The native states were a vast network of "fortresses" of British imperialism in India, and their rulers owed their existence to British arms. Human rights were non-existent there; the people lived in feudal bondage; and the princes were mostly a most depraved and despotic lot with nothing but the British paramount power to put any restraints on them.
There was a close nexus between them and the Indian big bourgeoisie. Much of the capital invested in Indian industries came from the princes like Gwalior, Baroda, Mysore, Bhopal and Travancore. They were among the largest investors in industries promoted by Indian big capitalists, and extended to them many other facilities.
It was not the Congress policy to liquidate these outposts of imperialism but to preserve them with some facelift as a bulwark against democratic anti-colonial revolution.
The Nehru Committee Report of 1928 assured the princes that, in the event of their agreeing to join `British India' in a federation, the future Government of India, as envisaged in the committee's `model constitution', would honour their treaties with the East India Company and all subsequent treaties and that there was "no desire to override cherished privileges or sentiments" of the princes.(75)
We may quote again what Gandhi declared at the Round Table Conference in 1931 :
"There is a States People's Conference and it is held back under my iron rule. I have been holding them back.... I have asked them to be satisfied with their present position."
At the conference he reassured the princes:
"Even up to now the Congress has endeavoured to serve the Princes of India by refraining from any interference in their domestic and internal affairs."
The Lucknow Congress in April 1936 adopted this formally as a principle despite the demands of the rank-and-file Congressmen and of the representatives of the states people that the Congress should lead the struggles for democracy in the native states.
The demands of the states people were modest: civil liberties, end of begar (corvee) and similar feudal obligations, and representative government. They wanted that `princely India' should not be politically segregated from 'British India' and expected advice and help from the Congress in their struggles.
The policy of the Congress leaders, on the other hand, was not only a policy of non-intervention in the affairs of the native states but a policy of intervention where necessary on behalf of the princes and the raj, a policy of smothering all sparks and flames of struggle against the direct rule of the princes and the indirect rule of the imperial power. The Congress leaders wanted to make the princes their allies. Replying to an accusation that he was a friend of the capitalists, Patel said that for achieving freedom the help of capitalists, landlords as well as princes should be sought.(76)
Throughout India, from the south to the north, there was an unprecedented awakening among the people of the native states in the years from 1937. In different states they had been setting up their own organizations -- Praja Parishads, Praja Mandals or State Congresses, and the All India States People's Conference was formed in 1936. Demanding civil liberties and representative governments the people started the civil disobedience movement in some states. Mysore led the way in 1937. The struggle spread to Travancore, Hyderabad, the states in Central India, the Eastern Agency States in Orissa, Western India, Punjab states and to Jammu and Kashmir. Peaceful meetings and demonstrations were brutally broken up and often fired upon. Tens of thousands were jailed; thousands were killed or maimed; and other atrocities were common features. In the Punjab states and Kashmir, "satyagrahis were locked up in prison in hundreds and thousands". In a small Orissa state, Ranpur, the people, victims of "unprecedented repression and abhorrent reactionary methods", and infuriated by the killing of one of them by the British Assistant Agent to the Eastern Agency States, clubbed him to death, which was followed by a "policy of frightfulness". Besides the Congress Prime Minister and other Congress leaders of Orissa, Nehru, who had no word of condemnation for the atrocities committed on the people, came out in fierce denunciation of the people and described their act as a "crime".(77)
On 26 April 1938 the police fired on a peaceful meeting in the Kolar district in Mysore, killing 32 persons and wounding 60, when the people defied the order banning the hoisting of the Congress flag and prohibiting meetings. Gandhi said in a press statement:
"We can never know with absolute certainty whether the firing was justified.... It must be a matter of opinion and opinions always have a knack of varying."
That is, according to the prophet of non-violence, this firing might be justified.
In the thirties, when an Indian `federation', as envisaged by the British, became a strong possibility, and the struggles of the people became more and more defiant, the Congress leaders, particularly Gandhi, while recognizing the right of the princes, advised them to "read the writing on the wall" and grant some civil liberties and introduce some form of representative government. They wanted the princes to associate men of the upper stratum with their rule and become less barbarous. They wanted the native states to be represented in the proposed federal legislatures partly by the nominees of the princes and partly by the representatives of the upper stratum of their subjects(78) (as actually happened after the transfer of power in 1947). Thus, they hoped to dominate the Indian `Federation" under the aegis of the colonial masters.
On 19 October 1937, when the Mysore government was pursuing a policy of ruthless repression of the people, Congress president Nehru wrote to Sir Mirza Ismail, dewan of Mysore:
"...it should be possible for Congressmen and state authorities, though differing from each other, to find some basis for mutual adjustment....I realize fully that a government has to take action against certain forms of subversive activity....I can assure you that I have every desire to avoid anything in the nature of conflict between the Congress and the Mysore state authorities."
Next day Nehru instructed the secretary of the Karnataka P.C.C. that
"direct action should therefore be avoided.... Our general policy should be to avoid a conflict with the state authorities..."
At a public meeting in Mysore on 9 May 1938, Patel admonished the Mysoreans :
"You must remember that they are Indian States and not foreign States. The struggle for freedom under the aegis of the Indian National Congress is freedom for 350 million people including Indian States' people and Indian princes."(79)
Mysore raised a storm within the Congress. Despite all the efforts of the leaders including Nehru, who was presiding, the AICC meeting, held in October 1937, adopted a resolution, the notice of which had been given by 80 members and which a majority of members insisted on being taken up. The resolution protested against the ruthless policy of repression launched by the Mysore state and its suppression of civil rights and liberties and appealed to the people of the Indian states as well as of `British' India to give all support to the people of Mysore in this struggle.
