Vithalbhai Patel, Sardar Patel

SPEECH OF SARDAR VALLABHBHAI PATEL - JULY 6th, 1948

Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel seconding the resolution said that the resolution covered the two statements by the Cabinet Mission and the Viceroy of May 16 and June 16. The Working Committee had accepted the Mission's proposals contained in their statement of May 16 but rejected the Provisional Government proposal contained in their statement of June 16.

Making it clear that the resolution just moved by Maulana Abul Kalam Azad could not be amended in any manner Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel said, "WE PLACE THIS RESOLUTION BEFORE THE HOUSE FOR RATIFICATION. EITHER YOU ACCEPT IT OR REJECT IN TOTO."

"Four Parties, the Cabinet Mission, the Congress, the Muslim League and the Indian Princes, have accepted the constitutional plau envisaged in the State Paper issued by the Cabinet Mission on May 16. All vital details connected with the negotiations have been fully published. You are aware the Muslim League first accepted the May 16 statement of the Cabinet Mission. We deferred our decision until the full picture was available to us, namely, of the Constituent Assembly and the Interim Provisional Government. The Interim Government plan was published in the June 16 statement of the Cabinet Mission and the Viceroy. We decided to reject this proposal as it did not accord with our demands. We however decided to accept the Constituent Assembly scheme contained in the May 10 statement. We have made it clear to the Cabinet Mission that the proposed Constituent Assembly will not prove a success if a responsible, representative Provisional Government at the Centre is not established soon. They have made it clear that the Care-taker Government will be there only for a few days.

Consistent with the existing circumstances we have secured the widest franchise possible for the election to the Constituent Assembly. The most dangerous proposal in the Constituent Assembly scheme is the one relating to Grouping. Our interpretation of the relevant paragraph in the State Paper is that the provinces are free to decide at the initial stage whether they wish to join a particular Group in which they have been placed. No province can be compelled to join any Group against its own wishes.

The difficulty about Europeans participating in the voting to the Constituent Assembly election has been practically overcome. We have thus secured a Constituent Assembly almost on the lines we have demanded all these years. Furthermore, under the proposed scheme the transfer of power from British to Indian hands will be smooth and peaceful. It is therefore, our conviction that we should take advantage of the scheme and not plunge the country in struggle.

At the very commencement of our negotiations with the Cabinet Delegation we made it clear to them that we could talk to them only on the basis of a free and independent India. The British Cabinet Mission accepted this and made it clear that their acceptance of our demand was without any reservation. In the face of such assurance it is difficult for us not to believe them.

We have also made sure that there shall be one undivided India with one Central Government. What the shape of that Central Government will be, is a matter for the Constituent Assembly to decide. The Muslim League sees germs of Pakistan in the scheme. We see a United India. It is for the Constituent Assembly to decide who is right."

Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel referred to the great injustice done to the great Sikh community in the Cabinet Mission's proposals and said that the Sikhs had not been consulted before they were thrown, bound hand and foot, into the "B" Group. Their being put in "B" Group without their consent naturally placed the at a disadvantageous position and therefore they were smarting under the sense of a grievance. Furthermore, the speaker could not see any reason why the Sikhs were not given the same safeguards and communal veto as had been given to the Muslims. He was opposed to all vetoes but once such a veto had been given to the Muslims he could not see the reason why it was refused in the case of the Sikhs. The Sikhs are a brave people and it is unwise to disregard their just demand.

Referring to the Indian States, Sardar Patel welcomed the Cabinet Mission's statement saying that once India was independent there would be no further paramountcy. The Cabinet Mission's statement had made it clear that in future that States rulers would have to look more and more to their own subjects rather than to the Paramount Power if they wanted progress. The question of representation in the Constituent Assembly of States people had not been decided, but he hoped that the Indian princes would provide adequate representation for their people in the Constituent Assembly.

Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel referred to numerous telegrams he was daily receiving seeking admission into the Constituent Assembly as delegates and said that this urge, coupled with the unanimous support the nationalist Press had given to the Congress in its decision to accept the proposal, clearly showed the verdict of the country in favour of the Congress Working Committee's decision.

