He wants to hold back our boys from the Universities and post-graduate studies and research that they may go back to their ploughs while the Universities of the Western world are sending their delegates all over the world to take stock of what has been done and to devise means for the intellectual and moral uplift of the Nations.
The constitutional reformers and the Councils have the great task before them of reconciling the Hindus and Mahomedans on a basis for their unity other than the one which arose out of the Mahomedan fury against the British Government for its failure to support Mahomedan interests in the West. They have also to promote goodwill between the Hindus and the Mahomedans on the one side and the Europeans on the other, both in India and in the colonies. They have to face the rising antagonism between the dark, the fair and the white—an antagonism which threatens in course of time to engulf the whites with all that modern civilisation, whatever be its faults, is standing for. The Reform party want India to take her rightful place in the Indo-British commonwealth, the first place, in fact, to which her natural genius and her resources entitle her, with all its responsibilities. The conditions are all favourable to India. Governorships of Provinces are thrown open to Indians. There are Indians in the Viceroy's and other Councils. But Mr. Gandhi and his friends will not only do practically nothing in that direction but they have created what threatens to be a permanent gulf between the Mahomedans and non-Mahomedans, and they are dangerously widening the gulf between the Indians and Europeans. The reformers have to improve the conditions of women both amongst the Mahomedans and the Hindus, as without such improvement India is not entitled to take her place among civilised nations. They have practically to get rid of the caste system as with such a cancer political progress is impossible. Mr. Gandhi, on the other hand, panders to Mahomedan vanity and justifies the racial differences as between different classes of Hindus. He insists upon the necessity of our going back to our own caste system, which is responsible for the condition of our women and of the lower classes. He has given a handle to those who want to maintain the repressive laws, and is really responsible for the retention of them. He has not only thrown doubts as to our fitness for Self-Government but has rendered it possible for our opponents to urge with plausibility that danger would accrue to the Empire and to India itself by granting Home Rule to India. He has thus to the best of his sinister ability attempted to prevent all reforms and has tried to paralyse all the efforts of the reformers in every direction, fomenting racial and class differences, as I have already explained.
Everywhere we see a class of narrow thought in the white world raising the colour sentiment against the Asiatics, and against Indians in particular, proclaiming that there is no place for Indians in British Empire on terms of equality. These are not the intellectual leaders of the white races, nor are they those who set the best standards of morality. On the other hand, we see the noblest of them proclaiming and striving with all their might, with varying degrees of success, to enforce the opposite ideal. We know also that in India the question is only one of time and within a short period absolute equality in every respect will be carried out. We see further that our countrymen elsewhere are weak and comparatively helpless, and till we in India attain our manhood they must continue at the mercy of the white races. What is it, then, that not only Religion, Universal morality, or good, but also policy and prudence, dictate? There can be only one answer. We must strengthen the hands of those who are fighting for race equality and give no opportunity to those who maintain that the Indians are a peril to the white race. What is Mr. Gandhi doing? He is doing everything possible to increase racial and class hatred.
We see the wonderful phenomenon of Australian ladies begging pardon for the atrocious treatment of their Indian sisters by a few Englishmen in Fiji and elsewhere. We see the Universities and Professors, ashamed of themselves for their aberration during the great War, hastening to make amends by trying to bring together all classes and races of men. We see white women trying to band themselves and other women of whatever colour and creed into one sisterhood, without any difference, to throw themselves into all social and political movements for sex enfranchisement and uplift; to work for the good not only of themselves but of children in particular, and generally to devote themselves to all activities of mercy. We find various Nations calling to one another across seas, deserts and mountains to join in a common fellowship, not to work in opposition to one another. Every where, after the fearful cataclysm through which we have passed, there is wistful yearning for fellowship and brother-hood to carry out in practice the teachings of the ancient prophets and seers, Buddha, Confucius, Zoroaster, the seers of the Upanishads, Christ, Mahomed, in opposition to the Churches and the dogmatic religions identified with their names. And is it not extraordinary, we see this man, uninfluenced by this tremendous intellectual and moral up-heaval, waging a bloody and racial struggle for what? that if successful Indians may not take part in any of these movements, shun them all, since God has not created man with his limited means of natural locomotion to labour for general good, and may therefore, retire to their village to lead a solitary life.
If he had followed this advice for himself, or had retired to the Himalayas to live a mahatmaic life he would have saved the lives literally of thousands, prevented horrible outrages worse than death, saved thousands from incalculable misery. Instead of paying the penalty themselves, he and his lieutenants stalk about the country dripping with the blood of the victims of their policy.
