THE SULTAN AND INDIAN MOSLEMS.

Gisborne Times, Volume XXV, Issue 2089, 25 May 1907, Page 1

THE SULTAN AND INDIAN MOSLEMS.

A well-informed correspondent of the Times of India at Constantinople reports that the \ultan v has recently had placed before him a letter from Bombay, which seems to have escaped tlio vigilance, of liis secret police. Copies of the letter, which is printed hi Persian, have reached both the Grand Vizier and tlie foreign Minister, and much consternation is the result, although there is not a word in the document which is not justified by actual facts. The correspondent has no doubt, from internal evidences, that the letter is what it professes to he, the work of some natives of India who have recently visited Turkey and seen for themselves tlie lmsgovernment rife throughout the Empire, The letter says that as the siiprome head of Islam His Majesty is held in veneration by nearly 200,000,000 Moslems in all parts of the world, and remarks that, had his policy been different, it would have been easy for him to unite all Moslems under his leadership for tlie mutual benefit of fliose of their coreligionists who lack freedom and education. The maladministration of the Empire was the cause of foreign interference, and His Majesty’s energies were concentrated in endeavors to sow discord amongst European Powers, and so prevent their working in common to carry out those reforms which lie himself should he the very first to introduce. Wherever the writers travelled in the Sultan’s dominions they saw bribery and corruption; they saw officials living by extortion, and their hearts bled at the sight of the Turkish soldiers starving and in rags. In consequence of tlieir ill-treatment tlio troops now refused to fight against their co-religionists in Yemen. Moslems throughout the world were ashamed that the chief Moslem State should be so lost to all ideas of good government. Mention is made of Germans being paid large salaries merely to attend the weekly Selamik in the train of tlie Sultan, and of the vast sums squandered in the purchase of war material at the bidding of tlie German Emperor. Tjie Hejnr Railway appears to' the writers tq ho carried on.at the present time, whatever its future benefits to pilgrims may ho, for the sole purpose of putting money into the pockets of the committee, with whom the patronage for contracts rests. Tlio. letter compares the freedom enjoyed under British rule in India with the tyranny oxistent in Turkey, and it is remarked that under the former the services of upright, jioqest Malioinmedans are readily obtainable, The correspondent doubts whether fhe letter will have any ipimediato good, as the members of His Majesty’s entourage will not allow him to probe these ills and to see for himself how evil is the state of affairs. Ho believes that wore the letter scattered broadcast throughout the whole Moslem world there would he a general uprising of Islam to demand reform.