THE period between 1945 and the end of direct British rule in India is characterised by two contrary currents. The first is one of massive, often armed, upsurges in large parts of the country against British rule and landlord oppression. The second is of wholesale and increasing brazen collaboration of the Congress with the British.
These two contrary currents coincided with two other contrary trends respectively: on the one hand, great revolts marked by close communal amity, displaying once again the scope for Hindu-Muslim-Sikh unity forged by common anti-imperialist struggle, and, on the other, the grand and horrifying game of the ruling classes - the British and their Hindu and Muslim collaborators - setting Hindu and Muslim against each other in the most awful communal carnage of Indian history.
First, it is necessary to set the frame: viz., the attitudes of the Indian big bourgeoisie on the eve of the transfer of power. Again we see sharply contrary currents. On the one hand, war demand rid the jute, cement, paper, steel and other industries of their problems of excess capacity; and profits rocketed. August-November 1942 notwithstanding, war contracts were the desiderata of all big Indian firms. But the really spectacular prizes were won through speculation in scarce commodities. Thus the horrendous famine of 1943-45 in Bengal also meant wonderful gains for the Indian big bourgeoisie, black marketing foodgrains. This very contradiction between the situation of the compradors and the people meant, as Sumit Sarkar points out, that "As a class which had never had it so good amidst unprecedented mass misery, the bourgeoisie was naturally averse to any further round of popular struggles...".
Similarly, while on the one, hand the Indian big bourgeoisie had made whopping profits it had by no means strengthened its position internationally. As Morris D. Morris in the Cambridge Economic History of India (vol. II, Cambridge, 1982) points out:
"...the wartime performance also exhibited the gross frailty of the manufacturing sector at the end of the colonial era. India still did not possess a capital goods sector. It thus lacked the ability to expand or even to reproduce its existing productive capacity. The system remained, as it always had been, dependent on imports of machinery, transport and electrical equipment, heavy and fine chemicals, and other basic industrial inputs. Above all else, it lacked adequate technical skill and any significant facilities to train technicians. Output was significantly increased during the war only where considerable excess capacity existed at its beginning. Otherwise, war needs were met by diversion from civilian consumption and neglect of repair and maintenance. The Indian manufacturing sector emerged at the end of the war with a seriously overworked plant, badly in need of replacement and modernisation, and with very limited capacity to provide this from its own capacities."
Thus profits did not translate into greater independence for the Indian big bourgeoisie. With the end of the war, major Indian firms such as TISCO were busy placing large orders abroad for machinery.
In the entire period of its growth, the Indian big bourgeoisie had not been able - or had made no effort - to indigenously develop the technology it was importing. Even the number of patents applied for were exceedingly small. For example, of the 1,099 applications made in 1930, 80 per cent were filed from abroad by Europeans. Of the 212 that originated in India, some were for improved charkhas, others for agricultural improvements - ploughs, waterwheels and waterlifts, husking machines, and sugar crushers. There were only three applications in the field of electrical engineering.
The combination of exhausted unmodernised plants, the absence of indigenous technology and the absence of a capital goods sector provided a powerful incentive for the Indian compradors to seek even closer collaboration abroad.
There has been a mistaken notion that Indian tycoons were at one point hostile to the entry of large multinationals into India. It is true that, in the late 1920s to 1930s, a number of multinational giants took advantage of tariff protection to set up firms under their direct control in India: the Swedish Match Trust, Lever Bros., Guest Keen Nettlefords, Metal Box Co., Dunlop, Imperial Chemical Industries, British American Tobacco, General Motors, British Aluminium, Alcan, and go on. It is also true that the rise of such "India Ltd." firms (as these direct branches were called) earned criticism from several Indian capitalists. Walchand Hirachand, whom Claude Markovits (Indian Business and Nationalist Politics, 1931-39, Cambridge, 1985) claims was "a staunch economic nationalist, probably the most radical among Indian businessmen", was particularly sharp in his opposition.
