E-Book - Mahatma Gandhi

Mahatma Gandhi – His Life & Timesand Sessions judge. Sir J. T. Strangman, Advocate-General of Bombay,prosecuted. Gandhi and Mr. Banker had no lawyers. Heavy military patrolsguarded the building and nearby streets. The little courtroom was crowded.Admission passes were marked: 'Sessions Case No. 45 of 1922. Imperator vs (1)Mr. M. K Gandhi (2) Mr. S. C. Banker.'After the indictment was read and the Advocate-General had stated the caseagainst Gandhi, the judge asked the Mahatma whether he wished to make astatement. Gandhi had a written statement ready. He introduced it with someoral, extemporaneous remarks. The Advocate-General, Gandhi said, 'wasentirely fair... It is very true and I have no desire whatsoever to conceal fromthis court the fact that to preach disaffection towards the existing system ofgovernment has become almost a passion with me'. Indeed, he had preachedsedition long before the prosecution said he had. 'I do not ask for mercy. I donot plead any extenuating act. I am here, therefore, to invite and cheerfullysubmit to the highest penalty that can be inflicted upon me for what in law is adeliberate crime and what appears to me to be the highest duty a citizen. Theonly course open to you, the Judge, is as I am going to say in my statement,either to resign your post, or inflict on me the severest penalty if you believethat the system and the law you administer are good for the people. I do notexpect that kind of conversion, but by the time I have finished with mystatement you will perhaps have a glimpse of what is raging within my breast torun this maddest risk that a man can rim.'Gandhi then read his prepared statement to 'explain why, from a staunchloyalist and co-operator, I have become an uncompromising disaffections andnon-co-operator'. In South Africa, he began, his contacts with the British werenot happy; 'I discovered that I had no rights as a man because I was an Indian'.But he thought this 'was an excrescence upon a system that was intrinsicallyand mainly good.' So, he criticized the government but supported it, and joinedin two wars which it fought. In India, too, he recruited for the British Army. 'Inall these efforts at service,' he explained, 'I was actuated by the belief that itwww.mkgandhi.org Page 229