From the Indian Express editorial “Heart strings and Purse strings” of August 19, 1942, in which the newspaper declared that it was on the side of Gandhi’s nationalists (the paper went on to shut down operations in protest against the gag order imposed by the British government and reappeared on the stands only in December that year):
Only the other day we published the message of Mahatma Gandhi about the duty of the Press and we have done our best. The recent orders of the government mean nothing but that we shall be glorified issues of the Gazette of India…
… We somehow feel that the same blood runs in our veins as in those of Gandhiji, Azad, Nehru and other leaders who are in jail… We do not want to detail to the public the gagging orders that we have received. Suffice it to say that we cannot publish news relating to our leaders, to the Congress movement, or relating to anything for that matter — indeed, not even facts that vitally affect the community — unless it is contained in a government communique or in a report from a registered correspondent blessed by the District Magistrate. It would be nothing less than a fraud on the public for us to send out a paper containing just that and nothing more…
Political economy fails in the face of events and impressions which we cannot forget if we are to live a thousand years … The human race is said to be fighting for its freedom; what avails it to us unless it includes the freedom of our country? … We have no regret in suspending publication because we firmly believe that the children of India will hear the voice of the Mother, telegraph or no telegraph, newspaper or no newspaper, Gandhiji has given his message to the people and it does not require further publication. His message lives and will regenerate itself in the heart of every Indian. If the government still wants to save the situation, there is one course, and one and only one, open to them — to release Mahatma Gandhi and concede the national demand.
The whole thing here
