Before I come to deal with that I should draw your attention to
another significant fact and that is, the gradual awakening of
the consciousness of the Mahomedan community of Bengal (cheers).
At the time of the Swadeshi agitation we were held apart. The
self-consciousness which grew within us--the soul of Bengal which
revealed herself to us, did not reveal herself to the Mahomedans and we
found that they were banded together against this national activity;
but, gentlemen, do not be disappointed. You have to view the awakening
of the political consciousness of the Mahomedans in Bengal in its true
historical perspective, otherwise you will lose sight of much that is
important. If you will allow me, I will tell you very briefly something
about that history. The literature which would show the wonderful
activities of the Mahomedans of Bengal has not yet been unearthed but
I have not the least doubt that one day you will find that literature
in which both Hindus and Mahomedans joined. Hindus writing in Urdu
and Bengalee Mahomedans writing in Sanskrit--I have seen one or two
such manuscripts and I am sure there are many such--and when all that
literature is unearthed, you will find a wonderful history of Bengalee
civilization. In the days of Ram Mohan Roy when English education was
introduced in this country, the Mahomedans did not accept it. I am
not sorry for that. The Mahomedans did not accept it and they were
waiting for a ruder shock. They had forgotten what their forefathers
had done in the way of national development. They did not accept
English education and at the same time they were divorced from the
culture which their fathers had advanced. The result was that whereas
the Hindus got on in life, got into government employment, got many
things which people value in life, the Mahomedans were left without
it and gradually there came to be a sort of estrangement between the
two nationalities at the time of the Swadeshi movement. They kept
away from that movement and even fought with their might and main
against it. Now, gentlemen, I told you I am not sorry for that. I do
not remember how I felt it then but now I see that the very attitude
which the Mahomedans had taken, that very opposition was the result of
their national awakening. We used to deprecate the work of the late
Nabob Salimulla in those days because he had organised the Mahomedan
opposition to the Swadeshi movement in Bengal. I do not do that now
because whatever the form of that activity might have been, Nabob
Salimulla succeeded in organising the Mahomedans (cheers). The spirit
of nationality spoke amongst the Mahomedans at that time. Once the name
is roused I do not care how it is roused. Let it be roused once and
then all its narrowness will pass away. All that is true forms part of
the national consciousness. What is the result to-day? I went to Dacca
and the Mahomedans invited me to an informal conference. When I went
there what did I find? Not that estrangement but an intense anxiety
on their part to side with the Hindus to combine with the Hindus,
(cheers) to fight shoulder to shoulder with the Hindus for working out
the real salvation of Bengal (Loud applause). If the Swadeshi Movement
was the first step in our national self-consciousness so far as Hindus
are concerned, I say it was equally the first step of Mahomedan
self-consciousness. Its appearance was against the nation, but its
reality was in our favour.