THE New Zealand Herald AND DAILY SOUTHERN CROSS SATURDAY, JANUARY 26, 1935 A CONSTITUTION FOR INDIA

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXII, Issue 22018, 26 January 1935, Page 10

THE New Zealand Herald AND DAILY SOUTHERN CROSS SATURDAY, JANUARY 26, 1935 A CONSTITUTION FOR INDIA

Nobody has yet dared to say that the British shirk their share of "the white man's burden." They are often charged with having taken too much upon themselves, especially in the way of territory, but the accusation has been deprived of its sting by the eventual admission that native peoples have not been subjected, in the process, to tyranny. Indeed, no other nation can show an equal success in winning the regard of such peoples. These things are brought to mind by the Government of India Bill, now beginning its course through the British Parliament. Its provisions embody the just and liberal principles underlying a policy that has become traditional in it's care for subject peoples. Not to bring them to their knees, but to encourage and help them to stand on their own feet, is the distinguishing idea. This implies a patient process : education in self-rule, opportunity to try their growing powers, freedom to express their mind, but an overseeing—if need be, overriding—care le-st ambition of liberty outrun capacity for it and destroy the beneficent enterprise. This offer of a constitution will have to run the gauntlet between two lines of critics —one believing that the offer is too mean, the other protesting that it is prodigally and perilouslygenerous. The first of these is composed chiefly of malcontents in India, identified with the refractory National Congress, bent on attaining Swaraj (Home Rule) in "Dominion status," and girding at every check imposed; members of the Labour Party in Britain are inclined to ally themselves with this complaining, rabid resentment. The second line, opposite to the first, is made up of "die-hard" Conservatives in Britain and a few others shstring the fear that the policy of emancipation goes too far and too fast; some of them are making the policy an issue in the Wavertree (Liverpool) by-election, and their general attitude is expressed in Lord Lloyd's summary of events as he sees them—"We have had our judgment deflected by glamour and warped by timidity; we are now being rushed to do in days what can be done safely only in decades." As outlined in the news to-day, the measure both gives and withholds, makes bold departures a»d prescribes safeguards, is a real project of freedom and yet keeps a precautionary grip of the reins.

Several things should be kept in mind when judging the bill. It is an effort to keep a promise sincerely made in accordance with the just and" liberal principles just noted. This promise dates back many years. After much exploratory work, which kept pace with developments in India, the British Government of 1917 announced its intention of "increasing the association of Indians in every branch of the administration and the gradual development of self-governing institutions with a view to the progressive realisation of responsible government in India as an integral part of the British Empire." From that declaration of willingness to give India a constitution there has been no withdrawal: the only serious question has been whether the time had come for granting any considerable measure of responsible government. It is on this that opinion has been sharply divided, not on the promise itself. Next, happenings, in India have retarded the keeping of the promise, especially the campaign of defiant demands laflnched by the National Congress. These happenings have fed the anxiety of the British doubters, and in the Government of India Bill their influence can be read. Nevertheless, following the Simop Report and the Round Table Conferences at which Indian ambitions had as full opportunity. of expression as had British misgivings, this legislative outcome, the direct product of the subsequent deliberations of a Joint Select Committee, goes a long way in the "progressive realisation of self-government." An All-India Federation, comprising 11 British provinces (two of them new) and such of the prince-riiled States as agree to join, is to be set up. Burma is to have a similar constitution apart. The provinces are to deal with affairs belonging naturally to their own internal requirements, but three reserved matters defence, foreign relations and religion—are to be under federal control, since the.v concern India as a whole. The Indian States, of which at least half must voluntarily join to make the scheme operative, will have their rights respected as hitherto. It is obvious that an intention to confer considerable local freedom has guided the framers of the constitution.

Difficulties will be encountered. Some of them will arise from the composite racial, religious and political nature of India, as heretofore. These are inseparable from the problem ; they have largely contributed to the creation of it ; but the scheme certainly proposes a feasible solution. Nothing more compact than a federation is possible at this stage, or in the visible future. In the working of a parliamentary system, both in the provinces and at the centre, practical difficulties are likely to be met, again because of the composite nature of the units and the vast wlfiole composed of them. Among these difficulties is the harmonising, in practice, of the divergent purposes—provincial freedom and the over-riding powers of the Crown's representatives. The decentralisation of certain responsibilities and the maintained centralisation of

others seems to be the only possible way; but the shadows of the Governors, the Governor-General and the British Secretary of State for India will be inevitably so substantial, in the minds of many Indians as well as in actual fact, that only time can tell how the system will work. On the capacity and tact of the representatives of the Crown and the good intent of their respective Ministries tendering advice, almost everything will depend. Yet similar difficulties have had to be faced at every constitutional advance of an outlying British territory—although without the vastness and complexity of the Indian situation —and there can be reasonable hope of ultimate success.