INDIAN REFORMS

Otago Daily Times, Issue 22432, 29 November 1934, Page 10

INDIAN REFORMS

COMMITTEE'S PROPOSALS DISCUSSED BY CONSERVATIVES CBritish Official Wireless.) (United Press Association.) (By Electric Telegraph—Copyright.) RUGBY, November 27. Sir Austen Chamberlain, who was a member of the Parliamentary Committee on Indian Constitutional Reform, addressed a private meeting o- Conservative members of Parliament last night. Press reports state that, although no vote was taken, there was abundant evidence that the tone of the meeting was sympathetic to the committee's proposals. Sir Austen Chamberlain is reported to have said that he %vent into the committee with grave doubts about some of the matters which were the subject of the committee's consideration, but as the result of his work in the committee his views underwent a considerable change. He was at first inclined to think that it would be wise to deal for the present only with the proposals for provincial autonomy, but later he had come to the conclusion that to establish 11 autonomous Governments and to leave the centre without any representative character would result in a further weakening of the Central Government itself. He said it was imperative that in the same statute in which they had established provincial autonomy they should lay down conditions for a measure of responsibility at the centre, and he defended the changes which the committee proposed in the composition and character of the Central Legislature. ADDITIONAL SAFEGUARDS (British Official Wireless.) RUGBY, November 27. Lord Zetland, a member of the Joint Select Committee, addressed the India Association. He said that, while the report accepted the main principles of the White Paper, it recommended some' radical alterations in their application. In justification of the change from direct to indirect election for a general Lower House, he said the vast constituencies which would be inevitable under tl-3 rejected plan would reduce the representative system to an absurdity. Tendencies inherited' in any federation of which Providence was a component part would be more effectively counteracted by making the Provincial Legislatures constitutents of the federation. " Noting the additional safeguards concerning the transfer of law and order, Lord Zetland said that any objections thought still to attach to the proposals would be far less than those inherent in any attempt to deprive the Ministry of the responsibility for the discharge of the most essential of all functions of the Government. The chairman, who is also a member of the House of Commons, said he regarded the report as a well-reasoned and comprehensive scheme, and in accordance with the' historic traditions of this country in the progressive and political development of its dependencies. He believed it would meet with the approval of moderate opinion both here and in India. Lord Londonderry, in a speech at Maidstone, said a great weight of practical experience and knowledge lay behind the plan for an Indian federation, and there would never be surer guidance and greater authority on which to rely than that of the Joint Committee's report. Its 32 members, with the exception of six, had personal knowledge of Indian affairs.