Jawaharlal Nehru, The Socialist Leader

University Press Scholarship Online

Oxford Scholarship Online

Inside India
Halidé Edib and Mushirul Hasan

Print publication date: 2009

Print ISBN-13: 9780195699999
Published to Oxford Scholarship Online: October 2012
DOI: 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195699999.001.0001

Jawaharlal Nehru, The Socialist Leader

Halidé Edib

DOI:10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195699999.003.0024

Abstract and Keywords

In India, socialism is a tendency even among the communalists of the most
orthodox type. Jawaharlal Nehru differs from them in the sense that the
socialism he has in mind is an exportation, and he unifies all problems in India
as being common to all Indians. Nehru naturally comes into conflict mostly with
Hindu communalists, who are the most organized in India. He considers his
nationalism, which exists side by side with his socialism, merely as an
expediency to get rid of foreign rule. He aims to change India from within by
arguing that communalism and capitalism must go and calling for a complete
nationalization. Whereas Mahatma Gandhi is the continuation of the nineteenth-
century Hindu reform movements, and played a key role in resurrecting more
humane and spiritual principles of old Hinduism applied to life, Jawaharlal
Nehru, at least in ideology, completes the break with the Hindu past.

Keywords:   Jawaharlal Nehru, socialism, nationalism, Mahatma Gandhi, communalism, capitalism,

Hinduism

We have already spoken of Socialism as a tendency in India even among the

Communalists of the most orthodox type. Jawaharlal Nehru differs from them in
the sense that the Socialism he has in mind is an exportation. But he differs from
the other political leaders of all denominations in a more fundamental way. He
unifies all problems in India as being common to all Indians. In his mind there is
no Muslem or Hindu or Parsee; every son of India is an Indian.

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Jawaharlal Nehru, The Socialist Leader

Jawaharlal Nehru naturally comes into conflict mostly with Hindu Communalists,
who are the most organized in India. It is, as we have already mentioned,
controlled by the body called the ‘Hindu Mahasabha’. The Socialists who have
taken Socialism from Europe and not from their Scriptures, usually call the
‘Hindu Mahasabha’ an instrument of vested interest, that is a capitalist
formation with no definite interest in the masses, or plans for their betterment;
an association of job-hunters; the strongest support of foreign domination. There
is some truth in those charges; yet if it were nothing else but that, it would not
be worth mentioning as one of the forces in Hinduism. It would be blown to
pieces of itself just like a card-house. As a matter of fact, it is a structure with
deep foundations in the soil. In the first place Communalism still represents the
dominant Hindu mentality. In the second place the men of Mahasabha are not all
job-hunters; on the contrary, their danger lies in the fact that they are convinced,
and within their field they have created admirable educational and economic
institutions for the masses. Further, quite a number of them profess Socialism of
a sort, reconciling Communalism with Socialism. (p.203) All this they derive
from ancient Hinduism, and it constitutes an effective prophylactic serum
against an imported and classless Socialism.

From the political point of view it is difficult to class them all as supporters of
foreign rule. When the Hindu Communalist is surrounded by a Muslem majority,
he openly advocates the continuation of foreign rule. But when he is part of a
Hindu majority (which is oftener the case) he is a Nationalist. But in his mind
India is a Hindu nation. There should be no place for the Muslem in it. He openly
declares ‘No peace so long as there are any Muslems or Christians.’ His
Nationalism is Fascism based on religio-racial foundations. The Muslem
expresses this in a nutshell when he talks of a possible Hindu Communalist rule
in a future Independent India: ‘We will be the future Untouchables if they rule.’

But this is not by any means the only possible result. The Muslems both in
number and virility constitute a body which could not be easily reduced to such
a fate. Besides, contradictory as it may sound, there is also a possibility of Hindu
and Muslem Communalism making common cause, as both represent vested
interest, and both are frightened of any new political creed which may menace
their ultra-conservative social forms.

