ADVICE TO INDIA

Hawera Star, Volume XLVIII, 2 April 1925, Page 5

ADVICE TO INDIA

WAY TO GOVERNMENT

SUPPRESSION OF VIOLENCE

LORD BIRKENHEAD’S INVITATION

HY CABLE —PRESS ASSOCIATION COPYRIGHT Received April 2, 9 a.m. • , LONDON. A.iril 1.

A responsive not was sounded by Lord Birkenhead during the course of a debate on India in the House of Lords, iii regard to the recent utterances of the Swarjist leader, Das, in which the latter expressed an abhorrence at political assassinations, at violence in any form as well as repression by the Government. Lord Birkenhead expressed the desire to join Das and lay aside undue suspicion. He would hopefully watch the results of Das’s appeal to his supporters. If he saw that revolutionary soeities were beginning to atrophy for, want of monetary and moral support, and that the channels of comnnfnieations between the political and anarchia] worlds were effectively closed, then a new era would have begun in Bengal, and the need for what Das, called repression would have disappeared. Lord Birkenhead emphasised the point, however, that all the British authorities were concerned with legislation for the repression of crimes of violence in Bengal, and constantly and justly repudiated the intention or practice of repressing political opinion. He invited Das to take a further step to 'co-operate with the Government in repressing violence. “All we desired was co-operation between British and Indian political parties, with a view to the progressive realisation of responsible Government in India as an integral part of the Empire. Never, never would it be reached bv violence and desperate crimes,” he declared.— A. and N.Z. Assn.