THE BOER WAR 69 should cease to think of discriminating between dignified work and other and serve, putting up even with insults if it came to that.
We encountered formidable difficulties in getting our offer favourably entertained. The story is interesting but this is not the place to detail it. Suffice it to say that the leaders among us received training in nursing the wounded and the sick, obtained medical certificates of physical fitness and sent a formal letter to the Govern¬ ment. This letter and the eagerness we evinced to serve in whatever capacity the Government would accept us creat¬ ed a very good impression. The Government thanked us in reply but rejected our offer for the time. Meanwhile the Boers continued to advance like a great flood, and it was feared that they might reach Durban. There were heaps of wounded and dead everywhere. We were continually renewing our offer, and sanction was given at last for the formation of an Indian Ambulance Corps. We had ex¬ pressed our willingness even to do sweepers’ or scaven¬ gers’ work in hospitals. No wonder, therefore, that the idea of an Ambulance Corps was perfectly welcome to us. Our offer had been made, in the first instance, in respect of free and ex-indentured Indians, but we had suggested the desirability of permitting the indentured Indians too to join the rest. As Government was then in need of as many men as they could get, they approached the em¬ ployers of indentured labourers to allow their men to volunteer. Thus a large and splendid Corps composed of nearly eleven hundred Indians left Durban for the front. At the time of our departure, we received the congratula¬ tions and the blessings of Mr Escombe, whose name is already familiar to the reader and who was the head of the European volunteers in Natal.
All this was a complete revelation to the English newspapers. No one expected that the Indians would take any part in the war. An Englishman wrote in a leading newspaper a poem eulogistic of the Indians with the follow¬ ing line as a refrain: {We are sons of the Empire after all.’
There were between three and four hundred ex- indentured Indians in the Corps, who had been recruited 70 SATYAGRAHA IN SOUTH AFRICA by the efforts of the free Indians. Of these, thirty-seven were looked upon as leaders, as the offer to Government had been sent under their signatures and as they had brought the others together. Among the leaders there were barristers and accountants, while the rest were either artisans such as masons or carpenters, or ordinary labourers. Hindus and Musalmans, Madrasis and up- country men, all classes and creeds were well represented. There was hardly any trader in the Corps, but the traders subscribed considerable sums of money. The Corps had needs which were not adequately met by the military rations, and which, if satisfied, might provide them with some amenities in their hard camp life. The traders under¬ took to supply such comforts, and likewise rendered good assistance in entertaining the wounded in our charge with sweets, cigarettes and such other things. Whenever we camped near towns, the local traders did their best to look after us.
The indentured labourers, who joined this Corps were under the charge of English overseers from their respective factories. But the work for them was the same as for ourselves and as we were all to live together, they were highly pleased at the prospect, and the management of the entire Corps naturally passed into our hands. Thus the whole Corps was described as the Indian Corps, and the community received the credit for its work. As a matter of fact the Indians were not entitled to the credit for the inclusion of indentured labourers in the Corps, which should rightly have gone to the planters. But there is no doubt that the free Indians, that is to say, the Indian community, deserved credit for the excellent management of the Corps when once it was formed and this was acknowledged by General Buller in his despatches.
Doctor Booth, under whom we had placed ourselves for training in first aid, joined the Corps in the capacity of Medical Superintendent. He was a pious clergyman, and though his work chiefly lay among the Indian Christ¬ ians, he freely mixed with Indians of all denominations. Most of the thirty-seven leaders mentioned above had received their training at his hands.
THE BOER WAR 71 THE BOER WAR 71 There was a European Ambulance Corps as well as the Indian, and both worked side by side in the same place.
Our offer to Government was absolutely uncon¬ ditional, but the letter by which they accepted it granted us immunity from service within the firing line. This meant that the permanent Ambulance Corps attached to the army was to bear far away the soldiers as they got wounded and leave them behind the army outside the line of fire. The temporary Ambulance Corps of Europeans as well as Indians were formed in view of the great effort which General Buller was to put forth for the relief of General White in Ladysmith and in which, it was appre¬ hended, there might be more wounded than could be dealt with by the permanent Corps. In the country where the armies were operating there were no made roads between the battlefield and the base-hospital and it was therefore impossible to carry the wounded by means of ordinary transport. The base-hospital was always situated near a railway station and at a distance of between seven and twenty-five miles from the battlefield.