Source : Making of the Indian Constitution

VANDE MATARAM

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The Rajkot Dilemma - Sardar Patel

While in some States, the ruling authority has managed to secure quiet by keeping well with leading Congressmen, in Rajkot a peculiar situation has arisen. As a result of discontent with the Indian Dewan both on the part of the subjects and the Paramount Power, Rajkot was obliged to take in a British Dewan, Sir Patrick Cadell, Mr. Patel expressed dissatisfaction at the appointment on ground of expense and for other reasons as well, but with unusual caution he pleaded for restraint in criticism. The Ruler son found himself at loggerheads with the Dewan and his efforts to terminate the administration do not seem to have been very successful. The Dewan then appealed to two quarters: To the Government of India on the plea that conditions in Rajkot are crying for redress; and to the people of Rajkot on the contention that his reforms are held up owing to the non co-operative attitude of the Thakore. Mr. Patel who seemed to regard the new Dewan as an extra and unnecessary item of expenditure, will not now tolerate the Thakore adopting the same attitude. He expressed surprise recently that the Thakore could even attempt to send away an "experienced administrator" like Sir Patrick Cadell. At one stage Rajkot which is regarded as the key State in Kathiawar, was the scene of almost complete co-operation between Congress leaders and the Government of India in applying pressure on the local prince. The State agitators observe a discreet silence as to the value of the Cadell reforms but they look to the all India Congress leaders to guide them. Whatever Congress extremists may think, the orthodox Congress leader has little desire to break up the States completely. The Margin of difference between the Government of India attitude and that of Congress politicians has widened. It is believed that the fears of other Kathiawar Princes that concessions in Rajkot would seriously shake their own security, have retarted the reforms. A compromise scheme makes the Thakore the President of a Council of Administration, Sir Patrick the vice-president and two nominees of the old Dewan members. The public are assured vaguely that responsible government is the goal.

Source : Indian Social Reformer - November, 5th 1938

VANDE MATARAM

THE HINDU MARRIAGE VALIDITY ACT - Mr. V. J. PATEL LEGISLATIVE COUNCIL MEMBER

I - THE REFORMER'S VIEW POINT

The honorable Mr. Patel is signalising his entrance into the Imperial Legislative Council by displaying his wonted activity at the very first session which he is attending. Among other things he is raising the question of inter-caste marriages among the Hindus and the debate on the leave to introduce the bill was to have taken place yesterday. Although the report of the debate is not available to us at the moment of writing, it would not be amiss to put forward some obvious considerations on the subject once again before the public.

About six years ago the Hon'ble Mr. Bhupendranath Basu introduced a bill in the Imperial Legislative Council with the object of doing away with the necessity of abjuring one's religion before one is able to contract a valid marriage under the Special Marriage Act. That bill of course met with opposition from many orthodox Hindu circles, and as it was also opposed by Government it was not successful. Even at that time however, it was, remarked that the bill met with a very considerable amount of support from some unexpected quarters, e.g. the Maratta in this Presidency, Many thinking men have come to realise that for the consolidation of an Indian nationality the old religious obstacles to individual action should be as far as possible removed, and therefore they have no objection to permissive bill like Mr. Basu's. But the Government of those days opposed the bill on this very ground and did not want to give this small facility to enable enterprising members of different communities to contract legal alliances, seeing in this proposal a future political danger.

There were some Hindus who opposed Mr. Basu's bill on account of its going to far in that it proposed to validate marriages between members of different religions. They were ready, they said, to accept a bill validating marriages between different castes and sub-castes among the Hindus, between which, according to the best legal opinion of the country, there cannot be lawful marriages. We have never seen the force of this objection, for to the orthodox the marriage between a Brahman and a Shudra is as unthinkable as one between a Hindu and a Parsi. When the fight is one for a principle in this case that of individual liberty to contract marriage, it is best not to compromise it by trying to conciliate a class of opponents who after all can never be really conciliated, and one might "as well be hanged for a sheep as for a lamb."

The Hon. Mr. Patel has attempted to choose this apparently easier path, and though we have not much hope of its success under a Government which is in mortal dread of any measures of social reform we trust that his effort will meet with enough public support to allow another bill of a wider scope to pass the expanded legislative council of the future. We hope that Mr. Patel will make his position quite clear; otherwise in this case a small reform will once again prove the enemy of a large reform. Mr. Patel's bill really consists of a single clause, and we are afraid that it has not been well drawn up. The question of marriage is bound up with a host of other questions which will have to be faced by the legislator. We do not wish to raise objections for objection's sake and we do wish that Mr. Patel or some other member will bring in a comprehensive measure which will take account of all the logical consequences of the validation of intercaste marriages. The work is absolutely necessary in the interests of the Hindu community if it is not to suffer from gradual attrition.

