UNITED NATIONS, INDIA AND
SOUTH AFRICA'S LIBERATION STRUGGLE
A Collection of Articles
by E.S.
Reddy
Former Director of the United Nations Centre against Apartheid,
and member of the Board of Trustees of the International Defence and Aid Fund for
Southern Africa
CONTENTS
GANDHIJI AND THE STRUGGLE FOR LIBERATION IN SOUTH AFRICA(1)
As important as the fortieth anniversary of the assassination of Gandhiji which is observed on January 30, 1988, is the eightieth anniversary of his first imprisonment in South Africa in January 1908, which was a turning point in his life.
Gandhiji always considered himself an Indian and a South African. Not only had he spent twenty-one years of his adult life in South Africa, but he had served four of his ten terms of imprisonment in that country - in the prisons of Johannesburg, Volksrust and Dundee. It was in South Africa that he developed his philosophy of Satyagraha.
In a sense, his last Satyagraha was also in South Africa. Though he could not be physically present, he guided and inspired the great Indian passive resistance movement of 1946-48 and lent it enormous support.
Birth of Satyagraha
The small Indian community in the Transvaal had launched, in July 1907, a passive resistance campaign against the Asiatic Registration Act (the Black Act) designed to humiliate, harass and eventually expel them from the territory. Volunteers picketed registration offices and most of the Indians refused to take out permits under the Black Act.
Gandhiji found that "passive resistance" was seen even by European friends as a "weapon of the weak." He sought a term which could be understood by Indians and make it clear that the resistance was out of moral strength rather than any weakness. He invited suggestions and, in November 1907, invented the term "Satyagraha" (firmness in truth). The choice of the term itself appears to have helped crystallise his thinking.
On December 28, 1907, Gandhiji and several of his colleagues were taken to court for refusing to register and were ordered to leave the Transvaal within two weeks. They defied the order and were sentenced on January 10, 1908, to two to three months` imprisonment.
General Smuts, however, was obliged soon to negotiate a settlement with Gandhiji and the prisoners were released on January 30th - the very day that Gandhiji was to be assassinated forty years later.
The brief imprisonment was not only the "baptism of fire" for Gandhiji but transformed him from a public servant and adviser to the Indian community into the leader of resistance.
In the many years that the struggle lasted with its ups and downs - jailings, beatings, torture and deportations of resisters, as well as the intervals when they were obliged to while away their time on the Tolstoy Farm - Gandhiji developed the concept of Satyagraha which was later to inspire the national movement in India.
There was little discussion at the time of non- violence, for no one had contemplated an armed struggle which was, in any case, unthinkable for an unarmed and vulnerable community of a mere 15,000 people. Gandhiji had not yet become an uncompromising devotee of non- violence: he had in fact favoured the enlistment of Indians in the armed forces. The emphasis was on the duty to defy an unjust law and to defend the honour of India.
Satyagraha - the common heritage of India and South Africa
The Satyagraha in South Africa was not only a struggle for the rights of the Indians or the redress of their grievances, but a part of the struggle of India for freedom and dignity. It was influenced by the upsurge in India in protest against the partition of Bengal and the mass boycott of British goods in the Swadeshi movement.
The experience of Gandhiji in the struggle in South Africa had, in its turn, a great influence on the Indian national movement.
Out of his close association with the Muslims in South Africa, and their great contribution to the passive resistance campaign, came his stress on Hindu- Muslim unity as a tenet of the Indian national movement.
Out of his outrage at the treatment of Indians in South Africa by the Europeans as virtual untouchables came his determination to eliminate untouchability in India.
Out of his experience in trying to unify the Indian people in South Africa, speaking many languages, came his advocacy of a lingua franca for India. It was in Indian Opinion in Durban on August 18, 1906, that he first called for the adoption of Hindustani as the common language for India.
As the national movement developed in India under Gandhiji`s leadership - from non-cooperation to civil disobedience and then to the "do or die" struggle in 1942 - it became radicalised. It stopped seeking a compromise settlement with the oppressors and became committed to the complete independence of India. It also became strongly internationalist under the influence of Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru, and by 1946 Gandhiji began advocating the unity of all the oppressed peoples of the world for the elimination of colonialism.
Gandhiji, meanwhile, kept in contact with developments in South Africa. He encouraged the Indian passive resistance movement of 1946 under the leadership of Dr. Yusuf M. Dadoo and Dr. G.M. Naicker, and lent it great support. While he had confined the first Satyagraha in South Africa to the Indian and Chinese settlers whose security was threatened, he gave his blessings to the efforts of the Dadoo-Naicker leadership to build a united democratic front.
He was, in a sense, a patron of the movements both in India and among Indians in South Africa. In the last year of his life, when he felt anguish at the eruption of violence between Hindus and Muslims in India, he seemed to find some solace in the Satyagraha in South Africa.
One of his last speeches - at the prayer meeting in Delhi on January 28, 1948 - was devoted to the struggle in South Africa. He said:
"Today we are also a free country as South Africa and are members of the same Commonwealth, which implies that we should all live like brothers and equals. ... Why should they look down on the coloured people? Is it because they are industrious and thrifty? I shall tell the Government of South Africa through this meeting that it should mend its ways."
The Indian people in South Africa benefitted from the lessons of their own Satyagraha of 1907-14, as well as the experience of the Indian national movement. The concept of Satyagraha was enriched by their passive resistance of 1946-48 which was joined by several Africans, Coloured people and whites out of solidarity.
The Indian Satyagraha was the precursor of the great non-violent resistance under African leadership in 1952, aptly named the "Campaign of Defiance against Unjust Laws" and, indeed, the beginning of mass resistance in South Africa.
The heritage of Gandhiji and of Satyagraha is thus a common heritage of South Africa and India.
