{"id":290,"date":"2013-07-13T01:27:08","date_gmt":"2013-07-13T01:27:08","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/localhost\/?p=290"},"modified":"2013-07-13T01:27:08","modified_gmt":"2013-07-13T01:27:08","slug":"054-how-to-meet-the-ordinance-vol-01-bande-mataram-volume-01","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/01-works-of-sri-aurobindo\/01-sabcl\/01-bande-mataram-volume-01\/054-how-to-meet-the-ordinance-vol-01-bande-mataram-volume-01","title":{"rendered":"-054_How to Meet the Ordinance.htm"},"content":{"rendered":"\n\n
\n

\nHow to Meet the Ordinance<\/b><\/font><\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\n                       
\n<\/span><\/font>
\nW<\/b><\/font><\/span>HEN<\/font><\/b>
\nwe come to look at it closely, the new policy of the British Government in India
\nis a real blessing to the country. We find ourselves in unexpected agreement
\nwith the Anglo-Indian Press in this matter. The Anglo-Indian Press is full of
\njoy at these departures from pre-established policy and as- severs in one chorus
\nthough in many keys, ekam bahudhā<\/i>, <\/i>that it is the very best thing the
\nbureaucracy could have done in the interests of its own continued supremacy. We
\nwill not question their authority in a matter in which they alone are interested
\nbut we can certainly add that it is the very best thing the bureaucracy could
\nhave done in the interests of the country. Lord Minto ought therefore to be a
\nvery happy man, for it is not everyone whose actions are so blessed by Fate as
\nto command equal approbation from the Englishman <\/i>and the Bande Mataram<\/i>.
\n<\/i><\/font><\/p>\n

       
\n<\/i>Our reasons for this approval are obvious on the face of it. The great
\nstrength of British despotism previous to Lord Curzon’s regime was its
\nindirectness. By a singularly happy policy it was able to produce on the subject
\nnations the worst moral and material results of serfdom, while at the same time
\nit never allowed them to realise that they were serfs, but rather fostered in
\nthem the delusion that they were admirably governed on the whole by an
\nenlightened and philanthropic people. We pointed out the other day that the
\nrelics of this superstition still lingered even in the minds of many
\nthoroughgoing Nationalists of the new school. We did not indeed believe that the
\nbureaucratic Government was a good government or the British people guided in
\ntheir politics by enlightenment and philanthropy, but many of us believed that
\nthere were certain excesses of despotism of which they were not capable and that
\nthe worst British administration would not easily betray overt signs of moral
\nkinship with its Russian cousin. We ourselves, although we were prepared for the
\nworst and always took care to warn the people that the worst might soon come,
\nthought sometimes that there was a fair ba-<\/p>\n

<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

<\/span><\/i><\/p>\n

\nPage-337<\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

lance
\nof probabilities for and against frank downward Russianism. For such last relics
\nof the old superstitions, for such over-charitable speculation, there is no
\nlonger any room. The whole country owes a debt of gratitude to Sirdar Ajit Singh
\nand the Bharat Mata section of the Punjab Nationalists for forcing the hands of
\nthe bureaucracy and compelling them to change, definitely, indirect for direct
\nmethods of despotism. It has cleared the air, it has dispelled delusions; it has
\nforced us to look without blinking into the face of an iron Necessity.<\/p>\n

<\/font><\/p>\n

           
\n<\/span>The question may then be asked, what farther room is there for passive
\nresistance? A Punjab politician is said to have observed, after the arrests of
\nLala Hansraj and his friends and the first development of violent insanity in
\nthe Punjab authorities, "I do not see why the people should go on any
\nlonger with open agitation." But, in our opinion, there is still room for
\npassive resistance, if for nothing else than to force the bureaucracy to lay all
\nits cards face upward on the table; the oppression must either be broken or
\nincreased so that the iron may enter deeper into the soul of the nation. There
\nis still work and work enough for the martyr, before the hero appears on the
\nscene. Take for instance the Coercion Ukase, the new ordinance to restrict the
\nright of public meeting at the sweet will of the executive. It is obvious that
\nthe matter cannot be allowed to rest where it is. We would suggest to the
\nleaders that the right policy to begin with is to ignore the existence of the
\nOrdinance. So far as we understand, the Lieutenant-Governor of Shillong has been
\nempowered to proclaim any area in his jurisdiction, but as yet no area has been
\nproclaimed. This is therefore the proper time for the leaders to go to East
\nBengal and hold meetings in every District; and those who go, should not be any
\nlesser men, but the leaders of the two parties in Bengal themselves. We are
\ninclined to think it was a mistake to recall Srijut Bepin Chandra Pal from
\nMadras at this juncture; but since he has been recalled, it should be for a
\njoint action in East Bengal against the policy of repression. If the bureaucracy
\nlie low, well and good; it will be a moral victory for the people. But the
\nmoment any particular area is proclaimed, the leaders should immediately go
\nthere and hold the prohibited meetings as a challenge to the validity of the
\nukase, refusing to<\/font><\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\nPage-338<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n