We shall enumerate only a few of these consequences. In the first place a marriage act involves a divorce act as an immediate corollary. Then various questions of inheritance will also immediately arise. Is a mau who has married out of caste and who has consequently been excommunicated still entitled to claim his share of the ancestral house for living in it? Are his children by a wife of a different caste to claim an equal share with his children by a former wife of his own caste? Can a man marry two wives of different castes and can he enforce the restitution of conjugal rights in the case of a wife of higher caste who refuses to live with a co-wife of a lower caste? Again what is to be the caste of the children of these inter-caste marriages and what is the law of succession to which they would be subject? For although there is a general law of succession common to all Hindus, still there are several customary differences for different castes. Again a legislator ought to take care that in trying to do away with caste rigidity he does not unconsciously add to it, for there is likely to result different new castes from different combinations of two other castes. Further, there should be settled the question of anuloma and pratiloma marriages.

These and various other questions will each require separate detailed treatment, impossible in one article. Suffice it to say that we ourselves are prepared to follow up the logical consequences of the principle of individual liberty, when the similar liberty of others is not endangered. If we have mentioned several objections to Mr. Patel's bill it is only the role of a friendly critic who wishes him to seek expert advice in the matter of drafting and bring out his results once again in a complete and self contained measure.

R. P. Paranjpye.

Source : THE SERVANT OF INDIA SOCIETY - September 5, 1918

VANDE MATARAM

RAJKOT AGAIN

The primary school where Mahatma Gandhi studied.

Commenting on the arrangement come to by Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel with the Thakore of Rajkot, we observed that it did not advance by a single inch the cause of constitutional reform in Indian States including Rajkot itself. Little prescience was needed to reach that conclusion. The game of Power is an ancient one. Under different names it has been and is going on around us every day. A revolution is followed by a counter revolution as surely as the night the day. And this was a wonderful evolution! The Thakore was converted overnight from a believer in his right to rule autocratically to a seemingly fervent devotee of responsible government with his powers strictly limited. It would have been nothing short of a miracle if this had endured. It has not. As the public clamour against the Thakore's administration grew, the Indian Dewan Viravala, was dismissed and an English retired officer appointed in his place. The new Dewan's advice, however, was not palatable to the Thakore. He dismissed the English Dewan and the Sardar, if we remember, expressed himself disapprovingly of his action in trying to get rid of so experienced an administrator. Mr. Viravala had to leave Rajkot at short notice. The Thakore then agreed to Sardar's terms and got his help in clearing the English Dewan out and in getting back the man whom he had to dismissed in compliance with popular pressure. Now, the Thakore has resumed his authority and upset the arrangement with Sardar Patel who is an amateur in the game as compared with the Thakore Sahib. The Sardar has threatened to revive satyagraha but Mr. Viravala is not Cadell and the Government of India is not likely to supersede him now by an English Dewan. The local leaders are not plussed, they have sought the advice of the Sardar who himself seems to be taken a back by the sudden turn events have taken in Rajkot, which he thought he had finally and permanently placed on constitutional footing.

Source : Indian Social Reformer : 28 January 1939

VANDE MATARAM

RAJKOT

The Thakore Sahib of Rajkot, has after an eight hours parley with Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel agreed to appoint a Committee consisting of a majority of members of the principal political organization in the State, to draw up a scheme of responsible government for his people. This does not advance by a single inch the cause of constitutional reform in Indian States including Rajkot. What has really happened, if nothing supervenes to annual it, is that Sardar Patel has become Mayor of the Palace and the Thakore Sahib and his subjects will have henceforth to submit to his rule. It will be very good thing for the State because Sardar Patel is an exceedingly capable and resolute administrator. His success in toning p the municipal administration of Ahmedabad during his presidentship of the Municipality wrung a tribute of praise from an unsympathetic Minister in the previous diarchy. But political agitators will have short shrift at his hands and the men and women who helped him in this palace revolution, unless they acquire a loyalist mentality will feel his hand as heavy on them as on the Thakore Sahib.

