I submitted to the community that if a deputation was to go to England, it was as well that they realized their responsibility in the matter still more fully, and with this end in view I placed three suggestions before our Association. First, although we had taken pledges at the meeting in the Empire Theatre, we should once again obtain individual pledges from leading Indians, so that if they had given way to doubt or weakness, they would be found out. One of the reasons advanced by me in sup¬ port of this suggestion was, that if the deputation was backed up by Satyagraha, they would then have no fears and could boldly inform the Secretary of State for India and the Secretary of State for the Colonies about the resolution of the community. Secondly, arrangements for meeting the expenses of the deputation must be made in advance. And thirdly, the maximum number of members should be fixed. I made this last suggestion in order to correct the current misapprehension that a large number of members would be able to put in more work, and to bring this idea into relief that the members should join the deputation not because it was an honour to them but with a single-minded devotion to the cause. The three suggestions were accepted. Signatures were taken. Many signed the pledge, but still I saw even among those who had orally pledged themselves at the meeting, there were some who hesitated to sign it. When once a man has pled¬ ged himself he need not hesitate to pledge himself a hundred times. But yet it is no uncommon experience to find men weakening in regard to pledges deliberately taken and getting perplexed when asked to put down a verbal pledge in black and white. The necessary funds, too, were found.
The greatest difficulty however was encountered in selecting the personnel of the deputation. I was to go, but who would go with me? The Committee took much time in arriving at a decision. Many a night passed, and we had a full experience of the bad habits which are generally prevalent in associations. Some proposed to cut the Gordian knot by asking me to go alone, but I flatly declined. There was for all practical purposes no Hindu-Muslim problem in South Africa. But it could not be claimed that there were no differences between the two sections and if these differences never assumed an acute form, that may have been to some extent due to the peculiar conditions in South Africa, but was largely and definitely due to the leaders having worked with devotion and frankness and thus given a fine lead to the community. My advice was that there must be a Musalman gentleman going with me, and that the personnel should be limited to two. But the Hindus at once said that as I represented the Indian community as a whole, there should be a representative of Hindu interests. Some even said that there should be one Konkani Musal¬ man, one Meman, one Patidar, one Anavala and so on.
At last, all understood the real position, and only two of us, Mr H.O. Ali and myself were duly elected.
H. O. Ali could be considered a semi-Malay. His father was an Indian Musalman and his mother a Malay. His mother tongue, we might say, was Dutch. But he had been so well educated in English that he could speak Dutch and English equally well. He had also cultivated the art of writing to the newspapers. He was a member of the Transvaal British Indian Association and he had long been taking part in public affairs. He spoke Hindu¬ stani, too, freely.
We set to work as soon as we reached England. We got printed the memorial to be submitted to the Secretary of State which we had drafted in the steamer on our way to England. Lord Elgin was Secretary of State for the Colonies and Lord (then Mr) Morley Secretary of State for India. We met Dadabhai and through him the British Committee of the Indian National Congress. We placed our case before it and signified our intention to seek the co¬ operation of all the parties, as advised by Dadabhai. The Committee approved of our policy. Similarly we met Sir Muncherji Bhownuggree, who also was of much help. He as well as Dadabhai advised us to secure the Co-oper¬ ation of some impartial and well-known Anglo-Indian who should introduce our deputation to Lord Elgin. Sir Munch¬ erji suggested some names, too, one of which was that of Sir Lepel Griffin. Sir W. W. Hunter was now no longer alive; or else on account of his deep knowledge of the condition of Indians in South Africa he would have led the deputation himself or induced some influential member of the House of Lords to do so.
We met Sir Lepel Griffin. He was opposed to current political movements in India, but he was much interested in this question and agreed to lead the deputation not for the sake of courtesy but for the justice and righteous¬ ness of our cause. He read all the papers and became familiar with the problem. We likewise interviewed other Anglo-Indians, Members of Parliament, and as many others of any importance as were within our reach. The deputation waited upon Lord Elgin who heard everything with attention, expressed his sympathy, referred to his own difficulties and yet promised to do for us all he could. The same deputation met Mr Morley who also declared his sympathy and whose observations in replying to the deputation I have already summarized. Sir William Wedderburn was instrumental in calling a meeting of the Committee of the House of Commons for Indian Affairs in the drawing-room of the House and we placed our case before them too as best we could. We met Mr Redmond, the then leader of the Irish Party. In short, we met as many members of Parliament as we could, irrespective of the party to which they belonged. The British Committee of the Indian National Congress was of course very help¬ ful. But according to English customs men belonging to a certain party and holding certain views only would join it, while there were many others who had nothing to do with the Committee but yet rendered us all possible assis¬ tance. We determined to organize a standing committee upon which all these could come together and thus be even more useful in watching over our interests and men of all parties liked our idea.
