Ghandi

[Louis Proyect <lnp3@xxxxxxxxxxxx>]

>From the book "India and the Raj, 1919-1947, Glory, Shame and Bondage",
Volume 2 by Suniti Kumar Ghosh [published by Research Unit for Political
Economy, Bombay, India (1995).]

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APPENDIX: Gandhi and His Charisma: A Brief Note
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Some reviewers of the first volume of this book have criticized it on the
ground that it draws a portrait of Gandhi (based, of course, on his words
and deeds) which can hardly be reconciled with his charismatic influence on
the people. In their view a leader who followed policies opposed to the
interests of the people could hardly enjoy the charisma that Gandhi did. It
may be noted that the critics have neither refuted my arguments and the
facts cited by me nor pointed out any inaccuracy in my quotes from Gandhi
and their interpretations.

Gandhi was indeed a charismatic leader, for he could attract,  influence,
and inspire devotion among people. But charisma, the  ability to influence
and inspire people, does not presuppose that the policies of a leader
possessed of it necessarily serve the interests of the people. Hitler
enjoyed charisma among the Germans for some time; so did Jinnah among the
Muslims. Few would agree that their policies were right. There may be a
complex of factors contributing to a leader's charisma.

Before we discuss what went into the making of Gandhi's charisma, we would
note the limits within which it worked.

First, Gandhi's charisma, as we have seen, failed to work on the Muslims.
Second, a large section of the scheduled castes and tribes remained
untouched by his charismatic influence. Third, his ability to influence and
inspire the politically-inclined youth of India was very much limited.
Fourth, towards the end of his life, his charisma ceased to work on his
close associates who had cherished implicit faith in him before.

A few words about the period which saw Gandhi's .advent in Indian politics.
World War I intensified the crisis of British imperialism. During the war
itself the British imperialists realized that it would be necessary to make
devolution of power by stages to Indian collaborators, which, instead of
weakening their rule, would strengthen it, and the Secrelary of Stale
Montagu made the appropriate declaration in August 1917. The appointment of
the Indian Industrial Commission 1916-1X, the Montagu-Chelmsford Report of
1918, and the Government of India Act 1919 were so many carrots dangled
before the comprador bourgeoisie and other upper classes and their leaders
in order to associate them with the administration. It is worth remembering
that World War I had contributed greatly to the development, expansion and
strengthening of the Indian big bourgeoisie who had emerged as agents of
British capital.

On the other hand, unrest swept through this sub-continent towards the end
of the war. By 1916, as Viceroy Chelmsford said, India had been "bled
absolutely white".[1] In Punjab press-gang methods were widely used to
recruit soldiers, and people were forced to make contributions to the War
Fund. The raj's measures to bleed the people white were compounded by the
reckless profiteering and swindling by the Indian big bourgeoisie. Both in
India and the world outside, the popular forces were growing and presenting
an immediate as well as potential threat to imperialism and its agents. The
great Russian Revolution was awakening the masses, and the right of
self-determination of the colonial peoples was placed by history on the
agenda. Early in 1918 the British government observed:

"The Revolution in Russia in its beginning was regarded in India as a
triumph over despotism; and... it has given impetus to Indian political
aspirations." [2]

In the immediate post-war days the struggles of workers were breaking out
in Bombay and other places. Discontent was simmering among the peasantry
whom the landlords, the usurers, British and comprador merchant capital had
reduced to a state of pauperization. During the war itself a section of the
youth took to the path of violence to overthrow British rule.

It was at such a crossroads of history that Gandhi appeared on India's
political stage. Early in April 1915 Gandhi , who had offered in London his
active help to British war-efforts, returned to India at the request of the
British Under-Secretary of State for India. While in Africa for twenty-two
years, he was full of eulogy for the British colonialists and ''vied with
Englishmen in loyalty to the throne": it was his ''love of truth [that] was
at the root of this loyalty". [3]

It was in South Africa that Gandhi devised the form of struggle  satyagraha
- an ideal weapon with which to emasculate the  anti-imperialist spirit of
the people. Gandhi himself declared that his satyagraha technique was
intended to combat revolutionary violence. It may be borne in mind that
this prophet of non-violence, though violently opposed to the use of
violence by the people in the struggle against British imperialism,
actively supported, whether in South Africa, London or India, the most
violent wars launched by the British masters and, towards the close of his
life, was in favour of war between India and Pakistan and approved of or
suggested the march of troops into Junagadh, Kashmir and Hyderabad

