Chauri-chaura & Withdrawal Of The Ncm

The Viceroy was unmoved, so Gandhiji announced that mass civil disobedience would begin in the Surat district's Bardoli taluqa, and that all other parts of the country should cooperate by maintaining total discipline and quiet so that the movement's entire attention could be focused on Bardoli. However, Bardoli would have to wait another six years before launching a no-tax movement. On February 5, 1922, members of a Congress and Khilafat procession in Chauri-Chaura, Gorakhpur district, Uttar Pradesh, decided its fate.

 

•    A section of the crowd became enraged by the actions of some police officers and attacked them. The cops started shooting.

 

•    When the police hid inside the police station, the entire procession attacked them and set fire to the building. Police officers who attempted to flee were hacked apart and thrown into the fire. 

 

•    In total, twenty-two police officers were killed. 

 

•    When Gandhiji learned of the incident, he decided to call a halt to the movement. 

 

•    He also persuaded the Congress Working Committee to ratify his decision, bringing the Non-Cooperation Movement to an end on February 12, 1922.

 

Criticised Gandhi’s decision: Many people, including Motilal Nehru, C.R. Das, Jawaharlal Nehru, Subhas Bose, and others, have expressed their surprise at the news. They couldn't understand why the entire country had to bear the brunt of some people's irrational behaviour in a small village. Many people in India believed the Mahatma had failed miserably as a leader and that his days of glory were numbered.

 

Support to Gandhi’s decision:  Some people argue that it as proof of the Mahatma's concern for the Indian society's wealthy classes. Their argument is that Gandhiji did not abandon the movement simply because he believes nonviolence is essential. 

 

•    He withdrew it because the Chauri Chaura action was a symbol and an indication of the Indian masses' growing militancy, radicalization, and willingness to launch an attack on the status quo of property relations.

 

•    Frightened by this radical possibility and the prospect of the movement falling into the hands of radical forces, Gandhiji called a halt to the movement in order to protect the interests of landlords and capitalists who would inevitably be on the receiving end of this violence. 

 

•    Congress Working Committee resolution of February 12, 1922, known as the Bardoli resolution, which, in addition to announcing the withdrawal, asked peasants to pay taxes and tenants to pay rents. They claim that this was the true, albeit hidden, motivation behind the historic February 1922 decision.

 

•    Gandhiji had repeatedly stated that he did not want any nonviolent movement in any other part of the country while he was conducting mass civil disobedience in Bardoli, and had even asked the Andhra Pradesh Congress Committee to revoke the permission that it had given to some of the District Congress Committees to begin civil disobedience. 

 

•    One obvious reason for this was that, in such a situation of mass ferment and activity, the movement could easily turn violent, either due to its own volatile nature or as a result of provocation by the authorities concerned also, if violence occurred anywhere, it could easily be used by the government to justify its actions. 

 

•    The government could always point to actual violence in one part of the country as proof of the likelihood of violence in another, justifying its repression. This would jeopardise the entire strategy of nonviolent civil disobedience, which was founded on the idea tharepressive forces would always be exposed because they would be using armed force against peaceful civil resisters. As a result, claiming that there was no link between Chauri Chaura and Bardoli was insufficient.

 

•    It's entirely possible that after Chauri Chaura, Gandhiji's chances of being allowed to conduct a mass civil disobedience campaign in Bardoli had dwindled even more. The government would have had an excuse to detain him and other activists and use force to subdue the public. Even before it was given a fair trial, mass civil disobedience would be defeated. 

 

•    Gandhiji was protecting the movement from repression and the people from demoralisation by putting the onus of withdrawal on himself and the Working Committee. True, the withdrawal itself demoralised many people, particularly active political workers, but it is likely that repression and crushing the movement (as happened in 1932) would have demoralised even more people.

 

•    After all, the Non Cooperation Movement was the first attempt at an all-India mass struggle against the British, and a major setback at this early stage could have resulted in a prolonged period of demoralisation and passivity.

 

•    The other argument, that the real reason for the withdrawal was fear of radicalization, and that Chauri Chaura was proof of the emergence of precisely such a radical sentiment, is even weaker. The crowd at Chauri Chaura had no intention of attacking landlords or overturning the property relations structure; they were simply enraged by police officers' overbearing behaviour and vented their rage by attacking them. 

 

•    Peasant unrest had died out in most of Avadh and Malabar by this time, and the Eka movement, which was active in some of Avadh's rural areas, showed no signs of wanting to abolish the zamindar system; instead, it demanded that zamindars stop imposing "illegal" cesses and arbitrary rent increases. 

 

•    The Guntur no-tax movement was very much a part of the Non-Cooperation Movement; it was directed against the government and was completely peaceful. Furthermore, it was already in decline prior to February 1922. It's difficult to pinpoint the exact location of the threat posed by radical tendencies.

 

•    The fact that the Bardoli resolution announcing the withdrawal also included clauses requiring peasants to pay taxes and tenants to pay rents, as well as assurances to zamindars that the Congress had no intention of depriving them of their rights, is not evidence of hidden motives. 

 

•    The Congress had never sanctioned non-payment of rent or questioned the rights of zamindars during the movement; the resolution was simply a restatement of its position on the subject. If the movement as a whole was being withdrawn, non-payment of taxes was bound to end.

 

•    There are also some indications that Gandhiji's decision was influenced by the fact that by the second half of 1921, the movement had shown clear signs of waning in many parts of the country. Students had begun to return to schools and colleges, lawyers and litigants to law courts, the commercial classes had begun to show signs of weariness and concern over the accumulating stocks of foreign cloth, and attendance at meetings and rallies had decreased in both urban and rural areas. This isn't to say that in places like Gujarat's Bardoli or Andhra Pradesh's Guntur, where intensive political work had been done, the people weren't ready to keep fighting.

 

•    However, the widespread enthusiasm that swept the country in the first half of 1921 had faded. The cadre and active political workers were willing to keep fighting, but a mass movement of this magnitude required the active participation of the masses, not just the most motivated. However, at this point in the investigation, it is impossible to argue this point with conviction; all we want to do is raise the possibility that this was one of the factors that led to the decision to withdraw.

 

•    Many of Gandhiji's critics fail to recognise that mass movements have an inherent tendency to ebb after reaching a certain height, that the masses' capacity to withstand repression, endure suffering, and make sacrifices is limited, that a time comes when breathing space is needed to consolidate, recuperate, and gather strength for the next round of struggle, and that, as a result, withdrawal is necessary. Withdrawal isn't the same as betrayal; it's an unavoidable part of any strategy.

 

•    Of course, whether the withdrawal was made at the appropriate time is always a point of contention. However Gandhiji may have had sufficient reasons to believe that the time he chose was the right one. The movement had already lasted over a year, the government was unwilling to negotiate, and Chauri Chaura presented an opportunity to withdraw honourably before the movement's internal flaws became apparent, forcing a surrender or making the retreat appear to be a rout.