The burden of carrying on the work of an institution chiefly falls upon its secretary. The secretary should be such, that not only does he have full faith in the aims and the objects of the institution, but he should be able to devote nearly all his time to the achievement of these aims and has great capacity for work. Mr L. W. Ritch, who belonged to South Africa, was formerly articled to me and was now a student for the bar in London, satisfied all the requirements. He was there in England and was also desirous of taking up the work. We therefore ventured to form the South Africa British Indian Committee.
In England and other Western countries there is one, in my view, barbarous custom of inaugurating movements at dinners. The British Premier delivers in the Mansion House on the ninth of November an important speech in which he adumbrates his programme for the year and publishes his own forecast of the future, and which there¬ fore attracts universal notice. Cabinet ministers among others are invited to dinner by the Lord Mayor of London, and when the dinner is over, bottles of wine are uncorked, all present drink to the health of the host and the guest, and speeches too are made while this merry business is in progress. The toast for the British Cabinet is proposed, and the Premier makes the important speech referred to in reply to it. And as in public, so in private, the person with whom some important conversations are to be held is, as a matter of custom, invited to dinner, and the topic of the day is broached either at or after dinner. We too had! to observe this custom not once but quite a number of times, although of course we never touched meat or liquor. We thus invited our principal supporters to lunch. About a hundred covers were laid. The idea was to tender our thanks to our friends, to bid them good-bye and at the same time to constitute the Standing Committee. Here too, speeches were made, as usual, after dinner, and the Committee was also organized. We thus obtained greater publicity for our movement.
After a stay in England of about six weeks we returned to South Africa. When we reached Madeira, we received a cablegram from Mr Ritch to the effect that Lord Elgin had declared that he was unable without further considera¬ tion to advice His Majesty the King that the Transvaal Asiatic Ordinance should be brought into operation. Our joy knew no bounds. The steamer took about a fortnight to reach Cape Town from Madeira and we had quite a good time of it during these days and built many castles in the air about the coming redress of many more grievances. But the ways of Providence are inscrutable. We shall see in the next chapter how the castles we had laboriously built toppled down and passed into nothingness.
But I must place one or two sacred reminiscences on record before closing this chapter. We had utilized every single minute of our time in England. The sending of a large number of circulars etc., could not be done singlehanded, and we were sorely in need of outside help. Money indeed does bring us this kind of help, but my experi¬ ence ranging over forty years has taught me that assistance thus purchased can never compare with purely voluntary service. Fortunately for us we had many volunteer helpers.
Many an Indian youth who was in England for study surrounded us and some of them helped us day and night without any hope of reward or fame. I do not remember that any of them ever refused to do anything as being beneath his dignity, be it the writing of addresses or the fixing of stamps or the posting of letters. But there was an English friend named Symonds who cast all these into the shade. Whom the Gods love die young and so did this benevolent Englishman. I first met him in South Africa.
He had been in India. When he was in Bombay in 1897, he moved fearlessly among the Indians affected by the plague and nursed them. It had become a second nature with him not to be daunted by death when ministering to sufferers from infectious diseases. He was perfectly free from any race or colour prejudice. He was independent in temperament. He believed that truth is always with the minority. It was this belief of his which first drew him to me in Johannesburg, and he often humorously assured me that he would withdraw his support of me if he ever found me in a majority, as he was of opinion that truth itself is corrupted in the hands of a majority. He had read very widely. He was private secretary to Sir George Farrar, one of the millionaires of Johannesburg. He was an expert stenographer. He happened to be in England when we were there. I did not know where he was, but the noble Englishman found us out as our public work had secured for us newspaper advertisement. He expressed his willingness to do for us anything he could. £I will work as a servant if you like,5 he said, £and if you need a stenographer, you know you can scarcely come across the like of me.’
We were in need of both these kinds of help, and I am not exaggerating when I say that this Englishman toiled for us day and night without any payment. He was always on the typewriter till twelve or one o’clock at night. Symonds would carry messages and post letters, always with a smile curling round his lips. His monthly income was about forty-five pounds, but he spent it all in helping his friends and others. He was about thirty years of age. He was un¬ married and wanted to remain so all his life. I pressed him hard to accept some payment, but he flatly refused and said, T would be failing in my duty if I accepted any remuneration for this service.’ I remember that on the last night he was awake till three o’clock while we were wind¬ ing up our business and packing our things. He parted with us the next day after seeing us off on the steamer, and a sad parting it was. I have often experienced that benevolence is by no means peculiar to the brown skin.
