Civil Disobedience

WE cannot help thinking that the part of the resolution of the Working Committee which relates to civil disobedience is not as clear as it might have been. It begins by warning all Provincial Congress Committees against embarking upon mass civil disobedience without first making certain that a peaceful atmosphere is retained throughout the Province concerned, and ends by saying that it is in the opinion of the Committee essential for the successful working of civil disobedience that whilst it is in action in one part of India, the rest responds by remaining non-violent. If the latter proposition is to be accepted, the task of sanctioning civil disobedience in any part of any Province should definitely devolve upon the Working Committee or some other all-India body and not upon a provincial organisation, because no provincial organisation can possibly make certain of a nonviolent atmosphere being maintained throughout the country. Logically, therefore, what the Working Committee ought to have done was to have modified the resolution of the All-India Congress Committee, so as to take away the power of sanctioning civil disobedience from the provincial bodies. Secondly, it is not clear how any Provincial Committee or for that matter any other body can make sure that a peaceful atmosphere will be maintained in an eventuality that has not arisen. Who knew even a day before the actual occurrence that Bombay would frustrate the hopes of Mahatma Gandhi as it has done? These outbreaks of disorder are seldom planned beforehand: they are mostly due to the impulses of the moment. The question of a peaceful atmosphere being maintained at all times is essentially a question of complete control being obtained over all impulsive elements in the community, and this is not a simple thing.

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