THE EDICTS OF GANDHI
[To the Editor of the SPECTATOR.] SIR,—" Your own correspondent" in India, displays a very correct appreciation of the "edicts of Gandhi," when he makes good-natured fun of that misguided enthusiast and his saltmaking antics, and describes his childish ideas about the boycott of foreign cloths, the repudiation of State debts, and the exchange question as matters "of which Mr. Gandhi knows no more than he does of Chinese meta.. physics."
-But I venture from long intimate experience, to point
out that your correspondent's idea that there is amGagst the Indian masses a strong "emotional surge towards Swaraj, expressed in the yearning for Independence," is entirely without grounds and could only be held by people who only know the more or less educated Indians, who are a quite insignificant minority, a small fraction of 1 per cent. of the population. Nobody can know the truth of this question till he has lived as I have, in intimate relations with the coolie, and the ryot, and the small tradesman ; speaking their language, and possessing their confidence. Every man so qualified will know that so far from there being any "yearning for Independence," the very idea of it is unintelli- gible to the Indian illiterate masses, and talk of it simply fills them with puzzlement and apprehension of losing the security and impartial justice of British rule, which they prize highly, because no Indian trusts any other Indian of different creed or class or race to do him justice.
These are the root facts of the situation in India which must be realized as indispensable preliminaries to a true understanding of the subject of Indian "yearnings," Your other correspondent Mr. J. D. Jenkins while sound enough on the ineptitude of Gandhi's plan of campaign, is surely careless of his logic when he questions the idea that the British "have done good for the ' untouchables," on the grounds of the very bad health record of the Bengalis, as reported by the Director of Health of that province.
The rural unhealthy Bengalis, in the first place, are not largely "untouchables," but chiefly Mahomedans who have no caste at all, and secondly, even if the health statistics are still lamentably bad, there is nothing to show that they were not at least as bad before the British came in, while there can be no doubt that the roads, railways, canals, and steamers introduced by the latter, have done away with the famine and pestilence that used to sweep the country frequently and, combined with new industries, have enormously improved the prosperity of the country and the standards of living. That is what the " British rule has done for the ' untouchables,' " as well as for all the others. The nonsense talked about the " exploitation " of the country by the British can be exposed in two words, by giving the enormous figures of the gold and silver bullion imported yearly into India.—I am, Sir, &c.,
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