For the benefit of young aspirants after public work, I note down the fact that we were so punctilious in keep¬ ing the accounts of the deputation that we preserved even such trifling vouchers as the receipts for the money spent in the steamers upon, say, soda water. Similarly we pre¬ served the receipts for telegrams. I do not remember to have entered a single item under sundries when writing the detailed accounts. As a rule, sundries did not figure in our accounts at all, and if they did they were intended to cover a few pennies or shillings the manner of whose spending we could not recall at the time of writing the accounts at the end of the day.
I have clearly observed in this life the fact that we become trustees or responsible agents from the time that we reach years of discretion. So long as we are with our parents, we must account to them for moneys or business they entrust to us. They may be sure of our rectitude and may not ask us for accounts, but that does not affect our responsibility. When we become independent house¬ holders, there arises the responsibility to our family. We are not the sole proprietors of our acquisitions; our family is a co-sharer of them along with ourselves. WeTnust account for every single pie for their sake. If such is our responsi¬ bility in private life, in public life it is all the greater. I have observed that voluntary workers are apt to behave as if they were not bound to render a detailed account of the business or moneys with which they are entrusted be¬ cause like Caesar’s wife they are above suspicion. This is sheer nonsense, as the keeping of accounts has nothing whatever to do with trustworthiness or the reverse. Keep¬ ing accounts is an independent duty, the performance of which is essential to clean work, and if the leading workers of the institution which we voluntarily serve do not ask us CROOKED POLICY CROOKED POLICY for accounts out of a sense of false courtesy or fear, they too are equally to blame. If a paid servant is bound to account for work done and money spent by him, the volunteer is doubly bound to do so, for his very work is as a reward to him. This is a very important matter, and as I know that this is generally not sufficiently attended to in many institutions, I have ventured to take up so much space here in adverting to the subject.
chapter xv CROOKED POLICY As soon as we landed at Cape Town, and more so when we reached Johannesburg, we saw that we had over¬ rated the Madeira cablegram* Mr Ritch who sent it was not responsible for this. He cabled only what he had heard about the measure being disallowed. As we have already observed, the Transvaal was then, that is to say in 1906, a Crown Colony. Crown Colonies are represented in Eng¬ land by agents one of whose duties it is to instruct the Secretary of State for the Colonies in all matters affecting Colonial interests. The Transvaal was then represented by Sir Richard Solomon, the noted lawyer of South Africa. Lord Elgin had disallowed the Black Act in consultation with him. Responsible government was to be conferred on the Transvaal on January 1, 1907. Lord Elgin there¬ fore assured Sir Richard that if an identical measure was passed by the Transvaal legislature constituted after the grant of responsible government, it would not be refused the royal assent. But so long as the Transvaal was a Crown Colony, the Imperial Government would be held directly responsible for such class legislation, and as racial discrimination was a departure from the fundamental principles of the British Empire, he could not but advise His Majesty to disallow the measure in question.
If the measure was to be thus disallowed only in name and if the Transvaal Europeans could at the same time have their own way, Sir Richard Solomon had no reason to object to such an excellent arrangement. I have characterized this as crooked policy, but I believe it could be given a still harsher name with perfect justice. The Imperial Government is directly responsible for the legis¬ lation of Grown Colonies, and there is no place in its con¬ stitution for discrimination on the ground of race or colour.
So far so good. One can also understand that the Imperial Government could not all at once disallow measures passed by the legislatures of Colonies enjoying responsible govern¬ ment. But to hold private conferences with Colonial agents and in advance to promise the royal assent to legislation which is in open violation of the Imperial Constitution, — what is this if it is not a breach of faith and an injustice to those whose rights are thus pilfered? Really speaking Lord Elgin by his assurance encouraged the Transvaal Europeans in their anti-Indian activities. If he wanted to do this, he ought to have told the Indian deputation so in plain terms. As a matter of fact the Empire cannot escape responsibility even for the legislation of Colonies enjoying responsible government. Even such Colonies are bound to accept the fundamental principles of the British Constitution. As for example no such Colony can revive the institution of legalized slavery. If Lord Elgin disallowed the Black Act because it was an improper piece of legislation, and he could disallow it only on this ground, it was his clear duty privately to have warned Sir Richard Solomon that the Transvaal could not enact such an iniquitous law after the grant of responsible government, and if it had any intention of doing so, the Imperial Govern¬ ment would be constrained to reconsider the advisability of granting it any such superior status. Or he should have told Sir Richard that responsible government could be conferred only on the condition that the rights of the Indians were fully safeguarded. Instead of following such straightforward procedure, Lord Elgin made an outward show of friendliness to the Indians, while at the same time he really and secretly supported the Transvaal Govern¬ ment and encouraged it to pass once more the very law which he had vetoed himself. This is not the only or the first case of such tortuous policy followed by the British CROOKED POLICY 117 Empire. Even an indifferent student of its history will easily recall similar incidents.
