The joint statement

Lahore, Sunday, November 9, 1924

THE joint statement issued by Mahatma Gandhi, CR Das and Motilal Nehru divides itself into three parts. The preamble, which is not the least important of these parts, is not only wholly unexceptionable, but is an admirably complete presentation of the whole case for unity between the two wings of the Congress. All the features in the present situation that make unity not only essential but indispensable are brought in their proper sequence and summed up with a conciseness and precision on which it would be difficult to improve. Take the last of these factors, which happens to be also of the most pressing importance. Could any reference to it have been better or more appropriately worded than the following: “The policy of repression which has been started in Bengal by the local government with the sanction of the Governor General is, in the opinion of the undersigned, aimed in reality not at any party of violence, but at the Swarajya party in Bengal, and, therefore, at constitutional and orderly activity; and consequently, it has become a matter of immediate necessity to invite and secure the cooperation of all parties for putting forth the united strength of the nation against this policy of repression”? One thing which will probably occur to every careful reader is that this part of the preamble has nothing corresponding to it in the body of the statement, that while the phrases used here are “the cooperation of all parties” and the “united strength of the nation”, the actual measures recommended in the statement have reference only to the two parties at present within the Congress.