Public Finance- 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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Public Finance- Mahatma Gandhi

 

 

I hold the manifestation of the corruption in the Mandir to be merely the reflection of the wrong in myself. Nothing has been further from my thoughts in writing the above lines than to arrogate to myself superior virtue. On the contrary, I sincerely believe that the impurity of my associates is but his manifestation of the hidden wrong within me. I have never claimed perfection for myself. Who knows my aberrations in the realm of thought have reacted on the environment round me. The epithet of “Mahatma” has always galled me and now it almost sounds to me like a term of abuse. But what am I to do? Should I flee or commit suicide or embark on an endless fast or immure myself alive in the Mandir or refuse to handle public finance or public duty? I can do none of these things mechanically. I must wait for the voice within. I am an incorrigible optimist. I have the hope of attaining swaraj even through the purification of the Mandir. But I must first try discovering and removing my own shortcomings. Therefore in spite of the full knowledge of the grave short it comings and failures of the Udyoga Mandir, I still live on the hope that will one day justify its existence and reconvert itself into the Satyagraha Ashram. 1

I have nearly finished your monograph on Public Finance. So far as I have gone I like it and I would like to publish it in Young India and then perhaps separately in pamphlet form. If you are agreeable please telegraph your assent Anand Bhawan Allahabad. 2 Sjt. Kumarappa, M.A., B.Sc., is a Fellow of the Society of Incorporated Accountants. He has travelled abroad to gain practical experience and is now for the time being at any rate, if not permanently, in the Gujarat Vidyapith. He has written several informing chapters on public finance and our poverty. These being seasonable I propose to publish in installments in these pages. The reader will learn as he proceeds that according to Sjt. Kumarappa India spends 93.7 % on debts, military and administrative expenses as against 48.8 % spent by America. The money thus spent by India largely goes out of it; what is spent by America remains in it. Thus the richest country in the world spends about half of what India the poorest country in the world spends on administration. So long as this crushing burden is not removed there is no swaraj whether one knows it by the name Dominion Status or Independence. The reader should carefully study these chapters which contain facts rather than arguments. 3

Next in importance and almost part of the central resolution must be deemed the one dealing with our financial obligations. Everyone who knows anything of public finance knows how extravagant this Government is and how heavy is the load of debts that is crushing the nation. Everyone knows also what concessions have been given to foreigners in utter disregard of the national interest. These cannot demand, dare not expect recognition from independent India under the much abused name of vested interests. All vested interests are not entitled to protection. The keeper of a gambling den or of a brothel has no vested interest. Nor has a corporation that gambles away the fortunes of a nation and reduces it to impotence. The Congress at Gaya therefore passed a comprehensive resolution repudiating certain debts. The last, whilst reaffirming the Gaya resolution, lay down that obligations or concessions pronounced to be unjust and unjustifiable by an independent tribunal shall not be recognized by the independence Government to come. No exception can, in my opinion, be possibly taken against such a reasonable proposition. To shirk the issue is to invite disaster. 4 The booklet is a reprint, revised where necessary by the author, of the chapters written by Professor Kumarappa and published in Young India. They examine the economic policy of the British Government and its effect upon the masses. They are therefore very seasonable. The value of the chapters is enhanced by the addition of a very careful and copious index prepared by the author himself. I commend the booklet both to the Indian as also the Western readers. 5

 

References:

 

1. The Bombay Chronicle, 8-4-1929
2. Letter to J. C. Kumarappa, November 14, 1929
3. Young India, 28-11-1929
4. Young India, 9-1-1930
5. Foreword to Public Finance and our poverty, April 20, 1930