Document #11 Letter to Lord Irwin

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2 Document #11 Letter to Lord Irwin Mahatma Gandhi Mahatma Gandhi (Mahatma means of great soul ) was born in India in 1869, studied law in London, and in 1893 went to South Africa, where he opposed discriminatory legislation against Indians, was exposed to the writing of Henry David Thoreau, and carried on a famous correspondence with the Russian novelist Leo Tolstoy concerning civil disobedience. In 1914, he returned to India, and about 1920 began a lifetime of committed support for India s independence from England notably through the practice and encouragement of nonviolent resistance (satyagraha). After a decade of sporadic civil disobedience and periodic imprisonments, Gandhi in 1930 prepared a Declaration of Independence for India and soon after led a remarkable (and famous) 200-mile march to the sea to collect salt in symbolic defiance of the English government s monopoly on that product; by the end of the year, more than 100,000 people were jailed in the campaign. India of course did finally achieve independence, in The following year, while trying to calm tensions between Hindus and Moslems, Gandhi was assassinated. The following letter was sent by Gandhi to the British viceroy in India, Lord Irwin, in March 1930, just ten days before the salt march was to begin. It was sent from Satyagraha Ashram, a community established to practice Gandhi s method of nonviolent resistance. Dear Friend, Satyagraha Ashram, Sabarmati, March 2, 1930 Before embarking on civil disobedience and taking the risk I have dreaded to take all these years, I would fain approach you and find a way out. My personal faith is absolutely clear. I cannot intentionally - hurt anything that lives, much less fellow human beings, even though they may do the greatest wrong to me and mine. Whilst, therefore, I hold the British rule to be a curse, I do not intend harm to a single Englishman or to any legitimate interest he may have in India. I must not be misunderstood. Though I hold the British rule in India to be a curse, I do not, therefore, consider Englishmen in general to be worse than any other people on earth. I have the privilege of claiming many Englishmen as dearest friends. Indeed much that I have learnt of the evil of British rule is due to the writings of frank and courageous Englishmen who have not hesitated to tell the unpalatable truth about that rule. And why do I regard the British rule as a curse? It has impoverished the dumb millions by a system of progressive exploitation and by a ruinously expensive military and civil administration which the country can never afford.

3 It has reduced us politically to serfdom. It has sapped the foundations of our culture. And, by the policy of cruel disarmament, it has degraded us spiritually. Lacking the inward strength, we have been reduced, by all but universal disarmament, to a state bordering on cowardly helplessness Let me put before you some of the salient points. I remain, Your sincere friend, M. K. Gandhi The terrific pressure of land revenue, which furnishes a large part of the total, must undergo considerable modification in an independent India. Even the much vaunted permanent settlement benefits the few rich zamindars [landowners], not the ryots [tenant farmer do not own the land they farm]. The ryot has remained as helpless as ever. He is a mere tenant at will. the British system seems to be designed to crush the very life out of him. Even the salt he must use to live is so taxed as to make the burden fall heaviest on him,... The tax shows itself still more burdensome on the poor man when it is remembered that salt is the one thing he must eat more than the rich man both individually and collectively It is common cause that, however disorganized and, for the time being, insignificant it may be, the party of violence is gaining ground and making itself felt. Its end is the same as mine. But I am convinced that it cannot bring the desired relief to the dumb millions. And the conviction is growing deeper and deeper in me that nothing but unadulterated nonviolence can check the organized violence of the British Government.... Having an unquestioning and immovable faith in the efficacy of nonviolence as I know it, it would be sinful on my part to wait any longer I have deliberately used the word conversion. For my ambition is no less than to convert the British people through non-violence, and thus make them see the wrong they have done to India. I do not seek to harm your people This letter is not in any way intended as a threat but is a simple and sacred duty peremptory [absolute responsibility] on a civil resister. (edited and abridged)

