Remembering Motilal Nehru: The ‘prince amongst patriots’

The first session of Indian National Congress (INC), after the Non-Cooperation Movement of 1920-21, was held in Gaya in December 1922. The president of the session, C.R. Das and Motilal Nehru, who had earlier presided over the Congress “three years earlier”, were in favour of council entry as they felt that it was the best forum to present the country’s legitimate demands.

The other eminent leaders who supported the move were Hakim Ajmal Khan and Vithalbhai Patel (elder brother of Vallabhbhai Patel). They were called pro-changers. Those who were opposed to council entry were C. Rajagopalachari, Dr M.A. Ansari (later president, INC in 1927) and Vallabhbhai Patel. This group was called no-changers. Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru did not join either of the groups. Though his sympathy lay with the no-changers, Jawaharlal tried to bring about a compromise between the warring groups. But both sides were adamant and refused to compromise following which Jawaharlal resigned from the Congress Working Committee (CWC).

Motilal Nehru and C.R. Das formed a Swaraj Party within the Congress and contested elections throughout the country meeting with resounding success. Mahatma Gandhi, who presided over the Congress session in December 1924, earlier, in May, met Motilal Nehru and Das and told them that council entry and non-cooperation were not compatible with each other. At a meeting of the All-India Congress Committee in Ahmedabad in June 1924, a resolution was passed to debar those who did not believe in policy of boycott of courts and legislatures from holding an executing office in the Congress. Another resolution made it compulsory for all Congressmen to give 10 tolas of self-spun yarn in lieu of annual fee of four annas (25 paise). Both these resolutions were not accepted by the Swarajists and they walked out of the session. He felt “defeated and humbled”, wrote Gandhi in Young India. But the great liberal and democrat that he was the Mahatma left the Swarajists free to follow their own programme. But the death of C.R. Das in June 1924 seriously affected the fortunes of the Swaraj Party.

Motilal Nehru, however, despite the loss of his dearest friend, continued to preside over the Swaraj Party and was earlier elected Leader of the Opposition in the Central Legislative Assembly. It was recognised that “the Swaraj Party rendered signal service to the country. For the first time the Legislative Assembly wore the appearance of a truly National Assembly where national grievances were fully voiced, national aims and aspirations expressed without any reservation and real character of the British rule exposed. The British autocracy and Indian bureaucracy stood exposed to the whole world.” According to historian B.R. Nanda “with his (Motilal Nehru’s) commanding personality, incisive intellect, great knowledge of law, brilliant advocacy, ready wit and combative spirits, he seemed to be cut for a parliamentary role.” But communal troubles and factional fights divided and weakened the Swaraj Party by the end of 1926.

A year later, the exclusion of Indians from the Simon Commission united all Indian parties in Opposition to the government. At All-Parties Conference it was decided to appoint a committee to draw up a Constitution for India. Motilal Nehru was made chairman of the committee. The report of the committee — called Nehru Report — proposed a dominion status as the basis of the Indian Constitution. But the Muslim League rejected the Nehru Report as it wanted separate electorates for Muslims, which was not agreed by the Congress and Mahatma Gandhi. Even Jawaharlal Nehru and his closest comrade Subhas Chandra Bose, were critical of dominion status and founded their own “Indian Independence League” within the Congress.

During Gandhi’s Dandi March, in March-April 1930, Motilal Nehru gifted his palatial house Anand Bhavan in Allahabad to the nation. He passed away on February 6, 1931 in Lucknow. In an emotional tribute, the Mahatma said, “What I have lost through the death of Motilalji is a loss for ever, rock of ages, cleft for me, let me hide myself in thee.” Bose who was opposed to the Gandhi-Irwin pact, which was signed soon after Motilal Nehru’s death, wrote: “He (Motilal Nehru) towered head and shoulders above his contemporaries and, in 1931, he was the one man in the Congress Working Committee who could have influenced the Mahatma for good. It was therefore a misfortune that at the time of Delhi negotiations he was on his death bed and it was nothing short of a national calamity that he passed away in early 1931.”

Motilal Nehru, who was president of the INC twice — 1919 (Amritsar) and 1928 (Calcutta) — was an inspirational figure of the freedom struggle whose sacrifices and selfless service had few parallels. A poetic tribute rightly referred to him as “prince amongst patriots”.

Tomorrow, February 6, will be Motilal Nehru’s 87th death anniversary

The writer, an ex-Army officer and a former member of the National Commission on Minorities, is a New Delhi-based political analyst