The Non-Cooperation Movement dramatically affected the economy of the British.
(i) The import of foreign cloth halved between 1921 and 1922, its value dropping from Rs.102 crore to Rs.57 crore.
(ii) In many places, merchants and traders refused to trade in foreign goods or finance foreign trade.
(iii) People began discarding imported clothes and started wearing only Indian clothes (Khadi).
(iv) Production of Indian textile mills and handlooms went up. But this movement gradually slowed down for several reasons.
(i) Khadi cloth was more expensive than mass-produced mill cloth. It was not realistic for the poor Indians to afford it.
(ii) Many elated people had left their jobs to support the Non-Cooperation Movement. But soon the problem of unemployment came before them because of the dearth of Indian institutions. So, students and teachers began turning back to government schools and lawyers joined back work in government courts. Workers, industrialists, peasants, traders had inferred Gandhiji’s notion of ‘Swaraj’ differently. They started using violence to get their demands fulfilled. Gandhiji never approved violent means to achieve goals. Hence, he got disheartened.
