GRIEF IN THE MASS

Otago Daily Times, Issue 26708, 1 March 1948, Page 7

GRIEF IN THE MASS

DEATH OF GANDHI CONDITIONS IN INDIA 3 The shock with which the news of Gandhi’s assassination was received throughout India was described by Mr Erward Burgess, technical director of a British firm of agricultural manufacturers, as a very severe one. Mr Burgess, who is at present visiting Dunedin, was in New Delhi when Gandhi was shot, and he heard the news within a quarter of an hour of the new occurrence. In an interview with the Daily Times, he said that he was particularly impressed by the appalling grief the Indians had shown. Never before had he seen such grief in the mass. Mr Burgess also saw. something of the funeral while he was in New Delhi, and the crowds had amazed him.

The people who received the blame for Gandhi’s death were the right wing Hindus. Mr Burgess said, and the organisation known as the Hindu Mahasabha was now being dissolved as a political body, though it was beifcg retained as a cultural organisation.

The Hindu Mahasabha had been opposed to Gandhi’s policy of pacification towards the Moslems and to his ideas of the development of cottage industries and socialisation, Mr Burgess continued. Gandhi’s shooting could not be laid at the door of the Hindu Mahas-;-abha but undoubtedly the odium of, the whole thing had fallen, rightly or wrongly, on the party. “I do not believe Gandhi’s death. will have any immediate substantial, effect on Indian politics or life in gen-; eral in India,” Mr Burgess said. “ The, people believe a saint has died, and they still have before them the in-', spiration of his example and guidance. Mr Burgess said he was very pleased to find that the Indian business man was very pro-British, and in spite of many signs to the contrary, he thought the British manufacturer would do well to regard the Indian market as, one of his largest markets for many lines of equipment. A country with a population of nearly 400,000,000 could not be ignored. India had been regarded as the largest single market for British in-, dustry for the last 75 years, and so faras his own company was concerned it; did not intend to run out of it. he added. It had had a house in India for 75 years and now had a very large organisation there, with branches,, throughout the country.