I - Indian National Congress: Annual Session, Guwahati, December, 1926

This Congress calls upon the Working Committee, to take immediate steps in consultation with the Hindu and Musalman leaders to devise measures for the removal of the present deplorable disturbances between Hindus and Musalmans and submit a report to the All India Congress Committee, not later than the 31st March 1927.

Il -Working Committee Resolution, 15 August, 1927

The Working Committee, at its meeting held on the 15th May, "considered the proposals made by the representative Muslim leaders who met in Delhi, on the 20th March last, as well as the opinion of the Hindu Mahasabha and other Hindu organisations and the opinions of other leaders and representatives of both communities" and submitted its report to the All India Congress Committee on the 16th May 1927.

III - AICC Resolution, 16 May, 1927

The resolution ... passed by the All India Congress Committee, with the unanimous support of all the members present including some of the foremost leaders of the Hindu Mahasabha (follows):

NWF Province and British Baluchistan

That the proposal made by the Muslim leaders that reforms should be introduced in the NWFP and British Baluchistan on the same footing as in other provinces should be given effect to ...

Separation of Sind from Bombay

i) That ... the time has come for the redistribution of provinces on linguistic basis ..

ii) That a beginning may be made by constituting Andhra, Sind and Karnataka into separate province.

Liberty of Conscience

That, in the future Constitution, liberty of conscience shall be guaranteed and no legislature, central or provincial, shall have power to make any laws interfering with liberty of conscience. "Liberty of Conscience" means liberty of belief and worship, freedom or religious observances and association and freedom to carry on religious education and propaganda with due regard to the feelings of others and without interfering with similar rights of others.

Inter-Communal Matters

That no Bill, Resolution, Motion or Amendment regarding inter-communal matters shall be moved, discussed or passed in any legislature, central or provincial if a three-fourths majority of the members of either community affected thereby in that legislature oppose the introduction, discussion or passing of such Bill, Resolution, Motion or Amendment.

'Inter-communal matters, means matters agreed upon as such by a Joint Standing Committee of both communities, of the Hindu and Muslim members of the legislatures concerned, appointed at the commencement every session of the legislatures".

This resolution is a great advance on the Lucknow Pact, of 1916, which has so far regulated Hindu-Muslim relations. Its terms are ... clear ... I should, however, like emphasise the importance of the decision regarding join electorates. The one great cause of friction so far has bee separate electorates. If the success of a candidate at election depends entirely on the votes of his co-religionists the tendency to exaggerate and accentuate points of communal friction and division in order to catch votes is inevitable The resolution, while making the fullest possible allowance for the fear of minorities regarding adequate protection, by reservation of seats, presents fresh opportunities for the development of a spirit of friendliness and mutual confidence, the best augury for a United India.

The acceptance of the principle of representation on the basis of population puts our electoral system on a just and equitable basis. It puts an end, on the one hand, to the dissatisfaction felt at the preferential treatment accorded to minorities and, on the other, removes the grievance of the majorities in Bengal and the Punjab which were reduced to minorities. At the same time, the special interests of minorities have safeguarded by the provision that if a three-fourths majority of their representatives opposed any measure affecting its interests it shall not be even discussed or moved.

Conversion: The All India Congress Committee resolves that every individual or group is at liberty to convert or reconvert another by argument or persuasion but no individual or group shall attempt to do so, or prevent its being done, by force, fraud or other unfair means such as the offering of material inducement. Persons under eighteen years of age should not be converted unless it be along with their parents or guardians. If any person under eighteen years of age is found stranded without his parents or guardian by persons of another faith, he should be promptly handed over to persons of his own faith. There must be no secrecy as to the person, place, time or manner about any conversion or reconversion, nor should there be any demonstration or jubilation in support of any conversion or reconversion.

"Whenever any complaint is made in respect of any conversion or reconversion, that it was effected in secrecy or by force, fraud or other unfair means, or whenever any person under eighteen years of age is converted, the matter shall be enquired into and decided by arbitrators who shall be appointed by the Working Committee either by name of under general regulations."

Cow and Music: "The All India Congress Committee while approving of the following resolution on the Cow and Music question as a fair settlement of opposite demands and points-of-view, authorises members of the Congress to carry on propaganda among Hindus and Muslims along the lines indicated in the resolution and calls upon the Working Committee to appoint a Sub-committee for the purpose of carrying on such propaganda.

And further resolves that the resolution do come up for confirmation at the meeting of the All India Congress Committee and the Congress to be held in Madras:

Whereas no community in India should impose or seek to impose its religious obligations or religious views upon any other community but the free profession and practice of religion should, subject to public order and morality be guaranteed to every community and person.

