For Global Peace with Social Justice in a Sustainable Environment

Economic Life and Mahatma Gandhi

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

Economic Life and Mahatma Gandhi

It has often been urged that India cannot adopt swadeshi in the economic life at any rate. Those who advance this objection do not look upon swadeshi as a rule of life. With them, it is a mere patriotic effort not to be made if it involved any self-denial. Swadeshi, as defined here, is a religious discipline to be undergone in utter disregard of the physical discomfort it may cause to individuals. Under its spell, the deprivation of pin or a needle, because these are not manufactured in India need cause no terror. A swadeshi will learn to do without hundreds of things which today he considers necessary. Moreover, those who dismiss swadeshi from their minds by arguing the impossible forget that swadeshi, after all, is a goal to be reached by steady effort. And we would be making for the goal even if we confined swadeshi to a given set of articles, allowing ourselves as a temporary measure to use such things as might not be procurable in the country. 1

When we have sufficiently cultivated this spirit of fearlessness, we shall see that there is no salvation for us without true swadeshi, not the swadeshi which can be conveniently put off. Swadeshi for me has a deeper meaning. I would like us to apply it in our religious, political and economic life. It is not, therefore, merely confined to wearing on occasion swadeshi cloth. That we have to do for all time, not out of a spirit of jealousy or revenge, but because it is a duty we owe to our dear country. We commit a breach of the swadeshi spirit certainly if we wear foreign-made cloth, but we do so also if we adopt the foreign cut. Surely, the style of our dress has some correspondence with our environment. In elegance and tastefulness, it is immeasurably superior to the trousers and the jacket. An Indian, wearing a shirt flowing over his pyjamas with a waist-coat on it without a necktie and its flaps hanging loose behind, is not a very graceful spectacle. Swadeshi in religion teaches one to measure the glorious past and re-enact it in the present generation. The pandemonium that is going on in Europe shows that modern civilization represents forces of evil and darkness, whereas the ancient, i. e., Indian, civilization represents in its essence the divine force. Modern civilization is chiefly materialistic, as ours is chiefly spiritual. Modern civilization occupies self in the investigation of the laws of matter, and employs human ingenuity in inventing of discovering means of production and weapons of destruction; ours is chiefly occupied in exploring spiritual laws. Our shastras lay down unequivocally that a proper observance of truth, chastity, scrupulous regard for all life, abstention from coveting others’ possessions and refusal to hoard anything but what is necessary for our daily wants is indispensable for a right life; that without it a knowledge of the divine element is an impossibility. Our civilization tells us with daring certainty that a proper and perfect cultivation of the quality of ahimsa which, in its active form means purest love and pity brings the whole world to our feet. The author of this discovery gives a wealth of illustration which carries conviction with it. 2

There are a number of other defects too. But we cannot wait till these defects are removed and a new system established. We cannot stay under a flag which our boys were forced into saluting. Students, steady your hearts. If these institutions are to be shunned, then even the study of the Gita and the Koran there should be given up. You will not get here those huge mansions Here we have neither houses nor lands. But it is good to live and work in a thatched hut. It is bad to have to salute the Government flag [though living] in a palace. Every student who wishes to come forward should boldly declare: It is not my function to improve educational institutions; I have no time for it. If new teaching institutions are started, education will automatically be cleansed. If I come here it is because non-co-operation has found its way into the hearts of Babu Bhagwandas and Babu Shivprasad. This institution has been founded for the furtherance of non-cooperation. For us non-co-operation alone is shastra. Other knowledge metaphysical or religious is not shastra. There is no place here for selfish knowledge. We want to do away with it or raise it into something higher. If we do service today it is out of selfishness, with the desire to make our wives and children happy. We must serve the nation. Let us all work for the nation. We do not want to indulge in the gambling that is trade. We shall turn India into a punyabhumi. Every year a sum of Rs. 60 crore goes from here to foreign countries as the price of cloth. I shall tell you the way to stop this. We can install Sita (land)2 here after we bring her from Lanka, but we have to stop this stripping of Draupadi. It is not possible at once to make the land our own, but we should not let them deprive us of cloth. We should solemnly declare that it is a sin to wear foreign cloth. Both Hindus and Muslims can easily understand this because to both self-control and sacrifice are matters of religion. Using foreign cloth is a sin. Our first duty is to ply the charkha. Those who run this institution will remember this. We can save Rs. 60 crore with the aid of students. And we must save it. It is up to the students to do it. It will purify our economic life. 3

