Development Without Destruction

Economics of the Spinning Wheel

Nandini Joshi

1 2 Development Without Destruction

Economics of the Spinning Wheel

Nandini Joshi

Navajivan Publishing House Ahmedabad- 380 014

3

Rs. 100/-

@ Nandini Joshi

First edition Copies 1000 November 1992

Printed & Published by Jitendra T- Desai Navajivan Mudranalaya, Ahmedabad-380 014

4 for my parents

JYOTSNA and UMASHANKAR JOSHI

5 6 PREFACE

This book is an attempt to put forward a simple but, for that very reason, powerful concept of the spinning wheel (the charkha). The concept derives its conviction from the fact that the charkha provides a concrete strategy, universally available to one and all, which has a tremendous impact both on the individual and on society. It is incredible as well because it offers, as this book proposes to discuss, a specific solution to complex problems, an unmistakable solution to perplexing problems and a common solution to a multitude of problems simultaneously. The charkha is of course an age-old instrument belonging to all parts of the world till just two centuries ago. After the 'industrial revolution', it was Mahatma Gandhi who revived it in India, achieved great success and yet could not, during his lifetime, achieve his cherished dream he had perceived through it. As a philosopher has put it, no force is so powerful as the idea whose time has come. Is the charkha such an idea? Although the charkha is usually considered a useful instrument in some cases, the purpose of this book is to indicate that it is indispensable for tackling a multitude of problems. Although it is believed to be a relief measure for the poor, the objective of this book is to show that it is the very foundation of a prospering society. Although it is supposed to be unviable, impractical and non-implementable, the aim of this book is to demonstrate that it is the most profitable, practical and implementable strategy. Although it is regarded inconsistent with the 20th century development, the goal of this book is to suggest that it is the very thing that could carry the world into the 21st century. One of the major drawbacks of this book is its emphasis on only the economic aspect of the charkha. The charkha is an economic concept, being an instrument of production; nonetheless it is the only instrument of production - except for its counterpart, the spinning machine - which has profound political, social, psychological, cultural, environmental and, above all, ethical implications. Gandhi

7 conceived it in its entirety and therefore far more intensively, which had a vital bearing on various aspects of an individual's as well as a society's growth. Although readily implementable, the charkha is a step in the direction opposite to the one in which the contemporary society is moving. It is therefore very hard to accept it at first thought. The writing of this book gave me sleepless nights in the beginning as I had to part with the conventional tools and techniques and unlearn much of my formally-taught economics. The reader might dismiss the argument as it tears apart the existing norms and rules, and the more learned the reader the quicker might be the dismissal. However, on second thought one might get convinced as the complex problems of the contemporary life seem to fall in place. For simple people, at least, the concept of the charkha presents no problems. I have a wish that this book reaches the young people and the village people. My brief experience indicates that they immediately grasp and thoroughly appreciate the strategy of the charkha. An earlier version of this book was written several years ago. But my father gave me an invaluable warning to try implementing the ideas before advocating them. That changed the book in many ways. Gradually, an earlier chapter on 'Technology for Development' had to be deleted to my astonishment, and. new ones on 'Uplift of the Disadvantaged', 'Democracy at the Grassroots' and 'Relating Agriculture to Industry' had to be added. I still do not feel ready for publishing this book as my experiment has been brief, many errors still remain and much more work needs to be added. The purpose of this publication is to initiate a debate on the vision of the charkha and begin thereby its implementation in many places. In my search for a way to tackle the problems of poverty, neither my education in economics nor my work in the economics departments of, successively, an educational, a governmental, a private sector and a United Nations institutions proved helpful. Later, after I started meeting people in their huts and occasionally working with them, I went

8 through many failures accountable to my previous knowledge or the lack of it. It is the learning from these failures that has brought me to the present stage. I wish to take this opportunity to acknowledge that the economics, to say the least, that was imparted unintentionally by the people is something I had never learnt before. According to my analysis of future economic development, like that of many, the contemporary mass-scale and machine-based industrial structure is neither sustainable nor useful for achieving even economic gains such as prosperity. The book forwards a strategy for shifting from the present system of mass production for global markets to a system of local production for local market. The unique characteristic of this strategy is its providing a concrete and practical pivotal step for achieving this goal, namely, the local production of cloth for local market through the charkha in each village. A theoretical contribution of this work lies in its pointing out the need (1) to turn towards the local market to undertake production for gaining self- employment, (2) to begin with the production of cloth, (3) to accomplish the cloth production through thousands of elderly and weak people with the use of the charkha, so that the rest can produce other things to exchange with cloth and so with one another, and (4) to concentrate only on starting a pitloom and charkhas in each community, knowing that the rest will follow automatically. Of course, once one comes to the charkha, the whole world of Mahatma Gandhi with immense potentiality opens up. Gandhi spoke and wrote most extensively and spiritedly about the charkha, the centre of his philosophy throughout his life. As an economist I was baffled by his conclusion in one of the very few books he wrote: "Nothing in history has been so disgraceful to human intellect as the acceptance among us of 'the common doctrines of economics as a science. I know no previous instance in history of a nation's establishing a systematic disobedience to the first principles of its professed religion." The consequent loss of our ability to find meaning and relevance of things and events around us is reflected in the agony of a young man I met, for instance, in Moscow:

9 "Please excuse me. ... "Why?" "I am drunk, Last night I drank. We are in a deep crisis." "Economic? Political?" "Yes. ... Crisis of LIFE." "What do you mean?" "I do not understand, He does not understand, Nobody understands." As Gandhi had pleaded : "What we had to prove was the indispensability of the entire economics of khadi (handspun cloth)." This book is an attempt in that direction. Conventional economics has over the past two centuries brainwashed us so thoroughly that we do not seem to even comprehend the contemporary crisis engulfing the world. It is possible to trace back the roots of this crisis in the destruction of the charkha, which was simultaneous with the rise of the 'industrial revolution' and the parallel rise of the conventional economics. My great and inexhaustible source of inspiration and strength has been the lives of my parents. My mother, remarkable as a woman for giving up gold and always wearing khadi, as did my father, a poet, abundantly adding to the lives of everyone around, gave me an insight into the inner beauty, wealth and strength one can not only possess oneself but also impart to others. The present small effort is only one step along the path lit by the blessings of my parents. I am aware that this book hardly measures to the task before it. But the failures are attributable to me and never to the concept of the charkha which, as will emerge from the argument made in the following pages, is an eternal foundation of prosperity and peace.

7 October 1992 Ahmedabad Nandini Joshi

10 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

The author gratefully acknowledges that some parts of this book, in different form, have been published or are scheduled to be published, in the following books and journal. Paving Pathways to Work, The Hague, 1987; Futures of development, Beijing, 1991; Humanity, Environment and Philosophy, Nairobi, 1992; Linking Present Decisions to Future Visions, Budapest, 1992; Challenges of a Changing Global Order, Kyoto, 1993; Construction Beyond 2000,Helsinki, 1993; The Encyclopedia of the Future, New York,1993; Rabindranath Tagore and the Challenges of Today, Simla, 1988; The Collected Works of Rabindranath Tagore, in Japanese, volume 12, Tokyo, 1992 and Futures, special issue on South Asia, October 1992. The initial version of the thesis was published in Sanskriti, a Gujarati journal, October-December 1984. A special acknowledgement is to Mr. Jitendra Desai, the managing trustee of Navajivan Trust, and his colleagues for the warm support and care they gave during the publication of this book.

11 CONTENTS

Preface vii Acknowledgements xi 1 Abolishing -Unemployment and Poverty 1 2 Conditions of prosperity 34 3 Uplift of the Disadvantaged 57 4 Democracy at Grassroots 76 5 Industrial Revolution in Retrospect 89 6 Crisis of Economic Philosophy 100 7 Bankruptcy of Conventional Economics 109 8 Relating Agriculture to Industry 123 9 Human Values in Economics 133 10 Vision of the Charkha in the Words of Gandhi 144 11 Beautiful Struggle for a New World 167

Appendices : I Construction of the Charkha 182 II Ruin of Handspun Indian Textiles and Birth of 191 Industrial Revolution III Tagore's View of the Charkha. 205

12 1

Abolishing Unemployment and Poverty

The world community is confronted with alarms arising from the contemporary economic structure. Are we heading towards development or towards destruction? Are we landing into an economic system which values money and machines more than man himself? Are our industries serving producers, at the cost of consumers? Are we using scientific and technological achievements to strengthen a system which seeks profits, power and prestige rather than progress of people? Is the dream of consumerism turning into a nightmare of exploitation and domination? Is the system serving man or man serving the system? A strategy for development, therefore, ought to aim at altering this process. After all, man is the master. Man is the centre of thought and action. Even economic progress is not a final objective in itself, it is rather an instrument for a better society. It might therefore be worthwhile to examine an economic philosophy which would aim at prosperity along with the dignity, integrity and supremacy of man. The discussion may begin with the most crucial, yet neglected, section of the society: the economically poor, the unemployed.

1 Poverty and Unemployment

The lack of availability of work is a major cause of the chronic poverty afflicting a vast majority of the world community. There are no industries in villages, the only work available there is farm-work and that also only certain days a year. Millions of people, especially in Asia, Africa and Latin America, face starvation, disease and debt. Their time, energy and life are being wasted because they do not have productive work. Apart from the unemployed the rest also suffer from this because the lack of purchasing power at the large base of the society hinders the growth of industries and services. Not that these problems are not known, but in spite of intensive plans and huge expenditures the signs of their solutions are not even in sight. Instead of diminishing, the problems are multiplying. While tackling some problems, many others arise. The application of development theory was aimed at reducing poverty, removing inequalities and enabling societies to be self-sustained and sovereign. What has happened, however, is just the reverse. This warrants for thinking afresh and adopting a new direction to deal with the problems of poverty and unemployment. It would be useful to examine an approach which would be different from the ones adopted so far.

Self -Employment The search for a solution to the widespread massive unemployment is making it increasingly clear that neither the government nor the private sector of a country can provide jobs or wage-based work to the entire population. If the population were to be employed in large scale industries producing at mammoth rate, the huge production that is not domestically consumed will have to be exported which cannot be the case for all, or even a majority of, nations because all nations cannot be net-exporters simultaneously. The population cannot be given jobs in small scale industries either because, especially in countries like India where most people

2 live in distant remote villages, the huge costs of organisation and infrastructure required for such a production system would push up the prices of finished goods or lower the wage-rates that can be provided to the workers. Therefore the entire production cannot be sold in competitive markets at prices high enough to allow for acceptable wage-rates, rendering the system economically non-viable and unsustainable. The private sector, additionally, does not hope to provide jobs to the unemployed millions as their main aim is primarily to make money for the few owners, never the direct one of finding employment for the unemployed millions. It follows, therefore, that for tackling the problem of mass unemployment only one direction is available, namely self-employment, the unemployed people themselves starting their own professions and pursuing them. After having tried and failed in various approaches and programmes to provide jobs to the unemployed, even the planners have begun to realise this concept. No agency from outside, government or private, can give jobs on a mass scale. But, as the findings of the Planning Commission of India confirm, the number of self-employed persons has shown a steady decline over the 'years, which implies that the contemporary economic system curtails the scope for self-employment. What, then, are the avenues of self-employment for the millions of unemployed people? What are the occupations available to them which they can start and sustain on their own ?

Need for Local Markets The ability of people to sustain production, even launch it, depends on the availability of markets for their products. The lack of availability of a market has been the bottle-neck in launching production in villages. The millions of unemployed people cannot all succeed, even survive, in the contemporary competitive global markets which are characterised by fierce cut-throat profit-oriented race among big producers, Profit-oriented competition, combined with high technology,

3 means that only a few win and most cannot. Even though the few who win keep changing and therefore individually anybody has a chance to win, from the point of view of the society a majority of people cannot survive, and most cannot even enter, the present competitive markets. The contemporary economic system therefore can provide employment to only a few and never to all or even a majority of the world community. If, therefore, village people were to sell their production in outside markets, they would face many hurdles. In the far away markets the demand for their products may change, there may be new and more attractive substitutes, the need or choice of the people there may change, their purchasing power may decline and many such uncertainties may arise and affect the sales. As the outside markets involve many competitors battling to sell similar products, the millions of village people would find it difficult to sell their products in the face of the onslaught of advertisement and other sales devices of giant companies. All, even most, can never make it. Thus, in spite of being richly endowed with natural resources and raw materials, and so able to produce several commodities, the village people are not able to undertake the production because of the inability of the present system to provide effective market to all except the very few who control the high and latest technology. As another consequence of the modern economic system, the income and the purchasing power get concentrated among those controlling production and therefore the effective market is available only for those commodities which cater to the rich. The evidence shows that even the government schemes for training the unemployed for production now relate to diamond-cutting and carpet -weaving! The markets for such commodities are narrow and vulnerable and can never engage most of the population. The contemporary economic system therefore increasingly limits the scope for markets and therefore for employment. It follows that it is in their own local markets in which if the millions of unemployed village people can sell their products they can survive with self-employment - a crucial

4 point overlooked by economists and policy makers alike. Actually, what cannot be sold within a village cannot be produced there either, by the large majority of the world community who cannot battle in the competitive international markets. A self-contained system of local production and distribution is a necessary condition for launching production in villages. In producing for their local markets, however, the unemployed village people have two exclusive advantages. First, they can considerably cut down the costs of management, marketing, transport, organisation, infrastructure, machinery, procurement of raw materials and so on and therefore can successfully sell at prices lower than those at which these commodities and services are supplied from outside. Second, they can raise their economic strength by saving much of their own expenditure because now they produce themselves what they have been so far buying, or not able to buy, from outside. It follows that for being able to launch production successfully the unemployed village people need to look for commodities which they can sell in their own local markets. What are these commodities?

The Pivotal Industry At present there is no effective market in villages because of the lack of purchasing power of the people there due to poverty. However, there is one major exception. The one major commodity which the poor and the disadvantaged have to inevitably buy in spite of their poverty is cloth, next to food, and all the more because their families are large. In other words, cloth is the only commodity inevitably bought perpetually and in considerable magnitude from outside by all villages, and therefore it is the only commodity for which a local market, substantial and permanent, exists at present within the villages, among the unemployed themselves. Moreover, foodgrains are grown locally so they can at least be paid with labour, but cloth has to be paid with cash and cash is what the unemployed lack. DWD-1

5 Therefore, if they can produce cloth they can sell it locally, or barter it with other commodities and services, and they can also save much of their own expenditure. But if they started with the production of anything else they would not be able to find an effective demand locally, due to the poverty of the local people, and so they would have to sell it outside in cities, and enter the market competition with big business which they cannot survive. For example, even if a villager can produce footwear, how can he sell them in the village itself, in spite of the fact that the people there need footwear, as they cannot pay for them? So he will have to sell them in Ahmedabad, Bombay or abroad, and therefore compete with, for example, the Bata Shoe Company and obviously all village people can never survive such battle. It follows that for being able to launch production successfully, the unemployed village people must produce a commodity for their own local market and the only major commodity for which there already exists a substantial local market initially is cloth. The search, therefore, for self-employment for the teen-ling unemployed people must begin with the textile industry FIRST. Although economists treat all industries alike, in terms of 1,2,3 ... to n, and build mathematical models accordingly, such a treatment can be misleading. It overlooks the fact that the textile industry is not just one of the various industries but it is THE engine behind which other industries follow. Theoretically also, the textile is the only industry, outside agriculture, which caters to a basic need, has universal and continuous demand, accounts for a considerable part of a person's expenditure, especially among the poor, and therefore accounts for a major part of the national expenditure in the developing countries. In historical terms, the 'industrial revolution' was spearheaded by inventions in the textile industry - the Spinning Jenney and the Flying Shuttle. These inventions subsequently set off a chain of inventions throughout the economy. Thus the roots of the modern economic system can be traced back to the inventions in the textile industry. So if this economic

6 system is to be countered the change must also begin with the textile industry. The textile industry is thus the base of any economic system, In the stock markets the prices of the textile scrips are quoted to indicate whether the market is going up or down. When an economic upturn or downturn takes place, it begins with the textile industry. Thus the textile industry is the leader behind which other industries follow. It is the pivotal industry. It follows that the solution to the problem of mass unemployment must be sought in self -employment in the textile industry first. Unless the village people start with cloth- production, they will not be able to start production at all.

Textile Technology Manageable by the Weakest - the Charkha The solution to the widespread unemployment therefore requires a technique of producing cloth which an unemployed or a disadvantaged person can undertake and sustain on his or her own. The elimination of continuous dependence on the support from outside agencies, which is impossible in any case on a mass scale, dictates that all the necessary instruments, raw materials and the market must be locally available. This amounts to exactly what Mahatma Gandhi advocated very emphatically - the charkha, the hand-spinning wheel, along with a pitloom for every 30 to 40 charkhas. The charkha is an extremely simple and inexpensive hand-spinning instrument, constructed from wood or bamboo within hours by any carpenter and so easily available to all, including the weakest. This enables anybody to produce at very low cost, using easily grown cotton or wool, the most marketable, locally exchangeable and all the year round saleable commodity and basic human need, cloth (khadi), and therefore procure food also in exchange of cloth, without having to depend on - apart from a weaver - others including financial, technological, educational, organisational and governmental

7 structures, without exploiting anybody or being exploited oneselt.1 The charkha is the very centre of Gandhi's life, his philosophy, his message. Gandhi was not a mere visionary, he was a practical idealist. Paradoxically, however, the charkha is the most misunderstood message of Gandhi, therefore often criticised and invariably neglected, and consequently its multifarious benefits of monumental value remain untapped, even unnoticed. The vision capable of providing a concrete, feasible and viable alternative to save society from chaos and transfer it to a welfare state remains unappreciated, even undiscussed. It might be useful to clear at the outset some misconceptions about the charkha.

8 Does the Slowness Undermine the Charkha ? The charkha has been invariably criticised for its slow speed in producing the yarn. This criticism completely misses the issue, which can be seen from the point of view of the spinners, the non-spinners and the society as a whole. The spinner's returns are the highest on the charkha because he does not have to share the cloth-output or its income with any other person except for the weaver. For all the other spinning instruments, from the ambar-charkha of the Khadi Commission up to the spinning machines of the textile mills, most of the income of the cloth output is taken away by management, organisation, sales, advertisement, transportation, storage, electricity, machinery, factories, buildings, financial institutions and so on; and the spinner (as well as the weaver) ends up with a meagre income. The slowness of the charkha is therefore outweighed by what it alone can save in terms of all the monumental expenditures of cloth- production - and- distribution necessitated by other spinning instruments. For the society also the cost of obtaining its required cloth with the use of the charkha is the lowest in comparison to that with the use of other spinning instruments because, through the creation of a system of local production -for -local -use the charkha can eliminate all the above-mentioned huge expenses and in addition can bring into use, as shall be discussed shortly, the time of the weakest unemployed people as well as the short-staple cotton cultivable on waste-land, and no other inputs are required for cloth production on the charkha. For the non-spinners the charkha can create a tremendous purchasing power among a large number of spinners and thereby create employment opportunities to take up production of other commodities and services. When the non-spinners take locally- produced khadi from the spinners, they not only get the cloth, they also get an opportunity to produce a commodity or a service which they can give in exchange of khadi. In addition to, and more substantially than, cloth they get employment.

9 The charkha alone can create these large markets for the non-spinners. The charkha, therefore, is the instrument which can uncover the rich treasures which are lying untapped at present in villages. Contrary to the criticism, the charkha is not a slow instrument, it is the only instrument through which even the weakest people in large numbers can contribute to the economy and thereby provide it the required sustenance which is missing at present. What is relevant about a spinning instrument is not its speed but its simplicity and its consequent availability to one and all, including the weakest, so that markets are assured to all in the society.

Is the Charkha a Step Backward? Is the charkha a sign of economic backwardness as some might criticise? At the very mention of the charkha they disagree with the approach thinking it to be unscientific. One point however must be clearly understood. If what is meant by progress is the standard of living in the industrialised countries, then it should also be understood that such a standard of living is possible only for a few, say about 15 per cent, of the total world population. That standard of living is never attainable by the world community as a whole. It necessitates an economic structure in which the most of the world population carry the economic burden of the few. For the world community as a whole the picture of the standard of living of its various members is like a pyramid with only a small number at the top and innumerable persons at the bottom. Over and above this lies the question of wasting in a short span the natural resources accumulated over ages, the ecological imbalances and environmental damages caused by large scale and accelerated mechanisation. Therefore, on the contrary, it is the contemporary economic system the future of which involves crisis and chaos. It is now even being claimed that the very distinction

10 between the advanced countries and the underdeveloped countries is irrelevant because all development has been mal- development. The present 'developed' economy moreover renders millions of people unemployed. What solution can the modern economy offer to improve the conditions of more than 2500 million people living in the state of dire poverty? Can it be termed progress which is not available to all ? At a recent seminar, a British lady described the industrialised countries as 'undeveloping' countries. Even from a practical viewpoint, how can it be considered backward to produce and use better and cheaper cloth, the commodity accounting for major national expenditure, highest in poor communities, through unemployed people and using virtually no-cost cotton cultivable on waste-land? From a strategic viewpoint, how can it be considered backward to revive an industry the destruction of which has brought poverty and destitution to the masses and the extinction of their world-famous arts? A return from sickness to health is progress, rather than backwardness. The acceptance of the charkha is not backwardness, on the contrary it is the non-acceptance of the charkha that shows the bankruptcy of our intelligence.

Does the Charkha Imply Poverty? Does the charkha imply, as is often feared, low standards of living and low levels of production? It cannot, for several reasons. As argued above it brings into the production stream those who are unemployed, who are not contributing anything, who are burdensome to the society, to their families, even to themselves. It can therefore only add to the wealth. The number of the unemployed and the underemployed adds up to billions so if they can undertake production they can make tremendous addition to wealth. The charkha is designed to well utilise the unproductive time of the idle millions. Contrary to being a sign of poverty the charkha can turn

11 out to be a symbol of prosperity. The first condition for economic prosperity is full employment and the charkha turns out to be the pivotal step for achieving full employment. The poor and the weak take to the charkha immediately because it yields cloth at an extremely low cost. A kilogram of raw cotton would yield a kilogram of cloth which would measure to approximately eight to nine square metres. If the payment to the weaver is fixed at the rate of one-third or one-fourth of the cloth woven the spinner would receive about six square metres net. Considering the market price of cotton at Rs. 12 per kilogram, the cloth, khadi, therefore would cost the spinner only about two rupees a metre, much less than the market price of cloth which is around Rs. 20 a metre. The spinner can get it locally block-printed, in exchange of a small amount of yarn, and the market price of such cloth ranges between Rs. 20 and Rs. 30 a metre. The calculation can be viewed in another way. If, for example, a pair of dress requires eight square metres of cloth and weighs one kilogram, one would require for it one kilogram of cotton to produce the cloth. The payment to the weaver, at the rate of one-third of the cloth woven, would require an additional 0.35 kilogram of cotton, adding up to a total of 1.35 kilogram. Considering the market price of raw cotton at Rs. 12 a kilogram, this much raw cotton would cost Rs. 16. Thus the spinner's cost of production for the eight metres of cloth for a pair of dress would be Rs. 16, i.e. two rupees per metre. A pair of dress requiring eight metres of cloth is worth about Rs. 200 to Rs. 250 at the present market prices. The charkha can thus resolve the crucial dilemma of how to unite welfare issues with market forces. It can tackle this headache by enabling the poor and the weak to produce cloth and locally exchange it profitably in competitive markets.

Self -Accumulating Employment Opportunities Moreover, the charkha way is not limited to the production of cloth only. Its real purpose is to create in villages, or

12 in communities, the process of mass-based, self-sustained and perpetually accumulating growth. An example will illustrate this. When a few families in a village started spinning on the charkha and producing khadi, Jayesh, a medical man living there and employed part time in a nearby dispensary, liked the khadi shirt and wanted to save his expenses on clothing. But instead of undertaking the spinning himself he inquired: "Could Kesarbehn (the woman spinning on the charkha) come to me for treatment? She can give me cloth instead of fee." Rasik, a laundryman, wanted to bleach and press khadi and have some khadi in return. So also Lakhibehn wanted to tailor and stitch khadi clothes. Mavabhai, a milkman, asked: "Could the spinners give me the cotton seeds? I shall press them with the help of my bullock to produce cooking oil and give it to the spinners in exchange of the khadi.- Thus anybody can enter the production stream and eventually exchange her or his product not only with khadi but with other products as well. The unemployed non-spinners want khadi because at present they need money for getting cloth, which is inevitable, while they can get locally -produced khadi without money and also get an opportunity to use their time in producing something to give in return. The charkha therefore does not imply that all the unemployed people should produce cloth only, nor does it imply an over-production or glut of cloth. By the time the cloth production reaches the saturation level a large amount of purchasing power would be created among the cloth- producers where none existed previously, inducing other people to start new industries and services. The production of cloth and its exchange with food can induce other unemployed people to figure out the undertaking of production of other commodities and services, which can be exchanged with cloth and therefore also with food and with one another. The others can thus take up production to meet various needs of the village people such as household goods, medicines, building materials, education, entertainment and so on. Thus any person and any number of persons can find work in a charkha-based system.

13 Even though per capita expenditure on cloth in villages is meagre, when added up for the millions of people its, total is monumental. Therefore, if a part of the village population produced cloth with the charkha they can cater to this market and gain tremendous economic strength. This would in turn create a substantial new market for others opening up the scope for production of many other commodities and services. The charkha can usher in this possibility because cloth is required by everybody including the weakest. Once the new industries follow the textile industry the new producers would enlarge the market demand creating further scope for additional industries and providing further employment opportunities to the rest of the people. The scope for new industries and therefore additional employment would thus keep on increasing in a self -accumulating way. Eventually, therefore, such an economy can foster the growth of sophisticated commodities, a wide variety of services and intensive research efforts.

Full Employment The charkha-based economy therefore does not imply the production of cloth only. It implies the production of cloth first and the production of a chain of other commodities -services following the continuously expanding market created thereby. Such an economy can give full scope for the growth of an indefinite number of industries and services around the textile industry at the centre, leading to full employment. As economists explain, the highest state of economic prosperity is associated with full employment in society. The employment of all the members of a society is necessary not only for raising the production but also for sustaining it by creating the necessary demand for the output. It follows that the charkha is the only instrument which can (1) always create self-employment and so purchasing power where none exists, (2) create large scale employment in cloth - production and (3) thereby create other employment

14 opportunities which perpetuate themselves. Therefore it can lead to self -accumulating growth. The charkha thus constitutes the centre of the progresscycle, it can start its momentum as well as keep it moving forward. Gandhi called it the sun in the solar system of industries. "I see it more and more clearly that the Sun of the wheel will alone illuminate the planets of the other handicrafts. But I go a step further and say that just as we go on discovering new stars and planets in the vast solar system, even so we shall go on discovering fresh handicrafts everyday. But for the sake of this thing we have to make the spinning wheel really the life-giving Sun."2 All this discussion about prosperity must wait till the next chapter. The point to be underlined here is that not only can the charkha abolish unemployment and poverty but it is indispensable for that purpose. Not only is it useful, but it is both necessary as well as sufficient.

In dispensability of the Charkha It follows from the above discussion that the problem of mass unemployment would need to be tackled through self-employment, which in turn would need to be sought in local markets, and therefore in textile production first, and self-employment in textile production would amount to the use of the charkha. The indispensability of the charkha for launching production in villages arises from the fact that the millions of unemployed people can sell only in their own local markets and the only major commodity for which there already exists a market at present within the village is cloth. For running any other industry, before khadi, the unemployed people would have to depend continually on outside organisations for something or other, at least for the market, and therefore cannot have a bright future. The importance of the charkha thus arises from the fact that no other development is possible in villages before or without it.

15 The above analysis leads to the conclusion that the charkha turns out to be the only instrument with which production can be successfully started and sustained in villages, and with which employment in other industries can be generated. Therefore the launching of the charkha in villages turns out to be the only direction for relieving the chronic unemployment afflicting the vast majority of the world community. That alone can help the dumb millions. Gandhi had warned: "We make little headway because we have an unclassified catalogue of industries for the people to choose, when we should know that there is only one industry it is possible to put before all. They may not all take it up. Let those who can and wish to, by all means, take up any other. But national resources must be concentrated upon the one industry of hand-spinning which all can take up now and besides which the vast majority can take up no other.”3 Without the charkha, therefore, the other programmes for unemployment- eradication are, as a Gujarati proverb goes, zeros without a one in front of them. Without the charkha, therefore, the world might watch many a wonder of science and technology but not solve the basic problem of unemployment and poverty afflicting the huge part of its population. In his autobiography Gandhi titled the chapter on the charkha as "Got It" (Eureka!), as if he had hit upon the key to solve an overwhelming and complex problem.

Government's Economic Policy Explaining the top priority the charkha should have in the government's economic policy Gandhi argued, "Then, what should the government of that population (the eighty per cent of the Indian population in villages) be" The foremost thing that the future state of India would look after would be the economic welfare of these masses. You will therefore

16 have no difficulty in coming to the conclusion that this government is going to find some occupation for these idle six months of the year for the peasant. That should really be the primary concern of any person who undertakes this gigantic task. By a process of elimination we have come to the conclusion that for this homogeneous population you must have one predominant occupation. You must have an easy occupation, you must have tools for that occupation that can easily be made in the villages and the product of the village industry must be capable of being consumed by the villagers. If you give some occupation which will answer all these tests you will have a process of production and distribution, self -contained and without any other intermediary having to be resorted to. Such an occupation was the ancient occupation of hand-spinning and hand-weaving. I will not now take you through the history of how it was destroyed. “4 The only positive role he envisaged for the national government was the support it might extend to the charkha programme. A year before India got freedom, he made a specific suggestion in this regard. "The Government should notify the villagers that they will be expected to manufacture khadi for the needs of their villages, within a fixed date after which no cloth will be supplied to them. The governments in their turn will supply the villagers with cotton seed or cotton wherever required, at cost price and the tools of manufacture also at cost, to be recovered in easy installments. ... "The villages will be surveyed and a list prepared of things that can be manufactured locally with little or no help and which may be required for village use or for sale outside. ... If enough care is thus taken, the villages, most of them as good as dead or dying, will hum with life and exhibit the immense possibilities they have of supplying most of their wants themselves and of the cities and towns of India."5

17 However, although he identified a specific role for the government in the programme of national development, Gandhi was not abandoning his fundamental position that the government cannot be the appropriate machinery for carrying out this programme. What he was suggesting in fact was that the government should abdicate its presumed responsibility of promoting development and thus clear the ground for grassroot volunteers to take up the work of revitalising village economy.

Feasibility of the Charkha What is indispensable also turns out to be most readily feasible. As Gandhi explained: "It (the charkha) presents the least difficulty in its working. There is no rooted prejudice against it. For the simple folk at least it requires no elaborate reasoning. It needs the smallest capital.”6 It would be easy to start khadi production in villages as most people are unemployed and under-employed there. The most suitable time is summer as even farm-work is not available then while on the other hand the cotton crop is ready some of which is even left over after sales. For starting the production of khadi the capital requirement is negligible as the charkha can be easily made from wood or bamboo by the village carpenter in a few hours. The only raw material required is cotton which is, or can be, grown in villages, or wool, available in hilly areas and in cold climate countries. So even very poor people can undertake this production. The spinning on a charkha requires no particular training, let alone expensive curriculum. It takes less than an hour to learn it and even mentally weak can do it. The charkha is a very light instrument and not much physical effort is involved in plying it. It can be used without having to leave home and therefore at any time. Different members of the family can ply it at different times, resulting in a big total production. It can be plied even during short intervals. The

18 production does not require the use of electricity, so it can be undertaken at any place, including the far away villages. It offers easily and immediately available work for people struck by disaster or for refugees. It serves as an insurance against famine. The time needed for the production of khadi is very short. To get the cloth after spinning the yarn, it takes only as long as the weaver takes to weave it, so the return is obtained relatively quick. The biggest advantage of producing khadi is that its production involves very low cost with no overheads and that it is useful at all times, in all places and to all persons, making it the easiest thing to sell. It follows therefore that it is easy to start the production of khadi in villages, the key to reducing unemployment. Moreover, the dropping- spindle (takli), another instrument for hand-spinning, is even simpler and much smaller than the charkha. It is only a seven-inch long thin spike, of metal or wood, with a hook carved at the top and a one inch round thin tile at the bottom. It gives less output than the charkha but it has its own advantages. By the virtue of being so tiny and noiseless, it can be carried in pocket and plied while talking, listening or waiting. It is its capacity to give output at all odd times and places that makes it remarkable.

Dhanush Charkha The best charkha perhaps is the bow-and-spindle Dhanush charkha, another instrument for hand-spinning, but not yet in practice, which can give an equal output as the charkha and is even simpler. Its first version, Dhanush takli, was invented under Gandhi's instruction by his Polish colleague Maurice Frydman, known in India as Bharatananda. Gandhi advocated it in particular. "I strongly recommend the dhanush takli. I have used it frequently. My speed on it is almost the same as on the wheel. I draw a finer thread and the strength and evenness of the yarn are greater on the dhanush takli than on the wheel. This may not, however, hold good for all. My emphasis on the dhanush takli is based on the fact that it is more easily made, is cheaper than and

19 does not require frequent repairs like the wheel. ... Moreover, if the millions take to spinning at once, as they well may have to, the dhanush takli, being the instrument most easily made and handled, is the only tool that can meet the demand. It is more easily made even than the simple takli (dropping spindle). The best, easiest and cheapest way is to make it oneself.”7 In spite of the strong advocacy by Gandhi, however, Dhanush takli has somehow not been brought into practice. But a brief experiment by the author, on an improved instrument Dhanush charkha, indicates that it is far more useful than the Sudarshan charkha because while yielding the same yarn-output, if not more, it is much smaller and simpler to construct than the Sudarshan charkha and it does not require even the help of a carpenter. As the charkha is useful for independent production especially to the millions of weakest members of the society, these characteristics become very significant. It is the simplicity of the charkha which makes it available to the weak, and therefore the simpler the charkha the more powerful is its appeal to the weak and its consequent impact on the society. Moreover, Dhanush charkha looks so small and simple that even the mentally weak, alcoholic and untrained people find confidence that they can easily manage it. It is a revolutionary instrument because being a no-cost, promptly available and easily pliable instrument it can spread itself very fast. It involves a further improvement, being tried by the author together with other volunteers, on the Dhanush takli which makes it extremely simple even to construct so that anybody can have it almost free and, more significantly, without-a-wait. Since it can be the harbinger of the socio-economic change required to save the nation from the contemporary crisis, it is described below in details.

20 It consists of three simple parts: 1) Holder: a Y-shaped small (5") branch of a tree, the upper two ends pierced at 100 slant and lined with a piece of tin or a nipple of the spoke of a cycle-wheel (or a wire-spring) for smooth rotation of the spindle, and the lower end fixed on a stick to be kept under the foot for control. Instead of the Y-shaped branch one may also use a 5" long, 2 '/2" wide bamboo or a 4-square-inch piece of wood with a I" deep U carved at the top and a small hole at the bottom for fixing the stick in it. 2) Spindle: a 7" long spoke from a torn umbrella (or cycle-wheel), scrubbed in the middle, pointed at ends, with a I" round tile (a cutout from a mud -metal- or-any thick and heavy surface) fixed on the left side with cotton and glue, and balanced on the right side with a bead or rubber or wood. 3) Bow: a 1 " wide 2' long strip of wood (or bamboo) pointed at ends onto which a 1" wide1¾' long strip from a waste cycle-tube (or khadi coated with'raal') is fastened by stretching and scrubbed for better friction. The pictures of the three parts are given in Appendix I. The bow then is ready for rotating the spindle in the holder for producing yarn at the rate of 500 metres per hour, amounting to about 1.6 square metres of cloth per day (8 hours) and 40 metres per month (25 days) worth about Rs. 800. This implies that 25 to 30 metres (after paying to weaver and printer) of artistic cloth, equivalent to about Rs. 600 per month is available, without any investment or non-available instruments or any other control, to anybody including the unemployed, the poor, the illiterate, the village-based, the landless, the backward-caste, the blind and the other disabled, the old, the mentally retarded, the alcoholics, the dispossessed and even to those who belong to all these categories simultaneously.

Pitloom and Carder Apart from the spinning, khadi -production requires cotton-carding and yarn-weaving. The spinning can be taken up by many, while only a couple of families of carders and DWD -2

21 weavers are sufficient for a village. However, without the carding and the weaving activities, the spinning activity cannot start, survive or flourish in a village. It was by destroying the weavers, their number being relatively small, that the Indian hand-made textile industry was crushed in the early years of British rule. For the launching of khadi, therefore, it would be necessary to first find, or train, a weaver and a carder in the village or in one of the neighbouring villages. The instruments for both carding and weaving, a hanging-carder and a pitloom, are simple, inexpensive and easily constructible from wood or bamboo with simple tools usually by the carder and the weaver themselves. Some craftsmanship is necessary, especially for weaving. However, since only a few carders and weavers are required for many spinners the former can be given a little higher share of khadi -production. As explained in the following pages, the khadi- production in a village is highly profitable and consequently such craftsmen can earn at the rate of three to four metres of cloth with printed or woven design, i.e. up to Rs. 100 a day which is a good incentive for unemployed young people there. Another incentive for the weaver and the carder is the guarantee of their work. These craftsmen can count on permanent availability of work because the physically weak people would not be inclined to ever give up spinning as in the contemporary economic system they cannot get any work at all and in the proposed system of localproduction-for - local- use they cannot get more comfortable and profitable and reliable work than hand-spinning. Thus the first step would be for a few young intelligent persons in the village to explain to people the high returns from hand-spinning and offer their partnership in carding and weaving, so that together they can roll out artistic cloth. Once a weaver and a carder are available in the village many others can easily and promptly take up hand-spinning on the Dhanush charkha or the Sudarshan charkha where bamboo is available.

