INDIA’S PART.

Evening Star, Issue 23728, 8 November 1940, Page 4

INDIA’S PART.

Notwithstanding the prior zeal of the Congress Party for independence the war record, and still more tho war potentialities of India, recorded in part by tho finance member of the Viceroy’s Council, Sir Jeremy Raisman, make a bright showing. Expeditionary Forces are maintained! in Egypt, Aden, and Singapore. The personnel of the Royal Indian Navy has been trebled since war broke out, and further schemes of expansion are contemplated. Although thousands of Indian soldiers have already gone overseas, the Army in India is stronger to-day than it was when war broke out. This has been made possible by reinforcing the regular units, embodying the Territorials, raising new garrison companies, and accepting the services of the Indian States’ forces for collaboration with Imperial troops. The scheme of restricting Indian officers to a limited number of Army units has been abandoned, and arrangements are now being made to recruit officers for all brandies of the service. The difficulty hitherto faced in equipping the new forces, states an article in the latest ‘ Round Tabic,’ is now being overcome, and tho country is being transformed into a vast arsenal. Since the war broke out India has supplied Great Britain, France, Egypt, and the dominions with munitions and war supplies surplus to her own requirements, and projects are now being developed that will extend the range of munitions to be manufactured in India. A War Supply Board has been created, and it is significant that tho portfolio rests in tho hands of an Indian Minister. Large sums of money continue to pour into the Viceroy’s War Purposes Fund, for which no direct appeal was made. Sir Jeremy Raisman stated that over a million men have joined tho Colours, a large proportion of whom are already fully armed. There will bo small comfort in these figures for Nazis and Fascists, who may bo expected to approve entirely the doctrine of “ nonviolence ” as a creed for all but their own purely predatory countries.