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Home , Abdul Ghaffar Khan, Hermann Kallenbach, Khan (surname), Khan (title), Mahadev Desai, Pashtuns

REFLECTI•NS Rajmohan , a former member of the (the Indian parliament’s upper house), is a visiting professor in the Program in South Asian and Middle Eastern Studies at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. His latest book is Ghaffar : Nonviolent Badshah of the Pakhtuns (Penguin ). He is also the author of The Good Boatman, a biography of his grandfather, Mohandas Gandhi.

Mohandas Gandhi, , and the Today

The clouds have parted, at least for the trader caste who led India’s battle for inde- moment, in the Arab-Israeli conflict. A pendence. Yet his thinking is as relevant as newly elected Palestinian president, Mah- Gandhi’s. moud Abbas, has reached out to a hawkish Before we look at the arguments of the Israeli prime minister, Ariel Sharon, now two, it is important to recall that the sub- reborn as a cautious peacemaker. Jails have continent’s independence was won chiefly emptied, has ceased destroying but not solely through passive resistance. homes of alleged terrorists, and Islamic Indians believing in violence also con- radicals have heeded calls for an armed tributed to it, as did British fatigue after truce. One may reasonably hope that an- the Second World War. Moreover, it is also tagonists on both sides will seize the mo- true—the efforts of Gandhi, Ghaffar Khan, ment to think afresh about the cycle of vi- and their allies notwithstanding—that bit- olence and reprisal that has deepened and ter Hindu-Muslim violence marked the prolonged their conflict. In that spirit, I subcontinent’s independence-cum-division. have tried to answer the pertinent ques- The efficacy, nonetheless, of the nonvi- tion: How might India’s great apostles of olent movement of Badshah Khan (“bad- —Mohandas Gandhi, a Hindu, ,” or “ of ” being the hon- and Abdul Ghaffar Khan, a Muslim— orific the , or Pathans, attached to expound the benefits of a farewell to arms his name) is captured in a recollection by a to today’s tired and bloodied belligerents? British officer called Bacon of the 1930 The provisional truce and fresh interest struggle in the Northwest Frontier Prov- in passive resistance for addressing the ince when thousands of Pashtuns nonvio- Palestinian-Israeli question justify a re- lently stood up to the British. Eight years minder of the arguments advanced by later, when Badshah Khan’s followers, two South Asian leaders who not so known as the Red Shirts, had won power long ago practiced effective nonviolent in provincial elections Bacon talked about strategies. the 1930 events with Ghani Khan, Ghaffar Abdul Ghaffar Khan (1890–1988), the Khan’s son, who relates: Sunni Muslim from the subcontinent’s Northwest Frontier Province who won [Bacon] told me, “Ghani, I was the more than one battle against British power Assistant Commissioner in Char- in his region and then, after ’s in- sadda. The Red Shirts would be dependence, fought against difficult odds brought to me. I had orders to give for autonomy for the Pashtun people, is them each two years rigorous im- less well-known than Mohandas Gandhi prisonment. I would say, ‘Are you a (1869–1948), the Gujarati Hindu from the Red Shirt?’ They would say yes. ‘Do

