Page 54 - GANDHI A Biography for Children and Beginners

GANDHI – A Biography for children and beginners

Indian indentured labourers were working. They would tell the workers of the

struggle and the government's undermining of Indian marriages and families.

Gandhi's plan worked. Women Satyagrahis crossed the frontiers. Some including
Kasturba were arrested and sent to prison. Others who were allowed to go free

reached the mines. Their story sent the miners into a fit of indignation. They

downed their tools and came out of the pits. The response was overwhelming.

Gandhi came to know of the strike and rushed to New Castle. He cautioned the

miners. They were staking their all. They would lose the huts that the
employers had given them. They would lose their jobs and incomes. Their

families would suffer. They should leave the mines only if they were prepared

for all these possibilities.

The struggle might be long. All that he could promise was that he would "live
and have my meals with them as long as the strike lasted".

The workers reaffirmed their determination and arrived in their thousands,
with their women and children. Gandhi had a big problem on his hands. Surely,

the workers added a new dimension to the force at his command. But where

was he to house them? How was he to feed them? How was he to use them in
the struggle? They had to be housed under the roof of the sky. Some Indians

helped in finding grains and other requirements. One of them, Lazarus looked

after their needs with all that he had, housing them in his compound and

putting his stocks of grain at their disposal. But how long could thousands be
fed that way?

Gandhi hit upon a plan that would meet many of his objectives. He would take

the workers to the Tolstoy Farm where they could work and wait to participate
in the struggle. If they were arrested at the frontier of the State, Government

would take responsibility for them.

It was no easy task to take thousands of hungry illiterate men, women and

children on a long march. They had to get food on the way. A white baker came

to the rescue. He agreed to make bread available at the stages of the march on

the appointed days. Everyone would get Vi lbs. of bread and half an ounce of

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