THE PROBLEM OF INDIA

Hokitika Guardian, 22 November 1930, Page 6

THE PROBLEM OF INDIA

SPEECHES AT BANQUET.

Addressing a large assemblage at the London Chamber of Commerce banquet to the Imperial delegates last month, Sir John Simon, G.C.5.1., K.C.V.0., K.C., in proposing the toast of “India,” said how glad he was that the Indian Conference had been arranged to take place immediately after the Imperial Conference. During the last three years the great subject of India had been the sole pre-occupation of his mind. (Cheers.) On behalf of India, he ventured to bespeak the interest and attention of Dominion statesmen in this stupendous Indian.question. Nobody would think of blaming them because they were interested primarily in the affairs of their own lands, but after all this prodigious problem of India was going to be considered after the Imperial Conference. What did it. involve?. Tt involved a population thirty times as great as the population of Canada and thirteen times as great as the population of all the Dominions assembled at the Imperial Conference. Put together all the complication of questions, social, economic, industrial, racial, religious, and constitutional xvliich were involved, would tax the very best, efforts and the very clearest minds, and the most sympathetic hearts in the Empire. (Hear, hear.) They bad there that night more than one man who had been selected to serve on the Indian Conference, and to all of them they extended their warmest sympathy and most sincere good wishes.' (Hear, hear.) He had the good fortune to associate the toast with an old friend of his.

Sir Muhammad Shaft.; to whom he (Sir John)'was;grateful for much kindness when, the Commission was in India, and who had the very unusual and interesting distinction of serving in turn on the /Imperial Conference and later on the Indian Commission. They all wished Sir Muhammad Shaft and his colleagues the best of good fortune, and offered them the assurance of their warmest sympathy in the work which they were called upon to undertake. Their real task was to go forward with sympathy and insight to discover how they must help this immense Indian Continent to find its way towards further advance along those constitutional avenues which all men of good will desired to see it follow. (Cheers.) India and the Empire. Sir Muhammad Shaft, in responding, said there were'/dwocmain reasons which led him to co-opei'atdsxvith /"the Simon Commission in its investigations in India, When the British Government of that period committed the grave blunder of excluding representatives of India from the Royal Commission great feeling spread throughput India, and he thought that, if the British Government had committed one blunder, Indians would be cbifimitting an equal blunder by not co-operating with the Royal Commission. -The proper course was to settle differences among themselves and to place a well ' ‘considered scheme of constitutional advance before the Commission for it's consideration. (Cheers.) __ The second main rq'nsqxi wtas- that he bad been convinced;.,till.; Ijis" life that the future of'Miis counti , y“"l'Sid within the British Commonwealth of Nations. (Cheers.) Therefore, he consistently supported the cause of Indo-British cooperation. Proceeding, Sir Muhammad Shaft referred to the great part played h_v India in helping the Mother Country and the ’Empire in the Great War. In 1914, when the Great War broke out, thanks to the foresight of Lord Hardinge, Tndia found herself wholly prepared and equipped to take her share of the burden of responsibility in the defence of the Empire. Within a few weeks of the declaration of war India’s sons were fighting shoulder to shoulder with their British comrades, and within ten months India had. provided 124 regiments of infantry and 28 regiments oik.cavalry, besides smaller bodies of troops,' while by the summer of 1918 Tndifj; "supplied over 1,300.900 troops, or jn’ojre than all the British Dominions put 1 together. “If in the past,” adclecl Sir Muhammad Shaft, “India as a; Dependency of Great. Britain has done so much to uphold its honour and glory, what about the future, when she comes to occupy her rightful place in the British Commonwealth of Nations?” A contented Tndia would be ready to supply millions of men should any occasion arise when again the Empire might be in peril; the inexhaustible resources of Tndia

still called for development, and British capital and Indian capital and Indian labour would bo certain to find abundant scope for employment; and Tndia, for the present and for many years to come unable to supply the needs of modern civilisation, with its consequent higher standards of living, would furnish the Mother Country with a solution of the unemployment problem. (Cheers.)