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

84 THE INDIAN STRUGGLE
elected President of the ensuing session of the Congress which
was to meet at Ahmedabad in the last week of December.
His half-written speech, which was a vindication of the prin-
ciples and methods of the non-co-operation movement, was
sent to the Congress and the presidential chair was filled,
in his absence, by Hakim Ajmal Khan, the outstanding
leader of Delhi. There was great enthusiasm at the Ahmeda-
bad Congress and the main resolution was one which called
upon the whole country to adopt a policy of individual and
mass civil disobedience. Every man and woman was exhorted
to join the National Volunteer Corps, defy the emergency
ordinances and court imprisonment. The Congress further
appointed the Mahatma as the Dictator for the whole country,
following the precedent of the Bengal Congress Committee,
who had appointed the Deshbandhu as the Dictator for the
province.
There was an interesting episode at the Ahmedabad Con-
gress. Moulana Hasrat Mohani, an influential Moslem
leader of the United Provinces, moved a resolution to the
effect that the goal of the Indian National Congress should
be defined in the constitution as the establishment of a
republic (the United States of India). So impassioned was his
eloquence and so responsive was the audience, that one felt
as if the resolution would be carried by a large majority.
But the Mahatma rose to oppose the resolution and with
great sobriety argued against the proposition, with the result
that it was thrown out by the house. The proposition was,
however, to be brought up over and over again at subsequent
Congresses till it was accepted at the Lahore Congress in
1929, the mover on that occasion being none other than the
Mahatma himself.
With the dissolution of the Congress, the year 1921 came to
an end. Nothing of a startling character happened on or
before December 31st. The promised Swaraj did not come.
A few months earlier, at the conference with the ex-revolu-
tionaries of Bengal, the Mahatma had said, that he was so
sure of getting Swaraj before the end of the year that he could
not conceive of himself as living beyond December 31st,
without having won Swaraj. He had further said that pro-

THE STORM BREAKS 85
vincial autonomy and diarchy in the Central Government he
could have for the mere asking, but he wanted full Dominion
status and if he had that, he would be prepared to unfurl the
Union Jack over his Ashrama. As the curtain was rung down
on December 31st, 1921, these words floated like dreams
before my mind's eye.
Before the end of the year, with the exception of Mahatma
Gandhi, all the other important leaders were in prison. As
a matter of fact at the time of the negotiations between the
Deshbandhu and the Viceroy, none of the outstanding intel-
lectual stalwarts was in a position to advise the Mahatma as
to the proper course for him to adopt. If they had done so,
then in all probability, events would have taken a different
course. There can of course be no doubt that within twelve
months the country had made tremendous progress and much
of the credit for that belonged to the Mahatma. But what
has to be regretted is that he did not show sufficient diplomacy
and prudence when the crucial hour arrived. In this con-
nection I am reminded of what the Deshbandhu used fre-
quently to say about the virtues and failings of Mahatma
Gandhi's leadership. According to him, the Mahatma opens
a campaign in a brilliant fashion; he works it up with unerring
skill; he moves from success to success till he reaches the
zenith of his campaign—but after that he loses his nerve and
begins to falter.
Before we close this chapter it would be desirable to take
stock of the year's achievements and failures. The year 1921
undoubtedly gave the country a highly-organised party-
organisation. Before that, the Congress was a constitutional
party and mainly a talking body. The Mahatma not only
gave it a new Constitution and a nation-wide basis—but what
is more important, converted it into a revolutionary organisa-
tion. The tricolour national flag—red,¹ green and white—
was adopted all over the country and assumed great im-
portance. Uniform slogans were repeated everywhere and a
uniform policy and ideology gained currency from one end
of India to the other. The English language lost its importance
and the Congress adopted Hindi (or Hindusthani) as the
¹ The colour red in the national flag has now been altered to saffron.

