Mahatma Gandhi, his life, writings and speeches/The Struggle of Passive Resistance

by Mohandas K. Gandhi

APPENDIX I

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THE STRUGGLE OF PASSIVE RESISTANCE MOVEMENT IN SOUTH AFRICA

(By the Editor, Indian Opinion.)

To survey, within a limited space, the origins and incidents of a movement that has occupied eight years of the history of South African Indians is a task impossible of satisfactory fulfilment. The present sketch will, therefore, be but a hasty outline, with here and there an indicator emphasising a noteworthy occurrence or a fundamental outline.

The origins of the Passive Resistance Struggle are to be sought, not in the agitation of 1906, but in that which commenced, in one of its phases, in the Transvaal. In 1885, and, in another, in Natali in 1894. The old Republican Law 3 of 1885, whilst imposing various burdens upon Asiatics residing in the country, required that such of them as entered for purposes of trade should be registered at a fixed fee, and that, "for sanitary purposes," they should reside in locations specially set apart for them. To a large extent, both requirements proved a dead letter, but a great deal of friction with the British Government was engendered, resulting in Imperial intervention at the time of the War, when resident Indians, as British subjects, were promised complete redress of their grievances.

In Natal, a British Colony, the position had been complicated by the grave prejudice aroused by the presence of large numbers of Indian labourers brought at the instance of the European Colonists under indenture, and an agitation had arisen for the exclusion of free Asiatic immigration and the disfranchisement of all Asiatics. It became a question whether this was to be accomplished by specifically racial legislation or by general enactment differentially administered. The conflict of views represented by these two methods raged for sometime, but at last, thanks to the statesmanship of Mr. Chamberlain, in 1897, the second method was adopted, and the famous "Natal Act" passed, imposing an educational and not a racial test. From then onwards, in Natal, racial legislation was a thing of the past, and hence the first signs of renewed trouble arose in the Transvaal, where the principle of statutory equality had not been accepted, owing to a different political conception of the status of coloured people.

In the re-settlement that took place after the War, it was hoped that the burdens would be removed. from the shoulders of the British Indian community but Indians were dismayed to find the Imperial authorities endeavouring vigorously to enforce the obnoxious legislation against which they had strongly protested in pre-war days, a policy that was later weakly defended by Lord Selborne. Immigration of Indians was severely restricted by the Peace Preservation Ordinance. Re-registration of practically all adult male Indians, under Law 3 of 1885 was urged by Lord Milner, and was subsequently agreed to by the Indian leaders as a purely voluntary act, on Lord Milner's definite promise that this registration would be regarded as complete and final, and that the certificates issued would constitute a permanent right of residence to the holders and a right to come and go at will.

Meanwhile, Law 3 of 1885 was being enforced so as to compel all Indians to reside and trade in locations, and the pre-war controversy was revived, resulting in an appeal to the Supreme Court, which reversed the old Republican High Court's decision, and held that Indians were free to trade anywhere they pleased, and that non-residence in a location was not punishable at law. This decision was a severe rebuff to the anti-Indian element in the European population that had its representatives even in the Government, which endeavoured to legislate to overcome the effect of the Supreme Court decision—without result, however, owing to the intervention of the then Secretary of State for the Colonies, the late Mr. Lyttelton. But the general public, by ingeniously manipulated statistics, were led to believe in a huge influx of unauthorised Asiatics into the Transvaal, to which some colour was let by the dispersal of the Indian residents of the Johannesburg Indian location throughout the Colony, after it was burnt down at the time of the plague outbreak in 1904, and meetings all over the Transvaal were held with the object of closing the door against all Asiatic immigration, and compelling Indians to trade and reside exclusively in locations. In an atmosphere of prejudice and terror thus created, it was possible effectively to protest one's innocence, and the request of the Indian community for an open and impartial inquiry, whether by Royal Commission or otherwise, fell on deaf ears; so that when a draft ordinance was published, in 1906, to "amend" Law 3 of 1885, requiring compulsory re-registration of the entire Indian community, men, women, and children, it was voiciferously welcomed by the whole European population, whilst it fell amongst the Indian victims to be like a bomb-shell. The basic assumption, on the part of the authorities, for its necessity lay in the unquenchable belief in wholesale Indian immigration of an unlawful character, to which, in their opinion, resident Indians could not but be a party. So far as the general public was concerned, the measure was hailed as the first instalment of a scheme designed to drive Indians out of the Colony altogether, and Europeans in the neighbouring Colonies and territories eagerly looked on, as they had looked on, in 1903, at Lord Milner's abortive effort to compel Indian trade and residence in locations, so that they might take advantage of the results of the new policy to relieve themselves to their own Asiatic "incubus."