Gandhi's activities in South Africa were watched keenly by the Indian big
bourgeoisie like Sir Ratan Tata Sir Purshotamdas and others, besides some
of the princes, who overwhelmed him with large funds to help him to carry
on his work. They had found in him the man they were seeking, the man who
would be a powerful bulwark against all revolutionary struggles. He was
welcomed back home both by the raj which bestowed signal honours on him for
the services rendered by him in South Africa as well as by the Indian big
bourgeoisie. On the eve of his departure from London, General Smuts, the
South African minister responsible for the savage repression on Indian
workers in South Africa during Gandhi's stay there, told the press that
Gandhi would prove to be "an enormous asset to Britain''. [5] And Gandhi
did not belie Smuts's expectations. On his arrival in India Gandhi pledged
his loyalty to the British and declared war on the revolutionaries, and the
raj used him for furthering the cause of the war and recruiting Indian
soldiers.

There were three main factors which contributed to the making of Gandhi's
charisma.

A SUPERB COCKTAIL OF RELIGION AND POLITICS

Gandhi's charisma among the Hindus owed much to his capacity to  make a
superb cocktail of religion and politics. His continual  references to God,
to 'the inner voice' and to the religious scriptures and epics, his claims
that his steps were guided by God (that for instance his fasts were
undertaken at the call of God), his *ashrams* and his ascetic's robe swayed
the Hindu masses powerfully in this land where godmen flourish even today.
His harking back to a mythical past, the Ram Rajya, had an immense appeal
to the backward-looking Hindus, especially the peasantry enmeshed in feudal
ties. He never hesitated to make unabashed exploitation of the religious
credulity of the peasant masses and of other toiling people who shared the
peasant outlook. When Rabindranath Tagore met Romain Rolland and his two
friends in June 1926, Rabindranath dwelt on Gandhi's "variations and
contradictions, the compromises he has accepted and that sort of secret bad
faith which makes him prove to himself by sophistries that the decisions he
takes are those demanded by virtue and the divine law even when the
contrary is true *and he must be aware of the fact*''.(6)

Besides his *ashrams* and the ascetic's garb, the prayer-meetings Gandhi
held every day, where he blended prayers and politics, were a powerful
weapon of his with which he swayed the mass mind. Kanji Dwarkadas said that
Gandhi ''was exploiting for political purposes these public prayers to keep
and continue his hold on ignorant and superstitious people".[7]

Subhas observed that in this land where the "spiritual man has always
wielded the largest influence", Gandhi "came to be looked upon by the mass
of the people as a Mahatma before he became the undisputed political leader
of India". Subhas said that at the Nagpur Congress in December 1920,
Jinnah, who had addressed Gandhi as 'Mr. Gandhi', was ''shouted down by
thousands of people who insisted that he should address him as 'Mahatma
Gandhi"'. Subhas added:

"Consciously or unconsciously, the Mahatma fully exploited the mass
psychology of the people.... He was exploiting many of the weak traits in
the character of his countrymen [like inordinate belief in fate and in the
supernatural. indifference to modern scientific development, etc.] which
had accounted for India's downfall to a large extent.... In some parts of
the country the Mahatma began to be worshipped as an Avatar [incarnation of
God]."[8]

The appeal of Gandhi as a leader to the masses, as David Petrie  Director
of the Intelligence Bureau, Government of India, from 1924 to 1931 rightly
said, "was semi-divine" and his "influence was far more religious than
political". [9]

Gandhi did his best to turn the gaze of the people backward, to revive the
obscurantist ideas and faiths of the past and to blunt the power of reason.
When it suited him he talked of the ''sinfulness'' of foreign cloth or of
the Bihar earthquake in 1934 as having been caused by the caste Hindus' sin
of untouchability. His ''moral" outpourings on modern civilization
industry, medicine, etc., had their appeal to the masses of the people in a
colonial and semi-feudal society, who groaning under the impact of a
bastard civilization felt yearnings for the supposed pristine glory of a
vanished age. Gandhi knew how credulous the masses were. ''If one makes a
fuss of eating and drinking and wears a langoti'', said Gandhi "one can
easily acquire the title of Mahatma in this country.'' Again he said: "in
our country, a Mahatma enjoys the right to do anything. He may commit
murder, indulge in acts of debauchery or whatever else he chooses he is
always pardoned. Who is there to question him?" [10]

