Mansukhlal Mehta and 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

Contact No. – 09404955338, 09415777229

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Mansukhlal Mehta and Mahatma Gandhi 

 

Mansukhlal Mehta was a close associate of Mahatma Gandhi. He advised him always for his life and work for society. I am down with serious illness these days. I am confined to bed. Perhaps this will be my deliverance. Treatments continue my own. The mind is perfectly at peace. The knowledge that I have invited this illness by my own stupidity makes the pain I am going through seem less severe than it is. I think the present condition of the educated young men is pitiable. If there is anything by which I can rouse this class of people to useful work, I can now do it, but it seems to me that the time is not ripe. That class is now lost in a delusion of its own creation. I am convinced that this delusion would never have come to possess them simply through the policies of Tilak and Besant. Both these not only keep aside moral principles in politics but believe that sometimes that is the right thing to do.”Tit for tat” is a principle which they have deliberately and openly accepted. I don’t think I can at present persuade this class which has embraced their policy to accept anything from me, do what I will. Let them adopt and they will whatever they can indirectly from my work, my writings and my speeches.

If I come forward to give anything, they will reject it, as they well might. The policy of Mrs. Besant and Tilak Maharaj is mistaken, very much so indeed, but their achievement has been simply heroic. Their services it is impossible to measure. It is from them that the young got the message of patriotism. How can they, all so suddenly, disown these gurus? I would never ask them to do so, either. All the same, a time will surely come when the educated will turn away from the policy I have mentioned, though not ceasing to regard the two with reverence, such is my faith in the ancient greatness of India. It is not the Kauravas, but the Pandavas who triumphed in those times and the five men were imagined to be capable of holding their own against those hundreds of thousands. It is inconceivable to me that the youth of such a country will accept the perverted rule of “it for tat”. I shall be patient. For my part, I have been pleading with these two persons, too, but in doing all this I can only follow my own way. Sometimes this seems to bring about great delay but that is inevitable.

There are things which are done, ought to be done, only behind the scene. I have decided, this time, not to attend the Congress, and for the reasons shown above. Nor do I intend to attend the Conference of the Moderate party. My absence itself will strike the people. Everyone will begin to ask questions; if necessary, I will state my views then. I have written a long enough letter. It is not to be published. It is only for you to ponder over. 1 I am of the opinion that if a person has incurred debts he himself or his wife or children have to right to keep anything from the wealth amassed by him. But I do not know the facts of this case. And that reminds me: may I know if something has been done about the memorial to him?

 

References:  

 

1. Letter to Mansukhlal Mehta, August 17, 1918
2. Letter to Devchand Parekh, April 14, 1928