No More Learning

1 The Panjab was a province of many towns,
which varied from large commercial and political capitals like Delhi,
Lahore, Amritsar, Peshawar and Multan, to big agricultural villages.
Municipal life grew naturally, suiting itself to the diversity of local
conditions, depending for guidance on the local officials. In the
Administration Report of 1855–6 it was noted that drainage existed
in all cities and elaborate projects had been formed for Lahore,
Amritsar and Ambala, the cost of which would be “chiefly defrayed
in the most spirited manner by the citizens”. Although a few planes
availed themselves of the general municipal act (XXVI of 1850), the
great majority were without legislation till Act XV of 1867 was passed.
This was a brief measure enacted as an experiment for five years,
reserving wide powers to the lieutenant-governor and leaving to the
local committees the choice of their own form of taxation. Expendi-
ture from the municipal fund was to be applied first to the main-
tenance of a police force and then to the making and repair of roads,
drains and tanks, and to the provision of lighting, poor-houses,
market-places and education.
In Bombay Presidency, on the other hand, great use was made of
Act XXVI, so that by 1856 it was in force in 336 “towns”. To bring
it into force the local people had to petition the government for its
introduction, and the government, after giving the necessary sanction,
Proceedings, India Legis. Council, 14 December, 1866.
.


## p. 531 (#571) ############################################

DISTRICT TOWNS
531
a
appointed the local magistrate and others to form a local committee,
which had power to propose taxes and carry out improvements in the
town. Apparently in this province the district officers had little
difficulty in finding half a dozen people in a town to forward a petition
on which action was taken to bring the act into force. This act was
naturally vague in its provisions and so the greatest diversity of
customs and rules grew up under its nominal control. A peculiarly
fruitful field was found in the large villages of the Satara district,
where in pre-British days there had existed institutions of a municipal
type. By 1856 as many as 292 municipalities had been established in
this district but most of them existed only for a year or two. Bombay
Presidency remained content with this act for some years, but legis-
lated so that dispensaries and schools might be paid out of municipal
funds, and later threw on them a proportion of the police charges.
The application of municipal government to many of these “towns”
was farcical, one mentioned in council when Act VI of 1873 was being
considered having an annual income of only Rs. 88, most of which
was used to pay an orderly. By the act of 1873 Bombay brought its
legislation into line with that of the rest of India and classified its
towns with a population of not less than 10,000 as "cities” and as
“towns” those of not less than 2000. It put a large non-official ele-
ment on the “city” boards and prescribed special conservancy work
for these places. The “town" municipalities remained still in the
hands of their presidents, the district officers, while even for the
“cities” there were no elected members.
In Madras the people stoutly resisted the introduction of Act XXVI
and none of the inhabitants could be persuaded to petition the govern-
ment for its introduction. As elsewhere the necessity arose of some sort
of municipal administration and voluntary associations were started in
a few places. These the government recognised by making grants equal
to the amount raised by private subscription. But the government did
not long remain satisfied with this system, and passed Act X of 1865
so that funds could be raised for the police in the country towns and
provision be made for the construction, repairing and cleansing of
drains, the making and repairing of roads, etc. The government
decided how much was to be raised in each town and then contributed
a quarter of that amount, partly to help the local people and partly to
prevent the local officers making too extravagant demands. There
was a strong official element on each board, and even the private
persons were all nominated and held office for one year only. By 1869
the act had been introduced into forty-four towns, being received
with indifference in most places, and fierce opposition where strong
religious feelings existed. In some places, however, "the interest of
1 Proceedings, Bombay Legis. Council, 11 August, 1873.
· Administration Report, 1855-6.
• Proceedings, Bombay Legis. Council, 11 August, 1873.
34-2


## p. 532 (#572) ############################################

532
LOCAL SELF-GOVERNMENT
a
the native commissioners was aroused and the act carried out with
great heartiness". 1
In the Central Provinces and Oudh, Act XV of 1867, framed for
the Panjab, was introduced into several towns, the elective system
being adopted in many places from the first. The Jubbalpore
committee led the way in boldly borrowing money on perfectly
adequate security to carry out a large water supply scheme,a while
in Nagpur great progress had been made without any legislation in
cleaning up the town, driving streets through the worst areas, and
laying the foundations of a good drainage system. Lucknow, a city
that had been besieged and sacked, was in such a dreadful state that
a “Conservancy Committee” was formed in 1858, which worked on
the lines of Act XXVI, raised funds by means of long-established
octroi, and generally cleaned up the city. The position of the com-
mittee was legalised by Act XVIII of 1864, an act ahead of the times,
as provision was made in it for the annual election of nineteen out of
twenty-five commissioners. Funds were raised by octroi, but the old
tradition of imperial taxation remained as the divisional commissioner
retained for general purposes a share of the takings, being by law
compelled to give only one-third to the municipal committee. In the
North-Western Provinces legislation was modelled on that framed for
the Panjab the year before, save that the taxes were laid down and
limited by law and that the proportion of official members on the
boards was smaller.
In Bengal legislation was enacted to enable local officials to deal
with the insanitary conditions of the towns, which were thought to
be the reason for the widespread virulent epidemic in 1863. Act III
of 1864, which governed the larger towns, followed the lines of the
Calcutta Suburbs Act, with elaborate conservancy clauses. For the
smaller places Act VI of 1868 gave the local magistrate power to tax
for police and conservancy, and furnished him with a consultative
committee which might advise him about assessments and local im-
provements. In both cases all the non-officials were nominated and
control rested entirely with the magistrate. Taxation was strictly
limited, being mainly a house-rate in the former act and in the latter
a personal tax on the income of the inhabitants.
In Burma as early as 1853 two funds were started in Rangoon, one
from the proceeds of the sale of the town and suburban allotments,
which was spent on the reclamation of swamps, construction of roads,
etc. , and the other, a municipal tax imposed on each site, used to pay
for the town police, conservancy staff, and regular repairs to roads,
bridges, etc. In 1858, after consultation with influential local in-
habitants, the riunicipal tax was extended to fourteen other towns. In
1 Report of the Committee on Local Self-Government in Madras, 1882, pt 1, chap. i.
: Proceedings, India Legis. Council, 11 March, 1873.
• Administration Report, 1862–3.


