REFORM IN INDIA

Timaru Herald, Volume CXXXVIII, Issue 19943, 30 October 1934, Page 4

REFORM IN INDIA

COMPLEX PROBLEM FACING BRITAIN PROPOSALS TO BE DISCUSSED British Official Wireless RUGBY, October 27. Many days of the new Parliamentary session will be occupied in the House of Commons by the discussion of the Government proposals for constitutional reform in India, which was declared last night by Mr Neville Chamberlain in a speech at York as constituting one of the most difficult and most complex problems ever set to any nation in the whole history of the world. Mr Chamberlain said the Government s proposals would be comprised in a vast Bill containing perhaps between 350 and 400 clauses. The question had been the subject of the most exhaustive talks and examination, and he deeply regretted that the subject had been the occasion of serious differences of opinion in the Conservative Party. Without danger of aggravating such differences, he could say that affairs in India could not be left as they were. There was no dispute about that, and the only question to decide was how fast and how far they were prepared to go in the direction of helping India towards self-government. In the circumstances they were perhaps very fortunate, as they were going to have a report on the whole question from the Joint Select Committee, which included members of experience and well-balanced judgment. Those outside could not claim to be specialists on Indian affairs, and would desire to be guided by the recommendations of the Joint Select Committee. The committee would submit a report in a few weeks, and he urged that the people should not make up their minds before hearing what the committee had to say on the subject. In a speech at Portsmouth Sir T. Inskip said that, if they were going to have a Federal Government in India, they could not possibly divert the responsibility at the centre. It was impossible to have a Federal Government and no power and no responsibility. He did not claim that the Government’s proposals were infallible, but as to their general nature as a ground upon which to work he believed them to be the best that had been devised.