In Johannesburg, therefore, the sole topic of conver¬ sation was the trick played upon us by Lord Elgin and the Imperial Government. Our disappointment in South Africa was as deep as had been our joy in Madeira. Yet the immediate consequence of this deception was that the community became even more enthusiastic than before. Every one said that we must never fear as our struggle was independent of any help from the Imperial Govern¬ ment. We must look for assistance only to our own selves and to that God in Whose name we had pledged ourselves to resistance. And even crooked policy would in time turn straight if only we were true to ourselves.
Responsible government was established in the Trans¬ vaal. The first measure passed by the new Parliament was the budget; the second was the Asiatic Registration Act, which was, except for an alteration in the date specified in one of its clauses, which lapse of time made necessary, an exact replica of the original Ordinance, and was rushed through all its stages at a single sitting on March 21, 1907. The disallowance of the Ordinance, therefore, was forgotten as if it was a dream. The Indians submitted memorials, etc. as usual, but who would listen to them? The Act was proclaimed to take effect from July 1, 1907 and Indians were called upon to apply for registration under it before July 31. The delay in enforcing the Act was due not to any desire to oblige the Indians, but to the exigencies of the case. Some time must elapse before the formal sanction of the Grown to the measure was signified, and the prepara¬ tion of the forms set forth in schedules and the opening of permit offices at various centres would also take time. The delay therefore was intended solely for the Transvaal Government’s own convenience.
CHAPTER XVI AHMAD MUHAMMAD KACHHALIA When the deputation was on its way to England, I happened to talk about the anti-Asiatic legislation in the Transvaal with an Englishman who had settled in South Africa, and when I informed him of the object of our visit to England, he exclaimed, T see you are going to London in order to get rid of the dog’s collar.’ He thus compared the Transvaal permit to a dog’s collar, but I did not quite understand then, and cannot exactly tell while recording that incident even now, whether he thus intended to express his contempt for the Indians and joy at their humiliation, or whether he only meant to show his strong feeling in the matter. According to the golden rule that a person’s words must not be interpreted so as to do him an injustice, I take it that the gentleman used this graphic language only in order to evince his strong feeling. However that may be, the Transvaal Government on one side was prepar¬ ing to throw the dog’s collar on the Indians’ necks, while on the other side the Indians were getting ready to put up a fight against the wicked policy of that Government and were concerting measures calculated to strengthen them in their resolution never to wear that collar. Of course, we were writing letters to friends in England as well as in India and trying thus to keep them in touch with the situation from day to day. But a Satyagraha struggle depends but little upon help from outside, and it is only internal remedies that are effective. The leaders’ time therefore was chiefly taken up with the endeavours to keep all the elements of the community up to the mark.
One important question before us was what agency we should use for carrying on the struggle. The Transvaal British Indian Association had a large membership. Satya¬ graha had not yet seen the light of the day when it was esta¬ blished. The Association had resisted in the past, and must resist in the future, not one obnoxious law, but quite AHMAD MUHAMMAD KACHHALIA a host of them. Besides organizing resistance to obnoxious legislation, it had many other functions of a political and social nature to perform. Again all the members of the Association were not pledged to resist the Black Act through Satyagraha. At the same time we must take account of external risks to which the Association would be exposed in the event of its being identified with the Satyagraha struggle. What if the Transvaal Government declared the struggle to be seditious and all institutions carrying it on as illegal bodies? What would, in such a case, be the position of members who were not Satyagrahis? And what about the funds which were contributed at a time when Satyagraha was not so much as thought of? All these were weighty considerations. Lastly, the Satyagrahis were strongly of”"* opinion that they not only must not entertain any ill-will against those who did notjoi^ for want of faith or weakness or any other reason whatever, but must maintain their present friendly relations with them unimpaired and even work side by side with them in all other movements except the Satyagraha struggle. _ For all these reasons the community came to the conclusion that the Satyagraha struggle should not be car¬ ried on through any of the existing organizations. They might render all help in their power and resist the Black Act in every way open to them except that of Satyagraha, for which a new body named the ‘Passive Resistance Associa¬ tion5 was started by the Satyagrahis. The reader will see from this English name that the word Satyagraha had not yet been invented when this new Association came into being. Time fully justified the wisdom of constituting a fresh body for the work, and the Satyagraha movement might perhaps have suffered a setback if any of the exist¬ ing organizations had been mixed up with it. Numerous members joined this new Association, and the community furnished it funds too with a lavish hand.
