Congress Ministries and Ahimsa – Mahatma Gandhi

[Prof. Dr. Yogendra Yadav]

Prof. Dr. Yogendra Yadav

Senior Gandhian Scholar, Professor, Editor and Linguist

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

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Congress Ministries and Ahimsa – Mahatma Gandhi

 

People find it strange that men, who once called themselves satyagrahis should, on becoming Ministers, resort to the use of the army and the police. They feel it is a violation of ahimsa, whether accepted as a creed or as a policy. It would seem they are right. This contradiction between the belief and the practice of Congress Ministers confuses our workers and they find it difficult to face the critics, inside the Congress and those outside the Congress who want to make capital out of it. By and large the ahimsa of the Congress has been the ahimsa of the weak. This was the only thing possible under the prevailing conditions in India. I admit that there can be no objection to people who accept ahimsa only as a policy accepting positions of power. Thus many Congressmen have accepted positions in the Government and you have permitted them to do so. But having won power through ahimsa, how should we practise ahimsa in such a way government becomes redundant? If you do not suggest a way Satyagraha will be deemed to be an insufficient means for the end we seek. I think the answer is easy. For some time now I have been saying that the words “truth and non-violence” should be removed from the Congress constitution. If we proceed on the assumption that whether these words are removed from the Congress constitution or not we certainly have become removed from truth and ahimsa, we shall be able to judge independently whether a certain action is right or wrong. I am convinced that so long as the army or the police continues to be used for conducting the administration we shall remain subservient to the British or some other foreign power, irrespective of whether the power is in the hands of the Congress or others. Let us suppose that Congress ministries do not have faith in ahimsa. Let us suppose further that Hindus, Muslims and others seek protection from the army or the police. In that case they will continue to get such protection. Then these Congress Ministers who are votaries of ahimsa and do not like to seek help the army or the police may resign. This means that so long as people have not learnt to settle their quarrels themselves, goondaism will continue and we shall never be able to generate the true strength of ahimsa in us. Now the question is how to generate such strength. I answered this question [in the Harijan of] August 41 in my reply to a letter from Ahmadabad. So long as we do not develop the strength to die bravely, with love in our hearts, we cannot develop in us the non-violence of the brave. Would there be State power in an ideal society or would such a society be Stateless? I think the question is futile. If we continue to work towards the building of such a society, to some extent it is bound to be realized and to that extent people will benefit by it. Euclid has defined a straight line as having no breadth, but no one has yet succeeded in drawing such a line and no one ever will. Still we can progress in geometry only by postulating such a line. This is true of every ideal. We might remember though that a Stateless society does not exist anywhere in the world. If such a society is possible it can be established first only in India for attempts have been made in India towards bringing about such a society. We have not so far shown that supreme heroism. The only way is for those who believe in it to set the example.

 

 Reference:

Harijan Sevak, 15-9-1946