For Global Peace with Social Justice in a Sustainable Environment

Ahimsa and Mahatma Gandhi- XXVI

Prof. Dr. Yogendra Yadav

Senior Gandhian Scholar, Professor, Editor and Linguist

Gandhi International Study and Research Institute, Jalgaon, Maharashtra, India

Contact No. – 09404955338, 09415777229

E-mail- dr.yadav.yogendra@gandhifoundation.net;

dr.yogendragandhi@gmail.com

Mailing Address- C- 29, Swaraj Nagar, Panki, Kanpur- 208020, Uttar Pradesh, India

Ahimsa and Mahatma Gandhi- XXVI

When a woman is assaulted she may not stop to think in terms of himsa or ahimsa. Her primary duty is self-protection. She is at liberty to employ every method or means that come to her mind in order to defend her honour. God has given her nails and teeth. She must use them with all her strength and, if need be, die in the effort. The man or woman who has shed all fear of death will be able not only to protect himself or herself but others also through laying down his or her life. In truth we fear death most, and hence we ultimately submit to superior physical force. Some will bend the knee to the invader, some will resort to bribery, some will crawl on their bellies or submit to other forms of humiliation, and some women will even give their bodies rather than die. I have not written this in a carping spirit. I am only illustrating human nature. Whether we crawl on our bellies or whether a woman yields to the lust of man is symbolic of that same love of life which makes us stoop to anything. Therefore only he who loses his life shall save it. Every reader should commit this matchless shloka to memory. But mere lip loyalty to it will be of no avail. It must penetrate deep down to the innermost recesses of his heart. To enjoy life one should give up the lure of life. That should be part of our nature. 1

I have been telling you for the last twenty-one years that any advice regarding the practice of ahimsa is as good as an order to a satyagrahi. A satyagrahi can defy an order from without, as he can a Government law, but he voluntarily accepts something that comes from within. He cannot ignore the advice coming from within. Yesterday should have been a golden day for us, for we were engaged in awakening the religious spirit in us. If the question that has been raised today had been raised yesterday I could have suggested a way. If nothing else I would have got a lesson or two written down on the black-board. What has happened is indicative of our mental lethargy. We have to rid ourselves of it. Do you suppose that during the days of the Zulu rebellion, if that night we had been ordered to learn a few key Zulu words before the break of day any laxity in this regard would have been tolerated? Often the armed forces are made to learn some rudiments of the language of the enemy country before marching into that country. Here I had asked you to learn the language of friends. Please do not think that I am complaining. I am only telling you what your duty is. There is a saying in Gujarati, ‘Morning is when you wake up’. Forget about yesterday and make an earnest beginning today. Learning of Urdu requires perseverance and if we can acquire similar perseverance in other things a great power can arise out of the number of people sitting here. But today we have fallen a prey to a kind of inertia which makes it difficult for us to do anything. Inertia by itself is a very useful thing. Without it nature cannot precede even one step. But when it grows too much it becomes a flaw. Many today say: ‘Today we are sunk in tamoguna. We shall first have to traverse through rajoguna and then we shall arrive at sattva.’ Is this necessary? Today we permit heaps of garbage to lie in front of our homes and thus feed the disease and the doctors. Is not this same inertia at the bottom of it? 2

Legally and constitutionally the President is the sole authority. If there is a conflict of opinion between the majority of the Working Committee and the President, as was once the case in the early stages, the majority view would supersede the President’s. But on critical occasions legal opinion is not of much value. People have their favourite heroes, and they will follow the heroes even blindly. My advice, therefore, is that in the ticklish question of ahimsa each one should be his own authority not on the law but on interpretation. If all the four distinguished leaders whom you have mentioned were to sit together, they would probably give the same interpretation, but in the course of their speeches each would put his special emphasis on one aspect or another of the same matter. 3

Both the propositions you have cited may be said to be valid. One can say that the validity of a principle does not depend on its practice, and also that it does. The second statement would be more befitting in the case of a moral principle. What is the use of a principle that nobody puts into practice? What is the test of its validity? What would be the value of ahimsa if nobody observed it? 4 But we would not have succeeded in doing that and so we adopted the middle path. We made whatever progress we could. We had no means of forcing others, have none and shall have none. The Charkha Sangh is a symbol of ahimsa and at the same time a great experiment in it. It is based purely on a sense of justice. It endeavours to do justice to those who have long been denied it. All of our decisions should therefore be guided purely by a sense of justice. 5