My experience has taught me that no movement ever stops or languishes for want of funds. This does noF^mean that any temporal movement can go on without money, but it does mean that wherever it has good men and true at its helm, it is bound to attract to itself the requisite funds. On the other hand, I have also observed that a movement takes its downward course from the time that it is afflicted with a plethora of funds. When therefore a public institution is managed from the interest of invest¬ ments, I dare not call it a sin but I do say that it is a high¬ ly improper procedure. The public should be the bank for all public institutions, which should not last a day longer than the public wish. An institution run with the interest of accumulated capital ceases to be amenable to public opinion and becomes autocratic and self-righteous. This is not the place to dwell upon the corruption of many a social and religious institution managed with permanent funds. The phenomenon is so common that he who runs may read it.
But we must return to our narrative. Lawyers and English-educated persons do not by any means enjoy a monopoly of hair-splitting. I saw that even the unedu¬ cated Indians in South Africa were quite capable of draw¬ ing minute distinctions and making fine arguments. Some argued that the pledge taken in the Old Empire Theatre had been fulfilled as the old Ordinance was disallowed, and those who had weakened since then took shelter under this plea. The argument was not quite devoid of force, yet it could not impress those whose resistance was not to the law as a law but to the vicious principle underlying it. All the same it was found necessary to re-administer the oath of resistance for safety’s sake just to reinforce the awakening of the com¬ munity and to probe the extent of its- weakness if any. Meet¬ ings therefore were held in every place, where the situation was explained, the oath was administered afresh and the spirit of the community was found to be as high as ever.
Meanwhile the fateful month of July was gradually drawing to an end, and on the last day of that month we had resolved to call a mass meeting of the Indians at Pretoria, the capital of the Transvaal. Delegates from other places besides were also invited to attend. The meet¬ ing was held in the open on the ground of Pretoria mosque. After the inauguration of Satyagraha our meetings were so largely attended that no building could accommodate them. The entire Indian population in the Transvaal did AHMAD MUHAMMAD KACHHALIA not exceed 13,000 souls, of whom over 10,000 lived in Johannesburg and Pretoria. An attendance at public meetings of two thousand from an aggregate population of ten thousand would be considered large and satisfactory in any part of the world. A movement of mass Satyagraha is impossible on any other condition. Where the struggle is wholly dependent upon internal strength, it cannot go on at all without mass discipline. The workers therefore did not consider such large attendance as any¬ thing surprising. From the very first they had decided to hold public meetings only in the open so that expense was nearly avoided and none had to go back from the place of meeting disappointed for want of accommodation. All these meetings, again, were mostly very quiet. The audiences heard everything attentively. If those who were far away from the platform could not hear a speaker, they would ask him to speak louder. The reader scarcely needs to be told that there were no chairs at these meet¬ ings. Every one sat on the ground. There was a very small platform designed to accommodate the chairman, the speaker and a couple of friends, and a small table and a few chairs or stools were placed upon it.
Mr Yusuf Ismail Mian, acting chairman of the British Indian Association, presided over this meeting. As the time for issuing permits under the Black Act was drawing nearer, the Indians were naturally anxious in spite of all their enthusiasm; but no less anxious than they were General Botha and General Smuts, all the might of the Transvaal Government at their back notwithstanding. No one would like to bend a whole community to his will by sheer force. General Botha therefore had sent Mr William Hosken to this meeting to admonish us. The reader has already made this gentleman’s acquaintance in a previous chapter. The meeting received him warmly, and he said, “You know I am your friend. I need scarcely say that my feelings in this matter are with you. If at all I could, I would gladly make your opponents accede to your de¬ mands. But you hardly need to be told about the general hostility of the Transvaal Europeans to your community. I am here at General Botha’s instance. He has asked me