## p. 533 (#573) ############################################

DISTRICT TOWNS
533
1861 there was some correspondence with the Government of India
about the introduction of municipal committees, but the chief com-
missioner reported that, except in Rangoon, the people desired only to
be consulted occasionally about the disposal of municipal funds, but
not to have the actual management in their own hands. Finally,
however, in 1874 the British Burma Municipal Act was passed and
applied to seven towns. Under this act committees were nominated
for each of these towns, the elective principle not coming into force
till 1882. In addition to these seven towns there were in that year
twenty-four other places in which town-funds were raised though not
under any act, the funds being spent by the district officers with such
advice as could be obtained from the town elders. The people of the
lesser towns, where funds were raised, objected strenuously to any
proposals that their towns should be constituted municipalities, as
they feared that the establishment of a municipality would cause new
and heavy taxes to be levied and would lead to restrictions on their
freedom. 1
The start of municipal institutions. was thus of diverse origin and
of varying procedure. Only in Bengal could they be said to be a
development of that in the presidency towns, where their power of
taxation and the interference of thegovernment were strictly limited by
law. On the other hand, in the Panjab, Central Provinces and Bombay
municipal laws were vague, there were no legal limits to taxation, and
the local government had complete powers of control. Midway
between these two cases came the towns in Madras, where taxes were
prescribed and moderate limits imposed on taxation. It is noteworthy
that municipal life flourished most in the second group, as the form
of administration by a government official who consulted the leading
people was a natural and liberal growth from the rule of the kotwal,
while the system of octroi gave them easily and without oppression
the funds necessary for the simplest amenities of town life. In almost
all cases the members of the municipal committees were appointed
on the recommendation of the district magistrate, so there was little
responsible local government, although there was considerable asso-
ciation of the local people with the officials in the administration of
the towns. Some slight extension of the system occurred in the
'seventies, mainly in giving municipal bodies power to deal more
effectively with conservancy and water supply. Little was done,
however, to introduce the system of elected representatives, and,
where elections were held, they were not found to give satisfactory
results. The better-class Indian disliked soliciting or being dependent
on the votes of the crowd and much preferred to find his way to the
committee by government nomination. Not that the seats were not
prized. It was most agreeable to sit with the head of the district to
discuss what ought to be done in the town, and there was keen com-
* Memoranda submitted to the Statutory Commission, 1930, p. 453 (Burma).
!


## p. 534 (#574) ############################################

534
LOCAL SELF-GOVERNMENT
a
petition for this honour. These gentlemen did excellent and hard
work in many towns, numerous tributes existing in the administration
reports and elsewhere to the wisdom of their advice in sanitation and
their usefulness in explaining new measures to their fellow-townsmen.
Much was done to improve water supply, to promote public health
and to provide for education. It was not, however, local self-govern-
ment, but, as described by Lord Hobart, governor of Madras in 1874,
government by"an oligarchy dependent upon a superior power which
may control its action to almost any conceivable extent":1
Into such an atmosphere came the resolution of Lord Ripon's
government in May, 1882, insisting that government control over
local bodies should be from without rather than from within. It was
thought that sufficient control could be obtained if government
sanction were necessary for by-laws, new taxation, and the raising of
loans, and a final power left in the hands of the government to set aside
resolutions that were ultra vires or even to supersede altogether a local
body that habitually neglected its duties or abused its powers. These
proposals were largely borrowed from the powers of control over local
bodies in England, but again it may be noted that the most efficient
and educative part of the English control was omitted, namely the
power of the auditor to bring home to the individual members of the
local bodies through surcharge their financial responsibility for the
proper realisation and disbursement of public money. With the control
thus proposed the greatest possible extension of the elective system
was urged, so that the local townspeople might have the opportunity
of learning to govern themselves through their own representatives,
even though the elective system as tested by a few experiments had
had no wide success. It was further urged that municipalities should
be relieved by the provincial governments of the heavy police charges,
as the local bodies had no control over the police, but that they should
be given definite duties to perform in connection with education,
sanitation, public health, etc,, matters which should prove of the
greatest interest to the people themselves.
Under this stimulus acts2 were passed for all the provinces, making
election compulsory for a large proportion-from one-half to three-
quarters of the municipal commissioners, and giving power for the
appointment of an elected chairman. This power was not utilised to
any great extent. Even when the power to elect the chairman was
granted, the municipal commissioners often elected an official, usually
the district officer, to this post. This not only indicated the friendly
co-operation already existing between the officials and the people,
but also the knowledge that the district officer could maintain their
rights better than any elected non-official. On the whole, great
1 Report of the Committee on Local Self-Government in Madras, 1882, p. 9.
• XV of 1883, XIII of 1884, XVII of 1884, XVIII of 1889, III of 1884 (Bengal
Council), IV of 1884 (Madras Council), II of 1884 (Bombay Council).


