Nehru's 'Discovery of India' reveals that his real fight was not with the British. It was with Gandhi. However, Nehru's method of fighting- as Chou En Lai understood- involved sulking, throwing a tantrum and then surrendering.
It was one thing for Gandhi who, in the words of Govind Vallabh Pant, was the 'Il Duce' & 'Fuhrer' of India, to seek to help the Axis. But Nehru was supposed to be anti-Fascist. The charitable view is that Gandhi defeated Nehru and thus forced him to do his bit to help Tojo conquer India.
Nehru writes-
Within the legal framework then existing,
which would have permitted the formation of a Federal Government if the various Indian parties could agree. Nehru himself had ensured this would not happen by refusing to include Muslim League members in any of the Congress Ministries set up in 1937. That's why, when Congress resigned office after the Viceroy declared War, Jinnah said this was the 'day of deliverance' for the Muslims.
Congress proposed that a national government be formed by the Viceroy.
Did the Muslim League endorse this proposal? Did the Premier of Punjab- Sikandar Hyat Khan- or the Premier of Bengal- Fazl ul Haq? Both supported the Pakistan resolution in 1940. Since they helped the Allies, whereas Congress sought to hinder them, they, not Congress, were on the winning side and 'to the victors go the spoils'. Jews in Israel, similarly, supported the Allies and thus got Israel, just as Jinnah got Pakistan, whereas the Palestinian Grand Mufti, like Netaji Bose, had gone to cuddle with Hitler- which is why they got nothing.
The changes proposed, important as they were, could be brought about by agreement and convention.
As could the setting up of a Federal Government in 1937 or 1938 or 1939. Once Congress resigned office, it lost locus standi. It is obvious that if the Province you ruled over is being ruled well enough without you, then you have no bargaining power. It's like a guy in a key position asking for a raise. His bosses will at least pretend to listen to him. But, if he quits, and his department runs just as well in his absence, then he has fucked himself.
Statutory and constitutional changes would of course have to follow, but they could await further discussion and a more favourable opportunity, provided that India's claim to complete freedom was recognized.
Frances's claim to complete freedom was recognised. But Hitler had conquered it. To free France would require a massive deployment of American and British and Commonwealth forces.
Under these conditions, full co-operation in the war effort was offered.
But was such co-operation worth having? That was the question.
These proposals, initiated by C. Rajagopalachari, toned down the oft-repeated Congress demand; they were much less than what we had long been claiming.
But what was being offered? Was it credible or, indeed, worth having?
They could be put into effect immediately without legal difficulty.
There would have been no legal difficulty in forming a Federal Government under the terms of the 1935 Act. Nehru should have played the long game. As Azad says, he should have made a Parsi Premier of Bombay and a Muslim Premier of Bihar. He should have accommodated the League in UP and supported Fazl ul Haq in Bengal. He did none of these things. Congress Ministries implemented Gandhi's 'Basic Education' scheme and immediately alienated the Muslims.
They tried to meet the claims of other important groups and parties,
Congress could not even 'meet the claims' of the Bose brothers in Bengal.
for the national government would inevitably be a composite government.
i.e. the sort Nehru refused to countenance
They even took into consideration the peculiar position of the British Government in India.
How very kind of them! Sadly, the British took into consideration Congress's own peculiar position of being utterly shit.
The Viceroy was to continue, though it was presumed that he would not veto the decisions of the national government.
That would have been the outcome if Nehru had promoted a Federal Government in 1937. But his determination to monopolise power where Congress had won majorities destroyed this prospect and was a shot in the arm for the Muslim League.
But his presence as the head of the administration necessarily meant intimate contacts with that government. The war apparatus remained under the commander-in-chief; the whole complicated structure ,civil administration built up by the British remained.
Which is why the Japs didn't get to conquer India.
Indeed the principal effect of the change would be to introduce a new spirit in the administration, a new outlook, a vigour, and increasing popular co-operation in the war effort as well as in tackling the serious problems that were facing the country.
No. The principal effect would have been Congress politicians fucking things up while squeezing out bribes from all and sundry. As in the Bengal ruled by Fazl ul Haq and then Nazimuddin, there would have been famine as food for the public distribution system got diverted to the black market. One reason Congress won big in 1946 was because it hadn't held power during the War. Its faults were forgotten- albeit only by the Hindus. But the Muslims remembered and voted overwhelmingly for the League.
These changes, together with the definite assurance of India's independence after the war, would produce a new psychological background in India, leading to the fullest co-operation in the war.
India was shit. Even with 'full cooperation' it could not defend itself or feed itself. It took American air-power and British and African and Chinese troops, together with Indian troops, to push the Japs back.
It was no easy matter for the Congress to put forward this proposal after all its past declarations and experiences.
Because Congress was a house divided against itself. Nehru was fighting Gandhi, save when surrendering, while Bose was fighting both Nehru and Gandhi.
It was felt that a national government built up and circumscribed in this way would be ineffective and rather helpless.
Because India was shit and would remain shit. Sadly, Nehru only understood this after the Chinese invasion in 1962.