disperse
\nexcept on the application of force by the police or the military. The
\nbureaucracy will then have the choice either of allowing the Ordinance to remain
\na dead letter or of imprisoning or deporting men the prosecution of whom will so
\ninflame the people all over India as to make administration impossible or of
\nbreaking up meetings by force. If they adopt the third alternative, the leaders
\nshould then go from place to place and house to house, like political Shankaracharyas, gathering the people together in groups in private houses and
\ncompounds and speaking to them in their gates, advising them, organising them.
\nIn this way the fire of Nationalism will enter into every nook and cranny of the
\ncountry and a strength be created far greater than any which monster meetings
\ncan engender. How will the bureaucracy meet such a method of propagandism? Will
\nthey forbid us to congregate in our own compounds? Will their police enter our
\nhouses and force us to shut our gates to the guest and the visitor? Whatever
\nthey do, the country will gain. Every fresh object-lesson in bureaucratic
\nmethods will be a fresh impulse to the determination to achieve Swaraj and get
\nrid of the curse of subjection. All that is needed to meet the situation, all
\nthat we demand of our leaders is a quiet, self-possessed, unflinching courage
\nwhich neither the fear of imprisonment, nor the menace of deportation, nor the
\nulterior possibility of worse than deportation, can for a moment disturb.<\/font><\/p>\n

 \n<\/p>\n

\nThe
\nLatest Phase of Morleyism<\/a><\/b><\/font><\/p>\n

 \n<\/p>\n


\n <\/font>That
\nMr. Morley should completely throw off the mask and unceremoniously declare his
\nreal attitude towards Nationalist aspirations is more than what was expected by
\nmost people. It is not customary with politicians to be so rudely and
\nunnecessarily frank. Besides, such frankness is calculated to shake that faith
\nin their benevolent professions which is the chief security of British
\ndomination in India. We have always been deceived by words. The effect of a
\nseries of repressive measures on the feelings of the people is at once
\ncounteracted by one kind word from a Viceroy or Secretary of State. Mere
\nflattering promises have<\/span><\/font><\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\nPage-339<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n

hitherto
\nbeen sufficient to win and retain our allegiance. Why our bureaucrats have
\nbroken away from their policy of keeping their real intention veiled behind a
\nnumber of cant phrases and now make no secret of their determination to put down
\nNationalism with a high hand can be easily understood by those who have been
\nwatching the progress of events during the last two years. The appearance of a
\nNationalist Party and the home truths they preach have been causing real anxiety
\nto the bureaucracy. If this party gets the ear of the people whose patriotic
\nimpulses are never checked by considerations of expediency or immediate
\nself-interest, then such a popular re-awakening is bound to strike at the very
\nroot of foreign overlordship. It has therefore become essentially necessary to
\nintercept all communications between the people and their real leaders and
\nwell-wishers. It is for this reason that these openly despotic methods are being
\ntried in order to demoralise the Nationalists. The other game is to tempt the
\nModerates to betray the country by ever dangling before their eyes the bait of
\nadministrative reform. This is in every way a great crisis for the country and
\nby his conduct at this moment every man shall be judged. Persecution and
\ntemptation are God’s methods for separating the showy dross from the true gold.<\/font><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\n An Old Parrot Cry Repeated<\/a><\/b><\/font><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

The
\nHindu Patriot <\/i>claims to have grown wise with age, and tries to argue us
\ninto serfdom. Happily oblivious of its younger days when it had not yet been
\nprompted by senile prudence to sell itself to the alien lords, it comes forward
\nto justify its back-sliding and aim a few ineffective blows at the Swarajists.
\nThis is how it analyses the present situation: \u2014<\/font><\/p>\n

           
\n<\/span>We want food for our nourishment; we want education; we want new outlets
\nfor the employment of our sons. But they give us none of these. They would make
\nus swallow the bitter pill of autonomy even at the point of the bayonet and
\npreach the Gospel of "Swaraj". It is to be our food, our raiment and
\nthe panacea for all our evils. Everything else they would throw overboard.<\/font><\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\nPage-340<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n

 It
\nwould scarcely have called for notice had not this view been shared even now by
\na small section of the so-called educated community. The Patriot <\/i>tries to
\nestablish what has been disproved by our experience during the last quarter of
\na century. We had been trying patch-works and half-measures \u2014 with what
\neffect the Patriot <\/i>knows as well as ourselves. It was only when we
\ndiscovered that we had begun at the wrong end, that the ever-increasing drain on
\nthe country with its necessary accompaniments \u2014 plague and famine \u2014 could
\nnot be stopped so long as the people were left to the tender mercy of the
\nforeign overlord, that the cry of Swaraj went forth, and people began to take
\npolitics more seriously than before. It is exactly because we cannot get food
\nfor nourishment, nor proper education nor even "employment for our
\nsons", so long as we have to depend for these things on our unwelcome
\nguests, that we have begun to think of managing our household, and surely it can
\nserve no useful purpose to ignore our own experience and repeat the political
\nfarce over again. Are Englishmen here to give us food and education and provide
\nfat berths for our own children? The whole political situation has been
\nmisunderstood, and where the very premises are wrong, the arguments can but lead
\nastray.<\/font><\/p>\n

Bande
\nMataram<\/i>, <\/i>May 15, 1907<\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\nPage-341<\/span><\/font><\/p>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/table>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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