How the Mahatma’s 1922 court statement echoes amidst Delhi detentions of protesters

File photo of Mahatma Gandhi. | Photo Credit: Getty Images/The Hindu Archives

The protesters courting detention while peacefully demanding the resignation of Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar on October 10 brings back to life Mahatma Gandhi’s statement during a 1922 sedition trial in a colonial court on how dissent must confront power.

The youth protesters had called for passive resistance amidst the massive build-up of security forces in the national capital.

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March 18, 1922, which happened to be a Saturday like October 10, saw Mahatma Gandhi accept an offer from the Ahmedabad District and Sessions judge, C.N. Broomfield, to make a statement in open court.

The former lawyer and the future Father of the Nation stated that “affection cannot be manufactured or regulated by law”.

“If one has no affection for a person or system, one should be free to give the fullest expression of his disaffection, so long as he does not contemplate, promote or incite to violence,” Mahatma Gandhi stated.

He urged against what he called “violent non-co-operation”, which he said “only multiplied evil”.

He said that non-violence implied a “voluntary submission to the penalty for non-co-operation”.