THE UNREST IN INDIA.

Colonist, Volume LII, Issue 12767, 13 April 1910, Page 3

THE UNREST IN INDIA.

to'"TKe Colonist.")

Christohurch, April 11. An interesting contribution to that much discussed topic, the unrest in India, was made by Colonel Pollen, the president of the British Esperanto Society, in the course of an interview with a representative of "The Press." Colonel Pollen, who is a retired Indian civil servant, spent from 30 to 40 years in India, and should therefore be qualified to speak with some authority. Ho said that ha did not take as grave a view of the position as some people. Wo have educated some of these young men in such a manner . as to upset all their old traditions, and an English education is certainly upsetting the discipline of the Hindu household. The majority of the people ""of .India though they -~ don't exactly love us, are faithful and true to the Crown, and do not dislike their European chiefs. ■•■. He. could go as far as to say that they much prefer having their disputes settled by Englishmen rather than by their own people, as they are assured that the sahib is at any . rate unprejudiced. The civil and military services throughput Idnia. have, with' very few exceptions, "always upheld the old idoal of British truth and honour. Mistakes have been made; ar.d were still being made, but in spito of the misrepresentations of international mischief makers like the Kesr Hardies and Cottons, the bulk of the - people of India were true, and the Sahibs were working amongst and with them with the best feeling on both sides. He believed that the unrest in India would ■ be settled on common-! sense lines. In the great freemasonry movement he saw the best promise of a satisfactory settlement as it was doing extraordinary work by bringing Europeans and Hindus together in the bonds of Masonic brotherhood. The Christian missionaries were doing marvellous work throughout Hindustan. Their: success was not to be' counted in converts, but lay in the fact that. in spite or terrific mistakes they had succeeded in rendering Christian ethics acceptable throughout the. land. The Theosophist schools were alsddoinga great work by teach- - ing higher ethics iM' were to be: found fa th> <*W j«l|gion«, ~ . -