THE UNREST IN INDIA.

Rangitikei Advocate and Manawatu Argus, Volume XXXII, Issue 8857, 6 July 1907, Page 4

THE UNREST IN INDIA.

Fifty years ago the Indian Mutiny broke out in Meerut. Unrest is prevalent to-day m India, and wo read of the close connection between this unrest and the jubilee year of the ; Mutiny. The jubilee of the Mutiny ! ' Gould any word be more utterly out j of place v Heaven send this be not the Miserere year of the Mutiny ! It depends upon Englishmen in India, declares an Anglo-Indian in the Lonj don Express. There is no occasion to go back fifty years in order to find a close comparison with the present surge of sedition that is creating turmoil throughout our great dependency. Ten years suffice. As the public i memory is short, it may bo as well 1 to recapitulate whit happened in , India in 1807, when the people in I England were celebrating the Diaj mond Jubilee of Queen Victoria. ! On that eventful day, on tlieir re- : turn from the evening entertainment ;• given hi it.-; honour by the Governor js of Bombay, Mr Rand and Lieutenant | Ayers wore assassinated at Poona, i Just before, a leaflet had been widely circulated throughout the Bombay Presidency in which the Qnceu and the Indian Government were reviled. The leaflet ran : “Not even a demon would venture to celebrate his conquests in a time of famine, plague and earthquake. An ancient and noble nation is being killed by Ohris- | tiau government. Will none lift a finger to chock the excesses of the English tyrants who have been riding over us rough-shod for more than a century?” India at the time was passing through a period.of stress. Famine wr.s acute; plague raged. Early in June there was a great earthquake, which scattered Assam and shook Calcutta. Just before that date the treacherous attack took place at Maizar, in the Tochi Valley, on a political escort —the first warning of tlie coming frontier revolt. A month later the tribes in the Swat Valley rose. In August the forts in the Khybcr fell. Famine continued, plague continued, and, worst of all from the view of the populace, Government measures to repress plague continued. Everywhere in India, whether in Madras, Bengal, Bombay, or the Punjab, there was a strange feeling of uncertainty; the people wondered what would happen next. Ancient prophecies wore circulated that with the end of the century a new era would he iraugurated aud BritisJi rule abolished. Riots took place, first here, then there. Murders were not infrequent, One of the legacies loft to the peoples of India by the miseries of former centuries is an instinct for intrigue. The number of clever brains eager to turn anything to their own advantage and to scheme against the settled order of tilings is as great now as over. We have given to this class of mind the host western education; wo have ourselves pointed out to them the joints in our armour; we have shown them that while individually strong we are collectively frightened of the vague rebukes that owe their origin to Westminster. The clover Indian pleader lias learnt to play upon the English character as an orator plays upon his audicnco. The voice that lulls us into safety is the same voice that lures the peasant to rise against our rule. Telegrams from India mention how changes in in taxation and a severe outbreak of plague have been manipulated to the disadvantage of the Indian Government. The Express correspondent in Calcutta mentioned louly the other day that loyal natives of the better class declare’“that the anti-European movement lias gained tremendous strength in Bengal since I the resignation of tho late Liontcu-

j aut-Governor, Sir Bampfyldo Puller, * who was forced to relinquish his s post because lie tried to suppress j political agitation in tho native j schools. ” Only recently tho chief magistrate I of an Indian district, just homo on j leave, told tho writer exactly tho same thing; hut he also said—and his opinion is valuable—that if only strength be shown there is no reason why this outbreak of sedition should not bo checked. Tho groat danger in India now-a-clays is not mutiny, but organised and simultaneous revolt in a dozen different cities by the mob, controlled and worked by clover Hindu brains. The Maliratta Brahmins were°the organisers of the trouble in 18'.)T.

Unrests to a person who has never lived in tho East sounds only a phrase. To Englishmen in India it is far otherwise, more especially if wife and children bo with them. A sort of political earth tremor goes on all round. There is no visible connection ho tween many events—indeed when Nature steps in there can be no possible connection—aud 3 - ct there is a strong feeling in tho air as if they were all being blended together by some malign, invisible power, aud you cannot toll what terrible force may bo let loose suddenly upon you. Every European lives a more or loss isolated life in India; even in the big cities lie is separated usually 1 from liis fellows during tho night hours by tho breath of a compound j which in England would bo almost j worthy tho name of a park. In | tho smaller towns there is only a 1 handful—perhaps one or two families—of Europeans, aud there are Englishmen scattered all ovor tho country absolutely isolated. Sedition is ;> smouldering fire that may at any moment bo found into llaiiies. If when tho flame leaps up tho responsible Anglo-Saxon bo strong enough to stamp out it at all risk, then there is nothing to bo ner••bns of. Weakness of character displayed at tho arcitical moment hy the person in authority is tne chief j fear during those periods of unrest. India lias changed much since the j Mutiny, British power is stronger, I find a largo native community lias j arisen which has everything to lose j through anarchy. But tho agitator and the mob remain,