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Crusader Extraordinary:
Krishna Menon and the India League 1932-1936
Such realisation came about in the life of Krishna Menon through his work with the India League. Both Menon and the India League, the organisation where he did some of his most influential works, have been enigmatic in Indian history. The author has provided us with one of the most detailed documentation of the works done by him, thus filling a major gap in the understanding of the Indian national movement and its non-Indian links. The India League was composed of a mixed bag of people. Some had right wing leanings while others professed a commitment to the Communists and other varieties of radical thought. Menon made a considerable effort to shift the loyalties of the League to a more nationalist and Left-leaning philosophy. This was not an easy task because he soon realised that there was an inherent contradiction between the English and India. The English, irrespective of their professed political views, were simply not in favour of substantive independence for India. Moreover, Menon realised that where Indian affairs were concerned, the English spent considerable effort in saying one thing while meaning the other. As the Director, Public Intelligence, suggested to an appreciative government in the UK in the midst of the ongoing Round Table Conferences, India was used to being governed with a heavy hand. Authoritarianism and arbitrary methods were appreciated in the country. But to advocate them openly would bring forth criticism from English politicians and the public who had a greater commitment to parliamentary democracy. Indian nationalists, therefore, Menon felt, had little choice but to forge a path of their own, without much hope of help from English sympathisers since the sympathy was often only in words and not in deeds. The report prepared by the India League on the Condition of India (1934) with considerable help from Menon made it clear that English rule in India was essentially based on the use of the gun and there was no legitimacy of this rule in the minds of the people. But when this report was proscribed in India and effectively banned from the public spaces in England, there was little outrage among those who professed a commitment to democracy and love for India. When the League came under an oppressive surveillance of the intelligence agencies, Menon discovered that the liberal English simply turned away and refused to notice anything wrong being done. Despite police hassles, Menon remained committed, virtually single-handed, to obtaining popular support among the common English people, workers and those in "service", for the cause of Indian independence. It was this single-minded activism and commitment to socialism, even in the face of rival Indian activists who tried to cut him down, which so endeared Menon to Jawaharlal Nehru in the mid-1930s. This was further enforced, with Menon acting as Nehru’s literary agent in England and as the guardian of his daughter in Britain. On his part, Menon thought Nehru to be a new prophet who would enable Indian socialism to link up with rest of the world. In this extensively documented story, one could not but notice the presence of a biographical index. This is welcome even if rare in present-day books. Yet it needs to be balanced enough. Thus, it seems a travesty to mention S.A. Brelvi merely as a "Bombay nationalist", or the then Aga Khan as a "supporter of British rule", or Hakim Ajmal Khan as a "well known physician of Delhi" or Jawaharlal Nehru as a "barrister". They were much more than this and their contribution to the nationalist movement and relationship with Menon was quite different. It would have been proper for Chakravarty to be more prudent in choosing what to report as biographical detail. |
THE Raj, Krishna Menon had
learnt over the years, was a romantic sentiment, an enormously
profitable material concern, an amoral attitude, a particularly
provocative perception, a weighty counterpoise in international
politics, an applause-seeking vanity a diabolical policy and a terse
reality. This quote effectively sums up the story that Suhash
Chakravarty tells us in this book.