In an article Gandhi openly condemned the resolution. He found it very "offensive" and said that it was ultra vires of the resolution of non-interference adopted at the Lucknow Congress in 1936 and that it departed from truth.
Gandhi was so angry that in a note to Patel, dated 1 November, he asked Patel to resign from the Working Committee and said that he had suggested to others to do the same, leaving Nehru "completely free to have his own cabinet". "The reasons for resigning", he stated, "are obvious. The Mysore chapter and increasing differences of opinion..."(80)
Nehru's line was essentially the same as Gandhi's: his only offence was that as president he failed to avoid permitting the taking up of the Mysore resolution at the AICC meeting in the face of the insistent demands of a majority of its members though he tried hard to do so. Later, he openly confessed that he disliked the resolution.(81)
Both Gandhi and Nehru kept on insisting that the movement must remain always non-violent whatever the provocation. Gandhi further refined his ideas of non-violence, for the new situation demanded a "new technique". Among the new ideas that he developed were :
1. Non-violence "becomes a species of violence" when, "instead of bringing about a change of heart in the adversary, it fills him with panic".
2. Non-violent struggle may lead to greater repression and serve "further to arouse the brute in those in power" instead of putting "the brute in everyone to sleep".
3. If suspension of civil disobedience results in an accentuation of repression (and this is what actually happened in many states), it itself becomes "satyagraha in its ideal form".(82)
So Gandhi called a halt to civil disobedience in Mysore, Travancore, Talcher and Dhenkanal in Orissa, Jaipur, Rajkot and so on. He asked the states people to give up mass satyagraha for an indefinite period, "open a way to honourable negotiation with the authorities", lower "the pitch of the immediate demands", not to worry about the imprisoned satyagrahis, and to ply the spinning-wheel.(83)
In the late thirties the Congress leaders found it unwise to leave the native states to the radical elements like the socialists and communists. Nehru, Patel, Gandhi, Jamnalal Bajaj, etc., decided to enter the field to `control and discipline' the rebellious states people directly. Nehru was president of the All India States People's Conference from 1938 to 1946, when he was succeeded by Pattabhi Sitaramayya. Barbara Ramusack suggests that Nehru decided to claim the presidency of the AISPC because "in 1938 both he and Gandhi wanted to prevent Bose from adding this organization to his power base". (84)
One of the most dramatic episodes was Gandhi's appearance on the political stage of Rajkot, a tiny state in Kathiawar, the land of his birth, where a movement for representative government had been going on. Patel had preceded him and concluded an agreement with the ruler (the Thakore Sahib). But at the dictate of the British Resident, Gibson, the Thakore Sahib refused to honour the agreement. Gandhi considered it "insufferable that the Congress, which is today in alliance with the British Government, should be treated as an enemy..." He gave an ultimatum to the ruler and when it had no effect he went on a fast "purely in answer to the voice of God", and sought "immediate intervention of the Paramount Power". After exchange of messages with the Viceroy, who suggested arbitration by the Chief Justice of India's Federal Court, Maurice Gwyer, Gandhi broke his fast and went to Delhi to see Linlithgow. Maurice Gwyer's award went in favour of Patel but the Rajkot chief raised some more points. Gandhi renounced the Gwyer award and made a "sporting offer" to the Thakore Saheb to nominate his committee over the composition of which there was dispute. When the chief refused the offer, Gandhi acknowledged his defeat, recognized his "error"; for his fast, though undertaken, as he said before, "purely in answer to the voice of God", had been "tainted with himsa", and he appealed to the chief and his advisers "to appease the people of Rajkot".(85)
Rajkot served two purposes: first, it left the prince and the Paramount Power happy and the people confused and bewildered with their movement in a shambles; second, it diverted popular attention from Tripuri where another, much greater and more important, trial of strength was taking place. We shall deal with that in the next section.
On 1 November 1937 Gandhi wrote to Patel :
"I have observed that Subhas is not at all dependable. However, there is nobody but he who can be [the next] president."(86)
Why, then, did Gandhi decide to nominate Subhas as Congress president for the Haripura session of the Congress due to meet in February 1938 ?
When the Government of India Act 1935 was published, Gandhi offered presidentship of the Congress to Nehru. Nehru's term as president was extended for one more year. He served Gandhi's purpose well. When his rhetoric humoured the left and kept it on the right rails, he co-operated fully with Gandhi to guide the Congress to work the provincial part of the GOI Act -- and quite loyally, to the complete satisfaction of the Linlithgows.
While working the provincial part, the Congress leaders were loud in declaring their determination to combat the federal part of the constitution. And the radical elements within and without the Congress were assured of a confrontation between the raj and the Congress on this issue. True to his commitments to the raj, conveyed through Birla, Gandhi wanted quietly to get the Congress to work the federal part and negotiations went on in 1937 and 1938. He hoped to tame Subhas by making him Congress president and use him as he had used Nehru to neutralize all opposition to his move.
It appears from the correspondence between Birla and Gandhi or Gandhi's secretary Mahadev Desai that Birla was assiduously performing his task as a broker between the Viceroy and Gandhi. Birla told Linlithgow in December 1937 that "at the proper time Bapu would" propose a "constructive" solution within the framework of the GOI Act and appealed to him to have direct talks on the issue with Gandhi and Nehru before federation was imposed.
