Naked to Buckingham Palace

Truculent, wearing red shirts, a group of Indian Communists confronted St. Gandhi at Karachi last week, began to upbraid him for "betraying India" by his pact with the Viceroy (TIME, March 16).

Gently but in moving words the Mahatma answered. Little by little he set the Communists to sniveling, some even sobbing aloud.

"You say I have betrayed India," began Mr. Gandhi. "I shall not complain if you beat me. I have no bodyguard. God alone keeps vigil over me. Some men think me crazy and a fool because of my love for my enemies, but that is the very foundation of my whole life's work and creed. . . .

"If you say that I am doing harm to India, you have the right to do so. ... I have no weapon against you except love. Let none take upon himself the duty of protecting me. God alone can do that . . . and mark my words: The day that my inner voice tells me my country no longer needs me I will starve myself to death" (sobs).

Who Killed Bhagat Singh? Six thousand delegates to the 45th Congress of Mr. Gandhi's Indian Nationalist Party had gathered last week in Karachi, grouped in a great camp of tents and bamboo shanties. Correspondents were not sure but what St. Gandhi was drawing near his Waterloo. Younger elements in the party were urging violent resistance to the British Raj. Leaders of this young rebellion against elderly, non-violent Mr. Gandhi were the Mayor of Calcutta, Subhas Chandra Bose and the retiring President of the Congress, Pandit Jawarhalal Nehru.

To inflame the malcontents still further came news that British Justice had hanged last week at Lahore that murder-guilty patriot, Bhagat Singh./- Declaring that the pact with Viceroy Lord Irwin should not have been signed because it did not pardon Bhagat Singh, opponents of St. Gandhi went among the 6,000 delegates shouting:

"Who killed Bhagat Singh? Gandhi!"

Again the Voice. The Congress was opened last week by Pandit Jawarhalal Nehru with a stirring, inflammatory speech; but just as he seemed to have the crowd warmed up, Mr. Gandhi made a shambling entrance magical in its effect.

As though smitten by invisible forces, Mr. Nehru broke off his discourse, withdrew and later announced that he had withdrawn all opposition to St. Gandhi. The. latter, as is his way, did not press his advantage. There would be time enough next day, he said, to vote on the vital issues, and after a few unimportant speeches the Congress rose.

Before the delegates met again Mayor Bose of Calcutta had also thrown up his sponge, and Mr. Gandhi had served upon the Congress a characteristic ultimatum. "My inner voice tells me," he said, "that if resolutions approving the course I have taken are not passed my country will need me no longer. I would then be convinced that the people of India had not responded to my call, and I would therefore starve myself to death."

Shrewd, Mr. Gandhi has never tried to move Christians by this Christlike form of ultimatum; but upon the Hindus and Moslems of India he has tried it more than once, and last week it again suc- ceeded. Abruptly the Congress Working Committee approved the whole Gandhi program, threw it to the delegates.

Vote After Vote-- In the Gandhi landslide, hanged Patriot Bhagat Singh was not forgotten. "While dissociating itself from and disapproving of political violence in any shape or form," resolved the assembly, "this Congress places on record its admiration of the bravery and sacrifice of Bhagat Singh, Sukh Dev and Raj Guru and mourns with their bereaved families the loss of these lives. The Congress is of the opinion that their triple execution was an act of wanton vengeance and a deliberate flouting of the unanimous demand of the nation for commutation. "This Congress is further of the opinion that the [British] Government lost a golden opportunity for promoting good-will between the two nations, admittedly held to be crucial at this juncture, and for winning over to methods of peace a party which, driven to despair, resorts to political violence."

Soon St. Gandhi's truce with the Viceroy was ratified by unanimous vote. St. Gandhi was appointed to lead the Congress delegation to London for a Second Indian Round Table Conference soon to be held.

To call upon George V in Buckingham Palace, will St. Gandhi put on trousers for the first time in years? Followers of the Mahatma said that they thought he would: 1) Call on the King-Emperor in a simple loin cloth; 2) sleep in the yard of the Prime Minister's residence, No. 10 Downing Street "with a blanket over him if it be cold"; 3) appear at ceremonial British dinners with his tin pail of goat's milk and his large wooden spoon.

*With two other patriots, also hanged last week, he assassinated a British Police Commissioner in 1928.

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