Arthur Freeman- Gandhi and Churchill

A book of Epic proportions.

Arthur Freeman’s book on ‘Gandhi and Churchill’ seeks to unravel two mighty colossus’s of a bygone era. Churchill’ persona has been unraveled to a great extent, but Gandhi still remains an enigma to me, inspite of 600 plus pages on him.

Churchill’s personality appeared to be a rather uncomplicated one.

A die-hard imperialist ,he believed in the ‘White Man’s Burden’ and the racial superiority of the Anglo-Saxons, and was totally unapologetic about it. If he had his way India would have still been part of the ‘empire where the sun never set’.

But we can thank the World Wars, Hitler, Pressure from USA and of course Gandhi for our freedom.

Gandhi’s contribution to the freedom struggle, I believe is essentially two-fold.

Firstly, his genius in evolving the concept of ‘satyagraha’ or ‘truth force’ for which the colonial masters appeared to be clueless to deal with.
How do you deal with ‘Non-violence’ if you have been brought up to believe in the British sense of fair play and justice?

Secondly, his instinctive belief that ‘if enough Indians stood up and said ‘Go home, white man’ then the public opinion in Britain will sway in favour of granting India Independence.

And that’s what happened, and Churchill could only stand and watch his empire disintegrate.

The ‘information Warfare’ unleashed by Gandhi in driving the message home that ‘India is for Indians’ was in the form of spectacular mass movements like ‘the Non cooperation Movement’ of the 1920’s,the Salt Satyagraha of the 1930’s and the Quit India movement of 1942.

Yet, all these movements failed spectacularly to achieve their objectives, as brought out in the book . The non cooperation movement whittled out due to lack of public support after a while, the salt tax was never scrapped, Dandi march notwithstanding and Quit India movement only sizzled to deceive.

But Gandhi had achieved his objectives. He got India united (Hindu’s, Sikhs, Muslims and most importantly the Untouchables) to speak in unison and the message was driven home to the Empire that the time had come for them to pack their bags.

Of course its always debatable and a ‘what if’ whether Gandhi would have succeeded ‘if’ Britain had not been visibly weakened by the Wars and ‘if’ our colonial masters had been Germans or Japanese.

But that’s unfair. Given an enemy ‘X’ (Britishers) -Gandhi’s formula worked. Period.
Whether it would have worked against ‘Y’ -we can keep debating till cow’s come home.

But what has been mentioned above is the popular image of Gandhi……

There’s definitely more to him….and that’s why he remains an enigma to me. Sample a few cases as brought out in the book.

Gandhi’s take on Indians , Blacks and Anglo Saxons.

In South Africa Gandhi fought hard to get the Indian elites the same status as whites. He reminded his masters that ‘ Anglo Saxons and the Indians sprung from the same superior stock i.e ‘the Aryans’ and hence were entitled to same status as the ‘whites’ unlike the Indian laborers(mostly Tamilians) and Native Blacks. (the 'superior stock' opinion was echoed by Hitler later on)

His ‘Green Pamphlet’(1896) talks of the woes faced by the Indian elite in south Africa; how they were forced to use to use the same lavatories and entrances to buildings as the Blacks.

In ‘Indian Opinion’ Gandhi wrote ‘if there is one thing that Indians cherish it is the purity of the races.’ Blacks and Indians should not be forced to live in the same Johannesburg suburbs as ‘it would be unfair to the Indian population’.

In repeated interviews given to ‘London times’ and other press, Gandhi appealed that Indians be not treated as a barbarous race, as they were an ancient civilization.

So what does one make of that?

Hind Swaraj(1909)

Gandhi’s only political & moral treatise- ‘Hind Swaraj’ –crystallizes his beliefs.

The way forward for India ,Gandhi believed was to go back to the roots ,to ancient India,with its idyllic villages and Rishis and Fakirs. We did not invent machines ,not because we did not know how to ,but because our forefathers realized that if we set our hearts to such things then we will lose our moral fibre and become slaves to these machines.

Indians, as per Gandhi, needed to reject all modern influences to move forward. This included rejecting modern medicine, avoiding schools, closing textile factories and wearing only hand spun clothes made at home and avoiding railways.

In addn, as proponent of non Violence, During the period when Hitler was carrying out his pogroms against Jews, his message to the Jews was ‘to pray for Hitler’.

Gandhi remains an enigma to me. But if we discount the written/spoken word of Gandhi and just see his political achievements then he appears as a genuine master political strategist.

The book is however a great and inspiring read. The travails that Gandhi and Churchill had gone through would have broken an ordinary man. Its their firm belief in their ideals that stood them apart and changed the course of world history.