Appalled by the magnitude of the disaster that threatened the community, the Indian leaders hastened to take steps to avoid it, if possible. They sought an interview with the responsible member of the Government, but succeeded only in getting women excluded from the operation of the measure, and, as a last resort, an Indian mass meeting was held at the moment that the Legislative Council: was debating the clauses of the draft ordinance. Whilst the Council's debate was a perfunctory and prearranged performance, the whole business being concluded in less than a couple of hours, the crowded Empire Theatre rang with impassioned denunciations of the Government's policy, which belied the solemn undertaking of Lord Milner in every important respect, assumed the guilt of the Indian community unheard and without proof, and adumbrated their virtual expulsion from the Colony, and, eventually, from South Africa. So fierce was the indignation aroused that, when the famous Fourth Resolution was put, committing all present, and those they represented, to go to gaol, if the measure should become law, until such time as it should be repealed or disallowed, the whole vast audience of three thousand persons rose as one man, and shouted a solemn "Amen," when the oath of Passive Resistance was administered. Simultaneously, however, and as a last effort to avoid a terrible conflict, a deputation to England was arranged for. The delegates proceeded there to interview the Imperial authorities and arouse public opinion, and their efforts resulted in the suspension of the Royal Assent to the measure owing to the imminence of the inauguration of self-government in the Transvaal, and in the formation of the famous South Africa British Indian Committee, with Sir Mancherji Bhownaggree as its Executive Chairman, Mr. L. W. Ritch as its Secretary, and, subsequently, Lord Ampthill as its President.

The disallowance of the measure was, however, merely a temporary respite, for, taking umbrage at what was thought to be an impertinent intrusion on the part of the Imperial Government in the affairs of a practically self-governing British Colony, the European section of the population angrily demanded the immediate re-enactment of the ordinance, and almost the first action of the new Parliament was to

SIR M. M. BHOWNAGGREE, Chairman South Africa British Indian Committee London.	MR. RATAN TATA, A Patriotic Indian donor of munificent contributions to the Passive Resistence Fund.

rush it through all its stages in a single session of a unanimous House, entirely ignoring Indian opinion and Indian protests, for, as Indians were not directly represented in Parliament, nobody appeared to consider it necessary to take their feelings into consideration.