He also said that "Gandhi had personally cancelled a proposal that Congress Ministries should resign if federation was implemented.... According to Birla, however, the Mahatma would not oppose Federation because of his objection to the States' position.... Birla then said that Federation ought to be brought in without delay... while he [Gandhi] was alive, he could make it possible to secure Federation..." Linlithgow discussed the issue with Bhulabhai Desai. "Like Birla, he wanted Federation as soon as possible..." Early in 1938 Birla saw Linlithgow again. "He thought that Congress was moving towards acceptance of Federation. Gandhi was not overworried, said Birla, by the reservation of Defence and External Affairs to the Centre, but was concentrating on the method of choosing the States' representatives." In the course of the discussion Birla "suggested that the best course might be to let the Muslims have their Federation of the North-West".(87)
Lord Lothian came and became Gandhi's guest at Sevagram for two days in January 1938. Gandhi gave him a note which proposed that the states peoples should be represented through election and assured the raj that "once the right status of the Congress is fully recognized the rest becomes easy". Some "formula" suggested by Gandhi was given by Lothian to Linlithgow.
Gandhi's letter of 4 April 1938 to the Viceroy is revealing. Gandhi wrote :
"May I simply send by wire to P.S.V. [Private Secretary to the Viceroy] the day of my arrival in Delhi without giving the sender's name?... Now about secrecy, I am bound to tell some of my friends what I am doing.... I shall of course see to it that nothing goes to the Press. The fewest possible persons will be told. I assume too that you refer to secrecy before we meet. Isn't secrecy impossible after we have met?"(88)
Gandhi, who preached tirelessly his sermons asking the militant anti-imperialists to abjure secrecy, for secrecy stained the white radiance of his creed of non-violence and was morally repugnant, felt no compunction to plan and work in secret collusion with British imperialism.
So the process was being repeated -- the process which had changed wrecking the Act utterly to working the provincial part of it.
Besides Birla and Bhulabhai Desai, Agatha Harrison and Carl Heath were active. Nehru informed the Working Committee from Paris on 1 August 1938 that he had been informed that Bhulabhai had indicated in London that "if some minor changes were made the federation would be accepted". (Desai denied only to add one more instance of double-speak.) In a letter of 1 September to Kripalani and a note of 6 September to the Working Committee, Nehru wrote that Gandhi himself was sending "brief and cryptic letters to Lothian and Agatha Harrison about federation, etc.", which Lothian interpreted to mean that Gandhi was "prepared to accept federation, subject to some developments". Continuing, Nehru said that Gandhi "has hinted that under certain circumstances it might be possible to work a federation" and that thus "we might avoid conflict and strengthen ourselves if certain things were done". "These by themselves", Nehru added, "are not satisfactory but the alternative of conflict will not be worthwhile at this stage if these things are done." So Nehru, too, wanted to avoid conflict and accept Federation, if a few conditions were satisfied.(89)
Carl Heath, who was in constant and friendly touch with Lord Lothian and the Secretary of State, suggested to Gandhi that Gandhi, Nehru, Subhas Bose and other leaders should make a joint statement on the issue of Federation. Gandhi replied that it would not be "easy for the Congress leaders to make a statement offhand. Whatever has to happen will happen as a result of negotiation between parties. Let this be made clear that there is no real difference between Jawaharlal and me."
As noted before, defence, external affairs and several other subjects, besides an overwhelmingly large part of federal finance would be under the control of the Governor-General under the GOI Act. As Tomlinson writes,
"Gandhi seemed readier to accept a compromise on these matters (that the Viceroy would discuss them with his Council but retain control over them himself)."(90)
The main objection of Gandhi and his associates was over the nomination of the states' representatives to the federal legislatures by the princes, for they were afraid that in that case they would not be able to dominate the centre. They wanted the states to be represented partly by the princes and partly by the people, as Gandhi said to Guy Wint.
On 2 January 1939, the deputy leader of the Congress party in the Central Assembly, S. Satyamurthi, appealed to the Viceroy to hold consultations with Gandhi immediately and come to a settlement. He said that the changes which would satisfy them did not require amendment of the Act but could be effected through Orders-in-Council. He was afraid that delay might strengthen the extremist elements in the Congress.
Sometime in April or May 1939, Lord Lothian wrote to Birla:
"It looks as if the Mahatma is gradually swinging Congress round to the policy he outlined to me when I went to stay with him at Segaon."(91)
Subhas refused to toe Gandhi's line and took an unequivocal and uncompromising stand against Federation. Before his return to India, the president-elect, as Agatha Harrison informed Nehru, had talks with the Secretary of State, Halifax and others and "had been very frank with them and they were under no delusion as to the situation or to the determined front against federation". On the eve of the Haripura Congress, Subhas issued a press statement :
"My term of office as the Congress President will be devoted to resist this unwanted federal scheme with all its undemocratic and anti-national features..."(92)
True to his words, he carried on an extensive campaign against federation. When reports appeared in the British press about behind-the-scene negotiations between Congress leaders and the raj over Federation, Subhas issued a press statement on 9 July 1938. He said that he had already contradicted such a statement which appeared in the Manchester Guardian and that he could hardly believe that any influential Congress leader was negotiating for a compromise on this issue "behind the back of the Congress". He regarded "any weakness shown by the Congress or any section thereof during this fateful hour in India's history" as amounting to "treachery of the first magnitude to the cause of India's freedom". He declared that if the federal scheme was foisted on the Congress, "it will break the Congress" and that he would relieve himself of "the trammels of office" in order to put up "open, unmitigated and unrelenting opposition to the monstrous Federal scheme". There were many who did not relish the statement.