## p. 535 (#575) ############################################

DISTRICT TOWNS
535
interest was not taken in the elections, only a small proportion of the
voters exercising their rights, and many of the seats were uncontested.
There were, of course, exceptions in all the provinces, but at the end
of the nineteenth century it was generally held to be too soon to say
that Lord Ripon's policy in introducing self-government had been a
success. In some large towns, thanks to exceptional individual non-
officials of strong personality, it had succeeded, but in most places it
was still necessary for the local officials to help the private chairman
in administration.
While most of the larger towns in the west and north of India were
making good progress in providing wholesome water, proper drainage,
lighting, etc. , the need for much simpler administration for the
small towns and large villages was met by leaving such places
outside the ordinary municipal law. These were constituted "notified
areas”, areas in which only a few provisions of the municipal acts
applied, but where, as they developed, other sections could be brought
into force. Such places were administered by nominated committees
with the local officials at their head.
Except in Madras and Bengal the executive of the towns remained
largely official, as the election of non-official chairmen came very
slowly and was by no means universal by 1918. In the Panjab in 1915
out of the eighty-three towns that had the privilege of electing their
own chairman, only ten chose a non-official," while in Bombay and
the United Provinces the number of non-official chairmen was in-
creased only by continual efforts on the part of the local governments.
In many cases local factions and sectarian differences made the posi-
tion of an elected private person untenable, while in others he had
neither the time nor the staff to maintain administration at a reason-
able level. Latterlyseveral towns in Bombay and the United Provinces
have tried the experiment of concentrating executive power in the
hands of an experienced paid officer on the model that had been
found to work well in Bombay city.
Octroi or town-duties, the main source of municipal revenues in
Bombay, the Panjab, the United and the Central Provinces, had been
in existence in some form or other from a very early period. Megas-
thenes and Strabo refer to them, while the Ain-i-Akbari records show
that they were in force in the period of Muhammadan power and
that the duty of collection was in the hands of the kotwal. These town-
duties had been part of the imperial revenues, but at the beginning
of the nineteenth century began to be utilised for municipal purposes.
In the hands of energetic officers who wanted to carry out local
improvements, desired by the residents in the towns, they furnished
an easy means of finding the necessary funds. The East India Com-
pany, alarmed at the hindrance to trade that was caused by the
numerous imposts, abolished the tax in Bengal and the North-Western
1 Panjab Municipal Resolution, 1915--16.


## p. 536 (#576) ############################################

536
LOCAL SELF-GOVERNMENT
Provinces in 1835, but acquiesced in its revival in the latter province
and its use in the Panjab, Bombay and Central Provinces. The tax
had many obvious advantages as a means of finding money wanted
for municipal improvements. It was highly productive; it was borne by
all, yet hardly felt by the townspeople; it grew with the prosperity and
needs of the town and was paid apparently by others, the traders, who
could well afford the chungi or handful from their goods, or the country
people who had in return the privilege of using the town market;
above all it was the old customary tax of India. The Government of
India, which always had its suspicions about this tax, as it was con-
trary to the English tradition of local taxation and freedom of trade,
wrote in 1868: “It is to little purpose that the imperial government
reduces or abolishes customs duties in the interests of trade if muni-
cipalities are permitted to levy duties on articles of commerce passing
through their limits. In all parts of India municipal taxation is
largely on the increase and there is a growing tendency to overlook
for the sake of small local improvements the real injury that is being
inflicted upon important general interests". 1 For the next fifty years
there was a continual struggle between the government and the muni-
cipalities, the latter always wanting more and more money for their
development and finding it with least difficulty by an extension of the
octroi system, while the former struggled to keep it confined to articles
actually consumed within the towns. For the latter purpose elaborate
systems of bonded warehouses and refunds for goods in transit through
towns were utilised, but these did little to mitigate the evils of the
octroi system that became more and more apparent as municipal
administration improved. These were laid bare by the report of the
municipality taxation committee of the United Provinces in 1909,
who found that the advantages of the system were outweighed by the
disadvantages, namely, the heavy cost of collection of the tax, the
prevalence of corruption owing to the necessity of employing a large
and poorly paid staff, and the delay and loss caused to all traders both
by the imposition of the tax and the procedure for getting refunds.
They recommended its replacement in the smaller towns by direct
taxation and at the larger centres by a terminal tax, a system that
had been found to work well at Cawnpore and to be no hindrance to
trade. The change proved difficult, as there was the most vehemenc
opposition to direct taxation. Even where this had been in existence
for some time, it was found that the revision of assessments led to no
increase in the rates, as a committee of elected commissioners seldom
raised the assessments, although with the growth of the town there
had been a large rise in the value of the properties concerned.
Gradually, however, octroi was replaced by direct taxation in many
of the smaller towns and elsewhere by terminal charges. The latter
were collected without difficulty, but collections of the former were
Proceedings, Government of India, 6 November, 1868.