But today we have to go a step further. We have to take the risk of violence to shake off the great calamity of slavery. But even for resort to violence one requires the unflinching faith of a non-violent man. There cannot be any trace of violence either in my plans or in my thoughts. A non-violent person has complete faith in God. My ahimsa was always imperfect and therefore it was ineffective to that extent. But I have faith in God. In this context I say: “Rama is the strength of the weak.” There is no trace of violence in my consciousness or in the remotest corner of my being. My very being is full of consciousness. How can a man who has consciously pursued ahimsa for the last fifty years change all of a sudden? So it is not that I have become violent. The people do not have my ahimsa. And therefore I have to take a risk, if I cannot curb their violence. I cannot remain inactive. I will certainly launch a non-violent movement. But if people do not understand it and there is violence, how can I stop it? I will prefer anarchy to the present system of administration because this ordered anarchy is worse than real anarchy. I am sure that the anarchy created by our efforts to mitigate this dangerous anarchy will be less dangerous. The violence exerted then would be just a trifle compared to the existing violence. Violence which is due to the weakness of human nature is bound to be there. Crores of people in the country have no weapons.

Even if they indulge in violence among themselves how long can they do it? Ultimately they will have to listen to me even if some of them die in mutual violence. We have to take the risk of anarchy if God wills it. However, we shall try our best to prevent violence. If in spite of that there is violence then it is His wish. I am not responsible for that. But if I enjoy my milk and remain inactive and unconcerned about the terrible violence that is going on in the name of resisting a possible foreign aggression and about the prevalent, dangerous, orderly anarchy in the name of administration, I will be proved guilty. My ahimsa will not be effective at all then. For me such a situation will be intolerable. I will be ashamed of such ahimsa. Ahimsa is not such a useless thing. I hope that pure ahimsa will arise out of such anarchy. 6

I am sorry that after association with me since his discovering himself and allowing himself to be arrested, Sardar Prithvi Singh has parted company with me, having lost all faith in me all of a sudden and as a result of a single talk with me. This naturally led him to tender his resignation from the Ahimsak Vyayam Sangh. As a natural corollary to this step, the trustees of the Sangh have decided to wind up the Sangh and close the Vyayam Shala, which was established by the Sangh, purely to let him make an experiment and find out, under guidance, the scope and quality of non-violent Vyayam. I am hoping that, though he has lost faith in me, he has not lost it in ahimsa to which he was led after close and careful self-examination during years of secrecy. 7

Prophets and supermen are born only once in an age. But if even a single individual realizes the ideal of ahimsa in its fullness, he covers and redeems the whole society. Once Jesus had blazed the trail, his twelve disciples could carry on his mission without his presence. It needed the perseverance and genius of so many generations of scientists to discover the laws of electricity but today everybody, even children, use electric power in their daily life. Similarly, it will not always need a perfect being to administer an ideal State, once it has come into being. What is needed is a thorough social awakening to begin with. The rest will follow. To take an instance nearer home, I have presented to the working class the truth that true capital is not silver or gold but the labour of their hands and feet and their intelligence. Once labour develops that awareness, it would not need my presence to enable it to make use of the power that it will release. 8

I can’t say at the moment what we shall do in the jail if the Government arrests me and others because I myself do not know. I shall have to do what occurs to me at the time. What is more important is what those who stay behind will do. The conditions which are imposed every time will not be there this time. There will be only one condition, that of ahimsa, and that is indispensable. This should not be interpreted to mean that people will be exempted from constructive work. Those who know its value will never give it up. But when masses are called upon to sacrifice themselves on the altar of independence some specified conditions will be relaxed as had been done in the earlier mass movements. So when the leaders are arrested every Indian will consider him a leader and will sacrifice himself, and will not worry if his action results in anarchy. The blame for the anarchy will go to the Government which under the pretext of anarchy or under some other pretext goes on consolidating its own anarchy. Our ahimsa will remain lame as long as we do not get rid of the fear of anarchy. This is the time to prove that there is no power stronger than ahimsa in this world. 9

Volition and the other are undertaken in obedience to a general. What happens in a violent war? The soldiers put their faith in the general and plunge into the fire. Why cannot this be done in a non-violent war? This time I have also made a slight change in my concept concept of non-violence. In 1920 and 1930 I had laid down that observance of ahimsa in thought, word and deed was indispensable. Now I feel that it is not right to expect four hundred million people to accept this view and to wait till they do. Now I only tell them to abstain from violence in word and deed. When I send any satyagrahi to break a law, I merely say: “Leave your lathi here and go and do this work without using abusive language.” The success of the work which this will ensure will drive out thoughts of violence from his heart also. Supposing a non-violent struggle has been started at my behest and later on there is an outbreak of violence, I will put up with that too, because eventually it is God who is inspiring me and things will shape as He wills. If He wants to destroy the world through violence using me as His instrument, how can I prevent it? He is so subtle that it is beyond man to know Him. Though electricity is a subtler power, we can certainly find out something about it. But God is still subtler and all-pervading. All that we can say about Him is that it is a Power at whose bidding everything goes on. But it is impossible to find out what that Power is. We can only put our faith in Him and it is that faith which is moving me. 10

