D.A Low & why the cow-belt came to dominate Indian politics

 In 'Soundings in Indian History', D.A Low- writing almost 60 years ago of Keir Hardie, the Labour politician's, visit to Indian in 1907- shows that Hindu bhadralok Bengalis and Arya Samaji Punjabis were up in arms against the Government because of the Partition of Bengal on the one hand and the Agrarian Acts in Punjab on the other. UP however was quiet- indeed somnolent. Bombay was divided between Tilak and Gokhale. The South took an intelligent interest in current affairs but had no major grievances. One result of this was that Willingdon, as Governor of Madras, could contemplate Provincial Autonomy with equanimity as early as 1922

Low asks the question why Bengal and Punjab ceased to matter politically. The answer is obvious. They were Muslim majority and partition would marginalize their non-Muslim population. In Maharashtra, Gokhale's Congress, focused on agricultural and other bread and butter issues, would prevail over the dreams of the Hindutva exponents. The Shiv Sena would later emerge as a provincial party focused on issues of relevance to urban Marathas. Maharashtra and Gujarat could do well enough for themselves as could the deep South where the Brahmin dominated Congress soon shat the bed, on the issue of Hindi, and lost influence. 

In this context, Low observes 

So far as nationalist politics was concerned - and there is other evidence in support o f this - U.P. at this time, even though it lay between Bengal and the Panjab, stood politically inert. This, surely, is very remarkable, particularly when one remembers the central role played since about 1920 by men from U.P. both in the Indian nationalist movement and in independent India.

Apart from Gandhi, few men, man for man, have been more important in modern Indian politics than Motilal Nehru, Jawaharlal Nehru, Govind Ballabh Pant, Purushottamdas Tandon, Lai Bahadur Sastri, and Indira Gandhi; and they have all come from U.P. It is not very difficult to see why it should have played this major role. It is, after all, the largest of the states, the least exclusive, and, for internal Indian purposes, the most centrally placed strategically. It stands, moreover, at the centre o f a complex o f other states which have many similar characteristics, and which between them comprise not only the Hindu heartland, but the largest single cluster o f associated states in modern India. Yet if this be
true; if it is really not very difficult to suggest quite a number of reasons why U.P. should have led India in so many ways since about 1920, why was it, so far as nationalist politics were concerned, politically inert in the period preceding?

Low thinks UP was a 'husk' of what it had been. But that is still true 60 years after he wrote this. Being a husk can't explain shit. Thus, Low's answer is itself a question which he couldn't answer but I will. First, I will make the obvious point. The post Mutiny administration in 'Agra and Oudh' (which were consolidated into the United Province in 1921)  and Bihar entrenched itself in a manner quite different from what had happened elsewhere.  The terror of those times survived in living memory. Even those born in the Nineteen Twenties had heard the tales from old family retainers. The Nehru family, which had served the Mughals as kotwals and then John Company as vakils, retained vivid memories of leaving Delhi as homeless refugees. But, as Hindus, they suffered less. It was the Muslim aristocracy which had been dealt the bigger blow. This did mean that middle class Hindus recovered more quickly. Indeed, they began to displace the Muslims because the Brits had arranged things in a manner that the 'taluqdars' were as pasture for their sheep-like accountants and vakis. In other words, the pretense of being a lion was required for 'loyalty' because the reality was that you were grass before the Hindu sheep. True, there were exceptions- e.g. the Nawab of Chattari.

The air of unreality which clung to Muslim politics in UP arose out of the 'common knowledge' that , unlike in Bengal or Punjab, the Hindus were the vast majority. Furthermore, Brahmins are thick on the ground in the area. To a slightly lesser extent, this was also true of Maharashtra.  In the deep South, this was not the case. What this meant was that an educated Hindu 'High Caste' leadership was available in UP which could take a leadership role because it was so strategically located and had no internal enemy to fear or hold it in check. In the short term, this Hindu majority might cozen the Muslims by putting up Persian speaking Kauls like Motilal or Sapru, but sooner or later the pretense would be dropped. 

This obvious point having been made I will now turn to the actual reason UP dominated Indian politics from 1920 to 1980. UP wallahs are as stupid as shit.  Everybody knows it, but nobody says it. The interwar period was a period when every country did stupid shit. India, thanks to Pax Britanica, could go the extra mile and do stupider shit and, obviously, Biharis and UP bhaiyyas are going to outdo others in this respect. As for why UP continued to dominate India for the next 30 years, the answer is that Hindus hadn't fought and won their freedom. The thing had been thrust on them. They needed to stick together and UP wallahs and Biharis aren't utter cowards. They make good soldiers and are decent and pleasant enough. Being as stupid as shit is a desirable property in a soldier more especially since these guys tend to be of good moral character and not too inclined to talk vacuous bollocks at every opportunity. However, stupidity is not a desirable quality when it comes to economic 'mechanism design'. Good moral character may blind you to the need to create 'incentive compatible' mechanisms. Just lecturing everybody to be holier than the holy cow aint going to cut it. Pragmatism and a desire to grow wealthy and secure must drive collective action. 

It must be said that the people of the cow belt never tried to force their stupidity down the throat of anybody else. Indeed, after 1980, they were perfectly content to let smarter people get ahead and hopefully lift them up a little in the process. But UP and Bihar did become prey to the maha-crackpot from South Africa. I may mention that there was something spooky about the way crazy shit kept going down ther3. First you have the Xhosa- Nelson Mandela's people- who are highly intelligent and were prosperous and brave- going utterly crazy and slaughtering all their cattle coz some little girl said this would cause the resurrection of their ancestors who would then drive out the Whites. Quite naturally, most of them starved to death. This happened around the time of the Mutiny. What next happens is that Smuts- one of the bravest and highest I.Q statesmen ever- joins the Boers in an equally doomed war despite the fact that Smuts knew just how powerful and greedy the British Empire really was. Still, Smuts came to his senses and- thanks to a tip-off from Kitchener- prevailed over Milner and quite quickly became a great figure within the British Commonwealth. Gandhi however, though brave, was not smart at all. He did stupid shit in South Africa where, sadly, the Indians (except Gokhale) thought he'd played a blinder. He hadn't. He had prevented the Indians allying with the Coloreds and the rising Working Class. Worse, he and his chums had closed the door to escaping India through indentured labour. 

It is also worth reiterating that Gandhi's first activity in the cow-belt- the Champaran movement- was orchestrated by locals who wanted to distract attention from what was really happening in Bihar- viz. Hindus were beating Muslims till they gave up cow slaughter. On the other hand, this impressed the Khilafati Muslims who wanted to do a mutually advantageous deal. The Hindus gain by supporting an anti-Imperialist platform in Turkey and the MENA which they themselves could help link up to Buddhist struggles in the East. This means the colored people of the world could form a trading and military block and thus capture more of the gains from trade. Cow slaughter wasn't popular with upper class Muslims in the cow belt. It was a lower class demand which threatened their own hegemony. Sure, at some point down the line, the Dalits and Muslims and so on might get a concession on this issue which would be commercially beneficial to everybody but by then the better off would have started to grow rich and would be more interested in portfolio diversification rather than just exploiting the fuck out of the locals. 

Gandhi refused the deal though he said he'd support Khilafat because...urm... some bullshit about God or true manliness or Ahimsa or whatever. But, from the point of view of Indian law, this was a 'benami' transaction because no consideration had passed. This means that when Gandhi unilaterally surrendered in 1922, the Muslims knew they had been left in the lurch. By 1924, Delhi Muslims were saying plainly that they preferred British rule. Many would be forced to migrate when Nehru came to power. 

Gandhi, of course, was a nut-job. Gujaratis, being sensible people, would chase him away if he wagged his tail too much.  It was UP and Bihar which permitted the fabrication of the myth of the Mahatma because, obviously, it is Muth rational for everybody- including UP wallahs- to base their expectations on UP wallahs being as stupid as shit and thus falling for the craziest coot possible. There is a Keynesian Beauty Contest aspect to this. The cowbelt is shitty. Gandhi's basic premise is that Indians are shitty. Thus the shittiest shitheads must rule otherwise India might stop being India. The Indian Freedom Struggle might end in India become Ameri-fucking-kaka! That would totes get your dhoti in a twist. 

Wavell vs Gandhi

Gandhi, writing to the new Viceroy, Archibald Wavell, took exception to the following paragraph in his speech to the Legislature “...the demand for release of these leaders who are in detention is an utterly barren one until there is some sign on their part of willingness to co- operate. It needs no consultation with any one or anything but his own conscience for any one of those under detention to decide whether he will withdraw from the ‘Quit India’ resolution and the policy which had tragic consequences, and will co-operate in the great tasks ahead.” Then again, reverting to the same subject you say on pages nineteen and twenty, “There is an important element which stands aloof; I recognize how much ability and high-mindedness it contains; but I deplore its present policy and methods as barren and unpractical. I should like to have the co-operation of this element in solving the present and the future problems of India. If its leaders feel that they cannot consent to take part in the present Government of India, they may still be able to assist in considering future problems. But I see no reason to release those responsible for the declaration of August 8th, 1942, until I am convinced that the policy of nonco-operation and even of obstruction has been withdrawn — not in sackcloth and ashes, that helps no one — but in recognition of a mistaken and unprofitable policy.”

Gandhi's objection is as follows- 

 I am surprised that you, an eminent soldier and man of affairs, should hold such an opinion. How can the withdrawal of a resolution, arrived at jointly by hundreds of men and women after much debating and careful consideration, be a matter of individual conscience?

The answer is that any individual who supported a resolution made by a political party, can withdraw from it, either because they have come to see it as foolish or because they have come to believe that it goes against their own conscience. Indeed, every person is free to change their political affiliation unless they live in a totalitarian society and have sworn an oath of fealty to a Fuhrer. 

 A resolution jointly undertaken can be honourably, conscientiously and properly withdrawn only after joint discussion and deliberation.

No. It can be withdrawn without any discussion or deliberation if it is obvious that it was foolish or counter-productive. Such was the case with the Congress 'Quit India' resolution. Congress neither did anything nor died. The British repulsed Japanese aggression. 2.5 million Indians joined the British Indian Army. They were all volunteers. 

 Individual conscience may come into play after this necessary step, not before.

No. There is absolutely no need for 'deliberation' where everybody can see the foolishness of a course of action which, at one time, may have seemed reasonable. 

 Is a prisoner ever free to exercise his conscience?

Yes. A prisoner may have a change of heart and plead guilty to other crimes for which he has not been sentenced. He may give up a vicious way of life and seek to make reparation to his victims. 

 Is it just and proper to expect him to do so?

Yes. A prisoner remains a human being. To deny that he has a conscience which he can freely exercise is to deny his humanity. Equally, if a prisoner lacks a conscience by reason of imprisonment, it is likely that the prisoner also lacks the ability to think. Thus there is no point talking to or engaging in a correspondence with the cretin. 

Again, you recognize “much ability and high-mindedness” in those who represent the Congress organization and then deplore their present policy and methods as “barren and unpractical”. Does not the second statement cancel the first?

No. Able and high-minded people may make wrong predictions. After events have shown those predictions were wrong, such people can withdraw support for policies which have failed.  

Able and high-minded men may come to erroneous decisions, but I have not before heard such people’s policy and methods being described as “barren and unpractical”.

An erroneous decision does not have the desired fruit. In that sense it is 'barren'. Practical people don't stick with erroneous decisions. They don't debate or deliberate over what is bleeding obvious. They quietly give up their erroneous policies and adopt sensible policies.  

Is it not up to you to discuss the pros and cons of their policy with them before pronouncing judgment especially when they are also admittedly representatives of millions of their people?

Not if it is common knowledge that the policy was wholly erroneous and was wholly barren of the desired fruits.  