Source : Indian Social Reformer - 31 December 1938

VANDE MATARAM

Violence, Non-Violence And Congress Government

The resort to police firing by Congress Government and the declared faith of the Congress organisation in non-violence, which is being affirmed with embarrassing reiteration by Gandhiji in recent statements, present together a perplexing phenomenon to the public. The Bombay Government, according to their own account, were not able to control a worker's demonstration which failed to attract labour to its cause, without resort firing. The Madras Government according report in the Times of India, had recourse to the same weapon in controlling an anti-Hindi meeting in Ettiyapuram, even though the anti-Hindi agitation is represented by that Government to be a factious agitation which is now fizzling out. The only difference between Madras and Bombay is that in Bombay there were a number of injuries and two deaths as the result of police firing while in Madras there were no casualties. To cover the changed situation Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel has redefined non-violence. From what we can understand of his statement on the subject Congress Government can only give up the weapon of firing if political agitators abandon violence first. There is no difference between this attitude of the prominent Congress leader and that of the British politician-official of the Montagu Chelmsford period. Mr. Patel has probably forgotten that in the days of civil disobedience even a lathi charge was regarded as an indefensible use of force against unarmed crowds. And then it was just the same defence of police violence which he uses now that he resented that the crowds had not observed non-violent principles. There is some excuse for Sardar Vallabhbhai's line of reasoning in the change that has occurred in his own position from irreconcilable agitator to controller of eight provincial Governments; and we are prepared to make due allowance for this. What we cannot understand is the attitude of widely differing sections of the nationalist press. Like the British statesman on Federation, the Bombay Chronicle which ridicules his advice, solemnly asks the Bombay opposition not to condemn the Trades Disputes Bill until it has actually been worked. The Congress Socialist has swallowed all its differences with Mr. Patel and now earnestly rebukes the strike organisers for not ensuring that the movement was completely non-violent and that it was not prevented from growing into an anti-Congress demonstration. One would infer from this attitude on the part of a labour journal that the strikers were from the outset a violent undisciplined crowd. This is not borne out by the reports of the demonstration, which, after all, are more convincing if in his signed article he had told his readers how a demonstration against a measure sponsored by a Congress Government could be run on pro-Congress lines-particularly when the difference between Labour and Congress was as fundamental as it was on the Trades Disputes Bill The Only conclusion one can draw from the attitude of the Congress Socialist is that on this occasion it has proved more Congress than Socialist. Congressmen we are afraid, do not adequately appreciate the seriousness of the position. Non-violence which may be a virtue if self-assumed, comes very near an evil when it is insisted on as a preliminary to peaceful settlement of political disputes. A non-violent politician is more likely to be driven to a state of panic by stray instances of mob-violence than a politician who does not look for cherubic virtues in his people. What is a matter for sympathy in a private individual becomes a fearful thing in a man in control of the Government machinery.

VANDE MATARAM

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Congress and Indian States

To his many responsibilities Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel has added the task of putting strength into political agitators in Indian States. In his presidential address to the Baroda State Subject's Conference, Mr. Patel pointed with evident satisfaction to the growing unrest in some of the States and attributed it to the decision of the Indian National Congress at Haripura to leave the people of Indian States to conduct their own agitation. Mr. Patel held out British India as an example and told his audience how the people in the British provinces were now participating in their own Government. He advised the Baroda State subjects to win self-government through discipline, organization, unity and a readiness to make sacrifices. Self-government, he said, was never gifted from above. In unfurling the Congress flag earlier, Mr. Patel had pulled rather in the opposite direction by urging that the flag should "never be interpreted as an indication of opposition to authority." We fail to see how self-government can be won, without being "conferred as a boon by the ruler", and without "opposition to authority" as well. The only interpretation that can be put on Mr. Patel's complex reasoning is that the Congress must be kept scrupulously out of all States agitation while individual Congress leaders maintain popular discontent at a steady level without at the same time losing the favour of the rulers.