Again, on 15 July Subhas issued another statement in which he stated that the resolution adopted at Haripura left "no room for equivocation". While appealing to all to "sink our differences and present a united front to the British Government", he warned that the acceptance of the federal scheme by a majority would "inevitably cause a split" within the Congress".(93)
At the AICC meeting in September 1938, the amendments to the Working Committee resolution on Federation, demanding preparations for a mass movement against it, were thrown out. Besides, the Working Committee's resolution on civil liberties warning radical Congressmen against "acts of or incitements to violence", etc., drafted by Gandhi, was passed amid protests by `leftists' including Congress socialists and Kisan Sabhaites, who staged a walk-out. Gandhi denounced the walk-out and affirmed that the Congress "has been since 1920 like an army in action having one will, one policy, one aim and exact discipline". He asked those who challenged his policies to leave the Congress and warned: "If chaos is to be prevented, proper measures must be taken in time."
Gandhi decided that Subhas must go. In reply to two letters from Patel's daughter Maniben, he wrote on 28 October:
"What is happening regarding Subhas Babu is not out of my mind.... But father [Patel] was of the view that we should wait till Jawaharlal's arrival [from Europe], so I kept silent. There is bound to be some difficulty this time in electing the President."(94)
Gandhi tried to win over all those who could be won over. He invited Jayaprakash Narayan through his wife Prabhavati to "spend some days with him". "I sincerely wish", he wrote, "that we should understand each other correctly."
Gandhi offered Congress presidentship to Azad and, when he refused, suggested to Nehru that he might "try again" (for the third consecutive term) and in case he was unwilling, Pattabhi would be the best choice. When a Working Committee meeting in about mid-January 1939 was over and Subhas had left, Gandhi, Patel, Nehru, Azad, Bhulabhai Desai, Rajendra Prasad and Kripalani decided to set up Pattabhi Sitaramayya as the candidate, though they knew that several provinces had already sent their nominations in favour of Subhas's re-election.(95)
When Subhas decided not to withdraw from the contest, Gandhi's close associates became indignant and Patel wired to Sarat Bose that Subhas's re-election would "be harmful to [the] country's cause". Then, at the instance of Gandhi, Patel, Prasad, Kripalani, Bajaj, Bhulabhai Desai, Shankarrao Deo and Doulatram issued a joint statement as members of the Working Committee, opposing Subhas's re-election on the plea that it would violate the Congress policy of not "re-electing the same President, except under very exceptional circumstances", and commended Sitaramayya to the Congress delegates for election. Gandhi had suggested that Nehru might sign the joint statement or issue an "independent statement", and Nehru preferred to issue an "independent statement" opposing Subhas's re-election.(96) The entire Congress high command was ranged against Subhas.
A bitter controversy raged. Subhas refuted the contention that re-election was contrary to Congress principles. He challenged the claim of a group within the Congress to "dictate the selection of the Congress President every time" and asserted that "the delegates should have a free and unfettered choice". In reply to the statements of Gandhi's associates, including Nehru, which claimed that there was no difference within the Congress on the issue of Federation, he stated that "some influential Congress leaders have been advocating conditional acceptance of the Federal scheme in private and in public". He offered to withdraw in favour of "a genuine anti-federationist" like Narendra Dev of the CSP.
Subhas won the election that took place on 29 January with 1580 votes against Sitaramayya's 1377 though the high command had pooled all its resources to defeat him. Even in the previous years, before the Haripura Congress, "the Gandhian leaders wrote to their associates in the ministries and the Provincial Congress Committees asking them to ensure that dissident Congressmen were excluded as far as possible from election as delegates to the General Session and to the AICC".(97)
The issue was: which would prove stronger in the contest -- the forces of radical change seeking to overthrow imperialism and its domestic props or the forces which pursued a policy of constitutionalism and collaboration with imperialism to attain the goal of self-government within the imperialist framework? By electing Subhas as President, the former had thrown a challenge to the latter. Whether rightly or wrongly, Subhas had become in their eyes a symbol of change, a symbol of anti-colonial struggle.
Shankardass observes ;
"Bose came closest to destroying the hegemony of the Gandhiites and the latter had to resort to a change of rules to gain a victory over him.... ultimately, victory over the Gandhiites was well-nigh impossible, for, in addition to a vast and controlled organization, they had enormous control over vested interests which had been further strengthened by the power and patronage that accompanied their role as incumbents."
The odds against the forces seeking change were no doubt tremendous. But these forces were also inherently weak -- ideologically, politically and organizationally. Ideologically, Gandhi and Gandhism as well as Nehru and his `socialism' still cast a spell over a large section of them. Politically, they had no correct strategy of revolution and their links with the masses -- the workers and peasants, who, if roused, politically awakened and organized, could effectively challenge the mighty forces ranged against them -- were weak. They themselves lacked the confidence that they could lead a revolutionary struggle for freedom despite the opposition of the Congress stalwarts. Organizationally, they were disunited; suspicion and distrust and political rivalry divided them.
After the election Gandhi announced that Sitaramayya's defeat was his defeat -- the defeat of the "principles and policy" he represented. While magnanimously conceding that Subhas was "not an enemy of his country", he challenged those who sought change to implement their "policy and programme" and gave a veiled threat of a split within the Congress.(98) Both before and after the election Nehru did more, as Subhas said, than anybody else to harm the cause he represented. Nehru and others accused Subhas of casting "aspersions" on the other members of the Working Committee about carrying on negotiations with the raj for an eventual compromise on the Federation issue. They were fully aware that negotiations had been going on. Besides, Subhas had accused not all his colleagues on the Working Committee but "some leading members of the Congress". Now they all came out with an air of injured innocence to demolish the man who opposed their policy.