Does it become an all-powerful Government to be afraid of the consequences of releasing unarmed men and women with a backing only of men and women equally unarmed and even pledged to non-violence?

Did Gandhi really believe Wavell, a soldier, was afraid of him? The fact is Wavell had used his troops to kill agitators during the Quit India movement. The British sustained no casualties. Moreover, they could hire plenty of Indians eager and willing to do this type of wet work in return for quite modest remuneration.  

Moreover, why should you hesitate to put me in touch with the Working Committee members so as to enable me to know their minds and reactions?

Because Churchill hated Gandhi and didn't want his political career to revive. Churchill was Wavell's boss. Churchill would soon find that Wavell was not a good 'nightwatchman'- i.e. a diehard Tory who would be implacable in his treatment of Congress. The truth is Wavell was a decent chap. He didn't mind killing enemy soldiers. He just didn't greatly care for shooting darkies who could not shoot back. The other problem was that he was like Allenby. He didn't see why wogs shouldn't be allowed to rule themselves. 

10. Then you have talked of the “tragic consequences” of the ‘Quit India’ resolution.

At least a 1000 people were killed. That was 'tragic' to Wavell but not to Gandhi.  

 Even you, I am sorry, have fallen into the common error of describing the Indian forces as having been recruited by “voluntary enlistment”.

Unlike many Englishmen serving in the Army, Indians had not been conscripted. They faced no penalty if the refused to join the army. Wavell had made no error in describing Indians in the British Indian Army in these terms.  

A person who takes to soldiering as a profession will enlist himself wherever he gets his market wage.

This is utterly false. Wavell was a professional soldier. Would he have gone over to the Germans if they paid him more? No. Gandhi was lying and, what's more, he knew he was lying.  

Voluntary enlistment has come to bear by association a meaning much higher than that which attaches to an enlistment like that of the Indian soldier.

Gandhi is saying Indian soldiers are mercenaries. This was an outrageous lie. Still, it must be said, Gandhi had tried to recruit Indian soldiers during the Great War. No doubt, he was paid to do so.  

Were those who carried out the orders at the Jallianwalla massacre volunteers?

Yes. They went on to defeat the Afghans under Brigadier Dyer. The Indian soldiers were from the Gurkha and Baluch regiments. Both had fought Sikhs in previous centuries.  

The very Indian soldiers who have been taken out of India and are showing unexampled bravery will be ready to point their rifles unerringly at their own countrymen

Gurkhas are Nepali.  

at the orders of the British Government, their employers. Will they deserve the honourable name of volunteers?

In the case of young Indians who joined the Army between 1939-45, yes. During the Great War, there was an element of compulsion in enrolment, more particularly in the Punjab. 

Wavell's response was forthright- 

 'I regret that I must view the present policy of the Congress party as hindering and not forwarding Indian progress to self-government and development. During a war in which the success of the United Nations against the Axis powers is vital both to India and to the world, as you yourself have recognized, the Working Committee of Congress declined to co-operate, ordered Congress ministries to resign, and decided to take no part in the administration of the country or in the war effort which India was making to assist the United Nations. At the greatest crisis of all for India, at a time when Japanese invasion was possible, the Congress party decided to pass a resolution calling on the British to leave India, which could not fail to have the most serious effect on our ability to defend the frontiers of India against the Japanese. I am quite clear that India’s problems cannot be solved by an immediate and complete withdrawal of the British.'

I do not accuse you or the Congress party of any wish deliberately to aid the Japanese.

Bose had left the Congress party by then. Still, it must be said, if Gandhi or Congress had tried to help the Japanese they would have fucking nuked themselves. 

But you are too intelligent a man, Mr. Gandhi, not to have realized that the effect of your resolution must be to hamper the prosecution of the war; and it is clear to me that you had lost confidence in our ability to defend India, and were prepared to take advantage of our supposed military straits to gain political advantage. I do not see how those responsible for the safety of India could have acted otherwise than they did and could have failed to arrest those who sponsored the resolution. As to general Congress responsibility for the disturbances which followed, I was, as you know, Commander-in- Chief at the time; my vital lines of communication to the Burma frontier were cut by Congress supporters, in the name of the Congress, often using the Congress flag. I cannot therefore hold Congress guiltless of what occurred; and I cannot believe that you, with all your acumen and experience, can have been unaware of what was likely to follow from your policy.

Wavell, in a polite way, is calling Gandhi a liar and a hypocrite. If he gives up his foolish policy, he and his people might be able to do something constructive for the people of India. Sadly, Congress could do nothing constructive. 

Gandhi's reply is, he says, as frank as Wavell's letter. 

 Your letter is a plea for co-operation by the Congress in the present administration and failing that in planning for the future.

Wavell said he wanted Congress to 'join wholeheartedly with the other Indian parties and with the British in helping India forward in economic and political progress — not by any dramatic or spectacular stroke, but by hard steady work towards the end ahead.' In other words, Congress would be treated on the same footing as other Indian parties. This is what Gandhi objected to. 

In my opinion, this requires equality between the parties and mutual trust. But equality is absent

Jinnah and Ambedkar said that Congress did not treat the Muslims or the Dalits as equals.  

and Government distrust of the Congress can be seen at every turn.

Rival parties distrusted Congress. 

Is it not high time that you co-operated with the people of India,

The British had cooperated very well with the people of India for centuries. Indian cooperation with the British war-effort played a substantial role in Britain's victory over its enemies. 

through their elected representatives instead of expecting co-operation from them?

Those 'elected representatives' who resigned office in 1939 did not want to co-operate with the Viceroy. It turned out that their Provinces were run well enough without them. Then they tried non-cooperation but it failed once again just as it had failed twenty years previously. 

You remind me that you were Commander-in-Chief at the time.

Wavell experienced the bitterness of defeat at the hands of the Japanese. But he had no great difficulty in killing agitators in India.  

How much better it would have been for all concerned if confidence in the immeasurable strength of arms had ruled your action instead of fear of a rebellion!

Guns in the hands of even the worst regiments were very effective in completely extinguishing 'fear of rebellion'. During the Mutiny, 6,000 of the 40,000 British residents in India were killed. In 1942, there were hardly any White casualties. 

Had the Government stayed their hand at the time, surely, all the bloodshed of those months would have been avoided.

No. There would have been anarchy.  

And it is highly likely that the Japanese menace would have become a thing of the past.

Because Ahimsa fairy has magic powers. Did you know that if you spin cotton while sleeping naked with your great-niece you will get so much 'soul force' that Putin's army will turn into cute little rabbits? Zelenskyy is very wicked for not spinning cotton. What can I say? Jews are like that only.  

Unfortunately it was not to be. And so the menace is still with us, and what is more, the Government are pursuing a policy of suppression of liberty and truth.

They had jailed useless nutters.  

I have studied the latest ordinance about the detenus, and I recall the Rowlatt Act of 1919. It was popularly called the Black Act. As you know it gave rise to an unprecedented agitation. That Act pales into insignificance before the series of ordinances that are being showered from the Viceregal throne. Martial law in effect governs not one province, as in 1919, but the whole of India. Things are moving from bad to worse.

As in 1919, the Defence of India Act had been promulgated. But, once Gandhi unilaterally surrendered and went meekly to jail in 1922, the Government could withdraw the Rowlatt Act. This time around, there was no reason to fear  political repercussions from  jailing Gandhi & Co. 

  You say, “It is clear to me that you had lost confidence in our ability to defend India and were prepared to take advantage of our supposed military straits to gain political advantage.”

If Gandhi thought the Brits could defeat the Japanese, why did he ask them to 'quit India'? Either he wanted Japanese rule or thought that Indians could defeat Japan on their own. In the former case, he was a traitor to his country. In the latter case, he had shit for brains. 

Moreover, a politician is supposed to try to gain political advantage. Wavell had interpreted Gandhi's actions charitably. The old man was wrong in his assessment of the situation but not necessarily stupid or a traitor. 

Gandhi was greatly incensed with this view of him as a sensible man rather than a lunatic.  

I must deny both the charges. I venture to suggest that you should follow the golden rule, and withdraw your statement and suspend judgement till you have submitted the evidence in your possession to an impartial tribunal and obtained its verdict.

Why does Gandhi not refer this 'denial' of his to an impartial tribunal? The answer is that his golden rule was that only he was in the right. Everybody else was an evil bastard.  

I confess that I do not make the request with much confidence. For, in dealing with Congressmen and others Government have combined the prosecutor, judge and jailor in the same person and thus made proper defence impossible on the part of the accused.

This was perfectly legal. The Defence of India Act gave the Executive the power to suspend civil liberties of many types.  

Judgements of courts are being rendered nugatory by fresh ordinances. No man’s freedom can be said to be safe in this extraordinary situation. You will probably retort that it is an exigency of the war. I wonder!

Gandhi wonders whether there really was a Second World War. He was right to do so. The fact is the Ahimsa fairy prevents any such nastiness from occurring. All these so called 'soldiers' are just pretending to fight in wars. The truth is, when they meet on the battlefield they indulge in sodomy and mutual masturbation. Look at that Wavell fellow. Did you know he is blind in one eye? It is well known that masturbation causes blindness. No doubt, he only let Rommel toss him off but declined to permit any Japanese general a like favour. That's the only reason he still has one sound eye. Still, you can now understand the importance of keeping your hands busy spinning cotton. Mind it kindly. Jai Me!

The question may be asked, why did Viceroys bother to talk to or correspond with Gandhi? The answer is that Reading had found that once Gandhi started talking he could be manipulated into betraying his allies or, if he had none, betraying himself. Thus, the Brits published the corresponded between Viceroys and Gandhi so as to demonstrate that Gandhi was a lunatic while they themselves were doing everything possible to make India strong and independent. 

One letter not made public was written by Gandhi after the 'Direct Action Day' Calcutta riots. 

August 28, 1946 DEAR FRIEND, I write this as a friend and after deep thought. Several times last evening you repeated that you were a "plain man and a soldier" and that you did not know the law.

Nor did Gandhi. His trick was to pretend non-lawyers were obliged to talk like lawyers though if he was faced with a lawyer, he would start babbling about God.  

We are all plain men though we may not all be soldiers and even though some of us may know the law. It is our purpose, I take it, to devise methods to prevent a repetition of the recent terrible happenings in Calcutta.

The way to do this is by sending in soldiers and shooting rioters. 

The question before us is how best to do it. Your language last evening was minatory.

Wavell wanted Nehru to agree that provinces must remain in their assigned Groups under the Cabinet Mission Plan till the first election was held. This 'compulsory grouping' was a considerable concession to the League. Gandhi's retort was that 'if India wants her bloodbath, she will have it'. In other words, the Hindus could kill just as ruthlessly as the Muslims. 

As representative of the King you cannot afford to be a military man only, nor to ignore the law, much less the law of your own making.

The King's representative is accountable only to the King. Nobody else can tell him what he can or can't afford to do or be. 

You should be assisted, if necessary, by a legal mind enjoying your full confidence.

The Viceroy had access to very good legal advise.  Gandhi had shit for brains. Wavell considered Gandhi's letter 'abusive and vindictive'. 

You threatened not to convene the Constituent Assembly if the formula you placed before Pandit Nehru and me was not acted upon by the Congress.

Wavell saw compulsory grouping as vital to avoid Civil War. The question was whether he would have any sort of caretaker government, forget about an interim government, to work with. The Constituent Assembly would be useless if there was no fucking Federal Government for it to draw up a Constitution for. At around this time, he sent London this 'Breakdown' plan for evacuating India within 18 months come what may. Atlee, like Churchill, now realized Wavell was the wrong man for the job. If the Brits were going to evacuate, they should do it with all possible speed from the entire sub-continent. There was no need to drag the thing out. 

