The long-awaited war came. After Germany's attack on Poland, Britain declared war on Germany on 3 September 1939. On that very day the Viceroy of India, without any reference to the Central Assembly or to the ministries in the provinces or to any Indian political organization, announced that India was at war with Germany and issued the Defence of India Ordinance curtailing civil liberties. The same day the British Parliament passed an amendment to the GOI Act 1935, empowering the Viceroy to do away with provincial `autonomy',if he so willed.
Since 1927 the Congress leaders had been adopting resolutions and issuing statements declaring that the Congress would resist any attempt by the British to impose war on India. In the 1937 elections the Congress sought votes promising in its election manifesto that it would oppose India's participation in any imperialist war. In 1938 the Haripura Congress affirmed that India would not "permit her manpower and resources to be exploited in the interest of British imperialism". In March 1939 the Tripuri Congress recorded "its entire disapproval of British foreign policy culminating in the Munich Pact", etc., a policy of "deliberate betrayal of democracy", and resolved to keep aloof from both Imperialism and Fascism.
In April 1939, as war-clouds thickened, the British Parliament passed an amendment to the GOI Act 1935, empowering the Central government to assume all powers of provincial governments during an emergency arising from war or the threat of war. The AICC expressed its determination "to oppose all attempts to impose a war on India" and described the constitutional amendment as creating "a war dictatorship of the Central Government in India" and making "Provincial Governments helpless agents of Imperialism". On 10 August, only three weeks before the war started, the Working Committee "declared its opposition to any imperialist war" and directed the Congress members of the Central Legislative Assembly to boycott its next session as a mark of protest against the despatch of Indian troops to Egypt and Singapore. Throughout this period, Nehru's rhetoric, as usual, was strident.
And, as usual, the Congress policy was a two-faced one -- one face turned towards the people and another face turned towards the raj.
At a conference of the Prime Ministers of the Congress provinces, convened by Patel, in the last week of August 1939, a few days after the above solemn declaration of the Working Committee, "the most important decision", to quote K.M. Munshi, Secretary of the Conference, "was to the effect that in the event of war `co-operation with the British should be whole-hearted if an understanding were arrived at between the Congress and the Government'."(1)
The day after Linlithgow's announcement imposing war on India and promulgation of the Defence of India Ordinance, Gandhi rushed to Simla to respond to the Viceroy's invitation and, while imagining in the presence of the Viceroy the "possible destruction" of "the Houses of Parliament and the Westminster Abbey", he "broke down", became "disconsolate", was not "thinking of India's deliverance" and conveyed his "sympathies...with England and France". The apostle of non-violence told the Viceroy that personally he was for full and unquestioning co-operation with Britain in her war efforts.(2) Less than one year before, Gandhi had declared:
"For me, even if I stand alone, there is no participation in the war even if the Government should surrender the whole control to the Congress."(3)
Nehru hurried back from Chiang Kai-shek's capital Chungking and on his way back he declared at Rangoon:
"We do not approach the problem with a view to taking advantage of Britain's difficulties.... I should like India to play her full part and throw all her resources into the struggle for a new order."(4)
At the Haripura Congress Nehru had said :
"If England fights and wins, it is British imperialism that wins and the British hold on India is strengthened thereby. On no account therefore can we be parties to India's helping in such a war -- even against the fascist powers."(5)
Patel, too, struck a moral tone. "There was no intention", he said, "that the Congress should harass the British Government in its present plight."(6)
The desire to line up behind British imperialism and the repudiation of past pledges were not surprising. This was not only consistent with their past policies but also in conformity with the needs of the hour.
The advent of a new world war held out a thrilling prospect before the big compradors. World War I had enabled them to grow and expand; World War II, which would invariably rain misery and death on the already impoverished people of this British colony, was greeted by the big bourgeoisie in the hope that it would shower gold on them. (And it did.) Just on the eve of the war G.D. Birla sent Gandhi for his comments the draft of a statement which he and other tycoons proposed to issue immediately after the outbreak of the war. The draft stated that "after the successful functioning of provincial autonomy during the last two years and a half", the "existing differences between India and England" were "capable of satisfactory solution and amicable settlement through friendly negotiations" and held that it was "not difficult to evolve a scheme of national defence as an integral part of the defence of the British Commonwealth".(7)
After the outbreak of the war Birla wrote to Mahadev Desai:
"Maybe India and England may start competition with each other in manufacturing cordiality and friendship."(8)
And Birla continued to play an active role as an intermediary, as active as before, so that no conflict marred the relations between British imperialism and the Congress and a friendly settlement was arrived at in the new situation.