## p. 537 (#577) ############################################

OCTROI DUTIES
537
a
always in arrears, sometimes so great that the taxes themselves
lapsed.
In Madras and Bengal more progress had been made in the intro-
duction of elected non-official chairmen, but, as in other places, they
lacked an efficient staff. In the absence of octroi, they had the addi-
tional difficulty of being entirely dependent for their funds on the
assessment and collection of direct taxation, whether in the shape of
a rate or of a charge for services rendered. Seldom did the municipal
executive dare to use their powers to make full and prompt collections
of the rates assessed, while the periodical revision of assessments was
undertaken in a half-hearted manner. Often insanitary conditions
were preferred to a strict administration, with the result that progress
towards a good water supply and proper drainage was spasmodic
rather than continuous, depending as it did mainly on donations from
the local government. Elections were keenly contested, not only at
the polls but also in the courts, one-sixth of the elections in Bengal in
1915 being the subject of civil suits. But the zeal for the public good
seemed to grow weaker after the acquisition of a seat on the local
authority. In some cases, it is true, the members of municipalities did
excellent work. The majority, however, did not recognise the fact that
as trustees of the public they were bound to see that public money was
collected fairly and also spent to the best advantage. Government
control had been reduced to the extent advocated in 1882, and was
much less than that exercised in England by the Local Government
Board over local authorities; but municipal bodies showed few signs
of that healthy exercise of public spirit and enterprise to be found in
those after whose fashion they had been created. In 1919 the gover'i-
ment of Bengal observed:
One of the most noticeable features of the reports for the year is the reiterated
and general complaint of the inadequacy of municipal funds to maintain any high
standard of administration, combined with a general disinclination on the part
of municipal boards to raise funds for the purpose. . . . Many boards have only
elementary ideas of the duties and responsibilities of municipal administration.
The incidence of taxation is below R. i per head in more than one-fourth of the
municipalities, and at this figure it is impossible to expect much in the way of
civic amenities.
From the above review it will be seen that British administrators
were more successful in retaining and developing the indigenous local
self-government of the villages than in transplanting urban and rural
organisations to their appropriate habitats in India. After many ex-
periments an efficient system was evolved for the presidency towns,
thanks to the intimate intermingling of official and private elements
in these corporations. In the smaller towns and districts, however, no
great success was achieved in establishing a local self-government at
once competent and capable of a healthy natural development.
Bengal Municipal Resolution for 1915-16.
: Idem, 1918-19.
1


## p. 538 (#578) ############################################

CHAPTER XXIX
THE NATIONAL CONGRESS AND EARLY
POLITICAL LITERATURE
Political activity in India has been marked by a tardy
beginning and very rapid development. For the first thirty or forty
years after the decision to base higher education on occidental rather
than on oriental literature, educated Indians were engaged in ab-
sorbing the new ideas. The first effects of the impact were noticeable
in the religious field, causing the formation and growth of new sects,
accompanied by a revival of orthodoxy. Higher education was so
largely in the hands of missionaries that the earliest activities were
directed towards examination of faith and consequently led to move-
ments for social reform. In Bengal the Brahmo Samaj founded by
Raja Ram Mohan Roy (1772–1833) was a theistic sect, the members
of which supported the abolition of sati. While it was under the
leadership of Debendranath Tagore a schism occurred. A young
minister of the sect, Keshub Chundra Sen (1838–84) was dismissed
and founded a new society, the main question in dispute being the
toleration of Hindu usages and customs which appeared innocent. 1
Members of this pressed on radical social reforms in regard to mar-
riage, female education and temperance. Sir Surendranath Banerjee
in his autobiography2 describes the great effect on young minds of
public speeches on religious and social topics by Keshub Chundra
Sen, on temperance by Peary Churn Sircar, and on the remarriage of
widows by Pandit Iswar Chunder Vidyasagar. From ethics and social
improvement the step to political activity was short. Works by the
English liberals provided inspiration, and the affairs of Italy, and
above all, the career and writings of Mazzini, quickened the imagina-
tion of young Bengalis, already enlivened by religious and ethical
excitement.
At Calcutta there already existed a British Indian Association,
chiefly supported by the landed proprietors to look after their interests.
Sir S. N. Banerjee, who joined the Indian Civil Service in 1871 and
was dismissed a year later, took up educational work and devoted
much time to his students outside the class-rooms. In his own words
his aim was “to kindle in the young the beginnings of public spirit and
to inspire them with a patriotic ardour, fruitful of good to them and
to the motherland”,3 and his method was to lecture on Indian unity,
the study of history, the lives of Mazzini and Chaitanya,' and higher
1
4
1 Max Müller, Chips from a German workshop, 11, 63 (1895 ed. ).
? A Nation in the Making, pp. 6-8.
• Fl. 1485-1527. Founder of the modern Vaishnava sect in Bengal.
3 Idem, p. 35.


