No More Learning

Riots occurred at Lahore and Rawulpindi; and the principal
agitators, Lajpat Rai and Ajit Singh, were arrested and deported
under a regulation of 1818. 1 The unpopular agrarian legislation was
vetoed by the central government and trouble subsided; but the
suggestion that the root of the trouble was agrarian was negatived by
the secretary of state, John Morley, who said on 6 June, 1907, in the
House of Commons that of twenty-eight meetings convened by the
Panjab agitators between 1 March and 1 May, twenty-three were
"purely political”. All was quiet for a time till in 1909 a stream of
seditious literature issuing from Lahore necessitated further preventive
measures. In November, 1907, Lord Minto informed his legislative
council that not only had “disgraceful overtures” been made to the
Indian troops, but that seeds of sedition had been scattered even
among the "hills of the frontier tribes" 2
In Madras disturbances followed after a series of public lectures
delivered by an itinerant Bengal agitator, Mr Bipin Chandra Pal,
who declared that the British administration was based on “maya
(illusion), and after many inflammatory harangues of a local politician
Chidambaram Pillai. In the United and Central Provinces, which
under the firm and experienced administration of Sir John Hewett
and Sir Reginald Craddock presented an unpromising field for open
disturbance, there were seditious newspapers and secret burrowing:
In London an “India House” had been opened by Shyamaji
Krishnavarma, son of a Kathiawar merchant, who published a
1 Defined by Lord Morley as an emergency power which may be lawfully applied if
an emergency presents itself”. Indian Speeches, pp. 145-7.
: Lord Morley, op. cit. p. 57.


## p. 554 (#594) ############################################

554
THE RISE OF AN EXTREMIST PARTY
paper called The Indian Sociologist. This “India House” soon became
notorious as a centre of a secret conspiracy; and its activities, tolerated
for years, culminated in the murders of Sir William Curzon Wyllie
and Dr Lalkaka at the Imperial Institute on 1 July, 1909.
The congress of 1905 supported the boycott in Bengal. The president
was Gopal Krishna Gokhale, a Chitpavan Brahman who had acquired
considerable reputation as a politician, an educationist and a member
of the imperial legislative council. He complained that Lord Curzon,
like Aurangzib, had caused bitter exasperation by a policy of distrust
and repression. Lala Lajpat Rai, a Lahore lawyer who subsequently
became prominent in the Panjab disturbances of 1907, congratulated
Bengal on a splendid opportunity of heralding a new political future
for India. At the congress of 1906 the president was Dadabhai
Naoroji, a Parsi and a veteran politician who had sat in the British
parliament. The boycott was justified and revocation of the partition
was demanded. But in fact a split was only avoided by the adoption of
“swaraj” as the goal of congress ambitions. To the soberer spirits, the
Moderates, this meant the establishment of a full parliamentary system.
To the irreconcilables, the Extremists, it signified absolute independ-
ence. It was Anglicised as the extension to India of the system of
government which obtained in the self-governing British colonies.
Appearances had been saved, but only just saved; and the Moderates
were very uneasy, as some at least were aware that, behind all the
whirlwind of passion in Bengal, revolutionists were busily organising.
As yet the government had shown no sign of perception of this funda-
mental fact. The exercise of its ordinary statutory powers failed to
check the unprecedented incendiarism which was going on; and it was
not until the Indian Newspapers (Incitement to Offences) Act was
passed in June, 1908, that the most inflammatory of all the Calcutta
newspapers, the Jugantar (new era), was suppressed. The sanction of
the secretary of state to a measure of this particular kind was long in
coming. He justified it in these words:
An incendiary article is part and parcel of the murderous act. You may put
picric acid in the ink and pen, just as much as in any steel bomb. . . . To talk of
public discussion in connection with mischief of that kind is really pushing matters
too far. 3
Why then, it will be asked, was the preventive action that was so
urgently needed postponed until two innocent English ladies had
paid the penalty for prolonged tolerance of all this "mischief”? The
explanation is simple. The whole agitation was persistently minimised
by its friends in England; and “freedom of the press” is an English
naxim.
Throughout 1907 Moderate alarm increased. But some of the older
1 Report of the Sedition Committee, paras. 5-7, 10-12.
: Cf. Ronaldshay, Life of Curzon, II, 192, 390.
• Lord Morley, op. cit. p. 73. Cf. Chirol, Indian Unrest, p. 98.


