Bande Mataram

A Congress Committee Mystery

02-July-1907

When the All-India Congress Committee was appointed last December, we had no great hopes of its being of much utility either as a political instrument or an ornament, and when names were being juggled within the Pandal, we did not consider the matter of supreme interest. Nevertheless, the names of a few men of advanced opinions did find their way into the Bengal list. Men like Srijuts Motilal Ghose, Bipin Chandra Pal, Aswini Kumar Dutta and A. Rasul sitting side by side with Messrs. Tilak and Khaparde would form a leaven which, however small, might easily season the mass of the Committee and would at any rate prevent it from being a mere phonograph to repeat the decisions of the Dictator of Bombay. Recently there has been much talk of a meeting of the All India Committee. Mr. Gokhale took an active interest in the idea and a sitting was actually arranged for June 30 to consider the crisis in India. There was nothing to object to in that; it seemed right and reasonable that the Committee should at least appear to justify its existence. But then comes in the peculiar feature of this Committee which turns it from a straightforward body, of politicians elected by the people and observing the ordinary rules of business, into a Tibetan mystery. Certain gentlemen in Calcutta of more or less moderate views and irreproachable political respectability received notice of the meeting but other less favoured members of the Committee were utterly unaware that the meeting was to be held at all. A few days before the date fixed they were astonished to receive private letters from Bombay side assuming that they knew of it and would not fail to be present on the occasion. Neither Mr. Rasul nor Moti Babu nor Bipin Babu had received any notice from the proper quarters. Since then the meeting has been postponed and for the present all's well that ends well. But we should like to ask one or two questions. Is it possible that the conveners in Bombay did not know the addresses of the Nationalist members?—did not know for instance, that Mr. Rasul was a Barrister-at-law, or Sj. Motilal Ghose edited a not altogether unknown journal called the Amrita Bazar Patrika or Srijut Bipin Chandra was

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connected with a weekly called New India of which also even Bombay worthies must at least have heard. Or was it merely an amiable bit of "diplomatic tactics" such as it has been our privilege to witness on occasions? We heard that Mr. Gokhale had given up the idea because he could not get the Bengal leaders to agree—though we are not aware that he made any very strenuous efforts to bring about an agreement. Is it possible that it was only intended to call those of them this time who could agree? On the whole we are inclined to be charitable; no doubt the conveners thought that the Nationalist members would be likely to acquaint each other and the Committee might economise the public money in stamps; or else they may have published the date of meeting in some Bombay paper and left it to these gentlemen to take note—if they had the good luck to read it; or perhaps they knew all along that the sitting would not come off and did not like to trouble them. In any case we hope that this time they will be more formal and less kind. The members in question are none of them millionaires and cannot afford, on the strength of a newspaper notice, to take a trip to Bombay—and find the meeting postponed.

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