Still anxious to avoid a struggle that had appeared to be inevitable, the Indian leaders had urged the Government and Parliament not to proceed with the Bill, but to accept a voluntary effort of re-registration in a manner that might be mutually agreed upon, in which they proffered all possible assistance. But they were distrusted and ignored, and all the tragic possibilities of a prolonged conflict were forced upon the Indian community. In July, 1907, the new Act came into force, and registration under it officially commenced, in compartments, the registration officers travelling from town to town throughout the Colony. Their efforts to induce registration were wholly unsuccessful, and an extension of the advertised time for registration was given by the Government, as a last opportunity to comply with the law. But 95 per cent, of the Indian community remained true to its oath. Meanwhile, a further effort had been made to avoid an extension of the trouble, and a petition, signed by some 3,000 Indians, had been addressed to the Government, imploring them to realise the depth of suffering into which it was threatened to plunge the Indian community, who once more offered voluntary re-registration if the Act was suspended. The petition was rejected contemptuously, and, at the end of the year, several of the leaders were arrested ordered to leave the Colony, and, upon their refusal to do so, imprisoned for various periods. This process was repeated, until some hundreds of all classes were lodged in gaol, and the Government, realising that their efforts to crush the community had failed, opened up negotiations through the agency of Mr. Albert Cartwright, then Editor of the Transvaal Leader, with the result that, almost at the moment that H. H. the Aga Khan was presiding over a huge public meeting of protest in Bombay, a compromise was signed, whereby it was agreed to suspend passive resistance, to proceed with voluntary re-registration for a period of three months, during which the operation of the law was to be suspended, and, as the Indian signatories clearly understood, to repeal the hated Act if the re-registration was satisfactorily completed. In the meantime, the situation bad been complicated by the passing of an Immigration Act that, operating jointly with the Asiatic Law Amendment Act, absolutely prohibited all Asiatic immigration, no matter how cultured the immigrant might be. Thus, at a stroke, the policy of non-racial legislation, that had been so strongly advocated by Mr. Chamberlain, was destroyed. The community, however, realised that, with the repeal of the Asiatic Act, the racial taint would disappear and all efforts were, accordingly, concentrated upon that. The commencement of voluntary re-registration was signalised by a murderous attack upon Mr. Gandhi by a misguided countryman, and, for the moment, everything was in confusion. But a special appeal to the community was made, and, with confidence restored and the promise of repeal, re-registration was duly completed by the middle of May, and Lord Selborne himself bore testimony to its satisfactoriness. Then the Government were called upon to perform their part of the compromise, but the promise of repeal was repudiated, and immediately the Indian community was thrown into a turmoil. The Government offered to repeal the Act provided that certain classes of Indians were treated as prohibited immigrants, and the racial bar remained in the Immigration Law. Naturally, these terms were indignantly rejected, and the community prepared for a revival of Passive Resistance. Mr. Sorabji Shapurji, an educated Parsee from Natal, was imprisoned as a protest against the racial bar. The Natal Indian leaders entered the Transvaal, in order to co-operate with their brethren there, and were arrested as prohibited immigrants and ordered to leave the Colony, But at a mass meeting held in Johannesburg, at which they were present, hundreds of certificates of voluntary registration were publicly burnt, and a challenge of wholesale imprisonment was thrown out to the Government, who took alarm at the situation, and a Conference of leading members of the Government and Opposition, and of representatives of the Indian and Chinese communities, together with Mr. Albert Cartwright, as mediator, was held at Pretoria. The Conference proved abortive, however, for, though they were prepared to waive the other points upon which they had previously insisted, the Government proved adamant on the two main issues. They definitely refused either to repeal the Asiatic Act or to remove the racial bar of the Immigration Law. An amending Bill was passed through both Houses of Parliament, validating voluntary registration, and improving the Indian position in certain respects, but it being, in the main, unsatisfactory for the reasons given above, it was not recognised by the Passive Resisters, who resumed the struggle with energy. The new measure, however, strengthened the hands of the Government by giving them powers of deportation, which, however, were at first neutralised by their deporting Passive Resisters across the Natal border, whence they returned as fast as they were deported.

LORD AMPTHILL,

President of the South Africa British Indian Committee, London.

Into the many details and ramifications of the struggle at this stage it is unnecessary now to enter; suffice it to recall the Delagoa Bay incidents, when the Portuguese Government acted as the catspaw of the Transvaal, in preventing the entry into the Transvaal of returning Indians lawfully resident there, the various test-cases brought in the Supreme Court against the Government, some of which were lost and some won, the voluntary insolvency of Mr. A. M. Gachalia, the Chairman of the British Indian Association, who preferred to keep his oath and preserve his honour to the sordid joy of money-making, the imprisonment of Indians of all classes by hundreds, the appeals to India, where protest meetings were held in different parts of the country, the financial help of Natal, the arousing of enthusiasm amongst Indians all over the country, the activity of Lord Ampthill's Committee in London, and of the British Press, the bitter controversies that raged in the Transvaal papers, the latent sympathy of not a few Transvaal Europeans culminating in the formation of Mr. Hosken's Committee, that rendered such splendid and patriotic service in a number of ways, the public letter to the Times, the refusal of the Royal Assent to anti-Indian measures passed by the Legislatures of Natal and Southern Rhodesia, the Indian mass meetings in Johannesburg and all over South Africa, the weakening of some sections of the Indian community and the strengthening of others, the amazing revelation of Tamil strength and fortitude the energetic labours of the Indian women, the ruin and desolation of business and homes, the cruel jail hardships whose purpose was to crush the spirit of the Passive Resisters, the magnificent courage of those who sought imprisonment again and again, the glorious religious spirit that was developed as the struggle moved on from phase to phase, to hopes and fears, the firm faith of the leaders in ultimate success—all these constitute a pageant of incidents and emotions that gave greatness to the Passive Resistance movement, and that bestowed upon it its most distinguishing characteristics.