Another tycoon, Lala Sir Shri Ram, insisted that "the Congress must not bargain with the British raj to squeeze out promises until the war was over".(9)
While presiding over the annual session of the FICCI in March 1940, C.S.R. Mudaliar said that "the war should be seen as an opportunity for furthering industrial expansion, and that the expanded and new industries should receive adequate protection after the war". This theme became the "main concern of the session".(10) True to their character, the big bourgeoisie viewed the war between the rival imperialist powers not as an opportunity for achieving freedom from the foreign yoke but in furthering their own interests by serving British imperialism.
The Muslim League leader, Choudhury Khaliquzzaman, wrote that the League was pressed towards greater co-operation with the British by Muslim business magnates as well as by "our Muslim taluqdars and Zamindars...interested in smaller contracts.... They could hardly be expected to forgo the chance of a life-time".(11)
The war brought the raj closer to the big businessmen. The raj depended on them for procurement and production of materials essential for war. The Eastern Group Supply Council was set up early in 1941 with Britain, the dominions and India to plan production and procurement of war materials. Commerce expanded and industries thrived; vast profits, legitimate and illegitimate, were raked in, despite the Excess Profits Tax of 50 per cent, at the cost of the blood and sweat of the people. It was boom time for Indian business.
It may be noted that the Hindu Mahasabha, from which the Bharatiya Janata Party has descended, pledged all support to British war efforts.
There was within and outside the Congress a considerable section of political workers, usually called the `Left Wing' -- the followers of Subhas Bose, the Congress socialists, the communists, the Kisan Sabha members, etc. -- who were urging that a mass anti-imperialist struggle should be launched. An anti-war demonstration in which many thousands took part was held in Madras on the day the war was imposed on India. In early September numerous meetings denouncing the imperialist war took place in different parts of India.(12) On 2 October 90,000 workers went on a one-day political strike in Bombay condemning the imperialist war -- "the first anti-war strike in the world labour movement".(13)
On the other hand, the Congress ministers were more loyalists then the Britishers themselves.
"In the U.P.", writes S.Gopal, "the ministers seemed willing to give full co-operation in prosecution of the war, while in Madras the Governor had to restrain Rajagopalachari, on the outbreak of hostilities, from detaining all Germans and seizing their bank balances, `whereupon he commented that the English seemed to want to wage war according to High Court rules'."(14)
In Bombay, Kher and his colleagues assured Governor Lumley of their support for Britain. "Not only that, Munshi had expressed a desire to participate more actively in the war effort" and he became Chairman of the War Committee, while a Cabinet Sub-Committee was formed with Kher, Munshi and another minister.
"In Bombay, Kher had assured the Governor for many months that he would always keep the latter posted on developments and even when resignation had to be implemented it would be done `in a dignified and amicable manner'."(15)
Meeting from 10 to 14 September, the Working Committee adopted a long-winded resolution on the basis of Nehru's draft, inviting the raj to declare its war aims and seeking to know how these would apply to India(16) -- a resolution which, according to Subhas, represented "a policy of inaction".(17) To these astute leaders the war aims of the Chamberlains and Churchills needed further clarification, especially after the "war dictatorship of the Central Government" and the unilateral imposition of war on India. At this meeting Gandhi "said that there should be no obstruction nor non-co-operation, and that [Congress] ministers should carry on to the extent it was possible and offer co-operation in all respects in which they could do so conscientiously". He wrote that Congress support should have been "unconditional in the sense that the Congress would not have asked for clarification of Britain's war aims".(18)
Subhas was invited to attend this meeting. At the meeting Subhas insisted that the Congress should launch civil disobedience to achieve freedom without delay. Naturally, there was a sharp clash between him and Nehru. Munshi wrote that Gandhi managed to secure "a promise from him [Subhas] that he would remain quiet for a certain period".(19) Gandhi was dissatisfied with the resolution. But prudence dictated the policy of the Working Committee which rejected Gandhi's advice for overt co-operation with the raj.
