We have so far discussed the Report and such remarks as we have made
have been by way of comment. In this chapter we propose to give in brief
outline our own view of the problem.
Let us first be clear about the exact nature of the Indian problem.
Political institutions are, after all, only a reflection of the national
mind and of national conditions. What is the end? The end is freedom to
live and to live according to our own conception of what life should be,
to pursue our own ideals, to develop our own civilization and to secure
that unity of purpose which would distinguish us from the other nations
of the world, insuring for us a position of independence and honor, of
security from within and non-interference from without. We have no
ambition to conquer and rule other peoples; we have no desire to exploit
foreign markets; not even to impose our "kultur" and our "civilization"
on others. At present we are counted among the backward peoples of the
earth mainly because we are a subject people, governed by a foreign
power, protected by foreign bayonets and schooled by foreign teachers.
The condition of our masses is intellectually deplorable and
economically miserable; our women are still in bondage and do not enjoy
that freedom which their Western sisters have won; our domestic
masters, the prince and priest, are still in saddle; caste and privilege
still hold some sway, yet it is not true that, taken all in all, we are
really a backward people. Even in these matters we find that the
difference between us and the "advanced" nations of the world is one of
degree only. Caste and privilege rule in the United States as much as in
India. There is nothing in our history which can be put on the same
level as the lynching of Mr. Little, the deportation of Bisbee miners,
the lynching of the Negroes, and other incidents of a similar nature
indicative of race hatred and deep rooted colour prejudice. No nation in
the world can claim an _ideal state of society_, in which everything is
of the best. On the other hand, there are certain matters in which
comparison is to our advantage. Even with the advance of drunkenness
under British rule we are yet a sober nation; our _standards_ of
personal and domestic hygiene are much higher than those of the Western
people; our standards of life much simpler and nobler; our social ideals
more humane; and our spiritual aspirations infinitely superior. As a
nation we do not believe in war or militarism or evangelism. We do not
force our views on others; we have greater toleration for other people's
opinions and beliefs than has any other nation in the world; we have not
yet acquired that craze for possessions and for sheer luxurious and
riotous life which marks the modern Pharisee of the West. Our people,
according to their conceptions, means and opportunities are kindly,
hospitable, gentle, law-abiding, mutually helpful, full of respect for
others, and peace loving. It is, in fact, the abnormal extent in which
these qualities exist that has contributed to our political and
economic exploitation by others. In India capitalism and landlordism
have not yet developed as fully as they have among the civilized nations
of the West. The West is in revolt against capitalism and landlordism.
We do not claim that before the advent of the British there was no
capitalism or landlordism in India. But we do contend that, though there
was a certain amount of rivalry and competition between the different
castes, within the castes there was much more coöperation and
fellow-feeling than there has ever been in the West. Our native
governments and their underlings, the landlords, did exact a high price
from the village communities for the privilege of cultivating their
lands but within the village there was no _inter se_ competition either
between the tillers of the soil or between the pursuers of crafts. The
gulf between the rich and the poor was not so marked as it is to-day in
the West.
Under the British rule and since its introduction, however, things have
changed considerably. Without adopting the best features of modern life,
we have been forced by circumstances, political and economic, to give up
the best of our own. Village communities have been destroyed; joint and
corporate bargaining has given place to individual transactions; every
bit of land has been separately measured, marked and taxed; common lands
have been divided; the price of land and rent has risen abnormally. The
money-lender who, before the advent of British rule, held an extremely
subordinate position in the village community, has suddenly come to
occupy the first place. He owns the best lands and the best houses and
holds the bodies and souls of the agriculturalists in mortgage. The
villages which were generally homogeneous in population, bound to each
other by ties of race, blood and religion, have become heterogeneous,
with nondescript people of all races and all religions who have acquired
land by purchase. Competition has taken the place of coöperation. A
country where social coöperation and social solidarity reigned at least
within castes, within villages and within urban areas has been entirely
disrupted and disintegrated by unlimited and uncontrolled competition.
India never knew any poor laws; she never needed any; nor orphan
asylums, nor old age pensions and widow homes. She had no use for
organized charity. Rarely did any man die for want of food or clothing,
except in famines. Hospitality was open and was dispensed under a sense
of duty and obligation and not by way of charity or kindness. The
survival of the fittest had no hold on our minds. We had no factories or
workshops. People worked in their _own_ homes or shops either with their
own money or with money borrowed from the money-lender. The artisans
were the masters of the goods they produced and, unless otherwise agreed
with the money-lender, sold them in the open market. The necessities of
life, being cheap and easily procurable the artisans cared more for
quality than quantity. Their work was a source of pleasure and pride as
well as of profit to them. Now everything has gone, pleasure, pride, as
well as profit. Where profit has remained, pleasure and pride are gone.