We soon got work and that too harder than we had expected. To carry the wounded seven or eight miles was part of our ordinary routine. But sometimes we had to carry badly wounded soldiers and officers over a distance of twenty-five miles. The march would commence at eight in the morning, medicines must be administered on the way, and we were required to reach the base-hospital at five. This was very hard work indeed. It was only once that we had to carry the wounded twenty-five miles in a single day. Again the British army met with reverse after reverse in the beginning of the war and large numbers were wounded. The officers therefore were compelled to give up their idea of not taking us within the firing line. But it must be stated that when such an emergency arose we were told that as the terms of our contract included immunity from such service, General Buller had no intention of forcing us to work under fire if we were not prepared to accept such risk, but if we undertook it voluntarily, it would be greatly appreciated. We were 72 SATYAGRAHA IN SOUTH AFRICA only too willing to enter the danger zone and had never liked to remain outside. We therefore welcomed this opportu¬ nity. But none of us received a bullet wound or any other injury.
The Corps had many pleasant experiences into which I may not enter here. It must however be placed on re¬ cord, that although our Corps, including the indentured labourers who might be supposed to be rather uncouth, often came in contact with the members of the temporary Ambulance Corps composed of Europeans as well as with the European soldiers, none of us felt that Europeans treated us with contempt or even with discourtesy. The temporary Corps was composed of South African Euro¬ peans, who had taken part in the anti-Indian agitation before the war. But the knowledge that the Indians, forget¬ ful of their wrongs, were out to help them in the hour of their need, had melted their hearts for the time being. I have stated already that our work was mentioned by General Buller in his despatches. War medals too were conferred on the thirty-seven leaders.
When General Buller’s operations in connection with the relief of Ladysmith were over, that is in about two months5 time, our Corps was...disbanded as well as the European. The war continued long after this. We were always prepared to rejoin, and it was stated in the order disbanding our Corps that Government would certainly utilize our services if operations on a large scale were again necessary.
This contribution of the Indians in South Africa to the war was comparatively insignificant. They suffered hardly any loss of life. Yet even a sincere desire to be of help is bound to impress the other party, and is doubly appreciated when it is quite unexpected. Such fine feeling for the Indians lasted during the continuance of the war.
Before closing this chapter, I must place a noteworthy incident on record. Among those who were in Ladysmith when it was invested by the Boers, there were besides Englishmen a few stray Indian settlers. Some of these were traders, while the rest were indentured labourers, Working on the railways or as servants to English gentle- THE BOER WAR 73 THE BOER WAR 73 men, one of whom was Parbhusingh. The officer in com¬ mand at Ladysmith assigned various duties to every resident of the place. The most dangerous and most responsible work was assigned to Parbhusingh who was a ‘coolie.5 On a hill near Ladysmith the Boers had stationed a pom-pom, whose operations destroyed many buildings and even occa¬ sioned some loss of life. An interval of a minute or two must pass before a shell which had been fired from the gun reached a distant objective. If the besieged got even such a short notice, they could take cover before the shell dropped in the town and thus save themselves. Parbhusingh was to sit perched up in a tree, all the time that the gun was working, with his eyes fixed on the hill and to ring a bell the moment he observed a flash. On hearing the bell, the residents of Ladysmith instantly took cover and saved themselves from the deadly cannon ball whose approach was thus announced.
The officer in charge of Ladysmith, in eulogizing the invaluable services rendered by Parbhusingh, stated that he worked so zealously that not once had he failed to ring the bell. It need hardly be said that his own life was constantly in peril. The story of his bravery came to be known in Natal and at last reached the ears of Lord Gurzon, then Viceroy of India, who sent a Kashmir robe for presen¬ tation to Parbhusingh and wrote to the Natal Government, asking them to carry out the presentation ceremony with all possible publicity. This duty was assigned to the Mayor of Durban who held a public meeting in the Town Hall for the purpose. This incident has a twofold lesson for us. First, we should not despise any man, however humble or insignificant-looking he may be. Secondly, no matter how timid a man is, he is capable of the loftiest heroism when he is put to the test.
CHAPTER X AFTER THE WAR The most important phase of the war was over in 1900. Ladysmith, Kimberley and Mafeking had been relieved. General Cronje had surrendered at Paardeburg. Parts of the British colonies occupied by the Boers had been wrested from their hands and Lord Kitchener had conquered the Transvaal and the Orange Free State. Only guerilla warfare was left.