VANDE MATARAM

Congress Hierarchy and Madras Premier

Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel broke, in a speech at Karachi, the long silence of the Congress hierarchy on the arrest and conviction of anti-Hindi agitators in Madras under the Criminal Law Amendment Acts. He said that the Congress is now, as before it accepted office, opposed to these laws. But their use was necessitated in Madras by local conditions and by the use of vulgar and obscene language by picketers. He foreshadowed the repeal of the Acts within two months. As regards local conditions, we are not aware of any special conditions in Madras which require the use of a law which was condemned as oppressive and repressive when applied to the whole country by the Willingdon Government which, to do it justice, did not profess to be a popular Government. On the contrary, the Tamil land has perhaps the most law-abiding population in the whole country. Neither is the Sardar well-informed when he alleged that the opposition to the application of the Act came from a small section which was at the back of the anti-Hindi agitation. The opposition to compulsory Hindi is widespread, although the Madras Government may choose to belittle it just as Lord Lansdowne laughed at the Congress as a microscopic minority. The opposition to the application of the Act is not confined to the anti-Hindi campaigners. Mr. T. T. Krishnamachari who moved for leave to introduce a Bill for its repeal, definitely declared that he had no sympathy whatever with that agitation. He was not a non-Brahmin member of the Justice Party which is said to be working up the agitation to overthrow the Congress. Then, as regards vulgar language, the Sardar himself is no Chrysostom. He can no occasion rise or descend to language which Gandhiji would not admit at his prayer meetings. The that the Act stands to be repealed within two months, is wholly against the tenor of the many speeches which the Madras Premier has recently made on the subject. If it does come to pass then Mr. Rajagopalachari will cease to be regarded, as he is, as the one strong man of the Congress who goes his own way regardless of what happens at Wardha or Shegaon The country will watch with interest the progress of this political khedda operation.

Source : Indian Social Reformer - 3rd September1938

VANDE MATARAM

PANDIT MALAVIYA AND THE R. T. C.

While the Civil & Military Gazette's Shimla correspondent says that Mahatma Gandhi told him that he did not want Pandit Malaviya to accompany him to London, and that his place was in India along with Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel, an A. P. I. telegram from Simla states that "it is understood that Pandit Madan Mohan Malaviya will accompany Mahatma Gandhi to England by the S. S. Multan sailing on the 15th August." For our part we would much rather credit the second statement than the first. It is inconceivable, writes the Tribune of Lahore, that the Mahatma could in this matter, have bracketed Pandit Madan Mohan Malaviya with Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel. Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel, besides being the President of the Congress for the year, is a follower of Mahatma Gandhi in the strictest sense of the term. Pandit Malaviya, on the other hand, though in the Congress, holds a distinctly independent position, and in many matters of vital importance he has consistently opposed Mahatma Gandhi. Mainly for this reason he has not the same influence in Congress circles that Sardar Patel or Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru commands, though, of course, he is universally respected and revered. It cannot therefore, be said either that the Pandit's presence in India is needed in the same sense or to the same extent as the presence of Sardar Patel is needed in the opinion of the Mahatma, or that his presence of Sardar Patel is needed in the opinion of the Mahatma, or that his presence in England along with Mahatma Gandhi would be superfluous. He would undoubtedly, in many matters, bring an independent mind to bear on the questions that will come up for discussion; and both on account of the ripeness of his judgment and his vast and almost unrivalled experience of public life in India, his advice is bound to be of the greatest value both to Mahatma Gandhi himself and to the generality of delegates, both Indian and British. We, therefore, earnestly hope, whether the Congress delegation is or is not enlarged, that Pandit Madan Mohan Malaviya and some other leading Indians, including a number of nationalist Muslims like Sir Ali Imam and Dr. Ansari, will be definitely included in the Indian delegation.

Source : Indian Social Reformer - 25 July 1931

VANDE MATARAM

THE CONGRESS OUTLOOK

While the Tribune and the Mahratta welcome the resolution of the Nagpur Congress Committee urging the necessity of revising the programme of the Indian National Congress, we are surprised to see Mr. V. J. Patel and others protesting against the scheme which has been drawn up, it is understood, by an Indian administrator who has studied the introduction and working of responsible Government in one important Dominion which he visited more than once for the purpose. It is, we think, proposed that the scheme should be first circulated for opinion to several Indian leaders, that it should be revised in the light of the suggestions that they may make, that the revised scheme should be placed before a Convention of representatives of all political schools, and that, if the Convention agrees, a Dominion Status League may be formed for the sole, special purpose of bringing about the adoption of the scheme in place of the present Reforms scheme. Mr. Patel's argument is if the scheme is consistent with the Congress programme, it is superfluous; if it goes beyond it, it is mischievous; so in either case, it is useless. In the same breath, he says that the Congress is open to all schools of political thought and that all should join it and work within it. If Mr. Patel's attitude to the mere announcement that a scheme is in preparation to work out the details of full Dominion status, represents the position of the Congress, it is idle to insist, as he does, that it is open to all schools of political thought to work within it. It can only mean that the Congress, so far from being a broad national movement, is a narrow cult where the Khaddar cap, so easy to put on, counts for everything, and the Gandhi heart, so difficult to acquire, is nothing. No group of politicians can be allowed to acquire vested interests in a national movement. The result, it is plain to us is bound to be that the Congress will within the next year or two disintegrate into several small groups without any coherent purpose.