Interestingly, Wavell says Linlithgow agreed with him that the Brits had better clear out as fast as possible. The alternative was to completely change policies so as to hold on to it.

 In practice this meant leaving India to sort out its own problems. Perhaps, it was too poor to have a Civil War. Ethnic cleansing using agricultural implements is the most it could afford.   

 If such be really the case then you should not have made the announcement you did on 12th August.

i.e. of a caretaker government. Gandhi, it seems, objected to having a Government of any sort. 

But having made it you should recall the action and form another ministry enjoying your full confidence. If British arms are kept here for internal peace and order,

Evil Britishers refused to let the Japanese enslave the Indians. Now they are demanding the right to protect Indians from being massacred by other Indians! What a farce! India should be having bloodbath five times a day.  

your Interim Government would be reduced to a farce. The Congress cannot afford to impose its will on warring elements in India through the use of British arms.

In which case either it had to make concessions to the League or let bloodbaths occur. The real difficulty was that the Army didn't want to spend its time shooting rioters because officers would be accused of being as brutal as Brigadier Dyer.  

Nor can the Congress be expected to bend itself and adopt what it considers a wrong course because of the brutal exhibition recently witnessed in Bengal.

In which case, nothing could be expected of Congress. It was pointless to have a caretaker or interim government. There would be no Federal Government in Delhi. There would just be a Viceroy arranging the evacuation of the White population in between lecturing Provincial Premiers on their duty to protect minorities. 

Such submission would itself lead to an encouragement and repetition of such tragedies. The vindictive spirit on either side would go deeper, biding for an opportunity to exhibit itself more fiercely and more disgracefully when occasion occurs. And all this will be chiefly due to the continued presence in India of a foreign power strong in and proud of its arms.

But reluctant to use those arms to kill rioters. Only if there was a 'responsible' Indian government in Delhi could this be done. Otherwise each Province needed to do its own ethnic cleansing, or protection of minorities, using its own resources.  No British officer wanted to return to blighty to face the sort of charges that had been levelled against 'the butcher of Amritsar'. If you shoot Muslim rioters, the League will denounce you. If you shoot Hindus or Sikhs, then the Mahasabha or Akalis will denounce you. If do nothing, Congress will denounce you. But it will also denounce you if you do anything whatsoever. 

I say this neither as a Hindu nor as a Muslim.

nor as a goat. I've often felt that Gandhi would have been a very good politician if he had spoken purely as a goat.  

I write only as an Indian. In so far as I am aware, the Congress claims to know both the Hindu and Muslim mind more than you or any Britisher can do. Unless, therefore, you can wholly trust the Congress Government which you have announced, you should reconsider your decision, as I have already suggested. You will please convey the whole of this letter to the British Cabinet.

In the event it was Nehru who reconsidered. He came to the view that this was, as Wavell said, a practical, not a legal matter. Gandhi's idiocy had gotten Congress nowhere. It must help itself to power while power was on offer. After that, it could wave goodbye to its principles and deal with the League on a tit for tat basis. 

I think Wavell deserves his place in history. His brief from Atlee was to tilt towards Nehru and see if Jinnah's supporters deserted him.  He went in the opposite direction. Pakistani historians have a soft spot for him. Perhaps, that country would not have been created but for his sense of fair play. But that isn't necessarily a feather in his cap. Currently, Pakistan is a bigger shit-show than India

Gandhi vs Linlithgow

Six days after launching the 'Quit India' agitation, Mahatma Gandhi sent the following letter to the Viceroy. 

14-8-1942

DEAR LORD LINLITHGOW,

The Government of India were wrong in precipitating the crisis.

Congress had precipitated it. The Japanese had conquered the whole of Burma 3 months earlier. Perhaps they would sweep into India and send the Brits packing. The British army chief in India- Archibald Wavell, the next Viceroy- had only three divisions of inferior quality to defend India with. Seven crack divisions were in North Africa. Fortunately, you don't have to be a good soldier to machine gun civilians. 

The Government resolution justifying the step is full of distortions and misrepresentations.

Gandhi is referring to the Governor-General in Council's Resolution of August 8th which may be found here. 

That you have the approval of your Indian 'colleagues' can have no significance, except this that in India you can always command such services.

The Viceroy commanded the services of millions of civil servants and soldiers. Sadly, some of those soldiers were trying to defend the country from the Japanese. Gandhi was bitterly opposed to this. It turned out that the services of the people Gandhi commanded were utterly useless. The Viceroy continued to rule at the Federal level.  

That co-operation is an additional justification for the demand of withdrawal irrespective of what people and parties may say.

Indians should not cooperate. They should welcome invaders provided they are cruel and rapacious.  

The Government of India should have waited at least till the time I inaugurated mass action.

Which he had done on the 8th of August. 

I have publicly stated that I fully contemplated sending you a letter before taking concrete action.

But no such letter was sent. Gandhi wrote this six days after he launched 'Quit India'. That was a concrete action.  

It was to be an appeal to you for an impartial examination of the Congress case.

But it wasn't made. Why is Gandhi mentioning an imaginary letter?  

As you know the Congress has readily filled in every omission that has been discovered in the conception of its demand.

No. Congress had not explained how it proposed to defend India. Japanese air-raids were already occurring. The Resolution said ' The Committee resolves, therefore to sanction, for the vindication of India’s inalienable right to freedom and independence, the starting of a mass struggle on non-violent lines and n the widest possible scale so that the country might utilize all the non-violent struggle it has gathered during the last twenty-two years of peaceful struggle Such a struggle must inevitably be under the leadership of Gandhiji, and the Committee requests him to take the lead and guide the nation in the steps to be taken” Gandhi clarified that this meant the British must pack their bags and leave. He demanded “a complete and immediate withdrawal of the British from India at least in reality and properly from all non-European possessions”. He understood that this would mean that India would not be able to resist the Japanese. His hoped that they would pass through India to join up with the Germans who planned to take control of the Middle East and then gain control of Iranian petroleum. 

So would I have dealt with every deficiency if you had given me the opportunity.

This was impossible. India simply didn't have a navy or an air-force and it would run out of munitions within a week or two of a shooting war with the Japanese.  

The precipitate action of the Government

caused Gandhi and his followers to wake-up from their day-dreams. Once again, they would have to sulk in jail while the British dictated the pace and scale of reform.  

leads one to think that they were afraid that the extreme caution and gradualness with which the Congress was moving towards direct action, might make world opinion ever round to the Congress as it had already begun doing, and expose the hollowness of the grounds for the Government's rejection of the Congress demand.

World opinion was that Indians were good soldiers under British commanders. But they had no Navy or Air-force of their own. If the Brits left, much of India would be occupied by the Japanese. This would make them stronger and thus prolong the war in the Pacific. 

They should surely have waited for an authentic report of my speeches on Friday and on Saturday night after the passing of the resolution by the All-India Congress Committee.

Also, Britain should have waited till Hitler conquered their country before taking any precipitate action against him.  

You would have found in them that I would not hastily begin action.

What the Brits found in Gandhi's speeches and letters was stupidity. As for the action he counselled- viz. 'do or die'- the fact is, his acolytes did nothing, they sulked in jail, while others died fighting the Japanese. 

You would have taken advantage of the interval foreshadowed in them and explored every possibility of satisfying the Congress demand.

Which was that the Brits fuck the fuck off immediately thus leaving India defenceless against the Japanese.  

The resolution says, "The Government of India have waited patiently in the hope that wiser counsels might prevail. They have been disappointed in that hope."

The resolution says that Congress was weakening India at a time when the country was under attack. It was stoutly resisted by large sections of the population. 

I suppose 'wiser counsels' here means abandonment of its demand by the Congress.

Which Congress did abandon. India needed Britishers- like Lord Mountbatten whom Nehru asked to stay on as the first Governor General of independent India. Incidentally, the Indian Navy had a British Admiral till 1958.  

Why should the abandonment of a demand legitimate at all times be hoped for by a Government pledged to guarantee independence to India?

The answer was obvious. The Japs were at the gate. They were already bombing Indian cities. Gandhi was saying 'we don't mind being conquered by the Japanese.'  

Is it a challenge that could only be met by immediate repression instead of patient reasoning with the demanding party?

Cripps had come and gone. 'Patient reasoning' hadn't worked. 

I venture to suggest that it is a long draft upon the credulity of mankind to say that the acceptance of the demand "would plunge India into confusion".

It would have meant the conquest of Assam and Bengal by the Japanese. They would have requisitioned all the rice and fish to make Sushi for themselves.  

Any way the summary rejection of the demand has plunged the nation and the Government into confusion.

Quit India did pose a considerable threat. But the air-force could be used to machine gun agitators. Many were killed and about 90 lakhs was gained through fines inflicted on Hindus. The total cost of damages caused by the rebels was officially estimated at 30 lakhs. Violence succeeded. Non-violence failed.  

The Congress was making every effort to identify India with the Allied cause.

Then it decided that being conquered by the Japanese was preferable.  

The Government resolution says: "The Governor- General in Council has been aware, too, for some time past, of dangerous preparations by the Congress party for unlawful and in some cases violent activities, directed among other things to the interruption of communications and public utility services, the organization of strikes, tampering with the loyalty of Government servants and interference with defence measures including recruitment."

This was perfectly true. Congress contained a lot of very radical elements. 

This is a gross distortion of the reality. Violence was never contemplated at any stage.

Yet, it occurred.  

A definition of what could be included in non-violent action has been interpreted in a sinister and subtle manner as if the Congress was preparing for violent action.

Some of its members were involved in such preparations.  

Everything was openly discussed among Congress circles, for nothing was to be done secretly.

This may have been true of Gandhi's own circle. But it wasn't the only circle within Congress.  

And why is it tampering with your loyalty if I ask you to give up a job that is harming the British people?

Because that is part and parcel of 'tampering with loyalty'. Gandhi thought surrendering to Hitler was the best thing for the British people. Sadly, Churchill refused to surrender India to Japan. He was a big fat meanie.  

Instead of publishing behind the backs of principal Congressmen the misleading paragraph,

British should slit their own throats after surrendering to Hitler and Tojo. After that, they may kindly slit their own throats so as to avoid putting their conquerors to any trouble.  

the Government of India, immediately they came to know of the 'preparations', should have brought to book the parties concerned with the preparations.

They killed many of them though some were merely jailed.  

That would have been the appropriate course. By their unsupported allegations in the resolution, they have laid themselves open to the charge of unfair dealing.

There was a war on. Nobody gave a shit about fair or unfair dealing. What mattered was killing lots of the enemy.  

The whole Congress movement was intended to evoke in the people the measure of sacrifice sufficient to compel attention.

The attention they received involved incarceration.  

It was intended to demonstrate what measure of popular support it had. Was it wise at this time of the day to seek to suppress a popular Government avowedly non-violent?

Congress had already resigned from office. It wasn't in Government anywhere.  

The Government resolution further says: "The Congress is not India's mouthpiece. Yet in the interest of securing their own dominance and in pursuit of their own totalitarian policy its leaders have consistently impeded the efforts made to bring India to full nationhood."

That was a clever touch. The Resolution says that Congress had prevented India from becoming self-governing. What it didn't say was that India would have remained dependent on the British Navy and Army for a considerable period.

It is a gross libel thus to accuse the oldest national organization of India.

No. It was 'fair comment'. Gandhi himself indulged in worse.  

This language lies ill in the mouth of a Government which has, as can be proved from public records, consistently thwarted every national effort for attaining freedom, and sought to suppress the Congress by hook or by crook.

