INDIANS AND THE INDIAN ARMY.

Pukekohe & Waiuku Times, Volume 6, Issue 270, 27 April 1917, Page 2 (Supplement)

INDIANS AND THE INDIAN ARMY.

A REFORM THAT LS LONG

OVERDUE

By Colonel A. M. Murray. C.B In the Daily News.

Much of the interest of the ''Report of the Royal Commission on the Public Services in India" has been discounted by tho fact that the Commission was appointed during peace to deal with the civil side of Indian Government only, matters concerning the military service, which is just now tho most important of all the public services, being omitted from the terms of reference, and consequently from tho purview of the Commissioners. Their report can keep, but what cannot keep is the complaint put forward among others by Mr. Abdur Rahim, the talented Judge of the Madras High Court, who in his able courageous and wholly convincing dissenting minute, tells us that no educated Indian, whether he be Sikh, Pathan, Rajput, or a descendant of the Moguls, can hold a commission in the King s Army. An Indian may rise to high position in the Civil Service, lie may become a member of the Viceroy's or Legislative Council, a Judge of tho High Court, or fill any post of corresponding authority, but when his son, who may have been educated at one of our Public Schools, applies for a commission his request is refused, not by reasons of his unfitness for military service, but because he is an Indian. An Indian can obtam a Viceroy's Commission as 'native officer," but this is a very different thing from a King's Commission. However senior the so-called native officer may be, he has to salute the lastjoined British officer fresh from Sandhurst.

LORD CURZON'S PROPOSAL.

Tho poir.t raised by Mr. Abdur Rahim is not. new, for when Lord Curzon was Viceroy of India it is believed he submitted proposals to the Home Government for training young Indian gentlemen for Army Commissions, and only abandoned them when they were ruled out by the Cabinet in deference to the opinions of military men, whose names need uot be mentioned, but who were officers of high rank in the Indian Army. Lord Curzon's proposals, and the recorded opinions of the dessentient soldiers, have never been published, bat they have of course been pigeon-holed at the India Office, and are at Mr. Chamberlain's disposal whenever he chooses to call for the official file. All that Lord Curzon was allowed to do was to found the Imperial Cadet Corps at Dehra Dun for training the sons of ruling chiefs who have armies of their own. This corps was placed under the honorary command of Sir Per tab Singh, who is an ''honorary' Major-General in the Army, and who was given a British officer as executive commandant. The corps has done good work in training the young chiefs and nobles in habits of discipline and command, but has only led them into a blind alley without satisfying their demand for enrolment in the commissioned ranks of the Army.

INDIA'S SHARE IN THE WAR

Since Lord Curzon first raised this question circumstances have changed, and if his arguments were as sound as tho writer beieves them to have been fifteen years ago they are still more sound alter India has taken her full share in bearing the devastating burden of this world-wide war. Four separate Expeditionary Forces have been fitted out, dispatched over-seas, and maintain, ed in the field during the past two and a half years. Indian troops have fought in Europe, Africa, and Mesoptamia side by side with their European and Colonial bretliern, not for their own interests only, or even primarily, but for those of the Empire. Their services have been marked by a loyalty, courage, and devotion which have triumphed over all the general, under whom they havo served. The bitter memories of the tH)year old Mutiny have now been wiped off the slate of time, and replaced by a spirit of comradeship which has drawn Indians and Europeans together in close union cemented by blood cheerfully shed for the common cause. Ante bellum and post bellum conditions can never again be the same, and new methods must be applied to new circumstances. This is a matter,not for soldiers, but for statesmen to arrange.

COMMISSIONS FOR INDIANS

At present the Indian Army is recruited !.y natives, and ollicered by Euro -peans. The door, to the commissioned ranks ;s closed to natives, and what is now proposed is to open it by admitting a certain number of upper class Indians -th e sons of men like Sir Harnam Singh whose boys were educated at Harrow and Rugby, and the younger sons of ruling chiefs such as the Maharaja Scmdu, who is an ''Honorary" Major-Generai in tho Army, or of the late Maharaja of Jodhpur, whose son the present Mahar. a.ia has left Welingtou College. Selection would be by competitive examination among candidates nominated by tho \ iceroy unrestricted open competition not being in the present state of Indian Society an effective test ol a candidate's fitness for military command. Some day open competition may come, but not yet. Alter selection the candidate should be sent to the Quetta Cadet College. which has lately been established as the Indian Sandhurst, and is staffed by British officer-instructors. While at the college the young Indian would go ihrough the same training mill as his brother, and if lie failed to satify tho commandant his cadetship would be dissolved. If, on tho contrary, he came satisfactorily through the ordeal ho* wou.d be posted as ;i second lieutenant to a regiment of the Indian Armv, when he would come under the same rides ol probation a., in the ei.se with other! i litis * o(il,! ' Briefly Stated this i.J IM(» scheme, and tlirro is no reason lor rejecting it, except racial prejudice, " inch is dying out among British officers thl ; feneration as fast as cast; pi e|!iu!c is dying out anion" Jndiiii' gentlemen. " I

SPIRIT OF CO.MKADKSIIII'

•As long as we treat India as a conquered country unrest will spread pari pa;su witu the spread of education. Comrade. ■ ■l'ip males for cont'iitinent, and takes Mie wind out of the sads of agitators. Indians to feel that their cause n our cause, and that they have "hi.il lights of Imperial citizenship with ourselves and overseas Dominions. Wo cannot do everything at once, but w? '■■'•lli bcti.i with ihe Ariiiv. The Army of India. I ke the Government, of India, h o-gani-ed on bure.au-crafic, not deiiioerafic. liin-s t and this is what requires to undone. Soldiers will oppose the proposal for fusion, because br force of ha. i 1 and t'adition they oppose all reforms; but statesmen will understand what Indians want. am] i l ' fhry are wise tlmr will irivi it to t'leiu. Difficulties wll occur to ootb I'.uropi-an.s a.nd Indians ;n carrying out this proposal, I,ut in Ine' opinion of a distinguished Anglo-Indian' statesman whom the writer ha** consult 1 ed they a.re not msun n rable. !