Continuing inspiration of Gandhiji
One does not need to be a Gandhian to recognise that the philosophy and example of Gandhiji remain a powerful force in the world, spreading wider and adapting to the traditions and circumstances in different countries.
The leaders of the freedom movements in many colonial countries acknowledge the inspiration of Gandhiji. The civil rights movement in the United States, led by the Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., was inspired by his example, as was much of the movement against the Vietnam war.
The mass movement for disarmament and against nuclear war, and the environmentalist movement, have been influenced, among others, by Gandhiji.
Non-violent resisters in the Philippines played a significant role in the struggle to overthrow the Marcos dictatorship. The mobilisation of hundreds of thousands of unarmed people to surround and protect the armed forces which turned against Marcos was a crucial event in the struggle and added a new dimension to the history of non-violent resistance.
Liberation theology, which has spread in Latin America, Africa and Asia, draws some of its inspiration from Gandhiji.
A dramatic affirmation of the vitality of the heritage of Gandhiji was the Delhi Declaration of Mikhail Gorbachev and Rajiv Gandhi in November 1986 - calling for a non-nuclear and non-violent world - the reference to non-violence reportedly included at the suggestion of Gorbachev.
None of the recent non-violent movements perhaps strictly follows the tenets of Gandhiji, as understood by his disciples in India, but he has been an inspiration as people tried to choose the most peaceful and effective means of struggle against injustice and oppression in the light of the relevant conditions. The philosophy of Gandhiji cannot be codified into immutable rules, but must always be creative. It evolved with his experience in forty years of struggle. He kept his windows open to receive inspiration from all sources. He learnt from the humblest in the resistance campaigns. He welcomed discussion and debate. He changed his views many times and never hesitated to admit errors.
It is a pity that Indian thinkers and public leaders have not followed the spread and development of Gandhian ideology and have made little contribution to the movements inspired by it.
Is non-violent resistance relevant to South Africa?
Has Satyagraha lost all relevance in South Africa as a means of resistance, especially after the Sharpeville massacre?
The answer is not simple.
I believe that patient suffering with love has hardly ever melted the hearts of oppressive rulers. Satyagraha has succeeded to the extent that it aroused public opinion in the camp of the adversaries and beyond so as to restrain and exert pressure on the oppressors. That is why Gandhiji always devoted great attention to publicity.
Given the possibility to reach and arouse public conscience, non-violent resistance makes it difficult for the oppressors to resort to extreme savagery and thereby saves lives. It helps the oppressed people to overcome fear of prison and torture and steels them in the struggle. It makes it possible to reach settlements without bitterness.
In South Africa, however, the movement faced not only an enemy which became ever more brutal, refusing to recognise the humanity of the black people, but powerful international forces of greed and prejudice hindered effective pressure against the racist regime.
Regrettably, many people in the Western world are not outraged by violence against people with a black skin and such violence gets little press and public attention. As powerful vested interests from abroad became involved in South Africa, they tended to exert their influence to protect the racist structures which ensure them exorbitant profit. Perhaps even more important, mass resistance in South Africa began at a time when the world was divided by the "cold war" and cold war calculations began to influence the policies of powerful nations much more than justice. The ANC was branded by Western intelligence services as pro-Communist, because like most national movements it tried to encompass all the people and had not excluded Communists or followers of other ideologies. This has largely determined the actions of Western Governments, particularly that of the United States, whatever the public pronouncements of their leaders.
As a result, even on occasions when some of the white rulers in South Africa contemplated a change of course, powerful influences from abroad reinforced those who advocated reliance on ever greater violence to perpetuate racist domination.
It is, therefore, understandable, to say the least, that the leaders of the liberation movement felt that they had to undertake violent resistance. But that does not necessarily mean that non-violent resistance has become totally irrelevant nor that the spirit of Satyagraha had disappeared.
In many countries, non-violent resistance took place at the same time as violent resistance, or threat of such resistance. There was, for instance, violent resistance in India on many occasions and a threat of violence in the United States when Dr. King was leading the Civil Rights Movement. The oppressors are often obliged to choose between compromise with the mainstream of the movement pursuing non-violent resistance and confrontation with the growing trend toward violent resistance.
In South Africa, the movement has used peaceful means whenever possible and hardly any other country has seen such persistent non-violent resistance, even alongside armed struggle, as South Africa.
There are also situations where effective non- violent resistance by the oppressed people is not practicable while non-violent action can be carried on by those abroad outraged by the injustice. For instance, the Vietnamese peasants could not non-violently resist unseen persons throwing bombs from high up in the sky, but the American people could carry on such resistance against involvement in the Vietnam war. In the case of South Africa, too, there have been times when Satyagraha abroad in solidarity with the oppressed people was more feasible and effective than non-violent resistance inside the country.
Mass Satyagraha against apartheid and all its protectors and accomplices all over the world may well be the most effective means to put an end to the continuing tragedy in South Africa.
The answer to the question of relevance is then that even though the oppressed people and their leaders are convinced that clandestine activity, sabotage and armed struggle have become essential or indispensable, the spirit of Gandhiji has not lost all its relevance.
I would like briefly to trace the course of the liberation struggle, in the context of violence and non- violence, to underline this conclusion.
Unconcern for African lives
One of the first mass actions of the ANC was the 1919 campaign against the pass laws, reminiscent of the Indian Satyagraha a few years earlier. Thousands of men and women threw away their passes and were sentenced to imprisonment with hard labour; those who were sentenced to fines refused to pay fines and chose to go to prison.
The regime reacted with savagery. Many Africans, including even children, were trampled under horses` hoofs as mounted policemen charged on a peaceful demonstration outside a Johannesburg court and shot at by white vigilantes. Several were killed. But there was hardly a murmur of protest in the world - though that was the time when leaders of Allied Powers were waxing eloquent about human rights - as the victims were Africans.