86 ' THE INDIAN STRUGGLE
lingua franca for the whole country. Spontaneously, Khadi
became the official uniform for all Congressmen. In short,
all the features of a modern political party became visible in
India. The credit for such achievements naturally belongs
to the leader of the movement—Mahatma Gandhi. He has
unfortunately been guilty of many serious blunders—‘Hima-
layan blunders,’ to use his own language. And the fact that
even to-day he is enthroned in the hearts of his countrymen
does not mean that he has been free from errors of judgment
but that his positive achievements have been really so great
that his countrymen are prepared to forgive his mistakes.
It is necessary, in this connection, to refer to some of the
shortcomings inherent in the movement from the very begin-
ning and which were to reveal themselves more and more
with the lapse of time. In the first place, too much power and
responsibility was handed over to one man. The disadvantages
of such a state of things were not so great, while Deshbandhu
C. R. Das, Lala Lajpat Rai and Pandit Motilal Nehru were
alive, since they could control the Mahatma to some extent.
But since their death the entire intellect of the Congress has
been mortgaged to one man and those who dare to think
freely and speak out openly are regarded by the Mahatma and
his disciples as heretics and treated as such. Secondly, the
promise of ‘Swaraj within one year’ was not only unwise but
childish. It made the Congress appear so foolish before all
reasonable men. No doubt the Mahatma’s disciples have tried
subsequently to explain away the point by saying that the
country did not fulfil the conditions and so Swaraj could not
be won within one year. The explanation is as unsatisfactory
as the original promise was unwise—because arguing in the
same way, any leader can say that if you fulfil certain con-
ditions you can be free in one hour. In making political
forecasts, no leader worth the name should impose impossible
conditions. He should estimate what conditions are likely to
be fulfilled and what results are likely to be achieved in a
given set of circumstances. Thirdly, the introduction of the
Khilafat question into Indian politics was unfortunate. As
has already been pointed out, if the Khilafatist Moslems had
not started a separate organisation but had joined the Indian

THE STORM BREAKS 87
National Congress, the consequences would not have been so
undesirable. In that case, when the action of the Turks
themselves made the Khilafat issue a dead one, the Khilafatist
Moslems would have been completely absorbed into the
ranks of the nationalists.
The storm that was brewing in 1920 actually broke in
November 1921. During November and December it raged
with great intensity and when the new year dawned, such
was the prospect that it was impossible to predict how long
it would last. The year 1922 was, however, destined to
provide an anti-climax, as we shall presently see.

CHAPTER III
THE ANTI-CLIMAX (1922)
It is not possible at this distant date to understand how
profoundly the people of India believed in 1921 that Swaraj
would be won before the end of that year. Even the most
sophisticated people shared this optimism. I remember
listening once to the speech of an able Bengali advocate at a
public meeting in 1921, in the course of which he asserted
in all seriousness: 'We are surely going to get Swaraj before
the year is out. If you ask me how we are going to win it,
I cannot answer. But we are going to win it all the same.'
On another occasion in 1921, I was discussing with an
exceptionally able Calcutta politician, some instructions
issued by the Mahatma. He had declared that all funds at
the disposal of the Congress should be spent before the end of
the year and that nothing should be left over for the next.
To a normal rational mind this seemed improper, but defend-
ing the Mahatma, this friend said, 'We have deliberately
chosen not to look beyond December 31st.' All this may
appear now as madness, nevertheless, it gives some idea of
the exuberance of naïve enthusiasm and optimism that had
taken possession of the country that year.
With the dawn of the new year, 1922, a special effort was
made by the Mahatma to whip up public enthusiasm. It was
therefore decided to proceed to the last item in his plan—
namely, the non-payment of taxes. On February 1st, 1922,
he sent an ultimatum to the Viceroy, Lord Reading, saying that
if within seven days the Government did not demonstrate a
change of heart, he would commence general non-payment
of taxes in Bardoli sub-division in Gujerat (northern part of
Bombay Presidency). It was reported that in Bardoli sub-
division there were many people who had worked with
Mahatma Gandhi in the passive-resistance movement in
South Africa and had acquired experience in work of that
88

THE ANTI-CLIMAX 89
kind. The beginning of the no-tax campaign in Bardoli
would be the signal for starting a similar campaign all over
the country. Elaborate arrangements were also made to
start a no-tax campaign¹ in Bengal simultaneously, and the
United Provinces and Andhrà (northern portion of Madras
Presidency) were also well-prepared for a campaign of that
sort. The ultimatum of the Mahatma threw the whole
country into a fever of excitement. With bated breath
everybody began to count the hours as they sped by. Sud-
denly there came a bolt from the blue which left the people
speechless and dumbfounded. That was the incident at
Chauri-Chaura.
On February 4th, at a place called Chauri-Chaura in the
United Provinces, the villagers in a fit of exasperation set fire
to the police-station and killed some policemen. When this
news reached the Mahatma, he was horrified at the turn of
events and immediately summoned a meeting of the Congress
Working Committee at Bardoli. At his instance, the Com-
mittee decided to suspend the civil-disobedience movement
(that is, the defiance of laws and governmental decrees,
including non-payment of taxes) entirely throughout India
for an indefinite period and all Congressmen were enjoined to
confine themselves to peaceful constructive work. The
‘constructive programme’ included hand-spinning and hand-
weaving, removal of untouchability, promotion of inter-
communal unity, suppression of the drug traffic, extension of
‘national’ education, suppression of litigation and establish-
ment of arbitration-boards—without voluntarily violating any
law or governmental ordinance existing at the time.
The Dictator’s decree was obeyed at the time but there was
a regular revolt in the Congress Camp. No one could under-
stand why the Mahatma should have used the isolated incident
at Chauri-Chaura for strangling the movement all over the
country. Popular resentment was all the greater because the
Mahatma had not cared to consult representatives from the
different provinces and because the situation in the country
as a whole was exceedingly favourable for the success of the
¹ Non-payment of the Chowkidari tax, which all villagers then had to
pay for the upkeep of the village police, etc.

