Page:Speeches And Writings MKGandhi.djvu/764

 67 A NON-CO-OPERATION

massacre at Jallianwallabagh. It is my certain convic- tion that the massacre at Jallianwallabagh was a clean transaction compared to the unclean transactions des- cribed above, and the pity of it is that, because people are not shot or butchered, the tortures through which hundreds of inoffensive men have gone through do not produce a sufficient effect to turn everybody's face against this Government.

But as if this warfare against innocence was not enough the reins are being tightened in the jails. We know nothing of what is happening to-day in Karachi jail, to a solitary prisoner in the Sabarmati jail and to a batch in the Benares jail, all of whom are as innocent as I claim to be myself. Their crime consists in their constituting themselves the trustees ot national honour and dignity. I am hoping that these proud and defiant spirits will not be sent into submission masquerad- ing in the official garb. I deny the righc of the authori- ties to insist on high-sou4ed men appearing before them almost naked or paying any obsequeous respect to them by way of salaming with open palms brought together, or reciting to the intonation of " Sarkar ike-Jai \ No god-fearing man will do the latter even if he has to be kept standing in his stock for days and nights, as a Bengal schoolmaster is reported to have been for the sake of the dignity of human nature.

I trust that Lord Reading and his draftsmen do not know the facts that I have adduced or are being carried away by their belief in the infallibility of their employees, I refuse to believe in the statements which the publ.c regards as God's truth. If there is the slightest exaggeration in ths statements that 1 have made, I shall as publicly withdraw them and apologise

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