30 CWMG, Vol, 22, pp 415-21. ed in Rudrangshu Mukherjee (ed.), The Penguin 31 Shahid Amin, “Gandhi as Mahatma: Gorakhpur stance be party to partition. We should tell G andhi Reader (New Delhi, 1993), pp 3-66; and in District, Eastern UP, 1921-22” in Ranajit Guha the British to quit unconditionally…Why A J Parel (ed.), Hind Swaraj and Other Writings (ed.), Subaltern Studies: Writings on South Asian (Cambridge, 1997). The circumstances in which History and Society, Vol III (Delhi, 1984), pp 1-61. should we make ourselves a ccessory to the text was composed is taken from the last 32 M N Srinivas, “Gandhi’s Religion’’ in M N Srini- what we hold to be evil”?50 named book p xiv. Also see Rajmohan Gandhi, vas, Collected Essays (Delhi, 2002), pp 355-61. Mohandas: A True Story of a Man, His People and 33 Amin, “Gandhi as Mahatma”, p 52. an Empire (Delhi, 2006), pp 151-56. 34 Ibid, p 54. Isolation 4 Hind Swaraj in Penguin Gandhi Reader, p 3. 35 Hind Swaraj in Penguin Gandhi Reader, p 36. Gandhi realised his own isolation. In 1946 5 Raghavan Iyer (ed.), The Moral and Political Writ- 36 In the Harijan, 4 August 1946, CWMG, Vol 85, ings of Mahatma Gandhi, 3 Vols (New Delhi, pp 54-55. and 1947, he spoke of how he was left to 1986), i, p 278. 37 Jawaharlal Nehru, An Autobiography (London, plough his lonely furrow, and remarked 6 Ibid, p 285. 1936), pp 510-11. 7 R Iyer, The Moral and Political Thought of Mahatma 51 38 Jawaharlal Nehru, The Discovery of India that his voice was one in the wilderness. Gandhi (New York, 1973), p 24: cited in Partha Chat- (Calcutta, 1946), p 492. On one occasion, his comments about his terjee, Nationalist Thought and the Colonial World: 39 Ibid, p 488. A Derivative Discourse? (London, 1986), p 85. own isolation even seemed to predict what 40 Ibid, p 485. 8 Iyer, Moral and Political Writings of M G, i, p 277. 41 Autobiography, p 511. would happen to him in independent 9 Quoted in Parel, Hind Swaraj and Other Writings, 42 See Moore, Escape from Empire, p 6; also see Peter p xviii. India. In May 1947, he lamented, “Who lis- Clarke, The Cripps Version: The Life of Sir Stafford 10 CWMG, Vol, 79, p 421. Cripps (London, 2002), p 118. tens to me today?...I am being told to retire 11 This argument is presented in many parts of Hind 43 Nehru, Discovery of India, p 474. to the Himalayas. Everybody is eager to Swaraj. 44 Ibid, p 475. 12 See Hind Swaraj in Penguin Gandhi Reader, p 51. garland my photos and statues. Nobody 45 Ibid, p 490. 13 Ibid. 46 Since the focus of this essay is Gandhi’s idea of really wants to follow my advice”.52 At a 14 D G Tendulkar, Mahatma: Life of Mohandas Kara- swaraj, his differences with Nehru may appear here mchand Gandhi, 8 Vols (Bombay, 1951), i, p 103. to be too sharply drawn. In spite of their differences prayer meeting on 26 September 1947, he 15 This important point is noted by Parel in his intro- on the vision expressed in Hind Swaraj, Gandhi and expressed his complete disillusionment duction to Hind Swaraj and Other Writings, p liii. Nehru were in complete agreement on a vast number of critical issues. Both believed in democ- with the path that India was taking under 16 See Hind Swaraj in Penguin Gandhi Reader, pp 37-38. 17 Ibid, p 52. racy and dialogue; both were advocates of Hindu- an independent dispensation: 18 Penguin Gandhi Reader, p 79. Muslim unity; both saw themselves as Indians fi rst; and both were committed to India’s freedom. Over 19 Hind Swaraj in Penguin Gandhi Reader, p 12. Today I am a back number. I have been told I and above these areas of agreement, there was an 20 Penguin Gandhi Reader, p 79. unbreakable bond that held Gandhi and Nehru to- have no place in the new order, where we 21 CWMG, Vol 35, pp 489-90. gether. In Gandhi’s words, “Our bond is not merely want machines, navy, air force and what not. 22 Iyer, Moral and Political Writings of MG, i, p 286. political. It is much deeper. I have no measure to I can never be party to that. If you can have In 1942, Gandhi had spelt out his vision of village fathom that depth. This bond can never be broken” swaraj thus: “My idea of village swaraj is that it is the courage to say that you will retain free- (Iyer, Moral and P olitical Writings of MG, i, p 287). a complete republic, independent of its neigh- 47 Moore, Escape from Empire, p 26. dom with the help of the same force with bours for its own vital wants, and yet interde- 48 Pyarelal, Mahatma Gandhi: The Last Phase, 2 Vols which you have won it, I am your man.53 pendent for many others in which dependency is (Ahmedabad, 1956), i, p 239. a necessity. Thus every village’s fi rst concern will 49 Cited in The Oxford India Gandhi, p 624. be to grow its own food crops and cotton for its 50 Pyarelal, Last Phase, ii, p 162 (emphasis in the Gandhi’s swaraj had been unmade by own cloth. It should have a reserve for its cattle, o riginal). the men he had made. recreation and playground for adults and chil- dren. Then if there is more land available, it could 51 The lonely furrow statement will be found in ibid, On 30 January 1948, he was murdered grow useful money crops, thus excluding ganja, p 163; “Mine May Be a Voice in the Wilderness”: he wrote to Vallabhbhai Patel on 1 August 1946, by a Hindu fanatic who wanted India to be tobacco, opium and the like. The village will maintain a village theatre, school and public hall. see CWMG, Vol 85, p 102. a strong and powerful Hindu state. Min- It will have its own waterworks, ensuring clean 52 Pyarelal, Last Phase, ii, p 209: cited in The Oxford India Gandhi, p 642. utes before he kept his tryst with his mur- water supply. This can be done through control- led wells or tanks. Education will be compulsory 53 Penguin Gandhi Reader, p 279. derer, Gandhi had been talking to Patel up to the fi nal basic course. As far as possible 54 See Pyarelal, Last Phase, ii, p 772.

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