## p. 555 (#595) ############################################

CONGRESS SPLIT
555
men yielded to the growing frenzy for fear of being elbowed out by
their juniors, others were genuinely impatient of the tardiness of
constitutional reforms, and had not the tide been firmly stemmed by
such men as Gokhale and Pherozeshah Mehta, also a Bombay congress
man, who now refused emphatically to be dragged along at the heels
of their intemperate colleagues, the Extremists would have captured
the congress. As it was, when the time approached for holding the
1907 congress at Nagpur in the Central Provinces, the place of
meeting was altered, as a preliminary gathering of the reception
committee was broken up by a gang of Extremists.
When the congress
gathered at Surat, the Extremists tried to achieve domination by force
but were stoutly resisted; and dissolving in riotous scenes, the congress
severed itself from them. The Moderate leaders were Gokhale and
Pherozeshah Mehta from Bombay and Surendranath Banerjee from
Bengal. The last-named had long led the anti-partition agitation; he
had exerted himself to "give a religious turn" to the boycott move-
ment, and to enlist the participation of students and school-boys; but
now, finding the pace too fast, he began to retrace his steps. The most
prominent irreconcilables were Tilak from Bombay and Arabindo
Ghose from Bengal. The Moderates remained in command of the
congress executive until in 1916, after the death of Gokhale, when
the shadow of the war was lengthening over India, they joined with
the Extremists in the December meetings of that year.
Despite his exclusion from the congress, Tilak's prestige stood high
in the Deccan in the early months of 1908. He commanded the
allegiance of many barristers, pleaders, schoolmasters and others. His
propaganda was filtering down to mill-hands in cities, who, gathered
together in huge tenements, by their density as well as by their
ignorance, provide a peculiarly accessible field to political agitators.
It was also penetrating to the headmen of villages. A movement had
been started for the creation of “national schools”, independent of
state support and supervision, where revolutionary ideas could be
circulated without let or hindrance; and politics were intermingled
with temperance movements outwardly unimpeachable but in this
case subordinated to the promotion of racial hatred. On 11 May,
1908, the resultant situation was thus described by Sir George Clarke,
governor of Bombay:1“A large number of half-educated Indians, who
can read and write English and have the smattering of knowledge
which is useless for any practical purpose, but is always apt to be
dangerous, seem to have become permanently hostile. These people,
inspired by a few men of much higher calibre, run the seditious
section of the press and work in schools, as public speakers, as travelling
missionaries, and as distributors of placards and pamphlets”. ? On
12 May and on 9 June, 1908, Tilak published articles in the Kesari
Now Lord Sydenham, G. C. S. I.
Lord Sydenham, My Working Life, p. 222.


## p. 556 (#596) ############################################

556
THE RISE OF AN EXTREMIST PARTY
representing that the Muzaffarpur murders resulted from oppression
and the refusal of swaraj. The bomb was the answer. “Bombs explode
when the repressive action of government becomes unbearable. "
Tilak was prosecuted for attempting to bring the British government
into hatred and contempt, and for endeavouring to provoke enmity
and ill-will between different classes of His Majesty's subjects. He
was tried by an Indian (Parsi) judge of the High Court and a jury
which contained two Indians. He was convicted and sentenced to
six years' transportation, afterwards commuted on account of his age
and health to simple imprisonment at Mandalay. The character of
his offence was thus described by the judge:
You are a man of undoubted talents and of great power and influence. Had
those talents and that influence been used for the good of your country, you would
have been instrumental in bringing about a great deal of happiness for those very
people whose cause you espouse. Ten years ago you were convicted. The court
dealt most leniently with you then and the crown dealt still more leniently. After
you had undergone your imprisonment for a year, six months of it were remitted
on conditions which you accepted. . . . It seems to me that it must be a diseased
mind, a most perverted mind, that can think that the articles that you have
written are legitimate articles to write in political agitation. They are seething
with sedition; they preach violence; they speak of murders with approval; and
the cowardly and atrocious act of committing murders by bomb not only seems
to meet your approval, but you hail the advent of the bomb in India as if some-
thing had come to India for its good. . . . Your hatred of the ruling class has not
disappeared during these ten years, and these articles deliberately and defiantly
written week after week—not written as you say on the spur of the moment but
a fortnight after the cruel and cowardly outrages committed on English women-
persistently and defiantly refer to a bomb as if it was one of the instruments of
political warfare. I say that such journalism is a curse to the country.
It is remarkable that in correspondence with Sir George Clarke,
Lord Morley expressed decided disapproval of the prosecution of
Tilak. Morally and legally justifiable, it was, he held, politically
unprofitable. He was apparently inclined to accept the view of
Gokhale, who was then in London, that it would “prove an ugly
discouragement to the Moderates” | Looking back now over the
intervening years, we can see clearly that prosecution was not only
an absolute duty but an imperative necessity. Political Moderates
will naturally shrink from advising drastic action against former
associates. But it is not to them or to anyone else that a government
should turn for counsel at moments when its clear duty is to take
prompt action. But Morley was born to be a thinker and a writer,
rather than a practical statesman”. 2
Tilak's conviction caused riots in Bombay which bore the impress of
careful organisation, but were speedily stopped. Its more lasting result
was a definite set-back to extremism in Bombay and indeed everywhere.
Meanwhile remarkable developments were taking place in Bengal.
On 2 May, 1908, two days after the Muzaffarpur murders, searches
1 Lord Sydenham, op. cit. pp. 224-5.
* Kilbracken, Reminiscences, p. 184.
a


