Previous Year Question
Who out of the following had told “Destruction is the best method of dealing with the foreign clothes”?
Ravindra Nath Tagore
Mahatma Gandhi
Chitranjan Das
Subhas Chandra Bose
Correct Answer: B
Detailed Solution
Mahatma Gandhi gave an important place to Swadeshi and the boycott of foreign cloth in the programme of the Non-Cooperation Movement. His objective was not merely to boycott British goods but also to revive Indian spinning, khadi, weaving and indigenous production.
In 1921, to make the boycott of foreign cloth more effective, Gandhi asked people not to purchase foreign cloth, to wear khadi, and to destroy the foreign cloth already in their possession or send it outside India. He also connected the use of foreign cloth with the decline of India’s domestic spinning and weaving industry.
Thus, burning foreign cloth became a symbolic act associated with the Non-Cooperation-Swadeshi programme. Its economic objective was to reduce the demand for foreign manufactured cloth and encourage indigenous production.
It is also noteworthy that Rabindranath Tagore and Gandhi had ideological differences over some methods such as the burning of foreign cloth, while the statement given in this question is associated with Gandhi. Records relating to Gandhi also refer to Tagore and the issue of burning foreign cloth.