22 Profitability Would the village people, however, be prepared to ply the charkha? Would they find hand-spinning Profitable? Surely it is profitable for those who have many an idle hour at their disposal and to whom any income is welcome. What matters to the unemployed persons is the availability of work and there is no alternative work available before the charkha due to the lack of effective market for commodities other than cloth. The whole argument about the charkha is based on the tact that millions of village people are living in enforced idleness for at least six months a year. Moreover, as explained earlier, the charkha also appeals to an individual immediately because it drastically cuts down the cost of obtaining cloth. For producing cloth with the use of the charkha the spinner needs only an equivalent weight of cotton (or wool or any other fibre) plus a payment to the weaver. Consequently, the value (of cloth is much higher than the cost of producing it. For getting a printed saree, weighing 600 grams, for example, the spinner would need the equivalent 600 grams of yarn plus 200 grams yarn for paying to the weaver and 50 grams each for paying to the printer and the carder, in all 900 grams of yarn. The required 900 grams of cotton would cost Rs. 10-80, and the spinning of it takes about 4 1/2 days at the rate of 200 grams a day. Thus a spinner can get an artistic saree with printed or woven design worth about Rs. 200 or more in the market for less than Rs. 11 and about 4 1/2 days of work, amounting to a daily earning of about Rs. 45. As a weaver can weave about 12 to 15 metres, a printer can print ten sarees and a carder can blow about ten kilograms of cotton a day, they each can get the saree, requiring 900 grams of yarn, for less than two days work, amounting to the earnings worth Rs. 100 a day. These producers can realize these earnings by exchanging khadi with other locally produced commodities, in the process giving the others both khadi and employment. The above figures might vary but the advantage from

23 producing cloth with the charkha-and-pitloom would remain substantial. As will be discussed in the next chapter, when khadi is exchanged for other village products, carrying high price-tags in present markets, the earnings of the khadi-producers keep on increasing. The reason for the high returns to the spinners and the weaver in khadi -production lies in the system of local production for local use. By that virtue the spinners and the weaver can keep the total proceeds of the cloth for themselves and do not have to share them with a large number of middlemen nor do they have to incur huge overhead costs involved in the present large-scale production and the consequent sales in distant markets. Hand-spinning therefore is very rewarding to the unemployed whose own major consumption is cloth. Further, gradually as khadi fetches other commodities and services in exchange, the spinners' returns keep on multiplying. Moreover, one's own small requirement of cotton can be met by growing cotton oneself in his or her courtyard. In that case the spinner's cost of producing cloth would be even less than two rupees per metre calculated above. Valuable by-products of cloth- production using local raw-cotton are those obtained from the cotton-seeds: cooking oil and de-oiled cakes for feed for cattle. Both these are very useful items for the village people and can be jointly produced with the use of a bullock. The returns from cloth, combined with the returns from the cooking oil and cattle-feed, make the khadi production even more profitable. Another advantage of the charkha is that the entire cloth production is a net gain to the spinner. Whatever is obtained is additional. In order to produce cloth with the use of the charkha the spinner need not give up whatever work he already has or can have in future. The charkha can be used on the days one cannot find work, or in the evenings or spare hours when one can. This characteristic of the charkha makes it very useful in villages as farm work is available only in certain seasons and that also not on consecutive days. The charkha therefore provides a multifold economic

24 incentive, especially to the innumerable people who are unemployed and underemployed and therefore face poverty. These include, as discussed above: (1) The cloth, a substantial part of the expenditure in their family and locality, is obtained almost free. (2) No other employment is available so the comparative returns are significant. (3) The market price of cloth being high and increasing the returns are attractive. (4) The returns keep on increasing over time, as others in the community want khadi and therefore offer other commodities and services in return. Incidentally, but much more significantly, the profitability of cloth production on the charkha needs an emphasis in another context. For Gandhi, the benefit of charkha lay in a village producing khadi for its own use and not for sale in the cities.8 He therefore urged his co-workers: "Close them (the khadi stores in cities) down, we cannot maintain khadi bhandars (stores) to sell khadi ….9 But his fellow workers did not accept his advice claiming it to be impractical as they thought that village people would not find such charkha work profitable. Gandhi's reply was: "Of course it is difficult.Are we working through a gun over here. This alone is the way of love and service, the way I have shown you. If swaraj (freedom) is to be achieved through non-violence, I have no other method."10 Contrary to his fellow workers' claim, however, the above analysis shows that the unemployed village people would find such charkha work profitable as they can obtain khadi at m,-ich lower cost than the market price of cloth. They can save much of their own expenditure and, since they can produce cloth cheaper and better, they can barter it locally as well.

25 In fact it is the conducting of the khadi production by paying wages to the spinners in villages while selling the khadi in cities, as even at present, which due to the huge organisational and marketing costs, makes it difficult to sell the khadi production in competitive markets at prices high enough to allow for acceptable wage-rates to the village spinners, rendering the production economically unviable. In other words the profitability of khadi -production on the charkha for the unemployed village people's own use and local exchange, indicates that Gandhi's dream of realising swaraj is achievable.

Is the Charkha Implementable? The benefits of the charkha would remain only as an abstraction if the people in the villages were not to accept the charkha. When the world is moving towards the 21st century would the village people like to produce cloth on the age-old instrument charkha? It would not be appropriate to rule out the charkha right away without having brought it and its implications to the notice of the village people. If the people were to find it useful they would accept it, otherwise they would themselves give it up. The charkha should at least be brought to their attention. It is rather their own instrument which (along with the pitloom) the 'industrial revolution' has destroyed by force. It ought to be returned to them. However, while starting the charkha activity in a village the volunteer would receive warnings from many, especially the intellectuals, such as, nobody would like to spin on the charkha, people would not like the hand-spun cloth, they would not be prepared to do work for which they do not receive a cash payment, and so on. Nonetheless, by undertaking the charkha activity in a village some outcomes would soon be noticed. It may be useful to mention some features of the implementation. Although there are initial difficulties - till people gain a confidence in their ability to carry out the production, i.e.

26 till they begin to receive their cloth - people do lik e the charkha. Those people who were not ready to even listen and had to be persuaded to try and spin, now spin regularly, spin more and more and advocate it to others. Also contrary to common belief, they like and use the khadi they produce. Once a newspaper editor questioned a spinner, "Do you like such rough cloth? Do you not want to wear a nylon shirt?" Right came the reply, "Who does not want what is available free?" Although synthetic fibres can also be made in villages out of, for example, de-juiced sugarcane, trunks of banana trees and the skins of other trees, cotton remains in comparison much more easily available, more preferable and more comfortable. It can be seen that people use what they produce. For example, in a small state like Gujarat, in the north-east, the west and the south, people eat bread made from corn, millet and jowar respectively because that is the grain they grow. Another main hypothetical hurdle in the beginning is the lingering fear that the charkha activity would fall apart if the village people wanted cash money in return of their work and not the khadi cloth. But it turns out that they want the khadi cloth only. In a slum, for example, when a sale of the khadi was arranged the first time it was produced, the people specifically made a request not to repeat "the mistake". Afterwards also not a single person asked for money instead of khadi. Upon being questioned why he did not want money by selling his khadi, a young man replied, "Even with the money, I have to buy cloth and where else would I get such inexpensive and good quality cloth?" Over time the spinners sent some of the khadi cloth to their relatives who in turn sent them grains, jaggery and other commodities. Such barters of locally produced commodities turn out much more profitable to the spinners than their selling the khadi and buying from the money the equivalent commodities from the present markets, as the market prices are much higher and inflationary. This solves the biggest problem usually facing employment programmes, namely the sale of the output. Thus even if the implementation of the charkha activity

27 in rural areas is slow and difficult in the beginning, till the people begin to get their khadi, if pursued with patience, courage and conviction it gradually takes firm roots, flourishes and gets the whole-hearted support of the people. After a take-off it is likely to spread by itself through the demonstration effect. The above is only the economic reasoning behind why the village people would like to take to the charkha. The other benefits of the charkha, such as the freedom, human dignity, self-confidence, the new strength of being able to stand on their own, the security, the sense of brotherhood created from the exploitation -free production and other innumerable virtues mean much to them. The people feel immense pleasure and the dignity associated with freedom, in wearing and giving to their loved ones the cloth produced by the so far hidden energy of their own hands. They even begin to change their consumption habits to maximise their freedom. The benefits of the charkha are so easily understandable and attainable by the village community that it might not be difficult to bring the charkha into implementation in villages." 11 The weaving of khadi being both highly profitable and, more significantly, the spearhead of new progress, a couple of young persons might be induced to start weaving in a village, Once the weaving begins, the others in the village would be promptly induced to take up the charkha. The charkha is, therefore, vital for relieving poverty because it can encourage self -employment among those who have little work or support. They include not only small and landless farmers who are unemployed most of the year during off-seasons in agriculture, but also the unemployed and underemployed in the urban slums, the illiterate who are of little value in the present hierarchy, the old who cannot do heavy work, the handicapped who are at a disadvantage in the present competitive system, the refugees and the victims

28 of flood and drought in need of immediate relief, who together constitute a majority of the world community.

Practical Validity Some criticise the charkha as impractical because they assume this philosophy as postulating that one should not be selfish, acquisitive and greedy and should be concerned much more with the good of the community than with his selfish motives. It is therefore ruled out right away as invalid for psychological reasons. For the majority of the world population forced to live in poverty, however, no such postulates are necessary for taking to the charkha. Those who can and wish to may take to other professions, but those who cannot can profitably take to the charkha. On the contrary, the point is the other way. In spite of struggling hard, in spite of searching for a way, over years, if no alternative could provide even the evening bread which in reality is the case for the majority of the world population, would it be possible, even appropriate, to rule out the charkha?

Does the Charkha Keep the Poor at the Bottom for Ever? A widespread criticism of the charkha is based on the doubt that even if it can provide an occupation to the poor it will nonetheless always keep them at the bottom of the socio-economic order. However, it is only in the beginning that the poor sections would take to the cloth -production with the charkha. Once they demonstrate its success, the physically delicate - the old, the handicapped, the child-rearing - members would find it most suitable for themselves. So the charkha would find a place in most families throughout the society. The poor sections then would be able to take up other subsequent occupations. Thus the charkha does not keep the poor classes at the bottom for ever. Rather it strengthens those physically weak members whom no other economic system can, and brings the poor sections up to par with other sections of the society.

29 Survival Against the Big Can such a social change take place? Can the small survive against the big? The big always manage to exploit the small and the existence of the big has become all-pervading. How can the present exploitative system be countered ? One way to end exploitation can be the refusal of the exploited to participate in the system. Cloth being virtually the only major commodity bought from outside by village people at present, the charkha can open up this choice to them. By stopping to buy mill-cloth, the village people, around the world, can stop their exploitation by the giant global economy. As Gandhi said, "I do not teach the masses to regard the capitalists as their enemies, but I teach them that they are their own enemies."12 If the cause of our exploitation is our own conduct, then the key to stop the exploitation is also in our own hands. Our freedom or our progress does not depend on the mercy of the others; if we cultivate ourselves it will come by itself. The charkha can deliver this message, this lesson, this realisation to the poor and the disadvantaged around the world. The charkha can, therefore, provide answer to the overwhelming and baffling problem of how to combat the gigantic and powerful present economic system.

Why Has It Not Happened So Far? A question might be raised, if the charkha way is useful why is it not being pursued, at least in India in spite of Gandhi having revived the charkha throughout the country? When Gandhi revived the charkha, India was facing another challenge, that of gaining freedom from foreign rule. It was the time of the freedom struggle. Therefore a system (much lamented later by Gandhi) evolved to produce khadi in villages

30 and sell it in cities so that the British could directly notice that it had an impact on the Indian economy. Immediately the sales of British textiles fell and that affected the profits of the textile mills in Lancashire in Britain. Therefore the Indian political workers accelerated this work which frightened the British. As a result, the British of course lost their strength and their power but the original aim that the villages be self-sufficient in basic needs, that the villages be strong, free and prosperous could not be achieved. Swaraj (home rule) of Gandhi's dream remains to be attained. Gandhi's dream was that the charkha be plied in every cottage, that weaving and other occupations be flourishing around it, that villages be self-sufficient in their needs of food and cloth, that every human being be able to have work and bread and consequently the economy, the political system, education, arts and crafts, and the character and humanity of the people be progressive and conducive to peace. Gandhi had placed the charkha at the centre of the national flag during the freedom struggle of India. If the freedom he brought for India is to reach the villages, if it is to be preserved for the posterity, the charkha will need to be adopted throughout the length and breadth of the country. When the machine-made British textiles were first introduced in the Indian market, in the wake of the 'industrial revolution', a tremendous amount of force, coercion, terror and torture was exerted for their introduction, as the historical evidence testifies. The hand-made textiles, khadi, were crushed ruthlessly, primarily by wiping away the weavers and thus blocking the spinners'production. Without the drastic coercion the machine-made textiles would not have survived in a free market competition with the handmade textiles. 13 The reason for India's poverty is the extinction of its cottage industries and the subsequent unemployment of its masses. The masses lost their freedom, prosperity and work opportunity with the loss of the charkha. So if they are to regain them the most natural thing is the revival of the charkha.

31 A Future Reality The charkha is all the more relevant in the forthcoming times because of two major outcomes of the present economic system: widespreading unemployment and galloping inflation. As the cloth- production on the charkha does not require money, machinery, infrastructure, government or even organisation, it can be taken up promptly by the unemployed people. This chapter has illustrated how easily, simply and profitably it can be implemented. In these times of escalating inflation, the charkha and the consequent production methods will become so highly and increasingly rewarding to the unemployed masses that they will become a global reality in not too distant a future. Within a very short span of the last two to five years the commodities accounting for major expenditure of the masses. such as cloth, building materials, groceries like oil and sugar and so on, have been so expensive that similar hand-made commodities can be produced at less than one-tenth of their market prices. As the inflation would escalate in the coming years this comparative advantage would keep on increasing, rendering the high-technology products unviable and inducing the unemployed people to take to cottage industries. The textile being the pivotal industry, the charkha will pioneer these changes. As Gandhi had forecast, "I therefore claim for charkha the honour of being able to solve the problem of economic distress in a most natural, simple, unexpensive and businesslike manner." 14 He visualised that there will be no poverty in the world of tomorrow, no wars, no bloodshed. The future involves not chaos but construction.

Global Equation of Knowledge The development paradigms which emerged after the 'industrial revolution' to serve the machine-based society are now increasingly turning out to be bankrupt, if not destructive,

32 in their various formulations - from left to right. They have not delivered desired results even in the industrialised countries - capitalist as well as communist - which nurtured them, advocated them and transported them to the rest of the world. They are proving unsustainable economically, inadequate to serve as framework for culturally enriching growth, detrimental to ecological balances and counter-acting on fundamental human values of freedom, non-violence and justice. In spite of being opposite ideologically, both the capital-ist and communist models of development are based on mass-production through mega-automatic power-driven machines, and therefore centralised control over ownership and production and consequently over employment, incomes and livelihood of the people. The real issues therefore are left out by a discussion limited merely to pros and cons of only these ideologies. Not long ago, prior to the 'industrial revolution' in the late 18th century, the cultures of the so-called ' under- developed' countries of the 'Third' world set the pace for the rest of the world. But with the sweep of the 'industrial revolution' around the world through mammoth technology combined with aggressive international trade, and with the consequent descent of colonialism and imperialism, these countries lost their creative initiative, their western -influenced elite began to believe that the industrialism paradigms were better and changed the economic patterns in these countries. But now all countries are seeing, through their illusions, contemplating on the failure of the contemporary economic paradigms to meet the needs of the majority of their populations and searching for a new philosophy of development. In this respect, India has a responsibility in effectively countering the modern culture. The charkha can be the key for turning from centralised to decentralised production, from top-downwards to base-upwards changes, from automatic technologies to those utilising hands -head-and -heart. In the charkha, India has a remedy for the abolition of unemployment and poverty of her people as also a message for the shattered world economy.

33 2

Conditions of Prosperity

All over the world, especially in the industrially advanced countries, the growth-rate in production is decreasing. The technological blizzard which swept the rich to the dazzling heights of gloss and glamour is now raising doubts about its ability to sustain, let alone promote, prosperity. For the first time since the 'industrial revolution' we are now thinking of growth being possible without high technology. Although the charkha is usually understood as an instrument for providing assistance to the disadvantaged, it can actually provide an alternative for building a strong, prosperous, welfare economy. As Gandhi emphasised, "The goal of constructive work is not to provide economic relief to the unemployed or to distribute some wages to the poor but to build a strong non-violent social order."1 The charkha is necessary not for a rescue operation, but for the foundation of sustainable prosperity. It is not a moral obligation, it is a practical necessity.

The Root Cause The increase in production is constrained by the availability of markets. Although high technology can produce goods on mass scale, the production cannot be raised if markets are

34 not available to sell the goods, But the high technology also creates massive unemployment, reducing purchasing power of the masses, thereby reducing the effective market demand and therefore ultimately constraining further increase in production. To put it simply, if commodities and services were produced totally through automatic machinery, who would be able to buy the output? Thus the root cause of the industrial recession facing the world economy is the lack of purchasing power among the vast majority of the world society. The worldwide massive unemployment wipes out much of the market demand, constraining production and prosperity, and presents limits to growth. The malady of the present economy is not the lack of money, it is the lack of work.

The Common Cause of the Problems of Prosperity and Poverty The common basic cure therefore for the problems of prosperity as well as of poverty is the eradication of widespread unemployment. The problems of prosperity are inseparably tied up with the problems of poverty as the cause at their root is the same. The solutions to these problems therefore cannot be searched separately and partially, they need to be searched simultaneously and jointly. That is why it is often claimed that poverty can be interpreted by focussing entirely on the lifestyle of the prosperous.2 The study of the masses cannot be isolated from the study of the elite. Vice versa, the story of the prince involves the story of the pauper. Both are related factors of a common economic system. The fever in the body is felt equally on the wrist and on the forehead, and a treatment for an eye-disease can be a massage on the soles. In one of his famous speeches Martin Luther King proclaimed that a rich

35 man cannot be what he ought to be until the poor man is what he ought to be. The common solution to the problems of prosperity as well as poverty is the removal of mass unemployment. Prior to discussing how the charkha can lead to prosperity, let us consider whether the modern economic system can ensure growth.

Is Modern Technology Sustainable? Never in history has mankind achieved so much technological progress as in the last few decades. This is the age of glittering technological achievements. Dreams are nurtured for using the technological advancement to eradicate poverty and achieve prosperity for all. However this proposition, although widely held, needs to be examined. Can the modern technological advancement help reduce poverty on the one hand and build a base for the sustenance and perpetuation of progress on the other? In spite of India, for example, having intensively planned for economic progress through harnessing modern technology since 1951, according to the government data in March 1988 approximately 400,000 villages out of a total of 600,000 -which account for as much as 75% of the country's population - do not have an access-road during monsoons. Out of these about 200,000 villages do not have an access-road for the rest of the year as well. About 450,000 villages do not have a post-office. According to a government statement in 1988, 540,000 villages do not have a telephone. It is almost impossible to reach the remote villages. Still the initial hope is being nurtured and arguments forwarded that poverty will be eradicated with the use of even more advanced technology. It is argued that if all the members of a society produced goods through modern technology they could all create markets for one another. Under such a system, however, those very few who undertake the production of the basic necessities have a continuous and universal market and the large majority of the rest who undertake the production of commodities for less important needs (and considering the size of the

36 population most of the people would have to produce only superficial commodities) find only a limited and vulnerable market and therefore cannot sustain, even undertake, production. The rest who constitute an extremely large percentage of the population are therefore reduced to a vulnerable position and forced to live at the mercy of the few who control the production of the necessities. Mass production of basic necessities through modern machinery therefore results in mounting unemployment, wiping away purchasing power of the masses and thereby constraining the production itself. Power-driven machinery increases production but it also increases unemployment. Through the use of such machinery therefore a society increases its capacity to put more goods in the market, but it simultaneously reduces its people's capacity to buy them. Utimately therefore the mass production through modern technology is not sustainable for long. A system with a perpetually heavier top and weaker base would fall by its own weight. It is only if the millions of unemployed started producing basic necessities, can the rest find markets for their production.

Can International Trade Ensure Growth? What is not possible for the entire world society could be attained by a particular country - i.e. raise the standard of living of its people through modern technology - if, and as long as, it could make profits from selling in other countries the mass production obtained through modern machinery, i.e. from international trade. It is possible to raise this way the per capita income for countries with small population, as England and other European countries had done during the 'industrial revolution' and as Japan, Singapore and Korea have done in recent years. However, these countries are islands compared to India, or to many African and Latin American countries for that matter. It was possible for America also, in spite of its large population, but that was due to the markets in Latin America, Africa and Asia being available to it. D.W.D.- 3

37 For a country with a large population like India, for example, it would be improbable to raise this way the standard of living of its 850 million people, as that would entail earning corresponding huge profits from international trade and therefore an availability of extremely large markets abroad, an unreality in this age of cut-throat competition in international markets. All nations of the world, therefore, can never raise this way the standards of living of their populations simultaneously, because all cannot be net-exporters in international trade. Even for the few which can, the rise in the standard of living would be temporary because a country's ability to profit from international trade is dependent on its capacity to exploit, on the availability of foreign markets and on its superiority over competitors. As these factors fall, and they inevitably do over time, recession and unemployment will mount in the industrialised countries. The stipulated gains from modern technology, even with the use of international trade, are thus (1) impossible for the world society as a whole, (2) improbable for the countries with large populations and (3) temporary even for the countries with small populations.

Production by Masses Instead of Mass Production The charkha can, on the other hand, industrialise villages on human, rational and intelligent lines. "Its inestimable value", explained Gandhi, "consists not in its capacity for paying a few individuals highly but in immediately providing a remunerative occupation for millions.3 Unlike the contemporary economic system which tries to build prosperity by producing on a mass scale through mega machines and then distributing it to the masses, the charkha-based system tries to build prosperity by producing in millions of small cottage units throughout the masses, thus ensuring that the distribution is also taken care of simultaneously.

38 The Mode of Cloth-Production Fundamental to Growth Cloth being a vital necessity inevitably and recurrently bought by everybody including the poor masses, a society's total expenditure on cloth is monumental and continuous and, therefore, so are the incomes of the cloth -producers. If, therefore, cloth is produced with automatic mega-scale machines, these monumental incomes get concentrated in a few hands only, limiting the total number of people with purchasing power and so limiting the demand for other commodities, thereby restricting the scope for the production of other commodities. The concentration of cloth- production through automatic mega-scale machines, therefore, sets limits to growth. If, instead, the cloth were produced on small scale by a large number of people, the monumental incomes from cloth would also accrue to the large number of people who therefore would be able to provide wide markets in all places for a variety of commodities and services, thereby continuously creating the scope for undertaking production of a large number of commodities and services. The production of cloth on a small-scale, i.e. through a large number of people, therefore, is a precondition to widespread markets, to the enormous scope for undertaking production of other commodities - services - research and so to growth and prosperity. Incidentally, the charkha not only accomplishes the small-scale cloth- production but it does, that through the physically delicate - the old, the handicapped, the child-rearing - members of the society, and therefore provides the foundation of prosperity through the so-called weakest members of the society. Moreover, the physically delicate people not being able to undertake any other activity as simple, convenient, stable, profitable and rewarding as the cloth -production on the charkha, they would not be -inclined to leave it, ensuring the continuity and stability of the foundation of prosperity.

39 Growth Multiplier The previous chapter discussed the high profitability of khadi -production to the unemployed people. When khadi-production is taken up by some of the unemployed, the khadi being both a good quality cloth and much less costly than similar cloth in the market, the rest of the people in the village would also want it. They, especially the unemployed, therefore either start spinning or producing other commodities to exchange for khadi with the spinners. Note that the latter choice, rather the breakthrough, is achieved because the cloth is produced locally. The most significant advantage of the charkha to the other unemployed people is the availability of cloth without paying money while using spare time. When khadi is produced, some other unemployed persons in the village can take up dyeing, printing and tailoring it. This way the value of khadi would increase and still, considering the amount of such work these persons can do per day, it would turn out that even if these skilled workers earned more than the spinners, the spinners would have to pay them at much lower rates than the market rates of such work. For example, a block-printer can print ten sarees a day, so even if she charged at the rate of a quarter of a metre of cloth for printing one saree, she can earn at the rate of 2.5 metres of cloth a day, which would have required her more than two days of spinning. On the other hand, a quarter of a metre of cloth costs the spinner about two hours of spinning and about Rs.0.50 for raw cotton as against the market price of Rs.35 upwards for getting a saree printed. Thus both the spinner and the block-printer gain substantially. When khadi is block-printed and tailored, the non-spinners find it even more attractive and much less expensive than equivalent garments in the market. Khadi catches colours very well and block-printing is artistic. For obtaining it therefore they can take up production of other commodities and services and get khadi in exchange. For example, a medical practitioner can now offer his services to the spinners, which

40 was not done earlier as the spinners were not able to pay anything in return. By obtaining medical services in exchange of khadi the spinners' returns also grow considerably. Similarly the shepherds who own bullocks can now have cloth and medical services by starting a bullock-run oil-press, producing cooking oil and offering it to the spinners for whom it is very expensive at the present market prices. As a next step, another unemployed person in the village would figure out that he can produce, for example, roof-tiles from mud which are appreciated by these producers and carry high prices in the present markets, and so in exchange can get cloth, medical care and cooking oil. Thus more and more village people can keep on entering the production system and benefiting all in the process. This explains how better commodities and services are offered to the spinners - and therefore to the whole society - as more and more members of the village begin to make business by entering the new production system. Moreover, the products and services being offered for cloth can exchange for one another as well because they all would be valued in terms of cloth. Therefore the production of new commodities and services in the economy would not be limited to the total demand for cloth, but can cater to all kinds of needs and wishes of the people. The commodities which in the present markets carry high and ever-increasing price-tags would now be produced by local unemployed people, using local unutilised raw materials and for local markets, and therefore would be available at much lower costs or exchange- rates, as illustrated by the above examples of printing, medical services, cooking oil and roof-tiles. In other words, as more and more people start producing commodities and offering them for exchange, the returns or incomes of all the producers keep on multiplying. This constitutes the growth multiplier. In total contrast at present, even though the village people can produce many hand-made commodities they are not able to do so because they cannot sell or exchange them within the village due to the lack of purchasing power, or outside due to aggressive cut-throat competition in the outside

41 markets. The charkha can break this impasse by initially creating local purchasing power within the village, because it can substitute khadi for the mill-cloth which is the major commodity being bought by all villagers at present. In the charkha-based system the producers of commodities other than cloth benefit because of the spinners, the cloth- producers. They get a profession to produce something because they can exchange it with khadi. They would have no work if the spinners did not produce cloth. Therefore, the members of the society benefit not at the cost of the weak, as in the present system, but because of them. The charkha benefits not some but all members of the society. Such a system, therefore, can not only attain prosperity but also retain it. The system leads to the welfare of all - Sarvodaya, because it is based on the welfare of the most disadvantaged - Antyodaya.

The Hank Bank The khadi-producers and other producers need not actually exchange their products on the spot but can maintain their accounts in terms of cloth, or yarn, and get their things as and when they want them, because the value of every commodity and service is expressed in terms of yarn. Such an accounting system can be called a yarn bank or a hank bank (a hank is 1000 metres of folded yarn). In a short experiment by the author in a village the concept of the hank bank and the suggestion to start it were forwarded by the village weaver himself. A crucial difference between the yarn bank and the contemporary monetary bank is that the yarn currency, unlike the present money- currency, is always available to each and everybody including the weakest. Under this system every commodity and service can be valued in terms of yarn which is obtainable by all, and therefore the benefits of economic growth are virtually within the reach of everybody. Hand-spinning being most useful to the old people and (although for different reasons) to the children to some extent, the yarn currency would be produced in most families.

42 Most significantly, by removing the present need for the monetary currency for survival and economic betterment, the yarn-currency can break the dependence of the underprivileged, uprooted and dispossessed classes on the present exploitative system. As Gandhi pleaded, "Khadi would have to be extricated from the cycle of money exchange, in order to make it the instrument for purna swaraj (complete independence).”4 The function of money is that of enslaving others. The yarn currency can be a liberator. The pricing of the system in terms of yarn has its major virtue. What the unemployed lack is cash and what they have is time. The above system meets exactly these conditions - it saves on cash and it uses time. If the unemployed wanted to earn cash they would have to work, if at all they can find work, at the low competitive wage-rates of the present exploitative system and with the cash so earned they would have to buy their needs at the present inflationary high prices. Instead, why not work straight to produce these needs? If they began with producing their own cloth with the charkha, and gradually other commodities and services which can be exchanged with khadi as explained above, they can all make substantially high earnings in terms of the prevailing market prices of these commodities and services. Notice that the system would not work without khadi because cloth is the only commodity which is invariably bought by everybody including the poor. All other commodities and services derive their values because they can be exchanged for khadi which has a widespread local demand at all times. Thus khadi forms the centre of the economy and so do the khadi producers in the society. Therefore the most underprivileged members of the society who are out and away at the periphery in the contemporary economy would form the centre of the economy and would support the growth of all the rest in the society. Millions of those who are 'good

43 for nothing' in the contemporary economy, would be in demand by all in the system and would, in turn, initiate markets with the help of which others can flourish.

High Productivity The charkha is considered a slow instrument and therefore promptly discarded on the basis of low productivity. But the productivity of workers in a charkha-based economy turns out to be very high. It is only hand-spinning which is slow. But it is undertaken by elderly and handicapped people who have no productivity in any alternative economic system. Even when others ply the charkha, it is during their spare time. More significantly, the productivity in the subsequent occupations generated by the charkha is very high. For example, a potter can produce about five hundred roof-tiles a day amounting to a production worth about five hundred rupees at the present market prices. A block-printer can print about ten sarees a day amounting to an earnings of about four hundred rupees. So also a tailor can stitch about ten dresses a day. An oil- press -operator can press about eighteen kilograms of oil a day. A village medical practitioner can keep a complete medical record and register for the entire village community. Thus the productivity of workers in the charkha-based economy is very high. Since all the other producers owe their employment to cloth-producers, they can pay high remunerations to the spinners and the weaver whose productivity therefore keeps on increasing. The high productivity would form an incentive for all in the system to sustain production.

Towards Prosperity Once the charkha ushers in khadi -production in a village, or a community, and instils new economic strength, where almost none existed previously, all kinds of developments become possible.

44 The emergence of cloth- production and its availability in exchange of other products, bypassing the necessity of money, induce the rest, especially the unemployed, in the village to figure out what they can produce best that the community needs the most. The new possibility of having khadi and other things in return of something that can be offered acts automatically as an incentive to the rest to start new industries by matching their abilities with the society's needs. This would evoke the skills and the artistic talents of the village people. As Gandhi explained: "There will be village poets, village artists, village architects, linguists and research workers. In short there will be nothing in life worth having which will not be had in the villages. Today villages are dung heaps. Tomorrow they will be like tiny gardens of Eden where dwell highly intelligent folk whom no one can deceive or exploit.”5 Many necessary reforms, which are difficult at present due to the lack of availability of work and food to the majority of the people, can then follow. For example, the educational system can be meaningfully structured as people would have work available. Health and nutrition schemes can be devised because people would have purchasing power to obtain food.6 Various arts and research activities can flourish because people would gain their freedom and dignity. The growth embodied by the charkha has no limits.

The Rest Will Follow Automatically Khadi, therefore, is the sun of the village solar system, which provides heat and sustenance to other village industries and reforms. Without it the latter cannot grow. The understanding that other industries, reforms and developments cannot succeed without khadi -production and that after it they would follow automatically is crucial in order to save on the present unfruitful efforts for bringing about these changes and to focus attention and efforts on the introduction of the charkha alone.

45 Thus the charkha is needed not just for producing cloth, it is even more needed for solving the chaotic problems of the contemporary society. It is not enough to say it is useful, it is necessary to insist that it is the central industry requiring all our attention. Gandhi had a vital advice to economists: "It (the charkha) is to be the precursor of every reform, and if I can only concentrate the attention of the nation upon the charkha, it will automatically solve all the other problems and pave the way for legislation where legislation is required. ... It is the only constructive effort that is possible on a national scale. ... Without the charkha and all it implies there is no swaraj (home rule), and therefore a wise economist will concentrate his attention upon the charkha alone, knowing that the rest will follow." 7 He claimed, "all industrial departments of the nation should revolve round the charkha at the centre."8 In another context, while imagining himself in the role of a government minister, he emphasised: "The only question for me as minister is whether the All India Spinners Association has the conviction and capacity to shoulder the burden of creating and guiding a khadi scheme to success. If it has, I would put my little barque to sea with all confidence.”9

Standard of Living in A Charkha-based Economy The above discussion shows that a charkha-based economy is not at all condemned to low levels of living. On the contrary, as a proverb says, many hands make for higher production. In the present economic system, an extremely small fraction of the society is engaged in actual production of commodities. In a charkha-based economic system all the members of society can contribute to production, leading to an enormous amount of total production.

46 If there are, for example, 2000 persons in a village, 200 of them can make cloth for the community (considering, on average, 40 to 50 metres per person per year). Imagine the vast number of commodities and services that would be offered to the community when each of the rest of the 1300 adults can contribute through self-employment. The quality of commodities and services in a charkha-based economy can also be far better than in the present one. The Calico Museum of Textiles, Ahmedabad, known to be one of the best museums of textiles in the world, houses the fabulous handmade textiles of the earlier centuries, which are still unmatched in quality and grandeur. The exclusive characteristic of the charkha is that it can bring into the mainstream of production even the weak members of the society who have no work in the present set-up, making tremendous net addition to production. If as many as 2500 million unemployed and underemployed persons around the world, the alternative economic value of whose time is almost nil, can produce cloth and following it other commodities they can make an enormous contribution and thereby can also give the necessary boost to the world economy. Moreover, the charkha can eliminate most of the present tasks of supplies, middleman chains, management, distribution, and the paraphernalia of other tasks which do not actually produce commodities but have become necessary because of the gigantic scale of production. Furthermore, as would be seen shortly, it would eliminate the present production of many unnecessary and harmful commodities. In such an economy therefore all the members of the society would be engaged in only genuinely useful production, resulting in abundance of such commodities. It follows that all the people together can produce so abundantly that they can have a high standard of living according to each one's choice and still need to work for it for much less than eight hours a day, having ample time for their social, cultural, intellectual, scientific and spiritual pursuits. A charkha-based economy therefore can provide not only a high standard of living but also a high quality of life.

47 It is the inertia of our minds that precludes us from seeing that the destruction of the charkha is the root cause of our present predicament and its revival alone can bring about accumulating and self-sustaining prosperity. Folk poet saint Jivan has put it eloquently: '0 God Jagdish, Jivan is asking you: Where have your thousands of hands disappeared? What has made you miserly? Why are you annoyed?' '0 Jivan, Jagdish is answering you: Here are all my thousands of hands, But as man started withdrawing his mind I had to withdraw my hands.'

Alternative Society Recently there has been an upsurge of interest in alternative technology and alternative development, in sustainable and environmentally sound development. An emphasis, however, needs to be placed on the condition that an alternative development can exist only in an alternative society. We seem to wish to get rid of the present ills and evils while retaining the present socio-economic structure status-quo. The absurdity of this wishful thinking needs to be exposed. Growth results from making intelligent choices. A crucial choice for our society is between struggling to hold on to the present cities and building villages-between increasingly crowded, cumbersome, crime- threatened cities overridden with escalating inflation and unemployment on the one hand and lustrous, flourishing, free villages overflowing with useful goods, professions, intelligence and arts on the other. Although extensive theory has been developed, by Nobel Laureate Professor Simon Kuznets among others, to indicate how economic development has involved shifts of population from villages to cities, the above analysis indicates that future economic development will involve shifts of population from cities to villages. It follows from the earlier discussion that the charkha would be the pivotal step to building the villages and lifting them

48 to unforeseen heights. Freed from unemployment and destitution, the village people can give best examples of highly civilized, intelligent and cultured people.

Flourishing Villages It is becoming increasingly clear that the future of the world community lies not in the huge, congested and violence-ridden cities but in its thousands of villages. The charkha approach ensures that these villages be prosperous as well as peaceful. Commenting on the 'quality of life' in a charkha-based society, President Radhakrishnan said: "Gandhi struggled to retain the traditional rural civilisation which expressed the living unity of a people harmoniously interacting on a certain soil swayed by a common feeling about life, the earth and the universe. The ambitious spirit of man feels itself strong and free in the villages with their open spaces and green belts, rather than in overcrowded cities with their darkness and squalor, foul smell and stagnant air, fevers and rickets. In the village community men feel that they are responsible individuals effectively participating in its life. When these villagers move to town they become restless and hopeless. The peasant and the weaver are displaced by the mechanic and the businessman, and to compensate for the boredom of life, exciting amusements are devised. No wonder the spirit of man becomes lost in this wilderness of living. If we are to humanize society and bring moral significance to acts and relationships, we should work for a decentralised village economy. ...”10

Elimination of Harmful Production People in villages being socially and geographically closeknit, the charkha-based, economy can prevent adulteration in the production and sale of commodities. Under the present

49 system, the producers and consumers often not being in a face to face contact, many such things are produced which are actually unnecessary, burdensome, harmful and sometimes even disastrous for the society. The sole objective of the manufacturing companies being profit, consumers are trapped into buying harmful things through advertisements and other sales promotion techniques. It is now commonly known how a large number of people in Africa went blind for having consumed a medicine produced by a multinational corporation. A charkha-based economy would rule out production of such commodities. First, the producers would themselves be consumers of their products. Second, the narrowing of the distance between the producers and the consumers would increase the responsibility of the producers and reduce the probability of malpractice. In such a system therefore people while earning their living would also contribute to the good of the community. There could be injustice in this system also, but it would be reduced to a minimum. Along the charkha way therefore useless commodities, useless industries, useless production methods, useless professions would automatically come to a halt. As Gandhi argued, when goods are consumed where they are produced, there would be no greed to accelerate production without limits and at any costs.11 Another aspect in which the charkha way differs from the contemporary system is the spectrum of production and resource use. Under the present system the purchasing power is concentrated among a few at the top. The charkha can provide it to the weaker sections as well, inducing entrepreneurs to produce commodities and services useful to the entire community and reducing the present production catering to superfluous wants, vanity and sometimes disastrous ends.

50 Elimination of Wasteful Employment As a consequence this can reduce the wasteful employment of the country's manpower. In contrast, in the contemporary economy the biggest single agency providing employment is the army! A healthy society need not have a large number of soldiers earning salaries for their entire working-life; instead the young men can gather at the time of emergency and return to their work when the emergency is over.

Cost Reduction The replacement of mass -production -for -global -markets by local -production -for -local -use can in many ways lower the costs of production by eliminating big overheads and organisational costs, management salaries, payments to middlemen engaged in organisation and sales, costs of huge machinery, costs of plants and factory buildings, costs of energy and electricity, costs of obtaining raw materials from far away places, costs of transportation and storage, costs of distribution, costs of sales-promotion and advertising, costs of banking and finance and, in particular, profit margins involved at each of these stages. This means a manifold reduction in the costs of production. In a broader context, this would also reduce the costs of, for example, the financial institutions, governments and even wars. The charkha can therefore relieve the society from the tremendous burden involved in the mass-scale machine-based production. As a crucial consequence, the developing countries will not be forced to ask for financial aid from industrialised countries or the World Bank and incur mounting debt. Then they will be able to use their resources according to their own will and choice.

Eradication of Inflation The elimination of all these mammoth costs can naturally reduce the prices of the products also correspondingly. Moreover, when commodities are produced by unemployed people,

51 using local materials and for local markets, they can be supplied at drastically lower prices than those in the present markets. Other factors indirectly affecting prices such as corruption and speculation would also decline when things are produced locally. Thus the charkha-based economy can tackle the most threatening present problem of runaway inflation.