90 THE INDIAN STRUGGLE
civil-disobedience campaign. To sound the order of retreat
just when public enthusiasm was reaching the boiling-point
was nothing short of a national calamity. The principal
lieutenants of the Mahatma, Deshbandhu Das, Pandit Motilal
Nehru and Lala Lajpat Rai, who were all in prison, shared
the popular resentment. I was with the Deshbandhu at the
time and I could see that he was beside himself with anger
and sorrow at the way Mahatma Gandhi was repeatedly
bungling. He was just beginning to forget the December
blunder when the Bardoli retreat came as a staggering blow.
Lala Lajpat Rai was experiencing the same feelings and it is
reported that in sheer disgust he addressed a seventy-page
letter to the Mahatma from prison.
In semi-official circles another explanation has been given
of the sudden volte-face of the Mahatma. It is alleged that
elaborate arrangements had been made by the Government
in secret to render his no-tax campaign at Bardoli a debacle
and that a large portion of the next instalment of taxes had
been already collected. Official circles, sympathetic to the
Mahatma, conveyed secret information to him regarding the
counter-measures adopted by the Government and warned
him of the possibility of a failure, in case he launched the
campaign. When Mahatma Gandhi was brought face to face
with these facts, he realised the hopelessness of the situation
and thinking that without a successful campaign at Bardoli,
he could not work up the movement in the country, he
decided to use the Chauri-Chaura incident as a pretext for
calling off the civil-disobedience movement. Those who
know the Mahatma more intimately will not, however, accept
this explanation.
While the followers were fretting and fuming against the
Dictator, the astute ex-Lord Chief Justice of England was not
idle. Throughout 1921 he had given the Mahatma a long
rope, but since the Ahmedabad Congress he began to look
for an opportunity for putting a stop to his activities. In his
weekly paper Young India, the Mahatma had written some
articles—the finest he has ever written and which will rank
for all time among his inspired writings—which the Govern-
ment held to be seditious. They could therefore arrest him

THE ANTI-CLIMAX 91
and get him sentenced to a long term of imprisonment. But
the point they had to consider was what the effect of such an
action would be on the masses who idolised the Mahatma.
Lord Reading, it was reported, was genuinely afraid that in
spite of all the non-violence which the Dictator preached,
his arrest would be followed by widespread disorder, rioting
and bloodshed. And coming after Lord Chelmsford, under
whose regime the Amritsar massacres had taken place, he had
no desire to repeat the terrible events of 1919. He was
therefore anxiously and nervously looking for an opportunity
to strike at the Mahatma—when the latter himself took a
step which had a depressing effect all over the country and
produced a revolt within the Congress itself. That was
the proper psychological moment for Lord Reading to act
—if only the Secretary of State for India, Mr. Montagu,
would not stand in his way. Fortunately for the Government
of India, early in March, owing to differences with the
Cabinet in England, Mr. Montagu was forced to resign. The
last obstacle was therefore removed and on March 10th, 1922,
Mahatma Gandhi was made a prisoner.
The trial of Mahatma Gandhi was an historic event. In
describing the trial proceedings, Deshbandhu C. R. Das in
his presidential speech at the Gaya Congress in December
1922, drew an analogy with the trial of Christ before Pontius
Pilate. A similar comparison was also drawn by the well-
known Y.M.C.A. leader, the late Mr. K. T. Paul.¹ In the
trial, the Mahatma who described himself as a farmer and a
weaver, made a lengthy statement describing how 'from a
staunch loyalist and co-operator I have become an uncom-
promising disaffectionist and non-co-operator.' And he
ended his statement with these words: 'The only course open
to you, the Judge and the Assessors, is either to resign your
posts and thus dissociate yourselves from evil if you feel
that the law you are called upon to administer is an evil and
that in reality I am innocent, or to inflict on me the severest
penalty if you believe that the system and the law you are
assisting to administer are good for the people of this country
and that my activity is therefore injurious to the public weal.'
¹ The British Connection with India by K. T. Paul, London, 1927, p. 50.

