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

236 THE INDIAN STRUGGLE
I pleaded strongly against this viewpoint and urged the
capture of the official Congress machinery in place of boycott.
With regard to the Gandhi-Irwin Pact I made the following
criticism:

1. The Pact had gone into many petty and unnecessary
   details but had avoided the main issue of Swaraj.
2. The Conference was really no Round Table Con-
   ference because there was no finality about the
   decisions of the Conference and the whole matter
   would be considered de novo by the British Parlia-
   ment. In a real Round Table Conference, as the
   South Africans and the Irish had, the decisions are
   always final and binding on both parties. The name
   Round Table Conference had been used only to hood-
   wink foolish Indian politicians.
3. The Indian delegates to the Round Table Conference
   would be selected not by the Indian people but by
   the British Government.
4. The Conference would not be confined to the repre-
   sentatives of the two belligerent parties. Non-descripts
   of all kinds who had nothing to do with the fight for
   Swaraj, would be there to throw obstacles in the path
   of the real Nationalists.
5. The proposal of a Federation between nationalist
   British India and the autocratic Indian Princes was
   an absurd one. The Princes or their nominees would
   act as a dead weight against the national forces.
6. ‘Safeguards’ take away what ‘responsibility’ gives. It
   was a gross error on the part of the Mahatma to talk
   of ‘safeguards’ in the interests of India. The only
   safeguard that the Indians want is liberty. The actual
   ‘safeguards’ are demanded by Britishers and are
   against the interests of Indians. It is wrong to induce
   the Indian people to accept such safeguards by
   saying that they are in the interests of India.
7. The amnesty provided under the Pact was inadequate
   because the following classes of political prisoners
   were excluded:
   (a) The state prisoners and ‘detenus’ imprisoned
   without trial, of whom there were about one
   thousand in Bengal alone.