The Web of Freedom: J.C. Kumarappa and Gandhi's Struggle for Economic Justice.

356 Pages·2016·14.039 MB·English

by  Venu Madhav Govindu, Deepak Malghan

Title Pages
The Web of Freedom: J.C. Kumarappa and
Gandhi's Struggle for Economic Justice.
Venu Madhav Govindu and Deepak Malghan
Print publication date: 2016
Print ISBN-13: 9780199460816
Published to Oxford Scholarship Online: September 2016
DOI: 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199460816.001.0001
Title Pages
Venu Madhav Govindu
Deepak Malghan
(p.i) The Web of Freedom
(p.iii) The Web of Freedom
(p.iv)
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Title Pages
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Frontispiece
The Web of Freedom: J.C. Kumarappa and
Gandhi's Struggle for Economic Justice.
Venu Madhav Govindu and Deepak Malghan
Print publication date: 2016
Print ISBN-13: 9780199460816
Published to Oxford Scholarship Online: September 2016
DOI: 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199460816.001.0001
Frontispiece
Venu Madhav Govindu
Deepak Malghan
(p.ii)
J. C. Kumarappa (extreme left) and
Mahatma Gandhi at the Haripura
Congress Session, 1938. Gandhi’s
compatriot and physician, Sushila Nayar,
can be seen exiting the doorway to
Gandhi’s right.
Photograph courtesy of Baryalai Shalizi.
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Dedication
The Web of Freedom: J.C. Kumarappa and
Gandhi's Struggle for Economic Justice.
Venu Madhav Govindu and Deepak Malghan
Print publication date: 2016
Print ISBN-13: 9780199460816
Published to Oxford Scholarship Online: September 2016
DOI: 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199460816.001.0001
Dedication
Venu Madhav Govindu
Deepak Malghan
(p.v) To the many selfless workers of the All-India Village Industries Association
(1934–50) (p.vi)
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Illustrations
The Web of Freedom: J.C. Kumarappa and
Gandhi's Struggle for Economic Justice.
Venu Madhav Govindu and Deepak Malghan
Print publication date: 2016
Print ISBN-13: 9780199460816
Published to Oxford Scholarship Online: September 2016
DOI: 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199460816.001.0001
(p.ix) Illustrations
Venu Madhav Govindu
Deepak Malghan
Frontispiece image: J. C. Kumarappa (extreme left) and Mahatma Gandhi
at the Haripura Congress Session, 1938. Gandhi’s compatriot and
physician, Sushila Nayar, can be seen exiting the doorway to Gandhi’s
right ii
1. The Cornelius family, circa 1901. The nine-year-old Joseph is standing
in the back row (second from right, with a bow-tie) and his parents,
Solomon Doraisamy Cornelius (1851–1917) and Esther Rajanayakam
(1856–1924), are seated in the middle 30
2. Holidaying on the beach at Mandwa, 1925 30
3. On a picnic with friends in England, sometime between 1913 and 1919
31
4. Joseph taught accountancy at Davar’s College in present-day Mumbai.
The college was founded by Sohrab Davar, Joseph’s partner in the firm
Cornelius and Davar 31 (p.x)