92 THE INDIAN STRUGGLE
The English Judge, Mr. Broomfield, sentenced him to six
years' imprisonment.
The resignation of Mr. Montagu was an indication of the
growing power of the Conservatives in the Coalition Cabinet
of Mr. Lloyd George, the Premier. Under pressure from the
Tory members, Mr. Lloyd George delivered in August his
famous 'steel-frame' speech in which he described the Civil
Service as the steel-frame of the Indian administration
which must remain British, no matter what other changes
may overtake India. This speech caused widespread resent-
ment in India, because people were looking forward to the
day when the power and the emoluments of the Civil Service
would be curtailed and the people given thereby a due place
in the administration of their country. About this time,
Lord Winterton, the new Under-Secretary of State for India,
visited India. One of the purposes of his visit was to herald
a new policy with regard to the Indian Princes and Ruling
Chiefs. The year before, when the Prince of Wales visited
India, he had noticed a great difference between his reception
in British India and in the Indian States. In British India, his
visit had been boycotted by the public, whereas in the States
he had no such unpleasant experience. Since that moment,
the British Government were led to adopt a new attitude
towards the Princes—an attitude of greater friendship and
cordiality. The Princes, on their part, utilised the occasion
for persuading the Government of India to introduce
legislation with a view to suppressing hostile agitation and
propaganda conducted against the Princes from British India.
Accordingly in September 1922, a Bill was introduced in the
Assembly called the Indian States (Protection against Dis-
affection) Bill. The Bill was thrown out by the Assembly
but the Viceroy 'certified' it as urgent and necessary and it
became law. It is noteworthy in this connection that the
new Under-Secretary of State for India, Lord Winterton, in
his conferences with the Viceroy and the Governors of
Bombay, Madras and Bengal, advocated this new attitude
towards the Princes and after his visit, representatives of the
Government of India began to sing praises of the Princes
whenever a suitable opportunity presented itself.

THE ANTI-CLIMAX 93
In October there was a General Election in England. The
Coalition Government broke up and the Conservatives came
into power with Mr. Bonar Law at their head and with
Viscount Peel and Lord Winterton as Secretary and Under-
Secretary of State for India respectively. The next month,
Sir Basil Blackett was sent out to India as the Finance
Member to the Government of India. The current of
reaction began to grow stronger and stronger in India. The
Indian Liberal leaders, who under the influence of Mr.
Montagu had been led to work the Constitution and to accept
office as Ministers, found their position increasingly difficult.
Sir Tej Bahadur Sapru had already resigned from the
Viceroy's Executive Council in April, following the resignation
of Mr. Montagu in March. And in March 1923, when the
situation became unbearable for him, Mr. Chintamani, the
Minister of Education in the United Provinces, resigned.
During the whole of 1922 the only decent acts which the
Government did was to concede the demands of the people
in Midnapore district in Bengal and of the Akali Sikhs in
Punjab. In Midnapore, the new Village Self-Government
Act, as a protest against which the no-tax campaign had been
started, was withdrawn, and in Punjab a new law was passed
under which all the Sikh shrines were taken out of the control
of the Mohants and handed over to popular committees.
We must now interrupt our narrative and enquire as to what
the leaders had been doing in the meantime. In the first
week of December 1921, Lala Lajpat Rai and most of his
principal colleagues had been rounded up by the police at a
meeting of the Punjab Congress Committee. A few days
later, Deshbandhu Das and most of his colleagues, including
the Secretary of the Bengal Congress Committee, Mr. B. N.
Sasmal and myself had been placed under arrest. Following
this, Pandit Motilal Nehru and most of the important Con-
gressmen in the United Provinces had been clapped into
prison. According to the rules of non-co-operation, no Con-
gressman could put up a defence before a British Court of
Law. Consequently, everywhere the prosecution had an easy
task. Most of the trials would not last more than a few
minutes and the same magistrate would dispose of hundreds

