The general trend of European thought has not accepted the ideal of this new democracy. But the present problems which are agitating Europe seem to offer no other solution. I have very little doubt that this ideal which appears to many practical politicians as impracticable will be accepted as the real ideal at no distant future. “There is little yet,” I again quote from the same author, “that is practical in practical politics.”
The fact is that all the progressive movements in Europe have suffered because of the want of a really spiritual basis and it is refreshing to find that this writer has seized upon it. So to those who think that the neighbourhood group is puny to serve as a real foundation of self-Government, she says, “is our daily life profane and only so far as we rise out of it do we approach the sacred life? Then no wonder politics are what they have become. But this is not the creed of men to-day; we believe in the sacredness of life; we believe that divinity is for ever incarnating in humanity, and so we believe in Humanity and the common daily life of all men.”
There is thus a great deal of correspondence between this view of life and the view which I have been endeavouring to place before my countrymen for the last 15 years. For the truth of all truths, is that the outer Leela of God reveals itself in history. Individual Society, Nation, and Humanity are the different aspects of that very Leela and no scheme of self-Government which is practically true and which is really practical can be based on any other philosophy of life. It is the realisation of this truth which is the supreme necessity of the hour. This is the soul of Indian thought, and this is the ideal towards which the recent thought of Europe is slowly, but surely, advancing.
To frame such a scheme of Government regard must therefore be had:—
1. To the formation of local centres more or less on the lines of the ancient village system of India.
2. The growth of larger and larger groups out of the integration of these village centres.
3. The unifying state should be the result of minor growth.
4. The village centres and the larger groups must be practically autonomous.
5. The residuary power of control must remain in the Central Government, but the exercise of such power should be exceptional and for that purpose proper safeguards should be provided, so that the practical autonomy of the local centres may be maintained and at the same time the growth of the Central Government into a really unifying state may be possible. The ordinary work of such Central Government should be mainly advisory.
As a necessary corollary to what I have ventured to suggest as the form of Government which we should accept, I think that the work of organising these local centres should be forthwith commenced. The modern sub-divisions or even smaller units may be conveniently taken as the local centres, and larger centres may be conveniently formed. Once we have our local areas—“the neighbourhood group”—we should foster the habit of corporate thinking, and leave all local problems to be worked out by them. There is no reason why we should not start the Government by these local centres to-day. They would depend for their authority on the voluntary co-operation of the people, and voluntary co-operation is much better than the compulsory co-operation which is at the bottom of the Bureaucratic rule in India. This is not the place to elaborate the scheme which I have in mind; but I think that it is essentially necessary to appoint a Committee with power, not only to draw up a scheme of Government but to suggest means by which the scheme can be put in operation at once.