New life was given to the movement in the middle of 190j, when two deputations were authorised to proceed to England and India respectively, to cultivate public opinion there and to seek assistance. As the delegates were on the point of leaving, the majority of them were arrested and imprisoned as passive resisters, doubtless with the intention of preventing the departure of the remainder. But the community insisted that the deputations should go. In England, interest in the question was strongly revived, and, as Transvaal Ministers were there at the time in connection with the Draft Act of Union, the Imperial authorities strove to effect a settlement; but General Smuts proved obdurate, and flatly declined to remove the statutory racial bar and substitute for it general legislation, though it was clear that the Asiatic Act was doomed. The deputation, which had been led by Mr. Gandhi, therefore returned to South Africa, having accomplished only a part of what it had hoped to achieve, but having arranged for a body of volunteers who undertook to collect funds and keep the subject before the public.

The deputation to India, heralded by the tragic death of Nagappan shortly after his release from prison, was of a different character. Mr. Polak, who was the sole remaining delegate, placed himself unreservedly in the hands of the Hon. Mr. Gokhale, whose Servants of India Society arranged for meetings to be held in every part of the country, from Bombay to Rangoon, from Madras to Lahore. Tremendous enthusiasm was aroused, Indian patriotic pride in the sufferers in South Africa was awakened and funds were energetically collected, following the example of Mr. Ratan J. Tata, some £10,000 being contributed for the maintenance of the struggle, ruling princes, sending generous subscriptions. All sections of the people united in demanding the intervention of the Imperial Government, and at the historic session of the Imperial Council at Calcutta, the Government of India announced its acceptance of Mr. Gokhale's resolution, unanimously supported, to take powers to prohibit the further recruitment of indentured labour in India for Natal. After a thirteen months' campaign, India had been educated on the South African Indian question to a degree that aroused the attention and anxiety of the Home authorities, and when angry protests came from every part of the country against the Transvaal Government's action in deporting to India large numbers of Passive Resisters (many of them born in South Africa), with the object of breaking up the movement, the Imperial Government, upon the urgent representations of the Government of India, successfully implored the Transvaal—and subsequently, the Union—Administration to cease to deport. The deportees subsequently returned to South Africa, but with the loss of Narayansamy, who died at Delagoa Bay after having been unlawfully denied a landing anywhere in British territory.