94 THE INDIAN STRUGGLE
of cases in one afternoon. In the case of Deshbandhu Das,
however, the trial dragged on for two months and since Mr.
Sasmal and I had been made his co-accused in the same case,
we had to suffer the agony of a uselessly long trial. It was
freely talked about at the time that in view of the prestige and
influence commanded by the Deshbandhu, the magistrate
was unwilling to convict him without some show of legality.
Time was therefore given again and again to the prosecution
to collect evidence to prepare their case against him. The
prosecution case rested on certain notices, alleged to have
been signed by him, which were in violation of the Govern-
ment proclamation, banning as illegal all volunteer organi-
sations. Those who worked in the office of the Bengal Con-
gress Committee knew as a matter of fact, that these notices
had not been signed by him. Nevertheless, the official expert
in handwriting gave evidence on oath that the signatures were
genuinely of the Deshbandhu and on the strength of this
so-called expert evidence, he was convicted and sentenced to
six months' imprisonment. These as well as other illegalities
relating to his arrest were pointed out in a statement made
by him before the court towards the end of his trial, in the
course of which he sought to prove that the Government
never hesitate to break the law when it suits their own
purpose. Before sentence was passed, a message was sent on
behalf of the prosecution saying that if he accepted the
Bardoli resolution, regarding the suspension of civil dis-
obedience, the Government would set him free at once, but
he refused to entertain any such proposal.
Soon after our conviction we were transferred to another
prison in Calcutta, the Alipore Central Jail, where we had an
opportunity of meeting representatives from all the districts
in Bengal. Except among the orthodox followers of the
Mahatma who were in a minority, the general feeling was one
of resentment at the Bardoli decision. This feeling was
directed more against the Mahatma, since he was the Dictator
of the All-India Congress Committee and the Bardoli resolu-
tion had been passed at his instance. Accepting the Bardoli
retreat as an accomplished fact, the Deshbandu tried to devise
means for rousing public enthusiasm once again by a change

THE ANTI-CLIMAX 95
in tactics. He thus conceived of his plan of non-co-operation
within the legislatures. According to this plan, Congressmen,
instead of boycotting the elections, would stand as candidates
at the polls and after capturing the elected seats, would carry
on a policy of uniform, continuous and consistent opposition
to the Government. The boycott of the legislatures, as
conceived by the Calcutta Congress in 1920, had proved to
be a failure. While the nationalists had kept away from the
legislatures, undesirables had captured those bodies. These
people, instead of assisting the popular movement in the
country, had lent their support to the Government. Through
their help the Government was able to demonstrate to the
world that in their policy of repression, they had the support
of the elected members of the legislatures. According to the
Deshbandhu, in a revolutionary fight, the points of vantage
should not be left in the hands of the enemy. Therefore all
elected seats in the legislatures, as also in all public bodies
(namely municipalities, district boards, etc.), should be cap-
tured by Congressmen. Where there was room for doing
any solid constructive work, they could do so. But failing
that, they could at least keep up a systematic opposition to
the members and agents of the Government, and thereby
prevent them from doing mischief. Further, the election
campaign would give the Congress an occasion and an
opportunity for doing its own propaganda simultaneously all
over the country. The adoption of this new policy did not
imply that they were to abandon any of the other activities
of the Congress, but simply meant an extension of those
activities to include capture of the elected seats in the legis-
latures and all public bodies.
Discussions regarding this new plan were carried on
vigorously from day to day in the Alipore Central Jail. It
soon appeared that in all these discussions the main contention
of the opponents was that the Government of India Act,
1919, hardly left any room for useful opposition within the
legislatures. Owing to the presence of Britishers and of other
members nominated by the Government, it was difficult, if
not impossible, for the elected members to secure a majority
either in the Indian Legislative Assembly (the Central Legis-

96 THE INDIAN STRUGGLE
lature) or in the Provincial Legislatures. Further, the
Viceroy, in the case of the former and the Governors, in the
case of the latter, had powers of veto and certification, whereby
they could always override the decision of the legislatures.
The reply to this was that even if the elected members did
not have a majority, they could still keep up a continuous
opposition against the Government and thereby strengthen
the agitation outside the legislatures. Secondly, it would be
possible for the elected members to secure a majority in at
least some of the legislatures and if the Viceroy or the Governor
set aside the decision of any legislature, the Government
would stand condemned before the bar of public opinion,
both inside India and outside. Lastly, under the existing
constitution, a vote against the Ministers or their departments
could not be overridden by the Governor of any province,
and if the provincial legislature voted down the salaries of
Ministers, they would automatically be thrown out of office
and the working of the diarchical constitution would have to
be suspended. As these discussions went on for some weeks,
two parties crystallised among the political prisoners in the
Alipore Jail and they proved to be the nuclei of the future
'Swaraj' and 'No-Change' parties. In May 1922, the annual
conference of Congressmen in Bengal, called the 'Provincial
Conference,' was held in Chittagong. Mrs. C. R. Das was
elected President of the Conference because of the gallant part
she had played in last year's movement. In her presidential
speech, she stated that the Congress might have to consider
a change in tactics and suggested, among other things, that
the policy of non-co-operation within the legislatures was
worth considering. It was not difficult to guess who had
inspired her speech and taking it as a feeler sent out by her
husband, a storm of controversy was at once let loose all over
the country. It was clear therefrom that the orthodox fol-
lowers of the Mahatma would not think of any deviation
from the plan that he had laid down before his arrest and
that a stiff fight would take place before the new plan could
be adopted by the Congress. This prospect, far from dis-
couraging us, helped to whip up our enthusiasm. The Desh-
bandhu had frequent discussions with his supporters in