However, what Walchand was really objecting to was the fact that there was no scope in these branches for Indian collaboration: most of these firms were 100 per cent owned by the parent firm, and minority participation, when it existed, was British. Walchand was by no means opposed to collaboration with the multinationals. In 1936, even as he was uttering his criticisms, he formed (along with M.Visveswarayya, the Dewan of Mysore, who has also been glorified as an economic nationalist) an automobile company and concluded an agreement with the American giant Chrysler Corporation. Meanwhile Birla, that other "brilliant political mentor of the Indian capitalist class" (as historian Bipan Chandra calls him), concluded a deal with Studebaker Corporation, also for automobile production.
The official phrasing of this desire - to invite foreign capital, but on the condition that it collaborate with the comprador class - was that foreign investments should be allowed as long as they were "compatible with Indian interests". As early as in 1922, the note written by Ibrahim Rahimtullah, T.V.Seshagiri Ayyar, G.D.Birla, Jamnadas Dwarkadas, and Narottam Morarjee to the Indian Fiscal Commission clarified that "we will, therefore, state at once that we would raise no objection to foreign capital in India obtaining the benefit of the protective policy provided suitable conditions are laid down to safeguard the essential interests of India". By the summer of 1945, Birla and Tata led an Indian business delegation to the West and concluded agreements with Nuffield and Imperial Chemicals.
Of crucial importance was the rise of American interests in India. This was, of course, directly related to the rise of America world wide. After the end of its Civil War (1861-65) American industry grew rapidly - perhaps more so than any other in the world. As it assumed the status of a great industrial power, it hungered for raw materials, markets, and fields for investment. By the end of the 19th century, it had found itself dominions to its south and east, and was yearning for more. Senator Albert J.Beveridge foretold on April 27, 1898:
"American factories are making more than the American people can use. American soil is producing more than they can consume. Fate has written our policy for us: the trade of the world must and shall be ours. And we shall get it as our mother, England, has told us how. We will establish trading posts throughout the world as distributing points for American products. We will cover the ocean with our merchant marine. We will build a navy to the measure of our greatness."
However, direct British rule in India, through various policies favouring English firms, kept America at first out of the Indian market. In 1900, only 1.7 per cent of India's imports came from the U.S. By 1911, despite British resistance the US was able to raise this figure to 3.8 per cent. The First World War greatly exhausted and weakened the British Empire. By contrast, America's position was considerably strengthened. During 1909-14, its average share of India's imports was 3 per cent and of its exports 8 per cent; the corresponding average for 1914-19 were 7 and 12 per cent, respectively. America became the second largest trader with India.
American investments in India also steadily increased during the inter-war period, even as Britain's international supremacy was in rapid decline. American investments in India doubled between 1920 and 1938, by which point they amounted to a quarter of all non-British foreign investments. Moreover, the single largest managing agency in India, Andrew Yule and Co., was partly controlled by the firm of the American tycoon, J.P.Morgan, through its London subsidiary Morgan Greenfell.
Aside from this, the single largest company in India, TISCO, was built with American collaboration, American engineers, and even, till 1937, American managerial staff. One estimate of the amount paid by the Tatas during the period for American equipment and technicians is $60 million. (When J.N.Tata visited America in 1902 to find a collaborator, he was given wide press attention, and was hosted by a series of important public figures, including the crucial powerbroker Senator Mark Hanna. And the Tata deal constituted a major breakthrough for American interests in India.)
In 1929, the Tatas decided to hand over the management of their three electric power companies to an American firm, and Dorab Tata sold half his interest in these companies for Rs 37.5 lakh (though Tata representatives remained on the board). The American managing agents got 5 per cent commission on profits before deducting for depreciation, as well as Rs 24,000 annually as "office expenses", and salaries as executives of three plants (the Managing Director in those days received Re 1 lakh as salary). Dorab Tata insisted on raising the rate of agency commission, since, as he explained, "American co-operation is costly".
