DIFFICULTIES IN INDIA

Evening Star, Issue 22891, 24 February 1938, Page 13

DIFFICULTIES IN INDIA

UNITED PROVINCES AND BIHAR STATEMENT BY MARQUESS OF LINLITHGOW (British Official Wireless.) .. Press Association—By Telegraph—Copyright RUGBY, February 22. A statement issued by the GovernorGeneral of India (the Marquess of Linlithgow) to-day reviews the history of the difficulties which have arisen in the United Provinces and Bihar in connection with the release of political prisoners. It emphasises that the prisoners whose release was in dispute were almost without exception persons convicted of violence, or preparation for specific acts of violence, by normal criminal courts, and that to acquiesce in immediate indiscriminate release would have been to strike a blow at the root of law and order in India and dangerously threaten peace and good government. . There was no going back on the policy of readiness to examine individual cases and to release where there was no undue risk involved. There was, further, no impropriety in the Governors requiring individual examination or declining without it to accept the advice of their Ministers. Finally there was no foundation for the suggestion that the action he had taken was dictated by a desire to undermine the position of the Congress Ministers. Neither the Governors nor the Governor-General had any desire to interfere. After stressing the fact that the Congress Ministers heed expect no difficulty in securing the friendly and ready co-operation of the Governors, the Marquess of Linlithgow added: “ There is apparently no disposition to extend the area of difficulty beyond the limits of the present position,” and he hoped for an early return to normality in the two provinces most concerned. REGARDED AS CONCILIATORY PROSPECTS OF A SETTLEMENT. LONDON, February 23. The Delhi correspondent of ‘ The Times ’ says the Congress regards the Marquess of Linlithgow’s statement as conciliatory, and its publication coincides with an announcement that the Governors asked the Premiers of Bihar and the United Provinces to continue pending other arrangements, which is interpreted to indicate a resumption of negotiations and prospects of a settlement.