Everyone is free to go the fullest length under ahimsa. Complete deadlock by strikes and other non-violent means. Satyagrahis must go out to die not to live. They must seek and face death. It is only when individuals go out to die that the nation will survive. 11 No secret organization, however big, could do any good. Secrecy aims at building a wall of protection round you. Ahimsa disdains all such protection. It functions in the open and in the face of odds, the heaviest conceivable. We have to organize for action a vast people that have been crushed under the heel of unspeakable tyranny for centuries. They cannot be organized by any other than open, truthful means. I have grown up from youth to 76 years in abhorrence of secrecy. There must be no watering down of the ideal. Unless we cling to the formula in its fullness, we shall not make any headway. 12

What a difference between our spinning-wheel and their machines driven by steam or electricity? But all the same I prefer the snail-like speed of the spinning-wheel. The spinning-wheel is a symbol of ahimsa, and ultimately it is ahimsa that will triumph. If, however, we who claim to be its votaries are weak, we shall dishonor ourselves and discredit ahimsa. Your activity is excellent indeed. But you should now introduce some new changes in it. There is a science of the spinning-wheel, as there is one of machines. We have still not fully evolved the “technique” of the spinning-wheel. It requires deep study. 13 Why can’t you two warriors meet? I have not written to Shamaldas. We have a gigantic task before us. I have come to understand from our talks that you have started believing in ahimsa and truth. The strength derived from these two virtues should be organized. It seems to be going waste these days. True ahimsa needs no organization. It is always organized. 14 The struggle between the forces of good and evil is ceaseless and eternal. The former have truth and ahimsa as weapons against the letter’s falsehood, violence and brute force. There is nothing more potent in the universe than God’s name. If we enthrone Him in our hearts and keep Him there always, we shall know no fear and lay for ourselves rich treasure in life. 15

I will not meddle with this during this month. All of you may do what you think well. Everybody has truth and ahimsa in him. This need not have been mentioned in the last meeting of the Charkha Sangh, for the circular was drafted on that assumption. What you are doing about the kitchen must be all right. See that the men whom you engage are clean in body and mind. Their clothes, etc., should be decent. You should look after their all-round education. This should include their children. You should also go and inspect their homes. If they are well trained, we can influence the villages sooner through them. We must go deep into whatever work we do. 16 Realization of Truth is not at all possible without ahimsa. That is why it has been said that ahimsa is the supreme dharma. 17

The villagers will follow my language. They will not be able to follow a language which is full of Sanskrit and Arabic-Persian words. If those in the Hindi Sahitya Sammelan should say that they are going to sponsor a Sanskritized language, then, as far as I am concerned, the Sammelan does not exist. The language of the villages is only one. They cannot have two languages. The champions of Hindi want me to blow the trumpet for Hindi only and to forget Urdu. But I am a satyagrahi believing in ahimsa. 18 Whether I succeed in my desire to live to 125 years will not depend on doctors or medical science, though in my own way I have used the aid of both a good deal. It will depend on my ability fully to translate into practice the principles of truth and ahimsa. My experience of ahimsa has taught me that even in the work of service the pace should not be too fast. I confess that in this I have been only partially successful. I cannot regulate my pace sufficiently. Old, settled habits are not overcome all at once. I know undue haste is bad; it impedes work instead of facilitating it. 19

I have conducted many strikes. I can, therefore, give you the conditions of a successful strike. The first is that the cause should be clear and just. Secondly, the strikers should be firm and not be afraid of starvation, physical assaults or even death. Thirdly, they should never deviate from the path of truth and ahimsa in whatever they might do. Fourthly, the strikers should have public support behind them. If you can satisfy all these four conditions you should stand firm, but if you fall short in any of these respects you should boldly retrace your steps. I cannot give you further guidance. The details are for you to decide. 20 You will win over everyone by ahimsa. The heat there is stifling. You have to overcome that also. Everyone cannot go to a cool place. You must make that place itself as cool as you can. Take Dr. Kelkar’s help. He is a nice man and he has written to me about this. Make one house cool with his help. 21

Democracy need not be dismissed wholesale. It is based on ahimsa. There is profound truth in the saying “The voice of the Panch is the voice of God”. But the Panch should be worshipper of God. 22 The experiment which Munnalal is conducting in regard to the ‘servants’ is good. That is what should be done. If it fails, it will show that our ahimsa is as yet very incomplete. The error is one of understanding. Let us not treat servants as servants but as brothers. Even if they spoil things or steal or the expenses go up, it will not be in vain if we can consider them as members of the family. Think it over. 23

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