I remeber reading a piece from Rajaji’s autobiography in my school textbook. It was about how a toll of non violence or satyagraha should be used & why Rajaji was against use of such things in public life as they had far greater potentioal to be misused.
In the passage he first mentions two incidents both of them occured when he was mayor of Salem . In first case some of his friends requested him to transfer harijan employees deputed to open & close valves of Drinking water pipes in the locality as thier old Brahmin mothers would not drink the water touched by untouchable. But Rajaji did not pay any heed. Second incidence was protestations by parents of upper caste children in a municipal school when their wards were made to sit aongwith some lower cast pupils.
In both the cases Rajaji stood his ground. Now Rajaji’s argument was that if people would have resorted to Satyagraha in any of these cases then he would definitely have to give up/. Say if those old ladies refuese d to drink any water till HArijans were transferred or if upper caste people stopped sending their children to school any authority would have to yield.
This is why Annie Besant & Sister Nivedita had called Gadhiji’s Non- Cooperation movement as “Himalayan Blunder” & today when we see two communities clashing amongst thmeselves to decide who is more backword it seems that finall rivers from this Mountain of indescipline are flodding our society.
hats off to Rajaji for being such a prophetic observer & hats off to people who decided contents of books in my BIMARU home state to give students a balnced perspective on so called great national leaders like Mahatma Gandhi.