The full Congress programme formulated at Ahmedabad last December left a good deal to Mahatma Gandhi who, it was assumed, would be always available to infuse life and spirit into the dry bones of the several clauses. The most important parts of this programme have been rendered obsolete by the course of events but so long as they are not expressly repealed, it is open to any literalist in the Congress to point the finger of scorn at a fellow-Congressman who has children attending recognised schools where spinning is not a part of the curriculum, who has not given up the profession for which his training and talents are most suited, or whose Swadeshism includes mill made as well as hand-woven cloth. The Bardoli programme as amended at Delhi labours under the same disadvantage. It is not every one that can bend the bow of Ulysses and a programme which was safe and sure in the Mahatma's hands may not be so in less mighty ones. It is, therefore, necessary as a first step towards assuring those who are opposed to non-co-operation that there is a recognised place for them within the Congress, that the dead branches of the Ahmedabad programme should be lopped off and that the constructive parts of it should be so revised as to be sufficiently expressive in themselves now that unfortunately the Mahatma is not available for constant reference as to their precise meaning and purport. Constant repetition of the Mahatma's name does not make one an intelligent worker in the true spirit of the Mahatma. We strongly deprecate the tendency to represent the Congress as a semi-religious cult founded by the Mahatma from which the slightest departure should be expiated in political purgatory. This kind of thing is a positive hindrance in the way of awakening the masses to true political consciousness.

The most intelligent opinion the Congress and outside is agreed that full responsible government is the solution of our national problems. Mr. Patel says, let us have the promise first of full responsible government and then there will be no difficulty in drawing up a scheme. But that is not the right view to take about the matter. We should first show how and in what manner and in what period of time, the present system can be converted into a full responsible one with the least delay and dislocation. A definite scheme is also necessary to instruct the people as to their own duties and responsibilities under self government. The object of the proposal of a Dominion Status League outside the Congress and other political organisations, is to carry propaganda work both in the country and in Great Britain. Owing to the adoption of the policy of Non-Co-operation by the majority of Congressmen, the Congress is precluded from undertaking work which is essential to carry conviction to the British Government that the grant of full responsible government to India is prudent as well as practicable. Further there are many Liberals and others who are prepared to work for full responsible government but who are not prepared to join the Congress. The League, of one is started, will merely be the application of the principle of division of labour to political work.

The Congress as the oldest political movement in the country, rich in tradition, should not be allowed to fall to pieces. A strong effort should be made, in which all should join hands, to place the movement on a broad national footing. Mahatma Gandhi perceived this clearly and, since the Bardoli meeting, he has been most anxious to bring it about. If this is made impossible by the intolerance of those who find themselves in control of the Congress machinery of opinion in the country which believes as little in Non-Co-operation as in Diarchy for which India has had to pay dearly.

VANDE MATARAM

THE INDIAN BUDGET

The Council of State has passed, with a single dissentient, the Finance Bill which thrown out by the Legislative Assembly by the Nationalist Party. Even the Swarajist member, Mr. R. R. Karandikar of Satara voted for the Bill. The Right Hon. Srinivasa Sastri who was reported, in one of the messages to the Bombay Chronicle from its special correspondent at Delhi, to have instigated the Nationalists in the Assembly to throw out the Finance Bill, also supported the Bill on the ground that the stage had not arrived for seriously minded politicians to take the step taken by the Assembly. We do not know what the Swarajists propose to do now. It is inconceivable that Pandit Motilal Nehru had not considered beforehand the line of action to be taken in the circumstances. Mr. Vithalbhai Patel declare in the Assembly that the Party will have to appeal to the masses if Government did not comply with its demands, but, so far as we know, he is about the only politician of any note who has hopes in that direction. We venture to think that it is extremely ill-advised for a responsible public man to use such language unless he had made quite sure that it could be justified. The all but unanimous vote of the Council of State and the complete equanimity with which the country has taken its acceptance of the modified Finance Bill, show that Mr. Vithalbhai was speaking much in advance of public opinion. It may be possible by special effort to start an agitation against the Council of State, but the agitation in that case will not be the direct consequence of the rejection of the Budget by the Assembly. Mr. Patel's position in the Swaraj Party, however, has always been something of a puzzle, and we doubt if he will be able to continue in it. If we may make a suggestion to that Party, it will be somewhat as follows. The Swarajist Party, having demonstrated its strength, may now modify its programme in the Assembly and the Councils. A great deal, in our opinion, can be done by the Party to advance the constructive Programme through the legislature, and we hope it will now decide to take it up.