Gandhi, who pursued a policy of co-operation with the British imperialists, knew that there could be no co-operation with those who wanted to reverse this policy. In his letter of 5 February 1939 he informed Subhas that his associates would refuse to serve on the new Working Committee. Twelve of them -- Patel, Prasad, Azad, etc., -- submitted on 22 February a joint letter of resignation from the old committee. As usual, Nehru issued a separate statement which led people to believe that he had resigned.
Gandhi decided not to attend the Tripuri session due to meet in March and so informed Nehru on 3 February. As early as 27 January Mahadev had written to Birla that Gandhi would attend Tripuri if Pattabhi won but that he might not do so in case Subhas succeeded.(99) Gandhi left for Rajkot on 25 February.
Subhas had been seriously ill for some time but he went to Tripuri where he lay in bed. His opponents thought his illness a fake one and, refusing to trust even Reception Committee doctors who reported on his illness, had him examined by a panel of three doctors -- Inspector General of Civil Hospitals, C.P. and Berar, Director of Public Health, C.P. and Berar, and Civil Surgeon, Jubbulpore. They were of opinion that it was "imperative for Sjt. Bose to take complete rest, both mental and physical".(100)
In the course of his address to the session, the chairman of the Reception Committee, Seth Govind Das, affirmed:
"Our Congress organization can be compared and is similar to the Fascist Party of Italy, the Nazi Party of Germany... Mahatma Gandhi occupies the same position among Congressmen as that held by Mussolini among Fascists, Hitler among Nazis..."
Govind Vallabh Pant moved the following resolution, drafted by Patel and propagated as approved by Gandhi, who was then in Rajkot:
"The Congress declares its firm adherence to the fundamental policies of the Congress which have governed its programme in the past twenty years under the guidance of Mahatma Gandhi..."
While expressing confidence in the work of the Working Committee that functioned in the previous year, the resolution regretted "any aspersion cast against any of its members". It further stated :
"the Congress regards it as imperative that the Congress executive should command his [Gandhi's] implicit confidence and requests the President to nominate the Working Committee in accordance with the wishes of Gandhiji."
Replying to the debate on the resolution, which was no doubt ultra vires of the Congress constitution, Pant declared that
"wherever nations had progressed, they had done so under the leadership of one man. Germany had relied on Herr Hitler. Whether they agreed with Herr Hitler's methods or not, there was no gainsaying the fact that Germany had progressed under Herr Hitler."(101)
The CSP delegates opposed the resolution at the meeting of the Subjects Committee but, under the influence of Nehru, remained neutral at the delegates' session, and the resolution was passed.
The conflict was over another significant issue -- a closely related one. Since the Munich Pact in September 1938, Subhas had been carrying on an open propaganda throughout India in order to prepare the people for an anti-colonial struggle which should synchronize with the approaching war in Europe. He held that instead of waiting passively until Federation was imposed the Congress should present the British Government with the national demand for freedom and prepare for uniform and organized mass action to paralyse the machinery of the government if the demand was not met within a definite time. At his initiative the Bengal Provincial Conference, held in February 1939, adopted a resolution to this effect. At the Tripuri Congress Subhas proposed that the Congress "should immediately send an ultimatum to the British Government demanding independence within six months and should simultaneously prepare for a national struggle". It was opposed by the high command and thrown out. Instead, a resolution on `national demands', drafted by Nehru, was moved by Jayaprakash Narayan. It rejected the federal scheme and reiterated the desire to launch a struggle against it, if it was introduced. It did not state what the Congress would do, if the British delayed its inauguration or dropped this part of the constitution and continued with the 1919 Act as regards the centre, as they actually did with the outbreak of World War II.
Subhas was caught in an unenviable situation. While the high command's resolution directed him to nominate the Working Committee according to the wishes of Gandhi, Gandhi refused to let him know his wishes because of his "thorough disapproval" of the resolution. Subhas wanted a composite Working Committee representing the largest number of Congressmen while Gandhi was emphatic that there could be no composite cabinet but a homogeneous Committee. Subhas requested him to nominate a committee according to his wishes but Gandhi insisted that Subhas should do the same, "fully representing your policy". The choice before Subhas was either to defy the Tripuri resolution, form a Committee of his own and split the Congress or to resign. Subhas chose the latter course and resigned at the April meeting of the AICC. The tactics were superb, however unconstitutional they might be. Linlithgow "admired the way Gandhiji had succeeded soon after the Rajkot affair in ousting Mr Subhas Chandra Bose from the second term as President of the Congress and getting Dr Rajendra Prasad elected in Bose's place".(102)
The force desiring change, disorganized and lacking in self-confidence, panicked and retreated when the time for a showdown with the entrenched leadership came.
After resigning, Subhas formed the Forward Bloc, a party within the Congress. He stated:
"The three-fold task of the Bloc is Left-consolidation, winning over the majority in the Congress to our viewpoint and resumption of the national struggle in the name and with the united strength of the Congress."
