Page:The Life of Lokamanya Tilak.djvu/251

 full programme of activities in connection with Home-Rule.

A notable instance of Mr. Tilak's desire for unity can be seen in his hearty acceptance of the " Reform Memo- randum " of the nineteen elected members of the Imperial Legislative Council (October 1916). Left to himself, Mr. Tilak would have made more radical demands and we know some of his Bengal followers did actually make them. But Mr. Tilak wanted complete unanimity ; and so he was willing to take his stand on the memorandum with its subsequent development, vix — The Congress-League-Scheme.

The inauguration of the Indian Home Rule League (23rd April 1916) was also a step in the same direction. Mr. Tilak clearly reahsed that the Congress with the small survivors of the Old Guard would not go in for the radical propaganda he wished to concentrate upon. If the co-operation of the leading Moderates was de- sired, the pace of our activities must be slowed down j and this he was unwilling to do. He therefore started the Indian Home Rule League where he and his enthu- siastic followers would have a free hand. As a conces- sion to the misgivings of the timid Moderates the Home Rule League accepted the creed of the National Congress, a thing which gratified the(Right) Hon. Mr. Shrinivasa Shastri. But the Government was not so gratified. They wanted to crush the Heme Rule Propaganda by striking at the towering personality to whose organising genius the League owed its birth.

This year (1916), the sixty-first anniversary of Mr. Tilak's birth was celebrated in Maharashtra. It was certainly a proud and glorious day. The harassments