## p. 539 (#579) ############################################

RACIAL CONFLICTS
539
education in English. Pursuing his desire to awaken in the middle
classes a more lively interest in public affairs, he helped to found the
Indian Association in 1876. Within a year an opportunity came for
extending political agitation in other parts of India. The reduction
of the age limit for entrance to the Indian Civil Service (see chapter
xx) was regarded as injurious to Indian candidates and delegates
were sent first to Northern India, and later to the west and south, to
arouse interest in a memorial praying for the raising of the limit and
for simultaneous examinations, and to establish branch associations.
Accompanying these legitimate movements was an undercurrent of
dislike and antagonism which showed itself by scurrilous writings in
the vernacular press charging the British government with injustice
and tyranny. 1 In April, 1878, an act was passed for the better control
of the vernacular press, and this measure and an act to limit the
possession of arms led to further activity in criticism of the government
and discontent with the opportunities available to Indians of con-
trolling the direction of public affairs, as well as of obtaining posts in
the public service.
A change in the government in England led to the resignation of
Lord Lytton, who was succeeded as viceroy by Lord Ripon in 1880.
His early announcement of projected advances in local self-govern-
ment (see chapter XXVIII) was welcomed by the Indian Association,
and his repeal of the Press Act which had been condemned at the
time of its passing by Mr Gladstone, greatly increased his popularity.
During his term of office racial conflict was embittered by a con-
troversy over limits to the jurisdiction exercised by Indian magistrates
in cases where a European was charged with an offence. Lord Ripon's
government introduced a billto extend this jurisdiction and a strong
agitation was raised by non-official Europeans, especially the indigo
and tea planters, who resided on estates often remote from the head-
quarters of police and magistrates and were particularly liable to be
the subject of groundless or exaggerated charges. A counter resent-
ment was stirred up in the minds of the Indian middle classes, who
felt that a racial privilege was being perpetuated, and that a slur was
cast on Indian magistrates. Sir Henry Cotton, who at the time was
an official in Bengal, and who after his retirement joined the Indian
National Congress, was of opinion that this agitation and the protests
by Europeans against the policy of Lord Ripon tended more strongly
to unite Indian national opinions than legislation on the lines of the
original bill would have done. 3
Another religious movement, the followers of which had a strong
influence on political thought, was the Arya Samaj, founded by
Dayanand Saraswati (1825 or 1827-83). 4 Unlike the Brahmo Samaj,
· Sir George Campbell, Memoirs of my Indian Career, 11, 314; and Bengal Administration
Reports, 1874–5, and 1875-6.
3 Known as the Ilbert bill.
* H. J. S. Cotton, New India, p. 4.
• Max Müller, op. cit. 11, 167.


## p. 540 (#580) ############################################

540
CONGRESS AND EARLY POLITICAL LITERATURE
which evolved an eclectic faith, this new society based its creed on the
Vedas, and claimed that these alone were the revealed scriptures and
that they contained mystical references to all knowledge, even to the
discoveries of modern science. Mme Blavatsky, the founder of the
Theosophical Society, had been affected by Buddhism, and used this
new doctrine in developing her cult. While the Brahmo Samaj was
mainly confined to Bengal, and the Arya Samaj to Western and
Northern India, theosophy attracted individuals in all parts of India,
and had its established centre near Madras. None of these spiritual
movements had any direct political aims, but they brought together
men who were seeking fresh interpretation of the old faiths, and who
naturally passed thence into affairs of state.
In 1883 the Bengal group of
young political workers organised a national fund and held their first
national conference attended by delegates from the principal towns.
They were doubtless closely following affairs in Ireland, where the
Irish National League had taken the place of the defunct land league
in the previous October. A year later a small meeting in Madras,
chiefly composed of delegates to the annual convention of the Theo-
sophical Societ, , decided to organise committees to gather adherents
for an Indian national union, and meet again for political discussions.
In 1885 the national conference met again at Calcutta, with delegates
from Northern India as well as from Bengal, and simultaneously the
national union held a series of meetings at Poona which constituted
the first Indian National Congress, and absorbed the earlier institu-
tion. The promoters of both these gatherings made representative
government their main objective, and announced their hopes that
the conferences would develop into Indian parliaments. A congress
resolution asked for a considerable proportion of elected members in
the existing councils, for the creation of new councils in the North-
Western Provinces and Oudh (now the United Provinces) and in the
Panjab, for the right to discuss the budget and to put interpellations
on all branches of the administration, and for the formation of a
standing committee of the House of Commons to consider protests by
legislative councils if they were overruled by the executive. The
congress also desired to abolish the council of the secretary of state,
to have simultaneous examinations in India and England to admit
candidates for the Indian Civil Service, the age being raised, and to
limit military expenditure. It deprecated the annexation of Upper
Burma on the score of expense, and suggested that, if annexation took
place, the whole of Burma should be administered separately from
India, as a crown colony.
The meeting stimulated further political activity and organisation,
and was repeated annually. 'An attempt was made to give it a repre-
sentative character, but for some years the delegates could be chosen
1 Encycl. Brit. 11th ed. xxvi, 789.
: Annie Besant, How India wrought for freedom, p. 1.
>