This was false. The Government had not banned Congress. It seems Gandhi had got it into his head that there was a 'Gandhi-Irwin pact' which permitted Civil Disobedience. Linlithgow, in a subsequent letter, denied this was the case.  'I have read with surprise your statement that the principle of civil disobedience is implicitly conceded in the Delhi Settlement of the 5th March 1931 which you refer to as the “Gandhi-Irwin Pact”. I have again looked at the document. Its basis was that civil disobedience would be “effectively discontinued” and that certain “reciprocal action” would be taken by Government. It was inherent in such a document that it should take notice of the existence of civil disobedience. But I can find nothing in it to suggest that civil disobedience was recognized as being in any circumstances legitimate. And I cannot make it too plain that it is not so regarded by my Government.'

The Government of India have not condescended to consider the Congress offer that if simultaneously with the declaration of Independence of India, they could not trust the Congress to form a stable provisional Government, they should ask the Muslim League to do so and that any National Government formed by the League would be loyally accepted by the Congress.

The GoI was right not to consider this wholly hypocritical 'offer'.  

Such an offer is hardly consistent with the charge of totalitarianism against the Congress.

What was consistent with the charge was Govind Vallabh Pant, Premier of U.P, saying 'Germany has its Fuhrer. Italy has its Il Duce. India has Mahatma Gandhi.'  

Let me examine the Government offer. "It is that, as soon as hostilities cease, India shall devise for herself, with full freedom of decision and on a basis embracing all and not only a single party, the form of Government which she regards as most suited to her conditions."

The Brits thought that Japan had to be defeated before India could be independent. Gandhi thought that conquest by Japan was preferable to the British waging war on Indian soil.  

Has this offer any reality about it? All parties have not agreed now.

In which case, GoI was right to crack down on one party which wanted the British to depart immediately so the Japanese could take over.  

Will it be any more possible after the war?

Yes, though this entailed Partition.  

And if the parties have to act before Independence is in their hands ? Parties grow up like mushrooms, for without proving their representative character, the Government will welcome them as they have done in the past, if the parties oppose the Congress and its activities, though they may do lip-homage to Independence, frustration is inherent in the Government offer.

Gandhi was saying he neither trusted the British nor political parties which 'mushroom'. He was a totalitarian.  

Hence the logical cry of withdrawal first.

Followed by Japanese occupation. That's very logical.  

Only after the end of British power and fundamental change in the political status of India from bondage to freedom, will the formation of a truly representative government, whether provisional or permanent, be possible.

In which case, the British could not grant independence to India. They should simply leave and let the Japanese take over.  

The living burial of the authors of the demand has not resolved the deadlock.

Killing and incarcerating agitators resolved it.  

It has aggravated.

Killing and incarceration. As for those who sulked in jail, their aggravation did not matter in the slightest. 

Then the resolution proceeds: "The suggestion put forward by the Congress party that the millions of India, uncertain as to the future are ready, despite the sad lessons of so many martyr countries, to throw themselves into the arms of the invaders is one that the Government of India cannot accept as a true representation of the feeling of the people of this great country."

This was the obvious fallacy in Gandhi's thinking. It is one thing to advise foreigners to surrender to invaders. Your own people, however, aren't going to want to be enslaved by foreigners.  

I do not know about the millions. But I can give my own evidence in support of the Congress statement. It is open to the Government not to believe the Congress evidence. No imperial power likes to be told that it is in peril.

Britain didn't need to be told. It was fighting for its life. But, it was also fighting for India and Burma and Malaya and the other countries conquered by the Japanese.  

It is because the Congress is anxious for Great Britain to avoid the fate that has overtaken other imperial powers that it asks her to shed imperialism voluntarily by declaring India independent.

Gandhi had also advised the British to surrender to Hitler. But so had Bertrand Russell.  

The Congress has not approached the movement with any but the friendliest motive.

With friends like these, who needs enemies?  

The Congress seeks to kill imperialism as much for the sake of the British people and humanity as for India.

Japanese Imperialism was fine. A former president of Congress, Subhas Chandra Bose, was cuddling with Hitler and Tojo. 

Notwithstanding assertions to the contrary, I maintain that the Congress has no interests of its own apart from that of the whole of India and the world.

Why stop there? Why not say 'Congress members do not have arseholes. They never fart or shit.'  

The following passage from the peroration in the resolution is interesting. "But on them (the Government) there lies the task of defending India, of maintaining India's capacity to wage war, of safeguarding India's interests, of holding the balance between the different sections of her people without fear or favour."

The Viceroys succeeded in doing all that. The last Viceroy was asked to stay on as Governor General of independent India.  

All I can say is that it is a mockery of truth after the experience in Malaya, Singapore and Burma.

The Japs did try to invade India. Sadly, evil Britishers defeated them at Imphal.  

It is sad to find the Government of India claiming to hold the 'balance' between the parties for whose creation and existence it is itself demonstrably responsible.

Congress was set up by an ICS man. That is true enough.  

One thing more. The declared cause is common between the Government of India and us. To put it in the most concrete terms, it is the protection of the freedom of China and Russia.

The Allied war-effort in India was directly beneficial to China. The Russians too wanted Indian Communists to support the war-effort.  

The Government of India think that freedom of India is not necessary for winning the cause.

Because it wasn't necessary. Gandhi had tried to recruit Indian soldiers during the Great War, which Britain won.  

I think exactly the opposite.

Because you have shit for brains.  

I have taken Jawaharlal Nehru as my measuring rod. His personal contacts make him feel much more the misery of the impending ruin of China and Russia than I can, and may I say than even you can. In that misery he tried to forget his old quarrel with Imperialism. He dreads much more than I do the success of Fascism and Nazism. I argued with him for days together. He fought against my position with a passion which I have no words to describe. But the logic of facts overwhelmed him.

The fact that overwhelmed him was that Congress was useless. It could not aid the war-effort. What it could do was sit sulking in jail for the duration of hostilities.  

He yielded when he saw clearly that without the freedom of India that of the other two was in great jeopardy.

Stalin was trembling in his boots because India had a White Viceroy.  

Surely you are wrong in having imprisoned such a powerful friend and ally.

Sadly, Nehru was useless. What could he do against the Chinese in 1962? Nothing at all.  

If not withstanding the common cause, the Government's answer to the Congress demand is hasty repression, they will not wonder if I draw the inference that it was not so much the Allied cause that weighed with the British Government, as the unexpressed determination to cling to the possession of India as an indispensable part of imperial policy.

Gandhi should have mentioned Churchill and sought to drive a wedge between the Viceroy and Whitehall. The problem was that Churchill had sent Cripps to India.  

The determination led to the rejection of the Congress demand and precipitated repression.

What 'precipitated repression' was the belief that Congress could be crushed. It was touch and go in some parts of India, but Congress was indeed crushed.  

The present mutual slaughter on a scale never before known to history is suffocating enough. But the slaughter of truth accompanying the butchery and enforced by the falsity of which the resolution is reeking adds strength to the Congress position.

Congress's position got weaker. Resigning office in 1939 was a mistake. They had nothing to bargain with.  

It causes me deep pain to have to send you this long letter. But however much I dislike your action, I remain the same friend you have known me.

By 'friend', Gandhi meant 'nuisance'.  

I would still plead for reconsideration of the Government of India's whole policy. Do not disregard the pleading of one who claims to be a sincere friend of the British people. Heaven guide you!

Two years previously, this 'sincere friend' of the British people admonished them thus- 'You will invite Herr Hitler and Signor Mussolini to take what they want of the countries you call your possessions. Let them take possession of your beautiful island, with your many beautiful buildings. You will give all these but neither your souls, nor your minds. If these gentlemen choose to occupy your homes, you will vacate them. If they do not give you free passage out, you will allow yourself man, woman and child, to be slaughtered, but you will refuse to owe allegiance to them.'

Lord Linlithgow's replies to Gandhi's letters are courteous and well written. But the Viceroy commanded great resources. Gandhi was not writing in his mother tongue and had little knowledge of English jurisprudence. He wrote- 'You have condemned men and women before trying them and hearing their defence,

the Executive is welcome to take such action as it deems in the public interest. There may be avenues of judicial redress but some of these would have been curtailed under the Defence of India Act of 1939. 

 surely there was nothing wrong in my asking you to show me the evidence on which you hold them guilty.

The Executive may be required by a Court of Law to provide such evidence. However, during war-time, considerable latitude was granted to the Executive. Gandhi had no legal standing to ask the Viceroy for anything at all. 

 What you say in your letter carries no conviction. Proof should correspond to the canons of English jurisprudence.

Only if the matter was justiciable. Why did Gandhi & Co not bring a test case? The answer is obvious. DORA laws greatly extended Executive privilege. 

If the wife of a member of the Working Committee 

Aruna Asaf Ali

is actively engaged in “planning the bomb outrages and other acts of terrorism” she should be tried before a court of law and punished if found guilty.

An arrest warrant for her was issued. She remained underground till it was withdrawn. 

 The lady you refer to could only have done the things attributed to her after the wholesale arrests of 9th August last which I have dared to describe as leonine violence.

It was legal, not leonine. We now know that Aruna Asaf Ali and other revolutionaries had done a lot of planning prior to the wave of arrests. 

 You say that the time is not yet ripe to publish the charges against the Congress.

Because some Congress members were informants. 

 Have you ever thought of the possibility of their being found baseless when they are put before an impartial tribunal, or that some of the condemned persons might have died in the meanwhile, or that some of the evidence that the living can produce might become unavailable? 

After Independence, the revolutionaries were greatly honoured for their daring plots during that period. 

I reiterate the statement that the principle of civil disobedience is implicitly conceded in the settlement of 5th March, 1931, arrived at between the then Viceroy on behalf of the Government of India and myself on behalf of the Congress.

Such was not the case. Gandhi was arrested in January 1932. The Congress Party was banned till 1934. In any case the Defence of India Act of 1939 had completely altered the picture. 

 I hope you know that the principal Congressmen were discharged before that settlement was even thought of. 

They were rearrested soon enough. 

Certain reparations were made to Congressmen under that settlement. Civil disobedience was discontinued only on conditions being fulfilled by the Government.

Nehru says it was discontinued after the Government started seizing the property of the agitators. The Tories dictated the pace and scope of reform. 

 That by itself was, in my opinion, an acknowledgement of its legitimacy, of course under given circumstances.

If failed. Perhaps if the Tories hadn't come to power, it might have been seen as a qualified success. 

 It therefore seems somewhat strange to find you maintain that civil disobedience “cannot be recognized as being in any circumstances legitimate by your Government”. 

More particularly, because the enemy was at the gate. Gandhi had failed to grasp the nature of the threat which the nation faced. 

You ignore the practice of the British Government which has recognized its legitimacy under the name of “passive resistance”. 

Gandhi was thinking of the passive resistance movement launched in 1902 by John Clifford, a Baptist pastor, who opposed the new Education act's provisions for using public funds to support religious education in sectarian schools. Politically, it was a success in that it contributed to the Liberal victory of 1906. But no British Government 'recognized its legitimacy'. A lot of people were fined and about 80 were sent to prison for not paying those fines. 

Lastly you read into my letters a meaning which is wholly inconsistent with my declaration, in one of them, of adherence to unadulterated non-violence. For, you say in your letter under reply, that “acceptance of my point of view would be to concede that the authorized Government of the country on which lies the responsibility for maintaining peace and good order, should allow movements to take place that would admit preparations for violence, interruptions of communications, for attacks on innocent persons, for murders of police officers and others, to proceed unchecked”.

In law, an innocent person or group of persons may provide a shield for people who are not innocent. Laws can be passed which prohibit even those innocent people from engaging in activities which those with criminal intentions can use a shield. In 1914, the Defence of the Realm Act greatly widened the powers of the Government in this respect. In 1915, India adopted a similar law. Gandhi knew little of the law. To be fair, unlike the Viceroy, he did not have highly qualified people to help him draft his letters. 

 I must be a strange friend of yours whom you believe to be capable of asking for recognition of such things as lawful. 

