5 Reasons Why Non-Cooperation Movement Failed in India

An overview on Non-Cooperation Movement

Before moving on to how the Non-cooperation movement was called off? It is important for us to know what exactly was the non-cooperation movement and what led to the formation of the Non- cooperation movement in India?

The Non- Cooperation movement was an initiative by Mahatma Gandhi. He was one of the prominent figure in the history of independence of India and freedom from the British Raj.

Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi who is also called the father of our nation was the main personality who was behind the formation of the Non-Cooperation movement in India.

As for why the non-cooperation movement was formed. Gandhiji was an epitome of non-violence and harmony and after the violent and ruthless Jallianwala Bagh massacre he thought that the path of fighting for the freedom of the country was too ruthless and that many innocents were tortured and killed for the motive of freedom.

Image Credit: Source (The Non Co-operation Movement in India)

The Jallianwala Bagh massacre was one of the ruthless and a hostile incident that took place in the history of India. It was an incident where many civilians were shot in an open fire in a fare were they all gathered.

Many innocent lives were lost and the country wept for the innocent lives lost. It was one of the many reasons that led to the formation of the Non-cooperation movement.

Some other reasons were the Rowlatt act and the Khilafat movement, which led to the joining of many Muslim leaders to the non-violence proposal of Mahatma Gandhi. So, Gandhi decided to choose a less violent and more harmonized way of driving away the British Raj and so in order to do that he formed the Non-cooperation movement.

It was officially initiated or executed from August 1, 1920. Non-Cooperation movement was an important part of India’s journey to the independence. Although it was called off later on but it acted as a catalyst to initiate the people of India to work toward a greater motive and to work together as the people of India.

Let us now look into what were the points that were mentioned under the Non-Cooperation Movement. As mentioned earlier that the movement was initiated by Mahatma Gandhi so that there will not be any bloodshed. Some of the measures that were included were the boycott of all the foreign goods and services.

Gandhi felt that there was an urgent need to discard the increased use of foreign goods and products.

In India, it was seen an increase in the use of the foreign goods led to the decreased aid to the local merchants and sales and so in form of a rebel Gandhi said that the foreign goods should be boycotted at once.

This saw an immediate response by the people of India. Soon people started burning the foreign goods such as clothes and bags and many more in the streets as a mean to showcase the British Raj that they shall not use any of the foreign goods. This was one part of the movement.

Not only the Non-Cooperation movement asked to boycott the goods but also there was an appeal to the people to let go the titles.

The Indian officials were asked to give up their titles, school student was asked to give up the educational institutes and other officials were appealed according to the Non-Cooperation Movement to let go of the law and legislative departments.

The movement started with ease and with positive implementation so far but the non-cooperation movement could not manage to bring the British administration down.

Why Non-Cooperation Movement failed?

Even the Non-Cooperation movement saw a steady rise in its implementation and there were few successes that were otherwise would not have been possible without the movement. But the Non-Cooperation movement failed more than it had succeeded and as a result it had to be called off.

Let us go by some of the reasons why the movement could not reach its desired goal. One of the prime reason was the Boycott movement itself. As the discarding of the foreign goods were the motto after a while the essence or the spark that was ignited started to diminish among the people of India.

There were few merchants that had to break their promise and carry on with the supply of the foreign goods. The local goods were also turned out to be very expensive and not every Indian was capable enough to discard or boycott the foreign goods entirely.

Soon the flame that was burning the boycott goods diminished and came to its near end where no more foreign goods were discarded.

Image Credit: Source

Second reason was the Khilafat movement due to which the prominent Muslim leader had joined the proposal of Gandhi and agreed to the Non-Cooperation movement.

However due to the fall of the Caliph in the Turkish region of the Muslim Community also led to the decline of the impulse of the involvement of the Muslim leaders.

There was a steep decline of impulse participation of people from all over the country. The boycott movement earlier mentioned appealed the officers and students to let go of the titles and institutions resulted in hampering the students as well as the officials.

Students and their families could not support the Non-cooperation movement and were reluctant but soon had to join back the educational institution.

The officials who had discarded the titles and left the law and legislative administration were soon found to rejoin their post due to the increase need for money and aid. And so, the boycott movement led due to the non-cooperation movement soon saw a steep decline in its participation by the common citizens.

As for the leaders of the Swaraj movement, the congress representatives too decided to let go of the non-cooperation movement.

The congress leader called the movement too passive for any form of reformation to take place and some even said that there was a need for a strong protest in order for them to successfully drive away the British Raj. These are some of the prominent reasons that led to the fall of the Non-cooperation movement in India.