The Event (2/6)

February 26, 1918

(The previous installment can be read here.)

Five days after thousands of workers had been “temporarily laid off” from their work in the textile factories of Ahmedabad, India, Mohandas Gandhi called a mass meeting under a babul tree on the banks of the Sabarmati River. More than five thousand mill workers gathered to hear him speak on February 26, 1918. Gandhi had them renew the two parts of their pledges which were printed in a leaflet, the first of 17 that would be distributed before the labor dispute was concluded. The workers pledged that they would not go back to work without a 35% increase in pay, and they would remain nonviolent and peaceful during the lockout.

Gandhi’s influence on this second point impresses me. When 10,000 workers were suddenly out of work, the police took precautions. Extra, armed patrols went out across the city, ready to jump on any disturbances with both feet. It was easy to imagine the riots that could occur, the looting and destruction the mobs were capable of.

Nothing happened. Workers marched in the street, chanting “Keep your pledge!” After two days, the police pulled back to strategic intersections; two days after that, the extra officers disappeared. It was recognized that Gandhi was in control of the situation.

Speaking to the crowd under the babul tree, Gandhi warned them, “some of you probably think that everything will be all right after a week or two of suffering.” There were no guarantees that that would happen. However, he and the advisers had taken a pledge of their own; “If a time comes when you have to starve,” Gandhi said, “we shall only only eat after feeding you.”

What was Gandhi thinking when he made that statement? Was he already laying the groundwork for his first public fast? Or was he just telling the crowd what he thought they needed to hear? He had been dishonest with them already in the first leaflet. Although allegedly signed by the leader they knew, Anasuya Sarabhai, sister of a prominent mill owner, Gandhi had written the text, and would repeat this fraud over the coming weeks.

Have you ever presented your opinion as that of another, in order to give it more weight?