Freedom's Battle: Being a Comprehensive Collection of Writings and Speeches on the Present Situation — John Shaqi
Freedom's Battle: Being a Comprehensive Collection of Writings and Speeches on the Present SituationGandhi, Mahatma
Religion
Freedom's Battle: Being a Comprehensive Collection of Writings and Speeches on the Present Situation
Gandhi, Mahatma
British -- India; India -- Politics and government -- 1919-1947; Nonviolence
I decline to believe that the Arabs like the disposition that has been
made of them. Who is the King of Hedjaj and who is Emir Feisul? Have the
Arabs elected these kings and chiefs? Do the Arabs like the Mandate
being taken by England? By the time the whole thing is finished, the
very name self-determination will stink in one's nostrils. Already signs
are not wanting to show that the Arabs, the Thracians and the Smyrnans
are resenting their disposal. They may not like Turkish rule but they
like the present arrangement less. They could have made their own
honourable terms with Turkey but these self-determining people will now
be held down by the 'matchless might' of the allied _i.e._, British
forces. Britain had the straight course open to her of keeping the
Turkish Empire intact and taking sufficient guarantees for good
government. But her Prime Minister chose the crooked course of secret
treaties, duplicity and hypocritical subterfuges.
There is still a way out. Let her treat India as a real partner. Let her
call the true representatives of the Mussalmans. Let them go to Arabia
and the other parts of the Turkish Empire and let her devise a scheme
that would not humiliate Turkey, that would satisfy the just Muslim
sentiment and that will secure honest self-determination for the races
composing that Empire. If it was Canada, Australia or South Africa that
had to be placated, Mr. Lloyd George would not have dared to ignore
them. They have the power to secede. India has not. Let him no more
insult India by calling her a partner, if her feelings count for naught.
I invite _The Times of India_ to reconsider its position and join an
honourable agitation in which a high-souled people are seeking nothing
but justice.
I do with all deference still suggest that the least that Lord
Chelmsford can do is to resign if the sacred feelings of India's sons
are not to be consulted and respected by the Ministers. _The Times_ is
over-taxing the constitution when it suggests that as a constitutional
Viceroy it is not open to Lord Chelmsford to go against the decision of
his Majesty's Ministers. It is certainly not open to a Viceroy to retain
office and oppose ministerial decisions. But the constitution does allow
a Viceroy to resign his high office when he is called upon to carry out
decisions that are immoral as the peace terms are or like these terms
are calculated to stir to their very depth the feelings of those whose
affair he is administering for the time being.
THE MAHOMEDAN DECISION
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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