Let us now examine the suggestion made by the correspondent. It is true that agriculture occupies a place of importance in our economic life. But it has not disappeared; it is still there. We have got to revive it. There is in it scope for improvement. But improving agriculture is beyond the capacity of those who are engaged in national education. We can do nothing to improve it without the help of the State. It will need lakhs of I rupees which will have to be spent merely on the preliminary experiments. I am sure that this cannot be done without swaraj, for Government laws relating to agriculture should be in accord with the economic conditions of the country. There should be model farms at numerous places throughout the country for the dissemination of agricultural knowledge and the peasants and farmers should be provided various facilities to enable them to do their work more efficiently. All these things are lacking today in India. But in South Africa, Australia and other countries where there are popular Governments wedded to the welfare of the people, the peasants do enjoy all these advantages. Therefore, the next best thing the national educationists have—is the charkha, as is admitted by the above correspondent. And the institutions which have adopted charkha as the medium of national education can accommodate all the youths wishing to go in for national education, and can train them to become self-reliant. Bu their knowledge of the Charkha must be both comprehensive and scientific. Such youths are being trained gradually, and as the movement for khadi advances national education will also expand and extend over a larger and larger field. 4

Friends have told me there were special difficulties in Europe to adopt non-violent means. Europe consists of martial races unlike India. Here all know how to wield arms. All the male population has at one time or other wielded arms. It is difficult for you to understand the efficacy and beauty of non-retaliation. Why not punish the wrongdoer and in an exemplary manner? That is what is asked everywhere here. Thus non-violence is quite foreign to Europe. For people belonging to such a country it is difficult to strike out a new path. Your economic life is so constructed that it is not possible, generally speaking, for an ordinary man to get out of the ordinary rut unless he faces poverty. And the fourth difficulty is that in Catholic Europe the iron discipline allows very little free play to the intellect. These are the four difficulties we have not to face in India which you have to face. If India becomes free through non-violent means, it won’t enter upon war. But if she does, God will give me strength to fight India single-handed. 5

The centre of this village worker’s life will be the spinning wheel. I am sorry I have not been able yet to bring home to anyone the message of the spinning-wheel in all its implications. The reason is that my life itself is not a true echo of the message. But it came home to me again and again during my nine months’ peregrinations in India. We have not yet sufficiently realized that hand-spinning is a supplementary industry of universal application and scope in India. The village weaver cannot live but for the spinning-wheel. He gets his yarn no doubt from the mills, but he is doomed to destruction, if he is to remain forever dependent on the mills. Today, the spinning-wheel has established itself in our economic life only to the extent that it is needed to minister to the clothing needs of the new class of khadi weavers that has sprung up during the past decade. But a large body like the Spinners’ Association cannot justify its existence to fulfil that limited object. The idea at the back of khadi is that it is an industry supplementary to agriculture and co-extensive with it, that it is the life breath of millions of Harijan weavers who derive their sustenance from it. The spinning-wheel cannot be said to have been established in its own proper place in our life, until we can banish idleness from our villages and make every village home a busy hive. Unemployment and idleness of millions must lead to bloody strife. Khadi is the only alternative to this and not the so-called socialism, which presupposes industrialism. The socialism that India can assimilate is the socialism of the spinning-wheel. Let the village worker; therefore, make the wheel the central point of his activities. 6

The essay (which should be in English) should trace the early history of the barter system, the causes of its decline, and the possibilities of its revival at present. It should also describe the purpose it served in the past and the part it can play in the future economic life of the world, with particular reference to its adaptability to the Indian village life concerning some or all of the departments of its activities. The essay should discuss the conditions congenial for its successful working and development and to what extent the assistance of the ruling power is required for the same, and should indicate the nature and mode of exchange if the adoption of the system is recommended. The essay should also discuss the effects of the barter system on the development of the internal and international trade of India. 7

What they need is not knowledge of the three Rs, but knowledge of their economic life and how they can better it. They are today working as mere automatons, without any responsibility whatsoever to their surroundings and without feeling the joy of work. We are entirely responsible for this state of things, as we have had no intimate contact with them. We have indeed studied their Politico-economic condition, as did the late Romesh Chandra Dutt. But whilst we have been told of the state to which they have been reduced, they do not know how they themselves can partly or wholly remove their poverty. Now I think it is possible to show them how to double their income. You will say they are heavily taxed. That they are, but I am not concerned with that problem at the present moment. Our present policy is to leave all politics or politico-economics alone. You will therefore begin with a study of their social, hygienic and moral condition. You may use magic lantern slides for the purpose. You have to show them that untouchability is no part of religion, and that the idea of superiority of status is foreign to any true religion. Just as a healthy man does not regard an unhealthy man as inferior to him in status, even so a teacher or a merchant may not regard a scavenger as inferior to him. You have to teach them these fundamentals of religion and ethics. Then you will teach them geography and history you will begin with the history of their own village. Now I would teach them the three Rs. as a means for imparting knowledge of these things, but you do not need to make them matriculates or graduates for this purpose. Knowledge of English may be a source of income in these days, but it is not necessary to add to the health of one’s mind or body. All our energy has been sapped in mastering a foreign language and in reading tons of books which in no way help us to keep ourselves physically and morally fit or to serve the villagers. You will thus see where I bring in knowledge of the three Rs. It comes in at the end, and at the long end at that, and not in the beginning, and then, as a help to things permanent. You cannot more usefully pass an hour every night with them than by teaching them the laws of health, social morals, and the way of a strenuous life of easy labour. 8

