Sri Aurobindo
Karmayogin
Political Writings and Speeches — 1909-1910
Karmayogin: A Weekly Review
Saturday 11th December 1909 — No.23
Facts and Opinions
A Salutary Rejection
We draw the attention of all weak-kneed Nationalists to the ban placed by the Bombay Government on the candidature of the distinguished and able Poona Nationalist, Mr. N. C. Kelkar.
Mahratta Nationalism has never been so robustly uncompromising as the Bengal school in its refusal of co-operation in the absence of control, and Mr. Kelkar, though a sincere and ardent Nationalist, a friend and constant fellow-worker of Mr. Tilak, has always preserved an independent line in this matter and considered himself at liberty to help the cause of the country on bodies controlled by the Government.
It greatly helps our cause that the Government should so emphatically set its face against any mistaken diplomacy of this kind.
Mr. Kelkar's only specific 
offence against eligibility was a sentence of fine and two months' imprisonment for contempt of court, and that is short of the time required for ineligibility.
Sj. Surendranath, who was, by the way, sentenced to six months for a still graver contempt, has been specially exempted, unasked, by the Lieutenant-Governor of Bengal from another disability.
It is obvious therefore that Mr. Kelkar's real offence was his Nationalist views and his friendship with Mr. Tilak.
We hope that all compromising Nationalists will take the lesson of this rebuff to heart.
The object of the Government is to rally the Mahomedans and the Moderates and isolate the Nationalists.
No doubt they mean by the Moderates the Loyalist section of that party, but they are evidently wishful not to entirely alienate the Nationalist Moderates, if they can do so while excluding them from all real weight on the Councils.
But by what reasoning any Nationalist can imagine that he will escape the operation of the excluding clauses, we are at a loss to understand.
We may also ask our Mahratta brothers what advantage they have gained by being less rigid than ourselves.
They are, if anything, more rigorously persecuted than we are in Bengal.
Weakness of any kind does not pay in dealing with the Briton.