When the Indian people launched passive resistance on June 13, 1946, the police in Durban stood by without arresting the resisters and let white ruffians attack them with bicycle chains. At least two resisters fell unconscious, and one bystander died.
Fortunately, a white priest, the Reverend Michael Scott, felt compelled to join the resisters and get public attention to the vigilante violence. Gandhiji expressed his outrage and sent a personal appeal to General Smuts so that the violence was curbed.
The great Campaign of Defiance against Unjust Laws in 1952 attracted attention and sympathy around the world as 8,000 people of all racial origins courted imprisonment. The regime responded with inhuman laws for whipping passive resisters. There was hardly a protest from the governments of the great Western democracies.
The ANC, however, managed to carry on non-violent resistance - bus boycotts, school boycott, potato boycott and resistance against the removal of African communities - over the next few years. Its leaders were subjected to arbitrary restrictions and even a four-year trial for High Treason. But there was not even verbal condemnation of apartheid violence by the major Western Powers until the Sharpeville massacre of 1960.
Instead, they called for sympathy and understanding for white fears for the future rather than for the suffering of the black majority. They invited the Pretoria regime to discussions of Western military strategy and alliances in Africa and the Middle East. Britain signed the Simonstown military alliance with the Pretoria regime in 1955.
When some National Party leaders advocated a change of course in the wake of the flight of capital after the Sharpeville massacre, Western financial interests bailed out the regime and thereby strengthened the position of Prime Minister Hendrik Verwoerd and other advocates of greater repression.
Combination of armed struggle and non-violent resistance
As a result, the ANC leaders felt obliged, in 1961, to abandon strict adherence to non-violence and prepare for armed resistance. As Nelson Mandela explained in his statement to the court in April 1964, members of the ANC had begun to lose confidence in the ANC policy, as fifty years of non-violence seemed to have achieved nothing, and were developing ideas of terrorism. Scattered incidents of violence had broken out in the country and there was a danger of uncontrolled violence. The ANC leaders felt that a properly controlled violent resistance, under the guidance of the ANC, was essential to avert the danger of terrorism and make any progress.
The Umkhonto we Sizwe, the military wing of the ANC, said in its first manifesto on December 16, 1961:
"We of Umkhonto we Sizwe have always sought to achieve liberation without bloodshed and civil clash. We hope, even at this late hour, that our first actions will awaken everyone to a realisation of the dangerous situation to which the Nationalist policy is leading. We hope we will bring the government and its supporters to their senses before it is too late, so that both the government and its policies can be changed before matters reach the desperate stage of civil war."
The Umkhonto carried on some three hundred acts of sabotage between 1961 and 1963 against symbols of apartheid and some economic installations in order to warn the regime and its supporters, give hope to the people and promote international action. Every care was taken to avoid loss of human life. Only one person - a police informer in the eastern Cape - was killed by the ANC underground while the regime tortured several leaders of the people to death. Vuyisile Mini, the respected composer of freedom songs, and his colleagues were executed.
Until today, the total number of persons killed in numerous ANC armed actions is perhaps less than two hundred. Several of the casualties were possibly unintended and resulted from malfunction of the timing mechanism of explosives.
Even after gruesome killings of refugees in Maputo and Maseru by South African raiders, and a series of tortures of detainees to death, the ANC was able to prevent retaliation in kind.
It was not beyond the capacity of ANC, or of the black people in spontaneous eruptions of anger, to kill thousands of whites. The absence of such terrorism was due to the enormous restraint of the ANC and its influence among the people, an influence which it would not have had if it had opposed all violence.
During all these years since 1961, the freedom movement has also utilised every opportunity for non- violent defiance of unjust laws at great sacrifice.
The student upsurge in the 1970`s was essentially non-violent. The funeral processions defying laws prohibiting the display of the ANC flag and symbols - thereby making the laws virtually inoperative - were non-violent resistance, as are the rent boycotts and consumer boycotts and the "end conscription" campaign.
The United Democratic Front and allied organisations have contributed an impressive chapter to the history of non-violent resistance.
The growth of non-violent resistance in South Africa, and the development of international solidarity, encouraged and enabled Archbishop Desmond Tutu, the Reverend Alan Boesak and other churchmen to defy the laws on many occasions and force the regime to retreat.
Since 1985, the violence of the apartheid regime under its State of Emergency - the indiscriminate shootings and the mass torture of detainees - as well as the series of ghastly murders by vigilante groups provoked counter-violence. Enraged youth groups resorted to killing suspected informers by "necklacing," and that was used by the regime and its friends to malign the liberation movement.
The ANC could perhaps have said - as even Mahatma Gandhi wrote from jail in 1942 - that it could not condemn, without full information, people who were provoked to violence by the "leonine" violence of the regime when their leaders were confined and exiled.
But Oliver Tambo, the President of the ANC, declared last year that the ANC opposed "necklacing". He was reported to have advised African youth last September to try to win over informers and vigilante groups. I can think of none but a Mahatma Gandhi who could show such courage and humanism in the midst of a difficult battle and popular emotions.
Spirit of Gandhiji lives on in South Africa
The spirit of Gandhiji lives on in South Africa eighty years after he went to prison in the Transvaal defying unjust racist laws, forty years after his ashes were immersed in the ocean off the mouth of the Umgeni river in South Africa - not least in the hearts of the leaders of the liberation struggle.
They have stood firm on truth, despite constant provocation and bestiality by a racist regime, resisting all forms of racism and constantly upholding the objective of a non-racial democratic society. They have resisted unjust laws with exceptional courage and sacrifice. They have recognised that ends and means are inseparable, and have avoided the temptation to reply to the massive terrorism of the white racist regime with terrorism against white civilians. Even in the course of armed resistance, they have avoided the loss of innocent lives.