## p. 557 (#597) ############################################

OUTRAGES IN BENGAL
557
were made in a garden and elsewhere in Calcutta resulting in the
seizure of bombs, dynamite, cartridges and incriminating corre-
spondence. A number of young bhadralok were brought to trial on the
information of an approver. Fifteen were ultimately found guilty of
conspiracy to wage war against the king-emperor. The plans and
doings of the conspirators were fully disclosed. For two years and
more they had launched on the public a highly inflammatory pro-
paganda; they had collected arms and ammunition; they had studied
bombs. The words of the judge who passed sentence on those con-
victed shows the extent to which the unbridled licence accorded to the
press had assisted their project:
There can be no doubt that the majority of the witnesses are in sympathy
with the accused. . . . I do not say with their motives, but with their objects; and
it is only natural that they should be. Their natural desire for independence was
not likely to be weakened by the constant vilification in season and out of season
of government measures, not only by the yellow press, but by papers which claim
to be respectable.
Outrages and murders were checked by but did not cease with these
convictions; and other conspiracies came gradually to light. But the
cruel and inhuman nature of subsequent murders and “political"
dacoities (gang-robberies) did not deprive the perpetrators of the
sympathy of many impressionable Hindus, whose views were in 1925
accurately diagnosed by one who now holds high office in India:
I have reason to believe that the opinion is prevalent with very many people
that, although violence and terrorism will never bring a nation political freedom,
they are not bad instruments with which to weaken a government; in the words
of a leading article in an Indian paper recently, they are “the sappers and miners
of constitutional advance"; and it is claimed that their use is always followed
by advance. 1
On 7 November, 1908, an attempt was made to shoot Sir Andrew
Fraser, lieutenant-governor of Bengal. Toward the end of the year
nine prominent Bengalis were deported. On 17 December, Lord
Morley announced his scheme of constitutional reforms.
The reforms were supported by the Moderates; and in a speech at
Poona on 8 July, 1909, Gokhale urged loyal acquiescence in British
rule, pointing out that self-government was an ideal for which Indians
must qualify themselves. At Bombay on 9 October he strongly
denounced the active participation of students in politics which often
evoked in them a bitter partisan spirit injurious to their intellectual
and moral growth. Extremist teaching rightly inculcated patriotism
and self-reliance, but wrongly ignored all historical considerations in
tracing India's political troubles to a foreign government.
"Our old public life”, he said, "was based on frank and loyal acceptance of
British rule, due to a recognition of the fact that it alone could secure to the
Sir Hugh Stephenson in the Bengal Legislative Council, 7 January, 1925.


## p. 558 (#598) ############################################

558
THE RISE OF AN EXTREMIST PARTY
country the peace and order which were necessary for slowly evolving a nation
out of the heterogeneous elements of which India was composed, and for ensuring
to it a steady advance in different directions. The new system condemns all faith
in the British government as childish and all hope of real progress under it as
vain. . . . When one talks to young men of independence in a country like this,
only two ideas are likely to present themselves clearly before their minds. One is
how to get rid of the foreigner, and the other is how soon to get rid of him. All
else must appear to them of minor importance. . . . We have to realise that British
rule, in spite of its inevitable drawbacks as a foreign rule, has been on the whole
a great instrument of progress for our people. Its continuance means the continuance
of that peace and order which it alone can maintain in our country, and with
which our best interests, among them those of our growing nationality, are bound
up. Our rulers stand pledged to extend to us equality of treatment with them-
selves. This equality is to be sought in two fields: equality for individual Indians
with individual Englishmen and equality in regard to the form of government
which Englishmen enjoy in other parts of the empire. . . . It is on our average
strength that the edifice of self-government must rest. The important work before
us, therefore, is to endeavour to raise this average. ”
Gokhale's determined abandonment of a facing-both-ways policy
was imitated by other Moderates, whose influence increased as their
attitude grew firmer. Revolutionary conspiracy in Bombay had been
purely Brahman and mostly Chitpavan. It ceased with the recogni-
tion that the British government was obviously still capable, cal-
culable, and not in the least likely to abdicate. Chitpavans are
practical men; and equalitarian ideals are obnoxious to all Brahmans.
Later on, when toward the close of 1914, Tilak, who on release earlier
inrthat year had declared himself loyal to the government, endeavoured
to obtain readmission to the congress "in order to organise obstruc-
tion in every possible direction within the limits of the law", to bring
the administration to a standstill, and “compel the authorities to
capitulate” and grant self-government, but was unable to effect his
purpose. Nor did he return to the congress until Gokhale and
Pherozeshah Mehta had passed away. But in Bengal conditions were
different. There revolutionary conspiracy was not peculiarly Brahman.
Subversive ideas had been widely and industriously diffused among a
veryimaginative and emotional class, the members of which were often
sufferers from unemployment or economic adversity. For centuries no
Hindu dynasty had governed the province; but Hindu sentiment,
quick to resent the slightest legislative interference with any custom
which could be represented as interwoven with religion, flowed deep
and strong. The abolition of sati, 2 and the Age of Consent Act sixty
years later, had provoked clamorous protests from conservative Bengali
Hindus. Progressives too had their grievances, for Western learning,
often acquired with long and painful effort, had often yielded un-
satisfactory fruit.
Altogether there was a mass of discontent, social, political and
economic, which gave ample opportunity for revolutionary teaching.
i See a letter of Gokhale's quoted ap. Life of Sir Pherozeshah Mehta, 11, 654-6.
* See p. 142, supra.
>


