An appeal and a counter-appeal

IN his recent letter to us about Sarojini Naidu’s Gujranwala speeches, Lala Lajpat Rai made a personal appeal to that gifted lady “to devote her energies to bring about a change of heart among her Muslim friends.” Naidu, in her reply to the letter published in our Sunday’s issue, avoids any reference to this appeal, but makes a counter-appeal to Rai himself “to transcend all narrow communal considerations and in the face of even overwhelming provocation stand unmoved and inflexible in pursuit of the one national ideal and in the creation of the national will of which has so often and so eloquently spoken.” In both cases, the appeal is accompanied by and is, indeed, the outward expression of the severe disappointment felt by its author at the recent activities of the person to whom it is addressed. “I am afraid,” said Rai, “that her speeches have not made a very good impression on the people of this province, and are not marked by that sobriety of language and that dignity of tone which one has a right to expect from the President-elect of the Congress.” Naidu’s reply is equally pointed. “I had expected from Lala Lajpat Rai,” she writes, “a more generous response to my earnest and personal appeal.” We are constrained to say that these expressions of mutual disappointment, these appeals and counter-appeals do not serve any useful purpose. We should, indeed, have been better pleased if the two leaders, instead of fighting in public, had settled their differences in their private chambers.