HOW INDIA IS GOVERNED.

Oamaru Mail, Volume XXXIX, Issue 10764, 11 May 1911, Page 6

HOW INDIA IS GOVERNED.

The executive authority in India itself is vested in the Governor-General in Council. "The 'governor-general, or, as he is more generally called,' the viceroy, is appointed by the Crown, and holds office fox. five, years.: -.., This term is sometimes extended. The salary'of the viceroy is 250,000 rupees "a-oyear. The rupee is now worth one' and fourpence, or roughly thirty-four cents; the salary amounts therefore to" about £16,400 a year; but I should;-be sorry." to undertake the job and'to .pay my expenses''-'out'-of that sum, writes Price Collier, in Scribner's.; ': The council of the viceroys consists of six -ordinary members besides the com-mander-in-chief'of the army, and thej' are appointed by.the' Crown „and hold office for _five years. This council is enlarged into a legislative council by the addition of sixteen other members appointed' by tfie viceroy under certain restrictions.

Further, .India" is divided into nine provinces :'Bombay, Madras, Bengal, Eastern Bengal, United -provinces; the Punjab, Central • provinces, North-west Frontier provinces, and. Buririah. The governors' of Bombay and Madras are the most important officials after the viceroy, and are appointed by the Crown, and each carries a salary of £BOOO a year. The governors of Bombay and Madras 1 have an executive council of two members of the Indian civil service appointed by the Crown.' The lieutenant-governors of Bengal, Eastern Bengal, United provinces, the Punjab, and Burmah are appointed by the viceroy with the approval of the Crown; the chief commissioners of the Central provinces and the agent to the gover-nor-general who governs the North-west Frontier provinces are appointed by the viceroy in council; Of these divisions I visited seven, and in each I was impressed by the enormous amount of work being done, by-the conscientious — often I thought too conscientious —way in which it was done, and by the dignity and fearlessness of the men who were doing it. ■ If it were not for the interferences from the India office, and the criticism from ignorant politicians, who shamelessly play India off for votes at home, it would be the most ideally managed, as it is the most successfully administered dependency in the world.