In his statements and speeches Nehru went on decrying the Forward Bloc as an organization of opportunists and fascists. In a rejoinder, issued on 25 July, Subhas asked him to point out the opportunism or fascism in the Forward Bloc's programme and name those in the Forward Bloc who were opportunists or fascists. He said :
"I should rather label as opportunists those who would run with the hare and hunt with the hound -- those who pose as leftists and act as rightists -- those who talk in one way when they are inside a room and in quite a different way when they are outside.... Are those people to be called fascists who are fighting fascism within the Congress and without or should they be dubbed as fascists who support the present autocratic `high command' either by openly joining the present homogeneous Working Committee or by secretly joining in their deliberations and drafting their resolutions?.... The line of opportunism is always the line of least resistance."
Under Bose's leadership the Left Consolidation Committee was set up in the middle of June with the C.S.P., the Communists, the Radical League of M.N.Roy and the Forward Bloc as its units.
The AICC meeting in Bombay towards the end of June adopted two resolutions prohibiting Congress members from taking part in satyagraha except with the permission of the respective provincial Congress committees and forbidding provincial committees to interfere in the work of ministries. In case of difference, the committees were asked to refer it to the Working Committee. The Left Consolidation Committee called for the observance of 9 July throughout India as the day of protest and demonstration against these measures. Rajendra Prasad, elected President in April, immediately proclaimed a ban on the demonstrations. Fearing disciplinary action, the Royists dissociated themselves from the move and the C.S.P. vacillated. Subhas went ahead with the decision of the Left Consolidation Committee. In August the Working Committee debarred Subhas from remaining president of the Bengal PCC and holding any elective post for three years. The resolution was drafted by Gandhi.(103) Disciplinary action was taken by the high command against Subhas for propagating views contrary to the resolutions of the AICC though it was the practice of some leaders and other prominent Congressmen to propagate their views or act in defiance of such resolutions. Soon the Bengal PCC, which remained loyal to Subhas, was dissolved and an ad hoc provincial committee was appointed by the Working Committee.
After September 1939 the leaders of the CSP were won over by Gandhi and Nehru; the party formally withdrew from the Left Consolidation Committee in October and the Communists in December. In the meantime World War II had broken out.
1. The Congress Encyclopaedia, XI, 274,287-8.
2. Shankardass, Vallabhbhai Patel, 144,172; see also Birla to Thakurdas, 12 Apr. 1934, PT Papers, File 126, Part I.
3. CWG, LXVII, 225-6 -- emphasis added; Shankardass, Vallabhbhai Patel, 146.
4. K.M. Munshi, Pilgrimage to Freedom, 45.
5. CWG, LXV, 362,383,419; LXVI, 467 and n.1; SWN, VII, 278, 279; VIII, 156; Azad, op cit. (1988 edn.), 17.
6. For speeches and resolutions of the AIML conference in Bombay in 1936, see IAR, 1936, I, 293-5 ; Sharif al Mujahid, "Jinnah and the Congress Party", in D.A. Low (ed.), The Indian National Congress, 230-5; Gopal, op cit. 227; Rajendra Prasad, India Divided, 135; Tendulkar, op cit., IV, 108; for the Congress election manifesto and the AIML one, see The Congress Encyclopaedia, XI, 134-40 and IAR, 1936, I, 301, respectively.
7. Ram Gopal, Indian Muslims, 247; Shiva Rao, "India, 1935-47", in Philips and Wainwright (eds.), op cit., 418,419; Gopal, op cit., 226,227; Kanji Dwarkadas, op cit., 465; Michael Brecher, op cit., 231; Sharif al Mujahid, op cit., 232-3; Sitaramayya, op cit., II, 690 ; AICC Papers, File G/32/1938, cited in Deepak Pandey, "Congress-League Relations 1937-39", Modern Asian Studies, Oct. 1978, 632.
8. Munshi, op cit., 47.
9. Ibid, 47-8 ; Dwarkadas, op cit., 466-7.
10. CWG, LXV, 231.
11. Nehru to Prasad, 21 July 1937, SWN, VIII, 168-70.
12. Munshi, op cit., 46 -- emphasis added; Azad, op cit., 161.
13. TOP, V, 2; also VI, 174; XII, 790.
14. Shankardass, The First Congress Raj, 264 -- emphasis added.
15. Ram Gopal, op cit., 252.
16. The Congress Encyclopaedia, XI, 274,287-8; SWN, VIII, 110.
17. See Abul Mansur Ahmed, Amar Dekha Rajnitir Panchas Bacchar, 64-5,110-1,165.
18. See John Gallagher, The Decline, Revival and Fall of the British Empire, 162, fn.10. Gallagher refers to Royal Commission on Agriculture in India, IV, Evidence taken in the Bengal Presidency, Calcutta, 1927.
19. Shila Sen, Muslim Politics in Bengal 1937-1947, 76; Ayesha Jalal, The Sole Spokesman, 24-5; Kamruddin Ahmad, A Social History of Bengal, 3rd edn., Dhaka, 1970, 33-4, cited in Shila Sen, op cit., 78.
20. Amrita Bazar Patrika, 1 Sept. 1936.
21. Jalal, op cit., 26; SWN XI, 783.
22. Abul Mansur Ahmed, op cit., 134-9; Gallagher, op cit., 209; Humayun Kabir, Muslim Politics 1906-47 and Other Essays, 27 -- emphasis added.
23. Omkar Goswami, "Collaboration and Conflict: European and Indian Capitalists and the Jute Economy of Bengal, 1919-39", IESHR, vol. 19(2), 1982.
