PLEDGES TO INDIA

Wairarapa Times-Age, 5 February 1942, Page 4

PLEDGES TO INDIA

RECALLED BY THE DUKE OF DEVONSHIRE SELF-GOVERNMENT RIGHTS. AT EARLIEST POSSIBLE MOMENT AFTER WAR. Q LONDON, February 3. The Duke of Devonshire, replying in the debate on India in the House of Lords, said that India had given vtiy nearly 1.000,000 soldiers, every one a volunteer, and the numbers were being augmented by about 50,000 every month. The political issue in India today was not whether power should or should not be transferred from British to Indian hands; that was settled many years ago. Today the issue was what the Indian Government was to take over. After reading some of the concluding sentences of the statement issued bv the Governor-General of India on August 8, 1940, the Duke of Devonshire said that that declaration went. a very long way indeed. It was a definite promise that the Government was prepared to hand over to the Indians the government of their own countiy. It was anxious to do so, and would do so at the earliest possible moment. “It is not the practice of this Government to go back on its pledged word,” he said. “Quite apart from overriding considerations, it is its earnest desire to see India take her place at the earliest possible moment not only as a full member, but as a contented, united and* prosperous member of the Commonwealth. The Indians have to a large extent the government of India in their own hands. We are up against problems of the most formidable magnitude. We have invited Indian leaders of all shades of opinion to get together and frame some scheme by which an Indian Government or Governments might be formed to which we can Transfer powers, and we can give an assurance that this transference will take place at the earliest possible moment after the war. So far the Indian leaders have not found it possible to reach any agreement.”