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Jawaharlal Nehru, The Socialist Leader

The political creed advanced by Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru is entirely opposed to

all the preceding political creeds. The greatest difference between him and
other political leaders among the Hindus is that he aims at changing old
Hinduism entirely. Jawaharlal Nehru is descended from a Cashmiri Brahman
family which migrated two hundred years ago to the rich plains in quest of
fortune. Holding high office under the last Muslem rulers gave them a
traditional familiarity with the Muslem culture and outlook. On the other hand,
the family was very early Westernized, and had contact with the English. With
occasional setbacks, the Nehru family remained prosperous, highly cultured,
and one which was very little hampered by Caste traditions and barriers.

Motilal Nehru, the father, was an outstanding personality and a brilliant lawyer.
Up to the last few years of his life his politics never took an active form, but
whenever he entered the political arena he showed the same backbone and
courage as he did in all his legal career. His portrait presents a man of vigour
and force, with the clear-cut and domineering mask of a Roman senator. From
the writings of his son, one presumes that Motilal Nehru had no inhibitions and
metaphysical subtleties, such as possess the average Hindu intellectual.

Jawaharlal Nehru was born in 1889 and was the only son, and the only child up
to his twelfth year. This meant a lonely childhood, as his primary education was
by private tutors at home. He was sensitive to a (p.204) degree, and given
more to thinking and brooding than to physical activities and games.

He completed his education in Cambridge, which made his Westernization a

profounder process than that of an average Hindu boy, as he had not been
reared in an over-emphasized Hindu environment. It is probably for this very
reason that he could later formulate a political creed which is more on the
Western side of ideology than any formulated by Hindu political leaders or
reformers. The same influence makes him interpret his political creed without
reference to any Hindu Scripture. It gives a strange openness and uniqueness to
his views, but also an aloofness when judged by the standards of a religion-
obsessed Indian mind. He is evidently aware of it, for there is a half-formulated
exasperation, if not actual hostility, against religion. He saw that every barrier to
a free and united India was raised in the name of religion; and, as his great ideal
is a free India, he could not think of religion in any other way but as one of the
principal impediments to freedom. This does not mean that he is a pure
rationalist, and devoid of mystical fervour. He seems to realize that to carry the
masses one must appeal to their emotions as well as to their interests.

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Jawaharlal Nehru, The Socialist Leader

After completing his education in England he returned home and found himself
thrown into the political maelstrom. He came in contact with Mahatma Gandhi
in 1919 when Mahatma Gandhi visited Allahabad in connection with Satyagraha
against the Rowlatt Bills. He was an eyewitness to some of the tragic scenes
connected with the Satyagraha of that period. From 1920 to 1934 he was seven
times in prison. But both his participation in the movement and his contact with
India at the intervals of release gave him ample opportunity to study the
principal aspects of Indian problems.

This perpetual prison life during the best years of his youth and manhood had a
formative effect on his character and mentality. His innate tendency for thought
was increased, and he developed an extraordinary capacity for lucid examination
of the Indian situation and its bearing on the outside world. His Glimpses of
World History, two huge volumes, were written in prison, and they contain a
painful but honest struggle to find in human history the key to the Indian puzzle.
His autobiography, another voluminous work, was also written in prison, and has
the same objective scrutiny and analysis both of self and of events. Poignant as it
may seem, this superimposed loneliness on an already lonely soul has given him
the power to turn to himself for fellowship and guidance, and arrange his
thoughts and evolve his political creed undisturbed by external influences.

(p.205) ‘I believe that the whole Indian system must go, root and branch;’ that
is the essence of his political, social and economic creed. And that creed is
Socialism, a less maximalist form than that of present Russia, but nevertheless
based on Marxism.