Ravinder Kumar was right when he observed:

"More significantly, the religious idiom of Gandhi's politics widened the
gulf between the two major communities of the sub-continent, and was
probably one of the reasons bellied its division into the two states of
India and Pakistan in 1947." [11]

DEIFICATION OF GANDHI

Systematic efforts were made by interested classes and persons to deify
Gandhi - not without his knowledge. During the Bardoli satyagraha of 1928,
[12] which opposed the government's enhancement of land revenue "affecting
a small but dominant landed class", Vallabhbhai Patel and others including
Gandhi ''deliberately used a religious idiom in their speeches and
writings". Those reluctant to join the satyagraha were warned that "it
would be difficult...for them to face God after death on account of their
unholy actions". Support of the various social groups was sought "on caste
and religious grounds". The tribal people who constituted almost one half
of the Bardoli taluk's population, many of whom were serfs of their
landowners, were told that their gods Siliya and Simaliya, who had grown
old, had sent Gandhi their new 'god"', to look after them. They were
enjoined "to follow their dharma" and obey the command of their new god who
wore a langoti like them. [3]

The following was one of the verses of a Gujarati song:

Oh Englishman, the God Gandhiji came in the end and your days have been
numbered."[14]

This deification of Gandhi was not confined to Gujarat. Shahid Amin writes
that "legends about his 'divinity' circulated at the time of his visit to
Gorakhpur [on 8 February 1921]". To quote Amin, "Even in the eyes of some
local Congressmen this 'deification' - 'unofficial canonization' as the
*Pioneer* put it - assumed dangerously distended proportions.... Most of
the rumours about the Mahatma's *pratap* (power/glory) were reported in the
local press between February and May 1921." Amin says that numerous stories
of Gandhi's miracle-making powers - many times more numerous than Christ s
were spread by 'nationalist' journals and by word of mouth. Stories of
supernatural beings appearing and asking the people to do puja to [worship]
Gandhi were also circulated. According to Amin, the fact of the reporting
of these rumours in the local nationalist weekly Swadesh indicates that
''these were actively spread by interested parties". [15]

Similar stories about (Gandhi's miraculous powers were spread in Bihar and
he was deified. [16] P.C. Bamford, a high-ranking intelligence official,
noted:

"unscrupulous agitators were circulating to the credulous masses stories of
divine attributes and miraculous powers [possessed by Gandhi]. Gandhi's
influence was strengthened by a spurious divinity.'' [17]

As noted before, Pandit R.S. Shukla, then Prime Minister of the Central
Provinces and Berar, made it obligatory by an order issued in September
1938 to use the word Mahatma (Great Soul - SC) before Gandhi's name in all
official papers. Gandhi-worship was also prevalent in some places of that
province. [18]

In present-day Koraput in Orissa, rumours were spread early in July 1938
'that Mr. Gandhi will visit the area soon and those who do not produce
Congress tickets will suffer from ailments!' An official publication stated:

"The Congress had built up an organization and acquired a hold over these
backward tribes [in Koraput] by making attractive promises...; they also
played on their superstition, and in some places Mr. Gandhi was deified and
temple ritual took place at the Congress office." [19]

And, soon after 8 August 1942, a circular was issued in the name of the
Congress reproducing Gandhi's message to the people on the eve of his
arrest. It was entitled "Six Commandments of Gandhi Baba". [20]

EXERCISES IN GANDHI'S IMAGE BUILDING

Myths about Gandhi which have no semblance of truth were  consciously built
up and propagated by his colleagues. Two illustrative ones may be cited,
which will perhaps suffice. Nehru wrote:

"Crushed in the dark misery of the present, she [India] had tried to find
relief in helpless muttering and in vague dreams of the past and the
future. but he [Gandhi] came and gave hope to her mind and strength to her
mucb-battered body, and the future became an alluring vision." [21]

Nehru here deliberately falsified the history of the anti-colonial
struggles of the Indian people before Gandhi's advent - struggles  which
were not diversionary ones like those in which Nehru participated under the
leadership of Gandhi. Speaking of 1917 and 1918, Percival Spear correctly
pointed out that "the political classes were occupied by the government's
political moves. But the masses were getting steadily more restive. The
precipitation of these feelings into an anti-government movement came
about, as so often, by the government's attempt to prevent it."[22] It was
Gandhi's mission to shackle all anti-government and anti-feudal struggles,
not to organize or lead them. The future that Gandhi was striving for
self-government within the British empire and the preservation of the
social status quo was indeed 'an alluring vision' to the Nehrus and the
Birlas.

