Histories of the Non- Cooperation and Khilafat Movements

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The mass awakening in India after the First World War gave a new dimension to the Indian struggle for Independence. The emergence of M.K. Gandhi on the Indian political scene, his new techniques of mass mobilization, peasant upsurges, revolutionary activities and state peoples' movements, etc., alarmed the colonial power. The Indian National Congress approached the masses through its programme of non-cooperation, broadened its mass base and attempted to unite the people on a common platform to fight British imperialism.

The British reorganized their Intelligence Department to report on the activities of the 'seditious leaders', examine their methods of operation and to bring on record the mass response they received as well as the influence they commanded over the people.

This book is the outcome of reports prepared by an intelligence bureau official in 1924 on the two crucial movements of the day - Non-Cooperation and Khilafat movements - which were inter-dependent and posed a major challenge to the British authority. It provides a connected account of the movements in different regions of country.

Included in the book are the proceedings of some of the important meetings of the Indian National Congress, the Central Khilafat Committee and the Jamait-ul-Ulema Hind along with extracts from the speeches of Indian leaders.

The book throws open many vital questions and offers rare documentary material which was earlier almost inaccessible to scholars. This will be of much use to those engaged in reconstructing the history of the period.

P.C. Bamford was Deputy Director, Intelligence Bureau, Home Depart-ment, Government of India.

The success which attended the Non-co-operation and Khilafat Movements in India is undoubtedly attributable to the Great War. for neither agitation could have attained the dimensions which it did but for the economic pressure to which the people were subjected in consequence of the prolonged and wide-spread hostilities. This pressure aggravated and magnified local grievances and spread the spirit of unrest, thus making, for a time, the work of agitators easy. There is, however, no greater proof of the hollowness of these agitations than the manner in which they succumbed to improved economic conditions. The crops during the years 1922 and 1923 were good and financial stability was beginning to re-appear. The result was the total faqufe of the agitations to survive the set-backs they incurred in 1922, and in consequence, by 1924, they were confined (except in Burma) to the comparatively small irreconcilable elements from which every country, to a greater or lesser extent, suffers.

Although the Khilafat Movement ostensibly had the purely religious object of compelling the maintenance of spiritual and temporal Muslim control over the Holy Places of Islam, yet there is no doubt that the real aim of its most revolutionary and active leaders was the destruction of British rule in India: an aim which was justified on the ground that Britain is the most powerful rival to Muslim influence in the Near East. Gandhi quickly realised this and, appreciating the value of a common object for the Non-co-operation and Khilafat Movements, provided them with a common platform, i.e., the Punjab and Khilafat wrongs, from which to appeal to the feelings of people of all denominations. The Annual Congress and Khilafat Conferences were always held at the same time and place, and some of the personnel were generally common to the committees of both. These committees, during the period of their greatest activity in the years 1920 and 1921, were very closely associated.

In consequence of Gandhi's influence the two organisations became, for a time, largely interdependent; and although each maintained separate machinery, yet their methods and products were identical. It is therefore often very difficult to distinguish between the, results of the two movements, when considering them in retrospect, and the history of one would be incomplete without the history of the other. This is particularly applicable to Chapter III of Part I, viz., " The results of Non-co-operation propaganda ", much of which could, with equal ease, have been incorporated in Part II, since it contains matter which might be attributed as much to Khilafat as to Non-co-operatiou agitation.