THE ANTI-CLIMAX 97
prison and he chalked out his future line of action in great
detail. Among the measures that he contemplated was the
starting of daily papers in English and in the vernacular—
and out of this speculation came the birth of his paper
Forward, which was started in 1923 and soon attained dis-
tinction as one of the leading nationalist papers of India.
During 1922 conflicts between political prisoners and the
prison authorities took place in many prisons in India.
Matters came to a head in two prisons in Bengal—at Barisal
and Faridpur. Political prisoners in these prisons demanded
decent treatment at the hands of the authorities and refused
to submit to the humiliating treatment generally meted out
to prisoners in Indian Jails. The authorities were stubborn
and resorted to flogging, but even that could not break the
backbone of the political prisoners. Meanwhile, intense public
indignation was roused by the news of the flogging. Even
the tame Bengal Legislative Council was stirred to action and
within the Government itself, differences of opinion broke
out. The Member in charge of Jails, Sir Abdur Rahim, dis-
approved flogging of political prisoners, but he could not
carry the Government with him. As a protest he resigned
the portfolio of Prisons which was taken up by the then
Home Member of the Bengal Government, Sir Hugh
Stephenson.
After the arrest of Mahatma Gandhi in March, the Congress
Working Committee was at a loss to decide what to do.
Thereupon, a committee was appointed, called the 'Civil
Disobedience Enquiry Committee,' for the purpose of touring
the country and reporting on the possibility of starting civil
disobedience again. The general feeling among the members
of this committee was that it was not possible to start civil
disobedience so soon. But the point that it was difficult to
settle was what the Congress should do in the meantime.
Should the Congress be content with carrying on its peaceful
constructive work or should it adopt the new plan suggested
by the Deshbandhu? The committee made an extensive tour
of the country and submitted a report after some months.
The members of the Committee were equally divided in their
conclusions. Hakim Ajmal Khan (Delhi), Pandit Motilal
G

98 THE INDIAN STRUGGLE
Nehru (Allahabad) and Mr. Vithalbhai J. Patel (Bombay)
were in favour of adopting the Deshbandhu's plan of entering
the legislatures and Dr. M. A. Ansari¹ (Delhi), Mr. K. R.
Iyengar (Madras) and Mr. C. Rajagopalachari (Madras) were
against it. As the report was published shortly before the Gaya
session of the Congress to be presided over by Deshbandhu
Das, his hands were strengthened by the report.
Towards the end of September 1922, there were unexpected
floods in the northern districts of Bengal. Though floods and
famines are of frequent occurrence in the India of to-day, the
floods of 1922 were of an unprecedented magnitude. Four
large districts of Bengal were affected, crops were destroyed,
houses washed away and cattle killed. As a result of the floods,
there were several cases of death also. The whole countryside
was one vast expanse of water. The Congress organisations
throughout the province promptly responded to the appeal
for relief and I was among the first batch to arrive at the flooded
area for the purpose of organising relief. Thanks to the efforts
of Sir P. C. Roy, the famous chemist and the President of
the Relief Committee and to the generosity of the public, a
fund of more than 400,000 rupees was raised, besides large
contributions in cloth, foodstuffs and fodder (for the cattle).
On this occasion the Government of Bengal contributed a
sum of 20,000 rupees and in justifying the niggardliness of
the Government, the Maharaja of Burdwan, a member of the
Governor's Executive Council, stated that the Government
was not a charitable institution. The relief operations con-
ducted by the public, without any aid from the Government
were so successful that they added greatly to the prestige of
the Congress, whose members were largely responsible for
them. In fact we had the good fortune to be complimented on
our work by the Governor of Bengal, Lord Lytton, personally
when he inspected the flooded areas. Since then, the Congress
has always taken a leading part in organising relief operations
on the occasion of floods and famines.
Between August and December two other noteworthy events
took place. The first was the meeting of the All-India Trade)
¹ In the light of this fact it is surprising that Dr. Ansari should be one
of the sponsors of the Council-entry proposal in 1934.