Gandhiji did not condemn Sant Bhagat Singh or those who resorted to sabotage when he was jailed along with other leaders of the national movement in 1942 - but placed the blame squarely on the violence of the British Raj. Martin Luther King, Jr., did not condemn John Brown or Malcolm X, but only slavery and racism.
Chief Albert Lutuli did not condemn Nelson Mandela for founding and leading the military wing of the African National Congress, but declared when Mandela and his colleagues were sentenced in June 1964:
"... in the face of the uncompromising white refusal to abandon a policy which denies the African and other oppressed South Africans their rightful heritage - freedom - no one can blame brave just men for seeking justice by the use of violent methods nor could they be blamed if they tried to create an organised force in order to ultimately establish peace and racial harmony...
"They represent the highest in morality and ethics in the South African political struggle..."
The ANC is attacked by the Botha regime, which relies on violence and terrorism, as violent; and that charge is echoed by the friends of that regime who instigate and support violence and terrorism in many countries of the third world. But it has earned the understanding, sympathy and even active support of the greatest pacifists of our time, many of whom acknowledge the inspiration of Gandhiji.
NANA SITA: LAST OF THE GANDHIANS IN SOUTH AFRICA(2)
Among those who kept the spirit of Mahatma Gandhi alive in South Africa, long after he left the shores of that country in 1914, Nana Sita holds a special place.
Nanabhai, as he was affectionately known, came into prominence during the Indian passive resistance movement of 1946-48 and helped build the alliance with the African majority. He continued non-violent defiance of apartheid until his death in 1969, long after most militants of the liberation movement had become convinced that underground and armed resistance to apartheid had become imperative. Though they disagreed with him, members of the African National Congress and the Indian Congress respected his views and actions - for he continued to defy apartheid, without fear and flinching at no sacrifice.
The regime had been able to supress organized resistance in 1963-64, with the imprisonment and torture of thousands of leaders and activists, and a series of repressive laws. But the adamant defiance of Nanabhai - now old and sick - against forcible racial segregation, was an inspiration to the people. He helped keep alive the flame of peaceful resistance which was to grow in subsequent years.
When he passed away on December 23, 1969, shortly after the centenary of Gandhiji, at the age of 71, the Johannesburg Star wrote that he had enjoyed "universal respect of South Africans, white and non-white." (The Star, weekly edition, December 27, 1969). Sechaba, the organ of the African National Congress, pai tribute to his heroic life, full of sacrifice and devotion to the struggle in which he went to prison seven times. It said:
"... in paying our tribute to a fallen freedom fighter, the African National Congress works for the day when we can remember publicly in South Africa the man who was our comrade and friend." (Sechaba, March 1970).
The life of Nana Sita deserves to be recalled now when the people of South Africa look back at their struggle - armed and non-violent - and acknowledge the contribution made to it by people of varied backgrounds and ideologies, united in uncompromising resistance against racist domination.
Nana Sita was born in Matwadi, a village in Gujarat, India, in 1898, in a family which was active in the Indian freedom movement. He went to South Africa in 1913 and lived for some time with J.P. Vyas in Pretoria, to study book-keeping. Soon after his arrival, Gandhiji, then leading a Satyagraha, went to Pretoria for negotiations with General Smuts and stayed almost two months in the same house.
Identifying himself with the indentured Indian labourers, Gandhiji ate only once a day, wore only a shirt and loincloth, slept on the floor and walked barefoot several miles to the government offices to meet General Smuts. The contact with Gandhiji had a great influence on Nanabhai`s life. He followed the simplity of Gandhiji, and became a vegetarian, teetotaller and non-smoker. More important, he was always ready to resist injustice and gladly suffer the consequences.
He worked for some years in his uncle`s fruit and vegetable business and then started his own business as a retail grocer. He was active in the religious and social welfare work in the small Indian community in Pretoria. He joined the Transvaal Indian Congress and became secretary of its Pretoria branch.
During the Second World War, when the Government imposed new measures to segregate the Indians and restrict their right to ownership of land - culminating in the Asiatic Land Tenure and Indian Representation Act of 1946 (the "Ghetto Act") - militants in the Transvaal and Natal Indian Congresses, led by Dr. Yusuf M. Dadoo and Dr. G.M. Naicker, advocated mass resistance. They were able to defeat the compromising leaderships of the Congresses and launch a passive resistance campaign in June 1946 with the blessings of Gandhiji. The campaign was directed by the Transvaal and Natal Passive Resistance Councils and over 2,000 people went to jail.
Nana Sita joined the militants as any compromise with evil was against his principles. He became a member of the executives of the Transvaal Indian Congress and the Transvaal Passive Resistance Council. He acted as Chairman when Dr. Dadoo was in prison or on missions abroad.
He led a large batch of "United Nations Day volunteers" - Indians, Africans and Coloured people - from the Transvaal in October 1946 and was sentenced to 30 days` hard labour. After release, he went to prison a second time. Almost every member of his family - he had seven children - went to jail in the campaign. His daughter - Maniben Sita courted imprisonment twice.
Nanabhai - always wearing the Gandhi cap - became a familiar figure in the Indian movement. His courageous spirit was reflected in his presidential address to the Transvaal Indian Congress in 1948. He said:
"Do we all of us realise the significance, the importance, the heavy responsibility that has been cast upon each and every one of us when we decided to challenge the might of the Union Government with that Grey Steel, General Smuts, at its head? Are we today acting in a manner which can bring credit not only to the quarter million Indians in South Africa but to those four hundred million people now enjoying Dominion Status as the first fruits of their unequal struggle against the greatest Empire of our times?