Gandhi was strange. But he wasn't a friend. He was a nuisance. It may be argued that Linlithgow should have outlined the legal position to Gandhi. But, Linlithgow represented the Executive. He was not a lawyer. Gandhi had been a lawyer. It was up to him to get proper legal advise.

In a subsequent letter, Gandhi repeats his foolish claims-

Objection may be raised to that clause of the resolution which contemplated civil disobedience.

It was per se illegal by reason of the DoI act of 1939.  

But that by itself cannot constitute an objection since the principle of civil disobedience is impliedly conceded in what is known as the ‘Gandhi-Irwin Pact’.

It wasn't. Gandhi was re-arrested soon enough. Congress was banned.

Even that civil disobedience was not to be started before knowing the result of the meeting for which I was to seek from you an appointment.

So, a plan was made to start it under a particular contingency. That was per se illegal.  

Then, take the unproved and in my opinion unprovable charges hurled against the Congress and me by so responsible a Minister as the Secretary of State for India.

Why did Gandhi not seek to challenge it in Court? The answer was that the law was on the side of Leo Amery.  

Surely I can say with safety that it is for the Government to justify their action by solid evidence, not by mere ipse dixit.

No. What you can say with safety is that the actions of the Executive- including any ipse dixit assertion it makes- may or may not be justiciable. Because of the DoI act, justiciability was gravely limited. Gandhi was treated the same way that Oswald Moseley, in England, was treated.  

But you throw in my face the facts of murders by persons reputed to be Congressmen. I see the fact of the murders as clearly, I hope, as you do. My answer is that the Government goaded the people to the point of madness.

And then killed or incarcerated them. Gandhi may not have been aware that homicidal maniacs are dealt with in this fashion even if they have been 'goaded' by their pussy-cat.  

They started leonine violence in the shape of the arrests already referred to.

They were machine gunning mobs from the air.  

That violence is not any the less so, because it is organized on a scale so gigantic that it displaces the Mosaic law of tooth for tooth by that of ten thousand for one—not to mention the corollary of the Mosaic law, i.e., of non-resistance as enunciated by Jesus Christ.

Gandhi was ignoring the violence the Japanese were inflicting on India. The doctrine of non-resistance is not a 'corollary', it is diametrically opposed to Mosaic- or Islamic- law.  

I cannot interpret in any other manner the repressive measures of the all-powerful Government of India.

Gandhi couldn't interpret shit.  

Add to this tale of woe the privations of the poor millions due to India-wide scarcity which I cannot help thinking might have been largely mitigated, if not altogether prevented, had there been a bona fide national government responsible to a popularly elected assembly.

Bengal was ruled by a bona fide provincial government with a popularly elected assembly. That's why a food availability deficit led to such high excess mortality. But the same thing happened in Bangladesh in 1974. 

Linlithgow was the longest serving Viceroy in Indian history. Few thought he was anything more than a 'safe pair of hands'. Yet, that, by itself, was quite an achievement. Gandhi, however, felt he had been outfoxed by a wily opponent. He had set much stock on his going on a fast. Linlithgow arranged for him to be released for its duration so, if Gandhi died, less blame would fall on the Government. The problem was that Gandhi had no intention of dying. He had bluffed and he had bluffed and each time his bluff was called. This explains his last letter to the Viceroy-

 Detention Camp, 27-9-1943 

Dear Lord Linlithgow, On the eve of your departure from India I would like to send you a word. Of all the high functionaries I have had the honour of knowing none has been the cause of such deep sorrow to me as you have been.

In other words, no other Viceroy had been as successful in out manoeuvring Gandhi. Willingdon had been more minatory- but that was in peace time. Linlithgow's genius was to throw the blame on Congress for preventing a Federal Government being formed at the centre. 

It has cut me to the quick to have to think of you as having countenanced untruth,

i.e. had refused to believe Gandhi's fraudulent claims 

and that regarding one whom you at one time considered as your friend.

Gandhi's other great friend was Adolf Hitler.  

I hope and pray that God will some day put it into your heart to realize that you, a representative of a great nation, had been led into a grievous error. With good wishes, I still remain, Your friend, M. K. Gandhi

Linlithgow was a pious Presbyterian. Gandhi's mistake was to think he, a Hindu, could lecture a Scotsman on Christianity.  

Personal Viceroy’s Camp, India, (Simla), 7th October, 1943 Dear Mr. Gandhi, I have received your letter of 27th September. I am indeed sorry that your feelings about any deeds or words of mine should be as you describe. But I must be allowed, as gently as I may, to make plain to you that I am quite unable to accept your interpretation of the events in question. As for the corrective virtues of time and reflection evidently they are ubiquitous in their operation, and wisely to be rejected by no man. I am sincerely, Linlithgow.

 Gandhi had said in an interview that 'Quit India' might turn into a military conflict. “Q. Does the resolution mean peace or war? There is an interpretation particularly among the foreign journalists, that it means declaration of war and that the last three paragraphs of the resolution are the really operative part. Is the emphasis on the first part or the last part of the resolution?

 “A. The emphasis in any non-violent struggle, projected or in operation, is always on peace. War, when it becomes an absolute necessity'

Gandhi also spoke of a 'general strike'. In law this was enough for Congress to be proscribed and its members to be arrested under the DoI act. Did Gandhi know that he was lying when he accused Linlithgow of 'untruth'? Perhaps not. He had convinced himself that there was some mythical 'Gandhi-Irwin pact' by which anything at all that he did was legal and anything at all the Government did for the defence of the nation was illegal. 

Did Gandhi have a guilty conscience? There is an element of 'manic protestation' in this letter of his to Sir Reginald Maxwell- an ICS officer.

Detention Camp, 21st May, 1943 Dear Sir Reginald Maxwell, It was only on the 10th instant, that I read your speech delivered in the Legislative Assembly on the 15th February last on the adjournment motion about my fast. I saw at once that it demanded a reply. I wish I had read it earlier. I observe that you are angry, or at least were at the time you delivered your speech. I cannot in any other way account for your palpable inaccuracies.

Why would a man working for the defence of India be angry with a nutter who didn't want India to be defended?  

This letter is an endeavour to show them. It is written to you, not as an official, but as man to man. The first thought that came to me was that your speech was a deliberate distortion of facts. But I quickly revised it. So long as there was a favourable construction possible to put upon your language, the unfavourable had to be rejected.

Gandhi is lying. He has put the most unfavourable construction possible on Maxwell's speech. He even pretends to know whether Maxwell was calm or whether he was angry when he made the speech.  

I must assume therefore that what appeared to me to be distortions were not deliberate. You have said that “the correspondence that led to the fast is there for anyone to interpret as he chooses”; yet you have straightway told your audience that “it can perhaps be read in the light of the following facts.” Did you leave them the choice?

Yes. Maxwell said 'people are free to interpret what they read in their own way. One way such and such correspondence could be read is as follows.' Maxwell did not say- as a Judge might instruct a jury- that the thing could only be read in one particular way.  

I now take your “facts” seriatim: — 1. “When the Congress Party passed their resolution of August 8th, a Japanese attack on this country was thought to be likely.”

This was true. Japan had begun bombing India at the end of 1942. However, their push into Imphal occurred in 1944.  

You seem to have conveyed the meaning that the thought was that of the Congress and that it was gratuitous.

This is not the case. Everybody thought Japan would attack India after it had swallowed Burma.  

The fact is that the Government gave currency to the thought and emphasized it by action which even seemed ludicrous.

Gandhi was wrong. The Japanese did plan to invade India and would do so in the very next year.  

2. “By demanding the withdrawal of British power from India and by placing the Congress in open opposition to it the Congress Party might be thought to have hoped for some advantage to themselves if the Japanese attack succeeded.”

We might think anything we like. As a matter of fact, a previous president of Congress had gone over to Hitler and Tojo.  

Now this is not a fact but your opinion wholly contrary to facts.

This is Gandhi's opinion. It is not a fact.  

Congressmen never hoped for, nor desired, any advantage from Japanese success: on the contrary, they dreaded it and that dread inspired the desire for the immediate end of British rule.

Which would have been swiftly followed by a Japanese invasion.  

All this is crystal clear from the resolution of the 58 All India Congress Committee (8th August, 1942) and my writings.

No. What is crystal clear is that Congress was as stupid as shit. It had nothing to bargain with. It could merely queue up in an orderly fashion to go sulk in jail.  

3. “Today, six months after, the Japanese danger has, at any rate for the time being, receded and there is little immediate hope from that quarter.” This again is your opinion; mine is that the Japanese danger has not receded.

In which case, India needed the Brits to stick around. India had no navy or air-force to speak off.  

It still stares India in the face. Your fling that “there is little immediate hope from that quarter,” should be withdrawn unless you think and prove that the resolution and my writings adverted to in the previous paragraph did not mean what they said.

Why should Maxwell withdraw anything? What he said was 'fair comment'. Moreover, Bose had joined the Japanese in February 1943- i.e. around the time Maxwell made this speech.  

4. “The movement initiated by the Congress has been decisively defeated.”

That was true. The only hope Congress had was that Japan defeat the British and conquer the country. Hopefully, they would impose a puppet Congress government.  

I must combat this statement. Satyagraha knows no defeat. It flourishes on blows the hardest imaginable.

It flourishes on stupidity.  

But I need not go to that bower for comfort. I learnt in schools established by the British Government in India that “Freedom’s battle once begun is bequeathed from bleeding sire to son.”

The line is from Byron who fought with the Greeks against their Islamic conquerors. Gandhi's people hadn't fought anybody. Only after Pax Britannica was established could they rise to become Diwans.  This was because their cunning Bania brains were only good for making money, not fighting wars. 

It is of little moment when the goal is reached so long as effort is not relaxed. The dawn came with the establishment of the Congress sixty years ago.

It was established by a White ICS officer- just like Maxwell.  

Sixth of April, 1919, on which All India Satyagraha began, saw a spontaneous awakening from one end of India to the other. You can certainly derive comfort, if you like, from the fact that the immediate objective of the movement was not gained as some Congressmen had expected. But that is no criterion of ‘decisive’ or any ‘defeat’. It ill-becomes one belonging to a race which owns no defeat to deduce defeat of a popular movement from the suppression of popular exuberance, may be not always wise, by a frightful exhibition of power. 

It ill becomes a nutter from a conquered race from deducing anything from such shite as he has filled his brains with.  

“Now therefore it is the object of the Congress Party to rehabilitate themselves and regain if they can the credit they have lost.”

Congress was sulking in jail because they were useless.  

Surely, your own experience should correct this opinion. You know, as well as I do, that every attempt at suppression of the Congress has given it greater prestige and popularity.

Money from Indian merchants had given it that.  

This the latest attempt at suppression is not likely to lead to a contrary result. Hence the questions of ‘lost credit’ and ‘rehabilitation’ simply do not arise.

What arose was the question whether Congress had any nuisance value. It didn't. It could be safely ignored. 

“Thus they are now concerned to disclaim responsibility for the consequences that followed their decision. The point is taken up by Mr. Gandhi in his correspondence with the Viceroy. The awkward facts are now disowned as unproved.” 

Gandhi had spoken of open war or a general strike. He had said he and his fellows would 'do or die'. But they didn't do anything and stubbornly clung to life.  

‘They’ here can only mean ‘me’. For throughout your speech I was the target. ‘Now’ means at the time of my fast. I remind you that I disclaimed responsibility on 14th August last when I wrote to H. E. the Viceroy. In that same letter I laid it on the Government who by their wholesale arrests of 9th August provoked the people to the point of madness.

Mad people may turn homicidal. Congress did the goading but sought to blame the Government. They failed.  

“The awkward facts” are not awkward for me when the responsibility rests on the Government and what you put forward as ‘facts’ are only one-sided allegations awaiting proof.

