Administration Breaking Down

Northern Advocate, 28 August 1947, Page 7

Administration Breaking Down

The Daily Telegraph’s New Delhi correspondent says the administration of Northern India (Hindustan) and Pakistan appears steadily to be breaking down under the strain of the Pun-' jab disorders. The number of refugees drifting between Delhi and Lahore now is estimated at 500,000. Telegraphic and railways communication is disorganised. Armed bands continue to make road travel almost impossible. Lady Mountbatten arrived at Lahore by air and made a tour of refugee camps and hospitals before going to Rawalpindi. Lord Mountbatten leaves for Ambala, in East Punjab, on August 29, to preside at a meeting of the Joint Defence Council which is to consider the Punjab situation. After attending this meeting, Mr Nehru and the Indian Minister of Defence (Sardar Baldev Singh) were to go to Lahore for a meeting of Ministers of the Pakistan Government. It is understood that the Government of India proposed to the Government of Pakistan that Ministers of both Dominions should tour the East and West Punjab in two parties. Thousands of refugees continued to stream along Punjab roads today to escape from mass murder, arson and plunder which engulfed both sides of the Pakistan-Indian border. Moslem leaders claimed that over 100,000 Moslem refugees poured into Pakistan.

Hindu and Sikh leaders said many thousands of their people likewise had been driven from Pakistan.

Heavy troop movements are occurring as both the Pakistan and Indian

Governments strive to meet pledges of safety to minorities. Sardar Patel, in a report by the advisory committee on minorities and fundamental rights, of which he is chairman, recommended to the Indian Constituent Assembly the abolition of separate electorates for Indian minorities, which are said to have sharpened communal differences to a dangerous extent.

He recommended that elections- for central provincial legislatures should be on the basis of joint electorates. Seats for different minorities should be reserved on the basis of population. • w

Minorities should have rights to contest unreserved seats. . .. . The Indian Dominion Government asked South African nationals in India, except South African Indians, to secure before August 31 permission to continue to stay in India. The Government’s action brings Indian regulations under the Reciprocity Act of 1943 into line with those operative in South Africa against Indians.