Page:The Life of Lokamanya Tilak.djvu/322

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

unfriendly critics think that Mr. Tilak was pressed — nobody knows, by whom — to declare his programme and was required to show some constructive work as his name was associated with mere destruction. Others hold that it was a set off against Mahatma Gandhi's programme of Non-co-operation published about this time. There are persons who seek to justify Mr. Tilak's Manifesto by pointing out that the publication of the Congress Democratic Party's Manifesto was followed by the publication of at least half a dozen similar docu- ments from different groups of politicians in India. The truth is that the manifesto of Mr. Tilak forms only a link in the work of organisation required for carrying the Councils elections, on which Mr. Tilak had set his heart. The first step was, of course, the Amritsar Re- solution. The Sholapur Conference which followed, developed the Amritsar Resolution, and specified the persons eligible for election under the Congress banner. The Manifesto followed, pointing out at length, the scope of the work of the Congress Party. The fourth step was taken when at the Annual Conference of the Indian Home Rule League, the services of the League were placed at the disposal of persons belonging to the Congress Democratic Party and desirous of standing as candidates for Councils. Mr. Tilak's next idea was to get the Congress Democratic Party's Manifesto approved of by the Special Session of the Congress at Calcutta. He intended to make this Congress concentrate upon the elections in November 1920 ; and then, after having established an over- whelming majority in the Councils, he intended at Nagpur to give an ultimatum to the Bureaucracy. Had the Bureaucracy failed to respond^