## p. 541 (#581) ############################################

MUSLIMS AND THE CONGRESS
541
by any association of any kind or indeed at any public meeting con-
vened by anybody. A few Europeans became members, but their
example has not had many followers. Muslims joined only in small
numbers, and their sympathy as a community with the congress was
weakened by a lecture delivered at Lucknow by the late Sir Sayyid
Ahmad in December, 1887, while the congress was meeting in
Madras. " Sir Sayyid, after a long career in the judicial service of the
United Provinces, had devoted himself to promoting the study of
English by Muslims, and had been a nominated member of the
imperial legislative council. He was entirely free from religious pre-
judice, and had indeed exerted himself to reduce it, but he main-
tained that, in the conditions then existing in India, compliance with
the demands made by the congress would injure the state. Competitive
examinations, though suitable in English conditions, would in India
lead to the selection of officials whose origin would make them in-
acceptable to the strongly conservative Indian with his pride in
ancestry. Diversity of race and tradition created another problem,
and domination by the Bengalis, who were likely to gain most of the
posts, would not be submitted to by Muslims and Rajputs with their
more warlike traditions. The second congress in 1886 had elaborated
the previous scheme for representation in legislative councils, asking
that not less than half the members should be elected, and not more
than a quarter nominated non-officials. Sir Sayyid pointed out that
in any ordinary system the Muslims would be in a minority, and, even
if special representation were given to them, their backwardness in
education and their comparative poverty would place them at a
disadvantage. He asserted the loyalty of the Indian people and the
comparative insignificance of those who wished for political power,
and he questioned the authority of the congress to criticise military
expenditure. In a later address he shrewdly doubted the willingness
of Indians to tax themselves even if they had the power. Although
the third congress elected a Muslim gentleman from Bombay as
president, Sir Sayyid's advice was followed by most Muslims for
twenty years, and was not appreciably affected by a resolution of the
fourth congress that resolutions should not be introduced for dis-
cussion if one community strongly objected, or be passed if such
objection became apparent during discussion.
A change in viceroys, Lord Dufferin having ucceeded Lord Ripon
at the end of 1884, meant no reversal of the ge. eral policy of meeting
reasonabledemands with a liberality confined on. ybyrestrictions which
those best fitted to judge held necessary in the view of all interests.
Lord Dufferin had previous experience in the near East of the ways
of Eastern autocracy, and in Canada of the position of a constitutional
governor-general in a dominion feeling its way to responsible govern-
ment. His natural inclination to liberal measures was tempered by
1 Sir Sayyid Ahmad, On the present state of Indian politics, Allahabad, 1888, p. 1.
a


## p. 542 (#582) ############################################

542
CONGRESS AND EARLY POLITICAL LITERATURE
the dangers of academic idealism impressed on him as an Irish land-
lord, who had managed his own estates. Only a year before he went
to India he had drawn up a scheme for associating the people more
closely with the government in Egypt, which was in force for twenty
years, 2 and has been copied by several constitution makers for India.
After two years' study of Indian conditions he recorded a minute
(1886) which exhibits his insight into the real desires of the forward
party, and his sagacity regarding the method for meeting them. He
desired to make a careful examination of the demands,
2
. . . to give quickly and with a good grace whatever it may be possible or desirable
to accord; to announce that the concessions must be accepted as a final settlement
of the Indian system for the next ten or fifteen years; and to forbid mass meetings
and incendiary speechifying. "
Soon after his arrival he had felt the desirability of reform in the
legislative councils, and he now advocated changes which would give
the viceroy the advantage of relying more largely upon the experience
and counsels of Indian coadjutors, while the possibility of their having
a party behind them would relieve the Government of India from its
existing isolation.
Another period of two years passed before definite proposals were
sent home (November, 1888), in a dispatch accompanied by a minute
of Lord Dufferin. He had described in 1886 the risks to be incurred
byintroducing a representative element into the Government of India,
but was prepared to liberalise at all events the provincial legislative
councils, one of which, in the North-Western Provinces and Oudh, was
created in that year. Supported by a committee of his executive
council Lord Dufferin described his scheme as
a plan for the enlargement of our provincial councils, for the enhancement of
their status, the multiplication of their functions, the partial introduction into
them of the elective principle, and the liberalisation of their general character
as political institutions.
At the same time he deprecated the inference that the Government of
India were contemplating, in the provinces, an approach to English
parliamentary government and an English constitutional system. The
Indian executive was directly responsible to the sovereign and to the
British parliament and must remain so while Great Britain continued
to be the paramount administrative power in India. Describing the
British system of responsible government, he pointed out that it
could not be introduced into an Indian province because the
governor, if a vote was carried against him in his legislative council,
could not "call upon the dissentients to take the place of his own
1 Sir A. Lyall, Life of the Marquis of Dufferin and Ava, p. 43.
• Idem, p. 48.
3 Idem, p. 151.
• Montagu-Chelmsford Report, paras. 67-8.


