Meanwhile Rachanna’s two grandchildren come in, and gazing at Moorthy, they run into the backyard, and then Madanna’s children come, and then Madanna’s wife, pestle in hand, and Madanna’s wife’s sister and her two-months-old brat in her arms, and then all the women and all the children of the Pariah quarter come and sit in Rachanna’s central veranda and they all gaze silently at Moorthy, as though the sacred eagle had suddenly appeared in the heavens. Then Moorthy feels this is the right moment to talk, and straightening his back, he raises his head and says, ‘Sisters, from today onward I want your help. There is a huge panchayat of all India called the Congress, and that Congress belongs to the Mahatma, and the Mahatma says every village in this country must have a panchayat like that, and everybody who will become a member of that panchayat will spin and practise ahimsa and speak the truth.’ At this Rachanna’s wife says, ‘And what will it give us, learned one?’ and Moorthy says something about the foreign Government and the heavy taxations and the poverty of the peasants, and they all say, ‘Of course, of course,’ and then he says, ‘I ask you: will you spin a hundred yards of yarn per day?’ But Madanna’s wife says, ‘I’m going to have a child,’ and Satanna’s wife says, ‘I’m going for my brother’s marriage,’ and her sister says, ‘I’ll spin if it will bring money. I don’t want cloth like Timmayya and Madayya get with all their turning of the wheel,’ and Chennayya’s daughter says, ‘I shall spin, learned master, I shall spin. But I shall offer my cloth to the Mahatma when he comes here,’ at which all the women laugh and say, ‘Yes, the Mahatma will come here to see your pretty face,’ and the children who had climbed on the rice sacks cry out, ‘I too will turn the rattle, Master, I too.’ And Moorthy feels this is awful, and nothing could be done with these women; so, standing up, he asks, ‘Is there no one among you who can spin a hundred yards of yarn per day?’ And from this corner and that voices rise and Moorthy says, ‘Then come forward and tell me if you can take an oath before the goddess that you will spin at least a hundred yards of yarn per day,’ and they all cry out, ‘No oath before the goddess! if we don’t keep it, who will bear her anger?’
Then Moorthy feels so desperate that he says to Rachanna’s wife, ‘And you, Rachanna’s wife?’ and Rachanna’s wife says, ‘If my husband says “Spin,” I shall spin, learned one.’ And Moorthy says he will come back again in the evening, and mopping his forehead, he goes down the steps and along the Pariah street, and going up the promontory, enters the temple, bangs the bell and, performing a circumambulation, asks blessings of the gods, and hurries back home to speak about it all to Rangamma.
But as he goes up the steps something in him says, ‘Nay,’ and his hair stands on end as he remembers the tumbler of milk and the Pariah home, and so he calls out, ‘Rangamma, Rangamma!’ and Rangamma says, ‘I’m coming,’ and when she is at the threshold, he says he has for the first time entered a Pariah house and asks if he is permitted to enter; and Rangamma says, ‘Just come the other way round, Moorthy, and there’s still hot water in the cauldron and fresh clothes for the meal.’ So Moorthy goes by the backyard, and when he has taken his bath and clothed himself, Rangamma says, ‘Maybe you’d better change your holy thread,’ but Moorthy says, ‘Now that I must go there every day, I cannot change my holy thread every day, can I?’ and Rangamma says only, ‘I shall at least give you a little Ganges water, and you can take a spoonful of it each time you’ve touched them, can’t you?’ So Moorthy says, ‘As you will,’ and taking the Ganges water he feels a fresher breath flowing through him, and lest anyone should ask about his new adventure, he goes to the riverside after dinner to sit and think and pray. After all a Brahmin is a Brahmin, sister!
