द इण्डियन स्ट्रगल / भारतीय स्वाधीनता संग्राम (नेताजी सुभाष चन्द्र बोस - ऐतिहासिक विश्लेषण)

98 THE INDIAN STRUGGLE Nehru (Allahabad) and Mr. Vithalbhai J. Patel (Bombay) were in favour of adopting the Deshbandhu's plan of entering the legislatures and Dr. M. A. Ansari¹ (Delhi), Mr. K. R. Iyengar (Madras) and Mr. C. Rajagopalachari (Madras) were against it. As the report was published shortly before the Gaya session of the Congress to be presided over by Deshbandhu Das, his hands were strengthened by the report. Towards the end of September 1922, there were unexpected floods in the northern districts of Bengal. Though floods and famines are of frequent occurrence in the India of to-day, the floods of 1922 were of an unprecedented magnitude. Four large districts of Bengal were affected, crops were destroyed, houses washed away and cattle killed. As a result of the floods, there were several cases of death also. The whole countryside was one vast expanse of water. The Congress organisations throughout the province promptly responded to the appeal for relief and I was among the first batch to arrive at the flooded area for the purpose of organising relief. Thanks to the efforts of Sir P. C. Roy, the famous chemist and the President of the Relief Committee and to the generosity of the public, a fund of more than 400,000 rupees was raised, besides large contributions in cloth, foodstuffs and fodder (for the cattle). On this occasion the Government of Bengal contributed a sum of 20,000 rupees and in justifying the niggardliness of the Government, the Maharaja of Burdwan, a member of the Governor's Executive Council, stated that the Government was not a charitable institution. The relief operations con- ducted by the public, without any aid from the Government were so successful that they added greatly to the prestige of the Congress, whose members were largely responsible for them. In fact we had the good fortune to be complimented on our work by the Governor of Bengal, Lord Lytton, personally when he inspected the flooded areas. Since then, the Congress has always taken a leading part in organising relief operations on the occasion of floods and famines. Between August and December two other noteworthy events took place. The first was the meeting of the All-India Trade) ¹ In the light of this fact it is surprising that Dr. Ansari should be one of the sponsors of the Council-entry proposal in 1934.