द इण्डियन स्ट्रगल / भारतीय स्वाधीनता संग्राम (नेताजी सुभाष चन्द्र बोस - ऐतिहासिक विश्लेषण)

206 THE INDIAN STRUGGLE
give solid support to the coming campaign. After much
searching of heart, on February 27th, the Mahatma announced
his plan of campaign. The next few moves taken by him
will stand out for all time as some of the most brilliant
achievements of his leadership and they reveal the height to
which his statesmanship can ascend in times of crises. Writ-
ing in Young India on February 27th, 1930, he said:
'This time on my arrest, there is to be no mute passive
non-violence, but non-violence of the most active type
should be set in motion so that not a single believer in non-
violence as an article of faith for the purpose of achieving
India's goal, should find himself free or alive at the end of
the effort. . . . So far as I am concerned, my intention is to
start the movement only through the inmates of the Ashrama
(meaning—his own Ashrama) and those who have submitted
to its discipline and assimilated the spirit of its methods.'
Referring to the possibility of a suspension of civil dis-
obedience in the event of an outbreak of violence, as in 1922,
the Mahatma wrote: 'Whilst, therefore, every effort imaginable
and possible should be made to restrain the forces of violence,
civil disobedience once begun this time cannot be stopped
and must not be stopped so long as there is a single civil
resister left free or alive.' The last statement helped to
reassure all those people who had taken strong exception to
the Bardoli retreat in 1922 following the manifestation of mob
violence at Chauri Chaura.
The Mahatma further announced his intention of defying
the Salt Law along with seventy-eight of his chosen followers
—the members of his Ashrama. He would commence a
march from Ahmedabad to the sea-coast—his pilgrimage to
the sea—on March 12th and after arriving there, would
launch the civil-disobedience campaign. That would be the
signal for the whole country to take up the movement. The
Mahatma decided to start this particular campaign, because
it would appeal to the country as a whole, and especially to
the poor. From time immemorial the people had been
accustomed to manufacture salt from sea-water or from
the soil. That right had been taken away from the people
by the British Government. Now the Salt Law as adminis-