As are Gandhi's assertions. The plain fact is Congress did nothing and refused to die.  

. "Mr. Gandhi takes up his stand; ‘Surely I can say with safety that it is for the Government to justify their action by solid evidence.’ To whom are they to justify themselves?

A law court or else to Westminster to which the Viceroy and the Secretary of State were responsible.  But the DoI Act had removed this necessity.  

Sardar Sant Singh: Before an impartial enquiry committee.” Was not Sardar Sant Singh’s answer a proper answer?

No. Only Westminster was empowered to order any such thing. The Indians had failed to set up a Federal Government and thus the Viceroy was answerable to London, not Delhi.  

How nice it would have been if you had not put in the interjection. For, have not the Government of India been obliged before now to justify their acts by appointing inquiry committees, as for instance, after the Jallianwala Bagh Massacre?

The Hunter Committee was appointed by GoI on instructions from the Secretary of State not Sardar Santa or Banta Singh.  

But you proceed, "Elsewhere in his letters Mr. Gandhi makes this clear. He says, ‘Convince me that I was wrong and I will make ample amends.’ In the alternative he asks, ‘If you want me to make any proposal on behalf of the Congress, you should put me among the Working Committee members.’ So far as can be seen, these were the demands, when he conceived his fast. There is no other solid demand made.” Here there is a double wrong done to me. You have ignored the fact that my letters were written to one whom I considered to be a friend.

This is irrelevant. Gandhi had said that even letters he had marked 'personal' could be published. Moreover, Gandhi had no reason to believe that the Viceroy was a pal of his.  

You have further ignored the fact that the Viceroy in his letter had asked me to make clear proposals.

But Gandhi made no clear proposals. It appears he thought his fast would have some magical effect. But it had no effect whatsoever.  

If you had borne these two facts in mind, you would not have wronged me as you have done.

Maxwell hadn't wronged Gandhi. He had expressed his view and because there was logic behind it, it carried weight. Gandhi's protestations were disingenuous.  

But let me come to the ninth count of your indictment and it will be clear to you what I mean. 9. "But now, fresh light emerges. Government without granting any of his demands informed Mr. Gandhi that they would release him for the purpose and for the duration of the fast in order to make it clear they disclaimed responsibility for the consequences.

Such, indeed, was their intention.  

On that Mr. Gandhi replied that if he was released, he would at once abandon the fast and that he had conceived the fast only as a prisoner. Thus, if he were released, the objects for which he declared his fast, although still unfulfilled, would recede into the background. As a free man, he would neither demand these objects nor fast. Interpreted in this way, his fast would seem to amount to little more than a demand for release.” 

It would be fair to say that Gandhi wanted the release of all political prisoners.  

Together with the letter containing the offer of release, a copy of the draft communique that was to be issued by the Government was delivered to me. It did not say that the offer was made in order “to make it clear that the Government disclaimed responsibility for the consequences.”

but this was a reasonable inference to make.  

If I had seen that offending sentence I would have sent a simple refusal. In my innocence, I put a fair meaning on the offer and in my reply I argued why I could not accept it. And, according to my wont, in order that the Government may not be misled in any shape or form, I told them how the fast was conceived and why it could not be taken by me as a free man. I went out of my way even to postpone, for the convenience of the Government, the commencement of the fast by a day. Mr. Irwin who had brought the offer and the draft communique appreciated the courtesy. Why was this reply of mine withheld from the public at the time the revised communique was issued, and why was an unwarranted interpretation given instead? Was not my letter a material document?

No. It was nonsense. Gandhi and other Congress leaders were jailed because they had engaged in actions which imperilled the defence of the realm. Because the DoI act was in effect, the Executive had wide latitude.  

Now for the second wrong. You say that if I were released my objects for which I had declared the fast would recede into the background, and even gratuitously suggest that as a free man I would neither demand these objects nor fast. As a free man I could and would have carried on an agitation for an impartial public inquiry into the charges brought against Congressmen and me,

But such agitation imperilled the defence of the realm. The Viceroy was right to keep these agitators in custody.  

I would also have asked for permission to see the imprisoned Congressmen. Assume that my agitation had failed to make any impression on the Government, I might then have fasted. All this, if you were not labouring under intense irritation, you could have plainly seen from my letter, supported, as you would have been, by my past record. Instead, you have deduced a meaning which, according to the simple rules of construction, you had no right to deduce.

Everybody has the right to deduce anything they like. 'Simple rules of construction' are only applicable in law courts when dealing with legal documents. Gandhi does not seem to have understood that politicians and administrators are not officers of the court. 

Again, as a free man I would have had the opportunity of examining the tales of destruction said to have been wrought by Congressmen and even by non-Congressmen. And if I had found that they had committed wanton acts of murder, then also I might have fasted as I have done before now.

To no good effect.  

You should thus see that the demands made in my letter to H. E. the Viceroy would not have receded into the background if I had been released, for they could have been pressed otherwise than by the fast, and that the fast had not the remotest connection with and desire for release.

If we believe Gandhi. But we would also give up sex and eating nice food if we believed him.  

Moreover, imprisonment is never irksome to a Satyagrahi. For him a prison is a gateway of Liberty. 

In which case, it does not matter if they rot in jail.  

“I could quote several resolutions of the Congress Working Committee against him....Mr. Gandhi himself took up the subject in the Harijan dated 19th August 1939. There he says, ‘Hunger-strike has positively become a plague.’ ” My views quoted by you have not undergone the slightest change. If you had read the quotations' without passion, it would have prevented you from putting upon my letter the construction you have. 

Also, you would have given up sex and taken to spinning cotton. More importantly, you would have surrendered to Hitler and slit your own throat to spare the Gestapo the trouble.  

“On the ethics of hunger-striking, Mr. Gandhi had something to say in the Harijan of 20th May, 1939, after his Rajkot fast: ‘I now see that it was tainted by himsa.

The wily Diwan of Rajkot instrumentalized caste and religion to chase away the Mahatma. It must be said, it was Patel, not Gandhi, who snatched defeat from the jaws of victory by nominating only Brahmins and Banias for the new Council. The cunning Diwan then proposed representation for Muslims and Depressed classes thus outflanking Congress. 

Further on he remarks, ‘this was not the way of ahimsa or conversion.’ ” I am sorry to have to say that you have wholly misread my article. Fortunately I happen to have A. Hingorani’s colle tion of my writings “To the Princes and Their Peoples”. I quote from the Harijan article referred to by you: “At the end of my fast I had permitted myself to say that it had succeeded as no previous fast had done.

Because it failed so spectacularly.  

I now see that it was tainted with himsa. In taking the fast I sought immediate intervention of the Paramount Power so as to induce fulfilment of the promise made by the Thakore Saheb.

Gandhi lied about some supposed malign influence exercised by a wholly innocent British official- Sir Patrick Cadell- who wanted to restrain the Prince's extravagance. 

This was not the way of ahimsa or conversion; it was the way of himsa or coercion. My fast to be pure should have been addressed only to the Thakore Saheb, and I should have been content to die, if I could not have melted his heart....”

Sadly, Gandhi was not content to die. 

I hope you realize that you misapplied the stray sentences taken from their setting. I described my fast as ‘tainted’ not because it was bad ah initio but because I sought the intervention of the Paramount Power.

The Viceroy represented that power. Gandhi sought his intervention to get political prisoners released. He also asked him to very kindly fuck the fuck off so the Japs could take over the country.  

I have given you the credit of being unaware of the article. I wish you could read it. In any case, may I expect you to correct the error?

Where is the error? Gandhi had said his fasts were coercive and thus tainted by himsa. The question was whether furious mobs would run amok if he died during one of his fasts. That was his trump card. Sadly, some nice Hindu shot him before he could destroy independent India completely.  

For me the Rajkot episode is one of the happiest chapters of my life, in that God gave me the courage to own my mistake and purge it by renouncing the fruits of the award. I became stronger for the purging. 

The Viceroy had put in the Chief Justice as arbitrator. The Chief Justice sided with Congress. Then the Diwan, Virawala, mobilized the Muslims, Rajputs and Dalits to protest against Brahmin/Bania domination of the new council. Gandhi unilaterally surrendered and apologized to every body involved. 

“I must confess that speaking for myself it is certainly repugnant to Western ideas of decency to exploit against an opponent his feelings of humanity, chivalry or mercy or to trifle with such a sacred trust as one’s own life in order to play on the feelings of the public for the sake of some purely mundane object.”

You don't see Atlee threatening to chop his own head off if Churchill refuses to raise the wages of Coal Miners.  

I must tread with extreme caution upon the ground with which you are infinitely more familiar than I can be. Let me however remind you of the historic fast of the late Mac Swiney.

He died in prison after fasting for 74 days. Gandhi didn't fast that long and refused to die.  

I know that the British Government let him die in imprisonment.  But he has been acclaimed by the Irish people as a hero and a martyr. Edward Thompson in his “You have lived through all this” says that the late Mr. Asquith called the British Government’s action a “political blunder of the first magnitude”. The author adds: “He was allowed to die by inches, while the world watched with a passion of admiration and sympathy and innumerable British men and women begged their Government not to be such a damned fool.”

He should have been forcibly fed- like the Suffragettes.  Incidentally, his sister was imprisoned twice and went on hunger strike twice in Independent Ireland because of her pro-IRA, anti-Treaty, views. 

And is it repugnant to Western ideas of decency to exploit (if that expression must be retained) against the opponent his feelings of humanity, chivalry or mercy?

Yes. The thing is counter-productive. Still, during a war, we have to do repugnant things.  

Which is better, to take the opponent’s life secretly or openly, or to credit him with finer feelings and evoke them by fasting and the like?

Kill the enemy if you are at war. You may also have to kill or incarcerate those of your own people who side with the enemy.  

Again, which is better, to trifle with one’s own life by fasting or some other way of self-immolation, or to trifle with it by engaging in an attempt to compass the destruction of the opponent and his dependants?

During a war, it is better to kill the enemy secretly or openly. 

. ‘What he says in effect is this. You say, Government is right and the Congress is wrong. I say the Congress is right and the Government is wrong, I chose to put the burden of proof on you. I am the only person to be convinced. You must either admit you are wrong or submit your reasons to me and make me the sole arbiter in the matter....It seems to me that Mr. Gandhi’s demand is rather like asking the United Nations to appoint Hitler to adjudge the responsibility for the present war. It is not usual in this country to put the accused person on the bench to judge his own case.”

We are welcome to judge our own actions in any manner we please. But others are welcome to reject such judgments. What matters is if a particular case is justiciable. The problem was the DoI law which granted much latitude to the Executive.  

This is an unbecoming caricature of my letters to the Viceroy. What I said in effect was this: “You have allowed me to consider myself as your friend.

No permission is required in such cases.  

I do not want to stand on my rights and demand a trial.

Why not? The answer is that the DoI Act had greatly diluted such rights.   

You accuse me of being in the wrong. I contend that your Government is in the wrong. Since you would not admit your Government’s error you owe it to me to let me know wherein I have erred.

No such obligation arises. In any case, the Government had clarified that Gandhi and Congress 'erred' by creating obstacles to the proper defence of the realm. Their actions were per se illegal and warranted their detention without trial.  

For, I am in the dark as to how I have erred. If you convince me of my guilt, I will make ample amends.”

What amends could Gandhi make? He was a nuisance merely. It wasn't as though he could do anything for the war effort.  

My simple request you have turned against me and compared me to an imaginary Hitler appointed to adjudge his own case.

Govind Vallabh Pant, a very senior Congress man, had compared Gandhi to Hitler. But everybody must judge their own case in foro conscientiae.  

If you do not accept my interpretation of my own letters, can I not say, let an impartial judge examine the rival interpretations?

