Is violence or total surrender the only choice open to any people to
whom Freedom or Justice is denied? Violence at a time when the whole
world has learnt from bitter experience the futility of violence is
unworthy of a country whose ancient people's privilege, it was, to see
this truth long ago.
Violence may rid a nation of its foreign masters but will only enslave
it from inside. No nation can really be free which is at the mercy of
its army and its military heroes. If a people rely for freedom on its
soldiers, the soldiers will rule the country, not the people. Till the
recent awakening of the workers of Europe, this was the only freedom
which the powers of Europe really enjoyed. True freedom can exist only
when those who produce, not those who destroy or know only to live on
other's labour, are the masters.
Even were violence the true road to freedom, is violence possible to a
nation which has been emasculated and deprived of all weapons, and the
whole world is hopelessly in advance of all our possibilities in the
manufacture and the wielding of weapons of destruction.
Submission or withdrawal of co-operation is the real and only
alternative before India. Submission to injustice puts on the tempting
garb of peace and, gradual progress, but there is no surer way to death
than submission to wrong.