COLD-SHOULDERING THE COMMISSION.

Evening Star, Issue 19796, 21 February 1928, Page 6

COLD-SHOULDERING THE COMMISSION.

The Indian Commission is getting its full share of “ the blame of those ye better, the hate of those ye guard,” It was sent to India to consult with Indians as to how political reforms which give them a greater part in government can be best improved and possibly accelerated. And on every side, by those to whom some share of authority has already been given, it is being rebuffed and abused. It has the prospect of being able to say, at the end of its tour, in the words of a prominent American in London when the Lusitania had been torpedoed and President Wilson preserved his calm: “ I felt as though I had been given a kick at every lamp pose on Constitution Hill.” , It was not surprising that the National Congress should resolve on a That body has been

generally most renowned for unreason. But, except when Great Britain anticipated their own action in slighting a Khalif, the Mohammedans have been usually Britain’s friends. And the Mohammedans are divided into two camps at present, of which one stands for a boycott and the other is unwilling to go so far. The National Liberal Federation decided early that it would have nothing to do with the Commission in any shape or form. Its grievance against it was that it was not composed of Indians. Now the Indian Legislative Assembly, by a majority of six votes, has pledged itself to the same course. Everything is wrong with the Commission, as that body sees it. Its members know nothing of India; they are incompetent for their mission; it was conceived in iniquity and guile? India is not getting a fair deal. Only those Hindus—the vast majority, but quite the least powerful section—who have been oppressed and kept down by their own countrymen promise to support it. The Imperial parliament thought it was doing well by India. It saw no other way by whicji the progress of self-government could be either investigated or quickened. Mr Ramsay MacDonald has stated that, if a Labor Government came into office to-morrow, its plan would bo the same. But Indians of the political class are still suspicious, hostile. It looks as if, in the absence of their support, the Commission will be required to go into the highways and byways and enlist the “ untouchables ” and similar “no account’’ people as its advisers. Lord Birkenhead has threatened as much. But the “ untouchables ” are not yet ready to rule. If the classes who have had some education for that task choose to persist in their present attitude the conclusion can only be that they are as unfit, and that India is not ready yet for any extension of self-government.