Civil Disobedience in Indian Tradition, with Some Early Nineteenth Century Documents c5.s3: IV

Civil Disobedience in Indian Tradition, with Some Early Nineteenth Century Documents c5.s3

Language: English

IV

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The story of the 1810-11 protests at Benares and other towns does not necessarily include every form of protest resorted to by the Indian people in relation to governmental or other authority. A more systematic exploring of eighteenth and early nineteenth century primary records (as well as records of still earlier periods—if such exist) may well disclose several other forms of protest and their principal features. Yet it should establish beyond any doubt that the resort to non-cooperation and civil disobedience against injustice etc., are in the tradition of India. It also confirms Gandhiji's observation that 'in India the nation at large has generally used passive resistance in all departments of life. We cease to cooperate with our rulers when they displease us.' It further suggests that either intuitively or through knowledge of specific instances, Mahatma Gandhi was very much aware of such a tradition.

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Does the knowledge that non-cooperation and civil disobedience are in the tradition of India have any relevance to present day India? It appears to the present writer that there is such a relevance both for the people as well as governments and other authorities. A realisation of it in fact seems crucial in the sphere of people-government relationship, and its acceptance imperative for the health and smooth functioning of Indian polity even today.

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Before proceeding further, it is useful to indicate two major characteristics of the present polity which India has inherited from two centuries of British rule. The first pertains to the persistence of eighteenth and nineteenth century British notions and attitudes regarding the place of the people *vis-a-vis* their governments.

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As the documents show there is frequent expression by the governmental authorities in 1810-11 of the sentiments that the people must give ‘unconditional submission to public authority’; that the Government must not seem ‘to yield to the influence of popular clamour’; that if Government had to yield, it must be ‘without compromising in too conspicuous a manner the authority of Government.’ To the Bhagalpur collector, even the postponing of the collection of the tax ‘because a lawless rabble assembles, is striking at the root of that power, which the Government ought to possess over the subject.’ The magistrate of Benares expressed a similar sentiment with even more anguish when reporting the situation on January 20, 1811. He wrote: ‘I cannot but feel very forcibly, that such a state of things being permitted to continue in defiance of public authority, has already weakened, and weakens daily still more and more, those sentiments of respect, which it is so essential that the community should entertain for the government of the country.’ Such notions and sentiments are still enshrined in the rules, codes and laws of Indian Governments.

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Secondly, in spite of Mahatma Gandhi, the revival of courage and confidence has not been equally manifest amongst all people of India. As appearances go, many seem to have hardly been touched by it. Or perhaps, after an initial flicker of hope, like the people of Benares after they had been cowed down, they too have given in to ‘sullen silence’, feeling that though ‘they could not resist but they will not concur.’

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Since 1947, a controversy has been going on in India about the relevance of non-cooperation and civil disobedience in a free country. It seems to agitate all those concerned with the problems of Indian polity, including those who stand for social and political transformation or accelerated change. According to one view, there is no place for non-cooperation and civil disobedience in a free country with representative legislative bodies. According to another, these may still be resorted to in certain well-specified situations. The situations which qualify for such resort are also a matter of controversy. According to some, the permissibility applies only when resorted to enforce accepted norms. Others feel that it is permissible to resort to non-cooperation and civil disobedience for advocating the changing of certain norms themselves.

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But this is really no new controversy. It started at the same time that the idea of non-cooperation and civil disobedience was revived in India early in this century. Besides men in the governmental apparatus, those who opposed it then included persons like Srinivas Sastri and Rabindranath Tagore. Sastri felt he could not but be apprehensive of ‘any movement which has the tendency to over throw, the tendency to disestablish, the tendency to bring about a stage of anarchy in the country, the tendency which destroys law, the tendency which destroys order and ordered government.’²⁵ Tagore regarded it as inconsistent with the dignity of India and was fearful of the dangers inherent in its practice.²⁶

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The most vehement and argued opposition to it, however, was voiced by R.P. Paranjpye in his presidential address at the Indian National Liberal Federation at Lucknow on December 26, 1924. As it is very revealing of the thinking and attitudes opposed to non-cooperation and civil disobedience, it may be quoted here at some length. Paranjpye stated:

