I am currently reading Jaswant Singh's
JINNAH India - Partition - Independence. In Chapter 5 : A Short Decade - A Long End Game, Mr Singh quotes Gandhiji from his open letter to the British, published in the "
Amrita Bazar Patrika" dated 4th July 1940 under the title "Method of non-violence - Mahatma Gandhi's appeal to every Briton". It read, in parts to say :
"I appeal for cessation of hostilities....because war is bad in essence. You want to kill Nazism. Your soldiers are doing the same work of destruction as the Germans. The only difference is that perhaps yours are not as thorough as the Germans....I venture to present you with a nobler and braver way, worthy of the bravest soldiers. I want you to fight Nazism without arms or...with non-violent arms. I would like you to lay down the arms you have as being useless for saving you or humanity....Invite Herr Hitler and Signor Mussolini to take what they want of the countries you call your possessions. Let them take possession of your beautiful island with your many beautiful buildings. You will give all these but not your souls nor your minds..."This outrageous idea struck me like a bolt of lightning !! Befuddled, I scratched my head and read the paragraph again, rubbed my eyes to make sure that I wasn't dreaming. No! I wasn't.
I hope he was not serious and that the politician in the Mahatma was trying to taunt the British by conveying the message that to conquer a nation one needs to conquer more than its geography. Anyway, after the initial shock I burst into a paroxysm of laughter as I tried to imagine the Mahatma, with a straight face, hand over this letter to the Viceroy.
I wonder what the Englishman did after he read the letter !
I'll be back shortly to post my opinion of the book.
Posts