Rajendra Prasad wrote:

Gandhi "went to Noakhali [in 1946]. The result was that the Hindus
recovered their courage and morale. The Muslims who, to begin with
suspected his bona fides, began slowly to be affected by his presence and
his speeches, and saw the error of their ways. That was one Of the marvels
of non-violence in action..."[33]

No doubt, this is a marvel of untruth. The Muslims, who at first flocked to
Gandhi's meetings, soon boycotted them and put every conceivable pressure
on him to leave Noakhali. And how could the apostle of non-violence restore
a sense of security to the minds of the Hindus when he himself moved about
under the best possible armed protection provided by the Bengal government?
[34]. It should be noted that the ordinary Muslims were not responsible for
the communal riots, and the section which was involved in them was led by a
gangster - Mian Ghulam Sarwar - who had unsuccessfully contested the 1946
Assembly election helped with Congress funds. [25] It may also be borne in
mind that the Muslims of the neighbouring district of Tripura (Comilla)
organized themselves - not under the influence of Gandhi - and successfully
prevented the gangsters from spreading the riots in that district.

We refrain from citing more samples of image-building so essential for the
success of Congress policies. In the absence of a revolutionary party to
call the bluff, the Congress leaders were apt to make breathtaking claims.
After reading, according to his biographer and disciple Tendulkar, the
first volume of Marx's Capital in the Aga Khan Palace at the age of
seventy-four, Gandhi commented: "I would have written it better as
assuming, of course, I had the leisure for study Marx has put in." In this
context what Frances Gunther wrote to Nehru may be found interesting:
"Essentially ignorant - his ideas on science, food, sex, education, back to
the village, etc. are crack potted and assigned by another man would arouse
nothing but a yawn.  [26]

Gandhi's charisma amounted to something like adoration for a holy person
who was venerated but whose teachings were seldom followed. In the eyes of
the Hindu masses who came under the spell of his charisma, he was a saint,
an avatar, whose *darshan* (blessing - SC) was coveted, but whose sermons
on non-violence or injunctions to carry out the 'constructive programme' or
to abolish untouchability fell mostly on deaf ears. It may be noted that
his 'constructive' workers were usually paid. When, in January 1947, Gandhi
was asked ''How did your *Ahimsa* (non-violence - SC) work in Bihar?", he
replied: "It did not work at all. It failed miserably." [27]

Gandhi of the popular imagination was not as he really was. He  became in
the imagination of the oppressed and exploited, the simple and
unsophisticated masses a symbol of anti-imperialist, anti-feudal struggle
the very opposite of what he was. They created him in the image of an ideal
hero of their conception. During the Rowlatt Satyagraha, a small band of
Muslim workers and peasants, which called itself 'Danda Fauj', paraded the
streets of Lahore in April 1919 and plastered its walls with posters which
appealed to Hindus, Muslims and Sikhs to enlist in the 'Danda Fauj' and
fight against the "English monkeys", for this was "the command of Mahatma
Gandhi". The workers of the European-owned tea plantations in the Surma
valley in Assam left them and began their long trek back home during the
non-co-operation days, thinking this had been the call of Gandhi. The
peasants of Chauri-Chaura violently resisted and retaliated against the
murderous attacks on them by the police with Gandhi's name on their lips. [28]

Besides Gandhi's extraordinary astuteness, his unabashed exploitation of
the religious credulity of the Hindu masses, two other factors contributed
to the making of his charisma.

 BRITISH IMPERIALISM CONFIRMS GANDHI AS THE  NATIONAL LEADER

One was that, appreciating his worth, British imperialism recognized him as
the national leader. Like General Smuts, many Viceroys including Willingdon
regarded him as an asset. In combating tile militant forces of
anti-colonial and anti-feudal struggle, the British ruling classes counted
on his help and he never failed them. As Judith Brown wrote, "Gandhi was
impelled into or at least confirmed in a national leadership role by the
Government's attitude, its needs and fears, as much as those of his
followers or the compulsions of his own personality.... They [the British
officials] angled for his help in the struggle against violence and
terrorism." [29]

