1. LETTER TO ANAND T. HINGORANI Y. M., August 23, 1930 MY DEAR ANAND, I have your delightful letter. You do not tell me how you fared physically. I have already written to you. I am glad Vidya is with you and has seen a little of the Ashram life. Tell me how you are in mind and body. Love. BAPU From a microfilm. Courtesy: National Archives of India and Anand T. Hingorani 2. LETTER TO KASHINATH TRIVEDI YERAVDA MANDIR, August 23, 1930 CHI. KASHINATH, I have your letter. After Shanta and Kalavati have tried the medicine given by the doctor, write to me and tell me what effect it has. If the latter has taken a pledge to join the struggle, I think she cannot leave. But you have already written to Father. You should both do as your hearts bid you. Blessings from BAPU From a photostat of the Gujarati: G.N. 5249 3. LETTER TO CHANDRAKANTA Y. M., August 23, 1930 CHI. KANTA, I have your letter. If any questions arise with regard to the vow of not indulging the palate, ask me.1 You have not mentioned anything about your health in your letter this time. I therefore assume 1 For Gandhiji’s observations on the control of the palate, vide “Letter to Narandas Gandhi”, 12-8-1930. VOL.50: 23 AUGUST, 1930 - 5 JANUARY, 1931 1 that you are well. Do you go for a walk every day? Physical exercise is necessary. Blessings from BAPU [PS.] Blessings to Brother. When you write to Mother and Father, say that I often think of them. BAPU From a photostat of the Gujarati: Chandrakanta Papers. Courtesy: Gandhi National Museum and Library 4. LETTER TO VIDYA HINGORANI YERAVDA MANDIR, August 23, 1930 CHI. VIDYA, I have your letter. Look upon the Ashram as your home. Try to improve your Hindi handwriting still further. Blessings from BAPU From a microfilm of the Hindi. Courtesy: National Archives of India and Anand T. Hingorani 5. LETTER TO MIRABEHN YERAVDA MANDIR, August 24, 1930 CHI. MIRA, I have your love letter written during your journey to Madras. I am hoping that this strain will not prove too much for you. Your descriptions are all valuable. Yes, I had a strenuous time during the Nehrus’ visit. It was with difficulty that I was able to spin 375 rounds without doing which I should feel most unhappy. The box wheel is working very well and undoubtedly causes less strain. It gives more satisfactory work now that I have put on it the thin mal you sent me. The thick mal was causing trouble. The carding-bow is working to perfection. It imposes no strain on me. Kakasaheb rolls the slivers. He has yet to learn carding which he proposes to begin shortly. The translation of the bhajans continues as before regularly but slowly 2 THE COLLECTED WORKS OF MAHATMA GANDHI and I see no immediate chance of greater output. I am keeping well. The weight fluctuates. Last week I regained one pound out of two or three I seemed to have lost. There has been no loss of energy. The water here is hard and therefore constipation requires a little handling. Love. BAPU [PS.] You will be glad to know that the tant has not once broken. From the original: C.W. 5409. Courtesy: Mirabehn; also G.N. 9643 6. LETTER TO PRABHAVATI YERAVDA MANDIR, August 24, 1930 CHI. PRABHAVATI, I didn’t see any letter from you in the mail this week. You must have received my letters to Jayaprakash and to you. My weight, which was going down, has again increased by one pound. What is your daily programme of work these days? Vallabhbhai told me that Jayaprakash was not in good health. How is that? Blessings from BAPU From a photostat of the Gujarati: G.N. 3367 7. LETTER TO SUSHILA GANDHI YERAVDA MANDIR, August 24, 1930 CHI. SUSHILA (MANILAL), You seem to have dried up? Is it out of compassion for me or through laziness? If you had compassion for me, you would write to me. How is Sita? Why does she fall ill so often? I hope you are not being miserly about fruit. What is the condition of your ears? How do you keep generally? How is Tara? How is Nanabhai’s health? Think about other similar questions yourself. I hope you, always find Manilal with a smile on his face and joking. Does he read anything in jail? Blessings from BAPU From a photostat of the Gujarati: G.N. 4770 VOL.50: 23 AUGUST, 1930 - 5 JANUARY, 1931 3 8. LETTER TO RASIK DESAI YERAVDA MANDIR, August 24, 1930 CHI. RASIK (DESAI), Did you uphold my honour? Did you keep the vows which you had taken? Give me all the details. How did you spend the time? Were you lazy? Were you talkative? Did you keep good health? Reply to these and many other similar questions. What friends did you make? Blessings from BAPU From a photostat of the Gujarati: G.N. 6617 9. LETTER TO MRIDULA SARABHAI YERAVDA MANDIR, August 24, 1930 CHI. MRIDU, I have preserved your last letter. I did not reply to it. But after reading about your heroism I cannot help writing. Deal patiently with the situation. I would advise you not to do anything on an impulse. Does it need mentioning that pure sacrifice calls for careful thought, a sense of discrimination, restraint and patience? Since Khurshedbehn was with you, I felt reassured and satisfied. Blessings from both of us. MOHANDAS From the Gujarati original: C.W. 11109. Courtesy: Sarabhai Foundation 4 THE COLLECTED WORKS OF MAHATMA GANDHI 10. LETTER TO NARANDAS GANDHI YERAVDA MANDIR, August 