In a letter to Birla, Mahadev lamented:
"Bapu's proposition did not find favour with the W.C. Vallabhbhai and others did not, I fear, have the courage to go to the country with Bapu's proposition.... The future is dark and gloomy and we may have to wander in wilderness now for three or more years."(20)
Again, he wrote to Birla :
"Heaven alone knows what is in store for us. But the principle of non-violence by which we have been swearing these 20 years seems to be under a heavy eclipse."(21)
Birla also was disappointed and criticized the resolution as "a rambling document". With the declaration of war he had proposed that the Working Committee should appoint Gandhi "the sole plenipotentiary" of the Congress -- a proposal to which Patel agreed. Now, he wanted Gandhi to see the Viceroy again, for what was needed was "personal contact" and the Working Committee should not "talk through statements".(22) As desired by Birla, `Bapu' was "doing the needful". He sent his secretary Mahadev on an "ambassadorial mission" to Rajagopalachari in Madras "to tell him how much he can do at this juncture".(23) Rajagopalachari had his interviews with the Viceroy.
When Gandhi saw Linlithgow again on 26 September, he gave him "an account of the Congress Working Committee discussion at Wardha" and urged him for a declaration of policy. The Viceroy told him that "the British government would be most unwilling to define their war aims at this stage and had never committed themselves in the least degree to fighting for democracy".(24)
As V.P. Menon writes,
"The Viceroy stressed the lack of agreement between the various parties and the extreme seriousness and gravity of the communal issue" and stated that "agreement between the communities would be a condition precedent for future constitutional advance".(25)
Gandhi pleaded in vain with the Viceroy that he "should not allow the Muslim League to come in any way in connection with the terms of any declaration I [the Viceroy] might make, for the Congress carry their claim to be the one party entitled to speak or to be consulted on behalf of India, in connection with anything affecting India as a whole, to full length".(26)
Nehru was effusive in praise of Chiang Kai-shek and the U.S. ruling classes. He paid his tribute to "the supreme leader and commander of China, Generalissimo Chiang Kai-shek, who embodies in himself the unity of China and her determination to free herself".(27) The ruling classes of the U.S.A., on whom "ultimately will fall the burden of the future, whether they will it or not", "will no doubt play a dominating part in the reshaping of world affairs" and could establish a new world order free from imperialist wars. "We", he said, "naturally look to America in many ways."(28)
Nehru had already forged close relations with the US ruling classes and the Chiangs. It appears from his two letters to Krishna Menon, dated 10 July and 15 August 1939, that his visit to Chungking, Chiang's capital, was arranged by the US ruling classes in consultation with the Chiangs and the British raj. On his way from China to Europe one Edward Carter, secretary-general of the American Institute of Pacific Relations, saw Nehru and, on reaching England, had consultations with British cabinet ministers, and Nehru's visit was arranged. On the eve of his departure for China on 20 August 1939, Nehru received a long cable from the Chinese ambassador in London, who conveyed to him not only his good wishes and greetings but also Churchill's good wishes for success of his mission.(28a)
Soon after the CWC meeting in September, Nehru started a campaign which, while extolling Gandhi's leadership and the technique of non-violence -- "the new technique of fight evolved by Mahatma Gandhi [which] has nonplussed the British Government, as they do not know how to combat it"(29) -- tirelessly denounced those like Subhas, communists, Congress socialists and others who wanted a more militant line to be pursued.(30) And he publicly claimed that the CWC resolution of September, to which the British government attached no importance, "will shake to the foundations all imperialisms" and "uproot British imperialism".(31)
In private Nehru, states S.Gopal, his biographer and admirer, "made clear, even if only indirectly, his anxiety to assist personally to the full in the war effort, and wanted the association of persons like himself...with some form of National War Council. If India and Britain waged war together as equal partners with no formal legal changes, but with Indian leaders being taken into confidence and associated with decisions...this in itself would have removed most of the constitutional difficulties by the time the war had been successfully concluded. But it was hinted that Jawaharlal would not insist even on this."