Security of Work The uncertainties of the present economy leave little security, let alone guarantee, of job. Cloth however always has a market and the weaker members at least would never leave cloth- production. Appendix II shows that without the tremendous amount of force and torture the hand-made cloth industry could never have been destroyed. Consequently a large amount of purchasing power would always exist leading to the creation and sustenance of demand for other commodities. Thus the charkha-based economy can relieve people from the worry of unemployment and therefore create a healthy and strong society.

Problems of the Modern Lifestyle In the modern age, if the poor suffer from the lack of food the rich suffer from the lack of sleep. The mechanical mode of production leaves little room for physical labour, reducing the body's resistance to sickness. Even worse is the situation of mental uneasiness. Despite the increase in the items for consumption, the latter results in boredom instead of joy. Professor Richard Selzer of Yale Medical School predicts: "Many of the diseases that plague us today ... will fade from the scene in the next 20 years because effective ways to prevent or treat them will be found. ... Boredom will be the major medical problem of the future. B-0-R-E-D-0-M! As leisure time increases, as life gets more and more mechanized, people become bored - and that creates a dangerous situation. Our intensive care units are crammed already with people suffering from the complications of boredom. When we are bored we drive our cars and

52 motorcycles too fast, we take drugs, drink or eat to excess. We grow careless. We injure ourselves."12 We are like uprooted trees. We want to be re-rooted. The charkha can re-establish us and the new activities which start after the charkha can nourish the roots.

Poverty by Choice "The more I have, the less I am" sang the American poet-saint Henry David Thoreau. Still the important principle of 'poverty by choice' has not even been considered, let alone discussed, by the modem science of economics. Man, not being a mere economic man, wants to achieve not merely material comforts but other objectives in life as well. But according to economics man is a selfish greedy man, always aiming at more and more commodities; it is a degradation for him to have only a few things and the purpose of his life is to continuously strive for acquiring more and more commodities. Modern economics is structured around the assumption that man is never satisfied no matter how much he gets. Consequently, ours is a society in which fewer and fewer people seem to be attached to anything other than the improvement of their financial status. However, a situation enabling everyone to obtain his basic needs and thereby preventing destitution might induce man, after having honestly earned his living, not to waste the rest of his life in running after mere physical possessions only. This is a different kind of poverty which an individual embraces on his own, willingly, joyfully, consciously, thoughtfully, purposefully. It is well known that during the freedom struggle in India many, following Gandhi, embraced imprisonment and enjoyed not merely the denial of comforts but even took the police atrocities in their stride. Real happiness might thus consist in being able to serve society. Man is not a selfish but a social being. The charkha can help to bring about the synthesis of material as well as ethical wealth. D.W-D –4

53 The principle of non- accumulation is not only a moral value but a sound scientific principle. Building a heap necessitates digging a hole somewhere else. Nature grows enough everyday for everyone's needs, so if there is no accumulation by anyone all would find enough. Civilisations have upheld the value of non- accumulation. A Norwegian proverb says: The more you possess things, the more they will possess you. A poet has put it in his way: 0 mosquito, you are very kind, you suck blood but you do not deposit it in banks. The meaning of prosperity is also broad. As an object cannot be sufficiently described by its length, width and height, scientists find it necessary to determine its location and time as well; similarly the prosperity of a society cannot be sufficiently estimated from the resources and the political structure of that society, the estimate should include two other parameters as well: the knowledge and the character of the people. Ultimately the use of the prosperity itself is to build the character of the people. Real wealth is life. The richest country is that which nourishes the highest number of noble, honest and happy people.

Charkha in 21st Century When the world is preparing itself for the 21st century how does charkha, the age-old instrument, become relevant? The argument, however, is to be framed the other way: If man is to see the 21st century, the charkha will show it. We have to do something first in order to sail through the 20th century. As Gandhi explained, the revivification of the charkha and through it of other cottage industries is a necessity of our existence, because thereby alone can we tackle other crises of the contemporary society. 13 Although generally the prosperous are believed to be afraid of idealism and those in position of power suspicious of people with the freedom of spirit, all are, in a way, prisoners of the modern materialist system, which is incapable of serving

54 anybody, including its builders. As Gandhi said, "We are guilty of a grievous wrong against the villagers, and the only way in which we can expiate it is by encouraging them to revive their lost industries and arts. ... If we neglect our duty to our villages, we shall be courting our own ruin." 14

Resolving Conflicts The rich and the resource-holders are not natural enemies of the poor and the have-nots. There are no irreconcilable differences between the interests of the rich and those of the poor. It is the present economic system which by inducing capital accumulation among the rich, forces the poor into starvation. The system, however, devastates the rich as well by forcing them into constant, fierce and inhuman competitive race. It is, therefore, disastrous to both the rich and the poor. What needs to be condemned, therefore, is not any classes or countries but the prevalent economic system. What is warranted therefore is a replacement of the present system by one which is conducive to healthy and mutually helpful relationship between the rich and the poor. The charkha-based system can enable those who want a simple life to earn their basic needs easily, quickly and independently, and enable those who want more to contribute more to the welfare of the society. Above all, it can change the very value-system of the society in which not the rich but the socially useful persons are worshipped and thereby it can stop the very rat-race for materialism which is dominating at present. It therefore can lend dignity to simple but socially conscious poof people as well. In such an economic system in which nobody has to worry about basic needs and in which people's concern is how to contribute to the welfare of the others, the conflicts between various classes can be reduced to the minimum.

55 The Emerging Society What would be the emerging society like? By bringing in three-fourth of the, world population unemployed and underemployed at present into the mainstream of production, by reviving the intellectual treasures, artistic abilities and rich cultural heritage of the masses, by eliminating the present production of harmful and superfluous commodities, especially armaments, and by reestablishing ecological and environmental balances, the charkha would lead the world society towards prosperity. By making the majority of people and countries self -sufficient,- it would prevent the industrialised countries from engaging in wars to establish economic power abroad for securing markets, which consequently would bring in, a new peace in the world. By reducing exploitation and domination it would usher in a sense of security, equality and dignity among people and a socio-cultural ethos symbolised by freedom, peace and justice. The contemporary economic system is constrained by limited employment and therefore limited growth. Of course, it is all too human and therefore attractive, However, it is a closed system, because it stops at selfish crude man. But man is born to be more than man, to be divine. The charkha can open up the direction to cosmic growth. Therefore it is the hope of mankind.

Epilogue After a presentation of this chapter at a seminar by the author in Japan, the Japanese host professor reflected: "I will have to import the charkha." As it is said that the best salesman is the one who can sell a refrigerator to the Eskimos, in that sense is not Gandhi the best economist whose economic ideology induces even the Japanese to use the charkha? Nonetheless, unlike the refrigerator to the Eskimos, the charkha can turn out most useful to the Japanese.

56 3

Uplift of the Disadvantaged

In the contemporary system, money and power are supreme Further, they enhance each other. The root cause of this self -accumulating spiral is that a majority of the world community is hungry. Ironically, those very people who labour hard to grow food for others have to put their children to sleep on an empty stomach.

Insulating Poor Against Starvation The use of the charkha is not limited to obtaining cloth only. Its first real use for the majority of the world population which is half-fed is for obtaining food. As villages produce foodgrains and dairy products, cloth can be used to obtain these primary needs in exchange. With the use of the charkha the spinner's cost of clothproduction is, as discussed in Chapter 1, extremely low and a main advantage of being able to produce cloth inexpensively is the ability of the spinner to sell it easily. Khadi similar to the cloth which sells in the market for rupees fifteen to twenty per metre can be made on the charkha for only rupees two per metre, which enables the spinner to sell or exchange it conveniently. The quality of cloth of course is also a consideration, along with the price, for the sale of cloth. Khadi can brilliantly catch vegetable and other natural dyes, available in villages,

57 and therefore can be produced in attractive designs. Moreover, unlike mill-cloth, the fibres of hand-made cloth serve as brush and keep the skin clean and fresh. It is, a hundred per cent natural cloth and therefore more comfortable than the synthetic varieties of cloth. As a song goes, khadi is warm in winter, cool in summer and most convenient in monsoon. If preferred, however, other varieties of cloth can also be made on the charkha in the villages from fibres obtainable from sugarcane, banana trees and skins of several trees. The landless people therefore can take to khadi -production and obtain foodgrains and milk in exchange of khadi which always has a local market. The relevant point is that no other alternative economic ideology has been able to provide a system by which two hours of work can earn two square meals a day for anybody at any place and at any time. The objective of the charkha is to provide such a system. Although the world is witnessing the glamours and wonders of science and technology, would it be appropriate to rule out the charkha if there is no other alternative which can give bread and cloth to millions of half-clad and starving people? Economics of the charkha shows that it is a crime against semi-starved humanity not to introduce the charkha among them and to keep on selling them mill-cloth. The charkha is not just one of the instruments of production. Rather, it is the only instrument of production which can provide a strategy to uplift more than half the world population condemned to starvation and the consequent humiliation. As Gandhi explained, the aim of the charkha is very amloitious: to insulate the poor against starvation.1 "Giving bread to the hungry is the only task," he said in another context, "this hunger has drawn me to the charkha. " 2 He put it very humanely: What is a better way of

58 praying to God than plying the charkha which can enable anybody in any corner of the world to earn his daily bread ?3 The statesman Rajagopalachari put the point squarely: Wealth cannot be distributed equably after it is produced, but it could be so produced that the equality of distribution is ensured in advance. That is the khadi-based economy. 4

Imputing Value to People Whose Alternative Economic Value is Nil From the theoretical viewpoint, those whose time's alternative value is virtually nil according to the contemporary economic system can gain value with the charkha. The millions of the weak and uprooted people who have no work opportunities under the contemporary economic system can find productive work in the charkha-based system. The economically disadvantaged people can undertake production because the production does not require any investment. The physically weak people can undertake production because hand-spinning is not a laborious work. The mentally weak can also do the work because hand-spinning does not require any formal training. The work can be done at home, so the old, the disabled and all those who cannot leave home to do outside work can undertake it. Those who do not have a round the year employment can undertake this production during the slack seasons. Especially the landless farmworkers get work only during the farming seasons and face seasonal unemployment. Even these days are not consecutive, they are spread over the whole year. Together these people add up to millions. In the terminology of economics the alternative value of time of all these people is equivalent to zero under the present economic system. They cannot find any productive work. The charkha can provide it to them.

59 No government or no other economic system can give economic value to their time. An old woman who took to the charkha said: Now my daughter-in-law serves me another roti (piece of bread) and that too with ghee (butter).

'Unto This Last' The charkha therefore is the only instrument which can reach the lowest strata of the society. The millions of those who are left out by the contemporary system can become active participants in the economic life. The charkha can become their dependable support. It can provide them easy work at their own homes. It can help them stand on their own strength. By enabling them to contribute to the family and to the society, it can elevate their status. Instead of remaining burdensome to others they can become useful to them. The charkha can give them a productive and therefore a purposeful life. If one were poor, living in a village, landless, low-caste, illiterate, a widow, old or blind, or even if one were condemned to all these together, one can still make cloth on the charkha in her hut, a beautiful saree for only 0.9 kilogram of cotton, and therefore have a decent, comfortable and dignified life. The charkha can thus reach the millions of people lying at the periphery to whom the profits of the modern progress have not reached and from whom the modern system has not benefited. It can therefore help them gain economic strength and independence, personal dignity, family respectability and social esteem.

Population Control Some crucial reasons for the explosive increase in population in the low-income countries, and in the low-income groups within these countries, can be traced in the economic predicament of these people. A major, often the only, source of earning a livelihood for the poor is their physical labour. For their old age, therefore,

60 they have to rely on their children, They do not have a bank-balance or an insurance policy or a property which can be encashed when required. As the bank-balance is a hedge against old age for the rich, so are children for the poor. The support from their children is their only support, only asset, in cases of emergency, disability and old age. Another reason for high birth-rate among the poor is the high infant mortality due to malnutrition and scarcities afflicting them. This makes it imperative to first create alternative sources of livelihood and better standards of living among them for solving the problem of population explosion. By providing self-employment facility and local availability of commodities, the charkha can constitute a rational pivotal step in this direction.

Massive Production in Villages Out of the total Indian population of 850 million, as many as 650 million people live in villages. Even considering only a minimum of two pairs of clothing per year amounting to an expenditure of eight to ten rupees per person per month on an average, the value of cloth required in villages would sum up to a massive total of rupees six billion every month. These very villages grow raw cotton, so instead of sending it away and sitting idle if they produced cloth themselves they can produce at the massive rate of about Rs.70 billion worth of cloth a year, always. For comparison, it might be observed that at present virtually no industrial production takes place in villages. The charkha can therefore make a tremendous contribution to the nation's wealth by bringing into the economic mainstream the millions of village people by initiating them into the production of textiles and, as discussed in the previous chapter, of other commodities which follow.

Wealth from Wastes Another advantage of cloth- production this way is the new possibility of using any variety of raw-cotton in

61 yarn-production as the grip of fingers, unlike that in the machines, can be varied as required. Especially, the charkha can utilise all the short-staple varieties of cotton which can be grown on wasteland and which do not require fertilisers, pesticides or even irrigation. These varieties are not useful to textile mills and therefore not even grown at present. If cloth were produced with the charkha these varieties can be grown cheaply and used profitably. The country can therefore produce cloth, the commodity accounting for the largest national expenditure, outside agriculture, exclusively from the raw material and human energy which are being wasted at present. Moreover, the long-staple cotton, necessary for the spinning -machines of the textile mills, can be grown on fertile land only. So, if the cloth were made through the charkha, the millions of acres of fertile land, occupied at present for growing long-staple varieties of cotton for textile mills5 can then be released for growing foodgrains and other crops. The charkha can, therefore, bring about a substantial increase in food production.

Village Development At present the village people have to buy their clothrequirements from cities, for which they need cash, and it is the cash for which they have to sell whatever produce they have. For obtaining the cash they often have to sell-off their produce under desperation, at very low prices. Their need for cash can be reduced if they produced their own cloth because the village community's considerable and indispensable expenditure is over cloth. It follows that if a village community were to produce its own cloth, it would be able to substantially reduce its cashrequirements and therefore would not be forced to sell its produce under desperation. In that case it would be able

62 to utilise its produce according to its own will and choice, to grow what is useful to itself and to use its wealth for raising its own welfare. The charkha can open up this choice for villages. At present, on the contrary, in spite of growing all raw materials the villages have to beg for help to the government and to others. It is becoming increasingly clear that village people would not be able to carry out production which they cannot do independently, without requiring outside help. A self -contained system of production and distribution within the village is, therefore, necessary for launching production in villages. Only the charkha meets this feasibility criterion at present as all necessary requirements from the raw materials to the market can be met in producing cloth with the charkha in villages. If the villages were to keep the production of their vital requirements to thems - elves, they can obtain and retain their freedom. They already grow food. The charkha can help them produce the other vital requirement cloth also themselves, and therefore can usher in economic and political freedom for the villages.

Reversing Destructive Economic Values The basic objectives of the modern economic system, according to which economic transactions, activities and policies are governed are profit and competition. However, the emphasis on the profit objective can destroy the motivation for selfless service to the society. Similarly, the emphasis on the objective of competition can destroy the motivation for cooperation among the people. The charkha, as will be discussed in Chapter 9, can reverse these trends and re-establish the values of cooperation and service to the society while retaining healthy competition and profits not in the monetary but in the real sense.

Availability of Basic Needs to All If a fundamental objective of an economy is the availability of basic needs to all, as now claimed by many, the charkha

63 becomes most relevant. The charkha is the only instrument which can ensure anybody anywhere in the world both cloth and food in exchange of cloth. Moreover, as the charkha enables one to obtain the basic requirements without the dependence on external financial support or a government -operated system, it can provide a society its basic needs not only in terms of food and cloth but also in terms of freedom and dignity. As the basic needs, food and cloth, can be produced in villages, it hardly serves any purpose to centralise their production, especially cloth- production, in cities and then redistribute the cloth back in the villages, adding up in the process,the cost and profit margins on the price tags.

A Comparative Return Where None Exists Some criticise the charkha for being incompatible with this age of speed. According to them the charkha involves drudgery. As economists may put it, what is the productivity per day of the charkha? In a way the 'productivity per day' is a notion created by modern economics, a sign of the machine -oriented culture. It seems hardly relevant for the large unemployed populations whose main worry is how to use their time. What can be the meaning of 'productivity per day' to the millions of people who, due to the unavailability of work, are forced to waste months, their lives in fact, and consequently condemned to starvation and debt? As these village people cannot find any work, their alternative to the charkha is not a better job but no work at all. For them the relevant issue is that the production from the charkha is available, certain and permanent. Their problem is not the 'productivity per day', it is that of having a productive activity everyday. However, for the sake of analysis, let us consider the productivity per day of the charkha. An average person can spin during eight hours about three to four hanks, amounting to (considering 25 to 30 threads in an inch of cloth) approximately 1.5 square metres of cloth.

64 After deducting the payments for weaving and raw cotton the net production would work out to be about a metre of cloth a day. Three additional points must be considered: (1) At the least this can meet the family's needs obtained in exchange of cloth. Within a couple of months, a person can spin enough cloth for his, or her, family and can obtain other things from the cloth made during the rest of the year. (2) The value of this production is not less than the wages of farm labour, which are Rs.15 per day officially and about Rs.8 to 10 effectively. Again (a) The farm-work is not available to the entire unemployed population. (b) Even to those who can get it, the farm-- wages are available only during the farming seasons, while no seasonal unemployment is involved in the charkha. (c) The farm-wages are available only to those who can go to work on the farms, but the charkha can be used at home. (d) The farm-work requires heavy physical exertion under the heat of the sun, while the charkha does not involve such strain. (e) In times of calamities, such as famine, flood or cyclone, when even farm-work is not available, the charkha is a handy~ instrument available to everybody providing ready work and quick returns. (3) When other industries follow khadi production as discussed in the previous chapter, the value of khadi keeps on rising as it fetches other locally produced commodities and services in exchange, perpetually raising the productivity of the spinners. The relevant point about the productivity of the charkha is that the charkha is the only instrument which can generate productivity among the millions of the weaker members of the world society who have no productivity at present and that the productivity is high enough to enable them to have a free, dignified and decent life. The relevant point about the productivity issue is that no alternative ideology has been able to provide a system by which two hours of work can earn two square meals for anybody at any place and at any time.

65 Healthier Exchange System It might be questioned whether the charkha retards exchange among people, whether it secludes villages from one another. The charkha, however, does not imply building walls around villages and cutting them off from the outside world. The self -sufficiency it provides is in basic needs, so that the villages can be economically strong, secure and free. That need not discourage them from exchanging other commodities and services with the outside world. As Gandhi explained, "I do not want India an isolated life at all, but I do not want to depend on any country for my food and clothing."6 On the contrary, the charkha can remove the major vice of helplessness prevailing in the present exchange system. The lack of an alternative to earn a living for their family, drives many poor people to sell off their produce or labour at any low price. If they can obtain their bread and basic needs on their own they would not be forced to do so and would be able to carry out the exchange in a purposeful way. As the charkha can make them self-reliant in basic needs, it can remove the helplessness and the destitution prevailing among the millions of the disadvantaged and underprivileged in the present exchange system. It can thereby make the exchange system healthy, purposeful and progressive. The charkha-based economy can therefore establish an improved exchange system and better interdependence amongst villages and cities. Moreover, within the village it creates so much interdependence that it enables one to understand the value of interdependence almost at every step, unlike the present system which alienates people from one another.

A Way Out for the Landless Those who do not own land - almost eighty per cent of the village population in India - have to depend on the mercy of the landowners for a livelihood. Some scholars therefore

66 believe the re-distribution of land-ownership to be an indispensable step to progress. However, no land ownership is required for the cloth production through the charkha which therefore can provide the landless people an alternative system and additional source of earning. Thus the millions of the landless village people who in order to make a living under the present system have to depend on the land-owners, obey the land-owners' conditions and spend their lives under the burden of debt, can find a way out of the drudgery and slavery through the charkha. The land owners would also, contrary to hampering this process, as is often feared, rather help it because, as will be seen in Chapter 8, the charkha way is extremely useful to them also. Therefore, most of the village people who have lost their hope for the future also on account of not owning land can get out of the unfortunate predicament by starting the textile and subsequently other industries with the help of the charkha. The charkha can ensure them a bright and secure future, and break the present impasse of land-ownership blocking progress.

Fostering Intellectual Abilities When hands, head and heart are combined in accomplishing a task, the individual's abilities can find full scope for growth. In a charkha-based economy any individual can not only find work but become a producer instead of a labourer. He would create a product instead of working under instructions of a boss and earning wages for his labour. Consequently, his constrained mental talents can find scope for growth. As a philosopher has described the present system, man is becoming a vegetable. What else can be the consequence of the silicon chip and mass production ? They can weaken his faculty of thinking. Besides, by rendering millions of people unemployed and therefore burdensome the present system drives them to crimes. As a proverb puts it, an idle mind is a devil's workshop. The system drives the employed people to crimes as well

67 by forcing them into constant, cut-throat and inhuman competition. The psychological tensions induce people to fall on alcohols and addictions. On the other hand, as the present set-up can employ only a very small fraction of the total population the society's benefits are limited to only their intelligence, while in a charkha-based economic structure the entire population can participate in production and consequently the society can benefit from a vast base of intelligence. The present dependence of the society on a very small group can turn out to be dangerous. It is critically uncertain when the techno-economic structure, on which the entire social system is hanging, will turn out treacherous. The control of the few technocrats is so tight that the ordinary man feels helpless, voiceless, faceless. The contemporary educational set-up also has become an instrument for acquiring special privileges for a few rather than for attaining growth for all.

Healing Process Spinni ng helps one to identify himself with the weaker sections of society. Gandhi advocated it as a healing process, as an instrument to curb crime and as an aid to thought process. Jawaharlal Nehru advised: when in confusion, spin. A New York Post journalist commented: "If only Americans could get down to spin, they might be able to do some thinking for which otherwise they get no time.7 A jailer cited the use of spinning in curing lunatics, and a Glasgow professor advocated the therapeutic value of spinning. When the charkha was introduced in a slum, a spinner advised his neighbour, "Why don't you spin? You will get good ideas."

68 Holistic Approach The charkha is an economic vision which views life as a whole and in all its varied aspects. Therefore its virtues are so fundamental that every person finds it useful in his or her own way, even though these ways are different. For example, for an old, poor, blind widow the charkha is a support for earning her daily bread, while for Jawaharlal Nehru khadi was the instrument for liberating India from the British rule. A British energy scientist likes the charkha because "I want to meet my needs with my energy." An Australian social worker says, "The central pillar which has been so far missing in my Ashram is the charkha." A lady translator in a publishing company in Brazil feels, "So fdr I was not able to comprehend economics and politics but after seeing the charkha everything seems to be falling in place." An American college student says, "The charkha is a concrete step to take to a spiritual path under my surroundings.8

Environmental Protection Made from locally and easily grown cotton (or wool), without chemical fertilisers and pesticides, and with only two very small simple instruments - a charkha and a pitloom -obliterating electricity, khadi is the totally unpolluted cloth. Moreover, khadi -production makes possible the growth of the production of other commodities and services which also require only a few and small instruments, no electricity and easily cultivable raw materials. In total contrast, at present commodities are produced with giant machines at various stages, destroying in the process the limited and non-renewable natural resources and polluting environment. The environmental problems emerge from the need to sustain the mass-scale production through power-driven machines and the culture of the cities. D.WD.-5

69 The charkha therefore is a concrete step for turning from the present environmental damages and imbalances to an environmentally sound and healthy economy, ensuring what environmental scientists call sustainable development. The present mega-scale production also necessitates the centralisation of the cultivation of the huge total requirements of raw materials in particular areas, for minimising their collection- and- transportation costs. Instead the charkha can initiate people in the innumerable villages in all different places to cultivate their small requirements of raw materials on their surrounding land, establishing the ecological balances. The local production -and - distribution system generated by the charkha can reduce exploitation. In such a situation an individual would be induced to take care of every life, every species around him. As Gandhi argued: "Khadi mentality means sympathy with every life on the earth.-9 He predicted, "Future measurements will take note not merely of the human family but of all that lives and even as we are slowly but surely discovering that it is an error to suppose that I-Endus can thrive upon the degradation of a fifth of themselves or that people of the West can rise or live upon the exploitation and degradation of the Eastern and African nations, so shall we realise in the fulness of time, that our dominion over the lower order of creation is not for their slaughter, but for their benefit equally with ours. For I am certain that they are endowed with a soul as that I am." 10 The village-based eivilisation worships nature. It considers everything in nature as a living entity which is to be revered. But the modern materialistic eivilisation considers earth and all its entities as marketable commodities which are to be harnessed and exploited for accumulating money unlimitedly. The absurdity of this contention can be illustrated by an example of the American system of farming which makes huge profits but is so highly mechanised and petroleum-subsidised that it turns out to be inefficient when measured in terms of the amount of energy used for given output of calories.

70 Instead of recognising man's interdependence with nature and co-operating with nature the contemporary system equates nature in terms of its convertibility in cash. This ignorance can make man his own worst enemy.

Non-violent Economic Order Gandhi's concern for a non-violent economic order demanded that morality should not be subordinated to economic considerations. "Wealth which is not compatible with morality cannot be true wealth."11 What are the economic considerations which subordinate morality in the present set-up? They are fundamentally related to the present system of mass -production through power-driven machines which in turn necessitates sales in distant markets, as opposed to the system of small-scale production for self-and-local use. The present system of mass -production, consequently, cultivates exploitation and therefore violence on several counts: It breeds fierce battle among competitors, ruthless sales -promotion, spying and distrust, adulteration, speculation, corruption, the control of the managing institutions, and so on. It creates unemployment in countries where the production is dumped. It requires huge procurements of raw materials from distant lands promoting rackets to force the suppliers to provide them at cheapest prices. In the producing countries, it involves hiring people for money, or the sale of labour, and forcing them into constant fear of their substitution by machines or other workers. The mass-scale centralised production of basic necessities involves the control of the supplying agencies and the consequent loss of freedom of the people. The significance of khadi lies precisely in counter-acting these considerations of the present economic system. 12 The

71 charkha-based system involves a village republic in which the entire population can have self-employment in producing primarily for local use, at least the basic necessities, with simple tools and local materials. It, therefore, minimises exploitation and domination. If khadi is sold in cities by an organisation which hires on wages the spinners and weavers in villages to work on its spinning and weaving machines there, the mere production of khadi in village huts does not imply decentralisation. As Gandhi protested, "Even in Lancashire some cloth is made at home, but it is not for the use of the home. It is for the use of the masters. It would be outrageous to call this decentralisation. So also in Japan everything is made at home, but it is not for the use of the home. It is all for the Government which has centralised the whole business. ... I would certainly not call it decentralisation." 13 Distribution in outside markets involves separation between those who derive the benefits and those who bear the burden, and therefore the longer the chain of distribution the more is the likelihood of exploitation. Rainforests in Indonesia are cut to make coffee tables, for example, for Americans. What is required, therefore, is every village producing khadi for its own use and not for sale in cities for wages to be used for buying mill-cloth. As discussed in Chapter 1, this way even the economic returns to the spinners would be higher and secure. Additionally, rather fundamentally, this would put khadi above commercial competition, thereby reversing the terms of exchange between city and villages. "Khadi was from its inception conceived for the sake of reversing the order though never to bleed the townspeople", explained Gandhi. "To reverse the order was to restore the natural relation.- 14 What khadi, therefore, achieves is the freedom of small village producers from their dependence

72 on the markets in cities and thereby an end to the exploitation and inequalities generated by the present exchange system.15 That is why Gandhi's response to his fellow-workers who hesitated to stop the sale of khadi in cities was definite "Then our ideal must be lowered. -16 What was the ideal? It was the attainment of "Raniarajya" (welfare state) defined concretely as "independence (which) should be political, economic and moral: .1 'Political' necessarily means the removal of the control of the British army in every shape and form. " 'Economic' means entire freedom from British capitalists and capital, as also their Indian counterparts. ... " 'Moral' means freedom from armed defence forces. My conception of Ramarajya excludes replacement of the British army by a national army of occupation. A country that is governed by even its national army can never be morally free .17 The moral significance of khadi lies in its relation to the objectives of Ramarajya, i.e. in its creation of an economy of self-sufficient small-scale producers not having to need machinery not- enter large-scale commodity markets or sale of labour, thereby ending slavery and violence. If non-violence is to be central to our ethos, if violence either as conflicts and wars or in the subtle forms of exploitation is to be minimised, the charkha can provide the necessary system.

Gandhi and the Charklia The world would be indebted to Gandhi for having revived the charkha, a tool known to almost all parts of the world

73 till yesterday, and for having shown its message through his life. He had absolutely no doubt about this central philosophy of his life, "I may deserve the curses of posterity for many mistakes of omission and commission but I am confident of earning its blessings for suggesting a revival of the charkha, I stake my all on it. For every revolution of the wheel spins peace, good-will and love."18 The very short diary he wrote in 1931 and 1932, when his work was in full swing throughout the country, begins each day invariably with the word 'the charkha'. He emphasised, "India might be able to attain victory through the sword, but I would not be proud of it. As a nation India can live and die only for the chat-kha."19 About the bonfires of mill-cloth, when many expressed wonder at the logic about burning a useful commodity like cloth, he replied, "This fire burns the weaknesses of the heart and of the head. I am burning my shame."20 "My submission, in connection with the foreign (and mill-made) cloth, is that it is more than polluted and is infected with germs that are fatal to the welfare of India - moral, economic and political. -21 He saw God in every thread of the charkha. He regarded it as the instrument for salvation. "I do regard the spinning wheel as a gateway to iny spiritual salvation."22 He plied it every day till the last day of his life. The only thing he carried with him when he was sentenced to jails was the charkha. When people wanted to celebrate his birthday he instructed them to celebrate the charkha by christening it as "the Charkha Twelfth". A plea for the charkha is the refrain of his writings. He placed the charkha at the centre of the national flag during the freedom struggle. By reviving the charkha in the huts of the villages throughout India, he

74 revived the latent energy of the masses, brought new strength and confidence in the people and gained 'freedom through the thread of cotton' from the unshakable British empire. When questioned by a New York TiMes reporter, "Can the spinning wheel serve as a counter-weapon to the atom bomb?", he replied, "I have not the slightest doubt that the saving of India and of the world lies in the wheel. "23 Gandhi and the charkha are synonymous. 24 So sure was he about the charkha that when the members of the congress party hesitated about the spinning franchise, he replied, "I have faith that the day will come, - it may be after my death - when men will say that after all, Gandhi was right."25

A Vision, A Strategy As this chapter has strived to show, the charkha is not just an instrument, not just a production technique, it is a vision, it. is a strategy. It is a strategy for a progressive, prosperous, peaceful, non- exploitative, just and free society.

75 4

Democracy at Grassroots

Around the world there are rising aspirations for freedom. However, even in the countries with a democratic political system, people are painfully discovering the limitations of the democracy by representation and its contrast to the democracy by participation. Above all, the transnational corporations dominating the global society have hardly any loyalties to or concerns for national interests. Nonetheless they can outgrow even nations in size and power. Nations functioning within their own different political frameworks have to face the challenges and upheavals of the common global economy. Pitched against the chaos emerging from this conflict between the strong global economic system and a multitude of national ruling systems, the common man, aspiring and striving and pining for freedom, becomes voiceless, faceless. Never before was humanity subjected to such a domination of the giant centralised global economy. The contemporary crisis, therefore, can be resolved not through the strengthening of the modern system characterised by the supremacy of money and power, but through the regaining by the people at the grassroots their own strength, their freedom and their dignity.

Irrelevancy of the Governmental System Even within a nation, the prevailing power structures have proved bankrupt. In spite of efforts and financial allocations

76 by the government the basic problems facing the people, from inflation and unemployment to the deterioration in education and health care, have been worsening which proves the futility of tackling these problems from the top. National economic plans, strutAured by the planning body of the government, are primarily political exercises. They spell out basic objectives of the society in spite of the fact that a government machinery can do but little to reach the poor, the unemployed, the landless and the disadvantaged who, however, constitute a large majority of the population in a country like India. What these millions of people need is work, while what the government can sanction are money and laws which are no substitutes for work. It is even doubtful what social purpose is served by the government spending and legislation. Evidently, the number of policemen has increased but not protection, the number of universities has increased but not knowledge, the number of law-courts has increased but not Justice, the number of government -minis ters has increased but not leadership. The changes introduced by the government therefore only scratch the small top of the socio-economic pyramid. Not that this is unknown to planners and policy-makers but they continue to choose to remain quiet about it. What a government economic plan provides is a dream of a conceivable welfare state, in order to feed people with hopes. But it cannot cure malnutrition, disease and unemployment of the masses eroding their capabilities and foreclosing their future. Therefore the tax-collection, for example, undertaken in the name of mobilising resources for the great social goals of uplifting the millions of poor, actually get spent to finance government departments, industrial corporations, big land-owners and established organisations. These facts are becoming so assertive that even in the industrialised countries where these latter sectors form a substantial part of the society, the warning is being signalled that the government is a costly irrelevancy. A search for a solution to basic economic problems like inflation and unemployment would be futile, therefore, if it is addressed to changes merely at the top level. The changes

77 in political leadership or political parties have hardly helped to improve the basic performance of the economy. The solutions, therefore, might be searched not in making some modifications at the top level but in strengthening the base of the socio-economic system, in strengthening the poor and the weak and the disadvantaged at the bottom of the society, in capacitating them to survive and proceed on their own rather than look for support from authorities. We have witnessed enough the inadequacies of measures to induce economic progress from the top, instead the rational way might be to start from the base and build upwards. In stark contrast, the process of the present high-technology industrialisation vests increasing power and money at the top of the politico -economic system and weakens the base. The self -accumulating spiral of power- and -money prevents the benefits of even this economic growth from percolating down to the people at large. It seems difficult to perceive whether this system with perpetually heavier top and weaker base can survive indefinitely. The profit motive, the core of the system, results in increasing disparities between the rich and the poor, creating widespread discontent and unrest and instigating the forces of violence and disorder, of revolts and crimes, and consequently obstructs growth. What is needed, therefore, is not some modifications in the present system, but a new economic paradigm itself, which would introduce changes not from the top but from the base, which would draw upon not the monetary or legislative sanctions, but upon the participation and the resultant strength of the masses at large, which would activise not the government or the financial institutions but the people themselves at the grassroots. A fresh and revolutionary paradigm is needed for a holistic restructuring of the economy. The process of modern technology opens up the way to the centralisation of power and wealth and the centralised power can enslave the human race. A concrete and unmistakable strategy for preventing this is provided by the charkha.

78 Democracy Derives from Non-Violence True freedom of the masses can be attained through the elimination of exploitation from the economic system, by replacing the present centralised production with a decentralised production system, by replacing the present economic system of mass -production -for -global -markets with a new one of local- production- for-local -use. Such an economic system, therefore, requires village development which can be ushered in by the charkha. A non-violent social order can be constructed on the basis of self-reliant and prospering villages in which the entire population can freely participate in the process of progress. The present system of centralised production through power-driven machines produces on a mass scale and therefore necessitates sales in distant markets, struggles for defeating competitors, control of managing agencies, hiring people for money and so on, leading to multifold exploitation and violence, and suffocating the freedom of the people. Wars lead to dictatorship, non-violence alone can lead a society to democracy.

Freedom Means Earning a Livelihood Independently By enabling the millions of the disadvantaged members of the society to have a steady and gainful self-employment in the production of khadi and thereby creating self-employment opportunities for the rest in the production of other commodities and services, the charkha generates an economic system, in which all members of the society can make their living on their own and do not have to depend on help, if at all available, from authorities as at present. On the contrary, the rest depend for their employment on the weaker sections of the society because the latter, by producing cloth, provide them markets for their outputs. Without these wide sections to whom the rest can sell their outputs they would not be able to undertake the production, and they cannot supply their outputs to these sections unless the latter have something which they need. At present the latter have nothing - neither money nor a commodity - but

79 the charkha can break this impasse by enabling them to produce cloth which all the rest need. This is what ensures democracy at grassroots, because the real freedom of the masses is not their ability to vote for a political party as at present, it is their ability to earn their living on their own without being dependent for it on the mercy of the authorities at the top. A parliamentary system can, therefore, at best bring political freedom which is not true freedom. Gandhi introduced the concept of true non-violent freedom, 'Swaraj' i.e. self-rule or home-rule, which can come only by pursuing the programme of village development through the charkha. It follows that the true leaders of the people ought to be engaged not in contesting the parliamentary elections but in initiating the charkha in villages for constructing a strong and free village society. Upon being questioned by a newspaper correspondent about the forthcoming elections in India, a poet in New Delhi replied: "We need a revolution, not an election." Said another writer: "I am an angry old man. We did not visualise freedom like this."1 Less than two years before India gained political freedom from British rule Gandhi instructed the members of the All India Spinners Association not to take part in elections or any other political activity of that sort.2 Gandhi was at that time, like others, anticipating transfer of power but he did not approve of the plans of economic development which his former co-workers were chalking out in order to build a giant industrialisation. He insisted on and urged for commencing the charkha work with more rigour aiming at reconstructing free and prosperous villages, self - reliant in basic needs, producing mainly for use, not having to enter into large-scale ruthless exchange or sale of labour for earning wages.

80 Democracy in Industrially Advanced Economics Even in highly industrialised countries freedom, one's own power, derives from the capacity for self -reliance. The present huge economy, however, aims at eroding that capacity, and with it one's ability to defend oneself against economic aggressiveness. The success of democracy depends on changing over to a system of local self-reliance. A vibrant democracy depends on the people's participation in the process of progress and consequently on the widest ownership of productive capacity. But the present heavy automation, long distribution lines and the resulting complexity, demand larger and larger institutions to manage them. Gradually these institutions outgrow even nations. Instead of simply managing a system they become its masters and disown their responsibility even to the nation that promoted them. The president of an American transnational company, for example, said, "I was asked the other day about United States competitiveness and I replied that I don't think about it at all." Said the vice president of another company: "The United States does not have an automatic call on our resources. There is no mindset that puts this country firSt.3 In order to attain and retain freedom and autonomy, therefore, the people even in the industrialised countries must produce their basic necessities, food and cloth, themselves. The power of the transnational corporations on their lives can be contained when the corporations can no longer threaten them with starvation or freezing. Freedom means not having a boss. Such freedom, and the associated human dignity, can come only through self-employment. The economic system in which everybody can have self-employment is provided by the charkha. In total contrast, one wonders what kind of love for freedom do some highly industrialised democracies proclaim when they want the rest of the world to dance to their tune?

