If you keep the Hindus pleased, you will wound the feelings of the Muslims, and vice versa. If you try to please other parties, the Congresswallas would not like it. So you are always in a fix. But from now on, always leave the results of your actions to God, which will bring you satisfaction. Your aim is good and highly praiseworthy, and that is the noblest reward.
Gandhi admitted, "I am imperfect and full of defects, but the people must know that. I have not attained Perfection and have many drawbacks, which people should understand. Once they know my weaknesses, they will have to put up with them, and it is only proper that I make them aware of my shortcomings. I do have the conviction that whatever happens is God's will."
Referring to Jamshed Mehta, Gandhi remarked, "He is the most honorable person in Karachi. He is most worthy. I will telegram him tonight that I have seen you, Baba Saheb, and will ask him why he did not inform me earlier so that I could have spared more time to meet with you. When will such a time come again?
"I received your monthly magazine Meher Message in Yeravda Prison [when incarcerated there]. At the time, due to all the confusion, I had no time to read it and only glanced at it cursorily; but from that time after reading it, I wished to meet you one day. Now that day has dawned and the meeting has taken place. I am most happy. Tomorrow I will surely bring back the case to you and accept whatever you select for me to read from what you have written."
Gandhi then commented on Baba's silence, "I am wonderstruck at your silence. Seven years! I keep silence once a week. How small it is before your silence. I understand the significance of silence. You have been silent for seven years and when you speak, what untoward events will take place! I am astonished!"
Before leaving at 10:30 that night, Gandhi extended a cordial invitation to Baba to visit his place of residence in London, and Baba agreed to pay a visit while he was in London.
The next day, 9 September 1931, Baba called Aga Ali, Rustom and Chanji in his cabin and quoted these Urdu couplets:
When the crow tried to imitate the gait of the swan,
it only lost its own demeanor.
The moment Farhad tried to imitate King Khushrow,
his task was spoiled.
We know that eventually You will not deceive us.
But by the time You respond, we will have turned to ashes.1
Footnotes
- 1.The couplets mean that even though the crow started walking like a swan, it remained a crow. Likewise Farhad, the great lover of Shireen (King Khushrow's Queen), tried to imitate Khushrow, but remained himself and failed. In the second quoted couplet, the lover says to the Beloved, "We know that you will not deceive us, but by the time you pay attention to us we will have died." Ghani was fond of these couplets and recited them often. The author of the first couplet is unknown, but the second is by Ghalib.