5. Just in case you thought selfies were a new phenomenon. Joseph took
these in early 1927 and captioned them (a) ‘Reflections’, (b) ‘The
Denationalised One’, (c) ‘The Pathan’, and (d) ‘The Shah’ 32–3
6. As a student in Syracuse in the winter of 1927–8 34
7. The Kumarappa brothers: Bharatan, J. T. Cornelius, Joseph, and J. M.
Kumarappa. Probably taken in early 1930s 157
8. The nationalist at work, probably 1931 157
9. Kumarappa in Simla in the winter of 1935–6 158
10. This group portrait was very likely taken by Kumarappa in Simla. The
individuals in the foreground are (left to right) Amrit Kaur, Kasturba, and
Devadas Gandhi. The person in the background behind Amrit Kaur is
Gandhi’s secretary, Pyarelal 159
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Illustrations
11. Crowd at the inauguration of the Magan Sangrahalaya in Wardha, 30
December 1938 159
12. Kumarappa and Gandhi at the inauguration of the Magan
Sangrahalaya in Wardha, 30 December 1938 160
13. The Magan Sangrahalaya 160
14. Kumarappa lived in a small hut at Maganvadi for almost two decades
161
15. With two of his nieces 162
16. The hut has been carefully preserved to this day 162
17. Village industries: (a) processing of leather, (b) extraction of oil using
a ghani, (c) manufacture of handmade paper, (d) laboratory work, (e)
library, and (f) exhibit of charkhas and khadi 237–9
18. Kumarappa travelled extensively for his work: (a) At the cattle farm of
the Pattagarar of Palayamkottai in Tiruppur district of Tamil Nadu. The
farm was well known as a breeding station for the Kangayam bull. (b)
Coppersmith’s Bazar, Peshawar, taken in late 1939. (c) Visiting the
Summer Palace in present-day Beijing, 1951. Kumarappa is second from
left. (d) The ruins of Hiroshima, 1951. In front of the Hiroshima Peace
Memorial, Kumarappa is second from left. (e) At the Zwinger Palace,
Dresden, Germany, May 1954. Kumarappa is the figure in the middle,
dressed in white khadi and wearing a Gandhi cap. (f) Addressing a
meeting of the War Resisters International in Paris, July 1954. The person
seated on the left is Horace Alexander, a Quaker and campaigner for
India’s (p.xi) freedom. (g) With Fenner Brockway in August 1954.
Brockway was an anti-war campaigner and a British MP. 328–31
19. With Vinoba Bhave at T. Kallupatti 338
20. The President of India, Rajendra Prasad, called on an ailing
Kumarappa at the Mission Hospital in Madurai, 15 August 1957 339
21. Kumarappa’s last place of residence at the Gandhi Niketan Ashram, T.
Kallupatti 339
22. Kumarappa at the age of sixty-five 340
(p.xii)
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Acknowledgements
The Web of Freedom: J.C. Kumarappa and
Gandhi's Struggle for Economic Justice.
Venu Madhav Govindu and Deepak Malghan
Print publication date: 2016
Print ISBN-13: 9780199460816
Published to Oxford Scholarship Online: September 2016
DOI: 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199460816.001.0001
(p.xiii) Acknowledgements
Venu Madhav Govindu
Deepak Malghan
The idea of writing this biography arose out of our belief that the life and work
of J. C. Kumarappa (1892–1960) has important lessons for our own times. We
have received much help and support from a number of individuals and
institutions during the long period of working on this book.
The New India Foundation funded our work for a year (2006–7) through the
grant of a fellowship. The Foundation is also a co-publisher of this volume and
we are very grateful to its trustees for their generous support as well as their
exemplary forbearance over the long period it took us to produce a manuscript.
The most important primary material used are the personal papers of
Kumarappa that are archived at the Manuscripts Division of the Nehru Memorial
Museum and Library (NMML), New Delhi. During our multiple visits to NMML
we have benefited immensely from the help and cooperation of many, especially
D. S. Routela, Deepa Bhatnagar, and N. Balakrishnan. Our work at the archives
of the Sabarmati Ashram Preservation and Memorial Trust, Ahmedabad, was
greatly aided by Durgesh Trivedi and Amritbhai Modi as well as Dina Patel and
Kinnari (p.xiv) Bhatt. At Magan Sangrahalaya in Wardha—Kumarappa’s home
for some two decades—we were given free access to the available material by
Vibha Gupta. The Sangrahalaya’s copies of Gram Udyog Patrika, a journal edited
by Kumarappa, were invaluable for our work. We are also very thankful to Vibha
for her generous permission to use photographs from Kumarappa’s personal
collection. We are grateful to S. K. Bhatnagar and Y. P. Anand for their keen
interest in our work and their help during numerous visits to the library of the
National Gandhi Museum, Rajghat, New Delhi. We thank T. Kulashekar, Sita
Sivaramakrishnan, and Lawrence Surendra for arranging unfettered access to
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Acknowledgements
books and papers at the Kumarappa Memorial Trust at Santhome, Chennai. Our
lack of easy access to good libraries was significantly ameliorated by the
treasure trove available online at the Digital Library of India.
Prior to being deposited at NMML, Kumarappa’s personal papers were carefully
preserved for many decades by his devoted disciple, the late M. Vinaik. We wish
to record our gratitude to Vinaik for it would not have been possible to write this
book without the availability of these personal papers or the immensely helpful
outline provided by Vinaik’s own biography of Kumarappa.
Over the years we have benefited from the support, advice, and research
material provided by Gopalkrishna Gandhi, Ramachandra Guha, Srinath
Raghavan, and E. S. Reddy. We are also thankful to the following individuals for
providing us with useful research material: S. Theodore Baskaran, Satya Brink,
Herman Daly, S. Chandrashekar, Raghabendra Chattopadhyay, Kanakmal
Gandhi, Mark Lindley, Eric Lindquist, Arvind Krishna Mehrotra, Robert Nelson,
Atmaram Saraogi, Solomon Victus, and Gomati Vinaik.