"It is for each and every one of us in his or her own way to answer that question with a clear conscience. But let me say that I have nothing but praise for those brave men and women fellow resisters of mine. History has ordained that they should be in the forefront in the great struggle for freedom in this colour-ridden country of eleven million people...
"Over two thousand men and women have stood by the ideal of Gandhi and have suffered the rigours of South African prison life and they are continuing to make further sacrifices in the cause of our freedom. We at the head of the struggle cannot promise you a bed of roses. The path that lies ahead of us is a dark and difficult one but as far as I am personally concerned I am prepared to lay down my very life for the cause which I believe to be just." (Passive Resister, Johannesburg, April 30, 1948).
The Indian passive resistance was suspended after the National Party regime came to power in June 1948, but only to be replaced by the united resistance of all the oppressed people.
In June 1952, the African National Congress and the South African Indian Congress jointly launched the "Campaign of Defiance against Unjust Laws" in which over 8,000 people of all racial origins were to court imprisonment.
Nanabhai was one of the first volunteers in that campaign. He led a batch of resisters which included Walter Sisulu, Secretary-General of the African National Congress. He came out of jail in shattered health.
The next year, when Dr. Dadoo was served with banning orders, Nanabhai was elected President of the Transvaal Indian Congress but he was also soon served with banning orders preventing him from active leadership of the community.
Yet, in 1960, during the State of Emergency after the Sharpeville massacre, he was detained for three months without any charges.
With the banning of the African National Congress and the escalation of repression, leaders of the ANC decided to undertake an armed struggle, taking care even then to avoid injury to innocent people. Those who believed in non-violence as a creed or could not join the military wing of the movement faced a serious challenge as even peaceful protests were met with ruthless repression. Nana Sita - with his Gandhian conviction that resistance to evil is a sacred duty and that there is no defeat for a true satyagrahi - was undeterred. Like Chief Albert Lutuli, the revered President-General of the ANC, he continued to defy apartheid - especially the "Group Areas Act", described as a pillar of apartheid, which enforced racial segregation at enormous cost to the Indian and other oppressed people.
In 1962, Hercules, the section of Pretoria in which Nanabhai lived, was declared a "white area" under the "Group Areas Act". He was ordered to vacate and move from his home - which he had occupied since 1923 - to Laudium, a segregated Indian location eleven miles away. He defied the order and was taken to court on December 10th, the United Nations Human Rights Day.
Denouncing the Group Areas Act as designed to enforce inferiority on the non-white people and cause economic ruination of the Indian community, he told the court overflowing with spectators:
"Sir, from what I have said, I have no hesitation in describing the Group Areas Act as racially discriminatory, cruel, degrading, and inhuman. Being a follower of Mahatma Gandhi`s philosophy of Satyagraha, I dare not bow my head to the provisions of the unjust Act. It is my duty to resist injustice and oppression. I have therefore decided to defy the order and am prepared to bear the full brunt of the law.
"It is very significant that I appear before you on this the tenth day of December, to be condemned and sentenced for my stand on conscience. Today is Human Rights Day - the day on which the Universal Declaration of Human Rights was accepted by the world at the United Nations. It is a day on which the people of the world rededicate themselves to the principles of truth, justice and humanity. If my suffering in the cause of these noble principles could arouse the conscience of white South Africa, then I shall not have strived in vain.
"Sir my age is 64. I am suffering with chronic ailments of gout and arthritis but I do not plead in mitigation. On the contrary I plead for a severe or the highest penalty that you are allowed under the Act to impose on me."
He was sentenced to a fine of 100 Rand or three months in prison, and warned that if he failed to comply he would be given twice that sentence. He refused to pay the fine and spent three months in prison.
The next year, as he and his wife, Pemi, continued to occupy their home, he was again taken to court and sentenced to six mnonths in prison.
The authorities charged him and his wife again in 1965. He appealed to the Supreme Court challenging the validity of the Group Areas Act. The matter dragged on for a year before his appeal was dismissed.
When the trial resumed in 1967, Nanabhai read a 19- page statement on the background of the Group Areas Act which he described as a "crime against humanity", and said:
"The Act is cruel, callous, grotesque, abominable, unjust, vicious and humiliating.
"It brands us as an inferior people in perpetuity, condemns us as uncivilized barbarians... "One day the framers of this Act will stand before a much higher authority for the misery and the humiliation they are causing....
"If you find me guilty of the offence for which I am standing before you I shall willingly and joyfully suffer whatever sentence you may deem to pass on me as my suffering will be nothing compared to the suffering of my people under the Act. If my suffering in the cause of noble principles of truth, justice and humanity could arouse the conscience of white South Africa then I shall not have strived in vain... I ask for no leniency. I am ready for the sentence."
Many Indians attended the trial and wept when he concluded his statement.
He was sentenced again to six months` imprisonment and served the term, declining the alternative of a fine of 200 rand. His wife was given a suspended sentence.
On his release from prison, he said:
"It is immaterial how many other people accept or submit to a law - or if all people accept it. If to my conscience it is unjust, I must oppose it.
"The mind is fixed that any injustice must be resisted. So it does not require a special decision each time one is faced with injustice - it is a continuation of one commitment." (Jill Chisholm in Rand Daily Mail, April 6, 1968)
Soon after, on April 8, 1968, Nanabhai and Pemi were forcibly ejected from home and government officials dumped their belongings on the sidewalk. But they returned to the home and Nanabhai never complied with the order until he died in December 1969.
Few others followed Nanabhai`s example of determined non-violent resistance in the 1960`s. The militants among the Indians, espousing armed struggle, had been captured, or went into exile, or tried to rebuild underground structures which had been smashed by the regime in 1963-64. The traders, who were severely affected by the Group Areas Act, had given up resistance after all their petitions, demonstrations and legal battles had failed. A silence of the graveyard seemed to have descended over the country.