## p. 559 (#599) ############################################

EXTREMISM IN BENGAL
559
The conspirators had gained a long start and had spread their nets
widely. Murders and boycotting of witnesses and informers had
broken down some prosecutions and were building up terrorism. The
great water-country of Eastern Bengal was scantily manned with
British officers, and its administration generally was starved during
those critical years 1906–9. 1 The views of numbers of imaginative
young Hindus regarding the British were moulded, not by any personal
contacts with individuals, but by scurrilous newspapers, distortions
of history and the idea that while a millennium was struggling
on the threshold, its entry was blocked by a foreign government. The
Press Act of 1910 at last effectively checked the poisonous flow of
printer's ink. But by that time enormous mischief had been
done, and outrages were being perpetrated which, in the words of the
government mover of the bill in the imperial legislative council, were
"the natural and ordinary consequence of the teaching of certain
journals”.
Time has gone on. India's experience of extremism has widened.
The consequences of the events and movements described in this
chapter have become merged in the consequences of other events and
of movements which followed on the war. Through the first years of
that tremendous struggle extremism skulked in holes and corners.
Revolutionary conspiracies were met, baffled and suppressed by the
resolute action of the government. With subsequent events this
chapter is not concerned. In our own day by spreading abroad a
spirit of lawlessness and by sharpening animosities between various
sections of an immense society, extremism has gone far to make the
successful working of any parliamentary system in India for ever
impossible. But perhaps this is the object of some of its leaders for,
from the first, the movement has been chiefly Hindu. No orthodox
high-caste Hindu can really desire to see democracy established in
India.
1 See p. 252, supra.
: Chirol, Indian Unrest, p. 99.


## p. 560 (#600) ############################################

CHAPTER XXXI
THE REFORMS OF 1909
LORD CURZON'S departure from India towards the end of
1905 marked the close of a period of great administrative activity and
reform. But although so many functions of government came under
examination and were improved, organic change was not undertaken.
Some Indian politicians indeed were inclined to suspect that more
complete efficiency would crush their hopes of a larger share in both
the legislative and executive direction of the country. In selecting
Lord Minto as a successor to Lord Curzon, the conservative govern-
ment in England no doubt expected that his term of office would be
marked by a restoration of good relations with the educated Indians,
while it would be sufficient to watch the effects of the recent altera-
tions and unnecessary to make others of much importance. Every-
thing in Lord Minto's previous career supported these hopes. His
chief administrative experience was as governor-general of Canada,
a self-governing dominion, where he had shown great tact and power
of conciliation, but no desire to exceed his constitutional functions by
pressing his views about administrative details. Shortly before leaving
England he spoke of his future task and, borrowing a simile from the
turf, said that the best way to win a race was often to give a horse a
rest between his gallops. And yet it was by his initiative that funda-
mental changes were carried through in the next few years.
In January, 1906, a liberal government with a large majority came
into power in England and Lord (then Mr) Morley became secretary
of state for India. Currents of political thought often begin as vaguely
as natural floods, and require careful direction if they are not to
develop into the devastating torrents of revolution. The aspirations
which had become more insistently expressed in the twenty-first
meeting of the Indian National Congress at Benares in 1905 were to
be guided by a viceroy in India with a wide and varied experience
of many classes of men, and by a secretary of state of great historical
knowledge, but of a dictatorial habit tempered by a full realisation
of the difficulty of getting his views accepted by the House of Lords.
When Lord Minto arrived in India, his legislative council and the
councils in the provinces consisted (vide chapter xxix) of a small
number of members chiefly official or nominated, while only a few
had been recommended by election.
Their votes shaped legislation,
but the budget had been passed before they discussed it, and, though
questions could be asked, no supplementary questions were permissible.
By the congress these arrangements had been criticised at their first
1 Sir W. R. Lawrence, 'The India we served, p. 233.
a


## p. 561 (#601) ############################################

CONGRESS DEMANDS
561
introduction, but other matters had attracted greater attention until
1904, when three specific claims were made to secure to Indians a
large share in the control of administration. One of these, borrowed
from the French colonial system, was directed to securing the repre-
sentation in the House of Commons of each province of India, and
it was subsequently dropped. A second demand was for larger repre-
sentation in the legislative councils, with the right to divide these
bodies on all financial matters coming before them, while the third
was for the appointment of Indian representatives (to be nominated
by elected members of the legislative councils) as members of the
council of the secretary of state for India, and of the executive councils
of the governments of India and the governments of Bombay and
Madras. These claims were repeated and developed in the following
year. As early as March, 1906, Lord Minto began to discuss privately
the third suggestion with the members of his own executive council,
believing that an executive partnership would be easier to establish
than a joint electoral body in the legislature. " So much opposition
was made to his proposal that he did not even put it forward in his
early correspondence with the secretary of state. On the wider
question of admitting more Indians to the legislative councils, his
first impression made him deprecate the importation of British institu-
tions, a feeling with which Lord Moriey agreed, though at the same
time he argued that it was impossible in any advance to escape from
their spirit. In June, 1906, Lord Morley made detailed suggestions
clearly based on the congress demands. Lord Minto's Canadian
experience had shown him how easily suspicions of dictation from
England are aroused, and he pressed that the public and official
initiative should come from India. He therefore addressed a minute
to a small committee of his executive council desiring it to examine
certain questions. Impressed as Lord Dufferin had been by the
danger apparent in Indian conditions that any system of ordinary
election might exclude representatives of important communities, he
named (in almost the exact language used by Lord Dufferin's com-
mittee) as interests which must be protected to secure a stable and
effective administration: the hereditary nobility and landed classes,
the trading, professional and agricultural communities, and the
European planters and commercial classes. The specific topics for
discussion were the constitution of a council of princes or their
representation on the viceroy's legislative council, the appointment
of Indian members on his executive council, increased representation
on the imperial and local legislative councils, and the prolongation
of the budget debate, with power to move amendments.
While in Europe and America organic changes such as these are
freely discussed in the press, in periodicals and books, and on plat-
1 Buchan, Life of Lord Minto, p. 231.
? Lord Morley, Recollections, II, 173.
2
CHIVI
36