24/26, 1930 CHI. NARANDAS, This time I got the letters earlier than usual, that is, on Wednesday instead of on Thursday. Among the letters is one for Satis Babu. He is Krishnadas’s guru, Satis Mukherjee. His address is Harra Road, Calcutta. I have forgotten the number of the flat. You will find it somewhere in my papers. Surendra is likely to know it. Or you will get it in the Ashram office itself. How is Devdas’s health? Tell him that I often think of him. Has Ramdas’s health recovered? I have before now asked for the names of those who have been released. It would be better if against each name the quantity of carding and spinning done by the person is also mentioned. If, when you do not get a cloth-lined envelope, the ordinary envelope is tightly secured by a string, like a packet sent as book post, there will be no risk afterwards. Keshu seems to have lost health again.Take immediate and effective measures to help him to recover. Giriraj’s illness has lasted quite long. His blood must be impure. I have not received the guide to Singer’s. If you find it difficult to secure a copy, give up the attempt. I understand what you write about Hasmukhrai. Give him the letters if and when you think you may. Read the letter to Zaulinger before giving it to her. Hence I don’t write about her in this letter. You must have sent an acknowledgment to Dhangopal. How is Jamnadas? Do the authorities let you visit him occasionally? Tuesday morning, August 26, 1930 Non-possession is allied to non-stealing. A thing not originally stolen must nevertheless be classified as stolen property if we possess it without needing it. Possession implies provision for the future. A seeker after truth, a follower of the law of love, cannot hold anything against tomorrow. God never stores for the morrow; He never creates more than what is strictly needed for the moment. If, therefore, we repose faith in His providence, we should be assured that He will give us every day our daily bread, meaning everything we require. Saints and men of faith have always found justification for it from their experience. Our ignorance or negligence of the Divine Law, which gives to man from day to day his daily bread and no more, has given VOL.50: 23 AUGUST, 1930 - 5 JANUARY, 1931 5 rise to inequalities with all the miseries attendant upon them. The rich have a superfluous store of things which they do not need, and which are therefore neglected and wasted; while millions starve to death for want of sustenance. If each retained possession only of what he needed, no one would be in want and all would live in contentment. As it is, the rich are discontented no less than the poor. The poor man would fain become a millionaire, and the millionaire a multi-millionaire. The poor are not content if they get their daily needs. They have a right, however, to get enough for their daily needs and it is the duty of society to help them to satisfy them. The rich should take the initiative in dispossession with a view to universal diffusion of the spirit of contentment. If only they keep their own property within moderate limits, the starving will be easily fed and will learn the lesson of contentment along with the rich. Perfect fulfilment of the ideal of non-possession requires that man should, like the birds, have no roof over his head, no clothing and no stock of food for the morrow. He will indeed need his daily bread, but it will be God’s business, and not his, to provide it. Only very very few, if any at all, can reach this ideal. We ordinary seekers may not be repelled by the seeming impossibility. But we must keep the ideal constantly before us, and in the light thereof critically examine our possessions and try to reduce them. Civilization, in the real sense of the term, consists not in the multiplication, but in the deliberate and voluntary reduction of wants. This alone promotes real happiness and contentment and increases the capacity for service. Judging by this criterion, we find that in the Ashram we possess many things the necessity for which cannot be proved, and we thus tempt our neighbours to steal. If people try, they can reduce their wants and, as the latter diminish, they become happier, more peaceful and healthier. From the standpoint of pure truth, the body, too, is a possession. It has been truly said that desire for enjoyment creates bodies for the soul and sustains them. When this desire vanishes, there remains no further need for the body and man is free from the vicious cycle of births and deaths. The soul is omnipresent; why should she care to be confined within the cage-like body, or do evil and even kill for the sake of that cage? We thus arrive at the ideal of total renunciation and learn the use of the body for the purposes of service so long as it exists, so much so that service, and not bread, becomes for us the staff of life. We eat and drink, sleep and wake, for service 6 THE COLLECTED WORKS OF MAHATMA GANDHI alone. Such an attitude of mind brings us real happiness and the beatific vision in the fulness of time. Let us all examine ourselves from this standpoint. We should remember that non-possession is a principle applicable to thoughts as well as to things. A man who fills his brain with