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Evening Star, Issue 13099, 4 November 1908, Page 4

Just half a century ago Mr John Stuart Mill, than whom there were After Fifty few higher authorities, Veare. affirmed that “the British “ government in India is “not only one of the purest in intention, “but one of the most beneficial in act ever “known to mankind.’’ If this could be truly said of tlio “ Old John ’’ Company, under whose auspices both James Mill and his more famous son had served, how much greater cause have Englishmen to reaffirm it to-day ? In this year of grace, as in 1858, there are not wanting critics at home and abroad who question the beneficence of British rule in India, nor are there lacking causes of anxiety. If in 1858 our administration of India was as pure and beneficent as Mill declared it to be, why was there the Great Mutiny? And if, in the words of King Edward’s message to his millions of subjects on the occasion of the fiftieth anniversary of the formal assumption of our sovereignty over India, “Wc survey our “labors of the past half-century with a “clear gaze and a good conscience,” whv the present unrest and disaffection, which cannot be gainsaid? The answer, if set forth in general terms, would be practically the same to each question. Sir Evelyn Mood, F.M., V.0., in his recently published work ‘The Revolt in Hindustan, 1857-59,’ after enumerating many subsidiary causes of the Great Mutiny, lays stress upon “ the thoughtless acts of unimaginative British officials ” as possibly the chief. The British official has improved since then, but there is still quite a formidable array of evidence—unimpeachable alike for its authorship and matter—indicating that much Requires to be dome. Mr S. M. Mitra, a loyal Indian, in his ‘lndian Problems’ (also recently published), gives a formidable list of the mistakes made by the Government, “ chiefly through want “of proper information concerning the “thoughts, sentiments, hopes, and aspira- “ tions of the natives of India.” Apart from the failure to recognise fittingly the great

services rendered-by loyal Maharajahs, and 1 the inappropriate and inefficientctnethods, of j legal- administration? there are able, irritating blunders, such as holding a coronation procession on a fast day, refua-! ing to give a sepoy a V.C., and the neglect of British merchants to provide themselves with first-hand information as to “the “wants of the natives, their special de- “ mands, ■ their fancies, and their ■ prejudices.” But while the causes that in i part provoked the Mutiny, and are at the ! root of the existing unrest, hear a super-! flcinl resemblance, the motives inspiring the Crown,-the Government, and the people of Great Britain are wholly different from 1 those of the past. Not only was the ignor- ' auoe af the British people as a whole deplorably and contemptuously profound fifty years ago, but to many India was simply a land of exile and plunder—a place where one caught fever, made piles of money,. and cleared out of at the earliest oppor- j lunity. Charges of this nature cannot be sustained to-day. The Revolt in Hindustan sounded the death knell of the “ Old John” or East India Company. The Imperial Government and Parliament were. compelled to put an end to a system that, > however admirably it may have suited an ! earlier day, and under which—let the fact i not bo forgotten—the brightest jewel of all | was added to the Imperial diadem, was ' out of harmony with modern conceptions of ■ rational government. The proclamation in November, 1858, of the supremacy of the British Crown and of the inauguration of the new order throughout India established and brought into life the principles of “ representative institutions” that His Majesty now hopes “ may be prudently ex- j “ tended with politic satisfaction to the j “ claims of equality of citizenship and a | “ greater share in legislation and govem- “ ment.” Actuated by these wise and beneficent principles, and recognising that they are “discharging a trust affecting the “destinies of multitudes of men now and “ for ages to came.” the people of Great 1 Britain have done for the people of India I what no conqueror of the past, in his most benevolent mood, dreamed of attempting. The issue of frenzied appeals to the baser pnesions of the least worthy sections of Mahomedans and. Hindoos will not affect the great work the Empire has undertaken. “No anarchical crime will deter me,” remarked the present Viceroy, “ from endeavoring to meet, as best I can, the politi- “ cal aspirations of honest reformers.” And what Lord Minto has said Lord Morley has confirmed in another form. “ Nothing will “ever make me swerve for one moment “from any action or policy which I be- “ lievo to be required to preserve order.” The one is the complement of the other, and both arc strengthened and endorsed by the words of His Majesty’s Message; “I “ will not suffer guilty conspiracies to turn “me aside .from the task of building up “ the fabric of security and order.” No Englishman needs to bo ashamed of his country when he studies the history of the past fifty years of British rule in India; o.i the contrary, he is entitled to view it with pardonable pride, and to look with calm confidence to what the future has in store.