Purna Swaraj

Purna Swaraj 

Purna Swaraj 

In India, some of the national leaders felt attracted towards the concept of Dominion Status. When the Simon Commission was touring India, an All-parties Conference was held at Lucknow in August 1928 for a draft constitution for the country. Pandit Motila Nehru headed a committee to prepare the draft which the Conference accepted. It came to be known as the Nehru Report or the Nehru Constitution. This constitution proposed Dominion Status as the immediate goal of India. To silence the critic who felt that social condition in India were unsuitable for self-government, the Nehru Committee declared: “We do not deny that there is much need for social advance……… We feel, however, that is an argument for, rather than against the establishment of responsible government, for we believe that without real political power coming into our hands, a real programme of social reconstruction is out of the question. The Nehru Report rejected the separate electorate and some other dangerous doctrine which the British had introduced. It recommended for provincial autonomy and assured freedom of religion, freedom of conscience and freedom of expression to all Indians. While men like Motilal Nehru felt that India should win Dominion Status, there were others who regarded it as a status of no honour. For them, Purna Swaraj or complete independence should be the only goal for the Indian nation.

The National Congress had talked of Swaraj for years. It now talked of Purna Swaraj. In its Madras Session in 1927 the Congress announced complete independence as its objective. The younger generation of Congressmen led by Jawaharlal Nehru and Subhash Chandra Bose looked at the idea of Dominion Status with disfavor. So too, the Left Wing members of the Congress Party Gandhi announced his decision for complete independence.

While Simon Commission continued its work with the official support, most of the political parties were trying to frame a constitution for India. The committee constituted for the purpose was headed by Pandit Motilal Nehru. An ultimatum was served on the British Government that if the constitution framed by the Nehru Committee was not accepted in its entirety on or before 31 December 1929, the Congress would revive the non-violent non-cooperation campaign with the aim of realizing complete independence. The Indian National Congress met at Lahore on 29th December, 1929. Being a huge gathering of 15,000 people, the youth Congress President Jawaharlal Nehru announced the Congress polity that complete independence was the goal of India. It was to be “complete freedom from British dominion and British imperialism.” “ The embrace of the British Empire,” he declared, “is a dangerous thing. It cannot be the life-giving embrace of affection freely given and returned. And if it is not that, it will be what it had been in the past, the embrace of death.” In that historic session on the 31st December, 1929, Mahatma Gandhi moved his famous resolution on Purna Swaraj, saying: “The Congress declared that the words ‘Swaraj’ in Article 1 of the Congress Constitution shall mean Complete Independence and further declared the entire scheme of the Nehru Committee’s Report to have lapsed and hopes that all Congressmen will henceforth devote their exclusive attention to the attainment of Complete Independence for India.” To the anxious gathering of that great session, Gandhi held out the immediate prospect of a Civil Disobedience Movement. The resolution on Purna Swaraj was passed by the Congress on the last day of the year 1929. The tricolour National Flag, signifying independence, was unfurled by the Congress President Jawaharlal Nehru as the thunderous shouts of ‘Inquilab Zindabad’ or Long Live the Revolution greeted the occasion from countless throats.