684 NON-CO-OPERATION
finger. It shows the way India may easily go, if drastic precautions be not taken. If we are not to evolve violence out of non-violence, it is quite clear that we must hastily retrace our steps and re establish an atmosphere of peace, re-arrange our programme and not think of starting mass civil disobedience until we are sure of peace being started and in spite of Govern- ment provocation. We must be sure of unauthorised portions not starting mass civil disobedience.
As it is, the Congress organisation is still im- perfect and its instructions are still perfunctorily carried but. We have not established Congress Committees in every one of the villages. Where we have, they are not perfectly amenable to our instructions. We have not probably more than one crore of members on the roll. We are in the middle of February, yet not many have paid the annual four annas subscription for the current year. Volunteers are indifferently enrolled. They do not conform to all the conditions of their pledge. They do not even wear hand-spun and hand- woven khaddar. All the Hindu volunteers have not yet purged themselves of the sin of untouchability. All are not free from the taint of violence. Not by their imprisonment are we going to win Swaraj or serve the holy cause of the Khilafat or attain the ability to stop payment to faithless servants. Some of us err in spite of ourselves. But some others among us sin wilfully. They join volunteer corps well knowing that they are not and do not intend to remain non-violent. We are thus untruthful even as we hold the Government to-be untruthful, We dare not enter the kingdom of Liberty with mere lip homage to Truth and Non-violence.
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