81 Self -employment for the Entire Population For ensuring true freedom through self -employment opportunities to the whole population therefore instead of looking at the top for the government or the monetary system to accomplish this miracle which they have consistently failed to do; the natural, feasible and unmistakable way is to begin with the base and build upwards or, rather, around. That means introducing the charkha amongst the millions of the weak members of the society, who are not able to produce anything in the present system, but who with the help of the charkha can easily and profitably produce khadi and following it other necessities which all in the society would want, who therefore will then be always needed and demanded by the rest. As these commodities and services can be exchanged for one another as well, leading to a self -generating employment -and -growth cycle, the millions of the weak people who are out at the periphery can then constitute the centre of the employment-and-growth cycle for the entire society. The weak in the present system can then nourish all the rest. The charkha, therefore, is necessary and useful not only for the weaker sections, it is much more so for the other sections of the society because without its base their employment and prosperity cannot be sustained. The charkha serves all in the society and not the weaker sections exclusively. Only if the majority of the population can be economically revived, can other industries take roots and flourish. Only if the base is strong can the structure be retained. It would be difficult for a market mechanism to function in the face of enormous and increasing disparities. It wot~ld be difficult for an economic system to survive if it weakens the large majority in the society.

Sustaining Force of the Economy This also proves that the sustaining force of an economy is not at the top, not with the government or the monetary system which hold power, control, finance, machinery and

82 so on including technology and 'knowledge'. It is at the base, with the economically, physically, mentally weak members of the society who can provide basic necessities and, in turn, markets which all the members of the society need.

Freedom From the Present System What the masses have at present is an ability to vote for legislators who in turn provide an economic system catering to their needs. They are, therefore, dependent on a system which does not, and cannot, actually provide employment and livelihood to a majority of them. What the people at the grassroots need, therefore, is freedom from the present politico-economic system itself. Instead of letting their destiny being dependent on the authorities they need to be able to shape it themselves. The charkha becomes useful here because its implementation does not require external support, so the masses can attain their power on their own, without having to convince or wait for or depend on others. It, therefore, ensures that the people at the bottom of the present structure, in spite of being under -privileged and disadvantaged, can bring about the necessary change themselves. They can acquire a new socio-economic strength by taking to the charkha. They would no longer remain worthless or burdensome but would, on the contrary, form the backbone and strength of the economy. Even if the government leadership were not to cooperate sincerely, the struggle for true democracy through the charkha can still continue. In fact, in order to be an instrument of true freedom, the charkha must not flourish under the government or any other patronage. It must flourish, if need be, even in spite of the resistance from the government or any other quarters.

Balanced Instead of Knife-edged Structure The present socio-economic structure being pyramidal creates hierarchies of all kinds and further, by perpetually weakening the people at the bottom, it worsens into a

83 knife-edged structure itself. In contrast, in the charkha-based society, the millions of people producing khadi create a centre which supports all occupations and activities around it. As the charkha spearheads true democracy amongst the underprivileged, it gradually brings into its fold the reconstruction of a whole range of village industries, social services and basic education. The village then emerges as the crucial social -political unit, self-reliant not only in economic matters but also in governing and defending itself, As Gandhi emphasised: "Independence must begin at the bottom. Thus every village will be a republic or 'panchayat' having full powers. It follows therefore that every village has to be self-sustained and capable of managing its affairs even to the extent of defending itself against the whole world.4 Thus the 700,000 villages of India will dominate the country.

Underprivileged Sections of the Contemporary Society Growth justifies exploitation according to the conventional economic theory. So it creates unrest among the weak and the disadvantaged sections on all fronts. Moreover, as the system establishes the supremacy of money, it considers the weak and disadvantaged people almost worthless. This has led several disadvantaged groups to rebel against the system, in particular the feminists and the environmentalists, while the weak groups such as the old, the handicapped and particularly the landless are often not in a position to even put up a fight to safeguard their rights. These issues are so basic and crucial that each of them needs complete attention, treatment and justice. Nonetheless, a few observations which are common to them would be useful. 1) The struggle of these groups to secure gains within the present system would be a self-defeating strategy because the system's objective, namely the material accumulation, and the system's mode of functioning, namely the mega-tech machines, would always vest control and power in the strong and established groups, and uphold their superiority. The

84 strategy of these groups must, therefore, be oriented to changing the whole system itself. 2) Although each disadvantaged group is exploited by its own opposite group - women by men, nature -protectors by nature -exploiters, old by young, landless by land-owners - its struggle against its own opposite group would lead to only a limited success. However, if their exploitation is understood not as the outcome of the actions of their own respective opposite-groups but as the outcome of the system, they can unite in changing the system, rather than each group unsuccessfully struggling in its own sphere. Moreover, the disadvantaged groups are interrelated as most of them contain commonly the same people. Thus the economically pborest are also the environmentally deprived as they are pushed into ecologically fragile environments, drylands and hilly areas or slums of the urban areas. They are also the unemployed, the illiterate, the undernourished, the ill, the alcoholics, the low-caste and the minorities. A development strategy must therefore take on the challenge of all these categories jointly. As the charkha-based econornic system can liberate the weak from slavery and exploitation involved in making a decent living, and can provide everybody an equal opportunity to choose an occupation according to their ability vis-a-vis society's needs, it can help each individual to develop her or his full potential as a human being.

Equality of Women Gandhi explained this in the context of women. "Woman has been suppressed under custom and law for which man was responsible and in shaping of which she had no hand. In a plan of life based on non-violence, woman has as much right to shape her own destiny as man has to shape his."5 Historically also, in the wdke of the 'industrial revolution' women were most unfavourably affected. Prior to that the D.W D -6

85 industries were home-based, so women had a share in production, distribution and management. But with the rise .of the factory-system, they had to "choose between becoming dependent on what the man chose to give her out of his wage or going to work in the factory and leaving the home. The man's wage had not been fixed on the basis of keeping family. ... When the woman's earning declined the family income was insufficient, the man's wages were not adjusted to meet the deficit and the woman who does not like to skimp the children and dare not skimp the wage-earner is always the one to go short first. The family income became so small when the woman's and children's earnings declined that the Poor Law had to step in.6 Women should, therefore, take the initiative to change the system by changing over to producing and using khadi. At present, on the contrary, by buying and stockpiling millmade cloth women are supporting not just the modern textile industry but thereby the entire economic system which has been dominated by men and which has reduced women to the subordinate position. As the textile industry is the engine of the economic system, the effective way for all those who are dissatisfied with the system, who are exploited by it and who want to change it is to stop buying mill-made cloth (including the khadi sold by the Khadi Commission of India which is totally different from the khadi discussed in this book as explained on page 8) and start either producing khadi or teaching the khadi- production to the weak and the disadvantaged people and asking them for their khadi in exchange of what they want which, however, might be commodities and services instead of money. Efforts to improve the present system by persuading the government to sanction finance or legislation are futile. Even in an affluent country like America government -intervention does not work for the poor and for all those who are left

86 outside, uprooted and dispossessed by the system. They are inevitably neglected. One is reminded of the memorable quote retained from Ronald Reagan: Government isn't the solution, it's the problem. The usefulness of the charkha is its enabling the weak and the disadvantaged sections to shake-off their slavery and exploitation on their own. It enables them to do exactly what they need: stop co-operating with the exploiters - i.e. with the exploitative system - and start reviving their own strength. The way they can accomplish this is by producing themselves what they are buying at present, and since what these sections are buying the most at present is cloth they can start with khadi -production. As khadi turns out to be both much cheaper and better than the equivalent cloth in the market the rest of the people would soon want it, raising perpetually the demand and therefore the strength of the weaker sections. This can solve the baffling problem of the present crisis, namely, how the weak can win over the present giant exploitative system. Their destiny is in their own hands and not in the hands of the authorities, including the government. If they revive their own strength, their subjugation to the others will automatically wither away. As Ramayana, an Indian mythological epic, describes the puny monkeys, combined in brotherhood, brought about the downfall of a.giant, Ravana, ten-headed in his greed and twenty-handed in his exploitation. Blaming the current system for the unprecedented holocaust, 53 Nobel prize winners had in a joint manifesto called for civil disobedience by the world's poor to all laws except basic human rights. Hundreds of millions of helpless people are "the victims of the international political and economic disorder which prevails in the world today", the laureates said. "If the weak organise themselves and use the few but powerful *weapons available to them; non-violent actions exemplified by Gandhi, adopting and imposing objectives which are limited and suitable; if these things happen, it is certain that an end could be put to this catastrophe in our time." 7

87 Although the weaker sections of the society cannot win their battle within the framework of the contemporary system, they can change the system itself, by non-cooperating with it, by not buying the market-products - especially mill-cloth - and start producing these commodities themselves. They only need to get rid of their ignorance and idleness. The charkha enables them to do this successfully and profitably. They can thus restructure the whole system, for the benefit of all including the strong and the established sections. They can thus accomplish what even those at the top cannot. They can educate the people in power

88 5

Industrial Revolution in Retrospect

Analysts, policy-makers and people at large are increasingly finding that the present ways will not work, that something has gone wrong and that we ought to change the course. As the problems of the contemporary society, from unemployment and inflation to crimes and armaments pile-up, have emerged from the economic system, their solution also needs to be searched in the economic system. "You know", said Gandhi, "how Adam Smith in his Wealth of Nations, after laying down certain principles according to which economic phenomena are governed, went on to describe c6rtain other things which constituted the 'disturbing factor' and prevented economic laws from having free play. Chief among these was the 'human element'. Now, it is this 'human element' on which the entire economics of khadi rests; and human selfishness, Adam Smith's 'Pure economic motive', constitutes the 'distributing factor' that has got to be overcome."1 One is reminded of a cartoon which shows A-dam (Smith) asking Eve who is offering him the apple: "How much”? 2 Explaining the human element which should be central to economics, Gandhi emphasised: "Khaddar (khadi) economics

89 is wholly different from the ordinary. The latter takes no note of the human factor. The former wholly concerns itself with the human. The latter is frankly selfish, the former necessarily unselfish. Competition (for profits) and therefore prices are eliminated from the conception of khaddar. There is no competition between hotels and domestic kitchens. It never enters into the head of the queen of the house to calculate the cost of her labour, the floor space, etc. She simply knows that to conduct the domestic kitchen is as much her duty as it is to bring up children. If she were to count the cost, the logic of facts will irresistibly drive her to the destruction of her kitchen as well as her children. Some have done both. But thank God the cult makes no promise of appreciable increase. It is our innate laziness which prevents us from seeing that we sinned against Indian humanity when we destroyed the domestic wheel. Let us repent of our sin and return to the peace-giving wheel.3 The economic philosophy which generally prevailed before the 'industrial revolution' emphasised the quality of life along with material wealth. Unlike the present centralisation of economic production and power, with corporations in the capitalist system and with the state in the communist system, this philosophy underlined decentralisation of economic production and power among the people themselves. Economic development was viewed as an integral part of the entire system of social development rather than as an exclusive objective in itself. Material accumulation and possession were judged in a broader et'hicall perspective. Economic progress was important but so were interpersonal relationships. Even after the industrialism swept the world, Gandhi in India emphasised an economic system which centred around man rather than around the machine, which served the people rather than the establishment. Although Gandhi did not claim himself as an economist, his search for overall and integrated development of man makes his recommendations about the

90 economy most relevant, realistic and rewarding. He gave economics a human face. 4 Material well-being could be appreciated if it were associated with care for humanity, if it were available to all. Since his concern was for every man - poor or rich, ruler or ruled - his basic philosophy holds true in any circumstances, at any time, and more so during the contemporary world crisis. His economic programme is an alternative to the race for industrialism. He did not mean to be a mere visionary, much less a theorist. He was a practical idealist. He protested against industrialism because of the misery he saw around him. So had Ruskin and Carlyle in their times. Gandhi also tried to show a way out. His charkha-based system can lift man above money and machines which seem to be eliminating the very human factor from the social equation. The charkha-based system is not a negation to industries. On the contrary, it provides a system of rural industrialisation involving production in millions of cottages, as an alternative to the present urban industrialisaton involving production in a few corporations only. Unlike the present system, the alternative of rural industrialisation through the charkha is both economically viable as well as environmentally sustainable. Gandhi had foreseen the problems of the contemporary world economy. "Industrialism is, I am afraid, going to be a curse for mankind. ... Industrialism depends entirely on your capacity to exploit, on foreign markets being open to you, and on the absence of competitors."5

91 He showed that as these factors fall, as they inevitably will over a period of time, unemployment will mount in industrialised economies. He argued, "What is industrialism but a control of the majority by a small minority? There is nothing attractive about it, nor is there anything inevitable in it. If the majority simply wills to say'no'to the blandishments of the minority, the latter is powerless for mischief."6 He saw clearly that the source of modern imperialism lies specifically in industrialism, i.e. in the system of power-driven machine-based large-scale production, a position he stated emphatically as early as in Hind Swaraj (or Indian Home Rule) in 1909 and stressed increasingly all his life, a conviction whicl) formed the most crucial theoretical foundation of his entire strategy. He, however, was not working for narrow nationalism. His solution is meant to be universal, applicable as much to the industrialised countries as to the countries such as India. Two centuries after the 'industrial revolution', it would be useful to investigate whom it has benefited. Aiming at profits and capital accumulation as industrialism does, it cannot serve all and ultimately not even a few. Although the 'industrial revolution' brought economic prosperity in the West, this depended on economically squeezing the rest of the world. The industries in the West were fed by raw materials, minerals, metals, oil and labour -intensive inputs from other countries. The increase in production was sustained by creating new markets abroad through economic and political power. When an industrialised country supplies goods to the rest of the world, it needs to hold it in bondage to secure its markets. For the sake of earning profits it dumps its goods elsewhere "irrespective of the needs of a people and at the risk of their impoverishment" - 7 Tn the process the rest of the world became increasingly poorer in relation to the West. Instead of reducing scarcities,

92 industrialism led to the concentration of incomes in only a few countries and in a few pockets in other countries. Within the industrialised countries the weak, the disabled, the old and even the children were neglected. In spite of achieving phenomenal mass production and wealth America has not been able to abolish its unemployment and poverty. Millions of Americans live in misery, they have not benefited from the mass production. Willis Herman in his recent book observes, "It appears that, regrettable as it may seem, society in the United States can no longer afford really good education for every child. It can no longer afford to protect citizens in the city streets at night. It cannot even afford to give all citizens the health care they need. On the other hand, extravagant packaging and advertising, wasteful consumption, unnecessary transportation all add to the Gross National Product,"8 For the rich also, the industrialism led to the production of prestigious products for superfluous consumption, creating tensions in society and pollution in natural environment. The editor of an American journal says: "In the richest nation in the world, filled with greatest array of toys and pleasures known to man, I find unhappiness, narrowness of spirit, fear, We are obsessed with security. ... We are passing laws against drugs, spending a fortune trying to prevent the sale of dangerous substance. Yet we have high levels of crime, drug abuse, violence. These things don't exactly bear witness to a benign and benevolent economic system."9 Worst of all, the global marketing and the resulting competition which the industrialism created led to the production of armaments paving the way to international conflicts. A German scientist explains, "Western man was so proud of his obvious material achievements measured in the terms of urbanisation, energy- consumption and 'auto' mobility, that

93 nobody felt inclined to listen to those few who were asking about the ultimate cost. We were proud of the doubling of the life-expectancy of the children in the West and tried not to take any notice of the modern killing capacities that we developed simultaneously. ... These few data from our anomic 'brave new world' should suffice. A culture based on individual and material achievement has reached a point of self-destruction." 10 Industrialism, therefore, cannot be judged as a success in the human context. "I would categorically state my conviction that the mania for mass production is responsible for the world crises"11 emphasised Gandhi. This argument, however, does not justify communist system or governmental control over industries because "the evils are inherent in industrialism and no amount of socialisation can eradicate them."12 The problems emerge from the centralisation of production, either with capitalists or with the government. "Mass production through power driven machinery even when state-owned will be of no avail."13 Some main features of the communist ideology stand in contrast to the Gandhian thought. For example, Gandhi emphasised power at the grassroots instead of power at the top, non-violence instead of force, constructive work instead of class conflict, democracy instead of controls, aiming at the sanctity of means instead of final objectives and a philosophy about the individual instead of a collectivist philosophy. Any centralisation of production, either through private corporations or through state control, leads to exploitation, takes away the individual freedom and initiative and ultimately blocks progress.

94 Even though opposite ideologically, both the capitalist system and the socialist system nonetheless rotate around the common mode: mass production through mega automatic technology. They both, therefore, involve centralised control over production in spite of differing on who controls it. Both emphasise large-scale farms, huge corporations and elaborate technostructures. Both search for and survive on massive markets. Both proliferate through central control over capital and land, over raw materials and energy. Worst of all, capitalism through its emphasis on monetary profit-oriented competition and communism through its emphasis on bureaucratic control, lead to conflict - between dominant and dependent, between rich and poor, between man and nature. It hardly makes a difference for an Asian or African villager whether he is exploited by capitalism or commuriism. Both the mature industrial systems themselves are now discovering the tension between their ideology and the reality. Both the systems are discovering the absurdity, inconsistency and frustration of the mega-scale production. Both have sclerotic tendencies. The future of the world, therefore, need not be governed by only these two alternatives, capitalism or communism, which emerged from the 'industrial revolution'. A search for a third alternative is necessary. Unlike these present systems which seem to fail because they try to inject economic development from the top, the charkha-based system begins with the base. For the charkha-based system, the process of progress begins with the poorest, and aims at strengthening them by insulating them from any development adverse to them. The economic programme centres around their needs and priorities and the best way they can meet them without being controlled or dominated by others. Thus, economic development has its value only as it lifts the lowest in the society. This is not, as it might sound, inconsistent with higher production because it reduces income -inequality, which is not just an ethical virtue but the very feasibility condition for production itself, as production cannot be kept up continuously unless the people at large have purchasing power, incentive to work

95 and a sense of involvement in the process of progress. Such a system is centred around villages or small communities in which all participate in production, and control themselves the production of basic necessities, especially food and cloth. As Gandhi pleaded, "Villages cannot retain the freedom they have enjoyed from time immemorial, if they do not control the production of prime necessaries of life. ... The machinery method is no doubt easy. But it is not necessarily a blessing on that account. The descent to a place is easy but dangerous. ... If the craze for the machinery method continues, it is highly likely that a time will come when we shall be so incapacitated and weak that we shall begin to curse ourselves for having forgotten the use of the living machines given to us by God."14 As he argued, "Industrialization on a mass scale will necessarily lead to passive or active exploitation of the villagers as problems of competition and marketing come in. Therefore we have to concentrate on the village being self-contained, manufacturing mainly for use."15 On the contrary, however, capitalism has led corporations in the industrialised countries to become transnational; as raw materials, inexpensive labour and markets lie abroad. The transnational. corporations bring together the rich and the powerful in all participating countries and by establishing the superiority of the machine over man in search of profits spread mass unemployment. The widespread unemploymer)t, however, seems to be threatening the very social discipline upon which the industrial system is built. Simultaneously, the supplies of raw materials and energy are being curtailed. Unemployment together with the exhaustion of these supplies might inspire industrialised countries to tap instead the creative energies of their people. It is curious that we use the power-driven machines which, on the one hand, lead to 'energy -crisis' while, on the other hand, waste a tremendous amount of human energy by snatching away employment from people. The oil resources

96 are exhaustible, while human resources will always exist and, unlike oil, perish if unused. The problem of energy crisis is not that of oil, it is that of large scale, machine-based, centralised mass production. Why should other countries try to ape Western style industrialism when the West itself is facing the crisis created by it ? The Western countries which have left village industries far behind find it difficult to cope with recession and increasing unemployment. For India to take to industrialism is as Gandhi argued, "to find some other races and places of the earth for exploitation. ... Let us not be deceived by catchwords and phrases. ... Pauperism must go. But industrialism is no remedy. " 16 As he pleaded: "God forbid that India should ever take to industrialism after the manner of the West. The economic imperialism of a single tiny island kingdom (England) is today keeping the world in chains. If an entire nation of 300 (850 now) millions took to similar economic exploitation, it would strip the world bare like locusts."17 Even for India's internal economy he said, "'I know that there is no room for mill cloth, whether foreign or Indian, in our domestic economy and that the nation will be all the better for its entire disappearance. "18 The charkha is necessary to get rid of the present structure in which the few who get employment continuously struggle for survival, without fulfilment, and the rest are doomed to starvation. Of the two off-shoots of industrialism, the capitalist system holds that in the general tide of increase in production all will be lifted, but the emphasis of the system on self-interest and capital- accumulation destroys this possibility. The other, the communist system, holds that the state will plan for the economy and will provide for all, but the emphasis of the

97 system on power and patronage leads to the domination of the bureaucracy and prevents benefits from percolating down to the lower strata. It was this knowledge of progress, individual as well as social, that had prevented the mechanisation of production prior to the 'industrial revolution'. As Gandhi explained, "It was not that we did not know how to invent machinery, but our forefathers knew that if we set out- hearts after such things, we,would become slaves and lose our moral fibre. They, therefore, after due deliberation, decided that we should only do what we could with our hands and feet."19 The Chinese also are said to have discovered the system of machine-based mass-production in the eleventh century and discarded it after deciding it to be too dangerous and volatile a force. Gandhi's wife, Kasturba, put it most delicately: "There is no beauty in the finest cloth if it means misery and suffering."20 For "true art takes note not merely of form but also of what lies behind. -21 What Gandhi advocated for India, applies to any society or, for that matter, any individual: "When India becomes self-supporting, self-reliant and proof against temptations and exploitation, she will cease to be the object of greedy attraction for any power in the West or the East, and will then feel secure without having to carry the burden of expensive

98 armament. Her internal economy will be India's strongest bulwark against aggression. 22 He explained, "I want India's rise so that the whole world may benefit. I do not want India to rise on the ruin of other nations."23 Through the charkha, Gandhi integrated economics, politics and even sciences, with practical morality, he integrated the individual with the community. That is why the essence of his philosophy is constructive, catholic and assimilative, and never negative or destructive. The production of food and clothing must never be centralised if exploitation and slavery are to be avoided. Efforts should be aimed at overcoming the hurdles in enabling the masses to produce these two commodities independently, easily and successfully. The spinning jenny had heralded the 'industrial revolution' the consequences of which have accumulated in the forms of unemployment, crimes and wars. To counter it, the charkha can usher in a non-violent revolution the consequences of which can accumulate in the forms of prosperity, freedom and peace.

99 6

Crisis of Economic Philosophy

Coincidentally enough, in the '30s when the industrialised countries were struck with chronic unemployment and Keynes offered the monetary solution1 Gandhi was also deeply concerned about the widespread unemployment in India but refused the advice of a top industrialist for collecting money for his reconstruction programme. Money cannot do any magic, he replied, the strength must come from the people themselves.2 Based on the Keynesian and post-Keynesian economic philosophies, the present system is now turning out to be inadequate and unviable to tackle the problems of the contemporary economy. It might be useful to compare its relevance with that of the charkha doctrine. "One of the most fateful errors of our age", as explained the famous British economist E. F. Schumacher, "is the bplief that 'the problem of production' has been solved.3 The advantage of big machines is held out as yielding large production with few workers and increase in leisure. But

100 in the process the minority who own or control the machines also control the incomes and employment of the vast majority of the rest who therefore are often deprived of their share of the benefits of production, who become increasingly more vulnerable to unemployment and poverty and whose problem turns out to be not how to have more leisure but how to use idle hours to make a living. Khadi, and following it other village industries, can give them self -employment to gainfully use the idle hours, to fight against poverty and to become their own masters. The conventional economics argues about increasing the gross national production, without specifying for whom the commodities are to be produced, with the result that the commodities produced are often for the rich and the power-holders as they have higher purchasing power, and even harmful commodities and superfluous services flourish while the poor lack even the basic needs. It argues about consumers' sovereignty without ensuring how their interest would be protected against. profit -maximizing producers, with the result that people are increasingly loaded with commodities and services, although in palatable ways through brainwashing advertisements and product -promotion campaigns but without an assurance whether these commodities are right, and are Lmable to resist even if they are not because an individual consumer, or even a group, is too small a fraction of the market to afect a change in the giant system. Aid by those who benefit from the system to those who are left high and dry is no solution, either logically or otherwise. Since aid is given from profits, the argument implies a contradiction that those who give aid might - or rather must, according to the profit theory - pay low wages to workers, pay minimum prices to raw material suppliers and charge maximum prices to consumers. It amounts to justifying exploitation for the provision of aid. It also implies a suicidal. attitude on the part of the receivers because they must continue to contribute to the profits of their exploiters otherwise the very source of aid would be affected and thus they must support a system even if it leaves them high and dry. D.WD-7

101 The present system forces individuals, even countries, to compete with one another in search of monetary profits, or even survival, and therefore cultivates animosity as competition becomes cut-throat. It fosters hostility in several ways. They grow between employers and workers because the former might substitute machines for workers if that raises profits. They grow among workers within an organisation because, in the face of widespread unemployment and limited job mobility, the workers must vie with one another to retain their jobs and win the employer's favour. They grow among workers of different organisations because, as the competition among different organisations becomes intense and fierce, the employment of workers depends upon the profitability of their respective company and industry, and since they swim or sink together they try to save their own boat. An individual, therefore, has to constantly fight dangers on all fronts in order to survive and function in the system. The economic system based on the charkha, by striking at the very roots of competition for monetary profits and by ensuring work security to all, can eliminate such hostility. Competition characterises the charkha-based system also, but that competition is for being chosen. As the physically weak people undertake the cloth- production, and thereby contribute their best to the society, the rest compete to produce and supply the needs of the society in the best way they can. As every person - or family - exchanges his product to obtain what he needs, he has to offer the best product he can in view of what others need. Thus the competition is for providing to the others. In the terminology of economics, instead of the present demand-based competition the charkha can bring about the supply-based competition. Moreover, as Rabindranath Tagore put it in poetic words: "Money has ceased to be an instrument in the hands of man but has become a demonic power, before which the larger claims of humanity have become insignificant. Between money accumulated by the help of machinery and the natural powers of an ordinary man the difference is so great that the ordinary man must accept defeat at every step. Those in whose favour is this difference exploit others to the extreme

102 limit, and becoming unduly bloated themselves, destroy the equilibrium of the social structure. 4 Money, although introduced for facilitating transactions, has become a power beyond control because in the existing economic system those who possess or control money can dictate others as they determine wages and salaries, and can even deprive others of food as they determine whether to employ workers or instead use machines. Money, therefore, is accumulated by and large for private gains and power rather than used for economic welfare of all and for economic security of the poor in particular. Moreover, money can be made by underpaying, exploiting, cheating or deceiving the other party. Therefore what leads to becoming rich is ruthlessness. Thus, since the present system honours the rich, a vice comes to be regarded as a virtue. Such factors proliferate because what the system holds supreme is money in spite of proclaiming consumer's well-being as its attractive feature. In contrast, what the economics of khadi holds as supreme is physical work. The capacity for physical work is something which everybody possesses and, unlike money, cannot be obtained from others, stolen or confiscated. By assigning value and dignity to human labour, this system ensures that everybody can earn, and nobody can deprive another of, a living. What this system emphasises is production by masses instead of mass production. The conventional belief that things can be produced cheaper only through mass production with the use of big machines has turned out to be false. On the contrary, as the use of big machines necessitates huge overheads, fierce and international competition and a long chain of distribution, the consumers end tip with paying high and ever-increasing prices, Even historically, for example, when the East India Company of England was first established in India its ships could carry nothing that India needed and had salt as ballast

103 so that they could sail. Mass production may not be even necessary as people's needs, tastes, climatic conditions and resource-availabilities are different in different places. The physical geography of a country plays a vital role in determining its requirements and culture. It is often questioned whether people will be content with the things they produce in small communities. Apart from the virtue of contentment which modern industrialisation has wrecked turning man into an ever-running never-satisfied consumerist, they must at least for basic necessities, if they do not want to be exploited. It is due to our vulnerability to commodities advertised by others for their profits, that we succumb to exploita~ion and lose confidence in our own abilities. In any case, small-scale production does not imply inferior goods. On the contrary, it can lead to better, nicer and more useful goods. Al. the time machine-made textiles were first introduced, fine, rich and colourful Indian fabrics were world-famous. History bears testimony to the struggle the machine-made textiles had to go through for making an entry into the market, and records even extreme steps of atrocities and torture. For example, some agonized weavers in India chopped off their thumbs and a lady in England was burnt to death for wearing hand-made foreign textiles. Known by fanciful names like 'woven air', 'evening dew' and 'running water', the Dacca muslins of the earlier days still remain. unparalleled by the machine -produced muslins. Even today the high quality of some of the hand-made textiles is far superior to those made by machines. Criticising the ideology of mass-scale machine-based production, the philosopher and writer Kishorlal Mashruwala commented, "Western economics blindly emphasises machines, cities and industry (at the cost of agriculture). Instead of creating a harmony and cordiality among various countries and among various classes within a country, it creates conflicts among them. Instead of accomplishing welfare for all, it accomplishes welfare for only a few and for them also for only a short while. It seeks prosperity through exploiting the so-called underdeveloped countries and through bringing

104 about addictions among the people there degrading them morally. It thrives on brutal force. It nurtures superstitions in the name of theoretical principles which are no less forceful than the religious superstitions." 5 Nonetheless, it must be noted that the poetic insight of the West had upheld the paramount significance of the spinning wheel. G6ethe sang the benefits of the spinning wheel. At the time the 'industrial revolution' destroyed the cottage industries, Wordsworth lamented: Why did the spinning wheel come to a halt? Even today one finds a spinning wheel in the house of Shakespeare, and a loom across the street from the house, at the Stratford-upon-Avon in England. Interestingly, some of the new economic thought in the West comes quite close to the economics of khadi. The description of 'the next economics' given by the management expert and writer Peter Drucker comes close to the features of the khadi-based system: "Economics today is very largely 'The House that Keynes Built'. ... Yet both as economic theory and as economic policy Keynesian economics is in disarray. It is unable to tackle the central policy problems of the developed economies. ... Nor is it able to provide theory that can encompass, let alone explain, observed economic reality and experience. ... There may be no 'economics' in the future. ... But if there is a future economics it will differ fundamentally from the present one. ... The present'crisis in economics' is a failure of the basic assumptions, of the paradigm, of the 'system', rather than of this or that theory. ... "The next economics will thus require radically different micro -economics as its foundation. It will require a theory that aims at optimizing productivity; for a balance of several partially dependent functions is, of necessity, an optimization rather than a maximization. "The next economics will not, it is reasonably certain, have the luxury, however, of choosing between micro-economics and macro- economics. It will have to accomplish what (Alfred)

105 Marshall tried and failed to do: integrate both. - But what the term 'macro economy' will actually mean in the next economics is anything but clear and will be highly controversial. ... Predictably, therefore, the next economics will, at its center, have a spirited debate over the place of national government in economic theory. ... Equally central, and perhaps even more controversial, will be the relationship between the 'real economy' of things: commodities, resources, work, and the symbol economy' of money and credit. "And the next economics may even attempt again to be both 'humanity' and 'science'. A productivity-based economics might thus become what all great economists have striven for: both a 'humanity', a 'moral philosophy', a 'Geisteswissenschaft' and 'rigorous science'. "6 One of the important aspects of the present value system that is sought to be revised is the redefinition of 'work'. The modern system suffers from a divorce between labour and intelligence of its workforce. The modern industrial worker no longer feels responsible for his work nor proud about it. As a result, the craftsmanship and artistic quality of the products are declining. Work has become drastically degraded. For the workers its sole purpose is to earn money, while for the employer it is to increase profits. The lack of responsibility of the workers together with the overiding profit-motive of the employers has resulted in a situation where most, of the work carried out is wasteful. As Theodore Roszak has forcefully said: "Work that produces unnecessary consurner junk or weapons of war is wrong and wasteful, Work that deceives or manipulates, that exploits or degrades is wrong and wasteful. Work that wounds the environment or makes the world ugly is wrong and wasteful. There is no way to redeem such work by enriching it or restructuring it, by socializing or nationalizing it, by making it'small' or decentralised or democratic. 7

106 Work can be considered good if it yields useful things which sustain life. The sustenance is that which provides food, cloth and other necessities to man so that-he may live ethically and serve others. A new paradigm forwarded by the scientist and writer Fritjof Capra contains characteris ties which are also contained in the charkha-based paradigm: "Numerous manifestations of the existential crisis - high inflation, unemployment, energy crisis, crisis in health care, pollution and environmental disasters, a rising wave of violence and crime and so on - are all different facets of one and the same crisis and this crisis is essentially a crisis of perception. "What we need then, is a new'paradigm', new vision of reality, a fundamental change in our thoughts, perceptions and values. The beginnings of this change of the shift from mechanistic to the holistic conception of reality, are already visible in all fields and are likely to dominate the present decade. "The change is likely to result in a transformation of unprecedented dimension, a turning point for the planet as a whole. "The new vision includes the emerging systems view of life, mind, consciousness and evolution, the corresponding holistic approach to health and healing and the integration of Western and Eastern approaches to psychology and psychotherapy, a new conceptual framework for economics and technology and an ecological and feminist perspective which is spiritual in its ultimate nature and will lead to profound changes in our social and political structm-es." 8 For most of the contemporary economic problems, khadi seems to be the basic step towards, if not a precondition for, the solution, as discussed in the previous chapters. Poverty and unemployment, galloping inflation and sluggishness in effective demand, rising energy prices and high costs of complex machinery, bureaucratic red-tape and the burden of middleman chain, lop-sided use of natural resources and

107 wastes of latent human talents, environmental damages and ecological imbalances, pressures due to urbanisation and loss of contact with nature, subordination of women and maltreatment of minorities, destructive use of scientific knowledge and lack of relevance of educational system, increasing crime-rates and escalating arms-production -khadi shows a way out. Incredible as it may seem, the crises are multiple but the solution is single, simple, sure and simultaneous to all of them. Moreover, without the solution provided by the charkha, all other efforts to solve these problems would be worthless, like zeros without the one preceding them. With it, the effect of the efforts would multiply geometrically. Gandhi gave a permanent message that India, or for that matter any country, should use khadi only. "My position", lie said, "is clear. If I had my way, India would be clothed in khadi to the exclusion of all other cloth even made in indigenous mills." 9 Our situation is like that of the one who wants to go to the Himalayas, but is riding a south-bound train. We need to change to a north-bound train, the engine of which is the charkha. The cause of the crisis of the modern society is the economic system. People may be well-meaning but they are forced into particular wrong ways, being prisoners of a socially-harmful system. What needs to be attacked, therefore, is not an individual or a group or a country, but the system. The system based on khadi provides the alternative. Fascinatingly enough, not only can the charkha resolve conflicts but by enabling a vast majority of world population to peacefully participate in the process of progress, it can salvage, stabilise, stimulate and sustain the system itself.

108 7

Bankruptcy of Conventional Economics

The present economic system seems to be unable to deliver the goods because its very foundation principles have led to tremendous burden on the system itself. It, therefore, seems to be a self-defeating system. The system which was built to realise a consumer's dream has actually delivered a consumer's nightmare. In turn it seems that perhaps something is fundamentally wrong with the system. The motivating force of the conventional economics is selfishness or greed, but if everybody is to pursue one's own self-interest a society can hardly hold together. Selfishness, being an anti-social quality, is an inconsistent and futile base for building a social science. Nor does it correctly characterise even the individual. Man is by nature gregarious, and does not want to alienate himself. If economics is to be a social science, able to help individual growth and to guide economic policies in a community let it replace greed with love, violence with peace. Not surprisingly, therefore, more and more economists these days turn towards DE-establishing what the university textbooks still proclaim with serenity. Daniel Bell, Professor of Social Sciences at Harvard University, argues while the theoretical differences between a Friedman and a Samuelson are distinct and the policy consequences divergent, there is also the question whether the theoretical framework that encompasses both is itself adequate. In short, there is

109 the question not only whether there is a crisis in economic theory but also a crisis of economic theory itself. ... The economic theory that. developed in the West in the last 200 years is impotent before such (certain important) questions. It has been a historical and abstractly analytical." 1 The conventional economics, therefore, does not seem to succeed in even grasping, let alone tackling, the problems of the contemporary economy. In his famous book, The Turning Point, Fritj of Capra argues, "Economics today is in a profound conceptual crisis. The social and economic anomalies it can no longer address - global inflation and unemployment, maldistribution of wealth, and energy shortages among others - are now painfully visible to everyone. The failure of the economics profession to come to terms with these problems is recognised by an increasingly skeptical public, by scientists from other disciplines and by economists themselves." 2 It thus considers man a rational fool. Washington Post asserts, "Ambitious economists elaborate elegant mathematical solutions to theoretical problems with little if any relevance to public issues"3 and quotes an outgoing secretary of commerce who said flatly that she found it impossible to go back to her previous job as professor of economics because "I would not know what to teach.'4 A fairly general rule in the conventional economics seems to be: when you cannot convince a person, confuse him.

Relevance of Basic Concepts of Conventional Economics It would be worthwhile to consider some of the concepts of economics which are basic to the modern economic system. Prices: The pricing- mechanism has landed the system into feverish inflation. The world-wide inflation is the prize exhibit of the failure of conventional economic wisdom.

110 The principle that supply would increase in response to a rise in price, is not borne out by facts because, among othel things, not every input that modern industries require can be~ produced everywhere. The principle that a higher supply would result in a lower price is also not borne out in most cases. On the contrary, although the modern big corporation produces on a large scale, instead of lowering the price it tries to push it up by creating demand through advertisements and sales campaigns, and even by thwarting the competitors or by hoarding the output till the price rises. Moreover, the conventional price -mechanism implies that maximum money may be made from a needy consumer or minimum price may be paid to a desperate producer. The system, therefore, generates tremendous stresses and strains on the society. The contemporary system claims to provide the principle of price -determination on the basis of demand and supply of commodities but actually it considers only 'effective' demand, i.e. only the demand backed by money. Thus the modern system serves a person who wants to buy a gold glass for drinking alcohols and can pay for it but not a person who wants to buy some milk for his child but oannot afford it. Comparing the price determination in the present system with that in the charkha-based system, J. C. Kumarappa explained: "The capitalistic system depends for its development on the helplessness of its customers. The more helpless the customer the more sure it is of its markets. It seeks to kill all initiative in the customers. In cottage industries the principal desideratum is the customer's initiative; we expect every one to be resourceful. ... "Business transactions do not, begin and end with the transfer of goods and payment of money. One who buys an article takes it with all the moral values attached to the goods. 5

111 Kumarappa argued that the real valuation of commodities should reflect human consideration as well: The price of an old chair associated with the memories of one's parents is determined by emotions. The price determination of a brass pot on the basis of its weight reflects physical value. A gold chain snatched from a woman's neck should be valued on moral grounds. When a person like Gandhi, who was a barrister trained in England and could afford silk outfits, uses small coarse 'dhoti' in order to share the lot of the majority of his fellow people, the value- determination rises to a spiritual plane. Each material transaction, therefore, carries ethical considerations. Wages: The wage-theory has brought about such a distorted wage-structure that a sales manager, a bank executive, a government officer or many a professional expert gets fantastic remuneration, and a spy even higher, while a farm labourer or a street cleaner gets a miserably low wage, even though food and clean streets are society's first and foremost requirements. Obviously, the high scale of wages in the present system depends not on any ideal principle, but on a dubious characteristic - the availability of job in large-scale companies or organisations. Thus a truck-driver in a multinational corporation gets a fat salary while a school-teacher in a village finds it hard to obtain even a meagre salary. Due to a wage-structure which promises higher wages in large-scale production, the modern economic system has created big chains of middlemen, bureaucracies and many superfluous commercial services. The economy is being crushed by this burden because the people so involved can only 'facilitate' the system rather than actually produce commodities, but must be paid for by the consumers. Since the profit- calculations continuously consider substitutions between wages and capital-costs, i.e. between man and machines, man in order to survive might tend to approximate the performance of the machine and might slowly, even though unconsciously, begin to lose the very originality and creative imagination.

