On this day...100 years ago

Lahore, Wednesday, December 3, 1924

THERE is one consistent game which the bureaucracy has been playing ever since it became clear that the Swarajya party had the support of the majority of politically minded Indians. It has lost no opportunity of trying by every means in its power to put that party in the wrong. Both in the Central Provinces and Bengal, the ministry was offered to the party, in spite of its declaration that it would not and could not take office so long as the present conditions lasted. The offer was perfectly constitutional; in fact, it was just the thing which the Constitution demanded, and for our part, as our readers are aware, we did not hesitate to congratulate both Governors on their action. But while it was obviously right to make the offer, the attempt to make political capital out of the refusal of it by the Swarajya party was equally wrong. No right-thinking person had any right or any business to expect anything else than the refusal. How could the party take office consistently either with its pledge or its professed principles? If any member of the party in any province did want to take office, it would in our opinion be his clear duty not only to resign his membership of the party but to resign his membership of the Council itself, which he had obtained on the Swaraj ticket, and to seek re-election. And what is true of the individual member would, we venture to think, be equally true of all its members taken collectively. They had fought the election on the clear understanding that they would not accept office unless and until the government came to an agreement with the country in the matter of Swaraj.