According to Gopal, the Congress "conveyed to the Viceroy that it would be satisfied with a declaration clearly stating that India would be free to determine her own destiny after the war".(32)
When Nehru and Prasad saw the Viceroy on 3 October they were bluntly told that
"There could be no extensive expansion of the Executive Council or sharing of power with political parties in the central government. All he [the Viceroy] was prepared to do was to form a group from the two houses of the central legislature with whom the Government would keep in touch on defence matters."(33)
Yet pining for a gesture from the British imperialists, Nehru wrote a long letter to Linlithgow on 6 October. He regretted a "number of very undesirable speeches" made by Congressmen immediately after the outbreak of the war, and pointed out the calming influence of the Working Committee resolution of 14 September and "some action" taken in this regard by the Congress government of U.P. He wrote about an errant Congress M.L.A. "whose tongue runs away with him when he discusses the plight of the peasantry" and who was sobered by several warnings and advice from Nehru and other leaders. He went on to say how much he desired "that the long conflict of India and England should be ended and that they should co-operate together.... It was a pleasure to meet you for a second time, and whenever chance offers an opportunity for this again, I shall avail myself of it."(34)
To quote Gopal again, "Jawaharlal was desperately anxious to find a way which would enable the Congress to co-operate with the Government."(35)
Devdas Gandhi saw the Viceroy's private secretary Laithwaite with a letter from Mahadev Desai, which was written "at Bapu's instance, giving him an account of the AICC and the part that Jawaharlal had played in it". Laithwaite promised to show the letter to the Viceroy as he showed him "all that Mahadev sends me". Devdas assured Laithwaite that "there is really no bargaining because in a sense you have already got the Congress support and help incoming in various ways". While acknowledging "the greatest possible assistance from Mr Gandhi" received by the Viceroy and assuring Devdas that "whatever happens nothing can alter the great mutual understanding between H.E. and your father", Laithwaite stressed the difficulties impeding a settlement -- "The Mussalmans and the others" who "don't agree with the Congress".(36)
Not only the Viceroy but Secretary of State Lord Zetland too was quite sensible of the role Gandhi was playing. Speaking in the House of Lords, Zetland spoke of Gandhi in eloquent terms and acknowledged "the help which he has most willingly given us in our endeavours to surmount them [the difficulties]".(37) Interestingly, the Viceroy informed Gandhi on 3 June 1940 that the Maharaja of Darbhanga, then the biggest landlord in the whole of India, had given him a bust of Gandhi done by Clare Sheridan and that Linlithgow proposed to have it exhibited first in Bombay and then "to make it over to the Government of India with the suggestion that it should ultimately find a permanent home in the national capital".(38) It was no small tribute to Gandhi from the King's representative in India and a prominent representative of the feudal class.
Gandhi could smell violence in the air and was determined to resist civil disobedience. As Mahadev Desai wrote to G.D.Birla, "...Bapu alone is capable of holding back the tide of the civil disobedience movement and this he is already doing and will continue to do so till the very last."(39) While regretting that his "views in regard to unconditional co-operation are not shared by the country", the prophet of non-violence went on declaiming that "this war may be used to end all wars".(40)
After several rounds of discussion with Congress and Muslim League leaders, Linlithgow declared on 17 October 1939 that, as before, the grant of dominion status remained the ultimate goal of the British policy and that at the end of the war the raj would be prepared "to enter into consultation with representatives of the several communities, parties and interests in India and with the Indian princes" for modifying suitably the Government of India Act of 1935. During the war the raj proposed to set up "a consultative group representative of all the major political parties in British India and of the Indian Princes", over which the Viceroy would preside.(41) To the embarrassment of the Congress leaders, the raj refused to make the slightest concession to them. Moreover, it did not want to displease the Muslims, between whom and the Congress the gulf had grown wider particularly since the ministry-making in 1937 by the Congress.
Meeting on 22 and 23 October, the Congress Working Committee asked Congress ministries in the provinces to resign. At the same time it warned "Congressmen against any hasty action in the shape of civil disobedience, political strikes and the like".