But the resistance of Nanabhai was not in vain. It showed that non-violent defiance need not be abandoned even at a time of massive repression or armed confrontation. It inspired people in efforts to overcome frustration and apathy. The Indian Congresses, which had become dormant, were resuscitated in later years and helped build the powerful United Democratic Front.
Nana Sita`s children - Maniben Sita and Ramlal Bhoolia, both veterans of the 1946 passive resistance - played leading roles in the resurgent movement, defying further imprisonment.
As the freedom movement recovered, the Soweto massacre of African schoolchildren on June 16, 1976, failed to intimidate the people. Thousands of young people joined the freedom fighters. And many more began to demonstrate their support of the struggle and defy the regime, making several laws inoperative. The struggle entered a new stage.
The mass non-violent defiance campaign, which swelled in recent years like a torrent encompassing hundreds of thousands of people, has made a great contribution, together with the armed struggle and international solidarity action, in forcing the racist regime to seek a peaceful settlement. South Africa, the land where Gandhiji discovered satyagraha, has enriched his philosophy by adapting it under the most difficult conditions.
Nana Sita - who held up the torch when the movement was at an ebb - was in a sense the last of the Gandhians. The mass democratic movement now derives inspiration from many sources, including the experience of the long struggle of the African people and the Gandhian tradition cherished by the Indian community.
Nana Sita is remembered with respect as his colleagues in struggle - Nelson Mandela, Walter Sisulu, Ahmed Kathrada and others now out of jail - lead the nation in its continuing efforts to eliminate apartheid and build a non-racial democratic society.
"His sympathy and understanding of the problems of Africa were a great source of courage to all who have been engaged in the struggle for the liberation and unity of Africa."
-President Kwame Nkrumah of Ghana, in a broadcast on the death of Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru
"In the upsurge of anti-colonial and freedom struggles that swept through Asia and Africa in the postwar period, there could hardly be a liberation movement or national leader who was not influenced one way or another by the thoughts, activities and example of Pandit Nehru and the All India Congress. If I may presume to look back on my own political education and upbringing, I find that my own ideas were influenced by his experience."
- Nelson Mandela, in letter from prison to India, August 3, 1980
Whenever Jawaharlal Nehru spoke of Africa, it was with the passion of a historian who revolted at the long martyrdom of the people of that continent, the faith of a leader of a national liberation struggle in the ultimate triumph of all oppressed peoples, and the commitment of an internationalist to assist other peoples in their efforts for emancipation. There was not the slightest trace of condescension or paternalism, but respect for the culture of the African peoples and confidence in their resurgence. Africa, to him, was not a remote continent but a neighbour across the seas, "for the sea both separates and connects." (Nehru and Africa, page 38).
He espoused African freedom during India`s own struggle for independence. Hardly had he become head of the Interim Government on September 1, 1946, that he began to exhort Asia and the world to help Africa. He told the Asian Relations Conference in New Delhi in March 1947: "We of Asia have a special responsibility to the people of Africa. We must help them to take their rightful place in the human family." At the conclusion of the Asian-African Conference in Bandung in 1955, he felt compelled to point out:
"Everything else pales into insignificnce when I think of the infinite tragey of Africa ever since the days when millions of Africans were carried away as galleyslaves to America and elsewhere, half of them dying in the galleys. We must accept responsibility for it, all of us, even though we ourselves were not directly involved."
"Even now," he continued, "the tragedy of Africa is greater than that of any other continent, whether it is racial or political. It is up to Asia to help Africa to the best of her ability because we are sister continents." (Speech at concluding session on April 24, 1955).
He told the Seminar on Problems of Portuguese Colonies in New Delhi on October 20, 1961:
"My heart goes out to what is heppening in Africa. I think that the agony of the African continent throughout history has been such that it has not been equalled anywhere. It is terrible, and I think the whole world owes it to the African people not to hinder them, but to help them in freedom in every way." (Nehru and Africa, page 36).
He saw to it that India did its utmost to promote African freedom and play a leading role on behalf of Africa in the United Nations and other fora until newly-independent African nations could take over.
He rejoiced at the march of freedom in Africa by the early 1960`s and the formation of the Organization of African Unity. He said on August 12, 1963:
"... perhaps the most exciting thing that is happening in the twentieth century is the awakening of Africa...
"It is, I think, a major event in history and, what is more, it is going to play an ever-growing part in the coming years. We in India have naturally welcomed it." (Nehru and Africa, page 37)
Africa, moreover, was very much in his mind as he sought to promote a "peace zone" shielded from the cold war, and build a concert of non-aligned nations to secure the total abolition of colonialism and promote a world without arms and war. The decision of the African States in 1963, to join the Movement of Non-aligned Countries en bloc, making Africa the one continent that is totally non-aligned, was in a sense the best tribute to the labours of Pandit Nehru.
Heritage of the Indian national movement
Nehru`s concern with racialism and colonialism in Africa and his feeling of solidarity with the African people has its roots in his innate humanism, his experience in the Indian freedom struggle and his intimate association with Mahatma Gandhi.
Until the 1920`s Indian interest in Africa had centred around the position of Indian settlers in southern and eastern Africa. Tens of thousands of Indians had been recruited, after the abolition of African slavery in the nineteenth century, to work under semi-slave conditions as indentured labourers in plantations, mines and railways in South Africa, the Carbbean and the Pacific. Africans and Indians thus shared in oppression. By the end of the century, however, some of the Indian labourers who completed their indenture, and the traders who followed them, advanced in economically. Concerned at competition from them, European settlers in South Africa enacted a series of measures designed to dispossess and deport the "free" Indians. The Satyagraha led by Mahatma Gandhi in South Africa from 1906 to 1914, for the rights and honour of Indians, fired Indian imagination and the first political activity of Jawaharlal Nehru was to raise funds for the resisters in South Africa in 1912.