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The idea of civil disobedience as the highest form of patriotism that is being implanted among a large number of semi-educated people is perhaps the most mischievous feature of the present extremist propaganda. Under the names *satyagraha*, non-cooperation or civil disobedience, it is being sedulously advocated all over. The deleterious effects are already being seen...It inevitably leads to outbursts of violence whether on one side or the other...It may perhaps provide occasionally a suitable handle against government but the effect on the people is permanent. Respect for law and order disappears once for all and all the criminal elements in the population are led to think that they are becoming patriotic by imitating the so-called patriots in their actions. It must be remembered that this want of respect for law and order on the part of the masses will continue even if all the ideas of the Mahatma, Maulvis, or Deshbandhus are fully achieved. They will find, when they are responsible for the government of the country, that these seeds that they have now sown to cause trouble to government will grow into a pest which they will be unable to get rid of. I cannot think of a policy more shortsighted than this of preparing for infinite trouble for oneself

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in order to obtain a problematical momentary advantage. The extremist leaders may chuckle at a campaign for the refusal of taxes,...taxes will have to be levied and paid by the people under all governments. But once the people are taught to consider that refusal to pay taxes is the highest form of patriotism, the task of future government will become almost impossible.²⁷

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But as time passed and Mahatma Gandhi became the sole symbol of Indian nationalism, such opposition became less vocal. While individuals still disagreed with particular expressions of it, by the mid-1930s non-cooperation and civil disobedience emerged as the accepted Indian method of dealing with injustice. With the removal of British power from India, however, the views of Sastri, Tagore, Paranjpye, etc., once again came to the forefront. As perhaps should have been expected, the opposition or dissent has mostly been expressed by those associated with the ruling apparatus. The only curious part of it is that many of the dissenters, in the earlier period, had themselves been participants in the Gandhian non-cooperation and civil disobedience movements. But, at the same time, there was no lack of other public men who challenged this new attitude towards non-cooperation and civil disobedience. The following by J.B. Kripalani, perhaps sums up this challenge. In December 1953, Kripalani said:

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I repudiate the view developed by Congress bosses in the government that satyagraha can have no place in a democracy. Satyagraha as commended by Gandhiji was not merely a political weapon. It could be used in the economic and social fields and even against friends and family members. Gandhiji commended it as a principle of life. Therefore, it is absurd to say that it has no place in a democracy, specially of the kind that we now have, bureaucratic centralised.

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He added:

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All questions cannot await the next elections nor can a government be over-thrown on the basis of local grievances, which for sections of the people may be questions of life and death. The denial of the right of *satyagraha* would mean unresisting submission to tyranny for long stretches of time.²⁸

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The new opposition and dissent has, however, been more complex and somewhat less vehement. Most of it has not rejected non-cooperation and civil disobedience completely. Only it finds it irrelevant and injurious in what K. Santhanam calls ‘democratic government’. According to him, subject to some marginal cases ‘general *satyagraha* against a democratic government cannot be justified.’ According to U.N. Dhebar in 1955 (President of the Indian National Congress at the time): ‘In the context of democracy or democratically run institutions, there is, generally speaking, very little occasion for *satyagraha*.’ But even persons like Santhanam visualise the need of individuals resorting to it only in particular situations requiring the defense of fundamental rights. A former Chief Justice of India, P.B. Gajendragadkar, also seems to share such views and, as recently as March 1967, stated:

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*Satyagraha* or non-cooperation can also be regarded as a legitimate weapon in democracy, provided of course it is adopted as a last resort, after all other remedies have been exhausted.

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Thus, compared to the 1920’s, the present opposition is substantially different. While persons in authority and position of responsibility do not still much cherish the prospect of non-cooperation and civil disobedience, there has begun to be a general acceptance of these methods in India; that instead of being destructive, they are in fact complementary to democracy. Few would today contest Santhanam’s view that ‘it is essential for democratic rulers to realise that true *satyagraha* is complementary to true democracy.’ Yet such a view has still to sink into the consciousness of those who manage the ruling apparatus or other centres of authority. It is largely because of this dichotomy, strange though it may appear, that present day non-cooperation and civil disobedience has got more and more involved with the trivial.

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Without, perhaps, fully comprehending the implications of their observations, both U.N. Dhebar and K. Santhanam have pointed to the central issue. According to Dhebar: ‘The question of *satyagraha* [in the context of democracy] can only arise from the perpetuation of an act or undertaking an activity which destroys the very foundation of the state or its constitution.’³⁴ For Santhanam, *satyagraha* may be the quickest means of defending³⁵ the fundamental rights of the people. Where they, along with many others, have erred is in taking a mechanical view of what acts destroy ‘the very foundation of the state or its constitution’ or what constituted ‘fundamental rights’.

