UNREST IN INDIA.

Auckland Star, Volume LXI, Issue 15, 18 January 1930, Page 7

UNREST IN INDIA.

ANTI-BRITISH FEELING.

THE SWARAJ MOVEMENT.

PEOPLE STILL AGRICULTURAL.

"One must remember that India is still very largely a country of villages, and that 80 per cent of its population is still agricultural," said the Rev. H.

W. Newell, M.A., when questioned, upon his arrival in Wellington, on the situation in India.

Mr. Newell, with his wife and three children, has come from India to become minister of The Terrace Congiegational Church, Wellington He has been for some years in the service of the London Missionary Society in India, first as principal of that society's high school in Benares, North India, and latterly as principal of its high school at Coimbotore, in the Madras Presidency. Mrs. Newell was for some years a teacher in the Girls' High School at Calcutta.

"These people," said Mr. Newell, live in close touch with the soil, faped with the ordinary daily ; difficulties and troubles of a peasant's life, and are i:'or the most part not in a position to take part in discussions on political questions, Rumours, it is true, reach trem from time to time; and those rumours are often distorted and wild. Hut, so far as my experience has gone, and I have been fourteen years in India, I should say that most of the country people are unaffected by the political agitations one hears so much about; .though the Swaraj party, which is the party that is out for some measure of ndependence, has an increasingly efficient organisation for reaching the masses of the people. Only 20 Per Cent Affected. "The anti-British agitation is, for the most part, confined to the 20 per cent of the people of India who are city dwellers but it is not, of course, to be minimised on that account. I should say that most of this of the population is infected with anti-British •feeling." Asked what was, in his opinion, the reason for this adverse sentiment, Mr. Newell said: ."I do not think that it is so much an agitation against the British people in particular. _It is rather a movement of expression of national consciousness against the overwhelming impress of Western civilisation. Western culture presses upon the people of India in many ways, industrial and educational, in upsetting old-estab-lished religions and national ideas. One must remember that even an education which is strictly neutral in religious matters is bound, by its very natuie, to be revolutionary' amongst a people whose religious ideas depend upon views of the world which are contrary to the trend of modern thought. Perhaps, it is more this feeling of uneasiness that js at the bottom of the unrest in India. Of course, too, one must not forget the very strong feeling amongst the people against such incidents as those which occurred in Amritsar and other places when General Dyer felt it necessary to suppress by force of arms the agitation in the Punjab centred round the non-co-operation movement."

"What of the future ? Is there reasonable cause for hope that an amicable settlement will be arrived at?" "The policy of the British Kaj for the past thirteen years has been one of systematic and ordered progress towards self-goverenment under the Crown. That policy has been stead-i fastly adhered to by the successive Gov! ernments in Great Britain during that period; ! and there iJ no reason to doubt the honesty of Britain's intentions in that direction. The only question, is whether both sides, British and Indian, can keep their patience and maint&in sufficient trust in each other to go through this necessarily trying period of transition. The whole idea of undemocratic system of government in India is new; and is, of course, attended by considerable risk. But it is difficult to see what alternative is before any. progressive Government of, our days. , The only possible policy seems to be one of steady progress; towards some' form of democracy in India." Communist Influences, i "There is no doubt that Comfmunist influence is found in certain places in India; but it is difficult to think that the great mass of the people of India, witjh their hereditary ideas of classloyalty and class-discipline, can really be open to Communistic ideas. / A Com-mission-has lately been set up by the Viceroy (Lord Irwin), under the chairmanship of Mr. Whitley,/ formerly 'Speaker of the House of Commons, for the purpose of. inquiring intoj a number of industrial questions and < problems, including this one of foreign l influences subversive of good government." "What is the best service that a well-wisher could seek to render India in these days?" "For my part, I believe that one of the big needs of. India atithe present time is an education which aims at building up character on a basis of' fitness for life .as it. is foitnd: in India to-day; 1 The education of India now is in large measure sadly .unsuited for existing conditions; for enormous numbers of educated that is to say, in our westernised schoolsare either unemployed or have to be content with ludicrously unsuitable employment. This is not; only a menace to itself, but •• involves! an appalling waste o'f splendid material. Some education on vocational linesraiming rather at .quality : than quantity at the beginning, and seeking to, win the individual child to honesty and probity of life,: is, to my thinking, the biggest >n.eed to-day, not only in India, but elsewhere. And that is where, it seems,| to ;me, the missionary societies,, witli their freedom from bias and the heritage of trust which , they have with .<the people, have such a great opportunity."