INDIA’S FUTURE

Manawatu Standard, Volume L, Issue 142, 15 May 1930, Page 7

INDIA’S FUTURE

SUGGESTED CONFERENCE. NATIONALIST CRITICISMS. INFLUENCE OF DOMINIONS. (United Press Association—By Electrio Telegraph.—Copyright.) Received May 15, 10.5 a.m. DELHI, May 14. Lord Irwin’s reference to the possibility of Indian delegates having a round tabic conference with members of the Imperial Conference arouses no enthusiasm in India. The Nationalist Press criticise the suggestion, and many leaders are nervous regarding the influence of the Prime Ministers of the ' Dominions, which repeatedly have denied citizen rights, and even admission, to Indian subjects. The feeling is that the conference should be a straight-out issue between representatives of the Indian Nationalists’ aspirations and the Government, which alone has the power to grant them. The Viceroy, in a statement on the situation in India, said that steps were being taken to arrange for the assembling of representatives at a conference in London on or about October 20. This date, he added, would offer the advantage to delegates from India of establishing seasonal relations with the Dominion representatives who will be present in London in connection with the Imperial Conference. DESERTED CITY. MACHINE GUNS IN SHOLAPUR. Received May 15, 11.0 a.m. DELHI, May 15. The troops at Sholapur total nearly 180(1. Forty arrests have been made, including the president and secretary of the local Congress committee. The military are in possession of the city, and have posted machine guns and pickets at strategic points. The streets are barricaded, and the curfew is so strict that even the Moslems, who pray at seven o’clock and at nine o’clock, are forbidden in the streets. The city is at present deserted, and all the shops are closed. CLASH DURING FESTIVAL. HUNDRED CASUALTIES. DELHI, May 14. Nearly a hundred arrests were effect* ed this morning of Congress volunteers on suspicion of complicity in the Chittagong outrage. Belated accounts are arriving of a clash during the Moslem festival in the district of Assam. It is estimated that there were a hundred casualties. GANDHI’S DETENTION. COMFORTABLE QUARTERS. (British Official Wireless.) RUGBY, May 14. Describing in a written reply to a Parliamentary question the conditions in which Gandhi is undergoing detention, the Secretary of State for India, Captain Wedgwood Benn, states that Gandhi is occupying'the same quarters as those he had during his imprisonment in 1922. He lias the necessary furniture in rooms provided with electric light and with wide verandas, and a small garden in front. Gandhi has complete liberty to take what exercise he desires. He sleeps in the open, and is not closely confined. He is being supplied with his usual diet, and receives an allowance. , LEAKAGE OF NEWS. LONDON, May 13. In the House of Commons to-day, Sif W. Jowett explained that the suggestion that there had been a leakage of information with regard to the impending arrest of Gandhi was not borne out by an inquiry. Three newspapers gave an assurance that the news had not been received from improper sources. It appeared that the announcement had been based reasonably on the inference drawn from something. Mr Clynes, Home Secretary, said that nobody was blameworthy.

NEWSPAPERS’ PROTEST. LONDON, May 14. The Newspaper Proprietors’ Association has sent a letter to Mr Ramsay MacDonald expressing regret at the Government’s use of the Official Secrets Act against newspapers publishing the decision to arrest Gandhi, and the conviction that the interrogation of the journalist concerned who had been engaged in the collection of information by legitimate methods was an unjustifiable ( infraction of the freedom of the Press. Further, the letter urged the amendment of sections of the Act relating to civil affairs. I =====