admits that “the leaders of the Demonstration Committee, and anybody in Natal, would be perfectly justified in getting up a constitutional agitation if there was an organized attempt to swamp the Colony with Indians.” So that, if the scheme can be proved, as some people state, Mr. Gandhi’s mouth will be closed . . . Then, again, he totally denies the assertion that he was instigating legal proceeding against the Government for unlawful detention. If there is any proof for that charge, it, too, should be produced. He denies, further, that a printing-press and compositors were brought ever by him, or that the number of passengers for Natal is anything like so great as alleged. These matters are surely capable of direct proof or disproof, and it would be well if they were settled, because, if what Mr. Gandhi says is true, it would seem that the recent agitation was started on insufficient grounds, and incorrect information . . . It will be necessary, if the aid of the Imperial Government is to be obtained, to have hard facts to go upon. It will not advance our cause to raise an outcry that the country is being swamped, and to talk about thousands of Indians coming across in one or two vessels, and then, when it is all boiled down, find there are only one or two hundred. No good will be gained by exaggeration . . . There is no getting away from the fact that this brutal outrage was committed on the very day of the Demonstration, under the influence of feelings excited by the Demonstration, and what led up to it, and also in defiance of the assurance of the representative of Government that the passengers were absolutely safe. The incident shows what might have happened on a larger scale if the Demonstration had been carried to the lengths which were at first intended. — The Natal Advertiser, 16th January, 1897.
Enclosure in Despatch No.62 from the Governor of Natal to H. M.’s Principal Secretary of State for the Colonies, London, dated 10th April, 1897.
Colonial Office Records: Petitions and Despatches, 1897
35↑ Vide "Memorial to Secretary of State for the Colonies", 15-3-1897.
36↑ Vide “Interview to The Natal Advertiser”, 13-1-1897.