We are on the high road to a "distinctly industrial civilization." In
fact, the principal complaint of our political reformers and free trade
economists is that the British Government has not let us proceed on
that road at a sufficiently rapid pace and that, in preventing us, they
have been dominated by their own national interests more than by our own
good. We saw that other nations were progressing by following the laws
of industrial development, and quite naturally we also wanted to prosper
by the same method. This war has opened our eyes as it has opened those
of the rest of the world and we have begun to feel that the goal that we
sought leads to perdition and not salvation. This makes it necessary for
the Indian politicians and economists to review their ideas of political
progress. What are we aiming at? Do we want to rise, in order to fall?
Do we want to copy and emulate Europe even in its mistakes and blunders?
Does the road to heaven lie through hell? Must we make a wreck of our
ship and then try salvage? The civilization of Europe, as we have known
it, is dying. It may take decades or perhaps a century or more to die.
But _die it must_. This War has prepared a death bed for it from which
it will never rise. Upon its ruins is rising, or will rise, another
civilization which will reproduce much of what was valuable and precious
in our own with much of what we never had. The question that we want to
put to our compatriots is, shall we prepare ourselves for the coming
era, or shall we bury ourselves in the débris of the expiring one. We
have no right to answer it for others, but our answer is clear and
unequivocal. We will not be a party to any scheme which shall add to the
powers of the capitalist and the landlord and will introduce and
accentuate the evils of the expiring industrial civilization into our
beloved country.
We are not unaware that, according to the judgment of some thinkers,
amongst them Karl Marx, a country must pass through the capitalistic
mill, before the proletariat comes to its own. We do not believe in the
truth of this theory, but even if it be true we will not consciously
help in proving it to be true. The existing social order of Europe is
vicious and immoral. It is worm eaten. It has the germs of plague,
disease, death and destitution in it. It is in a state of decomposition.
It is based on injustice, tyranny, oppression and class rule. Certain
phases of it are inherent in our own system. Certain others we are
borrowing from our masters in order to make a complete mess. Wisdom and
foresight require that we be forewarned. What we want and what we need
is not the power to implant in full force and in full vigour the
_expiring_ European system, but power to keep out its development on
vicious lines, with opportunities of gradually and slowly undoing the
evil that has already been done.
The Government of India as at present constituted is a Government of
capitalists and landlords, of both England and India. Under the proposed
scheme the power of the former will be reduced and that of the latter
increased. The Indo-British Association does not like it, not because it
loves the masses of India for which it hypocritically and insincerely
professes solicitude, but because in their judgment it reduces the
profits of the British governing classes. We doubt if the scheme really
does affect even that. But if it does, it is good so far.
The ugly feature of the scheme is not its potentiality in transferring
the power into the hands of the Brahmins (the power of the Brahmin as
such, is gone for good), but in the possibility of its giving too much
power to the "profiteering" class, be they the landlords of Bengal and
Oudh, or the millionaires of Bombay. The scheme protects the European
merchants; it confers special privileges on the small European
Community; it provides special representation for the landlords, the
Chambers of Commerce, the Mohammedans and the Sikhs. What is left for
the general tax-paying public is precious little. The authors of the
scheme say that to withhold complete and immediate Home Rule is in the
interest of the general masses, the poor inarticulate ryot and the
workingman. We wish we could believe in it. We wish it were true.
Perhaps they mean it, but our past experience does not justify our
accepting it at its face value.
There is, however, one thing we can do. We can ask them for proofs by
insisting on and agitating for the immediate legislative relief of the
ryot and the middle classes. We should adopt the aims of the British
Labour Party as our own, start educating our people on those lines and
formulate measures which will secure for them _real freedom_ and not the
counterfeit coin which passes for it. It will require years of education
and agitation but it has to be done, no matter whether we are ruled by
the British or by our own property holders. We are not opposed to Home
Rule. Nay, we press for it. In our judgment the objections urged against
giving it at once are flimsy and intangible. The chief obstacles are
such as have been created or perpetuated by the British themselves. The
caste does not prevent us from having _at least_ as much home rule as is
enjoyed by the people of Italy, Hungary, the Balkan States and some of
the South American Republics. But if we cannot have it at once and if
the British must retain the power of final decision in their hands, we
must insist upon something being immediately done not only to educate
the ryot but to give him economic relief. So long as the British
continue to refuse to do that we must hold them responsible for all the
misery that Indian humanity is suffering from.
We want political power in order to raise the intellectual and political
status of our masses. We do not want to bolster up classes. Our goal is
real liberty, equality and opportunity for all. We want to avoid, if
possible, the evils of the class struggle. We will pass through the mill
if we must, but we should like to try to avoid it. For that reason we
want freedom to legislate and freedom to determine our fiscal
arrangements. That is our main purpose in our demand for Home Rule.