You can say what you like.  

Will it be an offensive comparison if I recall the fable of the wolf who was always in the right and the lamb who was always in the wrong?

It was a comparison Churchill might have used. Congress was the party of the Brahmins & Banias who wanted to tyrannize over the Muslims, Dalits and OBCs.  

. “Mr. Gandhi is the leader of an open rebellion... .He forfeits that right (the right of being heard) so long as he remains an open  rebel. He cannot claim to function except through the success of his own method. He cannot take part in public life under the protection of the law that he denies. He cannot be a citizen and yet not a subject.” You are right in describing me as the leader of an open rebellion except for a fundamental omission namely, strictly non-violent.

Some members of a rebellion may be non-violent- more particularly if they are as weak as fuck. But the law may permit their incarceration if that was conducive to public safety.  

This omission is on a par with the omission of ‘nots’ from the Commandments and quoting them in support of killing, stealing, etc. ..

No. It is immaterial. Rebellion may be punishable by law even if it is non-violent. Sedition is a different offence from 'waging war on the King Emperor'. Gandhi had pleaded guilty to sedition previously. 

You may dismiss the phrase or explain it away in any manner you like. But when you quote a person you may not omit anything from his language, especially an omission which changes the whole aspect of things.

There is no such rule. The question is whether the omission is material and made in bad faith.  

I have declared myself an open rebel on many occasions, even during my visit to London on the occasion of the second Round Table Conference. But the anathema that you have pronounced against me has not been pronounced before.

Because the DoI Act was not in operation.  

You will perhaps recall the time when the late Lord Reading was willing to hold a Round Table Conference in which I was to be present,

The 'moderates' (e.g. Sapru) floated the suggestion. Reading did not commit himself.  

although I was leading a mass civil disobedience movement. It was not called because I had insisted that the Ali Brothers, who were then in prison, should be released.

Gandhi surrendered unilaterally. The Ali Brothers turned against him.  

British history which I was taught as a lad had it that Wat Tyler and John Hampden who had rebelled were heroes.

The English weren't at war at that time. Neither of them had endangered the defence of the realm.  

In very recent times the British Government treated with Irish rebels whilst their hands were still red with blood. Why should I become an outcast although my rebellion is innocent and I have had nothing to do with violence?

Because you are harming the defence of the realm at a time when the enemy is at the gate.  

In spite of the validity of my claim that you have enunciated a novel doctrine, I admit that you made a perfect statement when you said, “He cannot claim to function except through the success of his own method.”

He can tell lies about how it is actually succeeding when the truth is that it failed utterly.  

My method, being based on truth and non-violence, ever succeeds to the extent it is applied.

In which case it was never applied.  

Therefore I function always and only through the success of my method and to the extent that I correctly represent, in my own person, its fundamentals.

Which consist of telling stupid lies and pretending everybody else is very evil whereas you consider them your very dear friends.  

The moment I became a Satyagrahi from that moment I ceased to be a subject,

Gandhi was born a British protected subject. He died as a British subject. He was not the citizen of any country.  

but never ceased to be a citizen. A citizen obeys laws voluntarily and never under compulsion or for fear of the punishment prescribed for their breach.

A citizen may or may not do so. But this is also true of a subject.  

He breaks them when he considers it necessary and welcomes the punishment. That robs it of its edge or of the disgrace which it is supposed to imply.

Yet Gandhi refers to himself as an outcast.  

15. “In some of the published correspondence, Mr. Gandhi has made much of his intention to seek an interview with the Viceroy. But the Congress resolution still stood, together with Mr. Gandhi’s own words ‘do or die’. The Government communique, on the subject of his fast, has already reminded the public of Mr. Gandhi’s statement made on 14th July that there was no room left in the proposal for withdrawal or negotiation....I may again quote Mr. Gandhi’s own words ‘Every one of you should, from this moment onwards, consider yourself a free man or woman and act as if you are free and are no longer under the heel of this imperialism.’

In other words, you should feel yourself free to wage war on the King Emperor- just like Netaji Bose. 

Now listen to this: ‘You may take it from me that I am not going to strike a bargain with the Viceroy for ministries or the like. I am not going to be satisfied with anything short of complete freedom.’ ‘We shall do or die. We shall either free India or die in the attempt.’ ‘This is open rebellion.’ ” Let me first of all make a vital correction of the quotation you have taken from my press statement made on the 14th July and reported in the Harijan of 19th July. You have quoted me as saying that “there was no room left in the proposal for withdrawal or negotiation.” The real quotation is “there is no room left for negotiations in the proposal for withdrawal.” You will admit that the difference is material.

There is no difference at all. Gandhi said the British must withdraw. They may 'negotiate' this with some people- he didn't know who those people might be. One thing was certain. They must fuck the fuck off.

But the point I want to stress here is this that there is no room left for any negotiations in the proposal for withdrawal. Either they recognize independence, or they do not. 

The British did not. They prevailed. 

The faulty quotation apart, you have omitted from my statement, which occupies nearly three columns of the Harijan, all the things which amplify my meaning and show the caution with which I was working. I take a few sentences from that statement. “ It is possible that the British may negotiate a withdrawal. If they do it will be a feather in their cap. Then it will cease to be a case for withdrawal. If the British see, however late, the wis¬ dom of recognizing the freedom of India without reference to the various parties, all things are possible. But the point I want to stress is this.” Here follows the sentence misquoted by you. The paragraph then proceeds: “Either they recognize independence or they don’t.

So, Gandhi was ruling out negotiations. Since the Brits had already tried that- by sending out Cripps- they could take a hard line with Gandhi without alienating the Americans. Linlithgow gave Gandhi just enough rope to hang himself.  

After recognition many things can follow, for by that single act, the British representatives will have altered the face of the whole landscape and revived the hope of the people which has been frustrated times without number. Therefore, whenever that great act is performed on behalf of the British people, it will be a red letter day in the history of India and the world. And, as I have said, it can materially affect the fortunes of the war.”

Gandhi was wrong on all counts.  

From this fuller quotation, you will see how everything that was being done was done in order to ensure victory and ward off Japanese aggression.

Linlithgow did what needed to be done. Gandhi did not.  

You may not appreciate my wisdom, but you may not impugn my good faith.

Why not? Gandhi was constantly impugning the good faith of all and sundry.  

Though I have no verbatim report of my speeches before the All India Congress Committee, I have fairly full notes. I accept the correctness of your quotations. If you bear in mind that all things were said with non-violence always as the background, the statements become free from any objection.

Not in times of war. Hampering the war effort for whatever reason can get you sent to jail.  

“Do or die” clearly means do your duty by carrying out instructions

So, Congress had issued instructions. Since those instructions were considered, by the competent authority, to be likely to hinder the war effort, Congress leaders were incarcerated.  

and die in the attempt if necessary. As to my exhortation to the people to consider themselves free, I take the following from my notes. “The actual struggle does not commence this very moment. You have merely placed certain powers in my hands. My first act will be to wait upon H. E. the Viceroy and plead with him for the acceptance of the Congress demand. This may take two or three weeks.

Which is how long the Viceroy waited before jailing Gandhi & Co.  

What are you to do in the meanwhile? I will tell you. There is the spinning wheel. I had to struggle with the Maulana Saheb before it dawned upon him that in a non-violent struggle it had an abiding place.

Because non-violent struggles are useless. Muslims had conquered large swathes of India at a time when there were plenty of spinning wheels.  

The fourteen-fold constructive programme is all there for you to carry out. But there is something more you have to do and it will give life to that programme. Every one of you should, from this very moment, consider yourself a free man or woman and even act as if you are free and no longer under the heel of this Imperialism. This is no make-believe. You have to cultivate the spirit of freedom before it comes physically.

This is best done in a prison cell.  

The chains of a slave are broken the moment he considers himself a free man. He will then tell his master: ‘I have been your slave all these days but I am no longer that now. You may kill me, but if you do not and if you release me from the bondage, I will ask for nothing more from you. For henceforth instead of depending upon you I shall depend upon God for food and clothing. God has given me the urge for freedom and therefore I deem myself to be a free man.’

God has given me the urge to live forever. This is why I deem myself immortal.  

” Apart from your resentment of the ‘Quit India’ cry, ask yourself whether the quotation as found in its own setting is in any way offensive?

Gandhi was lying. He pretended Indians were slaves. But the Brits had abolished slavery. This type of lie was highly offensive to British people serving in India. 

Should not a man, longing to be free, first of all cultivate the spirit of freedom and act accordingly irrespective of consequences? 

No. A slave should try to escape or else to purchase his freedom. Cultivating the spirit of freedom is like cultivating the spirit of immortality. It changes nothing. It is a waste of time.  

“It is not the method of peaceful persuasion to go to the person whom you wish to convince armed with a resolution declaring mass rebellion.

Which is what 'Quit India' was.  

The essence of negotiation is that both parties should be uncommitted and that neither should exert the pressure of force on the other.

No. That is the essence of chatting with a pal about something which doesn't matter in the slightest to either of you. 

That is true in any circumstances.

It is completely false.  

But as between a subject and the State which rules him the position is still more emphatic. It is not for the subject to deal with the State on equal terms, still less to approach it with an open threat.”

Some subjects may be so powerful that they can threaten the State and bend it to their will. We may not like it, but it happens.  

At the outset let me make one correction. The resolution did not “declare” mass rebellion.

It demanded British withdrawal and called for a mass rebellion. True, the pious hope was expressed that the rebellion be non-violent. But that was because the penalty for waging war on the King Emperor was very harsh.  

It merely sanctioned the “starting of a mass struggle on non-violent lines on the widest possible scale so that the country might utilize all the non violent strength it has gathered during the last twenty-two years of peaceful struggle.”

In other words, it was a useless and stupid stunt.  

I was to “guide the nation in the steps to be taken.” The paragraph sanctioning the mass struggle also “appeals to Britain and the United Nations in the interest of freedom.” The essence of negotiation should undoubtedly be that the parties are uncommitted and that neither “exerts the pressure of force on the other.” In the case under consideration the actual position is that one party has overwhelming force at its disposal and the other has none.

Had Congress not resigned office, it would have had a bargaining chip. Gandhi could say to FDR- my guys are running some of the biggest provinces in India. If I tell them to resign, the war effort will be greatly impeded. Tell your pal Churchill to stop being so fucking stupid.  

About non-committal too the Congress has no commitments except the immediate attainment of freedom.

Sadly, that 'commitment' involved sulking in jail till the Japanese threat ended.  

Subject to that there is the widest latitude for negotiation. Your proposition about the subject and the State is I know a reply to the cry of “Quit India”. Only the cry is intrinsically just and the subject and the State formula is too antediluvian to have any real meaning.

States exist. They are part of the real world. Satyagraha is a fantasy.  

It is because the Congress has felt the subjection of India as an insufferable reproach that it has risen against it.

The Muslim League felt Congress was insufferable. It rose against it and managed to remove it entirely from Muslim majority areas.  

A well ordered State is subject to the people.

A badly ordered State may be so. But there are plenty of well ordered States where the people have little say in things.  

It does not descend upon the people from above but the people make and unmake it.

Gandhi couldn't even make or unmake the state of Rajkot where his daddy had been Divan.  

The resolution of 8th August did not contain any threat open or veiled.

Sadly, it contained nothing at all. Gandhi & Co were asserting the power of the Ahimsa fairy. The Viceroy very kindly arranged for their incarceration so they didn't hurt themselves.  

‘It prescribed the limitations under which the negotiations could be carried on and its sanction was free of all “force”, i.e., violence. It consisted of self-suffering.

And whining incessantly about this particularly stupid type of 'self-suffering'.  

Instead of appreciating the fact that the Congress laid all its cards on the table, you have given a sinister meaning to the whole movement by drawing unwarranted inferences.