I thought that my work in South Africa was now over. I had stayed there six years instead of one month as originally intended. The outlines of the work before us were fairly fixed. Still I could not leave South Africa without the willing consent of the Indian community. I informed my colleagues that I intended taking up public work in India. I had learnt in South Africa the lesson of service instead of seTFdnterest. and was longing for oppor¬ tunities of such work. Shri Mansukhlal Nazar was there and so was Mr Khan. Some Indian youths born and bred in South Africa had returned from England as barristers. In these circumstances it would not be improper if I returned to India. When I had urged all these arguments, I was permitted to return only on the condition that if an unexpected situation arose in South Africa requiring my presence there, the community might recall me any day and I should at once go back. They undertook in such a case to bear my travelling expenses and the expen¬ ses incurred during my stay in South Africa. I agreed to this arrangement and returned to India.
I decided to practise in- Bombay as a barrister, primarily with a view to public work under the advice and guidance of Gokhale and secondarily in order to make a living for myself side by side with public work. I rented chambers accordingly and began to get some work. Thanks to my close connection with South Africa, clients who had returned from that country alone gave me work which 74 AFTER THE WAR 75 more than sufficed for my necessities. But peace was never to be my portion jn this life. I had beeffinTBomBaylEardly three or four months when I received an urgent cablegram from South Africa stating that the situation there was serious, that Mr Chamberlain was expected shortly, and that my presence was necessary.
I wound up my Bombay office and house and started for South Africa by the first available steamer. This was near the end of 1902. I had returned to India towards the close of 1901 and had opened my office at Bombay about March 1902. The cablegram did not contain full details. I guessed that there was trouble in the Transvaal. But I went to South Africa without my family as I thought I would be able to return to India in four or six months, I was however simply amazed when I reached Durban and heard everything. Many of us had hoped that the position of Indians throughout South Africa would im¬ prove after the war. We did not anticipate trouble in the Transvaal and the Free State at any rate, as Lord Lands- downe, Lord Selbome and other high functionaries had declared when the war broke out that the treatment accorded to the Indians by the Boers was one of the causes of the war. The British Agent at Pretoria had often told me that if the Transvaal became a British Colony, all the grievances under which the Indians laboured would be instantly redressed. The Europeans too believed that as the Transvaal was now under the British flag, the old laws of the Boer republic directed against the Indians could not be enforced. This principle was so widely accept¬ ed that the auctioneers who before the war did not accept bids from Indians for the purchase of land now openly accepted such bids. Many Indians thus purchased lands at public auctions, but when they tendered the deeds of transfer to the revenue officer for registration, the officer in charge refused to register the deeds quoting Act 3 of 1885! All this I learnt on landing at Durban. The leaders said that Mr Chamberlain would first come to Durban and we must first acquaint him with the situation in Natal. This done, I was to follow him to the Transvaal.
76 SATYAGRAHA IN SOUTH AFRICA A deputation waited upon Mr Chamberlain in Natal. He gave it a courteous hearing and promised to confer with the Natal Government on the subject of its represen¬ tations. Personally I did not expect that the laws which had been promulgated in Natal before the war would be modified very soon. These laws have already been described in a previous chapter.
As the reader is aware, any Indian could at any time enter the Transvaal before the war. I observed that this was not the case now any longer. The restrictions how¬ ever, equally applied to all — Europeans as well as Indians. The condition of the country was still such, that if a large number of people entered the Transvaal all- at once, there would not be sufficient food and clothing to go round, as all the shops had not reopened after the war. The goods stocked in the shops had been unceremoniously approp¬ riated by the late Boer Government. I therefore thought, that if the restrictions were only temporary, there was no reason for apprehension. But then there was a difference in the procedure by which a European and an Indian could obtain a permit, and this afforded ground for misgiving and alarm. Permit offices were opened in the various ports of South Africa. For all practical purposes a European could obtain permit for the mere asking, while an Asiatic Department was created in the Transvaal for dealing with Indians. The creation of this special depart¬ ment was a new departure. Indians were required to apply to the head of that department in the first instance. After he had granted their applications, they could generally obtain permits at Durban or any other port.
If I had to go through all these formalities there was no hope of my getting a permit before Mr Chamberlain left the Transvaal. The Indians in the Transvaal could not procure a permit for me. It was more than they could do. They had therefore relied upon my connections in Durban for obtaining a permit for me. I did not know the permit officer, but as I knew the Police Superintendent of Durban, I asked him to accompany me to the permit office. He consented and gave the necessary assurances. I obtained a permit on the strength of the fact that I had AFTER THE WAR 77 stayed in the Transvaal for a year in 1893 and thus reached Pretoria.