Jawaharlal Nehru's Nationalism, which exists side by side with his Socialism, is
considered by him merely as an expediency to get rid of foreign rule. As a matter
of fact it is adopted by Asia in general, where there is foreign domination of any
sort. But it also is dominating Japan, for political Nationalism must eventually
lead to a Capitalist and Imperialist expansion. Jawaharlal Nehru explains clearly
in his writings that he aims at avoiding Nationalism in this sense when India is
independent. His ultimate ideal is ‘freedom within the framework of
International co-operative world federation’. Hence he aims at changing India
from within. How he proposes to do it is contained in the following:

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Jawaharlal Nehru, The Socialist Leader

(i) Communalism must go; (ii) Capitalism must go, both native and foreign; (iii) a
complete nationalization, where the state will handle India's resources; (iv)
industrialization on a comprehensive scale must replace the hand-made
industry; (v) economics must replace the religious outlook in every aspect of
mass development; (vi) only in such a case can there be an economic and social
equality, only in such an event can there be unity and nationhood as Jawaharlal
Nehru understands it: ‘I do not think that unity will come by merely repeating it.
… It will come from below. Social and economic problems will inevitably bring
other problems to the front. They will create differences along other lines, but
the communal cleavage will go.’

Without minimizing various other active elements in present-day Hinduism, one

can say with certainly that Mahatma Gandhi and Jawaharlal Nehru, both as
personalities and as formative forces, are the most important. Mahatma Gandhi
is the continuation of the nineteenth-century Hindu reform movements, as well
as the resurrector of more humane and spiritual principles of old Hinduism
applied to life. With Jawaharlal Nehru, at least in ideology, the break with the
Hindu past is complete. Yet in spite of the basic differences of principle, these
two remarkable men are in close co-operation. For their objective is the same—
externally, independence by pacific means, and when that independence is
attained, co-operation with the outside world; internally, a state which will
function for the good of the Indian masses. As to the differences:

Mahatma Gandhi bases all life round religion or spirit, Jawaharlal Nehru round
economics. Mahatma Gandhi proposes to keep the original pattern of Hinduism
with some alterations, but he aims at giving it a (p.206) new spirit, and
working out a new modus vivendi to ensure equal rights to all. He stands for
class from an occupational point of view but the barriers between these classes
should be flexible enough to allow the individual who finds his talents not fitted
to his own class to pass to another. Jawaharlal Nehru wants the old system to go,
root and branch. Mahatma Gandhi's solution for labour problems is not definite,
but his plan for rural India is clear. It aims at reviving the village as the unit of
the Indian nation, free within certain limits, self-sufficient rather than
interdependent. Minimum mechanization and maximum hand-industry are in
Mahatma Gandhi's mind the only solutions for surplus leisure and for a limited
freedom with respect to the state. Mahatma Gandhi is a decentralist and a
democrat. Jawaharlal Nehru's plan for rural India is not clear beyond a
proposition for abolishing the landlord system. His plan for labour in the cities is
that of the current socialist system. He is a radical-centralist, that is he does not
accept autonomy of groups. But he is also a democrat.

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Jawaharlal Nehru, The Socialist Leader

In Mahatma Gandhi's lifetime there can be no break between the two leaders.
Jawaharlal Nehru would not break even if he could, for he is sincerely attached
to Mahatma Gandhi, and considers him the unique leader in India. Further, even
if he wished to break away he could not do so without losing his hold over the
Hindu masses, and to some extent over other Indian groups.

‘Do the Indian people want an uprooting change?’

This is the question the Indian asks in speaking about Jawaharlal Nehru.
Jawaharlal Nehru's answer is, ‘Let us find out by consulting the masses.’ But this
proposition for a Constituent Assembly is only for the time when India will be
free.

Besides these two prominent men, the Congress seems to be as vital and as
strong as ever. It also remains the most representative body in India. More so for
the Hindu than the Muslem. Nevertheless a great many prominent Muslems and
a considerable number of young Muslems support the Congress. As to the
masses, beyond the fact that they seem to have taken sincerely to constitutional
ways, one can say nothing. Do they want Communalism? Will they stand for a
united nation? Will they really gather round economic issues? All these are in
the womb of time.

These are the Hindu personalities, thought-forces and, to some extent, the
position of the masses in the Indian melting-pot.

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