112 If industries and services are based primarily on machinery, the very employment of the people would come to be dependent on the machines. Since big machines produce on a very large scale, the huge outputs must sell if the company is to survive. If, however, the huge outputs, for any reason, cannot be either produced or sold the system would have no use of the workers employed. The very employment of the workers would, therefore, become knife-edged because of the uncertainties of raw-material supplies from and markets in far away places under the modern economic system. The present wage-system considers man as an 'investment proposition'. It values even artists and scientists not primarily for their art or inventive ability but for the money - or economic power - they can be put to achieve. Knowledge and art are thus reduced to contribute to the desires of a few profit-mongers rather than set free to give a lead to the onward march of humanity. As poet Tagore argued, "In the days when civilization was not many-limbed, the scholar and the sage, the hero and the philanthropist were more highly respected than the rich. By the honour shown to them, it was humanity itself that was honoured. People were contemptuous of the mere money-maker. ... "Just as the present-day politics is a manifestation of extreme individualism in nations, so is the process of gaining a livelihood an expression of extreme selfishness of individuals. ... And yet, since man is man, even in his business he ought to have earned not only his daily bread, but. also his eternal truth." 6 Work: The concept of work in the modern economic system is detrimental. Work is viewed as an instrument to make money. Except for the 'money it earns it is a burden, for one would not work without being paid and aims at leisure. On the contrary, however, work ought to be the individual's main objective and a great pleasure of life. It ought to be the best expression of one's personality. What differentiates

113 a human being from an animal is the work she or he contributes to the society. Work ought to be viewed as an instrument to make life meaningful, purposeful, joyful and its other outcome of making a living ought to be incidental. But in the contemporary system, a person works to make money and uses leisure to enjoy life with the money so earned. Consequently the fulfilment of life is often to be found in dreadful activities like drinking and gambling and at best in benign but radarless activities like travelling or game-watching. Worst of all, the prime time of life which is spent on work is a sort of waste, good only for the money it makes! Life is to be enjoyed only in the evenings, or weekends or holidays! Nothing could be more suicidal than such a concept of work. Under the charkha-based system, work does not have a negative value that needs to be compensated by money wages. Gandhi's precious advice was: Do not count the value of your work in terms of money, count it in terms of the service it provides to others. An incentive to work, then, is the person's being chosen for the work. One's work ought to give him so much satisfaction for having served others that he may even be prepared to pay for it - i.e. undertake costs - and ultimately, like a true soldier even to die for it. "For he who is not prepared to die when required also does not know what to live for." 7 Interest: The interest theory of the conventional economics has led to the giant banking network. This proliferating network is an enormous burden on the economy because it cannot contribute in terms of actual material production or even actual service. In a way, it seems to be much ado about nothing real. More significantly, the banks do not seem to really know what they are doing. A senior USA bank executive is said to have put it bluntly: "Banks have done lousy job of

114 quantifying risk." It seems difficult, perhaps impossible, for banks to judge whether they are likely to gain or lose, in view of increasing economic complexity and uncertainty, and political upheaval and change. "No one really understands precisely what actually is happening.8 Even the prominent USA magazine Business Week referred to the world finance and debt manipulation system as the 'Global Casino'. Eminent economist and writer Professor J. K. Galbraith has long been warning in no uncertain terms: "There is no magic in the monetary system, however brilliantly or esoterically administrated. ... On the contrary, monetary policy is a blunt, unreliable, discriminatory and somewhat dangerous instrument of economic control. It survives in esteem partly because so few understand it. 9 The argument behind the investment theory is refuted by the story of a traveller and a fisherman who was catching fish for his family's supper. The traveller advised the fisherman, "Why don't you build a bigger net? That way you can catch ten fish." "But I need only two." "Sell the rest and out of the money build a boat." He told him to keep on building bigger instruments, catching more fish and making more money. Finally the fisherman asked, "But what do I do with all that money?" "Eat, drink and be merry" said the traveller happily; and the fisherman dropped the conversation because that was exactly what he was doing that very evening. "The tragedy of 'mainstream' economic theory", says I. M. Kirzner, Professor of Economics at New York University, "is that its present crisis-like situation appears as the natural outcome of an intellectual process that was, perversely, set in motion by a series of significant theoretical advances. Somehow the dynamics of this history has produced, out of basically sound insights, an elaborate structure of theory, dazzling in its technical sophistication, inspiring in the architectonic quality of its intellectual edifice - but seriously

115 deficient in any genuine understanding of the workings of market capitalism."10 Indeed it seems deficient in the understanding of the human aspiration itself. Rent: As an observer has put it, in the East wherever man saw a beautiful place he built a temple, while in the West he built a hotel. Both places invite people, but in the hotel one can stay only if one pays while in the temple one stays but pays if he wishes. The rent-mechanism has resulted in sky-rocketing prices of land in particular places and in the five-star hotel culture. The present economic system forces village people to migrate to cities in search of livelihood, as all jobs are in cities where factories and commercial services are located. This in turn creates the pressures of population and the problems of housing, utilities and pollution in cities. In big cities the cost of acquiring a house often eats up one's lifetime savings and, alternatively, the rent either takes away a large chunk of the salary or, if the housing is provided as a part of pay-package, substantially tightens the control of the employei-. The soaring real estate prices and house rents are consequences of the modern economic system. In sharp contrast, the materials in house- construction, especially if locally found or substituted, cost virtually little. Even these days in some villages, for example in Nagaland, a house is constructed for a new couple as a part of the wedding ceremony and by the entire village community. It involves a free house to all families and also a festival for the community. In a rural set-up a person's residence and his work-place are in the same building, while in the contemporary system they are in different and distant buildings. The contemporary system, therefore, involves an enormous burden of constructing and maintaining two sets of buildings and the related facilities like electricity and water as well as transport. Most of the concepts of modern economics, therefore, seem to be narrowly defined and used without their social and ecological context.

116 Several questions emerge. Has not the modern economic system reduced to a great deal man's effort in meeting his needs? Not really. Consider, for example, the most popular product of the modern system, the automobile car. A car offers much comfort and saves time in travelling. But in order to have a car, the society sustains automobile manufacturing companies, engineering firms producing spare parts and accessories, steel companies, petroleum companies, foreign exchange earnings if it is to be imported from abroad, tire manufacturers, rubber manufacturers, colour and chemical manufacturers, battery manufacturers, petrol pumps, garages to repair and service the cars, highways and flyovers, parking facilities, parking-time metres, car insurance companies, medical facilities in case of accidents, police, lawyers and so on. For the society, therefore, a car involves not iust the saving in the effort in travelling but an enormous effort that must be put in to keep the car running. Moreover, the car-rider's comfort is needle-edged because if even one of the above requirements is not met the car may corne to a halt. Wassily Leontief's input-output tabies show how much is needed to be put into the production system before a consumer gets the final output. The comfort due to the car is also to be balanced against traffic jams, accidents and the need to do walking or jogging to keep fit. Contrary, therefore, to the conventional belief that modern industry provides comforts, actually it seems to require a lot and accomplish but little. Moreover, the facility of the car has resulted in widening the distance between the residence and the office. Consequently, the person spends most of the day away from home. A car saves the time in travelling but on the other hand the increase in the distance takes away much time. Moreover, people arrange for car-pools in order to save petrol, which further adds to the travelling time. The person gets .so tired and bored by the end of the day that he turns to DWD-S

117 drinking or some such addiction. A vicious circle thus sets in. Commenting on the usefulness of a car, Gandhi argued, "... Car is not the essence of our spiritual experience. Were there cars in the time of Jesus and Mohammad? They did not need a car to accomplish their work.”11 Ironically, the present age which hardly has a message to give has produced all the communication devices. As Professor Bugliarello, the president of a New York polytechnic, says: "The time has come for the engineering profession to face up resolutely to the issue of its relationship to societal values." 12 The contemporary system thus creates problems not only through its failures but even through what are thought to be its successes. Still, has not the modern system made man smarter and more intelligent in handling his needs? - one might ask. This is still another myth. "Consider what an educated and smart office-worker in a city knows. He takes a bus or a train from home to office. He knows how to read railway time-tables. He knows which train to take for which place. He is smart enough not to get caught. in an accident. He knows how to interpret the caution signals. He knows how to telephone. He knows how to complain for breakage in plumbing or in electrical equipments. He knows how to call for repair service for fixing things in the house. He knows keeping accounts, filing papers, typing or whatever work he is given in the office, and he knows managing the salary he gets. Knowing this much he can carry on life. "He knows some other things also. He reads newspapers and can present the ideas presented therein as his own during conversation. fie also does a bit of exercise because he has read that exercises are necessary and useful for an office worker.

118 "He has to pet-form a small activity in a big system, so he often does not know the relation of his work with the final outcome, "Consider now a man in non-mechanised society. He must know about weather, seasons, crops, pastures, useful animals, trees, plants, creepers, all processes of cloth-making, smithy, carpentry, house-building, preservation and drainage of water, steps-reading, target-taking and many such things. Unless he knows them he cannot go on. He has to face the difficulties cropping up daily and he learns a lot from them. It also makes him brave, intuitive, self-reliant and free." 13 An American economist Robert Heilbroner observed that the big change in the US labour force in the last hundred years was that the country had been transformed from a nation of farmers to a nation of clerks; it had lost the multi-skilled capacity of the farmers and instead become a nation of semi-skilled office workers. Still, what young socialists even in Europe today scornfully dismiss as the 'pseudo-happiness' of 'th ' e consumption society' has become the substance of economics. 14 It might be protested: Would it not be considered backward to adopt the charkha and other village industries? Ravisbankar Maharaj has answered this question squarely: "Whom would you call backward? Are they backward who have not gone to a college and are poor, who do not carry fashionable clothes and cosmetics, who do no speak with accent? Are they backward who toil in the cold and in the heat of the sun and produce the necessities of life? Who is advanced - the one who produces grains, milk, butter, vegetables and so on or the one who keeps sitting and eating? Who is advanced - the one who gloats in extravagances or the one who leads a simple life?

119 "A backward really is he who does not labour himself and lives on the labour of others. A backward is he who lies, who cheats, who indulges in blackmarketing for making money, who exploits others. A backward is he who does not know how to live and one who does not know how to be useful to others, does not know how to live. Such a one is a backward.'15 But how can we give up the present civilisation? - it might be questioned. As Gandhi explained, "There is no such thing as Western or European civilization, but there is modern civilization which is purely material." 16 Tagore also in no ambiguous terms protested: "Inadequate resources are almost a crime in this order of life which has to stand on a vast assortment of materials. Education, health, law and justice, communications, transport, food, accommodation, conduct of warfare,* maintenance of peace and order - all cost huge sums of money, Poverty brings with it humiliation, for poverty is a drag on the progress of this civilization. ... It is not merely the earning of money, the worship of money is dominant. The false God destroys the goodness in man. Never before was man such a great enemy of man: for nothing can be more cruel, more iniquitous, thari this v-old hunger. The all-powerful hunger is the product of modern civilization, and measures for satisfying it surpass all endeavours," 17 As Gandhi further argued: "Civilization is that mode of conduct which points to man the path of duty-"18. "Many

120 of us believe, and I am one of them, that through our (i.e. ancient Indian) civilization we have a message to deliver to the world." 19 He pointed out the falsehood of the very fundamental assumption of the conventional economics which states that man's material wants are unlimited: "A certain degree of physical harmony and comfort is necessary but above a certain level it becomes a hindrance instead of help. Therefore the ideal of creating an unlimited number of wants and satisfying them seems to be a delusion and a snare. The satisfaction of one's physical needs, even the intellectual needs of one's narrow self must meet at a certain point a dead stop, before it degenerates into physical and intellectual voluptuousness. A man must arrange his physical and cultural circumstances so that they do not hinder him in his service of humanity, on which all his energies should be concentrated. 20 In another context, he persuaded, "I venture to think that the scriptures of the world are far safer and sounder treatises on laws of economics than many of the modern textbooks."21 Arguing extensively that the conventional economics is no science at all in his book Sarvodaya he established: "Nothing in history has been so disgraceful to human intellect as the acceptance among us of the common doctrines of economics as a science. I know no previous instance in history of a nation's establishing a systematic disobedience to the first principles of its professed religion."22 It is no wonder that radical economists in the West are trying to establish the pre-modern sovereignty of political, moral and religious values over economic life.

121 G. K. Chesterton painted gloom with sarcasm: -we would rather be ruined than change. We would rather die in our dread, Than climb the cross of the moment And let our illusions die." The most unfortunate slave is he who protects the prison thinking it to be his home.

122 8

Relating Agriculture to Industry

The Problem of Foodgrains Prices Modern economics does not succeed to provide a scientific principle or absolute rule to determine the prices of foodgrains. These prices are determined ad hoc in accordance with the judgment of policy makers. Although economics explains how to determine the prices of other commodities on the basis of the principle of their supply and demand, this principle is not to be applied to determine the prices of foodgrains. The reason is obvious. If the prices of foodgrains go up too high, it would entail hardship to the poor sections and if they fall too low it would affect the incomes of farmers. So the farm prices are determined not according to the principles of economics but in view of the government's prevailing policies and certain standards. Since the farm-prices are to be determined in an ad hoc way based on judgment, the question of their determination has become very complex and has turned out to be a headache in many countries. As the prices of commodities and services in the industrial sector are galloping and so are the wages and profits in this sector, it is difficult to neglect the farmers' demand for higher farm-prices. Moreover, since money derives its value essentially from its exchangeability with food, farmers cannot be neglected. But raising the farm-prices would be, on the other hand, a blow to the low-income and unemployed

123 people. This important problem of the determination of farm-prices has been left unsolved by the science of economics. The charkha can be relevant in handling this perplexing problem. Eighty per cent of the Indian people are related to agriculture, most of whom are the families of small farmers and landless farm-labourers. Employment in agriculture being seasonal they get farm-work only during certain days a year and even these days are not consecutive. Moreover, the farm wages are among the lowest. It is becoming imperative to support small farmers' earnings with supplementary income-earning occupations. The charkha can create the basic supplementary industry to agriculture. It can give farm workers work and income during the no-work days, in the production of khadi and subsequently other commodities. It can provide them occupations which they can manage themselves along with the farming. It can provide them handy work in their own village, without their having to leave the farming. It can thereby correct a crucial imbalance of the present system in which the agricultural sector is disassociated from the non-agricultural sectors like the industrial sector and the utilities sector. In the villages there is agriculture only and there are no industries, while in the cities there are industries only. There is no link connecting these two main sectors of the economy. The charkha can become the link connecting the two. It can connect agriculture with industries. By providing supplementary industries to those engaged in farming, it can bring about an equation between their time required in agriculture and in other occupations. Thus instead of agricultural sector and industrial sector being separate from each other, there can be a comparative relationship between the two. The prices of foodgrains can therefore be determined rationally in relation to the prices of other commodities and services. The charkha can therefore free the economic system from imbalances. Without the charkha, the puzzle of farm-prices is likely to remain unsolved and turn into a chaos. Without the charkha, the world might witness many a fascinating technological achievement but not solve its food problem.

124 Arguing the importance of the charkha in relation to agriculture Gandhi explained, "It (the charkha) is the second lung of the nation. It is because we are using only one lung, that we are being destroyed." 1 The small farmer is doomed without a supplementary industry. Spinning is the easiest, the cheapest and the best. Besides, it brings in its wake many other cottage industries.

Agricultural Wages and Reforms The charkha can also be very useful in tackling t he important question of determining the wages of the farm-labourers. Not being able to find employment in industry, a majority of the people have to work on the farms. Their number, i.e. supply, being very large, their wages are very low. The present economic system is not capable of offering to such a large number of people an alternative or supplementary employment in villages. But through the charkha these people can start the production of cloth and consequently of other commodities and services. Under that situation their wages in the farming cannot go below what they can earn from producing cloth and other commodities. Thus the charkha can fix the bottom below which the wages of farm-labourers cannot fall. This would be a rational determination of the farm-workers' wages, in contrast to their present ad hoc determination according to the will of the goverm-nent or the land-owners. At present the farm-labourers have no choice but to accept whatever wages the government or the land-owners might fix for them because they have no other means of earning bread for their families. The charkha can help them out of this situation of destitution. Moreover, several family members of the farm-labourers are not able to get even the farming work, or cannot go out and do the hard labour even when they are. The charkha can provide work to even physically disabled and old people in villages, as well as to village women with young babies.

125 It can free these people from the present oppression of the land-owners and money-lenders. Reforms in the agricultural sector have not been either possible or effective due to the feudal system prevailing between land-owners and landless labourers. Due to the feudal system, recurrent famines continue in spite of good rains and fertile land. Under such circumstances agricultural reforms cannot be injected from outside unless small farmers, especially the landless, gain economic strength of their own. The charkha can strengthen the small, even the landless, farmers and thus provide the base for an agricultural reform to succeed. The mission of khadi is to become supplementary industry to agriculture.

Benefits to the Land-owners It might seem that the land - owners would oppose the charkha activity. But a further thought would illustrate that on the contrary for the land-owners also the charkha turns out to be a blessing. So much so that they would co-operate and help in fostering the charkha activity, for a variety of reasons: (1) If the production of cloth and consequently other commodities can be started in the villages by the charkha, the landless villagers would no longer have to move out of the villages and migrate to cities in search of a livelihood. The land-owners, therefore, would no longer have to suffer from the present shortage of farm-workers for cultivating their farms. The problem of the shortage of farm-labourers has become so acute that often the newspapers report about the land-owners resorting to atrocities, such as even destroying the eye-sight of the farm-labourers, in order to prevent them frorn leaving the village. But if the charkha can establish textile and other industries in the villages, the farm-labourers can get an additional source of income to supplement their farm-wages, they can make a decent livelihood in the village itself and would not be compelled to migrate to cities. Having got an occupation in the non-farming seasons, they can settle down in the village. Therefore the land-owners also would no longer face the problem of securing farm-labour in the farming seasons. This could relieve them from a major worry.

126 (2) If the farm-workers start producing cloth and other things, they would exchange them for foodgrains. As they can produce them at a drastically low cost, these products would be available to the land-owners at lower rates than their market prices. Moreover, the land-owners are often not able to sell all their crop and a marketable surplus is left over, which can then be utilized to get cloth and other things in exchange. (3) As these things are manufactured by the people of the village itself, they can be made according to land-owners' choice and requirement. (4) If the charkha is started in the villages, the bullocks can get a better feed from the cotton seeds which in turn would mean healthier bullocks for farm work. (5) If the land-owners are able to sell their farm products in their own village, instead of having to sell them in far away places, their difficulties, uncertainties and costs of marketing can be reduced. (6) In the distant markets the land-owners have to constantly compete with other producers and often a part of their produce is left unsold. If they can sell the produce locally they can estimate the sales in advance, have a definite market, reduce risks and also save on the expenses on transport and sales -promotion. (7) Under the present. system land-owners tend to grow only a few crops as they have to sell each one in distant markets. This prevents the optimum use of the village land because different areas of the village land, such as the hilly area, the area near the lake, the grounds, the slopes, the sandy area, the glutinous land, the area under forest and such different areas are suited for growing different crops. Therefore if the land-owners were to cater to the needs of their own village-people they could grow many different kinds of crops instead of growing only a few for the outside markets, and in that case utilise their different plots of land in cultivating those crops for which they are best suited, i.e. in which their productivities are highest. A crucial point emerges : Under this system the different areas of land in the village are utilised in growing those

127 crops (1) in the cultivation of which their productivities are the highest and simultaneously (2) which best meet the needs of the village people in terms of food and raw materials. This amounts to a best possible utilisation of land for the community. Therefore under such a system it hardly matters who owns the land, as the land is used in the most productive way and in best meeting the needs of the people. This can also bring about an atmosphere of cordial co-operation, instead of the present state of conflicts, between the land-owners and farm-workers. Indirectly, but most significantly, this solves the present major problem of the pattern of land-ownership blocking progress.

Limitations of Mechanised Farming In the present economic system, farming is undertaken on large scale with the use of big machinery and chemicals, and the farm produce is then exported to other parts, sometimes even to other countries. The danger of such a system is the loss of freedom of the populations of the distant lands. A vital commodity like foodgrains should not be beyond reach and control of people if they are to retain their freedom and seccrity. Astonishingly, under such a system the burden of the large-scale farming in the industrialised countries is actually borne by the developing countries. The success of the large-scale farming through mega-machines and chemicals depends on the agricultural subsidies given by the governments in the industrialised countries. These agricultural subsidies are scooped out of the profits of the industries in these countries which in turn are derived from their purchases of raw materials from and sales of finished goods in the developing countries. It follows that ultimately the large-scale farming in the industrialised countries is nourished by the economically backward countries.

Charkha for the Nourishment of Cows -and-Bullocks On the other hand, the small farmers around the world have not given up their bullocks. They cultivate their farms

128 on small scale with the bullocks and plough, and these traditions have not been destroyed in spite of drastic upheavals in this machine-age. As the use of bullocks is often criticised or considered backward, it needs to be emphasised that bullocks are free. Cows will always be needed for milk and butter, so bullocks will always be available. It follows that if they are available they may as well be used. Using the bullocks is not backwardness, on the contrary, not using the bullocks indicates the inertia of our intelligence. Thus the alternative cost of using the bullocks is negligible, while the costs of acquiring the farm machinery are exorbitant. Besides, the machinery also entails high costs of operation and maintenance including electricity and oil, while the bullocks live on grass or waste. Unlike machines, the bulls reproduce themselves. Moreover, a machine can. do only one job for which it is made, bullocks can do many. They help in plougl-iing the farms, drawing water from the well, carrying the harvest to the market, running an oil-press and so on. Their dung is useful as fertiliser, fuel for cooking and a material for house-building and flooring, They provide for transportation for the family and for reaching places even if good roads might not exist. Unlike machines, they understand. Thev can return home on their own. They do not proceed in direction in which they sense danger and protect the people they live with. They thus serve the purpose of a number of machines without asking for anything. The machines can breakdown, or the supplies of electricity or oil may not be available, but bullocks can always be relied upon, which is a significant advantage as the farm-work has to be completed within particular time-periods in the monsoons. In addition to milk and the multifarious services the cow and bullock provide while alive, they give leather and bones when they die.

A Holistic Approach In this age of mega-technology, simple things are believed to be out-dated and, therefore, inferior and inefficient. But

129 a small example can illustrate how erroneous and rnisguiding such a belief can be, and how enormous a cost and loss a society incurs for taking decisions accordingly. The example is that of producing fertilisers out of the wastes in slums and villages. Its benefits are multifarious: (1) It would give the natural fertilisers for farms. It would raise the productivity of land, while the chemical fertilisers damage the land. It would also raise the capacity of the land to hold water in the case of scanty rains. (2) It would reduce the need for the chemical fertilisers being used at present and the pesticides necessary to remove the resulting insects, both of which render such foodgrains hazardous to health. On the contrary, the natural fertilisers raise the nutrition value, taste and preservability of foodgrains. The natural manure is a life-sustaining manure. (3) It can drastically cut down the huge costs incurred on factories, machines, electricity, management etc., for producing chemical fertilisers. (4) It can save the society from air-and-water pollution generated by the exhaust and fluid -discharge of the chemical fertiliser plants. (5) The natural fertilisers can be prepared in every village, while the production of chemical fertilisers is centralised and, therefore, has to be sent to many far away villages. The consequent huge costs of extensive transport, trucks, petrol, storage, advertisements, sales and distribution can be eliminated. (6) It can improve the sanitation standard in slums and villages as the garbage from the streets and house- courtyards is removed. (7) If the streets and courtyards become clean, the torture of mosquitoes, flies and other insects can be reduced. (8) If the village gets cleaned and the insects removed, the epidemics can be avoided. (9) The nutritious foodgrains resulting from natural fertilisers along with the low frequency of epidemics and other diseases and the resultant relief from physical weakness can all contribute to the standard of health of the village people, improve their capacity to work and increase their life-span. (10) The improvement in health standards and the decline in diseases in slums and villages can bring down the expenditure on hospitals, medicines and medical care. (11) People can get a practical lesson that the garbage is not a waste but a valuable input for growing more

130 food. (12) It can also reduce the present costs of fertilisers to the farmers and prevent the deterioration of their land due to the use of the chemical fertilisers. Thus instead of using simple and straightforward method which can tackle many problems simultaneously, we keep on adding to the problems. For removing garbage from the slums, municipalities set up a garbage removal department. For controlling flies and mosquitoes in the slums, they set up a department to spray insecticides. For treating the victims of epidemics they set up hospitals. On the other hand, for meeting the requirements of fertilisers we set up giant fertiliser factories, spend millions of rupees on them, import for them plants and machinery from abroad and invite foreign consultants to guide the production. Furthermore, on the one hand we generate air-and-water pollution through the exhausts and emissions of fertiliser factories and on the other hand we pollute the environment in slums by not cleaning up the garbage, thus creating double pollution simultaneously by not tackling the same problem in a simple way. All these problems can be tackled simultaneously by simply depositing garbage underground in each slum and village. The slum people can be given a kilogram of wheat or potatoes per every bucket of garbage, out of the value of the resultant manure, and they would themselves clean up the slum. Instead, however, we keep on compartmentalising problems, adding a new department for tackling every new issue, and in the process complicating them.

Symbol of Prosperity of Flourishing Villages "Today we find rush of the village people to cities. Its main reason is unemployment in villages. Having come to the city, life becomes mechanical. Man becomes a labourer in a mill or in a factory. He has to live in a filthy slum. He cannot get a neat, nutritious meal. But he is helpless. "In the village he used to live in a clean, unpolluted environment. He used to work on his own farm. He had cows and buffaloes. He used to get unadulterated nutritious

131 meal. He used to live with his family members. His life was peaceful and happy. If we can provide him employment and income in the village itself, if he can get work in his own village, this rush to the city can be halted. It was for this purpose that Gandhi insisted upon the independence of the village and upon the development of khadi and the other village industries and cottage industries." 2 The Indian mythological picture shows Lord Krishna with a wheel (Sudarshan) upheld on his index finger, a cow behind him, and his brother Lord Balararn with a plough on his shoulder. This picture is a key to the prosperity of our villages. The Sudarshan wheel symbolizes the spinning wheel or charkha (named after it as Sudarshan charkha), the cow the milk -and -butter, and the plough the agriculture. The charkha gives people work in the textile and other subsequent. village industries, as well as provides the cotton-seeds for the cow-feed. The cow provides milk and milk products to the people as well as bullocks for the agriculture. Tb-e plough provides foodgrains to the people, fodder to the cattle and cotton and other raw materials for the charkha and other industries. Thus the Sudarshan wheel, cow and plough are complementary to one another and vital to the society, The charkha is the symbol of industry, the cow of the cattlewealth and dairy products, and the plough of the foodgrains and raw materials. The picture of Lord Krishna and Lord Balarani is illustrative of the prosperity of our flourishing villages, of the glory of the Indian culture. In the iOth chapter of Bhagavad Gita, in which Lord Krishna describes Himself, He would have put it as: Among textiles, I am the Khadi.

132 9

Human Values in Economics

The exclusive benefits of the charkha are freedom and human dignity. The charkha connotes a birth of freedom, for the real freedom is the person's ability to win his or her bread without anybody's mercy.

Freedom and Human Dignity The charkha endows one with self -confidence that he will always be able to earn his bread on his own. It plants in one a sense of human dignity that he would not have to live in humiliation and oppression due to the inevitable submission to the mammoth aggressive system in order to make a living. In the present age of giant economic system and automatic technology most of the people have to live as wage-earners, as a bolt or a nut in a complex machine. Even those who seem to control the system live under the grip of market forces. Big or small, all five under the yoke of the machine. Under a charkha-based system, man can discard the slavery of the machine and live with human dignity, with freedom, without having to exploit anybody or be exploited himself, and that would add to his status. The priority for human relationships is felt so acutely in the industrialised countries that youth in these countries rebel time and again to underline that death by boredom is worse than death by starvation. DWD -9

133 With khadi and other subsequent cottage industries, the masses can realise their own strength. Having got an independent and steady profession they can find self-confidence, explore new horizons and scale new heights. Self-confidence is one's most precious wealth, which people have lost under the present hierarchical economic system in which one has to toe the line of one's boss. Without self-confidence and self-assertion, one remains backward in spite of possessing material wealth. With the khadi and the ot ' her cottage industries, millions of unemployed people can gain a livelihood, on their own, with ease, without even having to leave home and work under a boss. They would no longer have to be at somebody's mercy for obtaining their bread, would no longer have to suffer oppression. Such self-reliance can plant in one the ability to defend oneself against economic aggressiveness. One does not need to resort to flattery in a charkha-based system. By reviving the charkha's power to economically free the masses, including the most deprived, Mahatma Gandhi was able to generate tremendous strength among the people which won India freedom from the unshakable British rule. In the present century which has witnessed two world wars and many international conflicts, this struggle of India stands out as a unique example of winning freedom in a non-violent way, without bloodshed. The charkha was the base of the freedom struggle. It awakened the latent but tremendous energy of the people and generated in them a new vitality, a new confidence. It would have been impossible to attain the freedom from the British rule without Gandhi's charkha movement. It is due to the failure to carry out the charkha work in the way Gandhi had explained it, that the freedom India gained from the British rule has remained a transition of power and has not reached the masses. The correct way of conducting the charkha work, as Gandhi emphasised strongly, is to stop hiring village people as spinners and weavers on wages, stop selling their khadi n cities, and instead let them retain and use their total production of khadi and of other commodities which would then follow the

134 khadi- production. The sales of khadi in cities during the freedom struggle did wipe off the sales of British textiles in India and consequently the British hold over the Indian economy which forced them to leave their rule. But Gandhi's freedom struggle was not against the British people, it was against the British system. Even though India drove out'the British rulers it still has 'English rule without the Englishmen' because it was not the presence of the British which enslaved India, it was their system of machine-based industrialisation which did. Therefore, so long as the system continues the 'Swaraj' (freedom) cannot be achieved. It was for changing this system that Gandhi argued for the programme of villages producing their own khadi instead of buying cloth from the mills in the cities. The charkha is a symbol of the unity and non-violent strength of the people. For countries fighting for freedom from dictatorial or authoritarian rule, the charkha provides a method of how freedom can be won without a drop of blood being shed, how freedom can be won while parting with the rulers as friends. The method of non-cooperation through the charkha is a method of converting the ruler to thinking, in terms of the ruled.

Revival of Villages The invaluable message of the charkha for the poor classes is the realisation that the key to overthrow the shackles of slavery is in their own hands. Explaining this, Ravishankar Maharaj asked the village people: "Why do you allow yourselves to be robbed? I wish to tell you that your condition is like that of the one sitting on the well and yelling for water. The calamity is not that you are lying on the periphery, you have yourself created the calamity. If you wished, you do not have to be supplicant to the city. You grow cotton, you can make clothes from it. You grow foodgrains, vegetables, milk, butter. If you lived amicably, why would you need legal advocates? Even if there

135 were a quarrel, a few wise men of the village can settle it. Why do you need to rush to an infirmary, whenever you get a stomach-ache? The village-land grows various kinds of herbs. If you gained a little more knowledge about them and retained the medical remedies of your forefathers you would not need to go to a doctor. God has graced you with the sensibility to live. You only have to gain enough knowledge of not being robbed by anybody." 1 A little further thought would reveal that if village people regained their charkha-and-pitloom and started producing cloth and consequently other necessities, the city hardly has anything that is vitally essential for the village. On ',he other hand a city cannot do without the commodities which the village supplies. The foodgrains, milk, butter, oil and vegetables supplied by the village are life-sustaining and indispensable for the city. The industries also rely on villages for the raw materials. The cities are, therefore, completely and continuously dependent on villages. In reality, the village is a provider and the city is a bunch of beggars. The village sustains the city, while the city exploits the village, squeezes it. The charkha shows the way for thousands of villages to attain freedom and to achieve prosperity by utilising their abundant natural wealth and human wealth being wasted at present. As Gandhi showed we had committed a disastrous blunder when we parted with the spinning-wheel and sold our economic independence and prosperity for a few yards of mill-made cloth.

Ethical Economics Arguing that economics ought to be a moral science, Gandhi said: "It is quite true that I place khaddar (khadi) first and then only untouchability and temperance.

136 "The moral I want to submit to you is that every act may be done, conceived and presented from a spiritual standpoint or it may have none of it at all. I want to claim before you today that the message of the spinning wheel and khadi is supremely a spiritual message; and it is because it is supremely a spiritual message for this land that it has got tremendous economic consequences as also political consequences.... "Whereas religion to be worth anything must be capable of being reduced to terms of economics, economics to be worth anything must also be capable of being reduced to terms of religion or spirituality. Therefore in this scheme of religion cum economics there is no room for exploitation. "India is suffering from meningitis, and if you will perform the necessary operation and make some return to those starving millions today, I say there is nothing but khadi for you. And if, as men spiritually inclined, you will think of those less fortunate than you are and who have not even enough to support themselves or clothe themselves, if you will have an indissoluble bond between them and yourselves, I say once more there is nothing for you but khadi. But it jars, and the reason why it jars is that this is a new thing and is a visionary thing, a day-dream as it appears to many. The missionary friend of Vellore, whom I spoke about, told me at the end of our conversation, "Yes, but can you stem the march of modern progress? Can you put back the hands of the clock, and induce people to take to your khadi and make them work on a mere pittance?" AD I could say is that this friend did not know his India. From the Vellore meeting I went to two places, Arcot and Arni. I did not see much of the people there, I assure you, but saw the villagers less well clad than I am. I saw them not in their tens but in their tens of thousands. They were in their rags and their wages were practically nil for four months in the year. They gave me of their substance; I was hungrily looking at the thing they gave me. They gave me not pices; they gave me pies. "Come with me to Orissa in November, to Puri, a holy

137 place, and a sanatorium, where you will find soldiers' and the Governor's residence during summer months. Within ten miles' radius of Puri you will see skin and bone. With this very hand I have collected soiled pies from them tied tightly in their rags, and their hands were more paralysed than mine were at Kolhapur. Talk to them of modern progress. Insult them by taking the name of God before them in vain. ... But they have not lost all sense of decency, but I assure you we have. We are naked in spite of our clothing, and they are clothed in spite of their nakedness. 2 The situation in villages is still the same after sixty years. In a news item 'Orissa village awaiting silent but sure death' a newspaper reports: "Sansarthili Village, Koraput district, May 7, (1987). The 500-odd Adivasis inhabiting this village are in a state of stupor, awaiting death. ... A visitor to anyone of the hundreds of remote villages in the district hears how death has been stalking the villages for the past few months, taking a silent but sure toll of human lives, one after another.3

Cultivating Brotherhood The hand-spinning being the very work through which even the poor and disabled fellow brothers and sisters can earn their daily bread, one can achieve through the hand-spinning a feeling of identification with the weakest members of the society. All the privileged ones cannot live like them, cannot share their suffering, but the least that one can do is to ply the charkha for some time every day and thus do the work even as the under -privileged fellow brothers and sisters do. The charkha, therefore, can be a medium for cultivating brotherhood with those who are left behind. It is a method of showing love for them. It is practically the only way to express fraternity for the human community. The ideal of rejecting whatever is unattainable by the poor right away brings one to khadi.

138 By lifting millions of have-nots and destitutes economically and therefore socially, and on the other hand by undermining conspicuous consumption and vanity among the rich, the charkha can lead the society towards equality. If every home has facility for food - cloth- and - work, the social conflicts and crimes can be minimised. Within the home also, if the weaker members can conveniently start contributing to the family, they can gain satisfaction themselves and also strengthen the family ties. This can bring about an atmosphere of mutual tolerance and respect in villages.

Strengthening the Family and Social Ties The term 'economics' is based on the word 'eco' which means home, family. Accordingly, economics ought to be a science built around the family. The words spinster and wife are supposed to have been derived from the words spinning and weaving respectively which proves the ancient nobility of these arts. In the charkha-based economic system the members of a family work together to develop their occupation. A German executive lady visiting India said: "What I like the most about India is that in her villages husband and wife work together and therefore become real partners to each other. In my society a man goes to his factory early in the morning, his wife goes to her office, they meet only towards the end of the day and even then have little to talk to each other because they work in different environments, on different problems, with different people.4 The dream of life is to integrate home and office, family and work, love and achievement. Our society needs such occupations which the entire family can share. When young people part with family, they also part with the sense of reverence, respect and consideration. A man would not get drunk in front of his mother, or sister, or wife, or daughter. When people do not acquire drinking and other such habits, the house runs smoothly even on a

139 low budget. But when young people leave home, they indulge in intoxications and get lost in the world of crime. As another consequence, the society also spends a lot of money, time and energy to contain the crimes. In the industrialised countries, the family income kept pace with inflation in the previous decade almost entirely because more women joined the workforce. This implies that industrialisation has increased the pressure on the family, converting it into a purely economic unit and thus exposing it to the stresses and strains of ruthless aggression. In the less industrialised countries, the family income could not even keep pace with inflation, creating scarcities and tensions. As an Urdu poet has lamented : Those were the days when we wanted to dine when friends visited. These are the days when we want friends to leave so that we may dine. The destruction of the family system and the concentration of economic power in the hands of men have harmed women the most - emotionally, economically and socially. Women, therefore, should take the lead in changing the present structure which they can do easily, non-violently and unmistakably through the charkha. It so well becomes them, as is evident from the crucial role women played during the freedom struggle in India.5 Women can bring forth unforeseen progress. In a letter Gandhi, a "devoted brother", complimented the women of India for the boycott of foreign (mill-made) cloth and its sacrificial fire. "The women of India have during the past twelve months worked wonders on behalf of the motherland. ... There is no guile about your work. Yours is the purest sacrifice untainted by anger and hate. Let me confess to you that your spontaneous and loving response all over India has convinced me that God is with us. No other proof of our struggle being one of self -purification is needed than that lacs of India's women are actively helping it. ... The economic and moral salvation of India rests mainly with you. ... (Forthcoming time) will show of what stuff the women of India are made. I have not the shadow of

140 a doubt as to your choice. The destiny of India is far safer in your hands than in the hands of a government that has so exploited India's resources that she has lost faith in herself. At every one of the women's meetings I have asked for your blessings for the national effort, and I have done so in the belief that you are pure, simple and godly enough to give them with effect. You can ensure the fruitfulness of your blessings by giving up your foreign (or mill-made) cloth and during your spare hours ceaselessly spinning for the nation.6 The philosophers have used the khadi-metaphor to illustrate the social fabric of a community. They relate the three processes of khadi production, namely carding, spinning and weaving, to intellect, emotion and will respectively. The carding process symbolises working with intelligence, blowing ideas in the mental space; but that alone does not gather them into a neat, strong thread, which requires spinning. The spinning process symbolises emotion, the entire spectrum of consciousness, feeling one with all entities. The weaving process symbolises the will, it is at this stage the fabric is produced by integrating the warp with the weft. The society is what is woven. The young generation is integrated with the old, the rich with the poor, the rulers with the ruled. The present society, being disastrously structured, needs the vision and the will of a weaver.

