RULE IN INDIA

Manawatu Standard, Volume LX, Issue 215, 9 August 1940, Page 8

RULE IN INDIA

BRITAIN’S CO-OPERATION. MEETING NATIVE WISHES. (United Press Association—By Electric Telegraph.—Copyright.) Received August 9, 12.45 p.m. LONDON, Aug. 8. The Secretary for India (Mr L. C. M. S. Amery), in the House of Commons. said Dominion status for India remains Britain’s aim. the differences between the Indian communities which have prevented the achievement of national unity can no longer postpone the proposed expansion of the Viceroy’s Council, nor the establishment of a tody associating Indian public opinion more closely with the Central Government. Lord Linlithgow (Viceroy) is inviting a number of representative Indians to join his council and is also establishing a YVar Advisory Council, representing the B>tates and other interests of India as a whole. Full weight will be given minority views in any revision. Britain, said Mr Amery, could not contemplate the transfer at present of iho responsibilities for peace and welfare in India to any system of government whose authority large and powerful elements directly deny, nor be a party to the coercion of such elements into submission to such a government. “Britain sympathises with the contention that the framing of any new scheme should primarily be the responsibility of the Indians themselves and should originate from Indian conceptions of the social, economic and political structure, to which Britain wishes to see the fullest possible expression given, subject to Britain’s obligations to' India, of which the Government cannot divest itself,” said Air Amery.

The present was not, the moment in which fundamental constitutional issues could he decisively resolved, but the Government would very readily assent to the creation with the least possible delay after the war of a body representing the principal elements in India’s national life with the object of devising a new Constitution. “The Government will lend everv aid to hasten its decisions,” he added. MIXED RECEPTION. Received August 9, 1.55 p.m. SIMLA, Aug. 8. Lord Linlithgow delivered a statement identical with that of Air Amery. The Indian-owned Frees describes the announcement as a total negation of the Congress demands. Anglo-Indian newspapers, also minorities, notably the “depressed classes,” urge acceptance of the proposals. .