## p. 543 (#583) ############################################

DUFFERIN'S PROPOSALS
543
official advisers, who are nominated by the queen-empress on the
advice of the secretary of state”. In proposing to liberalise the
government, therefore, he insisted on the necessity of leaving "in
the hands of each provincial government the ultimate decision upon
all important questions and the paramount control of its own policy",
by arranging that nominated members of legislative councils should
outnumber the elected members, and that the governor could over-
rule his council when he felt it necessary to do so. He foresaw that
even with these limited powers the elected members would be able to
influence the policy of the government, and he felt that their presence
in the council would be beneficial by enlarging the field of public
discussion, while they would consider themselves “responsible to
enlightened and increasing sections of their own countrymen”.
The Conservative government in England declined to agree to any
system of election on the ground that “it would be unwise to introduce
a fundamental change of this description without much more eyidence
in its favour than was forthcoming". 1 Lord Lansdowne, who had
now succeeded Lord Dufferin, supported his recommendation, and
asked that at least the Government of India might be empowered to
make rules for the appointment of additional members by nomination
or otherwise, to include election where conditions justified its use.
A bill was prepared in 1889, but not introduced till February, 1890
(House of Lords). From the papers which were simultaneously
presented all reference to a system of election was completely
excluded, and the only portions of Lord Dufferin's minute, a state
paper of the highest value, which appeared in them were his recom-
mendations that the annual budget should be presented and dis-
cussed, and that non-official members should be allowed to ask
questions. Lord Cross accepted these and was also prepared to in-
crease considerably the number of nominated members in the councils,
and the bill provided for all these matters. While the proposals met
with no opposition in the House of Lords, the government was strongly
pressed to allow some method of election, and to publish in full the
dispatches and minutes. Lord Ripon asserted that Lord Dufferin's
minute had been surreptitiously printed in India, and it was known
that he favoured election. Lord Northbrook spoke eloquently in
favour of it, while at the same time deprecating any approach to the
British system: “India is a long way from having what is called a
responsible government, namely an administration composed of men
who possess a majority in the representative assembly”. He was not
opposed to a body like the congress, though he admitted that certain
1 Montagu-Chelmsford Report, para. 69.
2 Cd. 5950 of 1890.
• Lord Mayo had proposed this for provincial councils twenty years earlier, but without
success, vide Mr Curzon, Hansard, 28 March, 1892, p. 60.
• Another clause was added to give provincial councils powers of modifying laws passed
by the imperial equncil after 1861. See Lord Herschell in Hansard, 13 March, 1890,
• Hansard, 6 March, 1890, p. 63.
p. 669.


## p. 544 (#584) ############################################

544
CONGRESS AND EARLY POLITICAL LITERATURE
>
members were circulating papers which might be dangerous, and he
deprecated the scheme of election which it had advocated. All those
who supported him were agreed that details must be worked out in
India owing to the complexity and variety of Indian conditions, and
there was a disposition to avoid motions on the budget as leading to
irresponsible discussion. Lord Salisbury laid stress on the deep re-
sponsibility on any government that introduced the elective principle
as an effective agent in the government of India. He was careful to
make no rash prophecy about the future and said: “It may be--I do
not desire to question it--that it is to be the ultimate destiny of India". 1
But he pointed out that the idea was foreign to the East and its
adoption had so far produced no tangible results in Turkey or Egypt.
Representative government appeared to him admirable only when all
those who were represented desired much the same thing and had
interests which were tolerably analogous. Echoing perhaps the
addresses of Sir Sayyid Ahmad, he laid stress on the radical and acrid
differences between Hindu and Muhammadan, and he poured ridi-
cule on the idea that a constituency for representing virile communities
like Panjabis and Rajputs or even the ryots could be found in a body
elected for making streets and drains. He held that the chief need
was for a fuller representation of all interests.
Though the bill quickly passed through the House of Lords, it was
never taken up in the Commons. Irish affairs, while they had been an
incentive to the Indian politicians and their supporters in England,
proved a deterrent to the government. Mr Bradlaugh had already
introduced one Home Rule bill for India, at the request of the Indian
National Congress of 1889. It provided an elaborate scheme of
electoral colleges, with proportional representation, and a large
number of elected members. After the withdrawal (5 August, 1890)
of the government measure, he produced a more modest bill, leaving
details to be settled by rules. Mr Balfour's Land Purchase Bill for
Ireland was occupying public time, and, though the Indian Councils
bill was revived early in 1891, the certainty of great pressure to make
it more liberal deterred the government, and it was again dropped
after several postponements, causing great disappointment in India.
The president of the congress meeting of that year explained the
dropping of the bill as due to the death of Mr Bradlaugh.
With the break-up of the Parnellite party and the death of its leader,
preoccupation with the affairs of Ireland was less intense, and a fresh
bill passed the House of Lords in February, 1892, with little comment,
as it contained a clause wide enough to permit some degree of an
elective principle, though not prescribing it. Lord Northbrook indeed
said that he preferred to describe his object as “representation”
rather than "election”, which Lord Kimberley had advocated.
Commenting on this Lord Salisbury agreed with the former. ?
1 Hansard, 6 March, 1890, p. 98.
• Idem, 15 February, 1892, p. 117.