24. See CWG, LXVI, 405 and fn.1; Amrita Bazar Patrika, 5 Apr. 1938.
25. Nirad C. Chaudhuri, "Introduction to a `Historic Document'", Illustrated Weekly of India, 18 Aug. 1957.
26. Birla, Bapu, III, 193-4; Leonard Gordon, "Bengal's Gandhi", in David Kopf (ed.), Bengal: Regional Identity, 98.
27. Birla, Bapu, III, 195 -- emphasis added.
28. SWN, IX, 483; Nehru, A Bunch of Old Letters, 318-9, 331-2.
29. Ram Gopal, op cit., 246; Abul Mansur Ahmed, op cit., 165.
30. Birla, Bapu, III, 144.
31. Shiva Rao, op cit., 416 ; Palme Dutt, op cit., 385; Moore, Endgames of Empire, 112-3; Abul Hayat, Mussalmans of Bengal, 105.
32. R. J. Moore, Churchill, Cripps, and India, 11-2.
33. CWG, LXVI, 344, 419; LXVII, 225; LXVIII, 153, 240 -- emphasis added.
34. SWN, VII, 240, 464; VIII, 326 -- emphasis added.
35. Ibid, 468 -- emphasis added; see also 7, 12, 22, passim.
36. Ambedkar, op cit., Preface, p. iii; Ram Gopal, op cit., 245.
37. CWG, LXVI, 420,424,445 -- emphasis added; Proceedings of the CWC meeting, 26-29 Apr. 1937, AICC Papers, File 42/1936; Birla, Bapu, III, 74.
38. SWN, IX, 471; VII, 538 -- emphasis added.
39. Ibid, VIII, 24, fn.5; Times of India, 22 Mar. 1937, quoted in Shankardass, The First Congress Raj, 243.
40. SWN, VIII, 178,59-60,77,124 and fn.2, 180-1,180 fn.2, 182,184 ; CWG, LXII, 212.
41. SWN, VII, 137,149,153-4,160,218.
42. D.A. Low, "Congress and `Mass Contacts', 1936-1937", in Sisson and Wolpert (eds.), Congress and Indian Nationalism, 154; Pandey, The Ascendancy, 148; also SWN, VIII, 204 fn.9.
43. CWG, LXVI, 468-9; Stanley Wolpert, Jinnah of Pakistan, 155-6.
44. CWG, LXVI, 257; SWN, VIII, 215,217; X, 205,206,247,365,368,370.
45. For Nehru-Jinnah correspondence, see SWN, VIII; CWG, LXVII, 37.
46. Subhas Chandra Bose, Crossroads, 43; for Bose-Jinnah correspondence, see 37-46.
47. SWN, X, 397, fn. 2; AICC Papers File G 22/1938, quoted in Deepak Pandey, op cit., 637.
48. M.K. Gandhi, Autobiography, 259; CWG, XVII, 490-1; XV, 156, 159,240; XVIII, 85; XX, 531; XLIII, 64; LX, 443-8, passim; Tendulkar, op cit., VIII, 294.
49. CWG, XXXIV, 168-9 -- emphasis added; also LXI, 31-2.
50. Prasad, Autobiography, 424; CWG, LXVIII, 23; LXXVIII, 283 and fn., 343-5. Emphasis added.
51. SWN, VIII, 827, 829-45 -- emphasis added; CWG, LXVI, 7-8,60.
52. Humayun Kabir, op cit., 29; CWG, LXVI, 468; C.S. Venkatachar, "1937-1947 in Retrospect", in Philips and Wainwright (eds.), op cit., 471-2.
53. Deepak Pandey, op cit., 639-40; CWG, LXXXVII, 344.
54. Kabir, op cit., 28; Sailesh Kumar Bandyopadhyay, Jinnah: Pakistan -- Natun Bhabna, note 12, p.20 of the Notes; CWG, LXVII, 410; LXXII, 5.
55. Minutes of the CWC meeting, Bombay, 2-4 Jan. 1938, AICC Papers, File 42/1936.
56. Munshi, op cit., 44; Birla, Bapu, III, 94, 105-6 -- emphasis added.
57. Minutes of the CWC meeting, 14 to 17 Aug. 1937, and of the CWC meeting, 26 Oct. to 1 Nov. 1937, AICC Papers, File 42/1936; AICC Papers, Files G 90/1937 and 34/1937.
58. SWN, VIII, 388,365; see also 133,141,318,362-3,365, passim.
59. Munshi, op cit., 55; Gopal, op cit., 229,230; Munshi, op cit, 52-3 -- emphasis added.
60. Gopal, op cit., 230-1.
61. CWG, LXVII, 323-6; Postscript to Nehru's Autobiography, SWN, XI, 800 -- emphasis added; Gopal, op cit., 231.
62. CWG, LXXIV, 14; SWN, VIII, 369, fn.2; Statesman 21 Jan. 1939; Munshi, op cit., 390 -- emphasis added.
63. SWN, X, 170-3 -- emphasis added.
64. CWG, LXVII, 22; see also Vol.I of this book, 99-102; SWN, IX, 317.
65. Shankardass, The First Congress Raj, 119-21; SWN, XI, 159-60, 332.
66. Prasad, Autobiography, 459; IAR, 1938, II, 173,398; Walter Hauser, "The Indian National Congress and Land Policy in the Twentieth Century", IESHR, July-Sept. 1963, 64.
67. IAR, 1939, I, 411-2.
68. Deepak Pandey, op cit, 649; See G. McDonald, "Unity on Trial: Congress in Bihar 1929-39", in Low (ed.), Congress and the Raj, and Max Harcourt, "Kisan Populism and Revolution in Rural India" in ibid, 332-3; SWN, VIII, 366,392,429-30,505, passim.