Meanwhile, the four South African Colonies had become Provinces of the Union of South Africa, and the Imperial Government, convinced at last of the justice of the Indian cause, and taking advantage of the possibilities of the new situation, addressed to the Union Government the memorable despatch of October 7, 1910, in which they powerfully recommended the repeal of Act 2 of 1907, the removal of the racial bar, and the substitution for the latter of the Indian suggestion of non-racial legislation modified by administrative differentiation, effectively limiting future Indian immigration to a minimum, number annually of highly educated men, whose services would be required for the higher needs of the Indian community. To this despatch was appended the condition that nothing that was done to settle the Transvaal controversy at the expense of the Indians residing in the Coast Provinces would be satisfactory to the Imperial Government. The Union Ministers responded in a friendly manner, the struggle became less acute, and ultimately, in 1911, a Union Immigration Bill was published, purporting to settle the controversy that had been raging for so long. The new measure, however, obviously did not serve its purpose, for, whilst repealing the Asiatic Act of 1907, saving the rights of minors that had been declared by the Appellate Division of the Surpreme Court, in the Chotabhai case, the Bill did not remove the racial bar, but rather extended it throughout the Union, by reason of the Orange Free State entry question, and it took away other rights not only from Transvaal Indians, but from those resident in the Coast Provinces. An unanimous outcry arose from them, negotiations were re-opened, and the suggestion was thrown out by the Passive Resistance leaders that the Bill should be replaced by one limited to the Transvaal alone, which, however, was not adopted. Eventually it was found impossible to pass the Bill, and a provisional settlement was arranged, whereby the Indians undertook to suspend Passive Resistance, whilst the Government promised to introduce satisfactory legislation in the 1912 session of Parliament, meanwhile administering the law as though it had already been altered, and specially exempting, in terms of an earlier understanding, a limited number of educated entrants into the Transvaal.

Taking advantage of the lull, and of the better feeling aroused at the time of the King's Coronation in India, a further mission was sent there, in order to maintain public interest and to place before the Government the points upon which the Indian community insisted. The measure of 1912, however, met with no better fate than its predecessor, and the provisional agreement was extended for another year. It was then that preparations were made throughout South Africa to welcome the Hon. Mr. Gokhale, whose tour in the sub-continent is still fresh in the minds of all. He succeeded, as no one else had yet done in raising the discussion of the Indian problem to the Imperial plane, and won the admiration even of his opponents of his moderation and statssmanship. It was during this visit that Indians later alleged, on his authority, that a promise of repeal of the iniquitous £3 tax was made by the Government in view of the fact that, for over a year, further indentured immigration from India had been prohibited by the Indian Government.

When the 1913 Bill, however, was introduced into Parliament, and the Indian leaders observed the spirit in which the Indian question was dealt with by the Union Ministers, grave fears were aroused that a situation, which had already become still further complicated by the position created by the Searle judgment, invalidating practically every Indian marriage would once more develop into a catastrophe. The Government were warned that the marriage question must be settled if peace were desired, and that the racial bar mast ba finally removed from the measure. Amendments were introduced and accepted by the Government, purporting to settle the marriage controversy on the basis of the recognition of de facto monogamous marriages, but, even as passed, the Bill failed to satisfy the demands of the Passive Resisters, whilst the £3 tax remained unrepealed. A final attempt was made by the Indian leaders to avoid a revival of the struggle, and negotiations were once more opened with the Government, So as to obtain a promise of remedial legislation in the next session of Parliament. They were, however, interrupted by the European strike, during the heat of which Mr. Gandhi, as spokesman of the Passive Resisters, undertook to refrain from pressing the Indian case for the moment. Meanwhile, a mission bad proceeded to England to co-operate with the Hon. Mr. Gokhale, at his urgent invitation, in order to bring home to the Imperial Government and the British public the extreme gravity of the situation, and the certainty of the extension of the demands of Passive Resisters unless a settlement of the points in dispute were promptly arrived at. All these representations, however, failed to conciliate the Union Government, which proved obdurate, and a final warning was sent to them stating that unless assurances of the introduction of legislative and administrative measures, in the following session, were given to recognise in law the validity of de facto monogamous marriage, to remove the racial bar, as regards the Free State, to restore the right of entry into the Cape Colony to South African-born Indians, to repeal the £3 tax, and to administer justly and with due regard to vested interests existing legislation operating harshly against Indians, Passive Resistance would be immediately revived. The warning was ignored, and the struggle was resumed in all its bitterness and on a much wider scale than before. Its incidents are too fresh in the public mind to need more than a brief mention—the compaign of the Indian women whose marriages had been dishonoured by a fresh decision of the Supreme Court, at the instigation of the Government, the awakening of the free and indentured labourers all over Natal, the tremendous strikes, the wonderful and historic, strikers' march of protest into the Transvaal, the horrible scenes enacted into the latter in the effort to crush the strikers and compel them to resume work, the arrest and imprisonment of the principal leaders and of hundreds—almost thousands—of the rank and file, the enormous Indian mass meetings held in Durban, Johannesburg, and: other parts of the Union, the fierce and passionate indignation aroused in India, the large sums of money poured into South Africa from all parts of the Motherland, Lord Hardinge's famous speech at Madras, in which he placed himself at the head of Indian public opinion and his demand for a Commission of Inquiry, the energetic efforts of Lord Ampthill's Committee, the hurried intervention of the Imperial authorities, the appointment over the heads of the Indian community of a Commission whose personnel could not satisfy the Indians, the discharge of the lead’s whose advice to ignore the Commission was almost entirely accepted, the arrival of Messrs. Andrews and Pearson and their wonderful work of reconciliation, the deaths of Harbatsingh and Valiamma, the strained position relieved only by the interruption of the second European strike, when Mr. Gandhi once more undertook not to hamper the Government whilst they had their hands full with the fresh difficulty, and, when it had been dealt with, the entirely new spirit of friendliness, trust, and co-operation that was found to have been created by the moderation of the great Indian leader and the loving influence spread around him by Mr. Andrews as he proceeded with his great Imperial mission.

