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 notice a desire for the impeachment of General Dyer and Sir Michael
O'Dwyer. I will not stop to examine whether the course is feasible. I
was sorry to find Mr. Shastriar joining this cry for the prosecution of
General Dyer. If the English people will willingly do so, I would
welcome such prosecution as a sign of their strong disapproval of the
Jallianwalla Bagh atrocity, but I would certainly not spend a single
farthing in a vain pursuit after the conviction of this man. Surely the
public has received sufficient experience of the English mind.
Practically the whole English Press has joined the conspiracy to screen
these offenders against humanity. I would not be party to make heroes of
them by joining the cry for prosecution private or public. If I can only
persuade India to insist upon their complete dismissal, I should be
satisfied. But more than the dismissal, of Sir Michael O'Dwyer and
General Dyer, is necessary the peremptory dismissal, if not a trial, of
Colonel O'Brien, Mr. Bosworth Smith, Rai Shri Ram and others mentioned
in the Congress Sub-Committee's Report. Bad as General Dyer is I
consider Mr. Smith to be infinitely worse and his crimes to be far more
serious than the massacre of Jallianwalla Bugh. General Dyer sincerely
believed that it was a soldierly act to terrorise people by shooting
them. But Mr. Smith was wantonly cruel, vulgar and debased. If all the
facts that have been deposed to against him are true, there is not a
spark of humanity about him. Unlike General Dyer he lacks the courage to
confirm what he has done and he wriggles when challenged. This officer
remains free to inflict himself upon people who have done no wrong to
him, and who is permitted to disgrace the rule he represents for the
time being.
What is the Punjab doing? Is it not the duty of the Punjabis not to rest
until they have secured the dismissal of Mr. Smith and the like? The
Punjab leaders have been discharged in vain if they will not utilise the
liberty they have received, in order to purge the administration of
Messrs. Bosworth Smith and Company. I am sure that if they will only
begin a determined agitation they will have the whole India by their
side. I venture to suggest to them that the best way to qualify for
sending General Dyer to the gallows is to perform the easier and the
more urgent duty of arresting the mischief still continued by the
officials against whom they have assisted in collecting
overwhelming evidence.
GENERAL DYER
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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