Page:Report on the Memorial Meeting for Mahatma Gandhi.djvu/2



SHEIKE MOHAMMAD ABDULLA, Head of the Emergency Government of the State of Jammu and Kashmir and President of the All-India States’ People’s Conference:

“Mr. Chairman, I have had the honor of spending many hours in the company of this great man whose death we have come here to mourn. One thing I found in him was this: that I was never awed by his august presence. He completely took everybody into his confidence because he had completely identified himself with the masses.

“He lived for truth and non-violence. These principles are not the ones that Mahatma for the first time brought before the world. Lord Jesus, the prophet Mohammed, Buddha, and other great men of the world had honored those principles. Mahatma Gandhi tried to live up to those principles, to live up to those ideals.

“Many tributes have been paid to this great man from eminent and great personalties of various countries. I only wish that the world would live up to his ideals.”

M. ASAP ALI, Ambassador of India to the United States:

“Mr. Chairman and friends: As representative of India, my government, and my people, I consider it my duty and privilege that I should acknowledge a deep debt of gratitude to all who have paid their generous tribute to the memory of Mahatma Gandhi. I feel it is a happy augury that Mahatma Gandhi’s principles have been so spontaneously applauded throughout the world; at least I feel that if Mahatma Gandhi’s soul is watching these proceedings on this planet, he must be enormously happy to find that at least after his death there is not a corner of the world where it is not recognized that the principles by which he lived were really deep in everyone’s heart, and in that really lay a secret. It has been said before today that it was difficult for people to find out the secret of his greatness.

“Believe me, the secret of his greatness was the utmost