z:\ ambedkar\vol 08\vol8 04.indd MK SJ+DK 1 10 2013/YS 13 11 2013 281
PAKISTAN : NATIONAL FRUSTRATION 281
“The speaker emphatically declared that he would not tolerate any foreigner. He wanted an Indian Commander-in-Chief.”
The question of Independence was again raised at the Congress session held in March 1923 at Coconada but with no success.
In 1924 Mr. Gandhi presiding over the Congress session held in Belgaum said:—
“In my opinion, if the British Government mean what they say and honestly help us to equality, it would be a greater triumph than a complete severance of the British connection. I would, therefore, strive for Swaraj within the Empire but would not hesitate to sever all connection if it became a necessity through Britain’s own fault. I would thus throw the burden of separation on the British people.”
In 1925 Mr. C. R. Das again took up the theme. In his address to the Bengal Provincial Conference held in May of that year he, with the deliberate object of giving a deadly blow to the idea of independence, took particular pains to show the inferiority of the idea of Independence as compared with that of Dominion Status:—
“...... Independence, to my mind, is a narrowed ideal than that of Swaraj. It implies, it is ture, the negative of the dependence ; but by itself it gives us no positive ideal. I do not for a moment suggest that independence is not consistent with Swaraj. But what is necessary is not mere independence but the establishment of Swaraj. India may be independent tomorrow in the sense that the British people may leave us to our destiny but that will not necessarily give us what I understand by Swaraj. As I pointed out in my Presidential address at Gaya, India presents an interesting but a complicated problem of consolidating the many apparently conflicting elements which go to make up the Indian people. This work of consolidation is a long process, may even be a weary process; but without this no Swaraj is possible........
“ Independence, in the second place, does not give you that idea of order which is the essence of Swaraj. The work of consolidation which I have mentioned means the establishment of that order. But let it be clearly understood that what is sought to be established must be consistent with the genius, the temperament and the traditions of the Indian people. To my mind, Swaraj implies, firstly, that we must have the freedom of working out the consolidation of the diverse elements of the Indian people ; Secondly, we must proceed with this work on National lines, not going back two thousand years ago, but going forward in the light and in the spirit of our national genius and temperament........
“Thirdly, in the work before us, we must not be obstructed by any foreign power. What then we have to fix upon in the matter of ideal is