Charkha and World Peace The contemporary economic system is structured around huge machinery producing on mass-scale and therefore inevitably necessitates continuous search for overseas markets, constant struggle to keep competitors at bay and ruthless aggression to gain control over the economies abroad. Moreover, the procurement of raw materials from abroad also involves exploitation of the supplying countries, creating antagonism there and frantic race among the procuring countries. The present international economic system therefore pushes the world into wars.

141 The cut-throat race among the industrialised countries to capture raw materials from and market in foreign countries and consequently to retain their power and military superiority threatens the world with a nuclear crisis. This further necessitates the production of armaments which has become the most proliferating industry. In order to maintain the rate of growth of their economies the industrialised countries pile up armaments in the allied countries in Asia, Africa and Latin America, through sales and aid projects. Therefore the allied countries as well as their neighbour countries are compelled to apportion a large chunk of their budget for defence, in spite of their poverty. All this leads to colossal waste of the financial, scientific, human and natural resources of the world. The current world expenditure on armaments exceeds a trillion US dollars annually, even during peace times. The intellectual resources of scientists and technologists are also increasingly channelised in this destructive direction. Fostering enmities the present economic system forces nations into unproductive expenditure, devastates the world's resources and threatens the planet with the peril of atomic wars. When the history of the 20th century will be written, this century will be judged as the one which witnessed devastating international wars Efforts to establish peace have fallen short. Peace cannot be attained by resorting to governments or by increasing their strength. What is required is the replacement of the present economic system of mass -prod uction- for- distant -markets with the one of local-production-for -local- use. Violence and destruction can be, therefore, reduced only by the development of villages through cottage industries built around the charkha. Villages which produce mainly for their own use are'not forced into the necessity of searching for, let alone controlling, outside markets. Moreover, villages which produce primarily from their own raw materials do not have to vitally depend on the availability of supplies from outside. They, therefore, do not pose any threat to others and consequently do not

142 have to worry about maintaining an army or armaments to protect themselves from outside attacks. Their self-sufficiency in their primary needs reduces their fear of others exploiting them and consequently their compulsion to attack others. This is what the charkha can accomplish for villages. The economic system envisaged through the charkha, therefore, would mean freedom from the burden and fear of armaments. The relevance of the charkha for bringing about a non -violent economic order has been discussed in Chapter 3. Being extremely simple and therefore available to, as well as highly profitable for, the weak people the charkha can initiate this process in every place. Moreover, being an instrument to change the mode of cloth- production it can consequently change the mode of the entire production system. It is, therefore, the only means of a concrete action to pioneer the transformation from the present violence-ridden economy to an alternative peaceful economy. This makes the charkha indispensable for ensuring world peace. As a bomb symbolises violence, so does a charkha symbolise peace. As an atomic bomb is capable of destroying the humankind, equally so is the charkha capable of saving the humankind from destruction.

143 10

Vision of the Charkha in the Words of Gandhi

The charkha is not just an instrument it is a vision, it is a strategy. A strategy can be best described by its architect. In this chapter the vision of the charkha1 is described in the words of Bapu (the father of the nation, as Gandhi was affectionately called). The implementation of the charkha is the supreme issue about which Gandhi spoke most extensively throughout his life, and increasingly over the years, as can be seen from The Collected Works of Mahatma Gandhi2 and even that includes only his public speeches which were later published in his journals. These publications run into thousands of pages. The following is only a glimpse into the genius, the compassion and the power underlying his vision of the charkha.

144 For Freedom in Obtaining Food and Cloth "Khadi connotes the beginning of economic freedom and equality of all in the CoUntry. 3 "The economic constitution of India and for that matter of the world should be such that no one under it should suffer from want of food and clothing. In other words everybody should be able to get sufficient work to enable him to make the two ends meet. And this ideal can be universally realised only if the means of production of the elementary necessaries of life remain in the control of the masses. These should be freely available to all as God's air and water are or ought to be; they should not be made a vehicle of traffic for the exploitation of others. Their monopolization by any country, nation or group of persons would be unjust. The neglect of this simple principle is the cause of the destitution that we witness not only in this unhappy land but other parts of the world too. It is this evil that the khadi movement is calculated to remedy." 4

For Non-violent Economic Order "The supreme consideration is man.5 "The end to be sought is human happiness combined with full mental and moral development. ... This end can be achieved under decentralization. Centralization as a system is inconsistent with a non-violent structure of society.6 "Centralization cannot be sustained and defended without adequate force. Simple homes from which there is nothing to take away require no policing; the palaces of the rich must have strong guards to protect them against dacoity. So must huge factories. Rurally organised India will run less risk of foreign invasion

145 than urbanised India well equipped with military, naval and air forces. 7

Importance of Village Development Rural India is real India. "If the village perishes, India will perish too. It will be no more India. Her own mission in the world will get lost. The revival of the village is possible only when it is no more exploited. Industrialisation on a mass scale will necessarily lead to passive or active exploitation of villagers as the problems of competition and marketing come in. Therefore, we have to concentrate on the village being self-contained manufacturing mainly for use.8 "If we want Swaraj (Home Rule) to be built on non-violence, we will have to give the villages their proper place. ... Crores of people will never be able to live at peace with each other in towns and palaces. They will then have no recourse but to resort to both violence and untruth." 9 "The more I penetrate the villages, the greater is the shock delivered as I perceive the blank stare in the eyes of the villagers I meet. ... The spinning wheel alone can stop this reckless waste. It can do that now and without any extraordinary outlay of money or intelligence. Owing to this waste we are living in a state almost of suspended animation. It can be revived if only every home is again turned into a spinning mill and every village into a weaving mill. With it will at once revive the ancient rustic art and rustic song. A semi-starved nation can have neither religion nor art nor organisation." 10 "I hold that without truth and non-violence there can.be nothing but destruction for humanity. We can realize truth and non-violence only in the simplicity of village life and this simplicity can best be found in the charkha and all that charkha connotes.- If the society goes the wrong way, it

146 would "like the proverbial moth burn itself eventually in the flame round which it dances more and more fiercely." Gandhi considered it "my bounden duty up to my last breath to try to protect India and through India the entire world from such a doom." 11

Pivotal Importance of the Spinning Wheel Thus, "everything else is but an idle dream"12 the construction of village industries being the first task. Even there, "Other village industries stand on a different footing from khadi. There is not much scope for voluntary labour in them. Each industry will take the labour of only a certain number of hands. These industries come in as a handmaid to khadi. They cannot exist without khadi, and khadi will be robbed of its dignity without them." 13 "I have often said that if seven lakhs of the villages of India were to be kept alive, and if peace that is at the root of all civilization is to be achieved, we have to make the spinning wheel the centre of all handicrafts. Thus my faith in the spinning wheel is growing every day and I see it more and more clearly that the Sun of the wheel will alone illuminate the planets of other handicrafts." 14 "Khadi is the sun of the village solar system. The planets are the various industries which can support khadi in return for the heat and the sustenance they derive from it. Without it other industries cannot grow." 15

Power of Charkha "It (khadi) vitally touches the life of every single Indian, makes him feel aglow with the possession of a power that

147 has lain hidden within himself, and makes him proud of his identity with every drop of the ocean of Indian humanity. This non-violence is not the inanity which we have mistaken it through all these long ages; it is the most potent force as yet known to mankind and on which its very existence is dependent. It is that force which I have tried to present to the congress and through it to the world. Khadi to me is the symbol of unity of Indian humanity, of its economic freedom and equality and, therefore, ultimately in the poetic expression of Jawaharlal Nehru, the livery of India's freedom"16

For Total Growth "The message of the spinning wheel is much wider than its circumference. Its message is one of simplicity, service of mankind, living so as not to hurt others, creating an indissoluble bond between the rich and the poor, capital and labour, the prince and the peasant.17 An admirer of John Ruskin, Gandhi explained: "Human personality cannot be sustained in any other way. I stand by what is implied in the phrase 'Unto This Last'. ... We must do even, unto this last as we would have the world do by us. All must have equal opportunity. Given the opportunity, every human being has the same possibility for spiritual growth. That is what the spinning wheel symbolizes." 18 "I offer the economics of God as opposed to the economics of the devil which is gaining ground in the world to-day. The latter aims at or results in concentrating a million rupees in one man's hand, whereas the former in distributing them among a million or thousands; and in placing the economics of the spinning wheel before you, I am really trying to establish

148 the economics of God, and I ask for the co-operation of Hindus, Mussalmans, Parsis, Christians and all in this holy mission. ... "Personally, I think there is no room in true economics which is convertible with religion for the owning of slaves whether they are human beings, cattle or machinery. There is no room for slavery in economics." 19

For Moral and Spiritual Growth "I feel convinced that the revival of hand-spinning and hand-weaving will make the largest contribution to the economic and the moral regeneration of India. The millions must have a simple industry to supplement agriculture. Spinning was the cottage industry years ago and if the millions are to be saved from starvation, they must be enabled to reintroduce spinning in their homes, and every village must repossess its own weaver. 20 "For the poor the economic is the spiritual. You cannot make any other appeal to those starving millions. It will fall flat on them. But you take food to them and they will regard you as their God. They are incapable of any other thought. 21 "To a people famishing and idle, the only acceptable form in which God can dare appear is work and promise of food as wages." 22 "To them God can only appear as bread and butter." 23 Quoting nine 'shlokas' on 'work for sacrifice' from the Divine Song (Bliagwad Gita), Gandhi explained: "Work here undoubtedly refers to physical labour, and work by way of sacrifice can only be work to be done by all for the common benefit. Such work, such sacrifice can only be spinning. I do not wish to suggest that the author of the Divine Song D.W.L) - 10

149 had the spinning wheel in mind. He merely laid down a fundamental principle of conduct. And ... applying it to India I can only think of spinning as the fittest and most acceptable sacrificial body labour. I cannot imagine anything nobler or more national than that for say one hour in the day we should all do the labour the poor must do and thus identify ourselves with them and through them with all mankind. I cannot imagine better worship of God than that in His name I should labour for the poor even as they do. The spinning wheel spells a more equitable distribution of the riches of the earth. 24

For Elimination of Unemployment "By a process of exclusion one arrives at the irresistible conclusion that the only universal industry for the millions is spinning and no other. That does not mean that other industries do not matter or are useless. Indeed from the individual standpoint any other industry would be more remunerative than spinning. Watch - making will be no doubt a most remunerative and fascinating industry. But how many can engage in it? Is it of any use to the millions of villagers? But if the villagers can reconstruct their home, begin to live again as their forefathers did, if they begin to make good use of their idle hours, all else, all the other industries will revive as a matter of course." 25 "Poverty is merely a symptom, but idleness is the great cause, the root of all evil, and if that roof can be destroved, most of the evils can be remedied without further effort. A nation that is starving has little hope or initiative left in it. It becomes indifferent to filth and disease. It says of all reforms, 'to what good?'26

150 "The present pressing problem is how to find work and wages for the millions of villagers who are becoming increasingly pauperised, as anyone who will take the trouble of going to the villages can testify for himself and as is amply proved by contemporary expert evidence. The people are becoming poorer economically, mentally and morally. They are fast losing the will to work, to think, and even to live. It is a living death that they are living. Khadi supplies them with work, tools and a ready market for their manufactures. It gives them hope where but yesterday there was blank despair." 27 "I have never suggested that those who are more lucratively employed should give up their lucrative employment and prefer hand-spinning. I have said repeatedly that those only are expected and should be induced to spin who have no other paying employment and that too only during the hours of unemployment. There are only therefore two classes of people who are expected to spin, those who would spin for hire, whom I have already mentioned, and the thinking part of India who should spin for sacrifice by way of example and in order to cheapen khaddar. 28 "The whole of the charkha programme falls to pieces if millions of peasants are not living in enforced idleness for at least four months in the year." 29 "I have not contemplated, much less advised, the abandonment of a single healthy life-giving industrial activity for the sake of hand-spinning. The entire foundation of the spinning wheel rests on the fact that there are crores of semi-unemployed people in India. And I should admit that, if there were none such, there would be no room for the spinning wheel. But as a matter of fact everybody who has been to out, villages knows that they have months of idleness which may prove their ruin. Even my appeal to the middle class people to spin for sacrifice is with reference to their spare hours. The spinning wheel movement is destructive

151 of no enterprise whatever. It is a life-giving activity. And that is why I have called it 'Annapurna' or the replenisher. 30 "The sole claim advanced on its (hand -spinning's) behalf is that it alone offers an immediate, practicable, and permanent solution of that problem of problems that confronts India, viz. the enforced idleness for nearly six months in the year of an overwhelming majority of India's population, owing to lack of suitable supplementary occupation to agriculture and the chronic starvation of the masses that results therefrom." 31

For Production and Distribution "Ponder and realize what wealth this would mean to India, if Rs. 300 crores worth of cloth was produced by their own hands in the villages. There was a veritable mint of gold for them and if khadi became universal, the villages would rise to unknown heights. Today our masses are poverty-stricken, without the lustre of hope or intelligence in their eyes. The pure hands of the spinners could create this miracle for them and everyone could help. They should have understanding hearts and seeing eyes to detect the beauty in khaddar even if it is coarse and not be allured by mill finery which could never clothe their nakedness in the true sense of the term. ... Before the charkha class in full swing, everything else appears dull and lifeless to me." 32 "The spinning wheel is an attempt to produce something out of nothing. If we save sixty crore of rupees to the nation through the spinning wheel, as we certainly can, we add that vast amount to the national income. In the process we automatically organize our villages. And as almost the whole of the amount must be distributed amongst the poorest of the land, it becomes a scheme of just and nearly equal distribution of so much, wealth. Add to this immense moral

152 value of such distribution and the case for the charkha becomes irresistible. 33

For Education "I hold that true education of the intellect can only come through a proper exercise and training of the bodily organs, e.g. hands, eyes, ears, nose, etc. In other words an intelligent use of the bodily organs in a child provides the best and quickest way of developing his intellect. But unless the development of mind and body goes hand in hand with a corresponding awakening of the soul the former alone would prove a lop-sided affair." 34 "By education I mean an all-round drawing out of the best in child and man - body, mind and spirit. Literacy is not the end of education nor even the beginning. ... Literacy in itself is no education. I would therefore begin the child's education by teaching it a useful handicraft and enabling it to produce from the moment it begins its training. ... I hold that the highest development of the mind and the soul is possible under such a system of education." 35 "My plan to impart Primary Education through the medium of village handicrafts like spinning and carding etc. is thus conceived as the spear-head of a silent social revolution fraught with the most far-reaching consequences. It will provide a healthy and moral basis of relationship between the city and the village and thus go a long way towards eradicating some of the worst evils of the present social insecurity and poisoned relationship between the classes. It will check the progressive decay of our villages and lay the foundation of a juster social order in which there is no unnatural division between the 'haves' and 'have-nots' and everybody is assured of a living wage and the right to freedom. And all this would be accomplished without the horrors of a bloody class war.or

153 a colossal capital expenditure such as would be involved in the mechanisation of a vast continent like India. Nor would it entail a helpless dependence on foreign imported machinery or technical skill. Lastly, by obviating the necessity for highly specialized talent, it would place the destiny of masses, as it were, in their own hands." 36

Implementation in Villages "There is nothing inherently impossible in the picture drawn here. ... Any lover of true democracy and village life can take up a village, treat it as his world and sole work, and he will find good results. He begins by being the village scavenger, spinner, watchman, medicine man and school master all at once. If nobody comes near him, he will be satisfied with scavenging and spinning," 37 "I would say that whatever be the consequence, we must make use as much as possible of local help and if we are free from the taint of power politics, we are not likely to go wrong. ... I can categorically say to the principal worker: 'If you have any outside help, get rid of it. Work singly, courageously, intelligently, with all the local help you can get and, if you do not succeed, blame only yourself and no one else and nothing else."' 38 "Not even a pice is necessary for carrying out future activities (of the Spinners Association). All of -us should be convinced that the charkha will bring everything. If all the people grasp this significance of the charkha not a pice need be spent on carrying out the charkha work. Then we need not be afraid of the warrants of the government. Nor need we look to the rich for alms. We shall ourselves become the centre, and the people will rush to us. They will not need to go elsewhere to seek work. Every village will become a nerve centre of independent India. India will then consist not of the cities like Bombay and Calcutta, but of her 400

154 million people, of her 700 thousand villages. The problems of Hindu-Muslim differences, untouchability, conflicts, misunderstandings and rivalries will all disappear. This alone is the function for which the Association exists. We have to live for it and die for it." 39

Khadi Not for Sale in Cities and for Spinning-Wages in Villages "My idea of self-sufficiency is that villages must be self-sufficient in regard to food, cloth and other basic necessities. At least this much should be clear to all that we must give up the idea that khadi is merely an industry to distribute wages. For if khadi is an industry ... we would hardly be justified in asking anybody to put on khadi and boycott mill cloth. Nor can such khadi claim to be the herald of Swaraj. Actually, the claim made through the vision of khadi is that of uplifting the villages and thereby generating in the people the spontaneous strength for Swaraj. "It is not sufficient to keep on helping the villagers on the strength of philanthropic sentiments of city dwellers. On the contrary, the villagers should be made strong to face their life's problems and march ahead. ... "I first introduced khadi and studied it afterwards. This way I have been deceiving myself. What I gave to the people was money, but could not give the real substance - self-reliance. I gave them money in the form of wages and assured them that it contained Swaraj. People took me at my word and believed me. They still do. But I have now my own misgivings on this subject as to how far it can now continue. I am afraid that khadi cannot continue if we continue it this way. ... "AISA Secretary Jaju : Do you wish that the sales of khadi (in khadi stores in cities) be stopped and that people should spin for themselves ?

155 Gandhi : Yes Jaju: But a closure of the sales would mean a substantial reduction in spinning for wages. Gandhi : Yes. But whatever spinning we may then have would positively be such as can yield Swaraj through the thread of cotton. For that strength is definitely inherent in spinning."40

For a Way Out of Chaos and Crisis When asked, "What is the cause of the present chaos?" Gandhi replied, "It is exploitation, I will not say of the weaker nations by the stronger, but of sister nations by sister nations, And my fundamental objection to machinery rests on the fact that it is machinery that has enabled these nations to exploit other nations."41 "I would categorically state my conviction that the mania for mass-production is responsible for the world crisis. Granting for the moment that machinery may supply all the needs of humanity, still, it would concentrate production in particular areas, so that you would have to go in a round-about way to regulate distribution, whereas, if there is production and distribution both in the respective areas where things are required, it is automatically regulated, and there is less chance for fraud, none for speculation.42 "I do not believe that industrialization is necessary in any case for any country. It is much less so for India. Indeed I believe that Independent India can only discharge her duty towards a groaning world by adopting a simple but ennobled life by developing her thousands of cottages and living at peace with the world. High thinking is inconsistent with

156 complicated material life based on high speed imposed on us by Mammon worship. All graces of life are possible only when we learn the art of living nobly. , 43

For Minimising Exploitation To an American professor who asked whether "it (the spinning wheel) is a moral and spiritual symbol too?" Gandhi replied, "Yes, of truth and non-violence. When as a nation we adopt the spinning wheel, we not only solve the question of unemployment but we declare that we have no intention of exploiting any nation, and we also end the exploitation of the poor by the rich. It is a spiritual force which in the initial stages works slowly, but as soon as it gets started, it begins working in geometric progression, i.e. when it gets into the life of the people. When I say I want independence for the millions, I mean to say not only that the millions may have something to eat and to cover themselves with, but that they will be free from the exploitation of people here and outside. We can never industrialise India, unless, of course, we reduce our population from 350 millions to 35 millions or hit upon markets wider than our own and dependent on us. ... We cannot industrialise ourselves, unless we make up our minds to enslave humanity. -44 In a talk with Charlie Chaplin, Gandhi replied: "Precisely. In cloth and food every nation should be self-contained. We were self -contained and want to be that again. England with her large-scale production has to look for a market elsewhere. We call it exploitation. And an exploiting England is a danger to the world, but if that is so, how much more so would be an exploiting India, if she took to machinery and produced,45 cloth many times in excess of its requirements.

157 "I do not believe that the capitalists and the landlords are all exploiters by an inherent necessity or that there is a basic or irreconcilable antagonism between their interests and those of the masses. All exploitation is based on co-operation, willing or forced, of the exploited. However much we may detest admitting it, the fact remains that there would be no exploitation if people refused to obey the exploiter. What is needed is not the extinction of landlords and capitalists, but a transformation of the existing relationship between them and the masses into something healthier and purer." 46 "I do not teach the masses to regard capitalists as their enemies, but I teach them that they are their own enemies."47 "Exploitation of the poor can be extinguished not by effecting the destruction of a few millionaires, but by removing the ignorance of the poor and teaching them to non-cooperate with their exploiters. That will convert the exploiters also. I have even suggested that ultimately it will lead to both being equal partners."48

For the Purification of Means A foreign correspondent asked, "The fact is, Mr. Gandhi, the material resources of the West have advanced out of proportion to its moral resources, and something need be done to bring them on a level with each other. " Gandhi replied, "That is precisely what the charkha is intended to do. -49 "They say 'means are after all means'. I would say 'means are after all everything'. As the means so the end. ... There is no wall of separation between means and end. Indeed the creator has given us control (and that too very limited) over means, none over the end. Realisation of the goal is

158 in exact proportion to that of the means. This is a proposition that admits no exception."50 "Just as (arms symbolize violence) the charkha symbolizes non-violence, in the sense that we can most directly visualise non-violence through it. ... So if non-violence is to be pursued as an ideal the charkha must be acknowledged as its true form and emblem and kept ever before view as the personification of non-violence, as the symbol of non-violence. Unless you (addressing a meeting of the workers of Spinners Association) love this spirit of my worship of the charkha you will not gain an understanding of non-violence even for a hundred years."51

The Most Powerful Instrument with Quickest Effect "The spinning wheel stands for simple life and high thinking. It is a standing rebuke against the modern mad rush for adding material comfort upon comfort and making life so complicated as to make one doubly unfit for knowing oneself and one's God. It says appealingly every minute of our lives to you and to me: 'Use me and if you unitedly make use of me, small and insignificant though I may appear, you will find in the end that I will become an irresistible force against the mad indiscriminate worship of the curse called machinery.'" 52 The spiritual weapon of self -purification, intangible as it seems, is the most potent means of revolutionizing one's environments and loosening external shackles. It works subtly and invisibly, it is an intense process. Though it might often seem a weary and long-drawn process, it is the straightest way to liberation, the surest and quickest and no effort can be too great for it.53

159 Political Importance of the Charkha To a question (after a speech at Chatlam House, London), "Would Mr. Gandhi state briefly on what principle a strong, stable executive (goverment) could be framed for India?" Gandhi replied that "he had not dwelt on the political side, because the future of India, as he had been picturing it, did not admit of much political treatment. The cure of the disease of economic misery was economic, but he was dabbling in politics because it was impossible to deal with economics unless he also dealt with politics."54 "The spinning wheel for us is the foundation for all public corporate life. It is impossible to build any permanent public life without it. It is the one visible link that indissolubly binds us to the lowest in the land and thus gives them a hope. We may or must add many things to it, but let us make sure of it even as a wise mason makes sure of his foundation before he begins to build the super-structure and the bigger the structure the deeper and stronger the foundation. For the result to be obtained therefore spinning should become universal in India. "But spinning will be not only the connecting link between the masses and the classes, it will be the link between the different political parties. It will become common to all the parties. They may disagree on all other things if they like, but they can agree on this at least. 55 "A starving man thinks first of satisfying his hunger before anything else. He will sell his liberty and all for a morsel of food. Such is the position of millions of the people of India. For them liberty, God and all such words are merely letters put together without the slightest meaning. They jar upon them. ... And if we want to give these people a sense of freedom we shall have to provide them with work which they can easily do in their desolate homes and which would give them at least the barest living. This can only be done bythe spinning-wheel. And when they have become self-reliant

160 and are able to support themselves, we are in a position to talk to them about freedom, about Congress, etc. Those therefore who bring them work and means of getting a crust of bread will be their deliverers and will be also the people who will make them hunger for liberty. Hence the political value of the spinning-wheel, apart from its further ability to displace foreign cloth and thus remove the greatest temptation in the way of Englishmen to hold India even at the risk of having to repeat the Jalhanwalla massacre times without number."56 "There is no freedom for India so long as one man, no matter how highly placed he may be, holds in the hollow of his hands the life, property and honour of millions of human beings. It is an artificial, unnatural and uncivilised institution. The end of it is an essential preliminary to Swaraj. ... "Our Helplessness: This is apparent. We seem to have lost all power beyond passing resolutions. But if we could all unite on the constructive programme, it will by itself be a step towards regaining self-confidence and power of action. It must be clear to everyone that if Hindus and Mussalmans regain their senses, if Hindus treat untouchables as their brothers and if we have so popularized spinning and khaddar as to be within easy reach of exclusion of foreign cloth, we should not need to do any more to command attention to our will. What is more we should need neither secret societies for the promotion of violence nor open non-violent disobedience. Such a desirable consummation can be effected only by united, determined and ceaseless pursuit of the constructive programme. That, therefore, is my method of effective reply to the volcanic eruption of repression or the chronic and helpless subordination of a whole nation. ... If hand-spinning is an effective method of making India self-supporting it must be made part of the (voting) franchise. It is the best way of expressing national will and determination."57

161 Charkha in Economic Policy "Any plan which exploited the raw materials of a country and neglected the potentially more powerful manpower was lop-sided and could never tend to establish human equality. ... Real planning consisted in the best utilisation of the whole manpower of India and the distribution of the raw products of India in her numerous villages instead of sending them outside and rebuying finished articles at fabulous prices." 58 "Revival of the cottage industry (khadi) and not cottage industries, will remove the growing poverty. When once we have revived the one industry (khadi), all other industries will follow. They will add to the country's wealth. But the wheel alone can solve the general problem of starvation. Each district has no doubt its varying wants. They must have attention. But I would make the spinning wheel the foundation on which to build a sound village life. I would make the wheel the centre round which all the other activities will revolve. No spinner enters the village life without coming to contact with and helping to solve the other problems that tax the villagers. But if a worker enters a village and takes up any activity that comes his way and not the wheel, he will miss the central point and therefore simply grope without reaching every villager."59 "To supply India w ith cloth manufactured either outside or inside through gigantic mills is an economic blunder of the first magnitude." 60 "My position is clear: 1. If I had my way, India would be clothed in khadi to the exclusion of all other cloth, even made in indigenous mills." 61

162 "Khadi cannot be pushed side by side with the mill cloth. -62 "If the Department of Industries will justify its existence and will think in terms of the millions rather than of individuals, and of India rather than of England, then it will devote its attention principally to hand-spinning, organise it among the villagers, and make improvements in various methods of hand -spinning." 63

The Central Message from the Beginning to the End of His Life Gandhi's conviction about the charkha was firm and fundamental throughout his life. In the final years of his life he emphasised how thoroughly he was convinced about the charkha since the beginning. "I found in South Africa that if India wants to survive and progress in a non-violent way, it can be done only with the help of charkha - the charkha alone can be its symbol. 64 As early as in 1908, in his very first book Hind Swaraj, he wrote: "The workers in the mills of Bombay have become slaves. The condition of the women working in the mills is shocking. When there were no mills, these women were not starving. If the machinery craze grows in our country, it will become an unhappy land. It may be considered a heresy, but I am bound to say that it were better for us to send money to Manchester and to use flimsy Manchester cloth than to multiply mills in India. By using Manchester cloth we only waste our money, but by reproducing Manchester in India, we shall keep our money at the price of our blood, because our very moral being will be sapped, and I call in support of my statement the very mill hands as witnesses. ... Impoverished India can become free, but it will be hard for any India made rich through immorality to regain its

163 freedom. ... We need the requisite strength for the effort and that strength will be available to him only who ... if a wealthy man, he will devote his money to establishing handlooms ('eharkhas' in the original book written in Gujarati) and encourage others to use hand-made goods by wearing them himself."65 On the eve of his life, towards the end of 1947, four months after India gained the political freedom and only about a month before his death, Gandhi pleaded: "I have no doubt that spinning and weaving of khadi are more important than ever, if we are to have freedom that is to be instinctively felt by the masses of the villagers of India. That is the Kingdom of God on earth. Through khadi we were struggling to establish the supremacy of man in the place of the supremacy of power-driven machine over him. Through khadi we were striving for equality of all men and women in the place of gross inequality to be witnessed today. We were striving to attain subservience of capital under labour in the place of the insolent triumph of capital over labour. Unless, therefore, all the effort made during the past thirty years in India was a retrograde step, hand-spinning and all it implies must be prosecuted with much greater vigour and far greater intelligence than hitherto." 66 Three days before his death, on 27 January 1948, he wrote: "The Congress has won political freedom, but it has yet to win economic freedom, social and moral freedom. These freedoms are harder than the political if only because they are constructive, less exciting and not spectacular. All embracing constructive work evokes energy of all the units of the millions." 67 Two days later, he drafted 'New Constitution' for the Indian National Congress. Being his last piece of writing, it was later taken as his 'last will and testament'. In it he repeated that "The Congress in its present shape and form ... has outlived its use. India has still to attain social, moral and

164 economic independence in terms of its seven hundred thousand villages as distinguished from its cities and towns." 68 Gandhi and khadi are inseparable. He told his followers: "Cannot you also find the power of non-violence which I find in the charkha if you approach it and ply it with a heart like mine? That is why I say: Leave me or join me. If you want to come with me I will give you a scheme and will do everything. If you have not understood what I mean I shall sit with you the whole day. But if you say that you have grasped my meaning when you really have not, you will be deceiving both yourself and others. Ours is not an Association for making profit. ... Please do not therefore remain under an illusion. Let me go my way. If it were found that I was myself suffering from an illusion, that my belief in the charkha was mere idol-worship, either you may burn me to ashes with the wood of the charkha, or I myself would set fire to the charkha with my own hands." 69 Gandhi had asserted, "Whatever happens, (through the charkha) I shall fight on for the economic salvation of my people and that, you will agree, is worth living for and dying for. " 70

Topmost, Undefiable and Singular Message "The spinning wheel represents to me the hope of the masses. The masses lost their freedom, such as it was, with the loss of the charkha. The charkha supplemented the agriculture of the villagers and gave it dignity. It was the friend and solace of the widow. It kept the villagers from idleness. For the charkha included all the anterior and posterior industries - ginning, carding, warping, sizing, dyeing and weaving. These in their turn kept the village carpenter and D.W.D.- 11

165 the blacksmith busy. The charkha enabled the seven hundred thousand villages to become self -contained. With the exit of the charkha went the other village industries, such as the oil press. Nothing took the place of these industries. Therefore the villages were drained of their varied occupations and their creative talent and what little wealth these brought them. "Hence if the villagers are to come into their own, the most natural thing that suggests itself is the revival of the charkha and all it means. This revival cannot take place without an army of selfless Indians of intelligence and patriotism, working with a single mind in the villages to spread the message of the charkha and bring a ray of hope and light into their lustreless eyes. This is a mighty effort at co-operation and adult education of the correct type. It brings about a silent and sure revolution like the silent but sure and life-giving revolution of the charkha. "Twenty years' experience of charkha work has convinced me of the correctness of the argument here advanced by me. The charkha has served the poor Muslims and Hindus in almost an equal measure. Nearly five crores of rupees have been put into the pockets of these lakhs of village a . rtisans without fuss and tomtoming. Hence I say without hesitation that the charkha must lead us to Swaraj in terms of the masses belonging to all faiths. The charkha restores the villages to their rightful place and abolishes distinction between high and low."71 "It (the charkha) is a symbol not of. commercial war but of commercial peace. It bears not a message of ill-will towards the nations of the earth but of goodwill and self-help. It will not need the protection of a navy threatening a world's peace and exploiting its resources, but it needs the. religious determination of millions to spin their yarn in their own homes as today they cook their food in their own homes. I may deserve the curses of posterity for many mistakes of omission and commission, but I am confident of earning its blessings for suggesting a revival of the charkha. I stake my all on it. For every revolution of the wheel spins peace, good will and love. -72

166 11

Beautiful Struggle for a New World

"A quietly flowing river, a deer drinking the water, a splash of colours of the departing sun, flora and fauna in bloom, tinklings of the bells of the returning cowherd, ... heaps of foodgrains and streams of milk - on hearing all this a young man came to a village; "But on seeing the actual situation he was totally disappointed. As he was about to leave, he heard a sound : Where are you going? Our lustre and wealth were the same as what you had thought, but now we are robbed of them. Exploitation and pollution have turned us ugly. Please return to us our lustre and wealth." 1 For beginning the khadi -production one need not wait till others take to it. It can be started by individuals, families or groups. It does not need an organisation or a legislation. A few individuals through their conduct and dedication can bring about the required changes. They do not have to work round the clock. They might continue their professions and still introduce vital changes in the village through their dedication. As neither finance nor technology are needed for this work, anybody can start it at any place.

167 The Beginning The processes involved in producing khadi are the construction of the simple charkha,2 carding the raw cotton, spinning the yarn, weaving the cloth and dyeing or block-printing it. The spinning can be taken up by many, while each of the other processes can be taken up by a couple of families in the village. The instruments needed for all of them can be easily manufactured from a few sticks of wood or bamboo, with simple tools, by any carpenter or even by oneself, and therefore at insignificantly low cost. For a volunteer, one way to launch the work is to show the people her, or his, own khadi-dress and demonstrate with a charkha and some raw cotton how easy it is to spin the yarn to make such cloth. And explain how rewarding it ' is: The cost of khadi -production is only that of the equivalent weight of raw cotton plus some extra raw cotton to pay for weaving and carding. For example, if a pair of dress weighs 600 grams, a spinner can have it for about 900 grams of yarn: 600 grams for the cloth, 200 grams for the payment to the weaver and 50 grams each for the payment to the carder and the tailor. Considering the cost of short-staple cotton at Rs. 12 per kilogram, the complete dress, worth about Rs. 200 in the market, would cost the spinner Rs. 10.80 and about 41/2 days of work. An easy way to start khadi -production in a village would be to explain its benefits to the poor and unemployed people there, especially to the elders, as it is most useful to them. When the others see the pretty cloth thus produced so, inexpensively they would ask for it. If fifty spinners got together with a carder, about five to six weavers and a block-printer, they can roll out about eighty metres of artistic khadi each day, the cloth -equivalent to which sells in the market for around Rs. 25 a metre and the price keeps on rising. During a day a carder can blow about ten kilograms of cotton worth about eighty metres, a spinner can spin about 200 grams of yarn worth about

168 1.6 square metres, so the fifty spinners can spin ten kilograms of yarn worth eighty metres of cloth, a weaver can weave twelve to sixteen square-metres, so the five to six weavers can weave about eighty metres and a block-printer can print that much khadi. Out of the eighty metres, sixty metres, for example, can be given to the fifty spinners and twenty metres to the other seven craftsmen. This way the rate of return for the skilled craftsmen weaver-carder -printer can be three metres of printed cloth a day, while it would be about 1.2 metres a day for the spinners who can include even the old, the blind and other handicapped and mentally retarded. After a while when khadi is wanted by the rest in the village and therefore exchanged for other local commodities, expensive in the present markets, the returns to all the khadi-producers would keep on rising. Further, some of the village people can take up pressing the cotton seeds to produce cooking oil and de-oiled cakes for feed for cattle, which would make the joint production of khadi, cooking-oil and cattle-feed, all the more economically rewarding. The high and secure returns of the khadi -production are easily understandable even by the illiterate people, which makes it easy to start it among the unemployed, especially by teaching the spinning to the elderly members and the rest of the processes to the younger members.

Initial Difficulties In spite of the benefits of khadi -production, the implementation of this programme in rural areas is slow and difficult in the beginning, but if pursued with patience, courage and conviction it gradually takes firm roots. What helps the volunteer to stride through and overcome the initial difficulties, are her confidence in the ability of the charkha to bring about an all round progress and her firm conviction about the indispensability of the charkha before any other development in the village. The reason why the implementation is slow and difficult in the beginning is that the programme does not involve

169 distributing wages or stipends to the people like other programmes which however are consequently short-lived and limited in size. As a result the volunteer may not draw a crowd in a village and in fact may even find that people do not care to listen. She, or he, might have to start off with persuading a few that the work is easy, within their reach and, most of all, to their considerable benefit. It may not be possible to teach spinning to a group together, in the form of a class. In order to explain the advantages and teach spinning, the volunteer might have to go from hut to hut, day after day, succeeding in some cases and failing in many. Moreover, it is difficult for a volunteer to get accepted in a new place, because the people feel that the volunteer is organising the programme for her own selfish motives, such as pay or profits, and not for any durable or sizeable benefits to the village community. The experience of the author indicated that if the volunteer worked without pay or profits, the returns from her work, in terms of being accepted amongst the people and initiating them in the charkha were very high, although this may not imply that working with some pay would necessarily be a hurdle. Some characteristics of this form of work (without pay or profit) may be noted: Such work and hardship, if any, associated with it are to be shouldered only in the beginning, as gradually the initial spinners take up the work themselves. The volunteer gains support and all sorts of help from all quarters of the society, people go out of their way to lend a helping hand in such a work. Eventually the volunteer gets the support and love of the spinners beyond measure. Above all, the reward to the volunteer is probably the highest in terms of understanding and facing reality. Working without pay or perquisites also induces the volunteer not to keep on sticking to her work. In fact the volunteer must aim at ensuring that her help is not required on a permanent basis and at making the village community capable as soon as possible to carry on the work itself independently. This is possible because all requirements of khadi production, from raw materials to the market, are

170 available in every village. This is the very reason to begin with the production of khadi cloth. Gradually as people get and see the benefits accruing to them their doubts disappear. They find that they can produce cloth at a very low cost and work permanently, without having to depend on others and even when they have some other work. In spite of not getting wages or stipends, the people are gradually drawn to this programme because this way they can produce a most important commodity which accounts for the highest expenditure in the village and which they can produce at an extremely low cost and therefore can sell or barter locally.

