LECTURE ON INDIA

Evening Post, Volume CIX, Issue 55, 6 March 1930, Page 13

LECTURE ON INDIA

THE "GANDHI" CAMPAIGN

Miss Lilian Edger, M.A., who is on a visit to New Zealand after a residence of twenty-five, years in India, entertained a large gathering of interested listeners in the Lyceum Club last evening, when she gave an address on "Gandhi" and "The Outlawry of War." The lecturer was introduced by Mrs. J J. Clark, president, and held her audience with the quiet force and sincerity of her words.

She outlined the political and humanitarian side of Gandhi's work. The Indians, who served Britain so faithfully in the war years, heard a good deal of talk about self-determination, which roused the hope that they would be allowed to govern themselves. They were a race of people capable of very strong loyalty, and were, ready always to respond to anything done to help them. Unrest had increased through disappointment over reforms given, and Gandhi believed it would be better for India to have'self-government, but he was a man entirely opposed to any form of violence. He encouraged people to resist what was felt to be injustice, but iii a non-violent manner. He was seokiug to improve conditions among the working people, and was making a big effort to bring back the industry of spinning and weaving—described as "cottage industry"—among housewives. He even had special men who went out under his direction teach-' ing women the almost-forgotten -art, even to making their own machines, as an encouragement, and already the industry was beginning to -flourish. Gandhi found in his own religion what Christians found, in theirs, and he had the utmost sympathy for Christianity. He- was utterly selfless, sharing hardships even to the point of having his health affected. He was "one-of the best workers for peace in the whole world." His fasting was. done as a kind of self-imposed penance—when violence unavoidably followed any advice of his—hoping to produce a feeling and atmosphere to counteract the harm done.

Miss Edgcr upheld tho advocacy to recognise war as a crime. Then, she said, neither Church, State, nor £iw could support it, and' people would have power to indict their own wav instigators. She quoted Mr. Salmon Oliver Levinson's words, "We- shall never get rid of war unless we outlaw it." Mr. Levinson had been laughed at in America, but an Outlawry Committee had been formed, and propaganda quietly done. His idea to declare war a punishable international crime had been brought ' up in the American Senate every year since 1923, and was gradually gaining ground. Miss Edger stressed the need to build up public opinion in favour of it, so that the decision of the International Court would have a moral force behind it to mako it emphatic.