Page:Speeches And Writings MKGandhi.djvu/500

 410 EARLIER INDIAN SPEECHES

killing a fellow human being for the sake of saving a fellow animal.

So much on behalf of the innocent cow. A word only for my innocent wife who will never even know the wrong your correspondent has done her. If Mr. Irwm would enjoy the honour of being introduced to her he will soon find out that Mrs. Gandhi is a simple woman almost unlettered, who knows nothing of the two bazaars mentioned by him, even as I knew nothing of them until very recently and sometime after the establishment of the rival bazaar referred to by Mr, Irwin. He will then further assure himself that Mrs. Gandhi has had no hand in its establishment and is totally incapable of managing such a bazaar. Lastly he will at once learn that Mrs. Gandhi's time is occupied in cooking for and serving the teachers conducting the school established in the dehat in question, in distributing medical relief and in moving amongst the women of the dehat with a view to giving them an idea of simple hygiene. Mrs. Gandhi, I may add, has not learnt the art of making speeches or addressing letters to the press.

As to the rest of the letter, the less said the better. It is so full of palpable mis-representations that it is difficult to deal with them with sufficient self-restraint. I can only say that I am trying to the best of my ability to fulfil the obligation, I hold myself under, of promo- ting good- will between planter s and the raiyats, and if I fail it would not be due to want of efforts on my part, but it would be largely, if not entirely, due to the mischievous propaganda Mr. Irwin is carrying on openly and some others sub rosa in Champaran in order to nullify the effect of the report published by the Agrarian Committee, which was brought into being not

�� �