There was considerable opposition in Congress circles, and it was only after much difficult and anxious thinking that I brought myself round to agree to it. I agreed chiefly because of larger international considerations and my desire that, if it was at all honourably possible, we should identify ourselves completely with the struggle against fascism and nazism.
So, Nehru helped the Axis because it was not 'honourably possible' to help the Allies. Thankfully, no help or harm of his mattered.
But there was a much greater difficulty before us and that was Gandhiji's opposition.
Churchill's big difficulty was Hitler's belligerence ; Nehru's was Gandhi's opposition. Churchill defeated Hitler and Tojo. Nehru's 'great difficulty' was removed by Godse.
This opposition was almost entirely due to his pacifism.
In 1939, Gandhi wrote that if the British left without handing over the army to the Congress party, then the Muslims and the Punjabis (regardless of creed) and maybe also the Gurkhas would take over the country from the non-violent Hindu. This isn't pacifism. It is defeatism. It is cowardice. It is not honourable at all. It is the lowest pit of infamy
He had not opposed our previous offers to help in the war effort,
Offers don't matter. Efforts do. Congress, without holding office, could still have organized drives of various sorts (e.g. collecting scrap metal for the war effort).
though no doubt he must have felt uncomfortable about them. Right at the beginning of the war he had told the Viceroy that Congress could give full moral help only,
i.e. no help at all
but that had not been the Congress position as subsequently and repeatedly defined.
in which case, the honourable thing to do would be to part ways with Gandhi. You can't ride two horses at once. The real story here is that Gandhi decided that the Allies would lose because they were Parliamentary democracies. In other words, they kept changing their leaders. Only a whore gives herself a new master every few years. Obviously, as the Il Duce and Fuhrer of India, he was on the side of non-whorish powers. Since Hindus were shit at fighting, they should wait quietly till the Germans or the Japanese or the Italians conquered the country.
Now he expressed himself definitely against Congress agreeing to undertake responsibility for a violent war effort. He felt so strongly that he broke on this issue from his colleagues as well as the Congress organization. This was a painful wrench to all those associated with him, for the Congress of to-day was his creation. Nevertheless the Congress organization could not accept his application of the principle of non-violence to the war situation, and in its eagerness to bring about a settlement with the British Government, it went to the extreme length of breaking with its cherished and well-loved leader.
That extreme length wasn't very far at all. It just meant sulking in jail. There is no big difference between the conscientious objector who says he won't fight and the guy who refuses to fight but offers to do so if he is crowned Queen Empress of Essex.
The situation in the country was deteriorating in many ways.
Not for the Muslim League
Politically this was obvious. Even economically, while some among the peasantry and the workers were somewhat better off owing to war conditions, large numbers had been hit hard. The persons who were really prospering were the war profiteers, contractors,
i.e. the financiers of Congress
and a horde of officials, chiefly British,
chiefly Indian. Brits were patriots. Those fit enough to do so, tried to get into the Army. Unlike the Indians, Brits didn't want Hitler to conquer their green and pleasant land.
employed at fancy salaries for war work.
Communists got fancy salaries after Hitler invaded the Soviet Union.
The Government's idea apparently was that the war effort would be best promoted by encouraging the motive for excessive profit.
No. The Brits really wanted to defeat Hitler. They were patriots.
Corruption and nepotism were rampant
in Nehru's Congress which is daughter and then his grandson and great grandson turned into an ancestral property
and there were no popular checks on them.
but assassination tempered autocracy. Nehru's daughter and grandson were killed. That's why the dynasty preferred to install a prone proxy Prime Minister.
Public criticism was considered a discouragement of war effort and hence to be put down by the all-embracing provisions of the Defence of India Act. It was a discouraging spectacle.
For those opposed to the war effort- which Nehru tells us Gandhi was. Congress too was discouraging that effort though it offered to support it if it was declared Queen Empress of Essex, Estonia and Ecuador.
All these factors induced us to try our utmost once again to arrive at a settlement with the British Government.
This is the crux of the problem. Congress, even when trying its utmost, was utterly useless.
What were the chances? Not very promising. The whole Organization of the permanent services was enjoying a freedom from control and criticism such as they had not had for more than two generations.
In other words, Congress Ministries hadn't 'added value'. They had been stupid, incompetent and corrupt. In any case, capable Indians could always be appointed to offices where they could make a contribution. Nehru & Co weren't capable though they were ambitious, opportunistic and wholly self-serving.
They could clap in prison any person they disapproved of, with or without trial.
But they couldn't preside over ethnic cleansing- as Nehru would do when he became Prime Minister.
The Governors enjoyed unrestrained power and authority over vast provinces. Why should they consent to a change unless they were forced to do so by circumstances ?
Why should Muslims trust Nehru if he gained unrestrained power and authority over India? The Muslim population of Delhi fell from 33 percent to 5 percent when Nehru assumed supreme power.
The British Governor of an Indian province remained a British patriot. He wanted Hitler and Tojo to be defeated. Gandhi didn't. Congress, Nehru says, may have cooperated to defend India but only in exchange for being recognised as the ruler of undivided India.