All these things are of recent history, as are the favourable recommendation of the Commission on practically every point referred to it and out of which Passive Resistance had arisen, the adoption of the commission's Report in its entirety by the Government, the introduction and passing into law of the Indians' Relief Act, after lengthy and remarkable debates in both Houses of the Legislature, the correspondence between Mr. Gandhi and General Smuts, in which the latter undertook, on behalf of the Government, to carry through the administrative reforms that were not covered by the new Act, and the Indian protagonist of passive Resistance formally announced the conclusion of the struggle and set forth the points upon which Indians would sooner or latter have to be satisfied before they could acquire complete equality of civil status—and the final scenes of departure, enacted throughout the country, wherein the deaths and sufferings of the Indian martyrs, Nagappen, Naryansamy, Harbatsingh, and Valiamma, were justified and sanctified to the world.

It is significant that, as Passive Resistance became stronger and purer, it succeeded more and more in bringing together the best representatives of the European and Indian sections of the population. With each new phase came new triumphs and new friends. Whilst every material gain has been put the restoration of that which was taken away, each gain of principle has been the concession of that which had been denied. The struggle commenced with a protest against the universal distrust and contempt for the Indian community. That distrust and contempt have been exchanged for trust and respect. It commenced with the complete ignoring of Indian sentiment. Gradually that policy, too, was altered, save that it revived acutely when the Commission was appointed over the heads of those mainly interested in its findings. To-day, however, the leaders are consulted in matters vitally affecting the welfare of the Indian community, and Passive Resistance has given for these disfranchised ones far more than the vote could have won, and in a shorter time. The movement commenced with a demand for the repeal of the Transvaal Act 2 of 1907. The Act was repealed and its threatened extension to other parts of South Africa was completely prevented. At the beginning, racial legislation against Indians was threatened, so as to drive them from the Colony.

The settlement has removed the possibility of racial legislation against Indians throughout the Empire. The system of indentured immigration from India, that had been regarded almost as a permanent feature of South African economics, has been ended. The hated £3 tax has been repealed and its attendant misery and insult destroyed. Vested rights, that were tending everywhere to disappear, are to be maintained and protected. The bulk of Indian marriages, that had never previously received the sanction of South African law, are henceforth to be fully recognised in law. But above and beyond all this is the new spirit of conciliation that has resulted from the hardships, the sufferings, the sacrifices of the Passive Resisters. The flag of legal racial equality has been kept flying, and it is now recognised that Indians have rights and aspirations and ideals that cannot be ignored. The struggle has more than proved the immense superiority of right over might, of soul-force over brute-force, of love and reason over hate and passion. India has been raised in the scale of nations, her children in South Africa have been ennobled, and the way is now open to them to develop their capacities in peace and concord, and thus contribute their quota to the building up of this great new nation that is arising in the South African sub-continent.