E-Book - Mahatma Gandhi

Mahatma Gandhi – His Life & TimesChapter XXVIIFunds And JewelsIN the latter part of 1924, the world was subsiding into postwar normalcy. TheDawes Plan undertook to stabilize German economic and political conditions.The big European powers were granting diplomatic recognition to Soviet Russia.Except in south China, where Chiang Kai-shek had an alliance with Moscow, thethreat of Bolshevism was on the ebb. Coolidge and complacency presided overAmerica. England had experienced her first Labour government. The BritishEmpire, seriously menaced in 1919-23 by Sinn Fein in Ireland and Near Eastrevolts, was becalmed in stagnant waters.India, too, relaxed—and pursued the luxuries of division and inaction. Thepassions of the post- Armistice-post-Amritsar period were spent. Doubts anddespondency had replaced faith and fighting spirit. Perhaps Gandhi's nonviolencedampened the ardour of belligerent nationalism. His twenty-one-dayfast had failed. It impressed many and altered the attitude of some, but Hindu-Moslem tension continued unabated.Gandhi did not consider this a time for a contest with Britain. It was a time formending home fences. His programme was: prepare morally for future politicalopportunities; concretely—Hindu-Moslem unity, the removal of untouchabilityand spreading the use of homespun or khadi khaddar. In his propaganda forhomespun, Gandhi charged the British with killing India's village industries tohelp the textile mills of Lancashire. Otherwise, his writings and speeches during1925, 1926 and 1927 were remarkable for an almost complete absence ofdenunciations of British rule. He more often criticized Indians. 'I am notinterested', he said, 'in freeing India merely from the English yoke. I am bentupon freeing India from any yoke whatsoever.' For this reason, he could neverget excited about participation in the legislative or municipal councils: 'Swaraj',he affirmed, 'will come not by the acquisition of authority by a few but by theacquisition by all of a capacity to resist authority when it is abused.' A fewhundred Indians were elected to councils, and a few thousand Indians, mostlywww.mkgandhi.org Page 255