His interest widened to encompass the entire continent of Africa, and a global view of its struggles, when he represented the Indian National Congress at the International Congress against Imperialism, held in Brussels in 1927, and met several African leaders. He also became familiar with the developments in South Africa and warmly welcomed the agreement among the South African delegates at the conference to promote cooperation among Africans, Indians and radical whites in the struggle against racism.
In a memorandum on "A Foreign Policy for India" , sent to the Indian Congress later that year, he suggested that Indians in Africa "should cooperate with the Africans and help them as far as possible and not claim a special position for themselves which is denied to the indigenous inhabitants of the country." (Selected Works of Jawaharlal Nehru, Volume 2, page 362).
He maintained contact with several leaders of the African freedom movements, especially in London, and with the Pan African movement. The Pan African Congresses began to support the Indian demand for complete iodependence while the Indian national movement expressed its full sympathy for African aspirations.
In 1936, while passing through Rome on way to India, Nehru rejected approaches for a meeting with the Italian dictator, Benito Mussolini, because of the Italian invasion of Abyssinia. Instead, he organized nation-wide demonstrations in India to denounce the aggression, and declared in his presidential address to the Congress that year:
"In Abyssinia bloody and cruel war has already gone on for many months, and we have watched anew how hungry and predatory imperialism behaves in its mad search for colonial domains. We have watched also with admiration the brave fight of the Ethiopians for their freedom against heavy odds... Their struggle is something more than a local struggle. It is one of the first effective checks by an African people on an advancing imperialism..." (Selected Works of Jawaharlal Nehru, Volume 7, p.194).
At the same time, fascist measures in South Africa aroused resistance among Africans and Indians. A new generation of Indian leaders, led by Dr. Yusuf M. Dadoo, challenged the compromising leadership of the Indian Congresses, prepared for militabnt resistance to racist measures and sought unity with the African majiority in a common struggle for freedom. Nehru`s strong support to the militants helped promote a non-European united front and joint campaigns against racist measures.
Meanwhile, the progress and ideology of the national movement in India, the largest colony struggling against the mightiest imperial power, was followed with keen interest by Africans. The writings of Pandit Nehru were avidly read by African intellectuals. His international outlook and his stress that national freedom must benefit the common people, appealed to the emergent African movements in which the youth and trade unions played a crucial role. Nowehere was this as striking as in South Africa, with one of the oldest national movements struggling against the heaviest odds. To quote Nelson Mandela:
"While at university and engrossed in student politics, I, for the first time, became familiar with the name of this famous man. In the `forties, for the first time I read one of his books, The Unity of India. It made an indelible impression on my mind and ever since then I procured, read and treasured any one of his works that became available."
Indians in Africa
Discrimination against Indians in South Africa was one of the first concerns of Pandit Nehru when he became head of the Interim Government in 1946. The way he approached the issue, so unlike leaders of other governments, demonstrated most clearly his respect for African rights and interests.
Indians in South Africa had launched a passive resistance movement in June 1946 in protest against the "Ghetto Act". Public feeling in India was so intense that even the Viceroy`s government was obliged to impose a trade embargo against South Africa, recall its High Commissioner from South Africa and lodge a complaint with the United Nations.
While pressing for action by the United Nations for the removal of discriminatory measures against Indians, Pandit Nehru constantly drew attention to the broader context of racism in South Africa and beyond, and exhorted Indians in Africa to cooperate with the Africans. He wrote in a policy decision on September 15, 1946:
"While India must necessarily aim at protecting the interests and honour of her nationals abroad,... we do not seek any special privileges against the inhabitants of the countries concerned. This would apply specially to African countries where the inhabitants are relatively backward and have been exploited in the past by others, including to some extent even Indians. Our objective should be to help in the rapid progress of these African territories towards political and economic freedom." (Selected Works of Jawaharlal Nehru, Second Series, Volume 1, page 446).
In a message to Indians in South Africa on the eve of the formation of the Interim Government, he said:
"The struggle in South Africa is, however, not merely an Indian issue... It concerns ultimately the Africans who have suffered so much by racial discrimination and suppression. ... Therefore, the Indians in South Africa should help in every way and cooperate with the Africans." (Selected Works of Jawaharlal Nehru, Second Series, Volume 1, page 437).
He said in a further message to Africa in May 1947:
"Indians who live in Africa must always remember that they are the guests of the Africans and that they may not do anything which might interefere with the progress of the Africans towards freedom. They must help Africans to attain their goal, and must cooperate with them in every way for their mutual advantage. We do not want any Indians to go abroad to exploit the people of any other country...
"We want to build up one world where freedom is universal, and there is equality of opportunity between races and peoples.
"I send my good wishes to the people of Africa and my fellow-countrymen in Africa, and I hope that in the difficult days to come they will co-operate together to realise the great ideals we have before us." (Selected Works of Jawaharlal Nehru, Second Series, Volume 3, page 329).
Nehru`s outlook was shared by Mahatma Gandhi who had spent 21 years of his life in South Africa and maintained a continuing interest in the continent. Gandhiji believed, as did Nehru, that freedom of India should be a means for promoting freedom of all oppressed people. He stressed that Africa belonged to the African people and that if any rights of Indians there conflicted with those of oppressed Africans, they should forego those rights. When white hooligans attacked Indian passive resisters in South Africa in 1946, he declared that he would not shed a tear if all the Indian resisters were wiped out, for they would show the way to the Africans and vindicate the honour of India. (Collected Works, Vol. 84, pp. 422-423).
