Sri Aurobindo

Bande Mataram

Indu Prakas: A weekly newspaper

Monday — 26^th June 1893

Part One. Writings and a Resolution 1890 – 1906

India and the British Parliament

A great critic has pronounced that the aim of all truly helpful criticism is to see the object as it really is. The Press is the sole contemporary critic of politics, and according as its judgments are sound or unsound, the people whose political ideas it forms, will be likely to prosper or fail. It is therefore somewhat unfortunate that the tendency of journalists should be to see the object not as it really is, but as they would like it to be. In a country like England this may not greatly matter; but in India, whose destinies are in the balance, and at a time when a straw might turn the scale, it is of the gravest importance that no delusion, however specious or agreeable, should be allowed to exist. Yet in the face of this necessity, the Indian Press seems eager to accept even the flimsiest excuse for deluding itself.

If we want a striking example of this, we need only turn to the recent vote in the House of Commons on the subject of simultaneous examinations for the Civil Service of India. On this occasion a chorus of jubilant paeans arose from the Press, resembling nothing so much as the joyful chorus of ducks when the monsoon arrives. Had then some political monsoon arrived raining down justice and happiness on this parched and perishing country? What was the fountain-head from which this torrent of dithyrambs derived its being? Was it a solemn and deliberate pronouncement by the assembled representatives of the English nation that the time was now come to do justice to India? Was it a resolution gravely arrived at in a full House, that the cruel burden of taxation which has exhausted our strength, must be alleviated without delay? Or was it a responsible pledge by a person in authority that the high-sounding promises of ’58 should at last become something more than a beautiful chimera? No, it was simply a chance vote snatched by a dexterous minority from a meagre and listless House. As a fine tactical success it reflects every credit on the acuteness and savoir faire of our friends in Parliament, but no more expresses the real feeling of the English people than a decree of the Chinese Emperor would express it.

The vote was by no means a mandate of the British Parliament, as some have sonorously phrased it; it was merely a pious opinion. It will have to meet not only the bitter antagonism of the Indian Government, but the opposition, open or veiled, of a vast majority in the Commons. How then can it possibly be enforced? Can our handful of philo-Indian members help to eject a Government that will not ratify its empty triumph? It would be too absurd even to dream of such a thing: and even if any of them were so impossibly rash, their constituencies would quickly teach them that they were sent to Parliament to support Mr. Gladstone and not to do justice to India. The vote is nothing but a tactical advantage; and yet on this flimsy basis we have chosen to erect the most imposing castles in the air. Yet if this were an isolated instance of blindness, it might be allowed to pass without comment; but it is only one more example of a grave illusion that possesses the Indian mind. We constantly find it asserted that the English are a just people and only require our case to be clearly stated in order to redress our grievances. It is more than time that some voice should be raised – even though it may be the voice of one crying in the wilderness – to tell the Press and the public that this is a grave and injurious delusion, which must be expunged from our minds if we would see things as they really are.

The English are not, as they are fond of representing themselves, a people panting to do justice to all whom they have to govern. They are not an incarnation of justice, neither are they an embodiment of morality; but of all nations they are the most sentimental: hence it is that they like to think themselves, and to be thought by others, a just people and a moral people. It is true that in the dull comedy which we call English politics, Truth and Justice – written in large letters – cover the whole of the poster, but in the actual enactment of the play these characters have very little indeed to do. It was certainly not by appealing to the English sense of justice that the Irish people have come within reach of obtaining some measure of redress for their grievances. Mr. Parnell was enabled to force Mr. Gladstone’s hand solely because he had built up a strong party with a purely Irish policy: but we unfortunately have neither a Parnell nor a party with a purely Indian policy. We have Mr. Naoroji and Sir W. Wedderburn, both staunch friends of India; we have Mr. Swift McNeill, true son of a high souled and chivalrous race; we have Mr. Mclaren, Mr. Paul and many others pledged to champion the Congress movement: but well nigh all these are Liberal members who must give their support to Mr. Gladstone, whether he is inclined to do justice to India or no. It is evident that if we wish to obtain any real justice from the British Parliament we must secure the pledges not of individual Liberals but of the responsible heads of the party, and that is just what we are least likely to obtain. For we must remember that within the last 20 years the immense personal influence of Mr. Gladstone has been leavening and indeed remoulding English political life; and the tendency of that influence has been to convert politics into a huge market where statesmen chaffer for votes. In this political bazaar we have no current coin to buy justice from the great salesman, and if he is inclined to give the commodity gratis, he will jeopardise many of the voters he has already in his hand. What lever have we then by which we can alter the entire fuse of English opinion on Indian matters? It is clear that we have none.

Moreover the lessons of experience do not differ from the lessons of common sense. After years of constant effort and agitation a bill was brought forward in Parliament professing to remodel the Legislative Councils. This bill was nothing short of an insult to the people of India. We had asked for wheaten bread, and we got in its place a loaf made of plaster-of-Paris and when Mr. Schwann proposed that the genuine article should be supplied, Mr. Gladstone assured him on his honour as a politician that the Executive authority would do its best to make plaster-of-Paris taste exactly like wheat. With this assurance Mr. Schwann and the Indian people were quite satisfied. Happy Indian people! And yet now that the loaf has actually reached their hands, they seem a little inclined to quarrel with the gift: they have even complained that the proportion of plaster in its composition is extravagantly large. Nevertheless we still go on appealing to the English sense of justice.

The simple truth of the matter is that we shall not get from the British Parliament anything better than nominal redress, or at the most a petty and tinkering legislation. This is no doubt a very disagreeable truth to the sanguine among us who believe that India can be renovated in a day, but we shall gain nothing by shutting our eyes to it. Rather we shall lose: for the more we linger in the wrong path, the further we shall wander from our real and legitimate goal. If we are indeed to renovate our country, we must no longer hold out supplicating hands to the English Parliament, like an infant crying to its nurse for a toy, but must recognise the hard truth that every nation must beat out its own path to salvation with pain and difficulty, and not rely on the tutelage of another. It is not within the scope of the present article to point out how this may be done. But until we recognise these simple truths, half of our efforts will fail – as they are now failing – through misdirection and want of real insight.

Earlier edition of this work: Archives and Research: A biannual journal.- Volume 12, No2 (1988, December)