>From his days in South Africa, Gandhi ''regularly maintained personal
contact with the highest levels of Government, even when no specific issue
was at hand". [30] Jacques Pouchepadass has referred to 'fantastic rumours'
that circulated about Gandhi in Champaran in 1917 - rumours that Gandhi had
been sent to Champaran by the Viceroy, or even the King, to redress the
grievances of the peasants; that the administration of Champaran was going
to be handed over to the Indians and so on. According to Pouchepadass.
"*many of these rumours were very consciously spread by the local
leaders*".[31] The Indian elite, the rich peasants and others looked upon
him as their guide and placed implicit faith in him, for his easy
accessibility to the highest representatives of the raj fed their
opportunist hopes. Men like Prasad, Patel and many others gathered around
him thinking that while risks were small, gains would be enormous.

BIG BOURGEOIS SUPPORT

The other prop - a more important one - on which Gandhi's charisma rested
was the lavish support extended to him by the Indian big bourgeoisie. With
his home-coming, besides the Tatas and Thakurdases, the Sarabhais, Birlas
and others rallied to his support. The Indian business elite hailed him:
his message of non-violence, his satyagraha, his faith in the raj, his
political aspirations, his abhorrence of class struggle, his 'change of
heart' and 'trusteeship' theories, his determination to preserve the social
status quo, his 'constructive programme' intended to thwart revolutionary
action - all these and more convinced them that in the troubled times ahead
he was their best friend. His outlook on industrialization never frightened
them. Rather, they expected that Gandhi's 'moral' outpourings on industry
and modern civilization would weave a spell on the masses, victims of cruel
exploitation who were yearning to escape from it. His ashram, all other
organizations of his, and all his political, social and moral campaigns
were financed by them. Modifying somewhat Sarojini Naidu's quip, one might
say that it cost the big bourgeoisie, the Birlas in particular, quite a big
amount to keep him in poverty. And he too attended to their interests to
the very end of his life. During the war when the "prices of cloth reached
levels more than five times the pre-war level", the government intervened,
cloth prices were put under control and fixed at levels which
"industrialists themselves were not reluctant to accept". The profits of
the cotton mill industry, in which capital to the tune of Rs 50 crore was
"primarily invested", soared from Rs 7 crore in 1940 to Rs 109 crore in
1943. But the declared profits were only 'peanuts' compared to the actual
profits made when hoarding and blackmarketing were the rule. [32] G.D.
Birla's biographer, Ram Niwas Jaju, writes that "the boom in the
speculation market and then the war gave a boost to their activities, and
they [the Birlas] acquired twenty-two big factories" in addition to what
they had before. On 24 March 1947 G.D. Birla "wrote a seven-page letter" to
Rajagopalachari, a member of the Interim Government, asking for removal of
control on cloth. [33] Gandhi started inveighing against rationing and
control on prices of food and cloth. He pitied the millionaires. "We do
have millionaires in our country", he said, "and they make millions too,
but even they are left with little money because of heavy taxation." He
condemned 'control' ''as a vicious thing" and "continuing the controls as
criminal". [34] And control on cloth was lifted and cloth prices shot up
immediately to the satisfaction of the poor millionaires and to the immense
distress of the common people.

Edgar Snow was not wrong when he said: ''Nobody else in India could play
this 'dual role of saint for the masses and champion of big business, which
was the secret of Gandhi's power' [35] - the secret of Gandhi's charisma. A
negative factor that sustained Gandhi's charisma was the weakness of the
working class and the Communist Party of India.

 THE END OF THE GANDHIAN ERA

Gandhi's political decline started when it was realized by his close
associates as well as by his big bourgeois supporters that his calculations
about the 'Quit India' movement had gone awry. The British imperialists no
longer frosted him, though in 1945-47 they handled him carefully in order
not to antagonize him because of his influence on the Hindu masses. Nor did
his associates, his former 'yes-men', and big bourgeois patrons repose in
him the faith that they had before.