## p. 562 (#602) ############################################

562
THE REFORMS OF 1909
forms, the backwardness of education in India makes it impossible
to obtain the keen and constructive criticism available in Western
countries. Few Indians even of the educated classes can read or
converse fluently in a vernacular different from their own. As
English is the ordinary means of communication between literate
residents in different language areas, details of important discussions
often escape the notice of men, well fitted to consider them, who do
not know thạt language. The burden thrown on the permanent
official of examining such schemes is thus heavy and frequently causes
delay. While this preliminary examination was being made, the
congress held its annual session at Calcutta and for the first time
passed a resolution asking that the system of government obtaining
in the self-governing British colonies should be extended to India. The
first steps to be taken were those already described, but the proposal
that Indian provinces should be directly represented in parliament
was dropped. While the more intelligent Indian politicians were
endeavouring to persuade or convince the responsihle officials and
through them the British parliament that Indians we. u fit to exercise
substantially more authority than had hitherto been conceded to
them, a small but active section noisily demanded complete freedom
at once, and in the background was a growing number of individuals,
feeding their ill-taught minds with tales of oppression, and perverting
the minds of youths with distorted history and scraps of religion and
social service, in the hope of coercing the government. Advice on
revolutionary methods was supplied by Indians in London, and later
in Paris. In Bengal, where dissatisfaction had been caused by the
partition of the province, dangerous conspiracies were being hatched.
The public announcement by Lord Minto in the legislative council
in March, 1907, that he had addressed the secretary of state regarding
a liberal measure of reforms, was followed very soon by open displays
of violence in the Panjab. 2 The position became so serious that later
in the year an ordinance was made to regulate the holdings of
meetings, which were prohibited, if of a seditious nature, in the
Panjab and in Eastern Bengal. The trouble in the Panjab then
subsided, while in Bengal it grew secretly, and attempts were made to
spread the propaganda in Madras. Evidence of the harm done by
violent speeches at public meetings was so strong that in November
the ordinance was replaced by an act to enable seditious meetings to
be stopped. In the Bombay Presidency riots took place and Mr B. G.
Tilak was prosecuted and sentenced to a long term of imprisonment
for sedition. It was clear that the criminal law was not sufficient and
in June acts were passed giving power to forfeit presses which had
been used for incitement to commit certain violent offences, and
another to control the use of explosives on the lines of English law.
1 Speeches made in vernacular at meetings of the congress are or were till recently not
reporied.
· For details of these see chapter xxx.


## p. 563 (#603) ############################################

MINTO'S POLICY
563
In December a summary procedure for trial of seditious conspiracies
(which were liable to be unduly prolonged under the ordinary law)
was enacted, and power was taken to suppress associations formed for
unlawful acts. A number of Bengalis were also deported under the
emergency regulation of 1818. While these measures were accepted
by Lord Morley as necessary, in his private correspondence with the
viceroy he showed his dislike for them and expressed his distrust of
the bureaucrat whom he believed to be always contemptuous of law
and clamorous for the violent hand. 1 With too little regard for the
inflammable character of an Indian mob he criticised the sentences
passed on-rioters in Bombay.
Since August, 1907, when the Government of India had consulted
local governments, and through them the public generally, examina-
tion of the scheme for reform had continued. Lord Minto's policy as
announced in the legislative council when the press and explosive acts
were being considered was to remain undeterred by outrages while
taking steps to prevent their continuance. His aim had always been
to deal, not with ambițions he considered impossible, but to give to
the loyal and moderate educated classes a greater share in the govern-
ment of India. Lord Minto, at this stage, suggested the formation of
ai isory councils in addition to the legislative councils. To some extent
these resembled the first division in the enlarged councils proposed
by Lord Dufferin. They were to receive no legislative recognition and
no formal powers but would meet when summoned to consider im-
portant matters, or the members might be consulted individually.
The imperial advisory council was designed to include a number of
chiefs, as questions were already arising which affected their subjects
and British Indians alike. Other members were to be substantial land-
holders, and these with representatives of the smaller land-holders,
of industry, commerce, capital and the professional classes were to
compose the provincial councils. The scheme was described as in
accordance with the best traditions of oriental polity which recognised
that “the sovereign, however absolute, should make it his business to
consult competent advisers and should exercise his rule in accordance
with what, after such consultation, he deems to be the best mind of
the people”. . This part of the scheme was not favourably received.
Most of the chiefs declined to sit on a mixed council, and when
the Government of India sent its definite proposals to England, it
advocated an imperial council of chiefs only. To the scheme for the
provinces opinion was more favourable, but was marked by diversity
in the matter of detail. It was natural that the professional middle
classes, supported also by many land-holders, pressed for a large
statutory council, wholly or partly elected so as to represent various
1 Lord Morley, op. cit. II, 257.
* Buchan, op. cit. p. 276.
Dispatch of 24 Algust, 1907, para. 4.
.
36-2


