The Salt Tax

In 1882, the British India government passed a Salt Act that prohibited Indians from collecting or selling salt, a staple in their diet. Indian citizens were forced to buy the vital mineral from their British rulers, who, in addition to exercising a monopoly over the manufacture and sale of salt, also charged a heavy salt tax. Rishi Dayananda saw this as a gross violation and vehemently opposed this tax on salt imposed by the British. The Rishi argued that salt is an item of consumption by all, including the poorest of the poor. If the government understandably needed more money, it could raise tax on liquor and other intoxicants four times more that the current tax rate. This would serve the cause of prohibition too. Like the case of Swadeshi clothes, Rishi Dayananda’s active opposition to the British salt tax helped to galvanize the masses of India to think of independence from foreign rule. Fifty years later, Mahatma Gandhi embraced the same approach and, in his famous Dandi Salt March in 1930, he motivated millions of people in the whole country to go on the offensive in the fight for independence.