GIVING AUTONOMY TO INDIAN PROVINCES.

Auckland Star, Volume LXVII, Issue 139, 13 June 1936, Page 9

GIVING AUTONOMY TO INDIAN PROVINCES.

ORDERS PASSED

Commons Blessing on Great Project. SEPARATION OF BURMA. British Official Wireless. (Itccoived 12 110011.) RUGBY, June 12. The House of Commons to-day debated a number of draft Orders-in-Council under the Government of India Act, which have the effect of bringing into operation the whole of the Act except Part 2, relating to the Indian Federation.

Tlic Under-Secretary for India, Mr. R. A. Butler, moving approval of the orders, said that if provincial autonomy was to be inaugurated on April 1, the ®ime-table which the Government had in mind was that general elections should be held approximately eight months hence.

Spokesmen of the Labour Opposition and the Liberal party joined in, wishing the scheme the fullest measure of success, Sir Samuel Hoare, who as Secretary of India, piloted the India Bill through the House of Commons, speaking for the first time as First Lord of the Admiralty, added his blessing.

He said the significant and satisfactory fact of the debate was that 110 one suggested that the initiation of provincial autonomy should be delayed, although there had been criticism of some of the financial proposals. As a result of the orders, provinces, several of which were of greater magnitude than some European countries, would have the opportunity for the first time, on an extended scale, of developing their own provincial life.

Mr. Winston Churchill and Mr. L. M. S. Amery, two of the principal critics of the bill, also spoke. Mr. Churchill said he and his friends would do nothing to obstruct the carrying out of the policy which Parliament approved, and Mr. Amery expressed the wish that there might go from the House a message of good will to the new provinces and to India as a whole.

The Prime Minister announced that the Government lias decided that after the separation of Burma from India there should be a separate Secretaryship of State for Burma, and also a new office of Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Burma. For reasons of practical convenience the Secretaryship and the UnderSecretaryship for Burma for the present would be 'held by the Secretary and Under-Secretary for India. The Burma Ofliee will be housed with the India Office.