Salt production and distribution was a lucrative monopoly of the British government in India. Indians were prohibited from producing salt and had to purchase expensive imported salt. Despite the gradual reduction in salt tax, it remained a significant source of government revenue. In the year ended March 31, 1928, revenues from salt tax amounted to £5million, which was the third largest source of government revenue.
Mahatma Gandhi’s march to Dandi to produce salt and break the law ended on April 5, 1930. After ignoring the initial civil disobedience during the march, the authorities in Bombay arrested over sixty leaders of the Congress Salt Campaign volunteers. The police destroyed their implements used to manufacture salt. One agitator named Gopaldas was slapped a two-year jail sentence and fined £40. In Aat, a village near Dandi, 150 volunteers resisted the police, who tried to confiscate their illicitly manufactured salt. Women participated in selling contraband salt. Much of the salt produced was sold through auction. Small quantities manufactured by Gandhi realized £42 despite the government edict saying that it is “unfit for human consumption.”
The Secretary of State for India, William Wedgwood Benn, when questioned in the House of Commons, downplayed the impact of the Dandi March saying, “Gandhi’s march had caused a certain amount of excitement in the Bombay Presidency, particularly in the districts actually traversed [by Gandhi] where a small proportion of the village headmen had resigned temporarily, at any rate.” He continued, “Elsewhere, little general interest appeared to have been aroused.” He admitted that “it was too early to form any opinion as to its effects.”
A few days earlier, the government had employed hundreds of labourers, who guarded by police, destroyed the salt crystals, which lay on the seashore at Dandi.
After the Dandi March, tiny model statues of Gandhi, adorned the windows of all novelty Parisian houses. Designed by ceramist Andre Godin, these were salt and pepper pots. After his success, Godin proposed salt and pepper pots modelled on other world personalities.
Details of the salt taxation and Dandi March can be found on page 315 of the book.
Sources: Daily Mercury dated April 9, 1930; Sunday Mail dated November 2, 1930; Newcastle Morning Herald and Miners’ Advocate dated April 9, 1930; Illawarra Mercury dated April 18, 1930. All newspaper reports found on trove.nla.gov.au.