Mohandas Gandhi, Abdul Ghaffar Khan, and the Middle East Today 89 you want freedom?’ ‘Yes, I want Gandhi put it in the summer of 1940, when freedom.’ ‘If I release you, will you he and Ghaffar Khan were defending a non- do it again?’ ‘Yes.’” [Bacon] said, “I violent strategy (“,” in Gandhi’s would want to get up and hug him. phrase) before colleagues tempted by the But instead I would write, ‘Two route of violence: years.’”1 [Ghaffar Khan] is a Pathan and a In that same year, 1930, soldiers of the Pathan may be said to be born British belonging to the Garhwal Reg- with a rifle or a sword in his hand. iment, famously disobeyed orders to open But [Ghaffar Khan] deliberately fire on nonviolent rebels in ’s asked his Khudai Khidmatgars to bazaar. Even more striking were the psy- shed all weapons when he asked chological victories that Ghaffar Khan them to join the Satyagraha.... and Gandhi won over the British. These He saw that his deliberate giving were arguments that inspired nonviolent up of the weapons of violence had a resistance: magical effect. Triumph over fear. That passive resis- tance could overcome fear was the first ar- It was the only remedy for the gument. Around the time that Bacon was blood which were handed talking with Ghani Khan, his father, Ghaf- down from sire to son and which far Khan, said to Gandhi: had become part of the normal life of a Pathan. They had decimated We used to be so timid and indo- numerous families and nonviolence lent. The sight of an Englishman seemed to [Ghaffar Khan] to have would frighten us. [Our] movement come as longed for salvation. The has instilled fresh life into us and violent blood feuds would other- made us more industrious. We have wise have no end and would spell shed our fear and are no longer the end of the Pathans.4 afraid of an Englishman or for that matter of any man. Englishmen are Forestalling reprisals. Since a nonviolent afraid of our nonviolence. A nonvio- strategy did not invite unbearable retalia- lent Pathan, they say, is more dan- tion, it won enthusiastic support from a gerous than a violent Pathan.2 general populace spared the brutal reprisals that violent attacks provoked. Harold Gould The victory over fear is what Jawaharlal has contrasted the methods of Gandhi and Nehru, Gandhi’s political heir and India’s Ghaffar Khan that “brought down empires” prime minister from 1947 to 1964, singled in with the “walking bombs” out as the chief accomplishment of Gandhi’s in the Middle East and “whose nonviolent strategy. “Fearlessness—yes, I self-detonations invite devastating retalia- would say fearlessness was his greatest gift. tory assaults on their innocent fellow And the fact that the weak, little bundle citizens.”5 of bones was so fearless in every way, physi- Remembering the violent upheavals cally, mentally, it was a tremendous thing that destroyed life in the Northwest Fron- which went to the other people too, and tier during his boyhood in the late 1890s, made them less afraid.”3 Ghaffar Khan spoke with justifiable pride Beating the revenge code. If nonviolence in his autobiography of the contrasting re- overcame fear, it was an antidote to the re- sults of the movements he led in the early venge code, the curse of Pashtun society. As :

90 WORLD POLICY JOURNAL • SPRING 2005 The British crushed the violent ment, Britons welcomed him enthusiasti- movement in no time, but the non- cally, even though a year earlier he had led violent movement, in spite of in- an India-wide nonviolent movement that, tense repression, flourished.... If a in Churchill’s words, “inflicted such humili- Britisher was killed, not only the ation and defiance as has not been known culprit was punished, but the whole since the British first trod the soil of village and entire region suffered for India.”8 it. The people held the violence and After the 1857 mutiny of the Bengal its doer responsible for the repres- Army, which witnessed cruelty from the sion. In the nonviolent movement Indian side and horrific reprisals from the we courted suffering, and the com- British, the sentiment in the United King- munity did not suffer but benefited. dom raged against Indians. In 1931, by Thus, it won love and sympathy of contrast, and despite even greater defiance the people.6 in India of British rule, the popular mood was friendly to Indians, thanks to Gandhi’s Stunning, and winning, the foe. While a nonviolent approach. He had spelled out the nonviolent movement could baffle and even secret of success in remarks uttered in 1919, “stun” the adversary (as Ghaffar Khan a year that saw the worst incident in the an- claimed7), adhesion to a nonviolent approach nals of British rule in India, the Amritsar attracted support in the adversary’s camp. massacre, in which civilians were slaugh- When, in February 1922, demonstrators tered by the Raj’s infantry, as well as vio- shouting “Victory to ” lence by Indian mobs: “The Government went berserk in a remote corner of India and went mad, but our people also went mad. hacked to pieces 22 police constables fleeing I say, do not return madness with madness from their burning shelter, Gandhi called but return madness with sanity, and the sit- off an entire nationwide campaign that had uation will be yours.”9 aroused India and frightened the British. Protecting the future. The fifth benefit Days earlier Gandhi had issued an ulti- of a nonviolent strategy was that it made it matum to the , which was to be fol- harder for the nation to slide into the sinis- lowed by an intensification of the campaign. ter habit of violence. After a bomb hurled at But he stopped the campaign, even though, a British official in by Indian revolu- as Gandhi would say, he was tempted not be tionaries claimed the lives of two English- seen as a “coward” who backed off after issu- women in 1908, Gandhi predicted: “The ing “pompous threats to the government bomb now thrown at Englishmen will be and promises to the people....” aimed at Indians after the English are there When Gandhi called off the campaign, no longer.”10 thousands of his fellow fighters already Gandhi saw that it was in the nature of in prison for their passive resistance were violence to beget more and more of itself, aghast at what they saw as a retreat. For a and less and less of freedom. Thanks to him, time, the as a whole seemed it was Satyagraha rather than the bomb that demoralized. However, critics of the suspen- was aimed at the British, a fact that may sion later acknowledged that the movement have helped reduce violence in independent was slipping into unreliable hands, and that India. by his temporary suspension Gandhi had Tellingly, groups such as the Tamil managed to salvage its prestige among In- Tigers in and some Naga tribal dians and Britons. insurgents in northeast India, engaged in Thus in 1931, when Gandhi went to violent bids for independence, have proba- for talks with His ’s Govern- bly eliminated as many of their own people

