Wairarapa Times-Age TUESDAY, MARCH 10, 1942. INDIAN DEMANDS FOR FREEDOM.

Wairarapa Times-Age, 10 March 1942, Page 2

Wairarapa Times-Age TUESDAY, MARCH 10, 1942. INDIAN DEMANDS FOR FREEDOM.

the broadest view, and more than ever urgently in the present war emergency, full agreement on the extension of self-governing powers to India is highly desirable. .It would be a serious misreading of the facts, however, to suppose that the only obstacle to that agreement is the admitted unwillingness of a section of Cabinet and other opinion in Britain to make any substantial and immediate transfer of'power to Indians. The two great party organisations in India —the National Congress and the Moslem League—are as definitely at variance with one another as they are with Britain on the essentials of constitutional change and their demands can only be considered in light of that fact. How completely this holds good is made manifest in the latest statements of the Indian party leaders. The Congress loader, Pandit Jawaliaral Nehru, declares that: “Nothing but Indian freedom can make a vital difference or move our millions to effective action” and further that: — National minorities would be able to make proposals when the representative Assembly meets to frame India’s constitution. These minorities, however, include some 80 million Moslems i who are demanding imperatively that no constitutional changes should be made which would be prejudicial to the Moslem demand for a. partition of India. Just what the difference between Moslems and Hindus in India amounts to was made clear by the President of the AllIndia Moslem League, Mr M. A. Jinnah, when he spoke not long ago at a public meeting in Delhi. Stating on that occasion that the Moslem League stood for the partitioning of India into two separate Dominions —the Hindus getting threequarters of the country, with a population of more 200,000,000 and the Moslems one-quarter (chiefly in the NorthWest), with a population of 100,000,000, Mr Jinnah said in part:— The fundamental point is that the Moslems object to the Hindu demand that India should be treated as one single unit and that the constitution should be on the basis of United India, with a central Government vested with all-India powers. The result of that would be, under any democratic or popular system of government, a solid, permanent Hindu majority at the centre, of at least 75 per cent Hindus, as against 25 per cent Moslems. . . . This scheme would never work, having regard to the differences between Hindus and Moslems, not only religious, but historical, cultural and social. Without any attempt to go into the merits of these questions, it may be agreed that the differences disclosed between the two great racial and religious groups in India are wide and deep. As matters stand it is plainly impossible that Britain should satisfy both of the two great Indian party organisations and an attempt to satisfy one —for example the National Congress—while ignoring the Moslems, probably would plunge India into chaos. Any hopeful move for immediate settlement evidently must come in great part from the Indian party organisations and must be based on agreement between them. It has been suggested, in this connection, that a National Government might bo formed for the period of the war as the basis of a friendly settlement, but whether this proposal is backed by any large body of Indian opinion in either of its main camps has yet to appear.