Share of the UK and the US in India's Imports and Exports, 1938-1951 |
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Year |
|
Percentage of India's exports |
||
From US |
From UK |
To US | To UK | |
| 1938 | 7.3 | 30.6 | 8.3 | 34.5 |
| 1941-42 | 20.1 | 21.1 | 19.7 | 32.3 |
| 1942-43 | 17.3 | 26.8 | 14.8 | 30.6 |
| 1943-44 | 15.8 | 25.1 | 20.2 | 30.4 |
| 1944-45 | 25.7 | 19.8 | 21.2 | 29.0 |
| 1946 | 14.6 | 31.8 | 25.1 | 25.1 |
| 1949 | 16.0 | 27.6 | 16.1 | 26.3 |
| 1950 | 19.9 | 23.3 | 19.2 | 22.8 |
| 1951 | 26.2 | 18.7 | 18.1 | 26.2 |
Source: L. Natarajan, American Shadow over India, Bombay, 1952. |
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As can be seen from the above table, World War II permanently changed the position of the US in India's foreign trade. During the War, Britain became increasingly dependent on America. Over 100,000 American troops were stationed in India. Much of India's imports from the U.S. in 1942-45 were of lend-lease goods shipped to India on the basis of an Anglo-American agreement. ("Lend- lease" was a system adopted by America during World War II by which war materials were supplied to countries whose defense the President of the U.S.A. "deemed vital".) In the post-war settlement regarding lend-lease between India and the U.S., India wound up owing the U.S. $ 178.4 million. Post-war Indo-U.S. trade, despite the termination of lend-lease, was double its pre-war level.
Aside from this, a number of Indian firms were floated during the War which immediately entered into collaborations with American giants. We have already mentioned the Birla and Walchand deals. Added to these were examples such as the Fazalbhoy Photophone Equipment Co. collaborating with the Radio Corporation of America and the National Rayon Corporation (formed by Sir Purshottamdas Thakurdas, Sir Ardeshir Dalal, A.D.Shroff of Tatas, Walchand Hirachand, and others) collaborating with the Shanandoa Rayon Corporation of Utica, New York. Aside from this, American shipping successfully entered Indian trade: before the War, American ships carried only 27 per cent of Indian trade, but by 1949 they carried 52 per cent of India's exports and about a quarter of her imports.
Of course, Britain did not appreciate this invasion. Walchand had to abandon his automobile collaboration with Chrysler in 1942 in view of the British Government's refusal to grant him any tax preferences. The report of the 1942 American Technical Mission sent to India to recommend means for expanding production was suppressed by the Government. Wartime American attempts to get around Imperial Preference, through a commerce and navigation treaty directly with India, were scotched by the British.
India's enormous wartime trade surplus with Britain (the "sterling balances") were controlled by Britain. Britain used her control of these balances to check Indian imports of American goods. At the end of 1947, the U.K. refused to finance India's dollar deficits with the U.S., and continued to force India to lean towards her in trade right uptil the 1950s. America put pressure on the U.K. to write off a substantial portion of the balances; these attempts failed. Nevertheless, while Britain could use the sterling balances to temporarily maintain her position in India's external trade, she could not reverse her losses or halt the long-term trend.
Naturally, considering America's new position as supreme imperial power, it was dissatisfied with a half-open door. During the war itself it pressed for greater political leverage in India. After America's entry into the war, an American official with the rank of ambassador was sent to India. By early 1942, the Cripps mission had to be accompanied by Roosevelt's representative, Colonel Louis Johnson, who acted independently as an informal mediator with the Congress Working Committee and won Nehru's assurances of loyalty to the Allies.
The British now apparently had to report to the U.S. about their plans for India. As early as on June 18, 1942, the U.K. ambassador in Washington told the State Department, that "drastic action" was planned against the Congress. On August 8, the Deputy Prime Minister informed Roosevelt that the arrests would take place. During the war, it was repeatedly "leaked" that America was supporting the Indian cause. This was the American interest in a certain sort of Indian "freedom" ie, an open-door for American investments. As Cripps said during the Parliamentary debate on Attlee's pledge to transfer power in India (February 1947), "it would be politically impracticable, both from a national and international point of view" (emphasis added) to hold on to direct rule.
Such a transfer did not mean any greater freedom for the Indian people, or even greater power to the Indian big bourgeoisie; it denoted, rather, a changed correlation of imperialist powers worldwide. The United States was, in the immediate post-war period, the single greatest power, displacing all the European ones; in fact, in the period 1951-59, it was to account for fully 75 per cent of the entire international exports of long-term capital. In South East Asia, in Africa, and in fact throughout the world, it was devouring the former colonies of France, Belgium, Germany, Holland, the U.K. It is in this context that we should understand the "peaceful end" of direct British rule in India.