Mohandas Gandhi, Abdul Ghaffar Khan, and the Middle East Today 91 as of their adversaries. Gandhi and Ghaffar have been courageous in inviting death, but Khan realized that the merciless elimination the courage was the “result of intoxication.” of dissent was integral to violent bids for He added: power, while nonviolent strategies offered room for debate. Even should the British leave in Defining the enemy. Finally, Gandhi and consequence of such murderous acts, Ghaffar Khan realized that only a nonvio- who will rule in their place? Is the lent struggle could affirm the unity of hu- Englishman bad because he is an manity or ensure that injustice was being Englishman? Is it that everyone opposed, not a rival race. This was power- with an Indian skin is good? If that fully brought home in one of Gandhi’s earli- is so, there should be [no] angry est challenges to the Indian brand of vio- against oppression by Indian lence, following the assassination in London . India can gain nothing from in July 1909 of Sir Curzon Wyllie, an aide the rule of murderers—no matter to Lord , the Liberal secretary of whether they are black or white. state for India. Under such a rule, India will be ut- Invited to a reception hosted by the Na- terly ruined and laid waste.11 tional Indian Association in a South Kens- ington Hall, Wyllie was shot by an Indian Misgivings about passive resistance. More student, Madanlal Dhingra, who was influ- Palestinians and Israelis are passively - enced by militant Indians based at the time ing the occupation of Palestinian lands in London. Also killed was an Indian doctor through prison hunger strikes and in other called Cowasji Lalkaka, who tried to inter- ways than is commonly appreciated. But ar- pose himself between Dhingra and Wyllie. guments questioning the efficacy of nonvio- Gandhi happened to arrive in London, lent resistance against Israeli occupation on a mission on behalf of Indians facing have also been advanced. hardships in , eight days after Writing in Cairo’s Al-Ahram Weekly the killings. Finding that many Indians (September 2–8, 2004), Jonathan Cook, for studying in supported Dhingra’s instance, argues that Palestinian citizens deed, Gandhi commented in , living in Israel think that “if non-violent the journal he was editing in South Africa: protest gets you killed, better not protest.” In the occupied territories, Cook adds, It is being said in defense of Sir “Palestinians say if non-violent protest gets Curzon Wyllie’s assassination that... you killed, either better not protest or bet- just as the British would kill every ter go down all guns blazing.” German if invaded Brit- The assumption here is that passive re- ain, so too it is the right of any In- sistance invites death at Israeli hands, and dian to kill any Englishman.... The incidents from the first intifada are offered analogy...is fallacious. If the Ger- as proof, yet it needs asking whether this mans were to invade Britain, the evidence is firm. British would kill only the invaders. Claiming that “specific circumstances They would not kill every German that have followed the Palestinians’ dispos- whom they met.... They would not session and dispersion” render passive resis- kill an unsuspecting German, or tance unsuitable, Cook lists six. Unlike the Germans who are guests. British in the subcontinent, first of all, Is- rael has installed a settler population “com- As Gandhi saw it, those who incited mitted to [the Israeli] project and to the oc- him were guiltier than Dhingra, who may cupied territory in a way that...British army