And when dusk fell over the river, Moorthy hastily finished his ablutions, and after he had sat at his evening meditations, he rushed back home, and after taking only a banana and a cup of milk, he rushed off again to the Pariah night school that Seenu held in the panchayat hall every evening. And when Seenu heard of the Congress committee to be founded, his mouth touched his ears in joy, and he said he would wake up Kittu and Subbu and Post-office-house Ramu from their inactivity. Moorthy said that would be fine and he went out to see Rachanna, who was sitting by the veranda, sharpening his sickle in the moonlight, and with him were Siddanna and Madanna and Lingayya, and when they heard about the Congress committee, they all said, ‘As you please, learned master.’—’And your women?’ asked Moorthy. — ’They will do as we do,’ said Rachanna, and Moorthy went again to the Potters’ street and the Weavers’ street, and they all said, ‘If the elder says “Yes”, and the patel says “Yes”, and the panchayat says “Yes”, what else have we to say?’ And then he went home and told the whole thing to Rangamma and she too said, ‘Of course, of course.’ And Seethamma and Ratna said, ‘Splendid — a Congress committee here,’ and Moorthy said, ‘We shall begin work straight off.’
The next morning he went and recounted the whole thing to Rangè Gowda, and Rangè Gowda said, ‘I am your slave.’ Then Moorthy said, ‘We shall hold a meeting today’—and Rangè Gowda said, ‘Of course.’—’Then this evening,’ said Moorthy. — ‘As you please, learned one,’ answered Rangè Gowda — and Moorthy then said, ‘We shall hold a gods’ procession and then a bhajan, and then we shall elect the committee.’ And as evening came, Moorthy and Seenu and Ramu and Kittu were all busy washing the gods and knitting the flowers and oiling the wicks and fixing the crowns, and as night fell the procession moved on and people came out with camphor and coconuts, and Seenu took them out and offered them to the gods, and Ramu shouted out, ‘This evening there’s bhajan,’ and everybody was so happy that before the procession was back in the temple, Rangè Gowda was already seated in the mandap explaining to Elder Ramayya and to Elder Siddayya and to others around them about weaving and ahimsa and the great, great Congress. And they all listened to him with respect. When Moorthy entered they all stood up, but Moorthy said, ‘Oh, not this for me!’ and Rangè Gowda said, ‘You are our Gandhi,’ and when everybody laughed he went on: ‘There is nothing to laugh at, brothers. He is our Gandhi. The state of Mysore has a maharaja, but that maharaja has another maharaja who is in London, and that one has another one in heaven, and so everybody has his own Mahatma, and this Moorthy, who has been caught in our knees playing as a child, is now grown up and great, and he has wisdom in him and he will be our Mahatma,’ and they all said, ‘So he is!’ And Moorthy felt such a quiet exaltation rise to his throat that a tear escaped and ran down his cheek. Then he looked back towards the bright god in the sanctum, and closed his eyes and sent up a prayer, and, whispering to himself, ‘Mahatma Gandhi ki jai!’ he rang the bell and spoke to them of spinning and ahimsa and truth. And then he asked, ‘Who among you will join the panchayat?’ and voices came from the Sudra corner and the Pariah corner and the Brahmin corner and the Weavers’ corner, and to each one of them he said, ‘Stand before the god and vow you will never break the law,’ and some said they asked nothing of the gods, and others said, ‘We don’t know whether we have the strength to keep it up,’ and then Rangè Gowda grew wild and shouted, ‘If you are the sons of your fathers, stand up and do what this learned boy says,’ and Rangè Gowda’s words were such a terror to them that one here and one there went up before the sanctum, rang the bell and said, ‘My master, I shall spin a hundred yards of yarn per day, and I shall practise ahimsa, and I shall seek truth,’ and they fell prostrate and asked for the blessings of the Mahatma and the gods, and they rose and crawled back to their seats. But when it comes to the Pariahs, Rachanna says, ‘We shall stand out here and take the vows,’ and at this Moorthy is so confused that he does not know what to do, but Rangè Gowda says, ‘Here in the temple or there in the courtyard, it is the same god you vow before, so go along!’ And Rachanna and Rachanna’s wife, and Madanna and Madanna’s wife swear before the god from the courtyard steps.