Page:Speeches And Writings MKGandhi.djvu/741

From Wikisource
Jump to navigation Jump to search
This page needs to be proofread.

cl 2% is Congress hereby confers upon the said suc- cessor and all subsequent successors appointed in turn by their predecessor 's, all his aforesaid powers, provided that nothing in this resolution shall be deemed to authorise Mahntma Gandhi or any of the aforesaid successors to conclude any terms of peace with the Goverment of India or the British Govern* went without the previous sanction of the All-India Congress Committee, to be finally ratified by the Congress specially convened for the purpose, and provided also that the present creed of the Congress shall in no case be altered by Mahattna Gandhi or his successor except with the leave of the Congress first obtained." The following is the full text of Mr. Gandhi's speech : ]

I shall hope, if I can at all avoid it, not to take even the 30 minutes that Hakim Sahib has allotted to me. And I do not propose, if I can help it to take all that time, because I feel that the resolution explains itself. If at the end of 15 months' incessant activity, you, the delegates assembled in this Congress do not know your own minds, I am positive that I cannot possibly carry conviction to you even in a two hours* speech and, what is more, if I could carry conviction to you to-day because of my speech, I am afraid I would lose all faith in my countrymen, because it would demonstrate their incapacity to observe things and events, it would demonstrate their incapacity to think coherently, because I submit there is absolutely nothing new in this resolution that we have not been doing all this time, that we have not been thinking all this time. There is absolutety nothing new in this resolution which is at all startling. Those of you who have followed the proceedings from month to month of the Working'

�� �