Who is responsible for all this? The Government of India cannot divest themselves of their responsibility and India will hold the Indian members primarily responsible for the present situation. For no Viceroy will venture to disregard their advice in a matter of this sort. They do not seem to have strengthened the fibre of the Government. Nor have the Legislative Councils who also must share the responsibility advanced the claim for the transfer of the administration of justice to popular control. The Gandhi movement will no doubt collapse by internal disruption as it is composed of various elements, drawn from Tolstoy Lenin communism, socialism, Rigid Brahmanism, militant Mahomedanism mutually repellent and explosive when they come into contact with one another and already producing the natural terrible results. But before the final collapse comes it will have produced appalling misery and bloodshed unless it is dealt with firmly and with statesmanship. The Government should give Mr. Gandhi and some of his chief lieutenants who accept the whole programme the rest, they sadly need. And the Congress and the Khilafat associations must be treated as they themselves wish to be treated as disloyal illegal associations.
Since the above lines were written Mr. Gandhi has been arrested, tried and convicted. He pleaded guilty to the charges framed against him. His statements are worthy of careful attention (App. XXI). He said "I wish to endorse all the blame that the learned Advocate-General has thrown on my shoulders in connection with the Bombay occurrences, Madras occurrences and the Chauri Chaura occurrences. Thinking over these deeply and sleeping over them night after night, it is impossible for me to dissociate myself from the diabolical crimes of Chauri Chaura or the mad outrages of Bombay." He is quite right when he says, that "as a man of responsibility, a man having received a fair share of education, having had fair share of experience of this world, I should have known the consequences of every one of my acts. I knew that I was playing with fire. I ran the risk and if I was set free I would still do the same. I have felt it this morning that I would have failed in my duty, if I did not say what I said here just now." A man who says that if set free he would still pursue the same course though aware of the consequences of his acts is not a safe leader. There are signs however of a general recognition throughout the country that Mr. Gandhi's theories are no longer suitable as a guide for political action. The Maharashtra party have apparently resolved to seek admission into the Legislative councils. The Central Provinces are also apparently of the same opinion. A large section of Bengal represented by the Chitagong conference apparently hold the same view. In Madras a considerable section is inclined to agree. But there is little doubt that it would take a long time to eradicate the feeling of hatred that has been roused by Mr. Gandhi throughout the country.
As I left the Government of India long before the campaign of non-co-operation was launched, perhaps there is nothing inappropriate in the few observations which I propose to make regarding the delay in taking action against Mr. Gandhi and his followers. In September 1920 the Congress adopted the non-co-operation resolution. The Government might then have taken action with the support of a large majority of Indian politicians. After the final adoption of a non-co-operation programme by the Nagpur Congress it was felt that the Government should have stopped the activities of the party which from that moment had openly declared their disloyalty. They maintained their silence however even after Gandhi and the Congress party resolved on the recruitment of volunteers and the organisation of a parallel Government. On the arrest and trial of the Ali Brothers Mr. Gandhi challenged the Government to arrest him as he maintained that the conduct of the Ali Brothers in tampering with the loyalty of the Sepoys and uttering sedition was only in pursuance of the policy adopted by himself and the congress. His words are remarkable. "The National Congress began to tamper with the loyalty of the sepoys in September last year, i.e. 1920 the Central Khilafat Committee began it earlier and I began it earlier still, for I must be permitted to take the credit or the odium of suggesting, that India had a right openly to tell the sepoy and everyone who served the Government in any capacity whatsoever that he participated in the wrongs done by the Government."—"Every non-co-operator is pledged to preach disaffection towards the Government established by law. Non-co-operation, though, a religious and strictly moral movement, deliberately aims at the overthrow of the Government, and is therefore legally seditious in terms of the Indian Penal Code. But this is no new discovery. Lord Chelmsford knew it. Lord Reading knows it" ... "we must reiterate from a thousand platforms the formula of the Ali Brothers regarding the sepoys, and we must spread disaffection openly and systematically till it pleases the Government to arrest us." It will hardly be believed that even after this no steps were taken against him. Towards the end of the year he said "Lord Reading must clearly understand that the non-co-operators are at war with the Government. They have declared rebellion against it." It was after this that there was an attempt to bring about a conference between him and the Government which was contemptuously brushed aside by him. One of the mopla leaders when tried for rebellion pleaded that he was under the impression that the British Government no longer ruled the country and had abdicated. There is very little doubt of the unfortunate fact that there was a general belief that the Government was powerless and could be safely defied by Gandhi and his congress.