4 Document #12

5 SALT MARCH Document #13 INTRODUCTION The Salt March, which took place from March to April 1930 in India, was an act of civil disobedience led by Mohandas Gandhi ( ) to protest British rule in India. During the march, thousands of Indians followed Gandhi from his religious retreat near Ahmedabad to the Arabian Sea coast, a distance of some 240 miles. The march resulted in the arrest of nearly 60,000 people, including Gandhi himself. India finally was granted its independence in SALT MARCH: BACKGROUND Britain s Salt Acts prohibited Indians from collecting or selling salt, a staple in the Indian diet. Citizens were forced to buy the vital mineral from the British, who, in addition to exercising a monopoly over the manufacture and sale of salt, also exerted a heavy salt tax. Although India s poor suffered most under the tax, Indians required salt. Defying the Salt Acts, Mohandas Gandhi reasoned, would be an ingeniously simple way for many Indians to break a British law nonviolently. (British rule of India began in After living for two decades in South Africa, where he fought for the civil rights of Indians residing there, Gandhi returned to his native country in 1915 and soon began working for India s independence.) Gandhi declared resistance to British salt policies to be the unifying theme for his new campaign of satyagraha, or mass civil disobedience. DID YOU KNOW? Gandhi s followers called him "Mahatma, " which in Sanskrit means "great soul." SALT MARCH: 1930 On March 12, 1930, Gandhi set out from his ashram, or religious retreat, at Sabermanti near Ahmedabad with several dozen followers on a trek of some 240 miles to the coastal town of Dandi on the Arabian Sea. There, Gandhi and his supporters were to defy British policy by making salt from seawater. All along the way, Gandhi addressed large crowds, and with each passing day an increasing number of people joined the salt satyagraha. By the time they

6 reached Dandi on April 5, Gandhi was at the head of a crowd of tens of thousands. He spoke and led prayers and early the next morning walked down to the sea to make salt. He had planned to work the salt flats on the beach, encrusted with crystallized sea salt at every high tide, but the police had forestalled him by crushing the salt deposits into the mud. Nevertheless, Gandhi reached down and picked up a small lump of natural salt out of the mud and British law had been defied. At Dandi, thousands more followed his lead, and in the coastal cities of Bombay (now called Mumbai) and Karachi, Indian nationalists led crowds of citizens in making salt. Civil disobedience broke out all across India, soon involving millions of Indians, and British authorities arrested more than 60,000 people. Gandhi himself was arrested on May 5, but the satyagraha continued without him. On May 21, the poet Sarojini Naidu ( ) led 2,500 marchers on the Dharasana Salt Works, some 150 miles north of Bombay. Several hundred British-led Indian policemen met them and viciously beat the peaceful demonstrators. The incident, recorded by American journalist Webb Miller, prompted an international outcry against British policy in India. SALT MARCH: AFTERMATH In January 1931, Gandhi was released from prison. He later met with Lord Irwin ( ), the viceroy of India, and agreed to call off the satyagraha in exchange for an equal negotiating role at a London conference on India s future. In August of that year, Gandhi traveled to the conference as the sole representative of the nationalist Indian National Congress. The meeting was a disappointment, but British leaders had acknowledged Gandhi as a force they could not suppress or ignore. India s independence was finally granted in August The 78-year-old Gandhi was assassinated by a Hindu extremist less than six months later, on January 30, Article Details: Salt March Author History.com Staff Website Name History.com Year Published 2010 Title Salt March URL Access Date January 16, 2015 Publisher A+E Networks This copy is for you personal, non-commercial use only , A&E Television Networks, LLC. All Rights Reserved.

7 Where does Salt come from? Document #14 Salt is one of the few useful and abundant minerals on earth. Salt is all around us. Underground and on the earth s surface in the dried up residues of ancient seas. Some salt has even arrived from outer space in meteors. But our biggest source of salt is in our seas and oceans. With an average of 26 million tonnes per cubic kilometre, sea water offers a seemingly inexhaustible supply which if extracted, would cover the world s total land mass to a depth of 35 metres. There are many different types and grades of salt and a number of different methods of production. White salt is produced by evaporating solution-mined brine in pressure vessels. The rock salt we use for gritting roads comes from mining ancient deposits. In some countries the natural energy of the sun is used to evaporate brine produced from sea water. Salt Production As with so many other things, China is the largest salt producer in the world followed closely by the United States. Salt is generally produced one of three ways: deepshaft mining, solution mining or solar evaporation. Deep-Shaft Mining Deep-shaft mining is much like mining for any other mineral. Typically, the salt exists as deposits in ancient underground sea beds. Most salt produced this way is used as rock salt. Solution Mining In solution mining, wells are erected over salt beds and fresh water is injected to dissolve the salt. Then the salt solution, or brine, is pumped out and taken to a plant for evaporation. Most common table salt are produced this way. Solar Evaporation Salt is harvested through solar evaporation from seawater or salt lakes. Wind and the sun evaporate the water from shallow pools, leaving the salt behind. It is usually harvested once a year when the salt reaches a specific thickness. This only works in areas with low rainfall and a lot of sun - Mediterranean countries and Australia for example.

EQ: Who was Mohandas Gandhi and what role did he play in India s independence movement?

EQ: Who was Mohandas Gandhi and what role did he play in India s independence movement? * Identify Mohandas Gandhi. * Describe Gandhi s role in leading India s independence movement. * As we discuss the