## p. 564 (#604) ############################################

564
THE REFORMS OF 1909
interests, and with wide powers of control over the government.
Such a project was entirely different from that conceived by the
Government of India which, as will be seen, was proposing to extend
the powers and constitution of the existing legislative bodies. The
final decision was that the head of a province who so desired should
form a small council of persons of some distinction and obtain its
advice when he wished to consult it. 1
In arranging for membership of the legislative councils, the necessity
of ensuring adequate representation of important interests was borne
in mind. Failure of the system of 1892 in this respect was marked.
Of the persons recommended by electors for membership of the
imperial council 45 per cent. came from the professional middle
classes, only 27 per cent. were land-holders and not a single Indian
business man had been chosen. It was now proposed to admit
twenty-eight members by election, of whom twelve would be chosen
by members of the provincial legislative councils, seven by land-
holders in the principal provinces, a five by Muhammadans, two by the
chambers of commerce of Calcutta and Bombay (whose membership
is chiefly European) and two by representatives of Indian commerce.
A reserve of three seats was kept for nominations of experts or of non-
official gentlemen to represent minorities, or special interests.
For provincial councils the scheme was similar. In provinces where
education was more advanced, election was to be made by members of
the municipal boards in the larger cities, by members of the boards in
smaller cities along with members of district boards, by land-bolders,
by chambers of commerce, by the Indian commercial community, by
universities, by Muhammadans, and by representatives of special
interests where these existed, such as tea, jute and planting. In both
the imperial and provincial legislatures it was proposed to balance
almost exactly the number of officials and non-officials, leaving the
viceroy in the former, and the head of the province in the latter, to
exercise a casting vote. Burma was considered still unsuitable for a
system of election, and only one of the non-official members was to be
elected (by the chamber of commerce). In most provinces, as Lord
Dufferin had suggested twenty years earlier, elected members were
to be about 40 per cent. of the total council but in the Panjab the
proportion fell to twenty.
Legislative councils as constituted in 1861 were empowered to
discuss only bills actually before them. The act of 1892 had merely
extended the powers of the members to criticise the budget and in
that connection to express their views on any matter without being
able to move amendments or to vote. The Government of India now
suggested the grant of the right to move resolutions on subjects of
public interest, and the right to divide the council on the budget
1 Dispatch of 1 October, 1908, para. 75.
2. For a time one of these was to be nominated and not elected.


## p. 565 (#605) ############################################

MORLEY'S SCHEME
565
Lord Morley declined to sanction any advisory councils, on the
ground that the enlargements of the powers and size of the provincial
councils would give sufficient scope for the expression of views while
heads of provinces would always be able to consult persons whose
opinions and advice were valuable. He thought the scheme for a
chamber of princes was open to difficulties but promised to consider
any further proposals on this matter.
He accepted generally the proposals for numbers and constitution
of the provincial councils, with two reservations. While the Govern-
ment of India wished to allow each interest to elect its own repre-
sentatives, he suggested an electoral college the members of which,
chosen by the various interests, would be of such numbers that a
minority if unanimous could be certain of electing its own representa-
tives. He held further, in view of the restrictions on the powers of
provincial legislative councils under the act of 1861, that an official
majority should be dispensed with in their case, while it should be
substantial in the imperial council. Lord Morley accepted generally
the proposals for granting more freedom of discussion, and extended
these by allowing supplementary questions in addition to the right
of formal interpellation granted by the act of 1892. While in its
dispatch the Government of India had noted that the effect of its
scheme would be to throw greater burdens on the heads of local
governments, it refrained from proposing additions to the executive
councils already existing until experience had been gained of the
working of the new measure, and from recommending new executive
councils without the fullest consideration and consultation with the
heads of provinces to be affected. The secretary of state, who had
already appointed two Indians as members of his own council, and
agreed to the appointment of an Indian on the viceroy's council,
brushed aside these notes of caution and decided to increase the
possible number of three members in Madras and Bombay to four,
one of whom should in practice, though not by statute, always be an
Indian. And he proposed to take power to form such councils in
provinces where none existed. Lord Dufferin's committee had sug-
gested the constitution of an executive council because they antici-
pated that enlarging the functions of the legislative council would
materially alter the character of the administration, while Lord
Morley appears to have been more impressed by the desirability of
introducing Indian members than by administrative needs.
On 1 November, 1908, the fiftieth anniversary of the queen's
proclamation after the Indian Mutiny, a message to the Indian people
was published in the name of the king-emperor announcing the
extension of representative institutions, and the details were issued
publicly shortly after. They were well received in India where the
congress welcomed them as a large and liberal instalment of reform,
· Dispatch of 27 November, 1908.
1


