The Guardian And Evening Star, with which is incorporated the West Coast Times. WEDNESDAY OCT. 22nd, 1921. INDIA AND SELF-GOVERNMENT

Hokitika Guardian, 22 October 1924, Page 2

The Guardian And Evening Star, with which is incorporated the West Coast Times. WEDNESDAY OCT. 22nd, 1921. INDIA AND SELF-GOVERNMENT

Tim: cable news mates frequent reference to i lie state ol . atlairs in and about India, where the experiment ot modified self-government has been tried. A writer in a late English paper, familiar with bis subject, throws a good deal of light oil the situation in India, and the complex relations o' the peoples. He ill common with many others believes that the Indian people are far from ready for self-government in tile sense we enjoy it. He writes as IT flows: Every week In lugs fresh evidence of the disaster towaids which India is hastening as a result of the adoption of the Montagu .scheme of pretended self-government. The formulation of that scheme by .Mr Montagu and bis little grout* of highbrow advisers is one of the most remarkable illustiations of political folly. The very first condition for self-governiileiit is that there should -lie a self to govern. In India there is no self. T here aie three hundred million people, divided from one another by racial and religious animosities exceeding in bitterness even the mutual hatreds that divide tin- post-war States created in Central Europe. Moreover, in India the 1 acini and religions differences are not oven approximately conterminous with any geographical boundaries; they run right through the whole peninsula from north to south, I roll! east to w est. As long as British rule was firmly maintained it was possible to prevent these warring elements from doing very much damage to one another, and those Indians who had learnt English and had picked up .Radical phrases from English newspapers got, so far as to talk of Indian unity. The tragedy of the present situation is that -Mr .Montagu's recognition of tin's pretended unity lias only served to intensify the fundamental animosities. The broadest of the many dividing lines in India is the division between Hindus and Mahommedan.s. l-’or some time past Indian ‘•Reformers” have been attempting to secure a pact between Hindus and Mnhninmcdans with a

view to joint action against the English and also with a view to a division of the spoils of office when British officials have been driven out of India. I his proposed pact has now altogether broken down. Mr B. Das. who as leader of the Swaraj (self-government party) glorified the murder of an Englisli youth, will have nothing to do with it ; and articles in the Indian I’ress show that the Hindus are now preparing for a struggle with the Mahoinniedans. Particularly significant is a recent leader in the “Bengalee”, the principal representative of the Hindu |

opinion in Bengal. The article opens ns follows:—“Organisation of the 7ii niln Society for the. protection of legitimate Undo interests lias become absolutely necessary. . . The Mahommedan believes lie is very much stronger than the Hindu. Every Mussulman thinks that if only the British were out of the way lie could reduce the Hindu once more to his old position of political serfdom.” The writer then proceeds to argue in effect that the only way to secure Indian unity is for the Hindus to organise and keep the Mahommedans clown. In the same issue of the “Bengalee'’ there is a second leader referring to the “growing bribery and intrigues and corruption of our infant political life.” and a third leader describing the way in which political jobbery is rampant in the Calcutta Corporation, now under the control of the Swaraj Party. More interesting still is the suggestion made in the Calcutta. “Statesman”—the principal English newspaper in Bengal —that the recent riots around the Hindu shrine at Tarakeswar are to be utilised by the Swaraj Party as a means of obtaining money for their political campaign. The priests in charge of the

numerous holy shrines all over India collect (every year large sums of money from millions of Hindu pilgrims. It is suggested that the Swarajists, by organising attacks on these shrines in the name of religion, will lie able to levy blackmail on the priests. On the other hand, if the British Government effectively protects tile custodians of the shrines from violence—as Tsml Lytton has been doing—the Swarajists will proclaim that the English are interfering with the religious liberties of Indians. These are samples of the way in which the follies of Mr Montagu are destroying the peace of India. And each additional sign of weakness on the part of Great Britain brings nearer to the front the mutual animosities which in past centuries made India a theatre of constant warfare and wholesale massacres.