92 WORLD POLICY JOURNAL • SPRING 2005 officers on a tour of duty could never be.” During his 21 years living in South Second, “it has exploited Western guilt Africa, Gandhi received support from nu- over the Holocaust.” Third, “its strategic merous and . He would not Middle Eastern alliance with the US re- have gone to South Africa if Abdullah mains strong,” with Washington seeing Sheth, a Sunni Muslim trader from Gandhi’s Israel “as an effective bulwark against Arab hometown, Porbandar, had not sought his nationalism and the threat that poses to legal services. Two of Gandhi’s closest the oil supply.” Fourth, whereas South friends and allies in South Africa were Africa’s racism directly offended African Henry Polak, who came from a rabbinical Americans, no large U.S. group feels a sense family in Britain with Polish roots, and of kinship with the victims of Israeli occu- , a gifted Jewish archi- pation. Fifth, with its network of walls, tect born and trained in Germany. As for curfews, checkpoints, and Arab informers, Ghaffar Khan, who, unlike Gandhi, had Israel has cut off Palestinian neighbors visited , where his wife Nambata from one another and successfully pre- died in an accident and was buried, he was vented the coming together of Palestinians aware that some scholars linked the origins for collective action. Sixth, instead of aim- of the Pashtuns to the Jews. ing to involve the world against the occupa- The two would have been unreserved tion, Israeli critics of occupation speak in in their opposition to the occupation. In a Hebrew to fellow Israelis for internal relevant message to W.E.B. Du Bois for his consumption. journal, The Crisis, Gandhi said in 1929 that I cite these misgivings so that Arab, there was no dishonor in being “the grand- Israeli, or other proponents of a peaceful children of slaves,” adding, “There is dis- resolution may address them, and as well to honor in being slave-owners.”12 With respect speculate on how Gandhi or Ghaffar Khan to Israel/Palestine today, he would undoubt- might have responded. edly say to Israelis, “There is dishonor in be- I think they would say that death in ing occupiers.” And he would add that to be a peaceful Satyagraha in Israel/Palestine permanent occupiers would be unbearably would be more dramatic, effective, and costly, and futile. indeed glorious, than death-and-murder In dealing personally with Gandhi, the through suicide bombing. They would also British Viceroy and his senior officers were ask for hard thinking to discover means of almost always courteous and even respectful, passive resistance less likely to invite death but even before 1920, when Gandhi finally at Israeli hands, and more likely to attract abandoned his belief in the ’s global participation. They might point out usefulness to India, he was outraged if the that the salt tax was neither a volatile issue British treated ordinary Indians as suspected nor a predictable one, and yet it was passive “subjects.” In his view, the Raj could “re- resistance against that tax that produced the main in India only as India’s trustee and remarkable results of 1930. servant.”13 Writing to Mahadev , his But they would be unlikely to confine longtime confidant, Gandhi said in 1918: the onus for action to Palestinians or Is- “The first thought that rises up in the mind raelis. A Gandhi who had said, while com- is that the British should be driven out of mencing the defiance over the salt tax, “I India bag and baggage; but a feeling deep want world sympathy in this fight of right down in me persists that India’s good lies in against might,” would today ask all peoples, [the] British connection, and so I force my- and Americans above all, to involve them- self to love them.” selves in the unceasing plight of the As for and Muslims, Gandhi and Jews of Palestine/Israel. conceded that they could not be thought of