useless knowledge violates that inestimable principle. Thoughts which turn us away from God or do not turn us towards Him are unnecessary possessions and constitute impediments in our way. In this connection we may consider the definition of knowledge contained in Chapter XIII of the Gita. We are there told that humility, amanitvam, etc., constitute knowledge and that all the rest is ignorance. If this is true—and there is no doubt that it is true—much that we hug today as knowledge is ignorance pure and simple, and therefore only does us harm instead of conferring any benefit. It makes the mind wander and even reduces it to a vacuity, and discontent flourishes in endless ramifications of evil. Needless to say, this is not a plea for inertia. Every moment of our life should be filled with mental or physical activity, but that activity should be sattvik, tending towards truth. One who has consecrated his-life to service cannot be idle for a single moment. But we have to learn to distinguish between good activity and evil activity. This discernment goes naturally with a single-minded devotion to service. Blessings from BAPU [PS.] Kakasaheb’s weight has again increased by one pound, and his cheerfulness has also increased. I have regained one pound from what I had lost. For the past three days, I have been taking boiled vegetables in addition to curds. You will see that today’s letters are put into one of the envelopes received from you, fresh slips of paper being pasted on it. You can use the envelope again. BAPU [PPS.] There are 53 letters. From a microfilm of the Gujarati: M.M.U./I VOL.50: 23 AUGUST, 1930 - 5 JANUARY, 1931 7 11. LETTER TO PREMABEHN KANTAK YERAVDA MANDIR, August 29, 1930 CHI. PREMA, I got your letter. No one should be amused at my writing on slips of paper or be angry with me for that reason. That is the proper thing for me to do. Though I write on such slips, I try to make each letter as interesting as I can in the time I get. Why are you alarmed by the suspicion that you have got some disease in your body? What would it matter even if you had a disease and that too a grave one? “The body may live or perish, what should endure is one’s devotion to God.’’1 We have learnt at least this in the Ashram, if nothing more. If you fast for a few days, the body will be cleansed. You require Kuhne baths, hip-baths and particularly friction sitz-baths. If you do not know about them, ask Kanta or Radha. I think they know. You may also read about them in Kuhne’s book. Whenever women suffer from any disease, it becomes necessary to know the facts about their monthly periods. Are they normal with you? Are they regular in appearance and duration? Are they painful? If necessary, consult a doctor. I have not read Arvind Babu’s book. I alone know how limited is my reading. My main interest is in reading the book of nature. I shall never finish reading it. You should have enough sleep. You should observe the rule of sleeping from 9 to 4. Blessings from BAPU From a photostat of the Gujarati: G.N. 10232; also C.W. 6680. Courtesy: Premabehn Kantak 1 From the Marathi saint Namdev 8 THE COLLECTED WORKS OF MAHATMA GANDHI 12. LETTER TO MAHALAKSHMI MADHAVJI THAKKAR YERAVDA MANDIR, August 29, 1930 CHI. MAHALAKSHMI, Was there any letter to which I did not reply? I do think every day about you and all other sisters. I would have been happy, too, if you had spent a few months with me. However, both of you have so trained yourselves, though you lived away from me, that I don’t know what more you would have gained if you had stayed with me. It is good that the children still live on fruit, etc., and that you have started on it again. Why has not Dahibehn written to me? My blessings to all sisters. Blessings from BAPU From a photostat of the Gujarati: G.N. 6797 13. LETTER TO MANSHANKAR J. TRIVEDI YERAVDA MANDIR, August 29, 1930 CHI. MANU (TRIVEDI), Gangabehn writes and tells me that you have become impatient to go out [for work]. This was before you got my letter. I hope that my letter has overcome your restlessness. Can a soldier ever ask why? He goes on doing, silently and cheerfully, the work assigned to him. Let Kakasaheb’s condition be fulfilled. It is not long now before he will be released. If you are still not satisfied let me know. Blessings from BAPU From a photostat of the Gujarati: G.N. 7761 VOL.50: 23 AUGUST, 1930 - 5 JANUARY, 1931 9 14. LETTER TO PRABHAVATI YERAVDA MANDIR, August 29, 1930 CHI. PRABHAVATI, I have your letter. If Kamalabehn willingly lets you go and there is an opportunity for work in Bihar, it is your first duty to take it up. I hope Jayaprakash is keeping good health. Take care of your health. I got Mrityunjay’s letter. I am more or less all right. I have at present substituted fresh vegetables for raisins and dates in my diet. I shall watch the effect of the change. Don’t worry about me. Blessings from BAPU From a photostat of the Gujarati: G.N. 3368 15. LETTER TO MAITRI GIRI YERAVDA MANDIR, August 29, 1930 CHI. MAITRI, You should write regularly to me. I feel happy to hear from Gangabehn that she is satisfied with you. I hope you keep good health. Blessings from BAPU From a photostat of the Gujarati: G.N. 6218 10 THE COLLECTED WORKS OF MAHATMA GANDHI