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What acts of state destroy a state? What constitutes denial of fundamental rights? Answers to these cannot be determined by recourse to mere legality. To take one glaring example: large scale hunger and insecurity are both fast corroding the foundations of the Indian state and its constitution, as well as constituting a denial of the most fundamental human right. Hunger, impossible living conditions and insecurity amongst about 40 per cent of the people of India, of course, is not a creation of the present Indian state and its constitution. It is a product of the past two centuries. Nevertheless, the inability or insensitivity of the state in eliminating them, if by no other means, by a distribution of some poverty amongst all, is fast leading India to a subversion of the constitution and state structure. The practice of non-cooperation and civil disobedience for eliminating hunger and insecurity (by demanding “effective provision for securing the right of work” and “public assistance in cases of unemployment, old age, sickness and disablement, and in other cases of undeserved want” as provided in the constitution itself)³⁶ could have, and may yet if initiated in time, make such subversion much more difficult, if not impossible. (*According to even someone as responsible and law-abiding as Vinoba Bhave: “In the situation where an act is advocated by law and favoured by public opinion and yet it is not being put into practice, satyagraha for its implementation should be deemed appropriate.” (*Satyagraha Vichar* p.65) There is nothing less controversial in India than the immediate elimination of widespread hunger and insecurity. Its legal approval and advocacy arises from the constitution of the republic itself.)

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The reasons why the British would not attend to such protests are closely linked with the lack of assurance they possessed till the very end about the legitimacy of their rule in India. In contrast, most Indian political authorities prior to British rule had much greater assurance about such legitimacy. Hence, their surrendering to the protests of the people and altering or abandoning the decisions or enactments concerned did not in any material sense challenge the legitimacy of their rule. Rather, the willingness to listen and the ability to retract unpopular acts and decisions further confirmed such habit and legitimacy both in their own view and that of the people. Only a legitimate ruler, i.e., one who was accepted to be such by the populace, could in fact make such surrender and retraction.

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The British in India, on the other hand, even when in certain areas they might have been temporarily conceded some legitimacy by some or all of the ruled, never seem to have felt that their right to rule had any other sanction and legitimacy than that of conquest and an occupying armed force. It is true that their conquests were achieved by a relatively most adroit and economical use of force. Still these forces were not all that small. ([Till 1857, the European component of British occupying forces in India was as one European to four Indians and at times dropped to one European to six Indians. After 1857, when the British became completely panicky and frightened, the composition was altered to one European to two Indians and stayed at that till after 1900. The number of European troops in India was 45,104 in 1856; 92,866 in 1860; and 75,702 in 1908. While the number of Indian troops in 1856 was 2,35,221; it was 1,48,996 in 1908. (*British Parliamentary Papers*, 1908, Vol.74)])

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This feeling about the lack of legitimacy prevailed throughout British rule and was shared by men as different and separate in time as Robert Clive, Thomas Munro, John Malcolm and Charles Metcalfe. 1857 made it even more apparent. The fundamental maxim for British rule in India, according to Clive, was that ‘our influence and possessions were acquired, so they must be maintained by force; and that the princes of the country are only to be kept in order by fear.’³⁷ Fifty seven years later, Charles Metcalfe did not feel any differently; in fact he was more explicit. In a minute in 1829, he remarked:

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We are in appearance more powerful in India now than ever were. Nevertheless, our downfall may be short work. When it commences it will probably be rapid: and the world will wonder more at the suddenness with which our immense

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Indian Empire may vanish than it has done at the surprising conquest that we have achieved.³⁸

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Metcalfe continued:

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The cause of this precariousness is, that our power does not rest on actual strength, but on impression. Our whole real strength consists in the European regiments, speaking comparatively, that are scattered singly over the vast space of subjugated India. That is the only portion of our soldiery whose hearts are with us, and whose constancy can he relied on in the hour of trial.

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All our native establishments, military or civil, are the followers of fortune. They serve us for their livelihood and generally serve us well. From a sense of what is due to the hand that feeds them, which is one of the virtues that they most extol, they may often display fidelity under trying circumstances, but in their inward feelings they partake more or less of the universal disaffection, which prevails against us, not from bad government, but from natural and irresistible antipathy; and were the wind to change to use a native expression, and set in steadily against us, we could not expect that their sense of honour, although there might be splendid instances of devotion, would keep the men on our side, in opposition to the common feeling, which, with one view, might for a time unite all India, from one end to the other.³⁹

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Metcalfe further added:

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Our greatest danger is not from a Russian invasion, but from the fading of the impression of an invincibility from the minds of the native inhabitants of India. The disaffection, which would willingly root us out, exists abundantly. The concurrence of circumstances sufficient to call it into general action may at any time happen.⁴⁰

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A few months earlier, Metcalfe had advised: 'I am further convinced that our possession must always be precarious, unless we take root by having an influential portion of the population attached to our government by common interests and sympathies' and advocated the taking of every measure which was ‘calculated to facilitate the settlement of our countrymen in India.’⁴¹

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Such an assessment of the situation was universally shared by the British in India and reflected in government policy and enactments. Consequently, devoid of any other sanction and legitimacy, except the ‘European regiments’ and the ‘impression of invincibility’, the British could not afford to make any concessions, much less surrender to popular protests. Concession of any sort, in their view, implied (as in the case of the protests against the house tax during 1810-11), ‘the exciting in the minds of the natives an expectation of still further concessions’ which eventually (they felt) led to the erosion of every principle of their government. Therefore, in situations when tactical concessions or surrender could not be avoided, these were to be carried ‘into execution, without compromising in too conspicuous a manner the authority of government.’