The atmosphere in Pretoria was decidedly ominous. I could see that the Asiatic Department was merely a fright¬ ful engine of oppression for the Indians. The officers in charge were some of the adventurers who had accompanied the army from India to South Africa during the war and had settled there in order to try their luck. Some of them were corrupt. Two officers were even prosecuted for bribery. The jury declared them not guilty, but as really there was no doubt entertained as to their guilt, they were subsequently dismissed from service. Partiality was the order of the day. When a separate department is thus created and when restricting existing rights is the sole reason for its existence, officers are naturally inclined to devise fresh restriction from time to time in order to justify their existence and in order to show that they are efficient in the discharge of their duties. This is exactly what happened in the present case.
I saw that I had to begin my work from the very be¬ ginning. The Asiatic Department could not at once make out how I had managed to enter the Transvaal. They did not venture to ask me directly. I imagine they thought me above smuggling myself into the country. They in¬ directly obtained information as to how I had secured a permit. A deputation from Pretoria prepared to wait upon Mr Chamberlain. I drafted the memorial for sub¬ mission to him but the Asiatic Department excluded me from the deputation. It appeared to the Indian leaders that they should not see Mr Chamberlain if I was prevented from going with them. But I did not countenance this idea. I said that I should not mind the insult to me and advised them to ignore it too. The memorial was there and it was essential that it should be presented to Mr Chamberlain. Mr George Godfrey, an Indian barrister, who was present at the time, was charged with the task of reading the memorial. The deputation waited upon Mr Chamberlain. My name being mentioned in course of the interview, he said, “I have already seen Mr Gandhi in Durban. I there¬ fore refused to see him here, in order that I might learn about the situation in the Transvaal at first hand from local 78 SATYAGRAHA IN SOUTH AFRICA residents.” In my view this remark only added fuel to the fire. Mr Chamberlain spoke out as he had been tutored by the Asiatic Department, which thus tried to import into the Transvaal the atmosphere which pervades India. Every one knows how British officers consider Bombay men as foreigners, in, say, Champaran. At that rate how could I who lived in Durban know anything about the situation in the Transvaal? Thus did the Asiatic Depart¬ ment coach Mr Chamberlain. Little did he know that I had lived in the Transvaal, and that even if I had not, I was fully conversant with the Indian situation there. There was only one pertinent question in the present case: Who possessed the best knowledge of the situation in the Trans¬ vaal? The Indians had already answered it for themselves by asking me to go there all the way from India. But it is no new experience to find that arguments based on reason do not always appeal to men in authority. Mr Chamberlain was then so much under the influ¬ ence of the men on the spot and so anxious was he to humour the Europeans that there was little or no hope of his doing us justice. Still the deputation waited upon him, only in order that no legitimate step for obtaining redress might be omitted whether by oversight or through a sense of wounded self-respect.
I was now confronted by a dilemma even more diffi¬ cult than the one which faced me in 1894. From one stand¬ point, it seemed I could return to India as soon as Mr Chamberlain left South Africa. On the other hand I could clearly see that if I returned with the vain fancy of serving on a ]arger_fleld mMndia while I w a sTu lly*"a war e of the great clanger which stared the South African Indians in the face, the spirit of service which I had acquired would be stultified. I thought that even if that meant living 'in South Africa all my life, I must remain there until the gathering clouds were dispersed or until they broke upon and swept us all away, all our counteracting efforts notwithstanding. This is how I spoke to the Indian leaders. Now, as in 1894, I declared my intention to maintain myself by legal practice. As for the community, this was precisely what they wanted.
