CONSTITUTION OF INDIA

Hokitika Guardian, 10 December 1928, Page 7

CONSTITUTION OF INDIA

THE NATIVE STATES.. RELATIONS WITH CENTRAL GOVERaNM ENT. (United Press Association— By Electric Telegraph—Copyright).

RUGBY, December o. In the House of Jxirds, Lord Olliver, who was Secreary of State lor India in the Labour Government of 1924, called attention to questions arising regarding the Governments of Indian States not forming parte of any of the provinces of British India. He asked the Government whether it had in view any scheme for dealing with such questions concurrently and consistently with any amendments of the Constitution of the British Indian Government that might commend themselves to Parliament, as the outcome of the inquiry now being made by the Simon Commission.

Viscount Hardinge, a former Viceroy of India, said that the Indian princes were one of tho most loyal elements in India. They had rendered great services in the war and had offered ships, men and aeroplanes. As a whole the Indian States were well governed and met the needs of the population. There were States like Mysore that served as models of good administration. He could conceive of no steps more backward or more likely to he resented than any scheme by which they were placed in a position of subservience to lie Legislative Assemblies of the Central or Provincial Governments.

Tlic Marquess of Rending, also a former Viceroy of India, said that during r.he whole of his experience in India no more loyal body could be found than the ruling princes. He bad never found the princes as a body slow to recognise the necessity for making any concession, or for falling in with any view that might he put forward by the Government of India, which was founded upon the desire to protect India, or to strengthen India in any way. The Princes desired to maintain, as closely as they could, their relations with the viceroy, as the representative of the Govern ment. Whatever the Princes might do he felt that they would not desire to be placed under Legislative Assembly. Certainly the Liberal Party, with which he was associated, had no desire to see any change in the system of sovereignity under which the Indian Princes rule. They had no idea of comoelling or in any way forcing upon the States a different Constitution from the one they at present enoyed. In reply, Viscount Peel, the Secretary for India, .said that until the Government had received the report ol Sir Hareount Butler’s commit tee and the report of Sir John Simon’s Commission. discussion on the matter could lie only speculative and hypothetical. As to whether the Government had any scheme, he could onlv say that it had not-. At the present time such a scheme would he clearly premature. The Government was however, looking ahead and examining questions which could only be approached stage by stage, with fpll comprehension of the necessity of caution and deliberation. He desired to associate himself with the tributes that had been paid by the Marquess of Reading and Viscount Hard in go to the loyalty and devotion of the Indian Princes.