Vol. 17, Part III · pages 81–85

52 DR. BABASAHEB AMBEDKAR : WRITINGS AND SPEECHES is an accepted constitution in existence. But where there is no such constitution, few will be inclined to listen to the gospel of constitutional means. Such a view cannot be strange even to the British mind. For after all, was not the Ulster movement a movement of Civil Disobedience? And did not the best of British politicians support and participate in it ? The question is not whether the movement of Civil Disobedience is right or wrong. The question is whether it is opportune and consistent with the safety and security of our interests. I am opposed to the Civil Disobedience Movement because I am convinced that it is extremely inopportune. With all the evils inherent in imperialism the British Empire in India does leave some scope for the advancement of the Indian people. I am not alone in holding such a view. It is the view of Mahatma Gandhi who proclaims that treason against the established Government in India is his bounden duty. Not only has that been the spirit of the British Empire but genuine effort was made in 1920 to translate that spirit into a reality by the introduction of responsibility in the Provinces with a view to the progressive realisation of the ideal of self-government in India. Perhaps the reality fell too short of the ideal. Perhaps the realization of the ideal was proceeding at too slow a pace. But can it be said that there was a going back upon that policy? If there was a going back, one could understand the opportuneness of Civil Disobedience. But far from that being the case the goal was defined afresh in unmistakable terms in the Viceregal pronouncement to be that of Dominion Status and a Round Table Conference came to be offered to the Indians to discuss the ways and means of an early realization of that ideal. True enough the announcement has short-comings in it, from the point of view of those who stand for immediate Dominion Status. But that was hardly a reason for the Congress to reject the offer of Round Table Conference. The fight for undertaking and understanding of one sort or another with the Viceroy or the British Cabinet, seems to me a needless if not a useless fight. For undertaking or no undertaking, if the voice of India could be united in making the demand for Dominion Status it should never fail to produce its effect upon the British Parliament. At any rate nothing could

53PEOPLE CEMENTED............INDEPENDENT have been lost if the Congress had accepted the Round Table Conference. Its failure would entail nothing but the postponement of Civil Disobedience by a year and would be of positive value to the Congress. For, it must disillusion all and sundry who rightly or wrongly live in-faith. Taking all things into consideration I cannot help saying that the Congress has committed a great blunder in starting the Civil Disobedience Movement at this juncture and in rejecting the method of peaceful negotiations provided by the Round Table Conference. 30. Another reason why I cannot support the Civil Disobedience Movement is this. I do not think it is compatible with the safety and security of our interests. The Civil Disobedience Movement is a movement of mass action. It is a movement the essence of which is coercion. It is a method of stampede and if carried out on a sufficiently large scale it is bound to effect a revolution. A revolution, bloody or bloodless, it makes no difference, is a method of change which is most uncertain in its issue and in which the danger of confusion and disaster in the process is very great. We have before us the famous example of the French Revolution started for the ostensible purpose of establishing democracy resulting in the establishment of autocracy. Revolutions are often inevitable. All the same we must not forget the vast difference that separates a revolution from real social change. A revolution transfers political power from one party to another, just as conquest transfers it from one nation or race to another. I am sure we cannot be satisfied with an empty change of this sort. What we want is a transfer of power accompanied by such a distribution of that power that the result will be a real social change in the relative strength of the forces operating in society. This is a matter which needs adjustment. The future of the Depressed Classes entirely depends upon such adjustments being recognized and implemented. The problem in India is not to make a Government. Nor is it to give freedom. The problem is to form a free Government. And to quote Burke again “To make a Government requires no great prudence. Settle the seat of power; teach obedience; and the work is done. To give freedom is still more easy. It is not necessary to guide; it only requires

