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Facts and Opinions Volume I – Jan. 15, 1910 – Number 28 The Patiala Case
The Patiala Case has developed its real objective, which is the destruction of the Arya Samaj, the men arrested being merely pawns in the game. The speech of the Counsel for the prosecution, Mr. Grey, in no way sets out an ordinary case against individuals, nor is there any passage in it which gives any light as to particular evidence against the persons on their trial, but from beginning to end it is an arraignment of the Arya Samaj as a body whose whole object, semi-open rather than secret, is the subversion of British rule. Mr. Norton, taking advantage of the presence of Sj. Aurobindo Ghose in the dock, attempted to build up in the Alipur Case an elaborate indictment of the whole national movement as a gigantic conspiracy, but he did not neglect the individual cases and made some attempt to conceal the extra-judicial object of his oratory by a continual reference to actual evidence, relevant or irrelevant, in the case. Mr. Grey has not given himself that trouble. The political character of his advocacy is open and avowed. But he follows his Calcutta precursor in the ludicrous jumps of his logic from trivial premises to gigantically incongruous conclusions, in his heroic attempt to make bricks out of straw. His chief arguments are that the Arya Samajists read the Amrita Bazar Patrika and the Punjabee, — to say nothing of the long defunct Bande Mataram, — and that some of the prominent members of the Arya Samaj are politicians and yet remain members of the Arya Samaj. The perfectly general interpretations by Swami Dayananda of the Vedic view of politics are the basis of his attack, and even the vehement character of the great reformer’s polemics against other religions, the orthodox Hindu included, are pressed into the service of this unique argument. And all this is used to prejudice men under trial on a serious charge. Mr. Norton trifled with the traditions of the British bar by his pressing of tri-
Page – 353 vial and doubtful evidence against the accused in the Alipur Case, but it seems to us that Mr. Grey has departed still farther from those lofty traditions. And what if the Patiala Court decides that the Arya Samaj is a seditious body, seditious in origin, seditious in intention, seditious in action ? Will the Government prescribe as an illegal association this wealthy, powerful and highly organised community containing more than half the brains and activity of the Punjab ? Already the charge has been made that by giving special privileges to the Mahomedans, the Government have abandoned definitely the principle of religious neutrality on which their rule has hitherto been founded. The present Governor of the Punjab is possibly capable of such a step, — after the whitewashing of the Police in the Gulab Bano case and his speech to the Loyalist deputation, we can believe him capable of any rash and headstrong step. Fortunately, there is little likelihood that Mr. Grey’s oratory will be any more effective than Mr. Norton’s.
We have received a communication from a member of the Samaj in which he puts to us certain pointed questions relating to the aims, character and works of the Samaj and of its founder’s teachings. We have not that direct and first-hand knowledge which would enable us to answer these questions with any authority. But on the general question our views are known. Aryaism is not an independent religion. It is avowedly an attempt to revive the Vedic religion in its pristine purity. The Vedic religion is a national religion, and it embraces in its scope all the various activities of the national life. Swami Dayananda as a restorer of Vedicism included the theory of politics in his scope and revealed the intensely national character of the Hindu religion and morality. His work was avowedly a work of national regeneration. In dealing with the theory of politics as based on the Vedic religion he had naturally to include the truth that independence is the true and normal condition of a nation and all lapse into subjection must be a sin and degeneration, temporary
Page – 354 in its nature. No man can deny this great truth. Freedom is the goal of humanity and Aryaism was in its nature a gospel of freedom, individual freedom, social freedom, intellectual freedom, freedom in all things, and the accomplishment of such an all-pervading liberation cannot come about without bringing national freedom in its train. If to perceive these truths of Vedism and of nature is to be political and seditious, then Swami Dayananda’s teaching was political and seditious and the religion he preached may be stigmatised as political and seditious. But if sedition be limited to its proper meaning, an attempt by illegal and violent means to bring about the fall of the established authority or prepare by word or action lawless opposition and revolution, then there is no sedition in the Swami’s preaching or in the belief and actions of the Arya Samaj. They use the perfectly legitimate means of strengthening the national life at all points and their objective is national regeneration through an active and free religion, not political revolution. Individual members may be Loyalists, Moderates, Nationalists, even Terrorists, but a religious body is not responsible for the political opinions of its individual members. The religious teaching of Swami Dayananda was inspired by national motives, not political; and the aims of the Arya Samaj are national, not political.
