For Global Peace with Social Justice in a Sustainable Environment

League of Nation 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

League of Nation and Mahatma Gandhi

Have you noticed an unconscious betrayal of the true nature of modern civilization in Mr. Wilson’s speech explaining the League of Nations’ covenant? You will remember his saying that if the moral pressure to be exerted against a recalcitrant party failed; the members of the League would not hesitate to use the last remedy, viz., brute force. 1 I venture to submit that it will be a most disastrous thing if the questions affecting Islam are not settled by the League of Nations in accordance with enlightened Mahomedan opinion, and I suggest that the Brothers Ali may be invited to give their opinion. You cannot do better than having the Brothers in London to give the Home Government the benefit of their advice. They are amongst the honesties of Mahomedans. They are independent and able. It is their opinion and that of such Mahomedans which will count in the end with the vast masses of the Mahomedan population. I have not hesitated to tell the Mahomedans, whom I meet, that rather than harbour discontent, ill will and finally hatred, and depend upon methods of violence, it behoves them to depend on the peaceful and royal way of satyagraha. My reliance upon Satyagraha is so great that I do not despair of securing its acceptance by all the classes and communities of India on the one hand and Government on the other. For to me it is the rule of life to which to subscribe, more or less, consciously or unconsciously, often even against our will. 2

The Hindu-Muslim unity is equally a national and imperial necessity. A voluntary league between Hindus, Mahomedans and Englishmen is a league in my conception infinitely superior to and purer than the League of Nations just formed. Permanent union between the Hindus and Mahomedans is the preliminary to such Triple Union. That unity can be materially advanced by the Hindus whole-heartedly associating themselves with the Mahomedans in their very just aspirations regarding the Caliphate, holy Mecca and other holy places of Islam. 3

I gladly reproduce in another column an open letter sent to me by Miss Normanton. I do not know the lady save by her writings in India while it was being edited by her. Her views on non-cooperation are refreshingly strong and her unqualified support of the boycott of the reformed council ought to prove consoling to the waverers. But I would ask my reader not to overweigh the effect of the boycott on the British public or the League of Nations. It is better for us to rivet our attention on our own duty irrespective of the effect of its performance on outside opinion. We have over-estimated the effect of our action on British public opinion and in doing so have often damaged the true interests of the nation. At the same time Miss Normanton’s argument appears to me to be perfectly sound. 4

Nobody accepts the plea of Britain’s helplessness at the Council table of the League of Nations. The public may also recall the fact that, when the terms of the treaty of Sevres were published, the Viceroy entered upon an elaborate defence of the part played by the Premier. How comes it, then, that he finds himself again pleading the Muslim cause! Would he have done so if there had been no non-co-operation? And what has he to say even now? If the claim is disallowed and non-co-operation is still pursued, he assumes that anarchy will be the result. Therefore the Government, he threatens, will step in to restore order. We know what “restoring” order means. His Excellency forgets that, if there is anarchy in India, it would be due to the criminal breach of their duty both by the Imperial and the Indian Governments towards the three hundred millions of the people of India. 5

What is the use of the Congress President sending a cable to the League of Nations? I feel like a caged lion, only with this difference that the lion foams and frets and gnashes his teeth and lashes the iron bars furiously in the vain attempt to be free, whereas I recognize my limitations and refuse to foam and fret. If we had any power behind us, I would immediately send the cable suggested by you. 6 I could not see my way to accept their advice to send a cable to the League of Nations in the name of the Congress, and therefore sent the following answer: But the next best thing I could do was to publish the valuable letter and my reply. I do not believe in making appeals when there is no force behind them whether moral or material. Moral force comes from the determination of the appellants to do something, to sacrifice something for the sake of making their appeal effective. Even children instinctively know this elementary principle. They starve, they cry, or, if they are naughty, they do not hesitate to strike their mothers who will not grant their peremptory demands. Unless we recognize and are prepared to reduce to practice this principle we can but expose the Congress and ourselves to ridicule, if not worse. We cannot be naughty even if we will. We can suffer if only we will. I want us as Indians, Hindus or Mussalmans, Christians or Parsis, or Asiatics to realize our impotence in the face of this humiliation, barbarity, Dyerism, or call it what you will, inflicted on Syria.

A definite realization of our impotence might teach us to imitate if it is only the animals that in the presence of stormy weather come close together and seek warmth and courage from one another. They do not make a vain appeal to the god of the weather to moderate his wrath. They simply provide against it. And what is the League of Nations? Is it not in reality merely England and France? Do the other powers count? Is it any use appealing to France which is denying her motto of Fraternity, Equality and Justice? She has denied justice to Germany, there is little fraternity between her and the Riffs, and the doctrine of equality she is trampling underfoot in Syria. If we would appeal to England, we need not go to the League of Nations. She is much nearer home. She is perched on the heights of Simla except when she descends to Delhi for a brief period. But to appeal to her is to appeal to Caesar against Augustus. 7

Do you not see any difference between a cable to the President of the League of Nations and Council work? Personally I am as much opposed to Council-entry as I ever was. You may depend upon it that my part in the Patna Resolution was a matter of necessity and not of choice, Necessity in the sense that I recognize the democratic character of the Congress. And knowing that I could not convince the Swarajists of the error of Council-entry and knowing also that my best friends and co-workers had become Swarajists; I took it that I could not do less than throw my weight with them as against other political parties. Thus though I would personally dislike my appeal to the League of Nations while we were impotent, if there were two parties one wanting to approve of the French atrocity and another wanting to help the sufferers, I would throw in my weight with the latter. 8 If as a result of Miss Mayo’s effort the League of Nations is moved to declare India a segregated country unfit for exploitation, I have no doubt both the West and the East would be the gainers. We may then have our internecine wars. Hindus may be eaten up, as she threatens, by the hordes from the North-West and Central Asia that were a position infinitely superior to one of ever-growing emasculation. Even as electrocution is a humane method of killing than the torturous method of roasting alive, so would a sudden overwhelming swoop from Central Asia upon the unresisting, insanitary, superstitious and sexuality-ridden Hindus, as Miss Mayo describes us to be, be a humane deliverance from the living and ignominious death which we are going through at the present moment. Unfortunately, however, such is not Miss Mayo’s goal. Her case is to perpetuate white domination in India on the plea of India’s unfitness to rule her. 9

So far as I can say off-hand, the League of Nations may be a proper tribunal, but, I do not know whether England would agree to get the question examined by the League, and I can well understand that hesitation. Besides, the League of Nations may not undertake such a responsibility. There should be no difficulty in securing an acceptable tribunal. 10 War will never be exterminated by any agency until men and the nations become more spiritual, and adopt the principle of brotherhood and concord rather than antagonism, competition, and brute force. Those in the West do not recognize the power of spiritual things, but some day they will and then they will be free from war, crimes of violence and things that go with these evils. The West is too materialistic, selfish and narrowly nationalistic. What we want is an international mind, embracing the welfare and spiritual advancement of all mankind. 11

I should have to consider what was offered. It is not likely that I can get all I want. But if what I get is such that I can make much of it, then I might reconcile myself to it. I am prepared to compromise if necessary. I do not think that India should appeal to the League of Nations. Not now. We are still negotiating. If the Round Table Conference fails, then those who have no faith in the direct method may place India’s cause before the Tribunal of the League. But I would not do so. I prefer the method of civil resistance because it is the cleanest and the best method. The League of Nations is not strong enough to deal with the question. India is a world in itself. It is too big a bite even for the League.

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