Source : The Indian Social Reformer - March 29, 1924

VANDE MATARAM

Indian Shipping

Cautious as Mr. Patel has been in all his utterances abroad where he went to study the functioning of various legislatures, he let himself go on the occasion of the launching of the new steamer, "Jalabala," of the Scindia Steam Navigation Company. After dwelling at length feelingly on the fact that one time India possessed first rate vessels, built, owned, manned and managed by Indians, he entered into an indictment of the tardy policy pursued by Government towards the Indian Mercantile marine, which has lod a disastrous effect on it. Mr. Patel observed : - "Whilst the Governments of almost all maritime countries have helped and are helping their nationals to build up their own mercantile marine, are not Indians entitled to expect their Government to help them in this great industry? No wonder, then, that there is a keen feeling of disappointment when they find even the most modest recommendations made by the Mercantile Marine Committee, appointed by the Government of India themselves, to keep open the coasting trade of India only to vessels owned and managed by the Indians, just as the coasting trade of most of the maritime countries is reserved to their own nationals, have not yet been carried out. I shall say nothing here of the large overseas trade of India, in which Indian shipping participated. The annual freight bill of the India Office comes to thirty five or forty million pounds, a very substantial portion of which is claimed by non Indian shipping companies. It is, therefore, a most legitimate and natural desire on the part of Indians to retain as much as possible of this great freight bill in their own country and thus help to lesson, to however small an extent, the poverty of their economic life." Mr. Patel paid a well-merited tribute to the grip and capacity of the Scindia Steam Navigation Company which is the only organisation of this kind that has managed to survive the keen competition of foreign vested interestes.

VANDE MATARAM

Corruption - Its Cause and Cure

There was a full dress debate in the Constituent Assembly on its legislative capacity on the need for putting down corruption in the public services. It was admitted on all hands that corruption existed on a large scale and that must be checked. The Home Minister Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel frankly acknowledged that there was corruption and that Government wish it to be eradicated. But he cautioned the Assembly against adopting remedies which will make the disease worse. The introduction of a system of espionage is such a measure. Forty percent of the nearly 1500 cases investigated were not prosecuted, and of those prosecuted, about forty percent resulted in conviction. It is not safe to say that all the cases not prosecuted, should not have been investigated or that the person in the cases convicted were the worst offenders. But the vice of the system is in creating uncertainty and anxiety in the minds of all men in the services, which is not conducive to honest and efficient discharge of duty. Besides, investigating staff itself may be open to corruption; for the moment, espionage may be the only course open to put down corruption or rather to remind corrupt officials of the risks to which they expose themselves. But permanent remedy it is certainly worse than corruption.

The only completely effective means of avoiding corruption is a high sense of personal honour and public duty among officials. The creation of such qualities is helped by payment to officials of salaries which put them above reasonable wants. Mere increase of emoluments will not bring about purity. It may only increase the amount paid as bribes. Even on low scales of pay officials in the German Reich were acknowledged to be as incorruptible as civil servants in Britain. The civil servants pay even in Britain is less than what an ambitious man can earn in grade or commerce or as a cinema star. Public servants must be free of the profit motive. At the same time, unduly low salaries promote corruption. Edmund Burke wisely observed that to demand heroic virtues from the mass of men, ends in corruption. Low salaries have to be compensated by allowances perquisites and other extras or officials are likely to use their power to eke out their income by corruption or extortion.