THE ANTI-CLIMAX 99
Union Congress at Lahore, which was presided over by
Deshbandhu Das. In his presidential speech he made a
striking declaration to the effect that the Swaraj he was striving
to win was not for a section of the people—but for the masses
who comprised 98 per cent. of the population. Before and
after this meeting, he always took a keen interest in the trade
union movement and was for some time the President of the
Labour Association of the Tata Iron and Steel Company at
Jamshedpur. The other event was the meeting of the Young
Men's Conference in Calcutta which was the precursor of the
youth movement in the province. This Conference revealed
the desire on the part of the youth to have a movement and
an organisation of their own, quite apart from the Indian
National Congress.
Towards the end of November, a meeting of the All-India
Congress Committee was held in Calcutta at which there
was a trial of strength between the supporters of Deshbandhu
and of the Mahatma. This was a prelude to the annual
session of the Congress. In the last week of December in an
atmosphere tense with excitement the plenary session of the
Indian National Congress assembled at Gaya. According to
preliminary forecasts, Mr. Das's plan was likely to be defeated.
But no one could tell at the time how the voting would go.
It was clear, however, that Mr. Das would have influential
support from all the provinces, especially from Bengal, the
United Provinces, Punjab, Central Provinces and Maharashtra
(part of Bombay Presidency). After stormy debates in the
Subjects Committee, the matter came up for voting before
the open session of the Congress. Mr. Srinivasa Iengar, a
prominent leader from Madras, who was the leader of the
Madras Bar and had resigned the post of Advocate-General
of Madras, moved an amendment to the effect that represen-
tatives of the Congress should contest the elections but
should not participate in the work inside the legislatures. On
this amendment the principal voting took place and resulted
in a big majority for the supporters of the Mahatma. Great
was their enthusiasm and the hero of the day was the Madras
leader, Mr. Rajagopalachari, who stood up before the
Congress as the apostle of Gandhiism.

100 THE INDIAN STRUGGLE
The position of Mr. Das became rather anomalous. He
was the President of the Congress, but the plan he advocated
had been rejected. To settle his future course of action, he
summoned a meeting of his supporters. It was decided that
he should resign the presidentship of the Congress and
organise his party under the name of the 'Swaraj Party.' The
next day when the All-India Congress Committee met for the
purpose of laying down the programme of work for the next
year, that is 1923, Pandit Motilal Nehru stood up to make
an announcement about the formation of the Swaraj-Party.
The announcement came as an unexpected blow and cast
a shadow on the jubilant faces of the Mahatma's supporters.
Most of the outstanding intellectuals were on the side of the
Deshbandhu and there was no doubt that without them, the
Congress would lose much of its strength and importance.
The announcement first made by Pandit Motilal Nehru
was confirmed when Mr. Das in winding up the deliberations,
submitted his resignation of the office of president, since he
desired to work in opposition to the official resolutions, with
the object of persuading the country to accept his plan of
work.
The supporters of Gandhiji left Gaya satisfied at their
victory but not happy, because of the split that had taken
place. The Swarajists parted with a sense of defeat, but with
the determination to fight and win.

CHAPTER IV
THE SWARAJIST REVOLT (1923)
THE Swarajist leaders returned from Gaya to their own
provinces with a stiff programme of work before them.
The general understanding was that Deshbandhu Das should
conduct the propaganda in Bengal, Central Provinces and
South India; Pandit Motilal Nehru in Upper India and Mr.
Vithalbhai Patel in Bombay Presidency. The Nationalist Press
as a whole was anti-Swarajist. Therefore the Swarajists had
to depend mainly on lecturing as a means of propaganda.
In Calcutta we published a daily paper of four pages, called
Banglar Katha, to supplement our propaganda and I had to
become editor overnight under the orders of the leader. In
Madras, Mr. A. Rangaswami Iyenger, afterwards editor of
Hindu, was very helpful. His paper, Swadesamitram, a Tamil
daily, became an exponent of the Swarajist policy and he also
started an English weekly under the same name, to help our
propaganda. In Poona the extremely influential Marathi
paper, Kesari, became a champion of our cause. After Loka-
manya Tilak’s death, Mr. Kelkar had been the editor of
Kesari and as he became a staunch supporter of the Swaraj
party, the resources of his paper Kesari were placed at the
disposal of the party.
When the Deshbandhu returned to Bengal after the Gaya
Congress, he found his position considerably weakened.
The Congress machinery had passed into the hands of our
political opponents, who now came to be known as “No-
Changers,” because they were against any change in the
existing plan and programme of the Congress. When we
first took stock of our following, we found that we were in a
minority. It was difficult for us at first to raise funds because
we had rebelled against the official programme of the Con-
gress. Nevertheless, we were a disciplined and determined
band of workers and with unbounded enthusiasm, we