It was natural that the end of the war saw, fresh unrest in India. For one, while the excuse of war had now ended, wartime conditions survived. High prices were now supplemented by retrenchment as factories returned to pre-war production levels. The memory of 1943 was aggravated by a major food crisis in 1946. A drastic cut in rations in February 1946 reduced the calorie value to 1,200 per head (by comparison, even 1943 London had got over 2,800 calories).
But most important of all was the political situation. The Indian masses realised that if they now gave another powerful blow to the Empire, it could not withstand the force. With the memory of 1942 in mind, the Home Member of the Viceroy's Executive Council pointed out that:
"On the whole, I doubt whether a Congress rebellion could be suppressed.... by no means all units (of the army) could be relied on.... police over a large area would be likely to crack.... a call to a general strike would be widely obeyed.... labour is amenable mostly to communist and Congress leadership."
Cripps, in the Parliamentary debate on the pledge to transfer power, pointed out that it was "quite obviously impossible to decide to continue our responsibility indefinitely - and indeed, against our own wishes - into a period when we had not the power to carry it out..." General Sir Francis Tuker candidly answered the question "why did we quit?": "Ultimately we found that this garrison commitment was more than the industrial needs of our impoverished country could stand."
The circumstances thus offered the choice moment for the Indian people to strike for total independence. If there were a nationwide revolt, establishment of a sovereign republic, and confiscation of all foreign capital, there would not be a great deal the British could do about it.
It was such a moment, it must be noted, that the Congress seized to align itself with the rulers. On March 3, 1946, Congress President Azad publicly welcomed the ration-cut as "far-sighted", and declared that strikes were "out of place today" as the British were "now acting as caretakers".
Vallabhbhai Patel's correspondence reveals that, in May 1946, Congress labour leaders were desperately attempting to prevent a strike ballot in the railways "since if a ballot is taken it will be in favour of the strike". By August 1946, the Congress Working Committee at Wardha condemned "hasty or ill-conceived struggles" and the "growing lack of discipline and disregard of obligations on the part of the workers".
Viceroy Wavell wrote to Pethick-Lawrence on December 5, 1945:
"the strong capitalist element behind Congress... is becoming nervous about the security of its property. There have recently been indications, that the Congress leaders want to reduce the political tension by making it clear that there must be no mass movement until after the elections". (Sumit Sarkar, "Popular Movements and National Leadership, 1945-47", Economic and Political Weekly, Annual Number, 1982)
Birla himself reassured a London official on December 6, 1945:
"There is no political leader including Jawaharlal who wants to see any crisis or violence. Popular impatience and the prevalent atmosphere are responsible for these strong speeches. Even leaders are often led. But I think unrestrained language will be heard less and less in the future."
Popular feeling, however, was not as easily restrained as the Congress leaders were. When the British decided to put on public trial the soldiers of the Indian National Army (Subhash Chandra Bose's army, with which, backed by the Japanese, Bose planned to liberate India) nationwide protest was unleashed. The choice of a Hindu, a Muslim and a Sikh in the first batch was particularly rash of the British: it immediately united the masses on the anti-imperialist issue.
The Congress organised legal defense of these prisoners (Nehru and Bhulabhai Desai were among the arguing counsel), but did not organise any public protests. The Congressman, Asaf Ali, admitted in a private conversation that his party "would lose much ground in the country" if it did not take up their cause, but that if Congress came to power it would certainly remove the INA men from the army and might even put "some of them on trial". (In fact, a year and a half later, on April 2, 1947, when a Muslim member of the Central Assembly urged the release of all I.N.A.. personnel convicted of specific crimes, Nehru forcefully objected.)
Even as the trials began in November 1945, an Intelligence Bureau note admitted that:
"...there has seldom been a matter which has attracted so much Indian public interest, and it is safe to say, sympathy - this particular brand of sympathy cuts across communal barriers."
A journalist visiting he prisoners on the same day reported that
"there is not the slightest feeling among them of Hindu and Muslim... A majority of the men now awaiting trial in the Red Fort is Muslim. Some of these men are bitter that Mr.Jinnah is keeping alive a controversy about Pakistan."
On November 21, 1945, a Forward Bloc student procession in Calcutta, joined by Communist student cadres and League college students, faced police firing. The firing killed one Hindu and one Muslim student.