Through messages to the foreign press and other statements, Gandhi assured the concerned people that "the Congress must not embarrass" the rulers in the prosecution of the war and that he was "in no hurry to precipitate civil disobedience".(42)
Why did the Working Committee ask the Congress ministers to lay down their precious burden and go into the wilderness, which they were extremely reluctant to do?
"Lord Linlithgow's private letters to Lord Zetland", writes B.B. Misra, "show that when the Congress decided to call out its Ministries, it did so `only for the time being' under the impression that the exigencies of the war would compel the British Government to accept its terms of settlement. In fact, the Congress detested `the thought of leaving office' for any considerable period and was `anxious to resume power as soon as it can be made possible for it to do so'."(43) G.D.Birla could not "conceive that all that has been done during the last two years will now be undone suddenly". He continued to maintain contacts with the Viceroy, members of his family, and other high British officials to smooth matters.(44) According to Sitarammaya, "Some of the ministers themselves playfully and jocularly stated that they were all taking a three-month holiday. But every joke has a core of truth to be sure."(45)
During an interview with the Viceroy on 12 January 1940, Munshi reported to him about an anti-imperialist undercurrent among ordinary Congressmen and expressed his fear that Gandhi might not be able to keep them on leash for a long time. Defending their resignation as ministers, he said:
"We could not have continued long in office and helped you in the war unless we had obtained a share in the Centre which could justify our being there.... For instance, Subhas would have made our task very difficult.... if we had been in power he would have got himself arrested only in order to make our position difficult. Now things are better from every point of view and things should be done early.... You hold Gandhiji in great respect and Gandhiji, I am sure, holds you equally in great respect and if you both cannot settle the matter, nationalism will naturally go into wilderness."(46)
The Congress ministries had to be withdrawn for two main reasons. First, if they remained in office, the anti-imperialist mask of the Congress leadership would fall off. The ministers would have to serve openly as imperialism's agents and use the Defence of India Act and ordinances to suppress anti-imperialist struggles and perform every other dirty job when the tide of anti-imperialist feeling was rising. Moreover, as Munshi said, "The prestige of the Congress Working Committee was at a low ebb since the Tripuri Congress in March 1939."(47) Second, this decision, "nothing more than a passive action", was "intended to soften the attitude of left-wing circles, without involving anti-imperialist activity".(48) While this manoeuvre saved the Congress from internal disruption, it helped the raj to prosecute its war efforts unhindered by a political party holding offices in provinces, which, for its very existence, had to face both ways.
As Sitaramayya wrote, the Congress was faced with the dilemma that on the one hand, it could not initiate any satyagraha for fear that it might result in "red ruin and anarchy"; on the other hand, "to keep quiet to allow the ministries to function would be...to wipe out the Congress as a political party at the end of the war". Both satyagraha and withdrawal of ministries were evils. "The choice then", said Sitaramayya, "lay between the worse and the better of two evils."(49)
Appreciating the Working Committee's decision, Sir Stafford Cripps commented: "it was wise on the part of Mr Gandhi not to have hurried things and to have kept the door open." After "fairly lengthy interviews with Gandhi, Jawaharlal and the Sardar", Cripps "took with him back to London a long detailed memorandum prepared by Gandhi".(50) Sitaramayya does not disclose the contents of the memorandum nor does The Complete Works of Mahatma Gandhi.
Gandhi, Jinnah and Prasad met the Viceroy again on 1 November "to try to work out an arrangement in the provincial field as a prelude to co-operation at the centre". On 2 November Jinnah had a meeting with Gandhi and Prasad, but Gandhi and Prasad refused to discuss anything on the plea that the communal issue was not related to the political crisis and that the British government must first clarify its war-aims.(51) "Co-operation at the centre" with the colonial masters, so longed for by the Congress leaders, eluded them as they refused to agree to co-operation with the League in the provinces.
Appreciating the Viceroy's `sincerity', Gandhi urged "fellow workers not to lose patience".(52) Indeed, as Sitaramayya stated, "The British Government was not the problem to Gandhi. There were two internal foes or problems": they were the Muslim League and impatient Congressmen.(53)