102 THE INDIAN STRUGGLE
addressed ourselves to our task. One of the tactics we fol-
lowed at the time, consisted in summoning frequent meetings
of Congress organisations throughout the country and
asking for a reversal of the resolutions passed at the Gaya
Congress. At first our party used to be defeated at such
meetings but we gradually made headway and when our
party was able to secure a majority in one place, the news
would encourage our fellow-workers in other places.
After preliminary propaganda had been done all over
India, the first Swarajist Conference was held in March at
Allahabad at the house of Pandit Motilal Nehru. The
constitution and plan of campaign of the Swaraj Party was
drawn up at the Conference. When the constitution was
being discussed, a controversy arose with regard to the
ultimate aim of the Swaraj Party. Was Dominion Status to
be the goal of the Party or Complete Independence? On this
point the constitution of the Congress was not clear. It
merely stated that Swaraj was our goal but did not define
what was meant by Swaraj. As the Swaraj Party was more
practical, it wanted to define clearly what Swaraj meant, but
a complete agreement was not possible on the question,
because there were two groups among the Swarajists. It was
therefore decided, as a compromise, to declare in the con-
stitution that the 'immediate' objective of the Party was the
attainment of Dominion Status. Thus was the conflict
between the young and the old settled for the time being.
The Swarajist Conference over, Mr. Das set out on a long
tour in South India. It was a tremendously uphill work.
The Madras Presidency was at the time one of the strong-
holds of Gandhiism and Mr. Das deliberately undertook to
storm that citadel first. In spite of the grilling heat of a
South Indian summer he had a very successful tour. His
success there had repercussions in other parts of the country.
On his return to Calcutta he undertook the direction of the
propaganda in Bengal with very good results. About this
time the party decided to requisition frequent meetings of the
All-India Congress Committee. At each successive meeting
it was found that the votes of the Swarajists were increasing.
By the middle of the year 1923, such progress was made

THE SWARAJIST REVOLT 103
that the Working Committee (the Cabinet of the Congress)
composed entirely of 'no-changers,' could no longer command
a majority in the All-India Congress Committee and had
therefore to resign. But though the 'no-changers' were not
strong enough to hold office, neither was the Swaraj Party.
So a third party, which in the absence of a better name may
be called the 'Centre Party,' came into office. This party did
not accept the Swarajist plan but they were not die-hard
Gandhiists either. They advocated some sort of under-
standing between the two rival groups in the Congress. About
the same time the 'no-changers' were also defeated in Bengal
and in the Bengal Congress Committee, a Centre Party,
which was under the influence of the Swarajists, came into
office. Under this arrangement, Moulana Akram Khan
became the President of the Bengal Congress Committee.
But the former Secretary, Dr. P. C. Ghosh, refused to hand
over office. Therefore, two rival Congress Committees began
to function simultaneously, each claiming to be the represen-
tative body. Some months elapsed before the constitutional
question was settled by the Working Committee, when a
decision was given in favour of the Committee of which
Moulana Akram Khan was the president.
In most provinces, especially in Bengal, feelings between
the two parties were exceedingly bitter, though their aim
was a common one, namely to win Swaraj for India. The
prevailing bitterness made responsible Congressmen think
seriously as to how they could bring about some sort of
compromise between the warring groups. Then came the
suggestion to hold a special session of the Congress in Delhi
in September, 1923. This decision was a blow for the sup-
porters of Gandhiji, because the Swarajists were sure to press
their plan at the Delhi Congress once again and with better
chances of winning than they had at Gaya. Moulana Abul
Kalam Azad, one of the most intelligent and distinguished
Mohammedan leaders, was elected President of the Delhi
Congress and in his presidential speech he advocated the
Swarajist policy of contesting the elections and carrying on
the fight within the legislatures.
Shortly before the Delhi Congress, Moulana Mohammed