Weaver Among all the processes of khadi -production, the one that is crucial and requires a know-how is weaving. However, only a few families of weavers are sufficient for a village. So the first task of the implementing volunteer is to find a family or two in the village who know weaving or can pick it up and explain to them that they can earn at the rate of three to four metres of khadi a day. The weaver sustains the spinners. Therefore, considering the fundamental importance of the charkha in the economic, social and political development of the village, the weaver's contribution is extremely significant. The weaver, therefore, can become the true liberator of his community. One is reminded that Gandhi named his occupation as a weaver. The brief experience of the author suggests that when the unemployed people Are shown the colourful. khadi dresses and the Dhanush charkha to make them, they express much interest in taking up the charkha, so the real bottleneck in launching the khadi -production in a village is the weaver. If a weaver is established in the village the khadi -production can take-off. Thus the first task of the volunteer would be to explain to a few young intelligent unempolyed persons in the village both the high returns to weaving and, more significantly, its pioneering and monumental socio-economic significance

171 in the development of the village community. If a few young persons started weaving, along with carding, block-printing and tailoring and offered the dresses to others in the village, in return of yarn, the others would promptly take up the spinning. Initially there could also be a 'travelling weaver' for a bunch of villages, who would spend a month or so in a village, when the village community can get their year's requirement of cloth woven, and then move on to another village. As the production of khadi can set off the production of other commodities and services in the village, the weaver can vitalize the tremendous human energy in the village which is lying latent at present. The weaver can thus accomplish what even the president of an international bank or the prime minister of a country cannot. He can show a miracle to the world. As the handmade textile industry was crushed by the British by crushing the weavers, it can be revived by reviving the weavers.

Failures A brief discussion of failures encountered by the author in implementing such a programme might be useful. It was not found useful to conduct the khadi programme the way the Khadi and Village Industries Commission does, i.e. produce khadi in villages while sell it in cities, pay wages to spinners and weavers, and run the organisation with the revenue from the sales of khadi and grants from the government. Gandhi himself had, during the last years of his life, strongly rejected this approach as a wrong one and urged khadi workers to discard it. The number of persons who can find employment under such a programme would be constrained by the organiser's ability to sell the cloth. Moreover, the income of these persons would be reduced on account of the organisational and sales costs and overheads. For example, the spinners in an Ahmedabad slum sold the khadi they made for Rs. 14 per metre and after deducting the weaving cost of Rs. 2 per metre and the raw cotton

172 cost of Rs. 2 per metre, got the net earnings of Rs. 10 from spinning 21/,2 hanks required per metre, i.e. Rs. 4 per hank. In comparison, the Commission, even while selling khadi for Rs. 15 to 30 per metre, was able to pay only up to Re. I per hank to the spinners. In any case, the very airn of the production of khadi is to launch in the villages a self -accumulating process of gro,,,vth which the village community can sustain independently. This requires the use of khadi by the village people, i.e. its substitution for the mill-cloth being bought at present, by the non-spinners as well. This would enable the non-spinners to start the production of other commodities to exchange with khadi. The sale outside is not viable in any case. The short experience indicated that the village people themselves would not want to sell the khadi they produce. The costs of locally grown cotton and locally made charkha being insignificantly low and no middleman being required for producing and selling khadi locally, the availability of khadi at as low as one-tenth the market price of similar cloth acts as a strong incentive to the spinners to use the khadi themselves, and also to the rest of the village people to obtain the khadi in exchange by producing other commodities and services. All of them also very much value, of course, their newly- discovered ability for production and their freedom. As a slum-dweller referred to the charkha: "It is mind, it is heart." This further results in orienting the khadi -production not to the fashions in the city but to the choice of the village people who prefer tough rather than transparent cloth. This, in turn, renders the khadi-production much easier because thick yarn is easier to spin, faster to weave and can utilise any variety of raw cotton including the ones which can be grown on wasteland. It was found that the Ambar-charkha, the one used by the Khadi Commission, after Gandhi's death, as well as the later model Dabbacharkha based on the open-end -spinning technology, were not useful. The reasons were the following: The Ambar-charkha can use only one kind (i.e. length of fibre) of cotton even though a large variety of cotton can

173 be grown and every variety of cotton-plant yields about four harvests a season with different fibre-lengths. So the Ambar-charkha cannot produce yarn from all the cotton available in the village. It can produce yarn from only one of the many varieties available, or perhaps none if that particular variety does not grow in the village. Moreover, the people of the village cannot make themselves the cotton-tape required for the Ambar-charkha because it can be made only on huge automatic machines. So the people can work only if and when and so long and as much as an outside agency which controls the machines keeps on providing them cotton-tape which, however, is a daily requirement. The Ambar-charkha cannot be manufactured in villages, or even repaired there, as the parts can be manufactured only on huge machines. Consequently the Ambar-charkha cannot be used by the village people without total and continuous dependence on others. The same difficulties occur with the Dabba-charkha. Besides, such khadi therefore cannot be produced at low cost. Eventually, it is observed that even the use of the simple box-charkha has been a mistake, even though it eliminates all the above problems except that a village carpenter cannot make it. As a result only those people for whom the volunteer buys the box-charkha from the city are able to do the spinning. Had the Sudarshan charkha which can be made by a village carpenter, or the even simpler Dhanush charkha which can be made by oneself, and take only a few strips of wood or bamboo, been used other people in the neighbourhood, and the relatives of the spinners in other villages, who have in fact inquired about and asked for the charkha, might have been able to start spinning on their own. They would not have to be dependent on, and wait for, an outsider. In short the demonstration effect could have been much faster and larger. Retrospectively it seems that the box-charkha must have been devised for Gandhi's political followers during the freedom struggle. They had-to move from town to town and

174 also had to spin every day and therefore must have found the Sudarshan charkha cumbersome and uncomfortable to carry around. However, the Sudarshan charkha. and the Dhanush charkha are equally, if not more, productive, much simpler and much less expensive than the box-charkha. In any case, they are the only charkhas that a village carpenter can produce easily, which is the fundamental characteristic of a charkha. The very virtue of the charkha, namely its power to provide facility for self-employment and independent livelihood to all including the weakest, which characterises the simple Sudarshan charkha and Dhanush charkha, is missing in the Ambar charkha. Only the Sudarshan charkha or the Dhanush charkha therefore can enable people to become economically independent. The relevant point is that the above experience indicates the need to DE-technologise in order to search for a solution to the problems of poverty. In this case it involves the spinning technology, beginning with the latest open-end -spinning technology, and ending up with the simplest Sudarshan charkha which has been with the people for ages. Having started the khadi work in a village after attending the UN Conference on Science and Technology for Development, this was a startling revelation to the author! Does this tend to be an evidence towards a feeling gaining much ground in various quarters that technology is actually the means for raising profits but not for reducing starvation, for increasing prosperity of the few but not for relieving poverty of the masses, for serving the rich and not the poor? A few government schemes for rural development were tried but they failed. It seems that, except for the charkha programme, it may not be possible to construct a plan scheme useful to the masses in villages because the various necessary rules of these schemes turn out defective under different circumstances. For example, in a scheme for training rural youth for self-employment which offers them a stipend to attend the class, the production obtained through the class is to be retained by the organising agency and not by the

175 people, as expensive raw materials and equipments are provided by the agency. But then the village people are reduced to labourers and feel that a stipend of Rs. 100 a month is too small an amount for wages. On the other hand, if the stipend amount were substantial the costs of the scheme would become exorbitant if it were really meant to cover the millions of people and still the people may join the class just for the stipend rather than for learning the skill. Similarly another government scheme which offers up to Rs. 1000 to a person to buy equipment for undertaking self-employment, might on the contrary induce the people not to buy an equipment costing less than Rs. 1000, and perhaps even sell it off. The reason underlying such inadequacies lies in the condition that no other plan, except for the khadi production, can provide a self-contained scheme meeting all the requirements from raw materials to market within the village, which is necessary for the feasiblity of production there. Such plan schemes, therefore, can only distribute some money for a short while, without any other tangible benefits. On the other hand, when the charkha programme was started in a village, without any government plan or stipend, the people acquired the skill very fast, enthusiastically, and also taught it to one another, with the result that eventually there was not even much need for an outside agency to teach the skill there.

Exclusive Characteristics It would be useful to point out some exclusive and vital characteristics of the implementation of the charkha programme. The role of the implementing person is not that of a job-giver or of an exploiter. Her relationship with the people is not that of a boss and the labourers, or of a ruler and the ruled, or of -a landowner and the landless. The people are not dependent on her, even for the raw material or for the market. So they do not have to be afraid about being exploited. Her relationship with the people is that of equality, which is something exclusive to' the charkha programme. The people

176 can take the complete charge of the production. There is nobody to scold, to control, to check, to punish, to pay or to demand. The role of the person who teaches hand-spinning is that of a mediator, and becomes redundant after a while. She cannot have selfish gains, she cannot exploit people, no economic dependency is involved, which is unique about the charkha programme and which is necessary for successful implementation of any programme. The programme can continue even after the initial organiser withdraws from it. Any programme which falls apart if the services of the organising agency discontinue is vulnerable and does not have a bright future. But the Gandhian programme can be carried on by the people themselves, the organising agency is not indispensable. This programme is not dependent on, or constrained by, outside financial resources or government- executed plans. Although they may help under some circumstances, both these are in no way bottlenecks and certainly not indispensable. This realisation cuts across the constraints and loop-holes of many conventional programmes trying to provide employment. Above all, it ensures that the present approach can be implemented by anybody, anywhere and replicated at other places. Actually the government or any other outside monetary aid turns out to be a hindrance rather than a help in launching the work in a village. Tt is counter- productive. As discussed earlier, the first required project is khadi -production and the inputs required for it cost little monetarily. Gandhi was clear on this : "I can categorically say to the principal worker: 'If you have any outside help, get rid of it. Work singly, courageously, intelligently with all the local help you can get and, if Vou do not succeed, blame only yourself and no one else and nothing else."'3 He told an industrialist who advised him to collect money for his village work : "If it is- such an easy thing, you might do so with your money. But I know it is not easy. You cannot bring a model village into being by the magic wand of money.'4 He advised the members

177 of the All India Spinners Association: "We shall put into khadi work not money but our brain and heart. -5

Pivotal Work To focus on the charkha-work is not to imply that employment is the only problem deserving attention in villages. Other areas of village- development such as sanitation, nutrition, education and cultural facilities have legitimate claim to the honour. The emphasis on the charkha-work is not to undermine the importance of work in these other areas, but rather to clarify that employment, economic freedom and strength of the people seem to be prerequisites for the success of work in other areas. For example, consider the issues of energy and environment. Bio-gas plants can be useful for providing fuel in villages and for saving forest-wood from being chopped off. They can also save the village people the drudgery of carrying from forests the wood for fuel, and protect the forests as well. But while actually introducing them in a village, one finds that only about seven per cent of the village population, namely the big land-owners, have a considerable number of animals. For the disadvantaged majority in the village the bio-gas plant is non-usable even if it were available because they do not have the wastes to feed it. In that case, one would think, solar cooker can be useful in villages, as sun is available to all. But the food items the solar cooker can prepare, namely rice, pulses, vegetables, are out-of-reach for most village people, they are too expensive. The point is not that the solar-cooker and the bio-gas-plant are not useful in villages but the p~int is that prior to that the village people must have food and for obtaining food they first need to secure employment and economic strength. Once the volunteer has launched the khadi -production in a village, however, a number of immense possibilities for

178 developments on all fronts open up. She, or he, can show how to run the various village industries and how to make the necessary implements. She can then demonstrate ideal village diet, give model lessons on rearing animals, cultivating natural manure from wastes, utilization of hides, bones, etc., of animals, village sanitation, village arts and music, village games and physical exercises, basic education, natural medicines and therapies, village maternity home and so on. When the unemployed village people acquire economic strength, dairy products can be produced in villages by rearing cows and buffaloes. Similarly the production of footwear and leather-goods can be made after the animals die. Sugar factories in cities are sustained primarily through favourable legislation, on the other hand, however, bee-keeping in villages contains immense possibilities and, with research, honey can even become a common item of food. In any case jaggery can be made from palm trees. Handmade paper ha3 a charm of its own as well as durability. Once the khadi -production starts in a village, peo0e in the neighbouring villages show even more interest and determination to start the activity. Once they see the benefits, they can easily learn the skill, construct the instruments and start the production on their own. It seems people are more influenced by observation of the actual success than by explanation or persuasion.

Glorious Road One does not have to change the society, one has to change oneself. As Aldous Huxley advised the only thing one can be sure of changing is one's own conduct. No amount of lecturing or writing can be as useful for implementing the charkha in a community as the volunteer herself or himself spinning on the charkha, finding or initiating a weaver and wearing the self-produced khadi. Better still is her or his weaving the handspun yarn and thereby enabling others to take to hand-spinning. As Carlyle put it: Do not be world-wide, be world-deep. Gandhi advised the leaders of the country, "I am not saying

179 that swaraj will be secured if you alone spin. I am positively asserting that swaraj will be secured if everyone spins. It is certain that if you start spinning, you will thereby make others spin. The Bhagvad Gita says that masses follow the elite. It is said that the Prince of Wales sets the fashion in dress. You are considered or wish to be considered the elite of India. Would the others not follow if you set the pace ?- 6 Addressing the intellectuals he said, "The primary duty of the intelligentsia of the country was to identify themselves with the masses and to establish a bond of living relationship with them. They had neglected them, they had exploited their resources for their own welfare, they had hitherto maintained themselves with the hard-earned wealth of the poor cultivators; they should now do penance for all theirs ' ins. If they really wanted to establish dharmarqjya (Righteous State) they should now serve those who had hitherto served them, they should change their entire mode of life and angle of vision and look at the things in their true perspective. They all might not be able to undergo the tremendous sacrifice this would involve. But to enable all to do their duty he had suggested to them a simple religion - that of charkha. With the extinct of charkha had begun the poverty of India and it was going on increasing as the time rolled on. It was an axioynatic truth, he said, that with the revival of charkha the ancient glory of India would be revived. ,7 Especially asking students and youth to work in villages during 'vacations he said: "I endeavoured to show that the best form that social service could take in India was through the spinning wheel and khaddar, because it brought young men in touch with the villagers, it enabled them to put a few coppers (through self-employment) every day into the

180 pockets of the villagers and created an indissoluble bond between the latter and themselves, and it helped them to know their Maker because the selfless service of the poor was the service of God."8 He urged citizens that if they wanted village reconstruction, if they wanted to serve the poor, if they wanted to make their relation with the villagers purer, they could proceed on one line alone - and that was the line of charkha.9 He explained to fellow workers, "If I throw the wheel at the skeletons of Orissa, they will not look at it. But if I begin spinning in their midst, they will take to it like fish to water. The masses do as the great ones do, not as they preach. Hence the necessity of the spinning resolution. It gives us a real sense of responsibility towards the villages, it fills the air with the spinning taste and cheapens khadi. If the spinning resolution is faithfully carried out by the country, it has a potency of which we have as yet no conception."10 He had suggested to all, "Slow, as this may seem. it (the khadi -production) is, in my humble opinion, the sui-est and the quickest method. Let those the-efore who have belief in khadi oi, who have no belief in afi~thing else, do their best bit." 11 There is always a first step for beginning on the road leading to great lengths. The charkha is the first step for beginning on the glorious road to progress.

181 APPENDIX I

Construction of The Charkha

The design1 and measurements of the parts of the charkha are described on the following pages.

1. Sudarshan charkha 2. Dhanush charkha with a branch of a tree 3. Dhanush charkha with a piece of bamboo 4. Dhanush charkha with a block of wood 5. Winder for folding the yarn

1. Drawings by Vijay Solanki.

182 I. SUDARSHAN CHARKHA The Spinning Wheel

1. Wheel, 2. Thread Belt, 3. Holder, 4. Spindle, 5. Stand, 6. Handle, 7. Cotton Sliver

183 11. DHANUSH CHARKHA with a branch of tree Parts: A. Holder B. Bow C. Spindle D. Support

2 A. Holder: 1. 5" long Y-shaped branch of tree 2. holes at 10' slant, pierced with a heated spike (C3 below) 3a. thin tin tube, or nipple of a cycle spoke, or ballpen refill, or wire spring. Apply a drop of oil-and-kerosenc in them before spinning. 3b. If any of 3a is not available then cut a slit above the holes and line them with tin. 4. end sharpened for fixing it in the support

184 B. Bow: 1. 1" wide, 2' long strip of wood or bamboo 2. 1 wide 13/4' long rubber strip from a waste cycle tube, stretched and fastened on the two ends of the strip, and scrubbed for better friction C. Spindle: 3. 7" long spoke from a waste umbrella or cycle wheel, pointed at the ends 4. 1" round tile, thick and heavy to serve as weight-bearing, carved from a surface of, or cast in a bottle cap from, mud or metal or cement, pierced in the centre and fixed with cotton and glue 5. bead or rubber or wood D. Support: a 2' long branch of a tree, one end fixed with the holder, the other held under the right knee for controlling the holder while spinning E. Sliver from carded cotton

185 III. DHANUSH CHARKHA with a piece of bamboo Parts: A. Holder B. Bow C. Spindle D. Support A. Holder: 1. 5" long, 21/2 " wide bamboo with a F/2" deep U carved in the middle 2. holes at 10' slant, pierced with a heated spike W3 below) 3a. thin tin tube, or nipple of a cycle spoke, or ballpen refill, or wire spring. Apply a drop of oil- and -kerosene in them before spinning. 3b. If any of 3a is not available then cut a slit above the holes and line them with tin. 4. hole for fixing the support 5. joint of the bamboo

186 B. Bow: 1. 1" wide, 2' long strip of wood or bamboo 2. 1" wide, F3/4' long rubber strip from a waste cycle tubestretched and fastened on the two ends of the strip, and scrubbed for better friction C. Spindle: 3. 7" long spoke from a waste umbrella or cycle wheel, pointed at the ends 4. 1" round tile, thick and heavy to serve as weight-bearing, carved from a surface of, or cast in a bottle cap from, mud or metal or cement, pierced in the centre and fixed with cotton and glue 5. bead or rubber or wood D. Support: a 2' long strip of bamboo, one end lixed with the holder, the other held under the right knee for controlling the holder while spinning. E. Sliver from carded cotton

187 IV. DHANUSH CHARKHA with a block of wood Parts: A. Holder B. Bow C. Spindle D. Support A. Holder: 1. 4" X 3" piece of wood with a 1" deep U carved in the middle 2. holes at 10' slant 3a. thin tin tube, or nipple of a cycle spoke, or ballpen refill, or wire spring. Apply a drop of oil- and- kerosene in them before spinning. 3b. If any of 3a is not available then cut a slit above the holes and line them with tin. 4. hole for fixing the support

188 B. Bow: 1. 1" wide, 2' long strip of wood or bamboo 2.1" wide, 1-3/4' long rubber strip from a waste cycle tube, stretched and fastened on the two ends of the strip, and scrubbed for better friction C. Spindle: 3. 7" long spoke from a waste umbrella or cycle wheel, pointed at the ends 4. 1" round tile, thick and heavy to serve as weight-bearing, carved from a surface of, or cast in a bottle cap from, mud or metal or cement, pierced in the centre and fixed with cotton and glue 5. bead or rubber or wood D. Support: a 2' long piece of wood, one end fixed with the hhol er, the other held under the right knee for controlling the holder while spinning E. Sliver from carded cotton

189 V. WINDER Parts A. Stand with two eyes B. Winder Al - stand A2 - two eyes for passing the yarn, the lower eye at the level of the point of the spindle and the upper eye at the level of the winder B. Winder, with a circumference of one metre, each stick C. Hank: Yarn removed from the winder and folded with twists, usually 500 or 1000 metres of yarn. D. Bobbins: Used for saving the trouble of winding the yarn every time the spindle is full. Made by winding paper on the spindle with glue and fixing this paper-pipe in the centre of a I" round hard-paper. Used by fitting it on the spindle, and removing it when full with yarn. Later, the yarn on all the bobbins can be wound at a time.

190 APPENDIX 11

Ruin of Handspun Indian Texiles and Birth of Industrial Revolution

Historical records testify the glory and prosperity of the Indian economy throughout the ages till as recently as the rise of the 'industrial revolution' in England. In his Description of Ancient India Thornton noted: "Ere the pyramids looked down upon the valley of the Nile, when Greece and Italy, those cradles of European civilization., nursed only the tenants of wilderness, India (which included Pakistan and Bangladesh) was the seat of wealth and grandeur. A busy population had covered the land with marks of industry; rich crops of the most coveted products of nature annually rewarded the toil of the husbandman. Skilled artisans converted the rude products of the soil into fabrics of unrivalled delicacy and beauty. Architects and sculptors joined in constructing works the solidity of which has not, in some instances, been overcome by the evolution of thousands of years. ... The ancient state of India must have been one of extraordinary magnificence."1 A Hisforica.1 Disquisiboyi Couceniing Ancient India, by Robertson recorded: "In all ages, gold and silver, particularly the latter, have been the commodities exported with the greatest profit to India. In no part of the earth do the natives depend so little upon foreign countries, either for the

191 Necessaries or luxuries of life. The blessings of a favorable climate and a fertile soil, augmented by their own ingenuity, afford them whatever they desire." 2 Such evidences refute the criticism that Indian villages have always been backward. On the contrary. The village people were prosperous and intelligent, occupied in flourishing industries, but were ripped off their occupations during the last couple of centuries and doomed to poverty and indebtedness. In 1926 Puntambekar and Varadachan observed that "a prosperous, industrious and contented nation pl,-Yring busy trades and endowed with an extraordinary genius for art and craftsmanship, has been transformed almost imperceptibly, under the influence of some fierce and nasty curse as it were, into a race ground down by misery, experiencing periods of enforced idleness for want of honest occupation and striving in vain to lift its head amidst growing indebtedness and poverty. The change has been so vast and so striking that though the modern Indian village retains an outward appearance of placidity and calm there is no trace of the ancient and unique, self-sufficient and self-reliant village community to be seen any longer. Its inhabitants who once had enjoyed the fruits of an extensive and magnificent commerce have today lost their cherished inheritance of ancient occupations and are forced to eat the bread of dependence." 3 India's golden age and immortal civilization have been attributed to the genius of two personalities: the Vedanti - the source of knowledge and the weaver - the source of action. It was the weaver Miose creativity constituted the foundation upon which the industries and arts of India were built.

192 Rig Veda, the treatise on eternal knowledge and wisdom dating as Iona back as 3000 B.C., contains rich tributes to the delicate arts of weaving and spinning. The Rishis (sages) used the weaving metaphor to illustrate truth and mystery: -Night and day interweave in concert like two female weavers the extended thread to complete the web of sacrifice." The very creation of the universe, which proceeded from the sacrifice of Prajapati, is rendered in terms of weaving: "They, the refulgent sages, weave in the sky, aye in the depths of the sea, a web for ever anew." (Rig Veda 1.149.4). The continuity of life and of the human race is compared to the continuity of a well-spun thread: "As fathers they have set their heritage on earth, their offspring, as a thread continuously spun out." (Rig Veda X.56.6). Even till very recently, the hand-spun yarn was regarded sacred yarn and therefore a requirement in all sacred ceremonies. The sacred garlands, used for sanctioning a marriage, were made of hand-spun pure yarn. So was the sacred thread donned at the 'Yalnopavit' ceremony. While celebrating the 'Vata-Savitri' ceremony, the ladies used hand -spun yarn for sacrifice to the Vata tree. While celebrating 'Pavitra-Barasa' the cloth offered to Lord Vishnu was hand-spun cloth. When the Kshatriyas set off for defending the country against an outside attack, they were garlanded 'Vijaya-inala' (victory-garland) made of hand-spun yarn. The princes while taking oath as kings donned hand-spun dress at the swearing-in ceremony. -At the time other countries had not even heard of raw cotton, the arts of spinning and weaving were commonly known and practised in India. Many historical evidences confirm the ancientness of cotton textiles in India. In the Greek language, the word for cotton textile is 'Sindon' which originated from "Sindhu'. For muslin also, the Greek word 'Gangatika' has its origins in 'Ganga'. The word 'calico' is also derived from Calicut, the South Indian port which sent that cloth all over the world. The Greek writer Herodotus described raw cotton as 'a superior wool than the sheep-wool', which indicates that till lus time the Greek did not know about cotton. An admiral

193 of Alexander the Great, Nearchus, wrote about trees, grown in India, producing *something like wool' on every branch of theirs, 'from which wool the people of this country make sparkling white clothes'. The official documents of Japan show that cotton was introduced for the first time 'eleven centuries ago' into that country by two Indians. 4 The supremacy of Indian cotton textiles has been hailed since centuries by travellers from the countries of the West and the East as also from Africa, as shown by the records of the travellers Sulaiman, Marco Polo, Varthema, Caesar Frederic, P,~rard, Nicolo Conti, Barbosa, Linschoten and others. An Arab traveller in the ninth century, Sulaiman, wrote by about "... a stuff made in this country which is not to be found elsewhere; so fine and delicate is this material that a dress made of it may be passed through a signet ring. It is made of cotton and we have seen a piece of it.-5 Marco Polo, who came to India in the 13th century, wrote about the -finest muslins and other costly fabrics" made in the Telugu country. "In South" he said, "they look like the tissues of the spider's web. There is no king or queen in the world but might be glad to wear them."6 Varthema, who was in India for five years in the beginning of the sixteenth century, while describing the prosperity of Bengal, said that it had a greater abundance of cotton than any other country in the world. Caesar Frederic, a Venetian merchant who came later in the sixteenth century was amused by the printed cotton textiles which he called, "painted, which is a rarer thing, because this kind of cloth appears as if gilded with diverse colours and the more it is washed the livelier the colours will show." A traveller at the end of the sixteenth century, Linschoten, observed that "there is

194 excellent and fair linen of cotton made in Negapatam, St. Thome and Masulipatam ... of all colours woven in diverse sorts of loom work, very fine and cunningly wrought which is much worn in India and better esteemed than silk for that is higher priced than silk because of the fineness and cunning workmanship.-7 Another traveller who visited India at the beginning of the sixteenth century, Pyrard, was highly impressed with the economies of the ports like Cambay, Surat, Calicut and Goa and recorded that "the principal riches consist chiefly of silk and cotton stuffs wherewith everyone from the Cape of Good Hope to China, men and women, is clothed from head to feet. These stuffs are worked, the c~)Iton also made into cloth of the whiteness of snow and very delicate and fine. ... What is to be observed, however, of all their manufactures is that they are both of good workmanship and cheap.-8 As late as in the middle of the nineteenth century Mount Stuart Elphinstone hailed Indian cotton textiles as superb, the beauty and craftsmanship of which were praised since ages and the delicacy of the fine textures of which still remained unsurpassed by any other country. The natural resources of India were bountiful and craftsmen skilled and industrious. The weavers with their assiduously cultivated and delicately nursed hereditary sKills produced finest fabrics known to the world. The arts of dyeing and printing were aided by favourable climate which rendered all colours lively, durable and brilliant, imparting to the manufacture a beauty all its own. The weaver could always bank on help from all quarters of people whose gratitude was such that they accorded him a very high status in the society. The nation was proud of the spinner and the weaver. So highly significant and esteemed and yet so gentle and peace invoking was the profession of weaving that many Indian saints from Kabir in North India to Tiruvalluwar in South India were weavers.

195 Peaceful as it was, the economy was also prosperous. This prosperity attracted other peoples not acquainted with the craftsmanship from other countries especially in Europe. The Portuguese, the Dutch, the French and the British vied with one another to reach the land flourishing with bustling industries. In their struggles for establishing power over the Indian markets, the British won and got hold of the sovereign position. Irish historian Lecky in his History qf' England iii the Eighteen Century noted that "at the end of the seventeenth century great quantities of cheap and graceful Indian calicoes, muslins, and chintzes were imported to England, and they found such favour that the woollen and silk manufacturers were seriously alarmed. Acts of Parliament were accordingly passed in 1700 and in 1721, absolutely prohibiting, with a very few specified exceptions, the employment of printed or dyed calicoes in England, either in dress or in furniture, and the use of any printed or dyed goods of which cotton formed any part.-9 Nonetheless the Indian textiles were still the choicest and the British in India wanted them. One typical extract from the records of the Madras Government said: "On the Nawab of Arcot the diplomatic pressure was brought to bear and he issued or rather was obliged to issue the following circular in 1732 to his subordinate officers: The coming of the (British) Governor of Madras to your country to buy cloth is the occasion of my writing this, to let you know it is my will you give strict order to all merchants in your part to sell such goods as are proper to the Governor of Madras only and to his people and that they immediately deliver whatever cloth they have ready to his gumastas. What they refuse you permit them to sell anywhere. Take care that none buys such goods in your part but his people, for this is my strict command and take penalties from your met-chants to perform the same."10

196 England did not then possess "political sway over the destiny of India. When she came to possess that power she not only boy~ptted Indian goods but strangled Indian industries by means no one can pronounce to be fair and just."11 It was this 'Indian plunder', as Thomas Campbell called it, which enriched England and enabled it to build up the 'industrial revolution'. This is borne out by, for example, Brooks Adams in his book The Law of Civilization and Decay. "The influx of the Indian treasure by adding considerably to the nation's (England's) cash capital not only increased its stock of energy but added much to its flexibility and the rapidity of its movement. Very soon after Plassey (i.e. the battle of Plassey in 1757), the Bengal plunder began to arrive in London, and the effect appears to have been instantaneous; for all authorities agree that the 'industrial revolution', the event which has divided the 19th century from all antecedent time, began with the year 1760. ... "Plassey was fought in 1757 and probably nothing has ever equalled the rapidity of the change which followed. In 1760 the flying shuttle appeared, and coal began to replace wood in smelting. In 1764 Hargreaves invented the spinning-jenny, in 1776 Crompton contrived the mule, in 1785 Cartwright patented the power-loom, and, chief of all, in 1768 Watt matured the steam engine, the most perfect of all vents of centralising energy." 12 Very significantly, as such evidences testify, the 'Indian plunder' was directly correlated with the birth of the 'industrial revolution' in Britain. Not only was the 'industrial revolution' in Britain sparked off with the drain from India, it was also protected through drastically heavy duties on the Indian handmade textiles, and fuelled with very low duties on the British mill-made textiles produced on large scale through the machines. The Indian handmade textiles were so graceful and yet so D.W D - 13

197 inexpensive that extremely heavy duties and strict prohibition had to be resorted to by the British government to protect the emergence of textile mills in Britain. Historian Wilson witnessed: "Had this not been the case, had not such prohibitory duties and decrees existed, the mills at Paisley and Manchester would have been stopped at the outset and could scarcely have been set in motion even by the power of steam. They were created by the sacrifice of the Indian manufacture. Had India been independent she would have retaliated, would have imposed positive duties on British goods and would then have preserved her own productive industry from annihilation. This act of self-defence was not permitted her; she was at the mercy of the stranger. British goods were forced upon her without paying any duty, and the foreign manufacturer employed the arm of political injustice to keep down and ultimately strangle a competitor with whom he could not have contended on equal terms.,, 13 The 'industrial revolution' in Britain, thus, could not have taken place without the British hold over the Indian markets. The crucial measure ordered to sustain the 'industrial revolution'in England was the destruction of the hand-weaving industry in India which ensured the consequent blocking of the hand-spinning and so the ruin of the handmade textiles of India; setting off the decay of the entire Indian economy. The state leadership in Britain spared no efforts to ensure this. For learning the trade-secrets of Indian craftsmen and for exhibiting the products and manufactures of India, a museum was constructed in London, at the expense of India which amounted to more than even the revenues from the tariffs and duties. Dr. Forbes Watson, who was in charge of forming the museum noted . The British manufacturer must not look for his customers to the upper ten millions of India, but to the hundreds of millions in the lower grades. The plainer and cheaper stuffs of cotton, or of cotton and wool together, are those which he had the best chance of selling, and those which he would be able to sell largely

198 if in their manufacture he would keep well in view the requirements and tastes of the people to whom he offers them. ,14 For destroying the Indian handmade textile industry, in order to ensure the sales of British textiles, the weavers were subjected to severe torture. They were prohibited to work at their homes and were forced to work in the East India Company factories only. They were compelled to weave only those designs which suited the choice of the Western people. They were paid 1576, and sometimes even 4076, less than the market prices of their products. Attempts were made to reduce their position to that of slaves of the Company. The Company's men kept a constant watch over them to see that they worked fast. The textiles produced by the weavers were to be sold according to the Company's decisions only. The pathetic plight of the weavers worsened to such an extent that for getting rid of the torture the weavers of Bengal are said to have chopped off their thumbs themselves. William Bolts stated in Considerations on Indian Affairs, published within just eight years after the invention of the spinning jenny and fifteen years after the battle of Plassey, that the Indian weavers "upon their inability to perform such agreements as have been forced upon them by the Company's agents ... have been treated also with such injustice, that instances have been known of their cutting off their thumbs to prevent their being forced to wind silks." 15 On the other hand, British workers were called to India to enable them to pick up the secrets of the excellence of the Indian handicrafts and were given special facilities to develop their occupations. The ruin of the weaving industry can be accounted to the East India Company's desire to keep the entire trade in its own hands, without a rival or a competitor.

199 Bolts further stated: "Various and innumerable are the methods of oppressing the poor weavers, which are daily practised by the Company's agents and goinastahs in the country; such as by fines, imprisonments, floggings, forcing bonds from them, etc. by which the number of weavers in the country has been greatly decreased. "... and the gentleman was also in Siraj-ud-Dowlah's time witness to the fact of seven hundred families of weavers, in the districts around Jungalbarry, at once abandoning their country and their professions on account of oppressions of this nature, which were then only commencing. This last kind of workmen (winders of raw silk) were pursued with such rigour during Lord Clive's late government in Bengal, from a zeal for increasing the company's investment of raw silk, that the most sacred laws of society were atrociously – violated. ... 16 The British parliament conducted systematic inquiries about Indian markets, for promoting the interests of the British producers. All prominent politicians acquainted with the Indian situation, from Warren Hastings to Thomas Monroe, were interrogated about the scope of the sales of the British textiles in India. The testimonies before the Parliamentary Select Committee bore out that the difference between the prices of the British textiles and the Indian ones being massive, the very idea of selling the British textiles in India was impractical. Sir Thomas Monroe, who was in India for 28 years in the early nineteenth century, deposed as under as a witness before the Lord's Committee: "Have you had an opportunity of observing how far the natives of British India showed a disposition to use European manufacture?" "Again, those articles which he (the Indian) wishes for his food his own country supplies, all his clothing it supplies in much greater beauty and variety than anything we can furnish him with ......

200 "... any possibility of introducing to any great extent the use of English woollen manufactures?" "... I never knew a native who had not a large piece of coarse woollen of their own manufacture. ... It is so much cheaper than our manufactures, that I am afraid our woollens can never come into competition with it ...... "Am I to understand that it is your opinion, that the natives of India, being a manufacturing people, and ingenious in manufactures, are fully adequate to supply any demands that may arise among themselves?" "I think they are fully competent to supply all demands that can arise among themselves, and that the chief cause of the difficulty of exporting our manufactures to advantage for sale in that country is that we as a manufacturing people are still far behind them." Mr. Stephen Rumbold Lushington, M.P., who had served' in India for eleven years, gave as his opinion that "... (in India) the price of labour is so low, the raw materials are also so cheap, that I despair that the manufactures of this country, where labour is so much higher and the material not the produce of this country, can ever be sent there to advantage for native consumption. ..." "Are not the people of India more sober and diligent and as much employed and skillful in manufactures as the inhabitants of any country you are acquainted with?" "... There can be no human beings more patient, or more industrious, or more sober, than the Fhndus; and deriving their knowledge of the arts from the object immediately before them. They are eminently skillful in the manufacture of muslins, of chintzes, of shawls, and in some sorts of silver and gold work.' 17 The British government, therefore, exercised its power to design a tariff policy to crush the Indian hand-made textiles industry in order to enable the emerging British textile mills to launch their production by selling it in India. The tariffs on Indian textiles kept on mounting over the years. In 1813 the rate of tariff on white calico, for example, was 857o.

201 The British government on the one hand thus demolished the Indian handmade textile industry, while on the other hand allowed the imports of the British textiles to India at no tariffs or very low tariffs. When the Indian manufactures were charged tariff at the rate of 817o, the British manufactures were charged tariff at the rate of only 2 to 31/2%. Sir Martin witnessed: "For a quarter of a century we have compelled the Indian states to buy our goods. Our woollens are free from tariff. Our cotton textiles are charged only 21/27o tariff, while we have imposed on Indian goods the tariffs at the rates from 10 to 20, 30, 50, 100, 500 and 1000 per cent. ... I do not think this is a trade-benefit. It is the power exerted by the strong over the weak . 18 The British imports of famous Dhaka muslin which amounted to the extent of Rs. 3 million even in 1787, were completely stopped by 1817. In 1821 the exports of Indian silks were prohibited by law. The Indian handmade textile industry could have survived and flourished in spite of these tarIffs and trade -restrictions imposed on it. In comparison to other industries, the textile industry was prominent and steady, as most of the textiles were sold out at. the places where they were produced. The weavers would not have been forced into oblivion even if the exports to the foreign countries had been totally eliminated, because they could have happily occupied themselves in producing high-quality textiles for the domestic markets. But the British government introduced changes even in the excise policy in India to wipe out the Indian textiles even from the domestic markets. The artisans were crushed under the excise and transportation rates. As R. C. Dutt pointed out, deliberate attempts were made to use the political power acquired by the East India Company for discouraging the Indian manufactures sold in the local markets in order to dump there the British manufactures and thus sustain the production in Britain.19

202 The British government aimed at transforming India into lagricultural farm' for Britain as well as at transforming the huge and prosperous Indian population into the market for the large-scale production of the emerging textile mills and subsequently of other factories in Britain. As M. G. Ranade commented, the 19th century saw India being turned into a territory growing raw materials for Britain, the raw materials which were sent to Britain in British ships by British agents, were processed in British mills with British capital and British enterprise, and after being manufactured by British industrialists were returned for sale in the British markets in India. 20 "It can be said without fear of contradiction and without any exaggeration 11, explained Gandhi, "that he (the Englishman) has risen upon the ruin of India's commerce and industries. The cottage industry of India had to perish in order that Lancashire might flourish. The Indian shipping had to perish so that British shipping might flourish. In a word we were suppressed in order to enable the British to live on the heights of Simla." 21 Thus India which in the eighteenth century was producing rich cloth and other consumer goods of topmost. quality throughout the country in its thousands of villages, was by the end of the nineteenth century exporting raw cotton and other raw materials and importing cloth and other consumer goods. Her flourishing cottage industries were destroyed, her prosperous villages were devastated and her affluent, dignified and free people were doomed to poverty, humiliation and slavery. As Gandhi lamented, "We committed a crime against Indian humanity when we parted with the spinning wheel and sold the economic independence of India for a pottage of foreign cloth." 22

203 The economic history of India after 1750 is that of the ruin of her highly established handmade textile industry and of the consequent destruction of her prosperous and balanced economy. This destruction was directly related to the beginning and accumulation of the British power in India, to the birth and acceleration of the 'industrial revolution' in Britain and to the consequent rise and establishment of the science of conventional economics.