There was a war on. The question was whether locking up Gandhi & Co. would hinder or help the War effort. On balance, it helped.  

In so far as there was any violence after the 8th of August last on the part of any Congressman, it was wholly unauthorized as is quite clear from the resolution itself.

Free people are not subject to any authority- even that of the Ahimsa fairy.  

The Government in their wisdom left me no time whatsoever for issuing instructions.

Because the Government was wise. Gandhi had been given enough rope and had, very obligingly, hanged himself.  

The All India Congress Committee finished after midnight on the 8th August. Well before sunrise on the 9th I was carried away by the Police Commissioner without being told what crime I had committed.

This was preventive detention under the DoI rules. Gandhi was considered to be endangering national security. 

And so were the members of the Working Committee and the principal Congressmen who happened to be in 67 Bombay. Is it too much when I say that the Government invited violence and did not want the movement to proceed on peaceful lines?

Yes. It jailed the non-violent and tried to kill the violent.  

Now let me remind you of an occasion of an open rebellion when you played an important part. I refer to the famous Bardoli Satyagraha under Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel.

It was a rent-strike, not a rebellion. Moreover, it occurred during a period of peace. The Mutiny was a rebellion.  

He was conducting a campaign of civil disobedience. It had evidently reached a stage when the then Governor of Bombay felt that there should be a peaceful end to the struggle. You will remember that the result of an interview between H. E. the then Governor and the Sardar was the appointment of a committee of which you were a distinguished member. And the committee’s findings were for the most part in favour of the civil resisters. Of course you may say, if you wish, that the Governor made a mistake in negotiating with the rebel, and so did you in accepting the appointment.

Patel was not a rebel. That is why he wasn't charged with waging war against the King Emperor. To be fair, Gandhi & Co were ranters not rebels. Preventive detention was all that required. By contrast Pir Pagaro led the rebellion of the Hurs. He was hanged in 1943.  

Consider the reverse position, what would have happened, if instead of appointing a committee the Governor had attempted heavy repression. Would not the Government have been held responsible for an outbreak of violence if the people had lost self-control? 

Maybe. The question was whether the 22 percent tax hike was justified. It wasn't.  

“Government does hold Mr. Gandhi responsible for the recent happenings that have so disturbed the peace of India, caused so much loss of life and property of innocent persons and brought the country to the brink of a terrible danger. I do not say he had any personal complicity in acts of violence,.. .but it was he that put the match to the train carefully laid beforehand by himself and his colleagues. That he was forced to do so prematurely was not his fault but our fortune. This was the method by which they hoped to gain their ends. They may seek to repudiate it, now that it has proved unsuccessful, but the responsibility is theirs none-the-less_If Mr. Gandhi wished to dissociate himself from them, he could have spoken for himself without consulting the members of the Working Committee. Can he then, without cancelling the Congress rebellion, without reparation, without even assurances for the future, claim at any moment to step back as though nothing had happened into the public life of the country and be received by Government and society as a good citizen?”

Not for the moment. After the Japanese threat receded, he might prove useful. After all, the one thing he was good at was surrendering unilaterally.  

I can accept no responsibility for the unfortunate happenings described by you.

Which is why he remained in jail.  

I have no doubt whatsoever that history will record that the responsibility for the happenings was wholly that of the Government.

What history records is that Churchill saved India from the Japanese. Gandhi's policies were stupid.  

In the nature of things I could not put a match to a train which for one thing was never laid.

Because Congress was useless.  

And if the train was never laid, the question of prematureness does not arise.

But the question of stupidity does. Americans had to admit that Gandhi was crazy.  

The deprivation of the people of their leaders you may consider “our fortune”. I consider it a misfortune of the first magnitude for all concerned.

But a Japanese invasion wasn't a misfortune at all.  

I wish to repudiate nothing of what I have done or intended. I have no sense of repentance, for I have no sense of having done any wrong to any person. I have stated times without number that I detest violence in any shape or form. But I can give no opinion about things of which I have no first-hand knowledge. I never asked for permission to consult the Congress Working Committee to enable me to dissociate myself from violence. I asked for permission to see them, if I was expected to make any proposals on behalf of the Committee. I cannot cancel the Congress rebellion which is of a purely non-violent character.

It was useless. The war effort was not greatly hindered.  

I am proud of it. I have no reparation to make, for I have no consciousness of guilt.

Nor any consciousness of reality.  

And there can be no question of assurances for the future, when I hold myself guiltless. The question of re-entering the public life of the country or being received by Government and society as a good citizen does not arise. I am quite content to remain a prisoner. I have never thrust myself on the public life of the country or on the Government. I am but a humble servant of India. The only certificate I need is a certificate from the inner voice. I hope you realize that you gave your audience not facts but your opinions framed in anger.

The man was an experienced Civil Servant. His opinions carried weight because of his great experience of the country. Some foreigners thought that Gandhi & Co could help the war effort. They were wrong. Congress was useless. After the Brits left, the country became less capable of feeding or defending itself.  

To conclude, why have I written this letter?

Why indeed? The answer, I suppose, was that Gandhi knew he had told lies. He suspected that the wily Viceroy had given him just enough rope to hang himself. He had tried to be cautious and to avoid repeating past mistakes. But he could not help himself.  

Not to answer your anger with anger. I have written it in the hope that you may read the sincerity behind my own words.

Gandhi sincerely believed he was smart. But he wasn't smart. He was a self-deluded crackpot.  

I never despair of converting any person even an official of the hardest type. General Smuts was converted or say reconciled as he declared in his speech introducing the bill giving relief in terms of the settlement arrived at between him and me in 1914.

Smuts could not deport the Indians as he had deported the Chinese because the Indians were British subjects. But he ensured that his own people would be the masters of South Africa.  

That he has not fulfilled my hope or that of the Indian settlers which the settlement had inspired is a sad story, but it is irrelevant to the present purpose.

It is highly relevant. Gandhi snatched defeat from the jaws of victory in South Africa. He did the same thing in India on three different occasions- 1922, 1932 and 1942.  

I can multiply such recollections. I claim no credit for these conversions or reconciliations. They were wholly due to the working of truth and non-violence expressing themselves through me.

Smuts denounced apartheid. He married a Zulu lady. This was thanks to Gandhi.  

I subscribe to the belief or the philosophy that all life in its essence is one,

and fits into the same pair of underpants 

and that the humans are working consciously or unconsciously towards the realiztion of that identity. This belief requires a living faith in a living God who is the ultimate arbiter of our fate. Without Him not a blade of grass moves. My belief requires me not to despair even of converting you though your speech warrants no such hope. If God has willed it He may put power in some word  of mine which will touch your heart. Mine is but to make the effort. The result is in God’s hands. M. K. Gandhi

God's hands did not touch Maxwell's heart. The good news is that they also refrained from touching his penis or his bum. We should be thankful for small mercies.  

The Hon’ble Sir Reginald Maxwell, Home Member, Government of India, New Delhi 52 Personal New Delhi, the 17th June, 1943 Dear Mr. Gandhi, I have your letter of the 21st May and have read with interest your comments on my Assembly speech of the 15th February. I see you still maintain the position which you took up in your letters to His Excellency the Viceroy regarding the Congress resolution of the 8th August and responsibility for the disturbances that followed it. As you know, Government have never accepted the construction which you sought to put upon those events. So long as this fundamental difference exists, I must regretfully conclude that there is not sufficient common ground for profitable discussion of the other points raised in your letter. Yours sincerely, R. Maxwell

In the course of his laborious defence of his own position, Gandhi would summarize his views as follows

 1. I believe that non-violence alone is capable of defending India, not only against Japan but the whole world.

If Gandhi kept this belief of his to himself, the defence of the realm was not endangered. But Gandhi had not kept it to himself. He had launched the 'Quit India' campaign to get rid of the British who were defending the country.  

2. I do hold that Britain is incapable of defending India.

Gandhi was wrong. Britain succeeded in defending India.  

She is not defending India today; she is defending herself and her interests in India and elsewhere. These are often contrary to India’s.

This explains why Gandhi was against the Government of India. If he kept this view to himself, there would be no reason to arrest him. But he did not keep it to himself. He launched an agitation which he himself termed an 'open rebellion' with the aim of overturning the existing administration.  

3. ‘Quit India’ move was intended to result in the withdrawal of British power if possible with simultaneous formation of a provisional Government, consisting of members representing all the principal parties, if the withdrawal took place by the willing consent of the British Government. If, however, the withdrawal took place willy-nilly there might be a period of anarchy.

There was no withdrawal and no anarchy. Lawlessness was suppressed with a heavy hand. Non-Violence tried to fight Violence and got smashed to pieces.  

4. The Indian army would naturally be disbanded, being British creation—unless it forms part of Allied troops, or it transfers its allegiance to the Free India Government.

So, Gandhi admits his aim was to disband the army thus imperilling the defence of the realm.  

5. The Allied troops would remain under terms agreed to between the Allied powers and the Free India Government.

This supposes there would be a free India Government. What was to prevent a Japanese invasion? Gandhi said it was the Ahimsa fairy. But no such thing exists. The Government was right to lock up this nutter for the duration.  

6. If India became free, the Free India Government would tender cooperation by rendering such military aid as it could.

i.e. it would do nothing because it would be stupid and useless. At any rate that is what the world discovered in 1962.  

I suppose, one could argue that Gandhi had taken a gamble which, after the fall of Singapore, seemed reasonable enough. The Brits might want an excuse to give up on India and fight the Japanese elsewhere. But Gandhi's gamble did not pay off. The Brits turned out to be made of sterner stuff than the hysterical maha-crackpot. 

It must be said, Nehru understood that the Americans were interested in China and thus would want to protect the supply route from India 'over the hump' to the KMT. Thus he wanted India to continue to host Allied troops even if the Brits chose to cut and run. The problem was that the Brits were competent. Congress was incompetent. When it resigned office in 1939, the Provinces it had run did not fall apart. They did just as well under the rule of British Governors. Thus Nehru was bringing nothing to the table. He might as well sulk in jail as he had done every time the maha-crackpot launched one of his stupid agitations. 

 In the event, the eagerness of young Indians to join the armed forces, and the Indian industrialists' desire to make money from defence contracts overrode any other consideration. Communists and the Muslim League were making hay while the Sun didn't shine on incarcerated Congress leaders. The Mahasabha was gaining at the expense of Congress. The danger was that the Princes would ally with the 'Communal' parties and thus Congress would be left out in the cold. There was also the problem of Netaji Bose. The Bengalis firmly believe that Nehru wanted his rival out of the way. Perhaps, Stalin was holding Bose a prisoner in order to blackmail Nehru. 

My point is that Congress had to make some big gesture in 1942. Resigning office had been a mistake. Perhaps the safest thing was to go back to jail and wait things out. While Linlithgow was Viceroy, the Brits seemed determined to stay for another 30 years. The shrewd Scotsman had said that the introduction of air-conditioning had made India more habitable for the White man. Plenty more would soon turn up to shore up the Raj. Thankfully, his successor, Wavell- an army man- saw that India could very easily become ungovernable. His defeatism changed the atmosphere in Whitehall. Once Churchill was out of office, Britain became anxious to conciliate Congress. This meant going around Gandhi and establishing a working relationship with Nehru and Patel. Back in 1931, Churchill had warned that Nehru was using Gandhi in the hope of supplanting him. This was unfair. Nehru had a plan for India. Gandhi was a crackpot. Once, it had rid itself of Muslim majority areas, India could become a proper Nation State as Nehru had envisaged. Sadly, it turned into an incompetent, dynastic, kleoptocracy. Clearly, this was the fault of Lady Mountbatten. If only she had raped Rajaji rather than Nehru, India might now be ruled by a nice Tambram.