AFTER THE WAR 79 I soon applied for admission to practise in the Trans¬ vaal. There was some apprehension that the Law Society here too would oppose my application, but it proved groundless. I was enrolled as an attorney of the Supreme Court, and opened an office in Johannesburg. Of all places in the Transvaal, Johannesburg had the largest popula¬ tion of Indians and was therefore well suited for me to settle in, from the standpoint of public work as well as of my own maintenance. I was daily gaining bitter experience of the corruptness of the Asiatic Department, and the best efforts of the Transvaal British Indian Asso¬ ciation were directed to finding a remedy for this disease. The repeal of Act 3 of 1885 now receded in the back¬ ground as a distant objective. The immediate aim was limi¬ ted to saving ourselves from the on-rushing flood in the shape of this Asiatic Department. Indian deputations waited upon Lord Milner, upon Lord Selborne who had come there, upon Sir Arthur Lawley who was Lieu¬ tenant Governor of the Transvaal and who subsequently became Governor of Madras, and upon officers of lesser dignity. I often used to see Government officers. We obtain¬ ed some slight relief here and there, but it was all patch- work. We used to receive some such satisfaction as is exper¬ ienced by a man who has been- deprived of his all by robbers and who by beseeching the robbers induces them to return something of very small value. It was in consequence of this agitation that the officers whose dismissal I have refer¬ red to above were prosecuted. Our misgivings as regards the restrictions on Indian immigration proved correct. Permits were no longer required from Europeans, while they continued to be demanded from Indians. The late Boer Government never strictly enforced their drastic anti-Asiatic legislation, not because they were generous but because their administration was lax. A good officer has not under the British Government as much scope for the exercise of his goodness as he had under the Boer regime. The British Constitution is old and stereo¬ typed, and officers under it have to work like machines. Their liberty of action is restricted by a system of progres¬ sive checks. Under the British Constitution, Jherefore, 80 SATYAGRAHA IN SOUTH AFRICA if the policy of the Government is liberal, the subjects receive the utmost advantage of its liberality. On the other hand if their policy is oppressive or niggardly, the subjects feel the maximum weight of their heavy hand. The reverse is the case under constitutions such as I that of the late Boer republic. Whether or not the sub- ;* jects reap full advantage from a liberal law largely depends upon the officers who are charged with its ad¬ ministration. Thus, when British power was established in the Transvaal, all laws adversely affecting the Indians began to be more and more strictly enforced day by day. Loopholes, wherever they existed, were carefully closed. We have already seen that the Asiatic Department was bound to be harsh in its operations. The repeal of the old laws was therefore out of the question. It only remained for the Indians to try and see how their rigours might be mitigated in practice.
One principle must be discussed sooner or later, and if we discuss it at this stage, it will perhaps facilitate an understanding of the Indian point of view and of the situ¬ ation as it developed hereafter. Soon after the establish¬ ment of British rule in the Transvaal and the Free State, Lord Milner appointed a committee whose terms of reference were to prepare a list of such of the old laws of both the republics as placed restrictions on the liberty of the subject or were opposed to the spirit of the British Constitution. The anti-Indian laws could clearly have been included in this description. But Lord Milner’s object in appointing the committee was not to redress the grievances of Indians but those of Britishers. He wanted to repeal at the earliest opportunity those laws which indirectly pressed hard upon Britishers. The committee submitted their report in a very short time, and many acts, large and small, which affected Britishers prejudi¬ cially, were, it can be said, repealed by a stroke of the pen.
The same committee prepared a list of anti-Indian acts. These were published in the form of a book which served as a handy manual easily used or from our stand¬ point abused by the Asiatic Department.
AFTER THE WAR 81 Now, if the anti-Indian laws did not mention the Indians by name and were not thus made expressly appli¬ cable to them alone but to all subjects, and if their enforce¬ ment had been left to the discretion of administrators; or had the laws imposed general restrictions which could have been enforced against Indians in a specially rigorous manner, the object of the legislators would all the same have been achieved by such laws, and yet the laws would have been general laws. None would have felt insulted by their enactment, and when the existing bitterness was softened by time, there would be no need to modify the laws, but only a more liberal administration of the laws would have sufficed to relieve the aggrieved community. Tust as I have called laws of the second kind general laws, those of the first kind can be described as particular or racial, and establish what is known as the ‘colour bar,5 as on the specific ground of colour they impose greater restrictions on members of the dark or brown races than on Europeans.
To take one instance from the laws which were al¬ ready in force. The reader will remember that the first disfranchising Act which was enacted in Natal but was subsequently disallowed by the Imperial Government pro¬ vided for the disqualification as voters of all Asiatics as such. Now if such a law were to be altered public opinion should be so far educated that the majority be not only not hostile but actually friendly to Asiatics. The colour bar it set up could only be removed when such cordial feelings were established. This is an illustration of racial or class legislation. The Act referred to was withdrawn and a second Act was enacted in its place which nearly achieved an identical object yet was of a general nature, the sting of racial distinction being removed. The sub¬ stance of one of its clauses is as follows: ‘No person can be placed on the voters’ roll in Natal who is a native of countries which have not hitherto possessed elective representative institutions based on the parliamentary franchise.’ No reference is made here to Indians or Asia¬ tics. The opinions of counsels could differ as to whether or not India possesses representative institutions based on 82 SATYAGRAHA IN SOUTH AFRICA