India`s complaint to the United Nations provided no relief to the Indians in South Africa, but served to internationalize the issue of racism in South Africa, and encourage united struggle by the South African people. In 1952, when the African National Congress and the South African Indian Congress jointly launched the "Campaign of Defiance against Unjust Laws", India took the lead, in cooperation with other Asian and Arab States, to seize the United Nations of the broader question of apartheid and took all appropriate action to rally support to the African National Congress. Pandit Nehru declared that the revolt of all the oppressed people had overtaken the Indian question and "it is right that it should be so." (Letter to Chief Ministers, 26 August 1952).
He said in a speech in the Lok Sabha on March 28, 1960, after the Sharpeville massacre:
"The people of Indian descent in South Africa, as we well know, have had to put up with a great deal of discrimination and suffering and we have resented that. But we must remember that the African people have to put up with something infinitely more, and that, therefore, our sympathies must go out to them even more than to our kith and ken there."
Two years later, India withdrew its request for separate consideration of its complaint to the United Nations and threw its entire weight behind action against apartheid.
In Kenya, as in South Africa, Pandit Nehru tried to promote African-Indian unity for freedom. In 1952, when the Mau Mau rebellion and brutal mass repirsals by the authorities created a grave situation, he appealed to the Indians in Kenya to stand by the Africans in the hour of their need and resist maneuvres by the authorities to set Indians against the Africans. He strongly denounced the repression and did not hesitate to criticize Indian leaders who were timid.
Support for Africa`s freedom and advancement
Almost from the day he became head of the Interim Government, and even before India attained independence, Pandit Nehru ensured that India pressed in every international forum for speedy advancement of African and other colonial territories to self-government and independence. He never wavered in his confidence, which was shared by few other world leaders at the time that Africa would soon be free of colonial rule. As he wrote in his letter to Chief Ministers of Indian States on February 3, 1949:
"Whatever the immediate future may be in Africa, it is clear that the whole continent of Africa has got a big future and changes will take place there fairly rapidly. These changes will be governed by the new political consciousness of the African people. We welcome this new consciousness and wish to coperate with it." (Letters to Chief Ministers, Volume I, pages 275-76).
At the first session of the United Nations General Assembly in 1946, the Indian delegation carried his instruction to give highest priority to the issues of colonialism and racism. It not only pressed the complaint concerning racial discrimination against Indians in South Africa, but was instrumental in defeating the maneuvre of the South African government to annex the mandated territory of South West Africa. It fought doggedly to revise the trusteeship agreements proposed by the colonial Powers in favour of the colonial peoples, asserting that sovereignty belonged to the people of the territories and not the administering Powers.
This was a difficult task as the United Nations was then dominated by the colonial Powers and their friends, and even other Asian States tended to vacillate or succumb to pressures. The espousal of the cause of the peoples oppressed by colonialism and racism earned India the hostility of colonial Powers which increased with the aggravation of the "cold war" and the rise of military alliances and blocs. This experience was to have a significant effect on the country`s foreign relations.
India`s support for African freedom was not confined to public statements or debates at the United Nations and other fora or even diplomatic exchanges. Pandit Nehru was always responsive to requests of African leaders and organizations for practical assistance.
He instituted a scholarship programme for African students at the request of Kenyan organizations in 1946. The programme was rapidly expanded and despite the acute scarcity of places in Indian educational institutions, facilities were readily provided for African applicants. Pandit Nehru took personal interest in the welfare and progress of the African students.
In 1952, when Jomo Kenyatta was imprisoned in Kenya, he sent a senior counsel for his defence despite the resentment of British authorities. In 1955, when the African National Congress and the South African Indian Congress sought to send a delegation to the Asian- African Conference, he arranged for their travel to Bandung and introduced the delegation to the leaders at the Conference. In 1960, when Oliver Tambo escaped to Bechuanaland to seek international support for the struggle in South Africa, Pandit Nehru rushed him travel documents by a special plane.
In 1961, when the Congo (now Zaire) was faced with a grave crisis after the assassination of Patrice Lumumba, he sent an Indian brigade to serve with the United Nations peacekeeping force. It enabled the United Nations to expel Belgian and other mercenaries and protect the integrity of the Congo.
The process of decolonization of Africa was complicated by the cold war and the system of military alliances which encouraged colonial Powers like Portugal to undertake brutal wars. There was a constant threat of foreign military intervention even after independence and of a new scramble for Africa.
Pandit Nehru was forthright in opposing foreign intervention and the intrusion of East-West conflict into Africa. The non-aligned countries played a signficant role in providing diplomatic and other assistance to enable African countries to withstand external pressures.
Pandit Nehru recognized that the task of building themselves up would be much more difficult and would require the help of all countries. He assured Africa "that so far as India is concerned, all our thinking and emotions are with you, and that so far as we can help, we shall help." (Statement to Seminar on Problems of Portuguese Colonies, October 20, 1961, in Nehru and Africa, page 36). Despite its own economic difficulties, India provided assistance to a number of African countries and liberation movements.
Pandit Nehru`s advocacy of the policy of non- alignment, with its positive and dynamic content, had a great appeal to Africa. With the advance of African countries to independence, the Movement of Non-aligned Countries emerged as a major force in the community of nations.
The Legacy of Nehru
Pandit Nehru played a historic role in assisting the African people to ensure that the colonial revolution in Asia would be soon be followed by the resurgence of Africa, confounding those who hoped to keep that continent in perpetuity as their preserve. He was, in a sense, one of the architects of the united front determined to destroy the abomination of apartheid in South Africa. The decision of African States to the non-aligned movement en bloc is a tribute to his vision as to that of African leaders.
He has left behind a legacy of intimate friendship between India and Africa in the process of liberation and nation-building. But for him, this was to serve not only the national interests but the larger cause of humanity. The cooperation of India and the African nations - and, indeed, of all non-aligned and like- minded countries - in securing a world without arms and geneuine international cooperation in the interests of humanity is the abiding monument to his memory.