INDIA’S PART

Wairarapa Times-Age, 23 February 1942, Page 3

INDIA’S PART

IN WAR FOR FREEDOM NEED OE MAXIMUM EFFORT. GENERAL CHIANG KAI-SHEK'S MESSAGE. LONDON, February 21. The Chinese leader, Marshal Chiang Kai-shek, in . a message to India which he issued in Calcutta today, urged the Indians to exert themselves to the utmost in the cause of the freedom of mankind. lie stated that he hoped and believed that Britain would as speedily as possible give India real political power, and the Indians would thus be able to develop further their spiritual and material strength and participate in the war, feeling that it was a turning-point in thei-r own struggle. New Delhi reports that a notification by the Indian Government exempting from duty defence supplies for China is the first evidence of understanding between China and India. NON-PARTY CONFERENCE. Sir Tej Bahadur Sapru, who has been a member of the Viceroy's Executive Council and of the Indian Round Table Conference and Joint Parliamentary Committee, today presided in New Delhi at a non-party conference which demanded that India’s centre of political activity should shift from Whitehall to Delhi. The Mogul in Whitehall should perform an act of self-abdication, he said. “It will not do for anybody in England to tell us that political power is now concentrated in the hands of the men in authority in Delhi. They may exercise local administration authority, but at every step we see the benumbing hand of Whitehall. “This conference does not profess to advocate any scheme for a permanent Constitution for India, but it presses for changes in the administration to enable India to do her best to support the war effort. I do not believe that from the 400,000,000 Indians no man can be found who is capable ol administering India’s finances, nor that if an Indian Defence member had been appointed at this juncture he could have committed graver mistakes than those men in power have committed.” Sir Tej Sapru read Mr Churchills reply to the appeal by Indian Liberals, in which it was stated that India had been invited to be represented, if she desired, in the formulation of policy in the War Cabinet in London and on the Pacific War Council. Sir Tej said that they would welcome unreservedly the presence of representatives at these meetings. TRUCE ADVOCATED. He added, “It almost looks ridiculous that we should be talking about permanent Constitutional issues, Dominion status, independence, partition of India, or representation of this or that community in the Legislatures and Cabinets when the enemy is knocking at our doors. The significance of Singapore, Malaya, and Rangoon should not be lost on us, and. the siren voices of broadcasters from the enemy countries should not delude us, however much we may blame the British for this or that. “I think the hour has struck when we should recognise that regrets and mutual recrimination will carry us nowhere, but, on the contrary, may infect us with a deplorable spirit of defeatism. My advice is that we must coalesce and, if we cannot compose our differences for ever, we can at least call a truce.”