In the course of an interview, this afternoon, on the Government of India's communique regarding the release of political prisoners, Mahatma Gandhi said :
As I have said before the event, I must repeat after the event, that, so far as I am concerned, it cannot evoke a single responsive or appreciative chord in me.
From my student days onward, I have been, and still claim to be, a friend of the British people. But my friendship cannot blind me to the fact that British representatives hold India as a bondslave. All the freedom that India enjoys is the freedom of a slave and not the freedom of an equal, which is otherwise known as Complete Independence. Mr. Amery's pronouncements do not soothe the festering sore, but are like sprinkling chillies on it. It is in that setting that I am called upon to examine this release.
If the Government of India are confident of the determination of all responsible opinion in India to support the war effort, the logical conclusion would be to keep the civil disobedience prisoners in their custody, because they produce a jarring note. The only meaning I can attach to the release, therefore, is that they expect that the prisoners will have changed their opinions in their self-invited solitude. I am hoping that the Government will be soon disillusioned.
Civil disobedience was not taken up without the most careful consideration. It was certainly not taken up out of any vindictiveness. It was taken up, and I hope will be continued, in order to make good the claim of the Congress to let the British people and the world know that there is, at the very least, a large body of public opinion represented by the Congress which is utterly opposed to participation in the war, not because it wishes any disaster to the British arms or victory to the Nazi or Fascist arms, but because it sees no deliverance from blood-guiltiness either for the victor or for the vanquished, and certainly no deliverance for India out of this war.
The Congress, which seeks and claims to represent the dumb millions, has ,for the past twenty years, accepted non-violence as its unbroken policy to achieve India's independence. To stop civil disobedience, symbolic though it may be for the time being, will be to deny its policy at a crucial moment. The Government claim that, in spite of the Congress efforts, they are able to get all the men and money from India. Therefore the Congress opposition, in their estimate, can only be a moral effort and a moral demonstration. I, for one, am entirely satisfied with it, because I am convinced that from that moral demonstration will arise, when the moment comes, a demonstration which will result in the attainment of India's independence, not the ascendance of this party or that. The Congress struggle covers every single unit in India.
Now that the Congress President is expected to be out, it will be for him to consider whether and when to call the Congress Working Committee or the A. I. C. C. These two bodies will determine the future policy of the Congress. I am but a humble instrument of service in conducting the civil disobedience.
I would, however, say one word about the detenus and other prisoners. It sounds strange that those who have sought imprisonment are to be discharged and not those who are either detained without trial or imprisoned because they hold the freedom of their country dearer than their personal liberty. There is surely something utterly wrong somewhere. Therefore I cannot rejoice over the Government of India's decision.
