INDIA'S FUTURE

Evening Post, Volume CXVIII, Issue 113, 9 November 1934, Page 16

INDIA'S FUTURE

TREMENDOUS ISSUE

BRITAIN MUST DECIDE

THE BEST COUESE

IV c young Impenali&ls—Sn \dnan Baillie, lIP, Captain Cazalet, MP, Loid Duffemi, Wing Conimindei James, MP, md Mi Maik Patnck, MP — have wnttcn a pamphlet on the futuie of India I confess that I picked it up without enthusiasm, writes Maiolcl S( m naid in the "Duly Telegraph "

If it does not discuss the White Pnpei pioposals, I thought, it will not enlighten me on the matters on which I mobt need enlightenment If it docs dis cuss them it will vttempt to uiticipite the veulict ot the Joint Select Com mittee, a much moic auhontativc bod\ whose ■judgment it would be wioug to discount in advance

B;> the time I hid lead the lust pin gi iph I hid llteied b\ opinion "Inch i Fiom i Bick Bcmh" is the most help Jtul contiibution to eleir thinking about liulii that I line seen simo the pub lication of tlio flist volume ot Hie Simon fiepoit It is shoit, it is admiiabH cleu, its statement of facts is impic* sl\c, and its middling philosopli> is. piofound It is i credit to Lnglv-h politics and desct\cs> to be widolv lead and no less widely appicciatcd OUR GREATEST TASK The futute ot India, the connection between Britain and Indu, the lelition ship between East and AVest, which is the cential themo ol the world's his toiy, aie all inched m the pending Indii Bill i Ihesc tiomendous issues .no obsruied , by the contiov cities aheady beginning | to rxgc over such details as ic!>ponsi , bilitj at the Centic and law and 01 i dei in the Piovmces The authois ot the pamphlet at once lcstoie them to then piopor position in the foicgiound i "Oui connection with her (India) le I piesents the highest endeavoui we have i ever made to extend our conceptions of good government to an alien people > If this, endeavour 1 bieaks down, 01 degenerates into the lcpiession by force j of an antagonised population, we shall have to admit failwe m pcihaps oui gieatest Impcual undertaking " The men who could wnte that (though I should myself have omitted the qualifying "peihaps" of the last : phrase) have already proved tiemselves good guides to a spmt m * Inch the Indian problem should be appioachcd And approach is cvcij thing If we | aio to sohe a problem we must set its | elements in piopei peispeclnc, so is to he able to pick out those which must be dealt with. That is the method of this pamphlet. It woilcs its way up to a statement of the qncsions to which any India Bill must offer answeis , CHANGE MUST COME. Then it tuins to the White Papei. It docs not anticipate the Joint Select Comitteo's leport. On the contiaiy, it obsenes that tlio Committee is "one of the bhongest o\er set up b> Pai liament," and that "theie will be no one in fact, whatever view ho n she may have taken of the Wlnto Paper, who should not have much to lenin iioui its findings " But the authois of the pamphlet point out that the White Paper meets the tebt of answ enng the essential ques They go furthers » &tung to retoit by the cffoits of its opponents to dis. noso ot tho Indian, ls&uo by such parrot encs is "Scuttle," "Abicct suirenrlci," ana tho like, they show that the ansv\cis which tho White Paper ffives nTO in themselves.reasonable and tie suppoited by a body of opinion whoso weight cannot bo ignoied The-first important point taken is that change is now inevitable., Even if it were possible to go on as we are, honour forbids, since the system set up in 1919 was avowedly provisional. "Tho only real question in, therefore, what sort of changes should, bo made?"'Aro wo to go .forwaid or to

It is possible to go back With tho Aimy and a highly tiamcd cml admin Miration we couia mn a Government But since it would lack tho co operation ana coocl will of the governed, it would bo a bad Government accoidnig to om own standaids On tho othci hand, we have been teaching Indims foi a centurj to think oi then politicil futuie in Western tß™li Ind l a asks foi a moic lepicsenta the foim of government it i» because we ourselves have taught her to do so, to sa > nothing of having given hoi to undeistand that ultimately she sh ill have it " NQT SOUND The notion that we can satisfy her aspirations by provincial autonomy coupled with a strong official Governiment at the centre will not stand examination. "Either tho Provinces could not be genuinely autonomous, or the Central Government could not be •strong ' " Moreover, if India is ever to attain political unity, the Princes cannot be left out, and "the Punces have made it plain that they would cntoi a Pcaciation only on the concli -toon that the} would thereby secure a measuio of ie=pon=ibihtj foi All India affans " i, As to the capacity of Indians to undci take tho lesponsibilities ot government "factors such as communal feeling, oi tho Hindu conception of tho family, may expose to strong temptation some ot those- with patronage to exeicisc But heie again tho mle of the Pnnccs shows what Indians<an do It is noted that in the mattei of literacy thicc Indian fetatcs show bottei figuics than any Indian Piovince. (lhe point is woith lemembcnng by those who hko to lopicsent tho Pnnccs..;is despots stifling indcpcndcn( c of thought among their sublets ) Tlieic lemuns the economic climculU It is objected that a s>elf governing India would lof use to tiadc with us Would she Hci exports "foi genei i tions to come" must consist mainly of pnmaiy pioducts, foi which she cm fend picfciential maikets only m this country and in the Empne On tho othrr hand, a non self governing India will ceitainly refuse to trado with us, and tho bojeotts organised by Con giess a few years ago "piovided an ex ttllenfc illustiataon of how hard it would be to ±orce goods on unwilling buv-ers" The pamphlet drives this vital point home Good will is some thing which figuies m business ac counts. The business lesults of tho policy of securing India's good will aio already manifest "The alternative, if it can bo called an alternative, is a policy of the 'btiong hand ' Let thoso who feel at tracted by it remembei that, applied to India, it could not put one unemployed Lancashno operative back to work, 01 contribute sixpence tow aids i divi dend " THE CLIMAX The climax of the aigument is loathed with the following statement ol questions which no schemo can slink, togcthei with a sunnn uv o± tho AUntc Papei'a answus to them 1 How can India's demands foi uioio iespousibiht\, and her genuine belief tint we intend to gi.e it her, best bo brought into aceoid with hei own uidrests iiitf those" of tlio'Empno' White P.ipot answoi Kcsponsibilitv ■ vwth siiegu ml 2 How (. in Ip'h i'- v ist si/f>, TJitl the almust unlimited vautly oi hci ccim