Over the top of the imperial structure sat the Viceroy, Lord Linlithgow, surrounded by all the pomp and ceremony befitting his high position.
An Indian would soon occupy that office and be surrounded by 'pomp and ceremony'. Nehru himself moved into the mansion of the Army Commander-in-Chief.
Heavy of body and slow of mind, solid as a rock and with almost a rock's lack of awareness, possessing the qualities and failings of an old-fashioned British aristocrat, he sought with integrity and honesty of purpose to find a way out of the tangle.
Linlithgow wasn't popular, but he was smart. He got everything which could be got out of India for the War effort. Admittedly, it wasn't enough to turn back Tojo. Only American air-power could avail in that respect.
But his limitations were too many; his mind worked in the old groove and shrank back from any innovations;
Which is why he succeeded.
his vision was limited by the traditions of the ruling class out of which he came;
traditions which were utile. The innovative traditions established by Nehru and his dynasty were inutile. They made India unable to protect minorities, secure its borders or even feed itself.
he saw and heard through the eyes and ears of the civil service and others who surrounded him;
as would Nehru and Indira and so forth
he distrusted people who talked of fundamental political and social changes;
e.g. the BJP taking power.
he disliked those who did not show a becoming appreciation of the high mission of the British Empire and its chief representative in India.
Congress doesn't like anyone who does not appreciate the great intellect of Rahul baba.
In England there had been a change during the dark days of the German blitzkreig over western Europe. Mr. Neville Chamberlain had gone and that was a relief from many points of view. The Marquess of Zetland, that ornament of his noble order, had also departed from the India Office without any tears being shed.
He had pushed through the 1935 bill which enabled Congress to form Ministries. He resigned because he knew Churchill had opposed that bill.
In his place had come Mr. Amery, about whom little was known,
but much could be discovered from Hansard. Congress, it seems, didn't bother.
but this little was significant. He had vigorously defended in the House of Commons Japanese aggression over China,
Manchuria. The Japs were propping up the last Manchu Emperor in 'Manchuko'. But they were also propping up India. If Churchill hadn't defeated Tojo, Nehru would have died in a Japanese prison though Bose may have been a puppet 'Rashtrapati'.
giving as an argument that if they condemned what Japan had done in China, they would have to condemn equally what Britain had done in India and Egypt. A sound argument used perversely for a wrong purpose.
Like the argument given for Nehru's dynasty to continue to treat the Congress party as its ancestral property.
But the person who really counted was Mr. Winston Churchill, the new Prime Minister.
People were right to count on Churchill. He defeated Hitler, Mussolini & Tojo- albeit only because Hitler was crazy enough to break his pact with Stalin and then, quite gratuitously, declare war on the US.
Mr. Churchill's views on Indian freedom were clear and definite and had been frequently repeated. He stood out as an uncompromising opponent of that freedom. In January, 1930, he had said: 'Sooner or later you will have to crush Gandhi and the Indian Congress and all they stand for.'
There was no need. Gandhi would ensure that all other parties in India would unite against Congress and thus Britain would dictate the scope and scale of reform.
In December of that year he said: 'The British nation has no intention whatever of relinquishing control of Indian life and progress.... We have no intention of casting away that most truly bright and precious jewel in the crown of the King, which, more than all our dominions and dependencies, constitutes the glory and strength of the British empire.'
Labour had been saying the opposite since 1918. Thanks to Gandhi and Motilal and then his son, they weren't able to fulfil their manifesto pledge till their third administration. But, the price was partition.
Later he explained what those magic words 'Dominion status,' so frequently thrown at us, really meant in relation to India. In January, 1931, he said: 'We have always contemplated it (dominion status) as the ultimate goal, but no one has sup-posed, except in a purely ceremonious sense in the way in which representatives of India attend conferences during the war, that the principle and policy for India would be carried into effect in any time which it is reasonable or useful for us to foresee.'
Actually, the thing could have been done in 1924 or 1931- if Gandhi hadn't fucked things up.
And, again, in December, 1931: 'Most of the leading public men—of whom I was one in those days—made speeches—I certainly did—about dominion status, but I did not contemplate India having the same constitutional rights and system as Canada in any period which we can foresee. .. .England, apart from her empire in India, ceases for ever to exist as a great power.'
To be fair, Churchill was in the wilderness and had to take his friends where he could find them.
That was the crux of the question. India was the empire; it was her possession and exploitation that gave glory and strength to England and made her a great power.
This indeed is the crux of the matter. If India mattered to Churchill, then his fellow Harrovian, Nehru could attain glory by ruling India and turning it into a shithole unable to feed or defend itself. Moreover, the Indian National Congress- founded by an ICS officer, A.O Hulme- must become the hereditary property of his own imbecilic descendants.
Mr. Churchill could not conceive of England except as the head and possessor of a vast empire, and so he could not conceive of India being free.
But Jinnah could conceive of Muslim majority provinces being Nehru free. Khalistanis were less lucky. Still, a great principle was established. To get rid of Gandhis- shoot or blow them up. Nehru may not have helped the Axis very much but what is certain is that Godse was, for him, a veritable godsend.
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