Many personal recollections were shared with us by Kumarappa’s nephew, D. J.
K. Cornelius, and nieces, the late Prita Kumarappa Shalizi and the late Sarah
Chandy. Kumarappa’s grand-nephew, Baryalai Shalizi, was most helpful with his
prompt responses to a number of queries and his enthusiastic support. Baro also
provided us with some wonderful photographs from the family collection.
We thank the team at Oxford University Press for shepherding the book through
to publication.
Finally, we gratefully acknowledge the very useful and critical feedback provided
on a first draft of the book by Rajmohan Gandhi, Ramachandra Guha, Srinath
Raghavan, Amrita Shah, and Tridip Suhrud, as well as the two anonymous
reviewers commissioned by the publishers. Needless to say, all errors and
interpretations are those of the authors alone. (p.xv)
Personal Acknowledgements
In addition to the individuals and institutions listed above, my work on this book
was facilitated by the staff of many libraries, including the Gandhi Memorial
Museum, Madurai; Mani Bhavan Gandhi Sangrahalaya, Mumbai; and the Goa
State Central Library, Panaji. At the Gandhi Niketan Ashram, T. Kallupatti,
Kumarappa’s last place of residence, I was welcomed and helped by R.
Venkataswami and his colleagues.
I acknowledge the help received from my students Avishek Chatterjee and Sk.
Mohammadul Haque. Avishek designed the charkha icon used as a separator and
processed many of the images used. Mohammad created a high-resolution
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Acknowledgements
version of the cover photograph using image super-resolution techniques
developed as part of his research work.
In the early years of scouting for research material, I have freely availed of the
hospitality of many friends: Khushman and Arati Gandhi in Ahmedabad, Supratik
Chakraborty, Bibha Rani Chakraborty, and Lata P. M. in Mumbai, Sandhya and
Shekhar Deshmukh in Wardha, and P. V. Madhusudhan Rao in New Delhi.
I owe a special debt of gratitude to my doctoral adviser, Rama Chellappa, who
greatly aided the pursuit of my intellectual interests in computer vision. His free-
spirited generosity and support has also been a vital enabling factor in the
writing of this book. Ravindra R. P. played an instrumental role in seeding the
idea of this biography and has been an unwavering source of support and
friendship. A. G. Menon, Sugata Srinivasaraju, and Rosy D’Souza are the most
generous of friends.
My parents, Saraswati and Krishna Murthi, and my brother, Suresh, provided
their unconditional love as well as support for my atypical pursuits.
To Neeta I owe more than I can express here.
—Venu Madhav Govindu
Bengaluru
October 2015
U. N. ‘Ravi’ Ravikumar and Surendra ‘Dada’ Koulagi first introduced me to
Kumarappa on a birdwatching trip in 1996. Ashok Rao, Santosh Koulagi, and
Suresh Malghan facilitated access to the Gandhi Peace Foundation library at
Dharwad, which was the site of my first textual engagement with Kumarappa.
I thank Ravindra R. P., Rajesh Kasturirangan, and Vinay Kumar for their support
during the earliest stages of this project. (p.xvi)
My doctors in Bengaluru and Chennai, combining skill, learning, and humility in
equal measures, have been instrumental in seeing me through a significant
health setback during the course of this project. I am grateful to the Indian
Institute of Management Bangalore (my employer) for the generous health plan
that has provided me access to doctors and hospitals. A long train journey
shared with the redoubtable late Narayan Desai not only deepened my
understanding of the history of constructive work but also gave me renewed
strength to confront my medical problems. His creative and extempore
reinterpretation of Gandhi’s Ekadash Vrat, inscribed on the book that I was
reading on the train, has continued to serve as a source of strength and
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Acknowledgements
inspiration. Ravi Rajan has been another source of immense wisdom on all
things medical, and much else.
Venu and Neeta shared their warmth, friendship, home, and hearth. Their home
in Goa and especially the long evening walks on the beach at Miramar was
where this project took shape. Venu’s uncommon comradeship, generosity, and
forbearance have all been central to sustaining this project.
My family’s support has been crucial during this project. My mother, Jyoti, has
been a constant source of support despite upheavals in her own life. Arunima
provides unalloyed joy, and is a life-affirming force. I am not even going to make
an attempt to record Hema’s love and sacrifice through the years. This is a debt
that I cannot repay in any measure. She is—therefore, I am.
—Deepak Malghan
Bengaluru
October 2015
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