## p. 566 (#606) ############################################

566
THE REFORMS OF 1909
and Mr Gokhale in the following budget debate described the authors
as having saved India from drifting into chaos. An increase in the
numbers of elected members and greater facilities for debate had been
so confidently expected that the appointment of Indians to executive
councils appeared the greatest novelty. But there was keen debate
as to the class of person who would be selected. Active politicians
hoped that the choice might fall on them, but feared that men whom
they stigmatised as nonentities would be chosen.
The Musļiin section of the community was, however, greatly dis-
satisfied with the suggestion that its representation should be secured
by the device of electoral colleges. Muslim and Hindu are divided by
differences of religious belief incomparably greater than the sectarian
variations of Christianity. Sacrifice of cows and bullocks and the
consumption of beef are intensely repugnant to the Hindu. These
practices and the clash of processions celebrating religious rites lead
to disturbances often accompanied by loss of life. For more than half
of the nineteenth century the Muslims had held back from the study
of English and thus had not fitted themselves for public life and office.
In Northern India especially, where they were numerous and till the
break-up of the Moghul Empire had been politically supreme, they
clung to their old traditions. A few years before the project for
reforms had been launched, their minds had been agitated by a
demand of the Hindus in one province that the Arabic character
should no longer be used in the courts, and even that the language
should be altered. As soon as it was known that organic changes were
being discussed (October, 1906), a Muslim deputation approached
Lord Minto to press for adequate representation both on local bodies
and on the council. They asked that Muslim representatives should
be elected by Muslim voters, and that the proportion of Muslim
members should not be fixed merely on the basis of the numerical
strength of the community. In replying Lord Minto went further
than Lord Dufferin had done. He agreed that their position should
be estimated, not merely on their numerical strength, but in respect
to the political importance of the community and the service it had
rendered to the empire. He thought that any electoral representation
in India would be doomed to mischievous failure which aimed at
granting a personal enfranchisement regardless of the beliefs and
traditions of the communities comprising the people of that continent.
Previous experience had justified the Muslim apprehension. While
they formed 23 per cent. of the total population of British India, only
12 per cent. of the members recommended by election for the imperial
council had belonged to this community. In the United Provinces,
with 14 per cent. of the population, the Muslims had never succeeded
in obtaining a single nominee by election. Some objections were
raised by Hindus to the initial proposals of the Government of India
for securing Muslim representation on the baseless ground that they


## p. 567 (#607) ############################################

PARLIAMENTARY DISCUSSIONS
567
were an attempt to set one religion against another and thus to create
a counterpoise to the influence of the educated middle classes. But
the final proposals of the Government of India insisted on the im-
portance of adequate and separate representation for this community,
part of it to be secured by a separate electorate.
There was little disposition in England to criticise the intended
enlargement of legislative councils and of their functions. Speaking
on Indian affairs in the House of Lords (30 June, 1908), Lord Curzon
described such measures as only carrying out the traditional policy of
the British in India, which no one would wish to retard. To broaden
the basis of government was the act of a wise statesman. But, referring
to the disquieting reports of outrages in India, he pressed that changes
should not have the appearance of having been extorted by force,
that they should not tend to weaken British rule, and that they should
be preceded by a resolute vindication of the authority of governmen .
Introducing the bill in the House of Lords in December, 1908,
however, Lord Morley foresaw that there would be grave discontent
with some of his proposals, and sought to avoid it. Every politician
or administrator of importance who has had to deal with the method
of government in India has deprecated the importation of British
institutions without discretion. Lord Dufferin, after setting out his
plan, had said:
From this it might be concluded that we were contemplating an approach, at
all events so far as the provinces are concerned, to English parliamentary govern-
ment and an English constitutional system. Such a conclusion would be very
wide of the mark, and it would be wrong to leave either the India Office or the
Indian public under so erroneous an impression.
Faced with the unmistakable nature of his own bill Lord Morley
assumed the necessity of defending his retention of an official majority
in the imperial council, a measure which beyond all others was outside
controversy, and he repudiated “almost passionately", as Lord
Curzon subsequently said, the intention of mingling East and West.
If I were attempting to set up a parliamentary system in India, or if it could
be said that this chapter of reforms led directly or necessarily up to the establish-
ment of a parliamentary system in India, I, for one, would have nothing to do
with it.
On the second reading, however, his deep political convictions
prevailed, and he explained more clearly his reasons for suggesting
an advance which led obviously in the direction he professed to avoid.
Lord Curzon, dealing with his own term as viceroy, described his aim
as being directed towards the progress of the people by the removal
of abuses, by adopting a just and sympathetic attitude towards them,
and by carrying out social reforms. 1 Political concessions were not
then in the field. While he was viceroy, he had been pressed at the
1 Hansard, 23 February, 1909.


## p. 568 (#608) ############################################

568
THE REFORMS OF 1909
ba
a
1
instance of an Indian journalist to say that perhaps in fifty years India
might be self-governing. After long thought he had declined on the
ground that it might embarrass his successor if he raised any hopes
or expressed any opinion as to when self-government would come.
He criticised those provisions in the bill which went beyond the
proposals of the Government of India by giving up official majorities,
by enlarging and increasing executive councils, and by appointing
Indians to them. Lord Morley defended his scheme with the ardour
of a student of political history. Professing as much zeal for efficiency
as Lord Curzon he could not believe that any proposals could be true,
solid or endurable without concessions. He then quoted Lord Salis-
bury's warning against the introduction of occidental machinery into
India, to brush it aside with the remark that “we ought to have
thought of that before we tried occidental education; we applied that
and occidental machinery must follow". The elective principle had
been introduced (though tentatively) by the act of 1892, and was
demanded to bring proposals into harmony with the dominant senti-
ment of the people in India. It is to be noted that, both at this time
and in all subsequent political movements, the Indian politician has
shown himself possessed of imitative rather than of critical or con-
structive faculties, and has never wavered in his demand for a system
of government like that enjoyed by the self-governing dominions.
In the House of Lords the clause of the bill giving the government
power to create new executive councils was deleted at the instance of
Lord MacDonnell, who had himself held charge of three provinces.
Arguments against this power, which had not been immediately
recommended by the Government of India, and was known to be
opposed by most existing heads of provinces, were stigmatised by
Lord Morley as “good sound bureaucratic arguments but it was the
bureaucratic system they vere going to make a breach in”.
An overwhelming majority in the House of Commons replaced the
clause, but it was again modified in the House of Lords to create a
council only in Bengal, where the late Sir Edward Baker, the lieu-
tenant-governor, had asked for it, and in other provinces only after
a draft proclamation had lain on the table of both houses of parliament
for six weeks and no hostile address to the crown had been carried.
In the House of Commons Earl Percy, who had been under-
secretary of state for India, questioned Lord Morley's hope that this
measure would induce the more moderate Indian politicians to
abandon their dream of colonial self-government. He did not object
to enlarging the councils and giving greater power of discussion,
which would make them more useful for advisory and consultative
purposes. But he opposed the power of initiating legislation, moving
resolutions (even though like resolutions in the House of Commons,
they were not to bind government) and the creation of non-official
i Sir W, R. Lawrence, The India we served, p. 233.