69. Shankardass, Vallabhbhai Patel, 206,210; SWN, IX, 349 -- emphasis added.
70. Ibid, VIII, 332-4,352-3; David Arnold, "Quit India in Madras", in G. Pandey, The Indian Nation in 1942, 211; Raman Mahadevan, "The Politics of Business Interest Groups", op cit., 20,21-2.
71. Shankardass, The First Congress Raj, 185; SWN, IX, 310; Nehru's "Note on the Bombay Trades Disputes Act" (marked `Confidential'), 14 Dec. 1938, JN Papers, Part II, Subject File 150 -- emphasis added.
72. CWG, LXVIII, 195: see also LXVII, 285; LXX, 113-4,299; Sitaramayya, op cit, II, 62.
73. Claude Markovits, "Indian Big Business and the Congress Provincial Governments 1937-39", in Christopher Baker et al (eds.), Power, Profit and Politics, 515,524,526; Shankardass, The First Congress Raj, 187; Claude Markovits, Indian Business and Nationalist Politics, 146.
74. CWG, LXXVI, 436; Pyarelal, Mahatma Gandhi: The Last Phase, I, 65 -- emphasis added. See also Vol.I of this book, 95-7.
75. See All Parties Conference 1928, Report of the Committee Appointed by the Conference to Determine the Principles of the Constitution of India, 83-4; All Parties Conference, Supplementary Report of the Committee, 15-6.
76. CWG, XLVIII, 16,257 -- emphasis added; Barbara N. Ramusack, "Congress and the People's Movement in Princely India", in Sisson and Wolpert (eds.) op cit., 386; Shankardass, Vallabhbhai Patel, 119; see also SWN, VII, 451 fn.3.
77. Sitaramayya, op cit., II, 80,81; Statesman, 7 to 10 Jan. 1939; see also CWG, LXVIII, 285,300-1 for Gandhi's reaction.
78. Ibid, LXVII, 53-4,88,377; Notes of Gandhi's conversation with Guy Wint, 1 Apr. 1939, Birla, Bapu, II, 267.
79. SWN, VIII, 556-7,560 -- emphasis added; see also Nehru, A Bunch, 255; Shankardass, Vallabhbhai Patel, 224.
80. Minutes of the AICC meeting, Calcutta, 29-31 Oct. 1937, AICC Papers, File 42/1936; CWG, LXVI, 285-6,292-3.
81. See Minutes of the AICC meeting, 29-31, Oct. 1937, op cit.; Nehru, A Bunch, 254-6,248-9,260-2; Sitaramayya, op cit, II, 79.
82. CWG, LXIX, 31,73,102,322-3.
83. Ibid, LXVIII, 131-3,200,214,216-7,325, passim.
84. Ramusack, op cit., 397.
85. CWG, LXVIII, 348,480; LXIX, 2-5,7-10,22,67,158,168-71,269-71.
86. Ibid, LXVI, 285.
87. Birla, Bapu, III, 104-5,131-2 -- emphasis added; see also ibid, 139 and Words to Remember (a book on G.D. Birla, sponsored by the Birla family), Bombay, 1983, 82-3; the quotes are from John Glendevon, The Viceroy at Bay, 75-6,88-9.
88. Birla, Bapu, III, 141,145-6,148; CWG, LXVII, 441.
89. SWN, IX, 103 and fn.1, 128,132,134-5; Kripalani to Nehru, 11 Aug. 1938, JN Papers, Vol.40, Part I; see also B.N. Pandey, Nehru, 216.
90. Carl Heath to Gandhi, JN Papers, Vol.17; CWG, LXVIII, 441-2 -- emphasis added; Tomlinson, The Indian National Congress and the Raj, 113. Tomlinson cites "Note on an Interview with G.D. Birla", Linlithgow to Zetland, 3 Dec. 1937, Linlithgow MSS, Vol.4.
91. Tomlinson, ibid, 113 (he cites a number of documents); Birla, Bapu, III, 267; Statesman, 4 and 5 Jan. 1939; Birla, In the Shadow, 269; see also CWG, LXVIII, 441-2.
92. SWN, IX, 1 fn.2; Subhas Bose, Crossroads, 29; Shankardass, Vallabhbhai Patel, 175; Sitaramayya, op cit., II, 73.
93. Shankardass, Vallabhbhai Patel, 176; Bose, Crossroads, 47-8, 48-50; Kripalani to Nehru, 11 Aug. 1938, JN Papers, Vol.40, Part I.
94. CWG, LXVII, 401-2 -- emphasis added; LXVIII, 72; see also 144,198 and Nehru, A Bunch, 298,299-300.
95. CWG, LXVIII, 199,198,227,230; Bose, Crossroads, 96; see also 87.
96. Patel to Nehru, 8 Feb. 1939, Nehru, A Bunch, 312; Nehru's statement, 26 Jan. 1939, in Bose, Crossroads, 97-9.
97. Ibid, 91,92,101,102-3,104; Tomlinson, The Indian National Congress and the Raj, 117-8.
98. Shankardass, Vallabhbhai Patel, 188; Bose, Crossroads, 105-6.
99. CWG, LXVIII, 382-3,362; also 462,463; Birla, Bapu, III, 220.
100. AICC Papers, File 11/1929. The document has been put in the wrong file.
101. IAR, 1939, I, 324,332,335 -- emphasis added; Shankardass, Vallabhbhai Patel, 181.
102. Words to Remember, 84.
103. Bose, Crossroads, 187; SWN, IX, 595 fn.2; Tomlinson, The Indian National Congress and the Raj, 135.