The debate mostly turned on the corruption of officials. But the distressing feature of the present situation is the minister themselves often fall under the imputation. The public at the moment are more concerned about ministerial corruption than the corruption of permanent officials. One reason for this is the absurdly low salaries paid to ministers. These have to be supplemented by allowances for house rent, motor cars, and frequent movements from place to place which have become ministerial disease where a letter or telegram would be suffice in the old order, it is now thought only a person visit often by air, would do. A consolidated salary of reasonable proportion, with no allowances, travelling or other, would be a good remedy. But a worse cause, is the selection of Ministers not for merit but for caste or community. Men who are chosen for high office because they belong to a class are seldom the best type of men in that class. These men feel themselves safe from criticism or dismissal because they can easily make out that they are the victims of the prejudice against their particular class, whether it actually exists or not. The minority representative, therefore, enjoys a certain amount of immunity in wrongdoing. Until we get rid of this vicious system of having to provide for classes and communities, we cannot ensure perfect incorruptibility. Above all the men and women who lead or ought to lead should set to example of real and not ostentatious simplicity in their own personal lives.

Corruption it should be added is of various kinds. Bribery by payment of cash is the crudest and most easily detected form. There are many more insidious kinds which ramify in so many directions that it is practically impossible to detect them. These are the most dangerous forms. Espionage is powerless except as a means of blackmail against them.

Source - Indian Social Reformer - 13th December 1947

VANDE MATARAM

SOMNATH TEMPLE TO BE REBUILT

Standing amidst the ruins of the famous temple of Somnath, during his visit to Kathiawar, in connection with the Junagadh State's preservation from anarchy by the Indian Dominion, Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel declared last week that the temple would be re-constructed and the image of Somnath reinstalled in the same site, where they stood when Mahomed Ghazni sacked and looted one thousand years ago. This act of vandalism which Professor Habib has condemned as an act of avarice under the cloak of religion, was a wrong both to islam and to Hinduism-more to Islam than Hinduism. The restoration of the temple and the re-installation of the image will be a tardy atonement. But no one with a spark of historic feeling, can fail to be thrilled by the declaration of the Sardar with whom were Mr. N. V. Gadgil, Minister of Public Works in the Government of India, and the Jam Saheb of Nawanagar in whose territory Patan is situated. The outstanding movement of the last century and a half is the revival of Hinduism and the reconstruction of the Somnath Temple will be a fitting climax to it. It should not cost the State a single piece. Hindus all over India will gladly contribute the necessary funds. Broad-minded muslims too will co-operate in redeeming their great religion from an infamy which the Ghaznavite's greed has associated with it in the popular mind.

Source - Indian Social Reformer - 22nd November 1947

VANDE MATARAM

SARDAR PATEL'S SPEECH - 23rd November 1946

In moving a resolution relating to the Interim Government Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel explained the difficulties that stood in the way of the Central Government's intervention in Provincial matters, such as the Calcutta and Noakhali disturbance. He declared that he had warned Bengal's leaders who saw him after the Calcutta riots that East Bengal was bound to be the next scene of trouble. He told them. "If you want independence you must learn to defend yourselves and your neighbours and others helpless people. You should not run to the army or the police for protection".

Replying to critics who spoke of non-violence and avoidance of civil strife Sardar Patel reiterated his conviction that the sword must be met by the sword. Mahatma Gandhi said it was better to use violence than to be a coward. Non violence was a weapon which it was beyond the power of ordinary men to use, and, therefore, Sardar Patel urged people to adopt violence in self-defence and only in self defence, or in defence of neighbours. He gave this advice because the present Central Government during the transference of power was in a state of paralysis.

VANDE MATARAM

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Violence, Non-Violence And Congress Government

Congress and Indian States

Congress Hierarchy and Madras Premier

PANDIT MALAVIYA AND THE R. T. C.

THE CONGRESS OUTLOOK

THE INDIAN BUDGET

Indian Shipping

Corruption - Its Cause and Cure

SOMNATH TEMPLE TO BE REBUILT

SARDAR PATEL'S SPEECH - 23rd November 1946

Vithalbhai Patel

First Indian speaker of Central Legislative Assembly.

Birthday - 27-09-1873

Vithalbhai Patel's Punyatithi

22-10-1933

Sardar Patel

Home Minister & First Deputy Prime Minister of India.

Birthday - 31-10-1875

Sardar Patel's Punyatithi

15-12-1950

Maniben Patel

Vice-President of the Gujarat Provincial Congress Committee.

Birthday - 03-04-1903

Maniben Patel's Punyatithi

26-03-1990

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