This was followed on the next two days by agitation throughout the city: strikes by Communist-led tram workers, Sikh taxi-drivers, and strikes in many factories; burning of over 150 police and army vehicles; blocking of trains; and street-fighting, complete with barricades. Police firing killed 33 and injured 200. Calcutta rose again from February 11 to 13, 1946, in protest against the harsh sentence given to Abdul Rashid of the INA. Again the initiative in the strikes and streetfighting came, as official accounts point out, from the Communists, "without doubt the most disruptive organisation concerned in the disturbances". The Communists led a successful general strike and fought street battles with the British police and army: 84 were left dead and 300 injured. As in November, the Hindu-Muslim unity displayed in the battles was remarkable.
The Congress again displayed its true colours. On November 21, the Congress leader Sarat Bose had refused to address the students gathering on the street, and he blamed Communists for the violence. On November 24, Vallabhbhai Patel criticised, at a Bombay election rally, the "frittering away" of energies in "trifling quarrels" with the police. Gandhi had a friendly conversation with the Bengal governor, and the Calcutta AICC Working Committee Session (December 7-11) significantly reaffirmed its faith in non-violence.
In the February unrest, Congress took an even more open stand. A Home Department report clarified that "the Indian National Congress, whatever its individual members may have done, took no part... in the disturbance". An official situation Report on February 13 noted that there were "reassuring signs that the more well-to-do Indians are definitely annoyed by the riots and will bring pressure to bear to stop them. Congressmen are patrolling with loudspeakers telling the people to get off the streets."
The most heroic, potent, and significant of all these insurrections was the mutiny of the Royal Indian naval ratings, which began in Bombay, on February 18, 1946. The mutiny, a culmination of a long-brewing discontent and national consciousness among the ratings of one ship, the Talwar, spread with astounding speed to the Castle and Fort Barracks on shore and to 22 ships in Bombay harbour.
News of the ratings' revolt led to similar mutinies in Karachi, Calcutta, Vizag, Jamnagar, Cochin, Madras, and even at sea. There were signs of restiveness in the Air Force and Army too. By February 20 the strike had spread to 74 ships, four flotillas, and 20 shore establishments, including four major bases. In Bombay, a Naval Central Strike' Committee was elected; a Muslim, M.S.Khan, and, a Sikh, Madan Singh, were elected President and Vice President, respectively. Among the heroes of the strike was an eighteen-year-old, B.C.Dutt, later the author of Mutiny of Innocents (Bombay, 1971).
The demands of the ratings were not merely on their service grievances (as every single "national" leader was to make out later). On the contrary, the demands centred around "the release of all Indian political prisoners, including the INA personnel; withdrawal of Indian troops from Indonesia; Quit India". B.C.Dutt wrote much later that "The situation was ripe for the implementation of a political programme. Some 20,000 trained youth in Bombay alone, with access to arms and ammunition of the entire Navy, were waiting for orders (from the national leadership)."
Dutt writes:
"Ratings from every ship and from the shore establishments started marching towards the Talwar. The streets of Bombay resounded to their slogans, calling for national unity. `Hindu- Muslim ek ho' (Hindus and Muslims unite) and `Inquilab Zindabad'. It was a strange sight for the people of Bombay: the ratings marching through the streets with the party flags of the Congress and the League tied together to symbolise national unity.... The ratings were now on the road, not to suppress the people but to spread the message of unity and revolution. Crowds of people thronged the roads to watch the sight. They cheered lustily."
The general population, and even shopkeepers and restaurant-owners, fraternised with the strikers and refused to accept money for feeding them. When, on February 21, the ratings at Castle Barracks were encircled by Indian troops under British command, they appealed to them to stop firing. The firing stopped. On February 22, Bombay's entire working-class went on strike in solidarity.
The resources of the ratings were not easily exhaustible, either in ammunition or mass support; and in fact the British were to spend the remainder of February continuing to put down trouble in the air force and army. Then how was the remarkable and powerful revolt of the ratings suppressed within five days? The terrible tragedy of it was that the ratings placed total faith in the "national" leadership - the Congress and the League - and believed that they would lead this new army which had fallen into their lap full-grown. But, says Dutt, the Congress and the League leadership:
"...behaved as if they did not know what we were up to or what to do with us.... They were no longer in a position to make common cause with us against foreign rule.... At that time we were not aware that, we could hardly hope to propel a revolution with the help of a leadership which believed in reform and non-violent non-cooperation. Principles apart, the politicians of India at that point of time were already smiling to the radiance of coming power. And to those in power, service indiscipline is a nightmare. How, in retrospect, one wishes for the knowledge that they were already committed mentally to the continuation of the very order they were non-violently resisting! The pity of it! The pity, pity of it!"