54 DR. BABASAHEB AMBEDKAR : WRITINGS AND SPEECHES to let go the rein. But to form a free Government, that is, to temper together these opposite elements of liberty and restraint in one consistent whole requires much thought and deep reflection”. For, it is a matter of nice adjustments which I am sure will not be possible in a stampede of the sort involved in the method of Civil Disobedience. 31. These are the reasons, Gentlemen, why I think that the Depressed Classes should not support the movement of Civil Disobedience. They will do well to avail themselves of the method of peaceful negotiations offered by the Round Table Conference. They should make the most of it by insisting upon adequate representation of the Depressed Classes at the Conference through men in whose ability and integrity they repose full trust. VII. Organisation of the Depressed Classes. 32. I am warned by many of my friends that this attitude of neutrality is going to cost very dearly to the Depressed Classes; that the Depressed Classes must ally themselves either with the British Government or with the Indian National Congress. I have considered the question over and over again and I feel convinced that the safety of the Depressed Classes lies in being independent of both. As I have stated I cannot oppose Dominion Status for India because I feel convinced that the British Government will never be able to solve our problem. But I cannot understand how by joining the Congress we can be any nearer to its solution. It is said that the Congress does not recognize Untouchability and that it is the only organisation which stands for the masses. Under the auspices of Mahatma Gandhi the Congress has no doubt passed a resolution condemning Untouchability. But what has the Congress done to give effect to it? The Congress in order to carry out its programme had prescribed a Khadder franchise for its membership. Why did not the Congress prescribe the removal of Untouchability as a franchise for it membership? Such a franchise would have been easily workable. A touchable had only to keep in his house an Untouchable either as a servant or as a student to satisfy the requirements of such a franchise. What is the effort made by Mahatma Gandhi to remove Untouchability ? Great as has been his moral support he has

55PEOPLE CEMENTED............INDEPENDENT contrived to translate very little of it into practice, having regard to his personal influence and his pecuniary resources. Every year he goes on a tour to make collections for his Spinners. Has he ever set out on a crusade against Untouchability? Not one hundredth part of what he spends on the Charakha is spent by him for this cause. You all know how Mahatma Gandhi went on a three weeks’ fast to bring about unity between Hindus and Muslems. Has Mahatma Gandhi fasted even for a day to bring about a more charitable feeling between the touchables and the Untouchables? If these things had been done, one could have accepted the Congress platform. But we have not only no evidence of a genuine effort on the part of the Congress to remove the stigma of Untouchability; but we know that Swami Shradhanand had to leave the Congress in disgust because he found the Congress unwilling to do anything more than make a show in the matter. If one were to judge the colour of the Congress by its resolutions one will be slow to accept that the Congress stands for the masses. Its economic resolutions reflect the interests of the higher and the middle classes. Its commercial resolutions concern only the trader and the manufacturer, and the working man is severely left out. A body that stands for 1s.4d ratio and against 1s.6d. must forfeit its claim to be the guardian of the masses. The inclusion of the Salt Tax in the campaign of Civil Disobedience cannot give a different face to the Congress. The fulminations against the Salt Tax are welcome aids to political agitation. But just as the test of the pudding lies in the eating of it so also the true test of the Salt Tax campaign lies in the readiness to shift the burden by a substitute such as will cut the classes and spare the masses. Time alone can show the genuineness behind it. But I have no doubt that when the time for test comes many a Congressman will be in the camp of the classes and not of the masses. That the Congress should be lukewarm and apathetic to the masses is only inevitable. For, it represents a nationalist movement and is not a political party. As such its programme and policy must be a hodge-podge. It must be obvious to every one that when a body is constrained to take account of all and sundry it can take account of some only in name and that in case of conflict

56 DR. BABASAHEB AMBEDKAR : WRITINGS AND SPEECHES it must leave the weakest to its fate. I do not see therefore how we can expect the Congress to take up our cause and be our partisan when such a course is bound to antagonise it with our opponents without whose support it must cease to subsist. 33. Those of us who are anxious to serve the Congress believe that the Congress will remove our Untouchability after the attainment of Swaraj as a reward for our services. If we don’t do service to it now we shall be pilloried later on for our default. I need hardly make the comment that gratuitous services are rarely rewarded. But what I am most anxious to point out is that serve the Congress as much as we may, after Swaraj, we shall be searching in vain to find the Congress. We shall then have to depend upon our own resources. For, the Congress having accomplished its purpose will have vanished in to thin air with the advent of Swaraj. And the “Great Beast” to use the expression of Hamilton with which we will be confronted will be the people of this country with their passions and prejudices in full swing. I am afraid that even Mahatma Gandhi to whom we are asked to leave all our woes for redress will find himself unable to protect us against it, assuming that his span of life will be much longer than is allowed by nature to the ordinary mortals of this land. 34. If I am right in the view I have taken then it follows that we must shape our course for ourselves and by ourselves. I can quite appreciate the nervousness of those of us who fear to take such a course. They smell danger in being independent of both the Government and the Congress. This is a confession of our weakness, and I agree, that for the Depressed Classes to be independent and yet be without the power to make themselves reckoned with is not a happy situation. But what I like to ask is what is the advantage in being dependent either upon the Government or the Congress ? Merely to make yourselves agreeable to any party that happens to be powerful without caring whether you are reckoned with or not is the way of the beggar and amounts to an ignomious surrender which no respectable people ought to tolerate. The question before the Depressed Classes is how they can make themselves into a