Theme 16Part C · The Gandhian era
Civil Disobedience
1930 to 1934 · the salt march, the round tables and the Poona Pact
The second great Gandhian movement began with a walk to the sea. This theme puts the Dandi route on a map village by village, then shows how salt satyagraha spread to every coast and to the frontier, and follows the talks in London that ran alongside.
Event 1March to April 1930
The Dandi March
Gandhi chose salt, taxed by the government and needed by every household, rich or poor, as the symbol of British rule. When the Viceroy, Irwin, ignored his eleven demands, he set out from Sabarmati with 78 chosen satyagrahis on 12 March 1930.
Swipe the map sideways to see all of it.
The marchers leave Sabarmati Ashram at dawn and walk about 385 km (240 miles) through the villages of Kheda and Broach. Gandhi, aged 60, speaks at every halt, asks village officials to resign, and the press of the world follows him.
At each village people line the road; hundreds of village headmen resign. The march crosses the Mahi near Kankapura at night.
After 24 days the march reaches Dandi on the sea. On the morning of 6 April Gandhi picks up a lump of natural salt, breaking the salt law, and gives the signal for the whole country to do the same.
Event 2April 1930 to 1931
Salt satyagraha across India
Once Gandhi broke the law at Dandi, every region found its own way to break it: making salt, refusing taxes, picketing liquor and foreign cloth shops, or defying forest laws.
Swipe the map sideways to see all of it.
C. Rajagopalachari marches from Trichinopoly to Vedaranyam on the Tamil coast; K. Kelappan from Calicut to Payyannur in Kerala. Salt is made at Bombay, in coastal Bengal (Midnapore) and at Balasore (Inchudi) in Odisha. At Dharasana (21 May), Sarojini Naidu leads about 2,500 volunteers against the salt works; the American journalist Webb Miller reports how they were beaten down, row after row, without raising a hand.
In Peshawar, Khan Abdul Ghaffar Khan's Khudai Khidmatgars (Red Shirts), sworn to non violence, lead the protests. At the Qissa Khwani Bazaar (23 April) troops fire on the crowd; a platoon of the Garhwal Rifles under Chandra Singh Garhwali refuses to fire.
Textile workers of Sholapur take over the city for a week (May 1930). Forest satyagraha in the Central Provinces and Maharashtra; no chaukidari tax campaigns in Bihar and Bengal. In Manipur and the Naga hills, Rani Gaidinliu, who joined Jadonang's movement at 13, leads the resistance after his execution (1931); she is caught in 1932 and jailed until 1947.
What was new
- Women came out in huge numbers for the first time: picketing, making salt, going to jail.
- Muslims took less part than in 1920 to 1922, except on the frontier.
- Business groups gave money at first, then pressed for a settlement.
- About 90,000 people were jailed by the end of 1930.
Gandhi's eleven demands (selected)
- Abolish the salt tax.
- Halve the land revenue and military spending.
- Prohibition of liquor.
- Release political prisoners.
- A rupee sterling ratio of 1s 4d; protective tariff on foreign cloth; coastal shipping for Indians.
Event 31930 to 1934
Round tables, a pact and a fast
While the movement went on in India, the British held talks in London. The talks failed, but they brought the question of the depressed classes to the centre.
- Nov 1930 to Jan 1931 First Round Table Conference, London. The Congress stays away.
- 5 March 1931 Gandhi Irwin Pact: prisoners not guilty of violence released, salt for personal use allowed on the coast, peaceful picketing allowed; the Congress to suspend the movement and attend the next conference.
- March 1931 Karachi session under Vallabhbhai Patel endorses the pact and adopts resolutions on Fundamental Rights and the National Economic Programme, days after Bhagat Singh's hanging.
- Sept to Dec 1931 Second Round Table Conference: Gandhi the sole Congress delegate. It deadlocks on minorities; Gandhi returns empty handed.
- Jan 1932 Civil Disobedience resumes; Gandhi and leaders arrested; the Congress banned.
- Aug 1932 Ramsay MacDonald's Communal Award gives separate electorates to the depressed classes.
- Sept 1932 Gandhi fasts unto death in Yerwada jail. The Poona Pact (24 September) with B. R. Ambedkar: joint electorates, with 148 seats reserved for the depressed classes in provincial legislatures, instead of 71.
- Nov to Dec 1932 Third Round Table Conference: Congress absent again.
- April 1934 Gandhi withdraws Civil Disobedience. The Government of India Act 1935 follows.
Who's who10 people
People
Lord Irwin
Viceroy 1926 to 1931
Gandhi Irwin Pact.
C. Rajagopalachari
Tamil Nadu
Vedaranyam march.
K. Kelappan
Kerala
Payyannur salt march.
Sarojini Naidu
Dharasana
Led the raid on the salt works.
Khan Abdul Ghaffar Khan
Frontier Gandhi
Khudai Khidmatgar.
Chandra Singh Garhwali
Garhwal Rifles
Refused to fire at Peshawar.
Rani Gaidinliu
Naga leader
Jailed 1932 to 1947.
B. R. Ambedkar
depressed classes
Signed the Poona Pact.
Ramsay MacDonald
British PM
Communal Award (1932).
Lord Willingdon
Viceroy 1931 to 1936
Crushed the second phase.
Key terms7
Terms
- Salt satyagraha
- Breaking the salt law by making salt.
- Khudai Khidmatgar
- Servants of God, the Red Shirts of the frontier.
- Gandhi Irwin Pact
- 5 March 1931; Delhi Pact.
- Round Table Conferences
- Three London conferences, 1930 to 1932.
- Communal Award
- 1932 award of separate electorates to minorities and depressed classes.
- Poona Pact
- 24 September 1932; reserved seats in joint electorates.
- Karachi resolution
- 1931 Congress resolution on fundamental rights and economic policy.