Thus, one after the other, the rival national leaders of all hues came out against the mutiny. Dutt says, "The whole country had got to know of our takeover.... Yet the national leaders were silent. None of them sent either greetings or a fraternal message." On the second day of the mutiny, February 19, Attlee had announced the despatch of a Cabinet Mission to India to negotiate India's future, and the Indian "national" leaders were agog at the prospect. As Gandhi explained in refuting the ratings' decision:
"Emphatically it betrays want of foresight to disbelieve British declaration and precipitate a quarrel in anticipation. Is the official deputation coming to deceive a great nation? It is neither manly nor womanly to think so. What would be lost by waiting? Let the official deputation prove for the last time that British declarations are unreliable. The nation will gain by trusting."
Bewildered at the silence of Congress leaders, the ratings approached the Congress "Left-winger", Aruna Asaf Ali (wife of the prominent Congress leader Asaf Ali). She advised the ratings to "remain calm". (As Dutt, says; "it did not make any sense to us".) She told them that they were wrong to mix up political demands with service grievances, and told them "to separate the two and formulate your service demands" to the Naval authorities. "But we are the authority", she was told by the ratings. Rattled, Mrs. Asaf Ali told the ratings to "see the highest Congress authority in Bombay, Vallabhbhai Patel". Meanwhile, she telegrammed Nehru: "Naval strike tense. Situation serious. Climaxing to grim close. You alone can control and avoid tragedy. Request your immediate presence in Bombay." On February 20, she claimed to have urgent work in Poona, and disappeared from Bombay.
Vallabhbhai Patel had no Leftist image to protect so he was more straightforward. Patel condemned the strike, openly called on the ratings to surrender, and promised them that they would not be victimised if they did so (a promise he knew he was in no position to guarantee). The Bombay Governor reported on February 21 to Wavell that "the Congress leaders had denied any share in the mutiny, and had advised people to preserve order. I received a message from Vallabhbhai Patel to this effect on Thursday." As Patel was to explain a week after the upsurge, "discipline in the army cannot be tampered with ... we will want an Army even in free India".
Vallabhbhai Patel's press statement of February 21 is worth quoting:
"Who was responsible for the unfortunate turn of events which led to these disastrous consequences and what was the actual provocation which led to them is not known, but this is not an opportune moment to assess the relative responsibilities.... The primary and immediate duty of every responsible man is to see that peace is restored between the parties as also to see that the city is not plunged into trouble and its peaceful atmosphere disturbed. Every effort should be made to prevent panic and to control the unruly.... There should be no attempt to call for a hartal or stoppage of mills or closing of schools and colleges.... The Congress has a big party in the Central Assembly and is doing its best to help them (the ratings). I would, therefore, earnestly appeal to them to be patient and peaceful."
According to the Bombay Governor, Nehru came immediately to Bombay, but "restrained from inflaming the situation, as on arriving here he had been impressed by the necessity for curbing the wild outburst of violence." Nehru only spoke three days after the revolt had been suppressed, and he spoke then with his typical ambivalence: "I have all sympathy for the boys. The only thing that was not correct was that they were fighting against heavy odds. They had no provisions and very little of ammunition, as against the well-manned and heavily armed forces against whom they were fighting." But, as we have seen, the ratings were not only a considerably large and armed force. The sympathy of other Indian troops paralysed British attempts to repress them; a Congress call for a mutiny in the Army would have received wide response. And provisions were never a problem for the ratings, who were fed by the people.
