Mr. Nash And India

Dominion, Volume 37, Issue 234, 30 June 1944, Page 4

Mr. Nash And India

Sir, —H. Irwin’s statements about India iu today’s “Dominion” are so patently absurd as hardly to warrant a reply were it not that such statements lire so easily accepted by the public. He quotes Dr. Mayo a s saying that the physical degeneracy and short life of the vast majority of Hindus is due to the practice of child marriage, 3,200,000 Child mothers dying in childbirth every generation. This may be one of the Causes, but I doubt if even Dr. Mayo would really consider it the main cause. The All-India Conference of Medical Research Workers, which met in 1926, recorded in a Resolution that the annual deaths from preventlble disease amounted to 5 or 6 millions, of which malaria accounted for over a million, the latter alone being seven or eight times as many as Dr. Mayo’s figure for deaths from child marriages'. The main cause of the low expectation of life in India (which is 23 years and not 27 as stated by Mr. Nash) is poverty and malnutrition. In 1933 Major-General Sir Jbhn Megan, director of the Indian Medical Service, stated that 61 per cent, of Indians were under-nourished, and according to Colonel McHarrison, in charge of the Deficiency Diseases Inquiry at the Pasteur Institute at Croonoor. in 1926, “Malnutrition is the most far-reaching of the causes of diseases in India. As to poverty. (ho report of the India Central Banking Inquiry Committee of 1931 reached the conclusion based on 1928 figures that the average income of the agriculturists in British India (about 60 per cent, of the population) was £3 a year. If has dropped since then. In snite of Dr. Mayo’s assertion that the material prosperity of the Indians has increased so much during this century it is considered by economists as doubtful whether they were much worse off 200 years ago. To assert, as does Mr. Irwin, that, the poverty of the Indians is due to their customs and religion, is putting the cart before the horse. The ill effects of custom, superstition and religion are due (as in all backward countries) to lack of education which, in turn is due to poverty. . . Mivht I suggest to Mr. Irwin that Dr. Mayo’s book is not enough to give weight, as he puts it. to hi'. opinions, and that he would do well to read, for example, "The Rise ami Fulfilment of British Rulo in India.” by Thomson and Garratt, Professor Buchanan’s •‘Development of Capitalist Enterprise in India.” Vera Anstey's “Economic Development of India.” 'and H. N. Brailsford's “Subject India.” as well as two books by Indians. “India Today." by Palme Dutt, aud “The Problem of India.” by Shelvangar <a Penguin publication).—l am, etc—RETURNED SOLDIER. Featherston. June 2. [Several correspondents have written in reply to Mr. Irwin, but limitations of space prevent publication. The above letter mentions the main points raised by the other correspondents.] ,