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This principle of infallibility of state structure (and consequently of other units of power and authority) established by the British continues to survive in India even after the elimination of British power. It is true that finding itself very vulnerable, the state structure occasionally condescends to consider the complaints of the protesting after they agree to suspend or abandon their protests. Thus, while the reality of the principle of infallibility has been more or less abandoned, the rules, the codes and the laws which enshrine it, stay. And it is these latter that appear to provide the state system its real legitimacy and sanctity. Such a state of affairs has led to a most dangerous situation. It not only keeps intact the distrustful, hostile and alien stances of the state system *vis-a-vis* the people, but also makes the latter feel that it is violence alone which enables them to be heard. The happenings of the past several years—crammed with riots, protests, assassinations, police firings—in no way belie such a feeling.

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The opposition to non-cooperation and civil disobedience or the denial of even their theoretical relevance manifested by the wielders of the state apparatus from time to time or even by men like Srinivas Sastri, Tagore, Paranjpye before 1947 can be sourced to the British nurtured doctrine of the infallibility of the state system. Though now feeble and considered wholly ridiculous, this doctrine is not yet dead and buried. Its roots, while shaky, still remain. And many amongst the present wielders of the state structure and the theoreticians of the present Indian state system devote much of their talent and attention in nurturing them.

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Thus, while it is admitted that non-cooperation and civil disobedience are legitimate and valid when used against foreign rule, they are treated as illegitimate and invalid when used against indigenous governments and authorities. It is in this context that various leaders of India (not to mention teachers of history, political theory, etc.), while in general standing for an eventually classless and egalitarian society and a welfare state, have in effect allowed themselves to become the new defendants of the infallibility of the present state system. Such a doctrine—and more so, support for it—not only goes against all that Gandhiji advocated and did during his long public life, it is also contrary to the very psyche of the Indian people which has traditionally sustained the practice of non-cooperation and civil disobedience.

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The above does not imply that non-cooperation and civil disobedience are to be waged perpetually—as is advocated of ‘revolution’ by certain current doctrines. They are used when there is such a need. The more the ruling apparatus and other centres of authority are in tune with the ruled or those affected, the less the need to resort to them.

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It must also be admitted that non-cooperation and civil disobedience, like everything else, do not solve everything. There are social and political situations when they may not at all be applicable. As said earlier, to be successful non-cooperation and civil disobedience seem to require a certain commonality of values between the opposed parties. Such parties must share, even if temporarily, certain common socio-political or religious values. This however does not seem to happen in all situations. The late eighteenth and nineteenth century India provides one such instance when the rulers and the ruled had little in common. Similar situations seem to have obtained when most of Europe faced Hitler’s power, or Northern India faced Timur centuries ago. It was due to Mahatma Gandhi’s genius, indomitable courage and unmatched organisational capacity that he could visualise and make effective use of instrumentalities (originally fashioned for internal situations), to deal with an alien power. Circumstances (the British having become relatively mellowed by the early twentieth century being one such), and much more his personality, enabled him to make the British see at least at certain moments, the rightness and justice of the Indian stand. Step by step (from the issue of land revenue to the boycott of foreign goods to the abrogation of salt tax to the banning of liquor shops to the protests against India being forced into war), he led to the ultimate demand that the British ‘Quit India’. He even recommended these methods to the Czechs and to the Poles against Hitler. But such use or its advocacy against an alien power in no way implied the irrelevance of non-cooperation and civil disobedience against rulers or authorities who get elected or are appointed by the ruled themselves.

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Non-cooperation and civil disobedience are integral to the healthy functioning and even to the security of a free and democratic society. In a way, they are even more crucial than stratified courts of law; the present forms of periodic local, state-level or national elections, or the rather stilted and constrained debates and considerations within such elected bodies. Those who resort to non-cooperation and civil disobedience against callousness, authoritarianism and injustice are the protectors of their state and societies. Without them, a society will end up at best in some mechanical ritual; or, more often likely, in tyranny, provoking complete anarchy and armed insurrection.