Nehru capped his speech with the substantive and operative part of his stand: "In the recent RIN strike, the brave youths did commit a mistake." And then, "But we have to forgive them and do all in our power to prevent any victimisation." (emphasis added)
The Mahatma, of course, could be expected to outdo all others. On February 22, he condemned the ratings for setting "a bad and unbecoming example for India", and advised them peacefully to resign their jobs if they had, any grievance! Most significantly of all, he stated that "a combination between Hindus and Muslims for the purpose of violent action is unholy.... "
In April, he was to write more about this "unholy combination": "I might have understood it if they had combined from top to bottom". But combining only at the lowest level, he said,
"would of course have meant delivering India over to the rabble. I would not live upto 125 to witness that combination. I would rather perish in the flames."
However, this apostle of non-violence was later to countenance a path of action that set Hindus and Muslims at each others' throats; over half a million of India's "rabble" were to perish in those flames.
The Muslim League displayed wonderful unity with the Congress. Jinnah gave a press statement:
"I appeal to all RIN men not to play into the hands of those who want to create trouble and exploit those on strike for their own ends. I urge upon them to restore normal conditions and let us handle the situation, which will surely result in their welfare.... I, therefore, appeal to the ratings of the RIN to call off the strike and to the public in general not to add to the difficulties of the situation. Particularly, I call upon the Muslims to stop and to create no further trouble ... ".
However, neither the ratings nor the general population were listening to all these admonitions. An official telephone message from Bombay on February 22 reported that "Congress were against today's hartal (general strike), and Vallabhbhai Patel was emphatic about this, but the Communists' call for sympathy with the R.I.N. ratings has won the day and the Congress labour union has been totally ineffective."
The general strike closed down all the textile mills, railway workshops and city transport. There was bitter street-fighting throughout February 22 and 23; crowds erected roadblocks and covered them from nearby buildings. The fighting was fiercest in the working-class areas of Parel and Delisle Road. The British withdrew the Indian soldiers completely and sent in tanks and four military columns of British soldiers. The crowds attacked 10 police outposts, 9 banks, 10 post offices and, significantly, 64 government grain shops. Military lorries drove down roads machine-gunning anyone on the street; they were answered with a hail of stones. On February 22, Chundrigar and S.K.Patil, heads of the Bombay Muslim League and Congress units respectively, sent messages to the Governor "offering the help of volunteers to assist the police". In all, 228 civilians were killed and 1,046 injured (the police suffered 3 deaths and 91 injured).
"February 21", says Dutt, "had been the ratings' day. February 22 belonged to the workers of Bombay".
Karachi also saw, on February 23, a complete hartal, with a rally of 30,000 at Idgah Maidan and serious clashes with the police.
On February 23, however, the Naval Central Strike Committee surrendered. The earlier day they had received the Congress message, and relayed it to the ranks: "the advice of the Congress to the RIN ratings is to lay down arms and to go through the formality of surrender, which has been asked for. The Congress will do its level best to see that there is no victimisation and that the legitimate demands of the Naval ratings are accepted as soon as possible."
The ratings had passed a resolution at the start of the strike saying that "henceforth the ratings of the RIN will take orders only from, national leaders"! Now they openly wept with despair at the message. As Dutt says, "The news of the national leaders' reaction was a blow much harder than what the British could deal us afterwards". Despite considerable resistance from a section of the ratings, the leaders of the strike committee argued that there was little option but to surrender. The last message of the NCSC is heart-rending:
"The Naval Central Strike Committee wishes to inform the people of India and particularly the people of Bombay that it has decided to call off the strike. It has come to this decision after discussion with Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel, who has assured them that the Congress would see that there was absolutely no victimisation of any of the strikers and that their just demands would be taken up with the authorities...."A last word to our people: Our strike has been a historic event in the life of our nation. For the first time the blood of the men in the services and the people flowed together in common cause. We in the services will never forget this. We also know that you, our brothers and sisters, will not forget. Long live our great people! Jai Hind!"
The promise of "no victimisation" was immediately forgotten by the Congress. At least 400 ratings were immediately arrested in Bombay, and 500 in Karachi on the first day; eventually thousands were detained; some 500 were given prison terms as common criminals. Yet the Congress made no move to protest.
Today, as an extension of the same policy, the successive governments of "free" India have tried to wipe out from the public mind the memory and the true history of the ratings' revolt. No school child is told of their existence; no memorial stands in any area of Bombay to mark their sacrifice; and, of course, the Indian Navy, essentially a continuation of the colonial one, would never consider observing the occasion. If the naval ratings' last message is to be fulfilled, their memory will first have to be revived.
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