INDIAN CONGRESS

Gisborne Herald, Volume LXVI, Issue 20125, 20 December 1939, Page 11

INDIAN CONGRESS

GANDHI’S INFLUENCE

‘'■'NOT AN EXTREMIST”

MM OF DOMINION STATUS

Hope that the political ability and moderation ol Mahatma Gandhi would triumph in the present Indian constitutional crisis was expressed by Dr. A. Bramwell Cook in an interview in Christchurch. Dr. Cook is a New Zealander, educated at the Waikato Boys’ High School and in the University of Otago. At present he is chief medical officer of Emery Hospital, conducted by the Salvation Army at Annand, in the Bombay Presidency, and he is visiting New Zealand on furlough.

”Of the 11 Ministries of India, seven are, or have been, controlled by the Congress Party,” Dr. Cook said. “The policies of all Congress Ministries are conducted by a working committee of Congress, so that the policy of all seven Governments is uniform.

“Behind this policy is Mahatma Gandhi, who. although not a member of the Congress Party, has such a grip over public opinion in normal times that he can sway it one way or another. He is the master of compromise. Several times the resignations of Congress Ministries have been on the table only to be honourably taken up again later, after a workable compromise had been effected. This may happen again.

Gandhi’s Fasts “It is a mistake,” Dr. Cook said, “to think that Indians see their politics as we do. They can never forget that they are a conquered people. They want Dominion status and self-govern-ment, even if that means bad government. Persons abroad may laugh at Gandhi's fasts, but to him and lho people of India they are an expression of philosophy, a subduing of the needs of the body to a spiritual principle. AVhen the people realise that Gandhi’s life is at stake, they invariably come round to his way of thinking.

“Gandhi is not an extremist. Some members of Congress are, like Chandrah Bose, who would present the British Government with an ultimatum, It is the common aim of Dominion status for India that-holds them together. When once this has been attained, Bose and his followers will hive off and become the opposition. Non-Violence Principle

“Gandhi’s principle is ‘Ahisma,’ or non-violence, and his followers cannot

conscientiously engage in war. It is a question of which all India feels strongly. They arc definitely antiNazi. The considerable amount of Communist propaganda going on among the mill hands is not understood by a larger proportion of men than anywhere else.

“Tlie princes have wholeheartedly declared their support for the Allied cause because their authority is maintained by the British Government. The lack of democratic government in their states is the main reason for the opposition ot the Congress Party to 1 the federation that would have been brought about very soon now but for the war, and would have .led to representatives from these states sitting at the same table as those democratically elected in British India."