"I know you have not missed the woman in me," Gandhi responded to

"Dear Mother, Singer and Guardian of My Soul," Sarojini Naidu, who

begged him not to fast. He thus credited his "feminine" qualities of heart
and soul with his resolve now to choose a "way of life through suffering
unto death. I must therefore find my courage in my weakness."14 Gandhi's
astute consciousness of his own painfully passionate motivation on the eve
of this momentous, potentially fatal, step was revealing. "She who sees life
in death and death in life is the real Poetess and Seeress." He prayed that
"God may give me strength enough to walk steadily through the vale. If
Hinduism is to live, untouchability must die."
At 3 A.M. on September 20, 1932, Gandhi awoke and prepared himself
to "enter the fiery gate at noon."15 To his beloved Mira he wrote that "the
voice within said, 'If you will enter in, you must give up thought of all attachment!'
. . . No anguish will be too terrible to wash out the sin of untouchability.
. . . [T]he spirit which you love is always with you. The body
through which you learnt to love the spirit is no longer necessary for sustaining
that love."16
"My ambition is to represent and identify myself with, as far as possible,
the lowest strata of untouchables," Gandhi told the press, explaining
his reasons: "for they have indeed drunk deep of the poisoned cup ... if
they are ever to rise, it will not be by reservation of seats but will be by the
strenuous work of Hindu reformers."17 Reporters were allowed inside
Poona's prison, to the open sky compound where Gandhi lay on his fasting
bed. "What I want," he passionately confessed as he started to fast "and
what I should delight in dying for, is the eradication of untouchability root
and branch."18
A conference of Hindu leaders was convened in swift response to the
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Gandhi's Passion
fast in Bombay, including Dr. B. R. Ambedkar, brilliant lawyer and political
leader of India's untouchables, who later became India's first minister of
law and chair of its Constitution-drafting Committee. Ambedkar was furious
that Gandhi "singled out" special representational advantages for his
community as his "excuse" for fasting unto death. Nonetheless, he agreed
to go to Poona to discuss the issue with Gandhi, and on September 22 they
met for their prison summit.
"I want political power for my community," Ambedkar told Gandhi.
"That is indispensable for our survival."19 He demanded his just "compensation"
and "due," having himself insisted in London on the seventy-one
specially reserved seats that MacDonald granted.
"I want to serve the Harijans," Gandhi replied, using the name which
means "children of God." First coined by Narasinh Mehta, the "father of
Gujarati poetry," the term was made popular by Gandhi, whose adoption
of it for the remaining years of his life gave fresh nominal dignity at least to
India's millions of outcastes. Gandhi assured Ambedkar that as a "new
convert" to his community he was most zealous and wanted a Harijan to
be the viceroy of India and a Bhangi "untouchable" sweeper to serve as
president of the Congress. Ambedkar had brought an outline of his demands,
which Gandhi asked Devdas to have redrafted and which they soon
accepted as their agreement. It promised Harijans many more seats in Parliament
than MacDonald's award had, but they would not run or be
elected separately from the great body of Hinduism. All enfranchised Indians
would vote only for competing Harijan candidates for those affirmative
action "general" seats.
Congress Brahmans from north and south India, including such eminent
leaders as Sapru, Jayakar, Malaviya, Rajendra Prasad, and Rajagopalachari,

1
met with Devdas and others the next day to hammer out the
scheme that satisfied Ambedkar, guaranteeing almost double the number of
legislative assembly seats to his community than MacDonald had offered
the "Depressed Classes." Meanwhile cables poured in from around the
world, wishing India's Great Soul and "Magician" success and long life.
Thousands of Indians had started to fast in sympathy, including Mira.20
The Hindu Leaders' Conference met in Bombay again on September 25
and unanimously resolved "henceforth" that no Hindu should be regarded
as "untouchable by reason of his birth." Those so regarded hitherto should
all have the same rights as other Hindus "to the use of public wells, public
roads and other public institutions."21 The agreement was wired to London,
and MacDonald accepted it on behalf of the British government. On
September 26 Gandhi broke his fast, drinking a glass of orange juice
handed to him by Kasturba. Surrounded by about two hundred people,
Gandhi lay on his cot as Bengali Nobel laureate Gurudev Tagore sang a
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Imprisoned Soul of India
poem from his Gitanjali. Gandhi prayed and expressed his hope that all
caste Hindus would carry out to the letter and spirit every clause of the settlement.
He warned, however, that he would fast again if they were too
slow in carrying out the reforms. "I would like to assure my Harijan
friends, as I would like henceforth to name them, t h a t . . . I am wedded to
the whole . . . Agreement, and that they may hold my life as hostage for its
due fulfilment."22 His weight had fallen to ninety-three and one-half
pounds, but his passionate faith was never greater.