Nehru noted in his prison diary on 7 April 1943 that Patel, Kripalani,
Prafulla Ghosh and Shankar Rao Deo "have been hit in their great faith in
Bapu's instinct for right action at the right time.... it is obvious that
they visualize an end of the so-called Gandhian era in Indian politics and
this prospect leads to unhappiness, for the future is uncertain and dark."
[36]

The Birlas too were disillusioned about his 'infallibility' after 'Quit
India'. On 14 April 1934, Birla wrote to Gandhi:

"Somehow or other, I always agree with you and therefore please don't think
that I am lacking in reasoning powers. After all what am I to say if you
are ever correct?" [37]

The same Birla told Wavell in March 1944 that "political leaders had missed
a great opportunity during the war. [38] Until 1941 Gandhi was their
master-strategist and they wanted him to be the sole plenipotentiary of the
Congress. Gandhi's policies, aided by Nehru's rhetoric, were superb in
handling mass discontent, thwarting anti-imperialist, anti-feudal struggles
and in safeguarding and promoting the interests of the colonial masters,
the big compradors the princes and the landlords. They had found in him a
leader without an equal, gave him whatever help they could and venerated
him. But their faith was shaken after Gandhi's 'Quit India' gamble. Birla
distanced himself from Gandhi and his place was taken by Patel. Nehru too
proved his usefulness to them: his work on the Planning Committee, his
enthusiastic reaction to the Bombay Plan and his role during the postwar
upsurge established his bona fides.

In mid-1944 G.D. Birla, J.R.D. Tata, Thakurdas and Ardeshir Dalal saw
Gandhi and sought his opinion about Dalal's appointment as the member of
the Viceroy's Executive Council for Planning and Reconstruction. But they
refused to abide by his advice. [39] Early in March 1944, Birla proposed to
Wavell the visit of an industrial delegation to the U.K. and expressed his
willingness to go. And the delegation led by Birla and J.R.D. Tata actually
left India for the U.K. in May next year. It is somewhat significant that
Birla, who would earlier keep Gandhi informed of the minutest details of
much of his work, withheld this important information from Gandhi for more
than a year. When Gandhi came to know of it on the eve of the delegation's
departure, he issued a press statement accusing "big merchants,
capitalists, industrialists and others" of doing the will of the government
and profiting in the process, and suggesting that the delegation might
enter into "a shameful deal" with the government. When Birla protested and
Tata fumed, Gandhi blessed the delegation. [40]

Differences between Gandhi and his colleagues began to crop up and during
the talks with the Cabinet Mission they became serious. Pyarelal wrote:

"In that hour of decision they had no use for Bapu. They decided to drop
the pilot.... At noon [on 25 June] the Cabinet Mission invited the members
of the Working Committee to meet them. Bapu not being a member was not sent
for and did not go. On their return nobody told Bapu a word about what had
happened at the meeting! The final phase of negotiations with the Cabinet
Mission marked the beginning of the cleavage between Gandhiji and some of
his closest colleagues which in the final phase of the transfer of power
left them facing different ways."[41]

In a note to G.D. Birla in 1946, Gandhi wrote:

"My voice carries no weight in the Working Committee. If I leave the scene,
the soreness will go, I do not like the shape that things are taking and, I
cannot speak out.... Today I feel like Trishanku. Is it really time for me
to retire to the Himalayas? Many people have started suggesting this."[42]

Gandhi felt that he was not wanted in Delhi and thought of going to
Noakhali in Bengal. On 25 October 1946 he wrote to. his disciple D.B.
Kalelkar: "I have been reduced to the position of Trishanku. I am hanging
in mid-air. I do not know whether I shall go to Bengal or continue here or
go to Sevagram." The first person he consulted was Nehru. "Without a
moment's hesitation he [Nehru] replied: 'Yes, your place is there
Noakhali]...', I asked him, when?' As soon as you feel like it', he
replied."43 It seems it was good riddance for Nehru and Patel. All
momentous decisions - to dismember Punjab and Bengal and partition India
artificially - were adopted without any reference to him. He was allowed to
plough his lonely furrow. He came to Delhi at the end of March 1947 at the
invitation not of his colleagues but of the new Viceroy Mountbatten. Nehru
sarcastically told Mountbatten that "Gandhi was going round with ointment
trying to heal one sore spot after another on the body of India, instead of
diagnosing the cause of this eruption of sores and participating in the
treatment of the body as a whole". [44]

Gandhi's complaint to Nirmal Kumar Bose, his secretary in Noakhali,

seemed an acknowledgement of his tragic defeat. Gandhi said:

"Mountbatten had the cheek to tell me 'Mr Gandhi, today the Congress is
with me and not with you."[45]

On 15 August 1947, when Abul Hashim saw Gandhi at Sodepur (near  Calcutta),
Gandhi complained:

"The world knows Sardar Patel is my 'yes-man' but these days he says 'no'
to everything I say; Babu Rajendra Prasad goes out with me in my morning
walk but when I come back to my Ashram I feel as though we shall never meet
again..."[46]

The winter of the mahatma's life was a winter of despair. His charisma did
no longer work on those he had groomed so long. When Pyarelal rejoined
Gandhi in the middle of December 1947, he found him "the saddest man that
one could picture... spiritually isolated from his surroundings and from
almost every one of his colleagues, who now held positions of power and
prestige in the Government." [47] His hold on "the pillars of various
constructive work organizations" was also slipping away. He had to loyally
abide by the decisions made by them who had previously abided loyally by
his decisions. Those who had joined his bandwagon in the past and whom he
had placed in positions of power now ignored him. When Gandhi undertook a
fast to save Muslims in Delhi from massacre, Patel did not hesitate to
insult him. Even Patel's secretary refused to see Gandhi when requested by
Gandhi's secretary to do so in connection with some grievances of refugees.
[48] Gandhi went on lamenting: "today I have become a sort of burden. There
was a time when my word was law. But it is no longer so." He said at a
prayer meeting on 5 November 1947: ''Today I have become bankrupt. I have
no say with my people today." [49] In one of his letters written probably
in January 1948, Gandhi wrote: "I still do not know what the next step is
going to be.... I am groping for light." In another letter he said: "Regard
me as bankrupt". Nearly ninety-five per cent of the post received by Gandhi
in the months before 15 August 1947 was full of abuse. [50].

Who conspired to kill him is shrouded in mystery. It seems that the centre
of the "terrible and widespread conspiracy", as Gandhi called it days
before his assassination, was not Pune or some other distant place but
quite close to him, and he had apprehensions about it. [51]

To quote Khaliquzzaman,

"From a statement of Mr K.M. Munshi, it is borne out that months before his
assassination such talk had been taking place amongst big Hindu leaders,
which encouraged Mr Munshi to tell Gandhiji that if he suffered violence at
anybody's hands it would be a Muslim, to which Gandhiji replied 'No, it
would be a Hindu'."[52]

Significantly, early in the morning of the day he was assassinated, Gandhi
"had said to Biswan, his personal attendant: 'Bring me all my important
letters. I must reply to them today, for tomorrow I may never be'. "[53]

Information about the conspiracy, some of the conspirators, and some
details were conveyed to Bombay's chief minister B.G. Kher by one professor
personally after the bomb explosion at Birla House on 20 January 1948, and
the information was passed on to Union Home Minister Patel and to Gandhi.
Pyarelal writes:

"What, however, surprises one is that in spite of the definite and concrete
information of which the authorities were in possession, they should have
failed to trace and arrest the conspirators and frustrate their plan.... "
[54]

There is a contradiction between what G.D. Birla broadcast  immediately
after Gandhi's assassination and Patel's statement in Parliament on 6
February 1948 on the one hand and what Gandhi actually said on the other.
On the morning of 21 January Gandhi did say to Birla that he was prepared
to allow police guards to be posted for his protection, which is contrary
to the story spread by Birla and Patel. [55]

Gandhi's funeral procession was organized as a military operation by the
British Commander-in-Chief of 'free' India's army. His body went on its
last journey in an army vehicle after the last five months' stay in the
Birla House. As Pethick-Lawrence wrote, ''The funeral carriage was drawn by
units of India's army, navy and air force.... Dakotas of the Royal Indian
Air Force, dipping in salute, showered flowers on the bier." This seemed
incongruous to a Gandhiite who observed: "perhaps it was the height of
tragedy when his erstwhile companions so arranged that his mortal remains
should be carried in a gun-carriage over which military bombers hovered and
dipped low in ostentatious salute.''[56] This was indeed a somewhat ironic
tribute to the prophet of non-violence from his erstwhile disciples.
Perhaps the mahatma, whose love of non-violence manifested itself in his
refusal, even when approached, to comment on the USA's dropping of atom
bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki in August 1945, [57] apart from his other
actions and pronouncements, deserved this tribute.

Gandhi had served his purpose. His big bourgeois patrons, his Congress
colleagues and British imperialism had no more any use for him. In his
seventy-ninth year he passed away as a martyr with a halo around him and
with all criticism of both his political and personal life. [58] hushed.