The leaders of the Arya Samaj have issued a manifesto disclaiming the political motives attributed to them by the Counsel for the Prosecution in his extraordinary opening address at Patiala. But is there any use in these repeated disclaimers ? To a certain type of official mind, not in the minority in this country, every movement, body, organ of opinion or centre of activity that makes for national strength, efficiency or manhood is by that very fact suspect and indeed self-convicted as seditious and its very existence a crime to be punished by the law. The Governor of the Punjab is either himself an official of this class or swayed by advisers of that temper. Under such circumstances it is enough to issue once for all a strong and dignified repudiation
Page – 355 of the charge and then proceed calmly with the great work the Samaj has undertaken, serenely strong and unperturbed in good fortune or evil fortune, good report or evil report, confident in God’s grace and the spiritual force communicated by the founder. This is the only course worthy of a manly community professing a robust and virile religion. Anxious repetition of unheeded disclaimers seems to us undignified and futile.
The question, what is sedition, one of those Chinese puzzles which it seems impossible to solve, nevertheless presses for solution. In Nagpur it has been established that to laugh at the holder of a Government title is sedition. In the Swaraj Case Justice Chandavarkar has declared it to be the law that to condemn terrorism in strong language and trace it to its source is sedition. At Patiala it is contended that to read the Amrita Bazar Patrika and the Punjabee is sedition. We are not quite sure that at Patiala the prosecuting counsel did not hint that to bring Christianity or Mahomedanism into contempt or hatred is sedition. And we have these remarkable cases in the Punjab, where to translate Seeley’s Expansion of England or Mr. Bryan’s opinion of British rule in India seems to have a fair chance of being established as sedition. Mr. Stead’s Review of Reviews is now known to be a seditious publication. We are not sure, either, that the Indian Daily News is not even worse, for it is continually trying to bring the police, who are an indispensable part of the Government established by law, into contempt and hatred, and the incorrigible persistence of its efforts is sufficient proof of motive, if not of conspiracy. Now one of the charges against a Punjab accused is that he wrote impugning the character of the subordinate police service — just like the Indian Daily News or Sir Andrew Fraser. We would suggest that Sir Andrew Fraser should be arrested in England and brought here to answer to the outraged police for the remarks passed by the Police Commission. The reasoning is perfectly fair. Any strong criticism, especially if it is persistent, lowers the reputation of the Government
Page – 356 and creates in people a tendency to belittle, that is to say, have a contempt for authority established by law. It is still worse if the Government is accused of injustice, say, in the matter of the deportations or the Gulab Bano case; for that inevitably creates hatred. Therefore strong criticism of the Government is sedition. The Amrita Bazar Patrika and Punjabee strongly criticise the Government. Therefore they are seditious papers and their readers seditious conspirators. Every official is a member of the Government established by law; therefore to criticise strongly an official or a policeman, still more, officials or policemen as a class, is sedition. Christianity is the religion of the Government established by law; to criticise Christianity is to bring Christians into contempt; the Government are Christians; therefore to criticise Christianity is to bring the Government established by law into contempt. That is sedition. Therefore to criticise Christianity is sedition. To say that repression fosters Terrorism may be true, but it is seditious. To suggest a Press censorship, seriously or ironically, is to bring the administration of the law of sedition into contempt, that is, to bring the administrators into contempt; and the administrators are the Government established by law. Therefore Mr. Stead’s Open Letter to Lord Morley is seditious. We are almost afraid to go on, lest, finally, we should end by proving that the Englishman itself is an intolerably seditious rag, — for does it not try to bring Sir Edward Baker and the Government generally into contempt by intimating genially that they are liars, idiots and good-for-nothing weaklings, — in connection with the Reforms and their unwillingness to put the whole population of India into prison ? Would it not save trouble to prohibit speech or writing in India altogether ?
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