Hand spinning -- India; India -- Economic conditions; Manufactures -- India
Thirdly, boycott of British goods is thoroughly unpractical, for, it
involves sacrifice of their millions by millionaires. It is in my
opinion infinitely more difficult for a merchant to sacrifice his
millions than for a lawyer to suspend his practice or for a title-holder
to give up his title or for a parent to sacrifice, if need be, the
literary instruction of his children. Add to this the important fact
that merchants have only lately begun to interest themselves in
politics. They are therefore yet timid and cautious. But the class, to
which the first stage of non-co-operation is intended to appeal, is the
political class which has devoted years to politics and is not mentally
unprepared for communal sacrifice.
Boycott of British goods to be effective must be taken up by the whole
country at once or not at all. It is like a siege. You can carry out a
siege only when you have the requisite men and instruments of
destruction. One man scratching a wall with his finger nails may hurt
his fingers but will produce no effect upon the walls. One title-holder
giving up his title has the supreme satisfaction of having washed his
hands clean of the guilt of the donor and is unaffected by the refusal
of his fellows to give up theirs. The motive of boycott being punitive
lacks the inherent practicability of non-co-operation. The spirit of
punishment is a sign of weakness. A strengthening of that spirit will
retard the process of regeneration. The spirit of sacrifice is a
determination to rid ourselves of our weakness. It is therefore an
invigorating and purifying process and is therefore also calculated to
do good both to us and to those who evoke the spirit of sacrifice in us.
Above all, if India has a mission of her own, she will not fulfil it by
copying the doubtful example of the West and making even her sacrifice
materialistically utilitarian instead of offering a sacrifice spotless
and pleasing even in the sight of God.
KHILAFAT AND SWADESHI
It was not without much misgiving that I consented to include Swadeshi
as a plank in non-co-operation. But Maulana Hasrat Mohani by his sheer
earnestness bore me down. I fear however that his reasons for including
Swadeshi are different from mine. He is a protagonist of boycott of
British goods, I cannot reconcile myself to the doctrine as I have
explained elsewhere in this issue. But having failed to popularise
boycott, Mohani Saheb has accepted Swadeshi as the lesser good. It is
however necessary for me to explain how I have come to include Swadeshi
in the programme of non-co-operation.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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