E-Book - Mahatma Gandhi

Mahatma Gandhi – His Life & Timesdeserved or could wisely use. Gandhi always endeavoured to win, convert andconvince the adversary, not wrestle with him in a pool of blood. Bardoli wasready for civil disobedience.But on February 5 something happened in the United provinces in ChauriChaura, eight miles from Bardoli. In that small town, an Indian mob committedmurder. There had been a legal procession, Gandhi reported in Young India ofFebruary 16, 1921. 'But when the procession had passed, the stragglers wereinterfered with and abused by the constables. The former cried out for help.The mob returned. The constables opened fire. The little ammunition they hadwas exhausted and they retired to the Thana (city hall) for safety. The mob, myinformant tells me, therefore set fire to the Thana. The self-imprisonedconstables had to come out for dear life and as they did so they were hacked topieces and the mangled remains were thrown into the raging flames.'The news of this atrocity reached Gandhi in Bardoli on February 8, and it madehim sick and sad. Violence upset him physically and psychologically. 'Noprovocation,' he exclaimed, 'can possibly justify brutal murder of men who hadbeen rendered defenceless and who had virtually thrown themselves on themercy of the mob.'It was a 'bad augury'.'Suppose,' he asked, 'the non-violent disobedience of Bardoli was permitted byGod to succeed and the government had abdicated in favour of the victors ofBardoli, who would control the unruly elements that must be expected toperpetuate inhumanity upon due provocation?' He was not sure that he could.He accordingly suspended the campaign in Bardoli and cancelled any defianceof the Government anywhere in India. Let the opponent glory in our humiliationor so-called defeat,' he exclaimed. 'It is better to be charged with cowardiceand weakness than to be guilty of denial of our oath and to sin against God. It isa million times better to appear untrue before the world than to be untrue toourselves.'www.mkgandhi.org Page 224