INDIA AND RUSSIA.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXVII, Issue 20621, 21 July 1930, Page 13

INDIA AND RUSSIA.

LESSONS FOR EXTREMISTS. POINTS IN THE SIMON REPORT. LIFE UNDER THE SOVIET. jjr A. jr. THOMPSON*. LONDON, June 11. The monumental report of (he Simon Commission affords large opportunity of mental exercise- to those among our btilihling advocates of " Ifonie Eule for India" who have any brains to exercise and are not too steeped in self-conceit to take instruction. The authors of the report claim, with some show of sincerity, that it is the desiro and purpose of the British Government to cany on what young Mr. Crown, Labour M.P., from Wolverhampton, calls " the dirty work of British Imperialism," fur the benefit and advancement of the 319 millions of India's population. But the task presents difficulties which might cramp even the youngest of Parliamentary master-minds. There are 222 languages in India. Only 16 in every thousand men and two m every thousand women are literate in English. Two million girls were married and a hundred thousand were widows before the ago of ten. There are many religions, and the bitter antagonism between two of these—the Hindu and the Mohammedan —is " one of the chief stumbling blocks in the way of smoother and more rapid progress."

Caste System and Frontier Brigands. TJio people are divided into 2-300 graduated castes, and 33 per cent, of Hindus nro outcasts from their co-re-ligionists, " untouchables," who in some places must not approach within a certain distance of a high-class Hindu, and in some parts must leave the road to allow him to pass unpolluted; and whose children are either excluded from schooii provide<i by public funds, or else required to sit apart or even stand outside the school. y

The North West Frontier is infested by " hardy and fanatical tribesmen" who live on booty, from passing caravans or the plunder of raids in settled districts; between 185U and 1922 seventy-two military expeditions were required to check the inroads of the??, brigand mountaineers on the peaceful workers of the plains. Missionaries of Civilisation, These are a few of jthe difficulties indicated in the Simon report as " Home* Rule for India," which can- only be surmounted by the slow process'of gradualness. A small band of British civil servants are trying to surmount them by " lecturing in universities or bridging rivers, fighting epidemic disease'or dealing with widespread riots, excavating a pre-historic city or installing a water supply for a new ope."

These devoted missionaries of civilisation, " humble because of knowledge, mighty by sacrifice," are the hope of India. They rule one-fifth of the world's population, and are training the pick of the people to share their work and responsibilities. To allow their effort and achievement to be thrown back into the melting-pot, to be'scrambled for again' in fire and slaughter, would be neither wise nor humane. It would be the greatest disaster and set'-bajk that could possibly happen to the progress of the world.

The report of the Simon Commission—whose members include two staunch Socialists'—should give our sentimentalists fruitfully to think. Hollow-Faced " Comrades."

Another instructive document is the report of a traveller in Russia, published in the current issue of :i.he Engineering and Shipbuilding Draughtsmen's official organ. The writer, a member of. his trade union, has travelled for two and ahalf days in Russian trains to a distant part of the Soviet Republic. He starts by describing " tlw comrade who examined my baggage at the frontier post", as weary-eyed, dismally-clad and hollowfaced a living antithesis to the

mythical workers, glorious with might and triumph, which were depicted oil the many-coloured posters decorating the cr.stoms examination room."

En Moscow lie found that " people seem to olitain much of their food in communal kitchens.' Those which I saw were evillooking places, dark and ill-ventilated, crowded with people. ][ had not the nerve to enter one. The streets were full of people. . . . Rnggedness was universal; beggars numerous and persistent." Food Queues Numerous.

He says that necessities of life are exported to pay for imported manufactures, with the result that Russian butter, which is .sold in London for Is 8d per lb., costs over 10s in Russia, and he adds, During inv stay I did not- see anybody using butter. .A working man receives 31b. of black bread pe<- day. Ho is allowed one quarter-pound of meat every other day if it is available. A mental worker-' receives about 21b. of bread per diem, rood queues' are numerous and can be seen every dav, and ration _tickets' aro part of the sysjem. I was told that it was not uncommon for women to stand in foqd queues from 2 a.m. Unless a man has a card from the union he can obtain neither work nor food. Non-manual workers, such as shopkeepers and - professional mi-r. before the Revolution, not being workmen, are in a hopeless plight, i.e.. those still alive."

The writer tells of a works-official from whom the local Party Council demanded a week's pay for the help of the State; the mini said he could no I. spare it, as on his scanty pay he could barely live. "Without, warning, he was 'lifted' and sent away. There is no trial given; tiio victims simply disappear. In such circumstances no provision is made for a man's dependants. What- is worse, nothing in the house is allowed to be sold for food." Tlie New o#der in Industry. As for discipline in llio factories, tli® draughtsman confirms wLufc I myself saw in the early days of the revolution. " On the entrance of a stranger, 01* if» there is anything in the slightest degree of interest taking place in the shops, the men simply down tools,and gather round, often "giving advico to the management. My first experience was whan I went with two colleagues to measure the thickness of a steel plate. Within a few minutes we had fourteen workmen round 11s, including a fully-armed soldier." The story reminds 1110 of a score of similar experiences during my own stay in Russia in 1917. The experts, the administrative chiefs, had all been sacked. If a detail of management arose, the men held a meeting and talked. How they talked! And the -work waited. Now, according to this draughtsman, "if the prog ram mo required l>y the J-ivo Years' Plan falls behind in any particular, the members of the management are simply arrested and sent, away. This is done, presumably, at the initiative <>r . the Party Councils. Naturally enough, nobody wiii accept, unless under compulsion, a managerial post." The moral of these lessons—from India and from Russia —is the " inevitability of gradualness." The mills of the gods grind slowly, and it is hard to persuade a workless man to patience; but slow and sure is still a better way than fast and loose.