Hindus are at liberty to take processions and play music before any mosque at any time for religious or other purposes but there should be no stoppage of the processions nor special demonstrations in front of a mosque nor shall the songs or music sung or played in front of a mosque be such as is calculated to cause annoyance or special disturbance to the worshippers in the mosque.

Muslims are at liberty to sacrifice cows or, subject to existing municipal laws regulating the slaughter of animals for purposes of food, to slaughter cows, in any town or village, in any place not being a thoroughfare nor one in the vicinity of a temple or a mandir nor one exposed to the gaze of Hindus. Cows should not be led in procession or in demonstrations for sacrifice or slaughter.

Having regard to the deep-rooted sentiment of the Hindu community in the matter of cow-killing, the Muslim community is earnestly appealed to, so to conduct the cow sacrifice or slaughter as not to cause annoyance to the Hindus of the town or village concerned.

"Whenever a complaint is made that any of the provisions of this resolution have contravened, it shall be enquired into and decided by arbitrators appointed by the Working Committee by name or under general regulations and their decision shall be final.

A Young Muslim Freedom Fighter

Khair Mahomed, a young Muslim lad aged about 11 years, was arrested on the afternoon of 21st ultimo, under Section 108 at Matli, Sind, for having made speeches at Tando Mahomed Khan. On the 22nd morning he was brought for trial before Mr. Bolus, District Magistrate of Hyderabad.

The following answers were given by the accused when questioned by the District Magistrate:

What is your name?                            A: "Azad"

Your father's name?                            A: "Islam"

What is your caste?

I am a Non-Cooperator by caste.

What work have you been doing?

I have been preaching sedition against the government.

Will you offer any sureties?

Never. My surety is my God.

Will you apologize?

Why should I do so when I know I have committed no sin and have done my duty as an Indian.

The District Magistrate then asked him whether he would offer bail. The accused refused to do so ... (Source: The Bombay Chronicles, 7 Aug., 1922) (Courtesy: The People's Democracy)

B. Krishna On Gandhi: Triumph and Failure

. On August 1 - the day Tilak died - the Central Khilafat Committee had, under Gandhi's presidentship organised an all-India hartal. With that the non-cooperation movement was launched. Gandhi captured the Congress party and be its sole spokesman ... at the special Calcutta Congress session in September 1920. His non-cooperation resolution won 1,826 votes against 804.

The main issue before it was the redress of the Khilafat wrong - the dethronement of the Khalifa in Turkey to be reversed, whereas the Punjab atrocities and winning of swaraj were subordinate issues. The Ali brothers were primarily concerned with the Khilafat, not so much with the other two. Nevertheless, Gandhi seemed to have achieved a miracle in the union of hearts. The Hindu's wholehearted, unquestioning plunge into the Khilafat struggle moved the hearts of many Muslims; it was reinforced by Hakim Ajmal Khan's appeal to them: "To refrain from acts calculated to wound the susceptibilities of their compatriots. We are, and should be, fully cognisant of the fact that cow-killing seriously annoys our fellow countrymen."

Hindu-Muslim unity was, however, shortlived. The Khilafatists were rabid and unprincipled communalists. About mid-1921, there was the Moplah rebellion in Kerala and serious communal riots at Kohat in the NWFP About the latter, Gandhi confessed: "I am carrying a snake in my pocket." As an apostle of ahimsa, he could not have killed it, but could have removed its fangs. By not doing that, he allowed the communal virus to spread in the body politic in the years that followed. ... Gandhi did feel sad, but did not act insofar as Moplah atrocities were concerned. But he abruptly suspended his Non-Cooperation in February 1922 when, in violation of ahimsa, 21 policemen were done to death at Chauri Chaura, a village in Uttar Pradesh.

Gandhi allowed an hour of victory to slip from his hands. He suffered his defeat in two ways. First, his giving up his earlier boycott of legislatures. He yielded to C.R. Das and Motilal Nehru to fight assembly elections in 1926 and conduct parliamentary work on behalf of the Congress. Second, an estranged Mohammed Ali used ungentlemanly language when he said, "However pure Gandhi's character may be, he must appear tome, from the point of view of religion, inferior to any Mussalman, even though he be without character ... according to my religion and creed, I hold an adulterous and a fallen Mussalman to be better than Mr. Gandhi."

The tide of Pan-Islamism, set in motion by the Khilafat, showed its face in poet Iqbal's demand at the Allahabad session of the Muslim League in 1930 when he said: "I would like to see Punjab, the North Western Frontier Province, Sind and Baluchistan amalgamated into a single State. Self-government within the British Empire or without the British Empire, the formation of a consolidated North-West Indian Muslim State appears to me to be the final destiny of the Muslims, at least of North-West India ... In defeat, following the suspension of Non-Cooperation, Gandhi was down, but not out ...           (Source: The Hindu. 26.July. 1998)