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Civil Disobedience: The Indian Way

When Gandhi set out on a 241mile walk to pick up salt from the sea shore, he didn’t actually want the salt.  He wanted to demonstrate the futility and stupidity of a law that gave a monopoly of salt making to the British crown, who also made a hefty tax from salt.  Moreover, Gandhi felt that this obnoxious law could provide a focus for the start of the civil disobedience movement as part of the independence movement. 

He was watched by thousands of ordinary Indians who came out to greet him and give him support.  The unique march on foot for the deliberate and declared defiance of British might, proved to be a master-stroke of political strategy.  It awakened the Indian masses and shook the British Empire.  Gandhiji addressed huge meetings of villagers on the way.  Finally, on 5 April 1930 he reached the Dandi sea beach and early on April 6, broke the salt law by symbolically picking up a little lump of salt left by the waves of the sea.  This was the signal for mass defiance of the law.  The Civil Disobedience Movement had begun.

The movement sprang from the real desire of the people of India to overthrow the racist colonial power that resulted in economic exploitation of the Indian people.  Demonstrations against British rule had been met with lathi beatings and machine guns.  The rulers continued using brutal suppression – censorship, discriminatory laws, banning of meetings, mass arrests, killing unarmed civilians, etc., – in an attempt to isolate and terrorize the movement.  It failed to quell the spirit of the people.

Later that year, the British government convened a conference to discuss the future of government in India – excluding the Congress party, but with handpicked ‘government men’ - their voice was not the voice of India.  The Conference was designed to display the disunity of India rather than its unity.

The conference ended without arriving at any agreement on the vital issues.  However, the idea of an All-India federation did receive general support at the Conference.  The Muslims welcomed the federation but wanted to ensure that the minorities must have a sense of security without which no constitution would work.  The questions of granting autonomy and responsible government to the Provinces and possibly some form of diarchy in the Central Government were also contemplated and discussed.  The Conference made it abundantly clear that all Indians, irrespective of caste, party, community or interest, were united in the demand for the transfer of responsibility to an Indian cabinet answerable to an elective legislature.  Any decision taken by the Conference in the absence of the Congress was meaningless as it did not have the acceptance of the people.  This failure of the Conference made the British realise that without participation of the Congress constitutional progress was not possible. 

The British government did eventually introduce a form of self-government with limited powers, but one that was hand picked to avoid confrontation and effectively a lapdog of the British government.  Even the declaration of war on Japan was made by the British Viceroy on behalf of the Government of India, who weren’t officially informed that they were at war!  It took the Second World War and the continuing actions of the civil disobedience movement and other pro-independence movements to help India achieve independence in 1948. 

The similarities between the situation in Burma now and the situation in India in the 1930s/1940s are striking.  Both governments abhor the idea of relinquishing power to a people’s democracy, self-government and free elections.  Both governments use censorship, draconian laws, brutality, unlawful killing and imprisonment as a means of trying to suppress the freedom movement.  Both governments try to discredit and annihilate any opposition to their rule.  Both governments try to damage the reputation of and marginalize the iconic leaders of the pro-democracy movement, through insult and intimidation.  Those reactionary powers within the British government who wanted to keep the Empire the way it was failed - and the world is a better place for all that.  The SPDC in Burma will also fail – they will never gain the trust or the confidence of the people.

The civil disobedience movement in India didn’t achieve results immediately.  It took 18 years before India gained independence.  The independence movement wasn’t just about the civil disobedience movement – it was also about political activism, violent demonstrations and insurgency – but the civil disobedience movement was what caught the attention and imagination of the world.  The world rightly remembers Gandhiji as one of the foremost leaders for peace in the world, and we all have great respect for the great man. 

With all this, the independence movement in Burma has a great deal to learn from the independence movements in other countries.  We can all take upliftment and encouragement from the great changes that others have achieved by their own simple, straightforward and committed belief in the spirit of freedom and peace. 

Taisamyone

Quotations

• Freedom is a two-edged sword of which one edge is liberty and the other, responsibility.  Both edges are exceedingly sharp and the weapon is not suited to casual, cowardly or treacherous hands.
• Since all tyrannies are based on dogma and since all dogmas are based on lies, it behoves us to look beyond them for truth and freedom will both be far away.

[Freedom is a Two-edged Sword, Jack Parsons (Frater Belarion), Rocket scientist and arcane magic theorist.]

• There are times when you have to obey a call which is the highest of all, i.e., the voice of conscience even though such obedience may cost many a bitter tear, and even more, separation from friends, from family, from the state to which you may belong, from all that you have held as dear as life itself. For this obedience is the law of our being. Non-cooperation is an attempt to awaken the masses, to a sense of their dignity and power. This can only be done by enabling them to realize that they need not fear brute force, if they would but know the soul within.
• Strength does not come from physical capacity. It comes from an indomitable will.
• Whenever you are confronted with an opponent, conquer him with love.
• It is easy enough to be friendly to one's friends. But to befriend the one who regards himself as your enemy is the quintessence of true religion. The other is mere business.
• Democracy is an impossible thing until the power is shared by all, but let not democracy degenerate into mobocracy.
• They cannot take away our self-respect if we do not give it to them.
• I object to violence because when it appears to do good, the good is only temporary; the evil it does is permanent.
• Non-violence is the greatest force at the disposal of mankind. It is mightier than the mightiest weapon of destruction devised by the ingenuity of man.

[Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi (1869—1948) Indian political and spiritual leader.]

References

http://www.careera1.com/Projects/summary/disobedience.htm

http://quotations.about.com/cs/gandhiquotes/a/bls_gandhi.htm

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