The Pilgrims' March/Mahatma's Answer to the Viceroy's Challenge
MAHATMA'S ANSWER
TO
THE VICEROY'S CHALLENGE.
No yielding in Fundamentals.
I must confess that I have read the Viceregal utterance with deep pain. I was totally unprepared for what I must respectfully call his mischievous misrepresentation of the attitude of the Congress and the Khilafat organisations in connection with the visit of His Royal Highness the Prince of Wales. Every resolution passed by either organisation and every speaker has laid the greatest stress upon the fact that there was no question of showing the slightest ill-will against the Prince or exposing him to any affront. The boycott was purely a question of principle and directed against what we have held to be the unscrupulous methods of the bureaucracy. I have always, held, as I hold even now, that the Prince has been brought to India in order to strengthen the hold of the Civil Service Corporation, which has brought India into a state of abject pauperism and political serfdom. If I am proved to be wrong in my supposition that the visit has that sinister meaning, I shall gladly apologise.
It is equally unfortunate for the Viceroy to say that the boycott of the welcome meant an affront to the British people. His Excellency does not ralise what grievous wrong he is doing to his own people by confusing them with the British administration in India. Does he wish India to infer that the British administrators here represent the British people and that the agitation directed against their methods is an agitation against the British people. If such is the Viceregal contention and if to conduct a vigorous and effective agitation against the methods of the bureaucracy and to describe them in their true colours is an affront to the British people, then I am afraid I must plead guilty.
But, then, I must also say in all humility that the Viceroy has entirely misread and misunderstood the great national awakening that is taking place in India. I repeat, for the thousandth time, that it is not hostile to any nation or any body of men, but it is deliberately aimed at the system under which the Government of India is being to-day conducted and I promise that no threats and no enforcement of threats by the Viceroy or any body of men will strangle that agitation or send to rest that awakening.
WE ARE NOT AGGRESSORS.
I have said in my reply to Lord Ronaldshay’s speech that we have not taken the offensive. We are not the aggressors. We have not got to stop any single activity. It is the Government that is to stop its aggravatingly offensive activity aimed, not, at violence, but at the lawful, disciplined, stern, but absolutely non-violent, agitation. It is for the Government of India and, for it alone, to bring about a peaceful atmosphere, if it so desires. It has hurled a bombshell in the midst of material rendered inflammable by its own action and wonders that the material is still not inflammable enough to explode.
THE IMMEDIATE ISSUE.
The immediate issue is not now the redress of the three wrongs. The immediate issue is the right of holding public meetings and the right of forming associations for peace purposes, and, in vindicating this right, we are fighting the battle, not merely on behalf of Non-co-operators, but are fighting the battle for all India down from the peasant up to the prince and for all schools of politics. It is the one condition of any organic growth and I see in the Viceregal pronouncement an insistence upon submission to a contrary doctrine, which an erstwhile exponent of the law of liberty has seen fit to lay down, upon finding himself in an atmosphere where there is little regard for law and order on the part of those very men who are supposed to be custodians of law and order.
I have only to point to the unprovoked assault being committed, not in isolated cases, not in one place, but in Bengal, in the Punjab, in Delhi and in the United Provinces. I have no doubt that, as repression goes on in its mad career, the reign of terrorism will overtake the whole of this unhappy land. But whether the campaign is conducted on civilised or uncivilised lines, so far as I can see, there is only one way open to Non-co-operators, indeed I contend, even to the people of India.
OUR PRIMARY RIGHT.
On this question of the right of holding public meetings and forming associations, there can be no yielding. We have burnt our boats and we must march onward till that primary right of human beings is vindicated.
“MOST ANXIOUS FOR A
SETTLEMENT.”
Let me make my own position clear. I am most anxious for a settlement. I want a round table conference. I want our position to be clearly known by everybody who wants to understand it. I impose no conditions, but, when conditions are imposed upon me prior to the holding of a conference, I must be allowed to examine those conditions and if I find that they are suicidal, I must be excused if I don’t accept them. The amount of tension that is created can be regulated solely by the Government of India, for the offensive has been taken by that Government.
CIVIL DISOBEDIENCE.
The Indian National Congress 29th December 1921. * *
There is nothing in this resolution, which any one who has modesty and humility need be ashamed of. This resolution is not an arrogant challenge to anybody, but this is a challenge to an authority that is enthroned on arrogance. It is a challenge to the authority, which disregards the considered opinion of millions of thinking human beings. It is an humble challenge, and an irrevocable challenge to authority, which in order to save itself wants to crush freedom of opinion, freedom of forming associations, the two lungs that are absolutely necessary for a man to breathe the oxygen of liberty. And if there is any authority in this country, that wants to curb the freedom of speech and freedom of association, I want to be able to say, in your name from this platform, that that authority will perish, and that authority will have to repent before an India that is steeled with high courage, noble purpose and determination, till every man and woman who chose to call themselves Indians are blotted out of the earth. It combines courage and humility. *
PRINTED BY
C. MUNISAWMY MUDALIAR AND SONS, MADRAS.