Constitutional agitation

MUHAMMAD Ali Jinnah chose to take up very slippery ground in his speech at a public meeting at Bombay on Sunday evening. “Why did it take India from 1892 to 1909 for getting the Minto-Morley Reforms,” he asked. “Why again was further advance achieved before 1919?” The reason for this disparity between the length of time in the one case and in the other, in his opinion, was “the greater political awakening in the latter period which forced the Government’s hands.” If this statement stood by itself, it would be impossible for anyone to take exception to it, anyone, that is to say, who does not accept the fiction about the reforms being granted by the British Government in both cases out of its boundless generosity. Unhappily, it is immediately followed by the most misleading comparison between constitutional agitation and civil disobedience. “While holding that subject people are entitled to use any method to win their freedom,” said Jinnah, “the advocates of civil disobedience might be reminded that the opposite party would not sit with arms folded, while they are preparing the way for what is, in effect, a revolution. On the contrary, if they concentrate on awakening the political consciousness of the people to a pitch equal to their religious consciousness, for instance, and if they organise a united people’s party of opposition to the Government on perfectly constitutional lines with a membership of at least Rs 3-4 crore and with crores of rupees at its command, no Government would dare to flout it with impunity.”