Mohandas Gandhi, Abdul Ghaffar Khan, and the Middle East Today 93 as “being brothers right today,” but added: Years later, in South Africa, Nelson “In this matter also, something within tells Mandela emerged as a man for all races, me that there is no other course open to breaking from his past as a militant anti- them, and they have but to be brothers. If white radical. Israel/Palestine, too, cries out we go on remembering old scores, we would for persons prepared, irrespective of past his- feel that unity is impossible, but at any cost tory, to address the fears and hopes of both we ought to forget the past.”14 sides, Arabs as well as Jews. It was in 1947 that the British The fact that the initiatives of Gandhi as well as colleagues of Gandhi and Ghaffar and Ghaffar Khan did not quite achieve Khan in the their purpose on the subcontinent in the agreed to the demand of the Muslim 1940s does not invalidate their relevance to League, first raised in 1940, for the separa- today’s Middle East.• tion from India of a Muslim homeland called Pakistan. In sadness, and only because Notes no other solution seemed in sight, Gandhi 1. Omar Khan, “Interview, May 19, 1990, and Ghaffar Khan acquiesced in a division with Ghani Khan,” www.harappa.com. they had stoutly opposed. 2. D. G. Tendulkar, Abdul Ghaffar Khan: Faith On March 16, 1947, Ghaffar Khan Is a Battle (Bombay: Popular Prakashan, 1967), spoke in Bihar, where he and Gandhi pp. 253–54. sought to heal wounds from Hindu-Muslim 3. Francis Watson, Talking of Gandhiji (Cal- violence: cutta: Orient Longmans, 1957), p. 37. 4. Tendulkar, Abdul Ghaffar Khan, pp. 327–28. I find myself surrounded by dark- 5. See article by Harold Gould, Indian Express, ness, which increases the more I New , June 20, 2003. think of the future of India. Indeed 6. Tendulkar, Abdul Ghaffar Khan, p. 161. I see no light. India is on fire. If 7. Ibid., p. 366. India is burnt down, all will lose, 8. Quoted in Madhu Limaye, Prime Movers Hindus, Muslims, and Chris- (: Radiant, 1985), p. 34. tians. What can be achieved through 9. Pyarelal Nayar, In Gandhiji’s Mirror (New love can never be achieved through Delhi: Oxford University Press, 1991), pp. 5–7. hatred or force.... The Muslim 10. Indian Opinion (in Gujarati), July 18, 1908; League wants Pakistan. They can Collected Works of Mahatma Gandhi, vol. 8 (New have it only through love and will- Delhi: Publications Division, n.d.), pp. 373–74. ing consent. Pakistan established 11. Indian Opinion, 14, 1909; Collected through force will prove a doubtful Works, vol. 9, p. 302. boon.15 12. Quote from The Crisis, July 1929, in Sudar- shan Kapur, Raising Up a Prophet: The African-Ameri- A few days later, Gandhi and Ghaffar can Encounter with Gandhi (New Delhi: Oxford Uni- Khan made their daring final bid to avert versity Press, 1993), p. 39. division, proposing to their Congress col- 13. “To the Press,” in , Day-to- leagues to offer the first premiership of an day with Gandhi, vol. 1 (Varanasi: Sarva Seva Sangh. independent and united India to Moham- n.d.), p. 303. mad Ali Jinnah, the Muslim League presi- 14. Desai, Day-to-day with Gandhi, vol. 1, dent. Their colleagues turned down the pro- pp. 56–57. posal, which was never put to Jinnah, but 15. Tendulkar, Abdul Ghaffar Khan, p. 404. Gandhi and Khan had wished to involve Jinnah with all of India’s residents, not just its Muslims.

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