E-Book - Mahatma Gandhi

Five Fallacies … 147shoes, shelter, employment, medical care, and education. Theseactivities may bring us into conflict with the localrepresentatives of' the Government and with agents andbeneficiaries of big industry including multi-nationals.In the last 40 years or more we have not been able to doeither, of these, i. e. successfully canvas a Constitutionalamendment or lead the necessary peoples' action even in onevillage. (Is this an exaggeration?) A Fundamental change in theConstitution needs a clear popular mandate. It can not besecured through the peripheral support of political parties thatdo not believe in such radical change. It can come only throughelectoral action that is, if necessary, endorsed by a newConstituent Assembly. In the absence of such a mandate,Governments will only take peripheral action.A popular candidate is given only to those who areready to carry it out. Carrying out a mandate requiresadministrative action.If we are not willing to take up responsibility foradministrative action, people will choose others who arewilling to accept the power that the mandate gives, but have noconviction in, or commitment to the content of the mandate.This can lead only to the soft-pedalling of the content of themandate or to hypocritical exercise that will call for popularaction to divest the mandatories of the mandate. That can bedone only through compelling a re-election; it may be possibleto compel a re-election only through Satyagraha. There is noguarantee that choosing a new mandatory (assuming we arestill unwilling to accept the responsibility that comes with amandate) will not lead to the repetition of the earlier syndrome.Gandhi, of course, visualised the possibility ofcontrolling those in power without oneself assuming the reins