## p. 569 (#609) ############################################

DIVERSITIES OF RACE AND CREED
569
a
majorities in the provincial councils. Mr A. J. Balfour was impressed
by the religious dissensions, and though accepting the view that
representative institutions were the highest development as yet dis-
covered by the human race in dealing with its own affairs, held that
they were suitable only where the population was in the main homo-
geneous, where a minority was prepared to accept the decision of the
majority, and where there was unity of tradition, general outlook,
and a broad view of national aspiration. He could not conceive how
India would ever be fit for representative government until the whole
structure of Indian society underwent radical and fundamental
modifications. A few days later his remarks were echoed by an Indian
politician. Discussing the ambition to build a united Indian nation,
he said:
Can we expect to achieve that ambition by obtaining political concessions
alone? Suppose all the seats in the executive council of the viceroy and those of
the governors and lieutenant-governors, when they come into existence, as we
hope and trust they soon will, were occupied by Indians-suppose all the members
of the supreme and provincial legislative councils were the elected representatives
of the people-let us go even further ahead and suppose that we attained the goal
of our aspirations, the colonial form of self-government; would all, without
purging the many social diseases that your body politic suffers from, convert you
into a united Indian nation?
Referring to the millions of ignorant and superstitious masses he said
that a handful of great men would never make a nation of them, and
"there is no process of legislation or diplomacy by which these
millions with all their diversities of caste and creed, could be fused
into a harmonious whole. . . . "
The prime minister's defence of the bill followed the lines of Lord
Morley's. Adopting almost the exact words of Lord Dufferin's
minute, he described it as not revolutionary, but merely an extension
and development of institutions which had been many years in
operation and the extension of which had always been contemplated.
Education and the spread of ideas must more and more associate the
people of the country with government. There was a movement in
Asia for greater association of the natives of various countries in
passing laws and also in holding high executive positions. In England
also democratic feeling was strong and could not be resisted.
One topic which, though not affected by the bill, was much dis-
cussed during the debates, was the intention to appoint an Indian
member of the viceroy's executive council. Lord Morley, when intro-
ducing the bill, had announced that if, during his tenure of office,
there should be a vacancy, he would feel it his duty to tender to the
king his advice that an Indian should be appointed. He supported
his opinion by his experience of having had two Indian members on
his own council, and thus being in a position to get the Indian point
· Pt. Moti Lal Nchru, Presidential address, United Provinces Social Congress at Agra
on 11 April, 1909.


## p. 570 (#610) ############################################

570
THE REFORMS OF 1909
of view direct from them. Lord MacDonnell's objection was based
on the existence of strong religious dissension. A Muslim could not
be appointed unless a Hindu was also added, and a Hindu, unless
he belonged to the . class against which recent protective legislation
had been passed, would command no influence at all among his
co-religionists. At a later stage he agreed to the appointment of
Indians on the executive councils of the governors of Madras and
Bombay which had been in existence for a long period, though he
objected to the provisions of the bill which allowed such appointments
to be made without requiring the qualification of long service which
applied in the case of European members. On the other hand Lord
Cromer, arguing from his experience in Egypt, supported the appoint-
ment. He described India as in the almost unique position of being
the only important country in the world where education was con-
siderably advanced, but which was governed in all essential particulars
by non-resident foreigners, and he thought it most desirable to asso-
ciate Indians with the administration. Earl Percy, having no doubt
knowledge of the excellent qualifications of Mr (afterwards Sir S. P.
and later Lord) Sinha, went no farther than to press that the appoint-
ment should not be taken as implying that an Indian must always be
appointed, a suggestion which was obviously futile. Outside parlia-
ment there were louder protests, and Lord Minto, whose first desire
had been to obtain an Indian colleague, wrote to King Edward at
this time urging that Indians, if fitted for high office, should not be
debarred by race. 1 Mr Sinha was appointed towards the end of
March, 1909.
The statute fixed the maximum number of nominated and elected
members at sixty for the legislative council of the governor-general,
at fifty in the larger provinces, and at thirty in the case of the Panjab
and Burma. The total membership of existing councils thus rose
from 124 to 331 and the number of elected members from thirty-nine
to 135, with majorities of non-official members (including those who
were nominated) in all councils except that of the governor-general.