ON THIS DAY

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March 12, 1930:

Gandhi begins the Salt March.

The Salt March was an act of nonviolent civil disobedience in colonial India, led by Mahatma Gandhi. The 24-day march lasted from 12 March 1930 to 6 April 1930 as a direct action campaign of tax resistance and nonviolent protest against the British salt monopoly. The march was the first act in an even-larger campaign of civil disobedience (satyagraha) that Gandhi waged against British rule in India that extended into early 1931 and garnered Gandhi widespread support among the Indian populace and considerable worldwide attention.

Salt production and distribution in India had long been a lucrative monopoly of the British. Through a series of laws, the Indian populace was prohibited from producing or selling salt independently, and instead Indians were required to buy expensive, heavily taxed salt that often was imported. This affected the great majority of Indians, who could not afford to buy it. Indian protests against the salt tax began in the 19th century and remained a major contentious issue throughout the period of British rule of the subcontinent.

In early 1930 Gandhi decided to mount a highly visible demonstration against the increasingly repressive salt tax by marching from his religious retreat to the Arabian Sea coast. He set out on foot on March 12, 1930, accompanied by several dozen followers. Hundreds more joined the core group of followers as they made their way to the sea, and on April 5 the entourage reached Dandi after a journey of some 240 miles (385 km). On the morning of April 6, Gandhi and his followers picked up handfuls of salt along the shore, thus technically “producing” salt and breaking the law.

No arrests were made that day, and Gandhi continued his satyagraha against the salt tax for the next two months, exhorting other Indians to break the salt laws by committing acts of civil disobedience. Thousands were arrested and imprisoned, including Jawaharlal Nehru in April and Gandhi himself in early May after he informed Lord Irwin, the viceroy of India, of his intention to march on the nearby Dharasana saltworks. News of Gandhi’s detention spurred tens of thousands more to join the satyagraha. The march on the saltworks went ahead as planned on May 21, 1930 and many of the some 2,500 peaceful marchers were attacked and beaten by police. By the end of the year, some 60,000 people were in jail.

Gandhi was released from custody in January 1931 and began negotiations with Lord Irwin aimed at ending the satyagraha campaign. A truce subsequently was declared, which was formalised in the Gandhi-Irwin Pact that was signed on March 5.

Sculpture in New Delhi, India, depicting Mahatma Gandhi leading the 1930 Salt March.

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By the way, from the vault:

Pamela Hicks, daughter of Lord Mountbatten (the last Governor General of India), writing in The Telegraph about the impending marriage of Elizabeth and Phillip:

Princess Elizabeth had written me a sweet letter asking me to be one of her bridesmaids and I, of course, was honoured to accept.

Before we left, my parents saw Mahatma Gandhi and he told my father: ‘I so want to give Princess Elizabeth a present, but I have given all my possessions away.’

My father, however, knew he still had his spinning wheel and he told Gandhi: ‘If a cloth could be made from yarn you have spun, that would be like receiving the Crown Jewels’

And so this was done and we took his present to Britain for the wedding, but Queen Mary wrongly thought it was a loincloth and thought it was the most ‘indelicate’ gift.

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