For the last two or three months efforts were being made for the members to meet here, For this reason I had expected that you would try in the mean time and exhibit articles made here. Had this been done, all of us would have had the opportunity to see what Savli could do. But this criticism should be borne in mind for the future. The sessions of our Sangh will always be held in villages. On such occasions we should undertake a study of the local industries and the products to explore the potentialities of the place and content ourselves with exhibiting only the things that it can produce. We must also see that we do not confuse the aims of such exhibitions with those of a museum. There can be a display of ancient things which have no connection with our economic life. But such museums should be where they belong; they have no place in our sessions. Our duty is to concentrate on only those industries and crafts which are capable of being revived. Now when you go and see the exhibition, also note what things are not there and what could have been included. 9 Then I take the economic. The economic life of the Harijans has got to be lifted out of its miserable state. I venture to think that by a judicious and thoughtful working out of the programme, it can be prosecuted in a short time and with a limited financial outlay, in such a manner that Harijans may be easily able to hold their own by being taught to turn an honest chakram. Nor can the State now dare neglect the mental training I mean literary of these people. I know to my cost that today it is very difficult to carry on a connected conversation with Pulayas and Pariahs so that you can get a ready response even about simple facts of life. 10

The work touches the social and economic life of the people who are engaged in it. For the week, I wish to draw attention to a great experiment the branch is making in enabling spinning to yield a wage equal to any in the villages. Three annas per day was the minimum accepted provisionally and in the transition stage instead of eight annas minimum I have aimed at. If the buying public were to give intelligent and patriotic help, the objective can be achieved sooner than expected. The present experiment is one of increasing wages by inducing the spinners to do their own carding. The result has been most gratifying. Sixteen workers spun for two weeks slivers carded for them and after being taught carding for one month they spun their own slivers. The result was that in the place of 161 chhatank, they spun in the same period 198, the average count increased from 14 to 18, the test from 55 to 59, their earnings from Rs. 12-4-0 to Rs. 24-0-3. This is a striking example of how with intelligence and application earnings can even be doubled. 11

If we are able to adopt the charkha intelligently we can revive the entire economic life of our villages once more. But we can progress only as far as the strength of our members takes us. I do not wish to create a fresh universe, like Vishwamitra, who wanted to take Trishanku to heaven but the poor fellow remained suspended half way. Therefore, we have to work within the limits of our strength with our feet on the hard earth. 12 Today we are not really able to help the villagers. By offering the spinners three, four, six or eight annas I comfort myself with the belief that I have given them a livelihood. But it amounts to nothing more than a dole, for the work that I am providing them is not of a permanent nature. In case we get control of the State in our hands and by that means close all mills, it may perhaps then be possible to provide them permanent work. But today I cannot hide from them the truth that I have been only trying to fill their idle hours. If I have to provide them with some money I shall teach them other crafts also. I shall fully acquaint them with the present economic situation and educate them in this regard. No doubt I would wish to give work to every spinner who comes seeking it. But I shall not send the khadi thus produced to Bombay. I shall ask the workers to sell it in the neighbouring villages. But this is not enough. I must investigate what work other than spinning can be provided to them in the village. Only by revising the entire economic life of the village can our work become permanent. Whether for villagers or for us, I agree, cities will always have some sort of attraction. Nevertheless we shall be free from our present day city life. We shall show how in contrast to the cities more amenities can be provided in the villages. But if we merely go on sending to Bombay the khadi produced in the village, this object can never be accomplished, however high a wage we may pay to the village spinners. I allotted an hour every day for discussion with you because I believed that through such discussion my own thinking would be clarified. I am convinced that we shall have to introduce fundamental changes in our mode of work. If we are destined to fail we shall face it; we shall do so with full knowledge and alertness, not in our ignorance or folly. Even then if people laugh at me I shall bear it. They might say: ‘Gandhi wasted a crore of rupees. But of course no one pocketed it.’ I need your help in deciding whether what I am saying is correct. 13

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