204 APPENDIX III

Tagore's View of the Charkha

Rabindranath Tagore upheld the glory of the Indian culture in which man and morals ruled supreme rather than machines and money. Singing the contribution of the village set-up to the enrichment of Indian culture and civilization the poet said : "Dearth cramps the hospitality of man on which society is founded. That is why villages had to grow on the threshold of earth's store of food. It was through his re-unions that the immortal in man has expressed itself - his morality, his literature, his music, his art, the variety of his ceremonials. It was through these that he began to be conscious of his own depths, and the ideal of his own perfection became manifest to im. "1 In another context, Tagore lamented the decay of villages in India. "Today, the light of the village is extinguished. An artificial light burns in the cities - that light does not reflect the music of the sun, the moon, and the stars. The prayers that were offered at each sunrise have disappeared. The lamp that was lit at each sunset has faded. Not only the waters of the reservoirs have dried up, the heart has also dried up. The dances and the songs which blossomed naturally with the joy of life, have all withered away into dust. So

205 far the human heart produced artistic implements for its own spontaneous joy - today it has become defunct. Today it has to depend on the entertainments churned out by the machine. The more it depends on them, the more its creativity becomes dull. -2 For the implementation of his ideals into practice, Tagore set forth the objective, in the programme of Visva Bharati, "to lay at Sriniketan the foundation of a happy, contented and humane life in village,-3 and declared that "We have started in India, in connection with our Visva Bharati the work of village reconstruction. Its mission is to retard the process of racial suicide. -4 A study of Tagore's immense concern for and actual experiment with the uplift of village life would draw one's attention to the village reconstruction work being carried out during the same period by another great leader of India - Mahatma Gandhi. Tagore and Gandhi had always admired and adored each other. Even as early as when Gandhi was in South Africa, the poet had found his own wavelength with him, and when Gandhi returned to India, in the whole big country he found his home at Shantiniketan, itself taking shape at that time. Yet Tagore's protest against the charkha, the very central concept of Gandhi's life and message, has been well known. The poet made no bones about expressing his misgivings. "There are many who assert and some who believe that Swaraj can be attained by the charkha. But I have yet to meet a person who has a clear idea of the process." 5 Retrospectively it can be seen that Tagore's apprehensions and misgivings about the way he found the charkha being

206 practised were realistic. In fact Gandhi himself, very late in his life, found things going wrong with the way his'idea of the charkha was (and still is ) adopted in practice. The error lay in producing khadi in villages for selling it in cities, through an organisation which paid wages to the village spinners and weavers and kept the incomes of the khadi-sales, instead of the spinners and weavers retaining their khadi for its use in the village itself. The former way in which the khadi-activity was practised cannot bring independence to the villages, so Tagore's apprehensions were well-founded, but this was not the way Gandhi also really meant khadi. 6 In 1944 Gandhi clarified his position in no uncertain terms declaring that the way the charkha and khadi were brought into use by the Charkha Sangh was not at all consistent with his thought, his strategy, his vision. "I first introduced khadi and studied it afterwards. This way I have been deceiving myself. What I gave to the people was money but could not give the real substance - self-reliance. I gave them money in the form of wages and assurod them that it contained Swaraj. People took me at my word and believed me. They still do. But I have now my own misgivings as to how far this can now continue. I am afraid that khadi cannot continue if we continue it this way." 7 Gandhi pleaded with and urged the charkha workers that producing khadi in villages for selling it in cities was not the right way. Giving wages to the spinners was not the right thing. Instead the spinners ought to get the khadi made from their yarn. His concept of the charkha implied the village producing its own requirements of cloth itself. The idea was to ensure the basic needs of cloth and food - in exchange of extra cloth - and freedom for everybody in the village. The idea was to ensure economic independence to all, in

207 cloth- production and other occupations, because the village people can carry out such production on their own. The idea was to eschew exploitation and "establish a strong non-violent economy."8 Gandhi clarified his strategy: "... the real claim made through the vision of khadi is that of uplifting the villages and thereby of generating in the people the spontaneous strength for Swaraj." 9 Had Gandhi underlined this clarification earlier, had he seen earlier the wrong direction in which the charkha movement was proceeding, it is possible that Tagore, the votary of freedom, would have accepted the charkha as the instrument which could bring freedom and dignity and fearlessness to India's millions in its villages. During Tagore's lifetime (and even now), however, the charkha activity proceeded the way quite contrary to Gandhi's real vision. It is small wonder therefore that in spite of his ardent admiration for Gandhi, Tagore did not blindly follow the charkha and khadi, as did almost all others, and refrained from what did not appeal to his intellect. It would be of interest to note Gandhi's anguish about congressmen who followed the charkha blindly: "The congress did accept the charkha, but did it do so willingly? No, it only tolerates the charkha for my sake." He further urged them, "If in spite of not having the faith (that the charkha has the power to achieve Swaraj) you deceive me, you will do a great dis-service to the country. It is my humble request to you not to deceive me in the evening of my life.10 It is in a way a testimony to Tagore's genius that he detected something wrong with the prevailing practice of the charkha and also protested against it consistently, even though Gandhi and his charkha doctrine had an overwheln-fing influence in the country. The very uniqueness of Tagore's protest, however, leads one to wish that he had still further carried on his protest and pointed out in detail why in his

208 thinking the charkha did not seem to be a vehicle for Swaraj. It would have been of immense value to Gandhi to see the loopholes which he came to realise very late in his life. Gandhi could then have explained much earlier in crystal clear terms his real concept, vision and strategy of charkha - as the instrument for bringing economic freedom to all, basic needs to every villager, work for even unto the last and elimination of exploitation, thereby revitalizing the ideals of freedom, dignity and humanity - values so dear to Tagore. At Sriniketan Tagore had introduced training in pottery, basket-making, paper-making, leather work, woodwork, weaving, and other crafts. if the village had charkha in addition to these crafts it could generate a large amount of purchasing power (as most of the village -expenditure is on clothing and it is a recurring expenditure) and, therefore, all the other products could then find a market in the village itself. In the absence of the charkha, these products have no local market, have to search for outside markets, dominated by aggressive and fierce competition and other market hazards. But during Tagore's lifetime the charkha was not adopted in this manner and its crucial role was lost. Had the charkha been understood as an instrument to save an enormous expenditure every month which millions of village people have to undertake on clothing otherwise, and thus to make available a large amount of purchasing power for other village products; perhaps it would have found its proper place in Tagore's vision of Sriniketan. The poet had prescribed that "All villages ought to be able to produce all their requirements." 11 The charkha is the first pivotal step in that direction. As the village people already grow foodgrains, if they could produce their other basic need of cloth also themselves without having to be dependent for it on others, and in the process find work in spinning, weaving and other village crafts, then

209 their immense energies, their inner resources could begin to flow freely, enriching their arts, their culture and their civilization - the very dream Tagore so ardently cherished. By starting a small experiment to introduce the charkha in a village, for gaining the khadi and not wages, one can see that people rejoice in the freedom of being able to produce a vital commodity like cloth all by themselves. They beam with dignity on discovering the so-far-hidden energy of their own hands. Their erstwhile lustreless eyes shine up and they burst into a song as they start spinning the yarn. Thus there seen-is to be no conflict between Tagore's vision and Gandhi's doctrine of village reconstruction. When the poet rejected the charkha as he saw it, he was pointing to the deficiencies that Gandhi was to realise and repent about later. On the contrary, there is a remarkable affinity between the visions, thoughts and actions of these two great contemporary leaders of India. Both have sung praises of Indian culture and civilization even while the onslaught of the West was overwhelming. Both have condemned the disastrous outcomes of the machines -oriented industrialisation, even while the latter was sweeping across the globe. Gandhi fought against it throughout his life, while Tagore in his poetic way called it the demon king Ravana consuming with his ten mouths and exploiting with his twenty hands. Both deplored the -super status and power money has come to wield. Tagore gave the same message as Gandhi's in a poetic form continually lit with the sparks of his genius: "When greed and the worship of might grow unrestrained in social life, it becomes impossible for man to devote himself to the development of his humanity. He longs for power, not for fullness of self. Under such conditions the city becomes supreme and village falls into neglect.... "It is because the rich spend their wealth in towns and cities that the poor villagers have to lament the regardliness of their fate. They have lost the power to believe that the means of their betterment are in themselves. If in the first instance, this faith can be revived and

210 convincingly demonstrated in the economic field, the country will in time, prosper in every other." 12 It takes only one step further to see that Gandhi's charkha in its true, and not the prevalent, sense is exactly the instrument to revive this faith and demonstrate it in the economic field. It was nonetheless Tagore who protested that he did not see how the charkha could bring Swaraj, pointing out the very error in the way the charkha- activity was carried out, about which Gandhi was to realise and lament much later, almost at the end of his life, when the poet was no more. However, Tagore therefore did not take to the charkha. One therefore cannot help feeling intensely that had the two clarified each other's doubts, they could both have contributed immensely to their mission in life, the charkha could have assumed its true benefactory role, and the two great Indians - rather world luminaries - of this age could have realised in their very lifetime their dream of India - or the world - so gloriously sung by the poet : Where the mind is without fear and the head is held high.

Notes on Chapter 1 1. The term kbadi in this book does not mean, and is totally different from, the khadi produced and sold by the Khadi and Village Industries Commission. The khadi production discussed here therefore does not pertain to spinning yarn by sending to villages the Ambar charkhas and slivers which cannot be manufactured there and cannot use the locally grown cotton, nor to producing khadi in villages while selling it in cities, nor to paying wages to the spinners and weavers and running the organisation from the income of the khadi-sales and government-grants. Gandhi had protested vehemently against such khadi (refer to Gandhi Mohandas Karamchand, Lecture-, and Discussions at a conference of All India Spinners Association, I to 14 September 1944, after two years in prison, Charkha Sa-ngh ka Nov-S,anskorart - Re-orientation of the Spinners Association, in Hindi, Sevagram: All India Spinners Association, 1945, 120 pages). As he explained, "The economics of Khadi require that from the cultivation of cotton to the manufacture of khadi and its disposal all the processes should, as far as possible, be gone through in the same village." ("Spinning Wheels vs. Mills", Harijan, 30 December 1939, p. 391). Accordingly, the term charkha in this book means the Sudarshan charkha the one used by Gandhi and placed by him at the centre of the national flag during the freedom struggle in India, and the term khadi refers

211 to cloth both produced and used in the village. 2. ''The Solar System", Harijan, 19 February 1938, p. 11. 3. "The Universal Cottage Industry", Young India, 30 September 1926, p. 341. 4. A speech at Chatham House meeting, London, on 20 October 1931, International Affairs, November 1931. 5. "Minister's Duty", Harijan, 28 April 1946, p. 114. 6. "Hook Worm and Charkha", Young 1ndia, 27 August 1925, p. 299. 7. Constructive Programme, Ahmedabad: Navajivan Publishing House, 1941, p. 17. 8. For a further discussion refer to Chapter 3, pp. 71-73. 9. "Why the Insistence on Yarn Clause", Khadi Jagat (in Hindi), January 1946, translated in The Collected Works of Mahatma Gandhi, Vol. 82, New Delhi: Publications Division, 1980, p. 122. 10. Charkha Sangh ka Nav-Sanskaran (Re-orientation of the Spinners Association), in Hindi, Scvagram: All India Spinners Association. 1945, p. 32, translated into English by the author. 11. For further discussion on implementation refer to Chapter 11. 12. "The Young Communists' Catechism", Young India, 26 November 1931, pp. 368-69. 13. For historical evidence, refer to Appendix II. 14. "Indian Economics", Young India, 8 December 1921, p. 406

Notes on Chapter 2 1. See Gregg, Richard. A Philosophy of Indian Economic Development, Abmedabad: Navajivan Publishing House, p. 162. 2. The famous best-seller The Affluent Society was initially titled "Why People are Poor?", see Galbraith J. K. The Affluent Society, New York: The New American Library, 1958, page xxvii of Introduction. 3. ''Subsidiary Industry par Excellence'', Young India, 15 October 1925, p. 355. 4. "Yarn Donation", Khadi Jagat, (in Hindi), September 1945, translated in The Collected Works of Mahatma. Gandhi, Vol. 81, New Delhi: Publications Division, 1980 p. 137. For further discussion refer to Chapter 4. 5. "Village Industries", Harijan, 10 November 1946, pp. 393-94. 6. For a detailed example refer to Chapter 11, p. 178. 7. "Hook Worm and Charkha", Young India, 27 August 1925, p. 299.

212 8. "A Government Experiment", Young lndia., 8 October 1925, p. 342. 9. If I were a Minister", Harijan, I September IWI p. 288. 10. Radhakrishnan, S. "Mahatma Gandhi: A Giant Among Men" in Vision of India, New Delhi: Indian Council for Cultural Relations, 1981, pp. 118-126. 11. "Mass Production versus Production by the Masses", Harijan, 2 November 1934, pp. 301-2. 12. Selzer, Richard, in an interview with Marion Long. "The Seers' Catalog", Omni. January 1987, pp. 36-40 and 94-100. 13. "Why not Labour-saving Devices", Harijan, 30 November 1934, p. 331. 14. "The Public Meeting", recorded by Mahadev Desai, Harijan. 1 March 1935, p. 24

Notes on Chapter 3 6. "Gandhiji in Lancashii-c", Young India, 15 Octobei- 1931, p. 310. 7. Freeman, Andrew, at the end of an interview with M. K. Gandhi. "The Spinning Wheel and the Atom Bomb", Harijan, 17 November 1946, p. 405. 8. From a workshop conducted by the authoi- at a confei-once "One Failh - A Call for Action", at Findhorn, Scotland, 11 September 1986. 9, "Khadi Spirit", Ymvg India, 22 September 1927, p. 318. 10, ''A Student's Questions", Youkigbidi(t, 17 December 1925, p. 440. 11. Cliarkho SooPh ka Nwl-Souskoraa (Re-orientation of the Spinners Association), In Hindi, Scvagi,mi \11 India Spinners Association, 1945, p- 37, translated into Fnglish h~ the atithor. 12. Chattcrjeo, Tartha. %',itmral ThOlLght and. Colonial World, Delhi: Oxford University Press, 1986. 13. Charkha S(utgh ka Nm)-Sunskorurt (Re-orientation of the Spinners Association), in Ilindi, Sevagram: All India Spinners Association, 1945, p. 56, translated into English by the author. 14. "Khadi in Towns", Harijort, 21 July 1946, p. 228. 15. See "Why Khadi for Yarn and Not for Money?", a speech by M. K. Gandhi, in July 194.5, Gram Udyog Patriko, Vol. 1, pp. 352-54, in Hindi, translated in The Collected Works oj'klahatnta Gaiidhi, Vol. 81, Now Delhi: Publications Division, 1980, pp. 55-7. 16. Charktia Sangh ka Nar-Sanskaro.n (Re-orientation of the Spinners Association), in Hindi, Sevagrarn: All India Spinners Association, 1945, p. 10, translated into English by the author. 17. "Independence", Haxi,jart, 5 May 1946, p. 116.

213 18. 'Indian Fconomics". You ag lrid.ia, 8 December 1921, p. 406. 19. Pi orn M. K. Gandhi's speech filmed in the documentary movie Mahatma - Life. qJ' Go n(Ot i., produced by Vitthalbhai K. Thaven, for Gandhi Memorial Fund, Bombay, 1968, translated by the autbor from the original in Hindi. 20. Jbict, 21. "Burning Foreign Cloth and Ahimsa", Young Irt(fia, 25 April 1929, p. 134, 22. "The Cobwebs of Ignoranee", Young India., 27 May 1926, p. 190. 23. "The Spinning Wheel and the Atom Bomb", HariJan, 17 Novembei1946, p. 404, 24. Foi- a synopsis of Gandhi on the charkha, see Chaptei- 10. 25. "A Morning with Gandhiji ", recorded by Mahadev Desai, You rig India., 20 Novembei- 1924, p~ 386.

Notes on Chapter 4 1. The Tintes of India, New Dethi, 9 April 1991, p. 4. 2. "Khadi Workers and Politics". (original speech in Hindi on 3 November 1945), The Ideology of ate Charkha, edited by Srikrishnadas Jaju, Tirupkin The AfSA Khaddar Malar and Sarvodaya Praeburalayarn, 19,51, p. 109. 3. Morris, David. "Democracy Demands Autonomy", a paper published by Tristitute for Local Self-Reliance, Saint Paul, USA, 8 July 1990. 4. "Independence", Hur~jan, 28JkJIY 1W, p. 236, 5. ConstructiveProgi-cminte, Ahmedabad: Navajivan Publishing House, 1941, p. 21. 6. Knowles, L.C.A. The Industrial and Commercial Revolutions in Great ,Britain During the Nineteenth Century, 1,ondon: Routledge & Kogan Paul Ltd_ 1921, p. 96. 7. Manifesto signed jointly by 53 Nobel Laureates from all branches of science and literature including six Laureates of the Peace Prize, published in Geneva and six other cities, June 1981, quoted in The Tintes of India, Ahmedabad, 25 June 1981, p. 9.

Notes on Chapter 5 1. "Khadi - A New Orientation", Harkjan, 21 September 1934, p. 253. 2. tnternational Foundation for Development Alternatives, Dossier, January/April 1990, p. 76. 3. "Some Posers", Young India., 16 July 1931, p. 181. 4. Gandhi arrived at the charkba not through a step-by-step analysis, but

214 through intuition. "It was in London in 1908", he said, "that I discovered the wheel. I bad gone there leading a deputation from South Affica. It was then that I came in close touch with many earnest Indians - students and others. We had many long conversations about the condition of India, and I saw as in a flash that without the spinning wheel there was no Swaraj (freedom). I knew at once that evcryone had to spin." See "How I Discovered the Spinning Wheel", Young India, 20 September 1928, p. 316. 5. "The Week-end at Eton and Oxford", Young India, 12 November 1931, p. 355. 6. "Snares of Satan", Young India, 6 August 1925, p. 273. 7. Gandhi, M, K. "The Triple Aspects of Khadi", Harijan, 2 November 1934, p. 302. 8. 114man, Willis W. Global Mi-nd Change, New York: Knowledge Systems Inc., 1988. 9. Lapham, Lewis II., in a discussion "Is There Viilue in Profit?" -Ha)-pe7-',s -Magazine, December 1986, pp. 37-47. 10. Kantowsky, Detlef. "Gandhi - Coming Back from West to East?", Gandhi Marg, June 1986, pp. 37-47. 11. "The Triple Aspects of Khadi", Harkian, 2 November 1934, p. 302. 12. Gandhi, M. K. "An American's Questions", Huxijan, 29 September 1940, p. 299. 13. "The Message of Rural Exhibitions," Hctrijan, 16 May 1936, p. 111. 14. "Superstitions Die Hard", Young India, 2 July 1931, p. 161. 15. "Prevention of Exploitatim", Harijan, 29 August 1936, p. 226. 16. "The Same Old Argument", Young India, 7 October 1926, p. 348. 17. "Result of Exploitation", Young India, 20 December 1928, p. 422. 18. "Mill Cloth", Young India, 23 February 1922, p. 119. 19. Hind Swaraj (or Indian Home Rule), written originally in Gujarati, on the steamer Kildonan Castle, during Gandhi's return journey from England to South Africa, published in his journal Indian Opinion, 11 December 1909 and 18 December 1909. Issued in India in January 1910,!t was proscribed by the British government on 24 March 1910. This hastened Gandhi's decision to pubiish the English translation, by International Printing Press, Phoenix, in March 1910. Its first Indian edition was brought out in 1919 by Ganesh & Co., Madras. The text adopted here is that of the Revised New Edition published in 1939 by Navajivan Publishing House, Ahmedabad; p. 88. 20. From a speech at a public meeting in 1922.

215 21. Gandhi, M. K. "To the Women of India", Young India, August 11 1921, p. 253. 22. "Superstitions Die Hard", Young India, 2 July 1931, p. 161. 23. "Swadeshi and Nationalism", Young India, 12 Mareb 1925, p. 88.

Notes on Chapter 5 1. Keynes, J. M. General Theory of Employment, Interest and Money, London: Macmillan & Co. Ltd., 1934. 2. "Invincible Faith", Harijan, 30 November 1935, p. 330. 3. Schumakeher, E. F. Small is Beautiful - A Study of Economics as if People Alattered, London: Blond & Briggs Ltd., 1973, p. 1. 4. Tagore, Rabindranath. "The Co-operative Principle", translated from the original speech in Bengali first publisIned in 1918, Tozva.rds Universof Man, Now Delhi: Asia Publishing House, 1961, p. 25. 5. Ganditi-Vichax-Dohan, Ahmedabad: Navajivan Publishing House, 1935, p. 108, translated by the author from the original in Gujarati. 6. Drucker, Peter. Toword, the Neri Ecokiontics art(l Other Ussoy.,;, New York: Harper and Row Publishers, 1981, pp. 1-21, 7- Roszak, Theodore. PersonlPlanet. New York: Doubleday/ Anchors, 1978, 8. Capi-a, Fritjof. The Turr.~ing Ponit - Se?ertce, Society mid the Risiv.o Cidtii re, New York7 Bantarn Books, 1982. 9, "Lancashire versus Japan", Young India, 30 July 1931, p. 197.

Notes on Chatper 6 1. Bell, Daniel. "Models and Reality in Economic Discourse", The Pitblic Interest, Special Edition, December 1980, pp. 46-80. 2. The Turning Point - Science, Society (trid the Rising Culture, New York: Bantam Books, 1982, p. 192. 3. Washingtoo Post, 20 May 1979. 4. Ibid. 4 November 1979. 5. Kumarappa, J. C. Wity ate Village Movement?, Kashi: Akhil Bharat Sarva Seva Sangh, 1960, p. 156. 6. Tagore, Rabindranath. "The Co-operative PrincipIc", Tou.,ar(IsUniversal Alon, New Delhi: Asia Publishing House, 1961, pp. 31-32 and 1). 49. 7. Gandhi, M. K. Sari)odu.ya (based on Unto This Lost by John Ruskin), Ahmedabad: Navajivan Publishing House, 1922, p. 17, translated from the original in Gujarati by the author. 8. Samuelson, Robeil I. "Money Makes the World Go Round - But What If

216 ItCannot Anyrn ore 9 ",Na i iona t.lo u 7-na 1 2 Sept ern ber 27,1980, pp. 1596-1608. 9. Galbraith, J. K. Tfte Affluent Society, fhe chapter on "The Monetary Illusion". New York: The Now American Library, 1958, p. 207. 10. Kirzner, T. A "The Austrian Perspective on the Crisis", The Public Interest, Special Edition, December 1980, pp, 111-122. 11. ''Talks, with Missionaries-, Young Indiu, 11 August 1927, p. 251. 12. Bugharello, George. 'A Technological Magistrate', Bulletin of Atonlic Scientists, January 1978, pp. 34-37. 13, Parikh, Narahari D. Yantrani Alarzio(ta (Limitations of Machine), Ahmedabad: Gujarat Vidyapith, 1940, pp. 61-62, translated from Gujarati bY the author. 14. Kristol, Irving. ''Rationalism in Economics", Public _[nterest, Special Issue, 1980, pp. 201-208. 15. Maliaraj, Ravishankar. "Pachhat Kaun?" ("Who is Backward?"), reprinted in Vikus, April-May 1986, p. 1, translated from the original in GuJarati by the author. 16. Fxtract fron-i a letter to a friend", I December 1909, published in Speeches and Writings of Mahatma Gandhi, Madras: G. A. Natesan & Co., 1922, p. 1041. 17. Tagore, Rabindranath. "The Co-operative Principle", Towards UniVersal Man, New Delhi: Asia Publishing House, 1961. 18. Hind Swuroj (or 17ifflan Home Rule), Op. cit., p. 86. 19. Speecii es and Writings of Mahatma Gandhi, Op. cit., p. 331. 20. "The Ultimate Aim", Hari.ion, 29 August 1936, p. 226. 21. "Economics versus Moral Progress", a lecture delivered at the Muir Central College Economic Society at Allahabad on 22 December 1916, Speeches atid Wrinn.gs of Mahatma. Gandhi, Op. cit., p. 349. 22. Sco-vodaya. (based on Unto This Lost by John Ruskin), Ahmedabad: Navajivan Publishing Ifouse, 1922, p. 36.

Notes on Chapter 8 1. Bombay Chronicle, 18 September 1934. 2. Maharaj, Ravishankar. An interview with Navnit Parekh, Janntabhoomi. - Pravasi, the supplement, 16 August 1980, p. 11, translated from the original in Gujarati by the author.

217 Notes on Chapter 9 1. Maharaj, Ra~ishankar. "Why Do You Allow Yourselves to Be Robbed?", (reprint) Vikas, March 1986, p.1, translated from the ofiginal in Gujarati by the author. 2. Speech at Madi-as on 4 Septernbei- 1927, "Two Speeches", Young India, 15 Septembei- 1927, pp. 311-313. 3. The Timas of India, 8 May 1987, p. 9. 4. n-om a conversation with the author. 5. "Swaraj through Women", Horkjan, 2 December 1939, p. 359. 6. "To the Women of India", Young India, 11 August 1921, p. 253.

Notes on Chapter 10 1. All the writings about charkha and khadi by Gandhi relate to the Sudarshan charkha and the khadi made on the Sudarshan charkha, the one he used and advocated and emblematised on the Swaraj-flag, and not to the Arnbar charkha and the khadi manufactured on it and sold by the Khadi and Village Industries Commission, as the Ambar charkha was adopted by the Commission long after Gandhi's death. As this book has explained, the two types of khadi made on the two types of charkhas have totally different implications. 2. The Collected Works of Mahatma Gandhi, ninety volumes, New Delhi: Publications Division, 1958-1984. Supplementary volumes, two published, four in press, 1989 onwards. 3. Gandhi, Mohandas Karamchand. Constructive Programme, Ahmedabad: Navajivan Publishing House, revised and enlarged edition, 1945, p. 45. 4. "The Students' Interrogatories-, Young India, 15 November 1928, p. 381. 5. "A Morning with Gandhiji", recorded by Mahadev Desai, Young India, 13 November 1924, p. 378. 6. "Hand-spun as Measure of Value", Harijan, 18 Januaiy 1942, p. 5. 7. "Spinning Wheels vs. Mills", Harijan, 30 December 1939, p. 391. 8. "Prevention of Exploitation", Harijan, 29 August 1936, p. 226. 9~ Hi itd Swo raj (or Indian Horne Rule), Op. cit. p. 94. 10. "Out Qf Nothing", Young India, 17 Feloniai-y 1927, p. 52. 11. From a letter to Jawaharlal Nehru, dated 5 October 1945, Gandhi-Nehru Papers, New Delhi: Nehru Memorial Museum and Library, original in Hindi. 12. "Definite Suggetions", Young India, 26 December 1929, p. 420. 13. Con&tructive Programme, Ahmedabad: Navajivan Publishing House,

218 1945, p. 18. 14. "The Solar System", Hari.jan, 19 February 1938, p. 11. 15. "Village Industries", -Harijan, 16 November 1934, p. 317. 16. Constructive Prograrnme, Ahmedabad: Navajivan Publishing House, 1945, pp. 14-15. 17. "To Amei-ican Friends", Young India, 17 Septembei- 1925, p. 321. 18, "The Spinning Wheel and the Atom Bomb", Harijan, 17 November 1946, p. 404. 19. "Economics and Religion", Young India, 15 September 1927, p. 312. 20. "The Music of the Spinning Wheel", Young India, 21 July 1920, p. 4. 21. "Weekly Letter", Young India, 5 May 1927, p. 142. 22. 'The Great Sentinel', Young India, 13 October 1921, p. 325. 23. "Gandhiji in Lancashire", YozIng India, 15 October 1931, p. 310. 24.- The Charkha in the Gita", Young India, 20 October 1921, p. 329. 25.- The Universal Cottage Tndustiy", Young India, 30 September 1926, p. 341. 26. "Hook worm and Charkha", Young India, 27 August 1925, p. 299. 27. "Is Khadi Economically Sound?", Harijan, 20 June 1936, p. 146~ 28. "Bihai~ Notes", Young India, 22 October 1925, p. 361 29. "Bihar Notes", Young India, 8 Octobei- 1925, p. 342. 30. "The Cobwebs of Ignorance", Young India, 27 May 1926, p. 191. 31. "Charkha as the Only Cottage Industry", Young India, 21 October 1926, p. 368. 32. "Weekly Letter", Harijan, 22 September 1946, p. 322. 33. "Out of Nothing", Young India, 17 Februaiy 1927, p. 52. 34. "Intellectual Development or Dissipation?", Harijan, 8 May 1937, p. 104. 35. "Criticism Answered", Harijon, 31 July 1937, p. 197. 36. "Primary Education in Bombay", Harijan, 9 October 1937, p. 293. 37. "Question Box", Harijon, 26 July 1942, p. 238. 38. "Some Tmpoilant Questions", Har~jan, 2 March 1947, p. 44. 39. Opening speech at the Conference of All India Spinners Association, I Septernbei- 1944, Charkha Songh ka Nav-Sanskoran (Re-oi-ientation of the Spinners Association), in Hindi, Sevagram: All India Spinners Association, 1945, pp. 6-7, translated into English by the author, 40. Discussions at the All India Spinners Association Conference, 1st to 14th October 1944. Ibid., pp. 57-58 and p. 61. 41. Interview with Desmond Shaw on or before 9 October 1931 in London, "London Letter", Young India, 22 October 1931, p. 318. 42. "Mass Production versus Production by the Masses", Ha7ijan, 2 November

219 1934, p. 301. 43. "Alternative to Industrialism", Harijan, I September 1W, p. 285. 44. "A Talk with an American Friend", Hari.jan, 14 September 1934, pp. 245-46. 45. "A Meeting with Charlie Chaplin", on 22 September 1931, in London, Young India, 8 October 1931, p. 295. 46. The Antrit Bazar Patrika, 2 August 1934. 47. "Tndividual vs. the Systern", Young India, 26 November 1931, p. 369. 48. "Donation of Tained Money", Harijan, 28 July 1940, p. 219. 49. "With the Busy lntei-viewcr", Young India, 25 August 1927, p. 27-6. 50. "An Appeal to the Nation", Young India, 17 July 1924, pp. 236-237. 51. Charkha Sangh ka Nav-Sanskaran (Re-orientation of the Spinners Association), in Hindi, Scvagram: All India Spinners Association, 1945, pp. 15 and 17-18, translated into Fnglish by the aUthor. 52. "The Triple Message of the Charkha", Young India, 8 December 1927, p. 415. 53. "Be in Time", Young India, 10 Februaiy 1927, p. 44. 54. International Affairs, 31 November 1931. 55. "For Fallen Humanity", Young India, 4 September 1924, p. 292. 56. "Notes on Ehaddar", Young India, 18 March 1926, p. 103. 57. "Notes on the Agreement (of the Congress Party)", Young India, 13 November 1924, p. 371. 58. "Gandhiji's Walking Tour Diary", (on 27 February 1947), Har~jan, 23 March 1947, p. 79. 59. The concluding comment in "A Remarkable Address", Young India, 21 May 1925, pp. 176-177. 60. "The Spinning Wheel", a letter to Sir Daniel Hamilton, Young India., 6 April 1922, p. 185. , 61. "Lancashire vs. Japan", Young India, 30 July 1931, p. 197. 62. "Mill-Owners and Boycott", Young India, 4 July 1929, p. 220. 63. "The Handloorn", Young India, 14 May 1925, p. I'll, 64. Charkho. Sangh ka Nav-Sanskaran (Re-orientation of the Spinners Association), in Hindi, Sevagram : All India Spinners Association, 1945, p. 2, translated into English by the author. 65. Hind Swaraj (or Indian Honze Rule), Op. cit., pp. 149-50 and 164-66. 66. "Spinning Still", Hari~jan, 21 December 1947, p. 476. 67. "Congress Position", Harijan, I February 1948, p. 4. 68. "Draft Constitution of Congress", written on 29 January 1948, published as

220 "Ifis Last Will and Testament", Harijan, 15 February 1948, p~ 32. 69. Charkha Sangh ka Nav-Sanskaran (Re-orientation of the Spinners Association), in Hindi, Sevagrani: All India Spinners Association, 1945, p. 18, translated into English by the author. 70. 'Gandhiji in Lancashire", Young India, 15 October 1931, p. 310. 71. "Charkha-Swaraj-Ahimsa", Ha7ijan,13 Apffl 1940, p. 85. 72. "Indian Economics", Young India, 8 December 1921, p. 406.

Notes on Chapter 11 1. Vora, Harshakant. "Agficulture, Village and Education", Naya Marg, 16th July 1989, p. 11, translated by the author from the original in Gujarati, 2. For the details of the,,construction of the charkha, see Appendix 1. 3. "Some Important Questions", Ha-rijan, 2 March 1947, p. 44. 4. "Invincible Faith", Harijan, 30 Novembei- 1935, p. 330. 5. Charkha Sangh ka Nav-Sanskaran (Re-orientation of the Spinners Association), in Hindi, Sevagram: All India Spinners Association, 1945, p. 43, translated into English by the author. 6. "Speech at Excelsior Theatre, Bombay" (on 31 August 1924), (original in Gujarati), Navajivan, 7 September 1924, p. 7, translated into English in The Collected Works of Mahatma Gandhi, Vol. 25, New Delhi: The Publications Division, 1967, p. 61. 7. "Speech at Begusarai" (on 26 January 1927), a paraphrase, The Sea~chligftt, 4 February 1927. 8. "Bihar Notes", Young lri(Lia, 8 October 1925, p. 342. 9. "Speech at Jamkii" (on 27 January 1927), a paraphrase, The Searchli(., A, 4 February 1927. 10. "Faulty Production ?" You rig India, 7 August 1924, p~ 263. 11. "Be in Time", Young India, 10 February 1927, p. 44.

Notes on Appendix II 1. The Modern Reciew, Jankiar\ 1921, 1). 162. 2. Robertson, Willi am. A If istmico I Disqiiisi I imi Crmccruhqi At wwu I I it (I ia, first publishod in London, 1817, reprinted in fndia. Dolhi: Rare Reprint~, 1981, p. 180. 3. Puntambekar, S. V. and Varadachan. N. S. Howi-Spiwkiiii(i mici Hortd-Wcaoinfl - Ait Essm], Ahmedabad: All India Spinncr~ Association, 1926, 1). 4. Kasu, Taka. "What Japan Owes to India-, Journal of lado-Jopone,;e

221 A,,~;ociolioo, Jannary 1910. 5. Elliot, T1. M. The History (4' India, (is Told by Its Owo Histormits, Vol. 1, Indian reprint, Allahabad: Kitab Mahal. 1969, p. .5. 6. Puntanibekar, S. V- and Varadarhari, N. r;_0p. cil.. 1). 19. 7. Ibid., p. 20. 8, Ibid.. p~ 24. 9. Lecky, William. History of Englan(I in the Eighteenth Century, Vol. 11, London: Longinans, Green and Company, 1981, p. 1,58. 10. Puntambckar, S. V. and Varadachari, N. S., 01). cit., pp. 62-63, 11. Wilson, Hayman Horace. The History of British India., Vol. 1, London : James Madden, 1858, p. 185. 12. Adams, Brooks. The Law of Civilization and Decay, New York: Macmillan and Company, 1816, pp. 263-264. 13. Mill, James. The History of British lvdia, Chapter 8 on "Wilson's Continuation", London: James Madden, 1858. 14. Basu, B. D. ROn of Indi(m Trade and, Indiistries. Calcutta: Prabasi Prc,ss, 1935, p. 139 and p. 233. 15. Bolts, William. Considerations ori India.ri Affairs, London: J. Alman & Company, 1772. 16. Ibid.. pp. 193-9i. 17. Basu, B. D. lind, pp~ 241-242, and p, 247. 18. Dutt, R. C. The Ecortonue Hisfory oj'lridio. volumes I and IT, London: Rutledge and Kegan Paul Ltd., 19.50, Indian edition by the Government of India, New Delhi: Publications Division, 1960. 19. Ibid. 20. Ranade, M. G. Essa.ys in Indian Econontics, Madras: G. A. Nateson Company, 1898. 21. "The Giant and the Dwarf", Young India. 26 March 1931, p. 50, 22. "Burning Foreign Cloth and Ahirnsa (Non-Violence), Young India, 25 April, 1929, p. 134.

Notes on Appendix III 1. Tagore, Rabindranath. "City and Village", 1928, published in Towards Universal Man, Bombay : Asia Publishing House, 1961, p. 303. 2. "The Nature of Village", 1928, translated by the author from a GUjarati translation of the original essay in Bengali, by Nagindas Parekh, Rabindra. Nibundlia,iiiala - 1, New Dethi : Sahitya Academy, 1963, p. 530. 3. Visoo Bho,rati (,rr~d Its Pmst i tu t ions, Shantiniketan, 1961, p~ 42.

222 4. ''City and Village", 1928, published in Tou)(irds Uni?)ersal Mori,Bombay: Asia Publishing House, 1961, p. 315. 5. "The Cult of the Charkha", The Modern Review, September 1925, pp. 263-270. 6. For further discussion, refer to Chapter 4, 'Democracy at Grassroots'. 7. 17)iscussion after the Conference (of the Charkha Sangh)" 7 to 14 October 1944, Charkho Sangh ka Nax-Saytskaxarl (Re-orientation of the Spinners Association), in Hindi, Sevagrarn: All India Spinners Association, 1945, pp. 571-58. translated into English by the author. 8. Ibid., p- 67. 9. Jbid., p. 60~ 10. Speech at the Conference (of the Charkha Sangh), Ibid., p. 14 and P. 16. 11. Tagore, Rabindranath. "Pabana Prantik Parishad" 1908, translated by the author from a Gujarati translation of the original speech in Bengali by Nagindas Parekh, Stwdeshi Samaj, Ahmedabad: Navajivan Publishing flouse, 1954, p. 63. 12. Tagore, Rabindranath. "Co-operation", 1928, published in Towards Universal Mcm, Bombay: Asia Publishing House, 1961, pp. 323-380.

223