Much laughter has been indulged in at my expense for having told the
Congress audience at Calcutta that if there was sufficient response to
my programme of non-co-operation Swaraj would be attained in one year.
Some have ignored my condition and laughed because of the impossibility
of getting Swaraj anyhow within one year. Others have spelt the 'if' in
capitals and suggested that if 'ifs' were permissible in argument, any
absurdity could be proved to be a possibility. My proposition however is
based on a mathematical calculation. And I venture to say that true
Swaraj is a practical impossibility without due fulfilment of my
conditions. Swaraj means a state such that we can maintain our separate
existence without the presence of the English. If it is to be a
partnership, it must be partnership at will. There can be no Swaraj
without our feeling and being the equals of Englishmen. To-day we feel
that we are dependent upon them for our internal and external security,
for an armed peace between the Hindus and the Mussulmans, for our
education and for the supply of daily wants, nay, even for the
settlement of our religious squabbles. The Rajahs are dependent upon the
British for their powers and the millionaires for their millions. The
British know our helplessness and Sir Thomas Holland cracks jokes quite
legitimately at the expense of non-co-operationists. To get Swaraj then
is to get rid of our helplessness. The problem is no doubt stupendous
even as it is for the fabled lion who having been brought up in the
company of goats found it impossible to feel that he was a lion. As
Tolstoy used to put it, mankind often laboured under hypnotism. Under
its spell continuously we feel the feeling of helplessness. The British
themselves cannot be expected to help us out of it. On the contrary,
they din into our ears that we shall be fit to govern ourselves only by
slow educative processes. The "Times" suggested that if we boycott the
councils we shall lose the opportunity of a training in Swaraj. I have
no doubt that there are many who believe what the "Times" says. It even
resorts to a falsehood. It audaciously says that Lord Milner's Mission
listened to the Egyptians only when they were ready to lift the boycott
of the Egyptian Council. For me the only training in Swaraj we need is
the ability to defend ourselves against the whole world and to live our
natural life in perfect freedom even though it may be full of defects.
Good Government is no substitute for self-Government. The Afghans have a
bad Government but it is self-Government. I envy them. The Japanese
learnt the art through a sea of blood. And if we to-day had the power to
drive out the English by superior brute force, we would be counted their
superiors, and in spite of our inexperience in debating at the Council
table or in holding executive offices, we would be held fit to govern
ourselves. For brute force is the only test the west has hitherto
recognised. The Germans were defeated not because they were necessarily
in the wrong, but because the allied Powers were found to possess
greater brute strength. In the end therefore India must either learn the
art of war which the British will not teach her or, she must follow her
own way of discipline and self-sacrifice through non-co-operation. It is
as amazing as it is humiliating that less than one hundred-thousand
white men should be able to rule three hundred and fifteen million
Indians. They do so somewhat undoubtedly by force, but more by securing
our co-operation in a thousand ways and making us more and more helpless
and dependent on them as time goes forward. Let us not mistake reformed
councils, more lawcourts and even governorships for real freedom or
power. They are but subtler methods of emasculation. The British cannot
rule us by mere force. And so they resort to all means, honourable and
dishonourable, in order to retain their hold on India. They want India's
billions and they want India's man power for their imperialistic greed.
If we refuse to supply them with men and money, we achieve our goal,
namely, Swaraj, equality, manliness.
The cup of our humiliation was filled during the closing scenes in the
Viceregal Council. Mr. Shustri could not move his resolution on the
Punjab. The Indian victims of Jullianwala received Rs. 1,250, the
English victims of mob-frenzy received lakhs. The officials who were
guilty of crimes against those whose servants they were, were
reprimanded. And the councillors were satisfied. If India were powerful,
India would not have stood this addition of insult, to her injury.
I do not blame the British. If we were weak in numbers as they are, we
too would perhaps have resorted to the same methods as they are now
employing. Terrorism and deception are weapons not of the strong but of
the weak. The British are weak in numbers we are weak in spite of our
numbers. The result is that each is dragging the other down. It is
common experience that Englishmen lose in character after residence in
India and that Indians lose in courage and manliness by contact with
Englishmen. This process of weakening is good neither for us, two
nations, nor for the world.
But if we Indians take care of ourselves the English and the rest of
the world would take care of themselves. Our contributions to the
world's progress must therefore consist in setting our own house
in order.
Training in arms for the present is out of the question. I go a step
further and believe that India has a better mission for the world. It is
within her to show that she can achieve her destiny by pure
self-sacrifice, i.e., self-purification. This can be done only by
non-co-operation. And non-co-operation is possible only when those who
commenced to co-operate being the process of withdrawal. If we can but
free ourselves from the threefold _maya_ of Government-controlled
schools, Government law-courts and legislative councils, and truly
control our own education regulate our disputes and be indifferent to
their legislation, we are ready to govern ourselves and we are only then
ready to ask the government servants, whether civil or military, to
resign, and the tax-payers to suspend payment of taxes.
And is it such an impracticable proposition to expect parents to
withdraw their children from schools and colleges and establish their
own institutions or to ask lawyers to suspend their practice and devote
their whole time attention to national service against payment where
necessary, of their maintenance, or to ask candidates for councils not
to enter councils and lend their passive or active assistance to the
legislative machinery through which all control is exercised. The
movement of non-co-operation is nothing but an attempt to isolate the
brute force of the British from all the trappings under which it is
hidden and to show that brute force by itself cannot for one single
moment hold India.
But I frankly confess that, until the three conditions mentioned by me
are fulfilled, there is no Swaraj. We may not go on taking our college
degrees, taking thousands of rupees monthly from clients for cases which
can be finished in five minutes and taking the keenest delight in
wasting national time on the council floor and still expect to gain
national self-respect.
The last though not the least important part of the Maya still remains
to be considered. That is Swadeshi. Had we not abandoned Swadeshi, we
need not have been in the present fallen state. If we would get rid of
the economic slavery, we must manufacture our own cloth and at the
present moment only by hand-spinning and hand weaving.
All this means discipline, self-denial, self-sacrifice, organising
ability, confidence and courage. If we show this in one year among the
classes that to-day count, and make public opinion, we certainly gain
Swaraj within one year. If I am told that even we who lead have not
these qualities in us, there certainly will never be Swaraj for India,
but then we shall have no right to blame the English for what they are
doing. Our salvation and its time are solely dependent upon us.