There were only a few Pathans living in the Transvaal, their total number hardly exceeding fifty. Some of them had come over as soldiers during the Boer War and they had settled in the country like many other Indian as well as European soldiers. Some of them were even my clients, and I was familiar with them otherwise too. The Pathans are an unsophisticated and credulous race. Brave they are as a matter of course. To kill and get killed is an ordinary thing in their eyes, and if they are angry with any one, they will thrash him and sometimes even kill him. And in this matter they are no respecters of persons. They will behave even to a blood-brother in an identical manner. Even though there were so few of them in the Transvaal, there would be a free fight whenever they quarrelled among themselves, and in such cases I had often to play the part of a peace-maker. A Pathan’s anger becomes particularly uncontrollable when he has to deal with any one whom he takes to be a traitor. When he seeks justice he seeks it only through personal violence. These Pathans fully participated in the Satyagraha struggle; none of them had submitted to the Black Act. It was an easy thing to mislead them. It was quite possible to create a misunderstanding in their minds about the finger-prints and thus to inflame them. This single suggestion,—viz., why should I ask them to give finger-prints if I was not corrupt?—was enough to poison the Pathans’ ears.
Again there was another party in the Transvaal which comprised such Indians as had entered the Transvaal surreptitiously without a permit or were interested in bringing others there secretly either without a permit at all or with a false permit. This party too knew that the settlement would be detrimental to their interest. None had to produce his permit so long as the struggle lasted, and therefore this group could carry on their trade without fear and easily avoid going to jail during the struggle. The longer the struggle was protracted, the bet
ter for them. Thus this clique also could have instigated