## p. 545 (#585) ############################################

THE ACT OF 1892
545
Speaking with less derision of the local bodies, he said that the govern-
ment wished to popularise them and to bring them into harmony
with
the dominant sentiment of the Indian people, and added:'
But we must be careful lest, by the application of occidental machinery, we bring
into power not the strong, natural, vigorous, effective elements of Indian society,
but the more artificial and weakly elements, which -
we ourselves have made and
have brought into prominence. It would be a great evil if, in any system of
government which we gradually develop, the really strong portions of Indian
society did not obtain that share in the government to which their natural position
among their own people traditionally entitles them.
By a strange coincidence it fell to Mr G. N. Curzon to conduct this
bill through the House of Commons, as under-secretary of state, and
a quarter of a century later to draw up the final draft of a pronounce-
ment which led to the tentative introduction of responsible govern-
ment in Indian provinces. Like other spokesmen of the government,
he described the bill as in no sense creating a parliamentary system. "
No objection was raised to the proposals for discussion of the budget,
and the right to put questions. The chief controversy was on the
matter of election, and an amendment was moved by Mr Schwann to
declare that no system would be satisfactory which did not embody
this. In committee he elaborated details which would have had the
effect of fixing the number of elected members at between one-third
and a half of the total membership, with election by ballot and not
less than 2 per cent. of the population enfranchised. Though the
government was not prepared to bind itself to such a definite scheme,
it was clearly understood that the rules to be framed would recognise
the principle of election. Sir R. Temple, who had had a wide official
experience in India and had been governor of Bombay, suggested
that the sixteen additional members of the viceroy's council should
be chosen by the towns in which an elective system was in force for
municipal purposes, and Mr Curzon indicated as bodies which
would be suitable as constituencies the British Indian Association
(which Lord Ripon had already used to suggest additional members
for the discussion on the Bengal Tenancy Act), the chambers of com-
merce, the corporations of great cities, universities and various great
religious associations. Mr Gladstone was satisfied that it was intended
to have selectio after election and deprecated a division on
Mr Schwann's propu sal to prescribe this in the bill, as it was not the
business of parliament to devise machinery for the purposes of Indian
government, though it was right to give those who represented Her
Majesty in India ample information as to what parliament believed
to be the sound principles of government. The premature claims of
the congress to be accepted as representative were criticised by
Mr Curzon in picturesque and illuminating fashion:
1 Hansard, 28 March, 1892, p. 57.
* Idem, 28 March, 1892, p. 68.
,
• Idem, pp. 1301 $99.
• Idem, p. 98.
• Idem, p. 80.
35
OHI V


## p. 546 (#586) ############################################

546 CONGRESS AND EARLY POLITICAL LITERATURE
You can as little judge of the feelings and inspiration of the people of India
from the plans and proposals of the congress party as you can judge of the physical
configuration of a country which is wrapped in the mists of early morning, but
a few of whose topmost peaks have been touched by the rising sun.
Sir Richard Temple, with a more intimate knowledge of individual
members, gave a warning against entrusting more political powers to
them until they showed "greater moderation, greater sobriety of
thought, greater robustness of intelligence, greater self-control-all
which qualities build up the national character. . . ".
The bill having been passed without amendment (26 May, 1892),
the Government of India were informed that parliament intended
that:
where corporations have been established with definite powers, upon a recognised
administrative basis, or where associations have been formed upon a substantial
community of legitimate interests, professional, commercial or territorial, the
governor-general and the local governors might find convenience and advantage
in consulting from time to time such bodies, and in entertaining at their discretion
an expression of their views and recommendations with regard to the selection
of members in whose qualifications they might be disposed to confide. '
The possible number of additional members was increased under
the act from
twelve to sixteen in the imperial council, was more than
doubled in Bombay and Madras, and was raised by 70 per cent. in
Bengal and the North-Western Provinces and Oudh. By the regula-
tions it was provided that some of these should be nominated after
recommendation by certain bodies. Of the ten non-official members of
the imperial council, four were to be chosen by the non-official addi-
tional members of the councils in Madras, Bombay, Bengal and the
North-Western Provinces and Oudh, and one by the Calcutta Chamber
of Commerce, the remaining seats being reserved for the appointment
of experts on special subjects of legislation and the proper representa-
tion by nomination of different classes of the community. For the
provincial councils the method of selection varied according to local
conditions. Each of the three presidency cities (Madras, Bombay and
Calcutta) nominated a member, and there were representatives of
the trading associations and senates of universities. Representatives
of the district boards and smaller municipal boards met in an electoral
college to select other nominees. The scale of representatives of
municipal boards was based on the income of the municipality in
Bengal and on the population in Bombay, while in the North-Western
Provinces and Oudh each municipal board sent only one representa-
tive to the electoral college. Thus in Bengal the influence of the towns
outweighed that of the countryside. In Bombay the bigger land-
owners also had a right of nomination.
1 Montagu-Chelmsford Report, para. 69.
· Cd. 86 of 1894.


## p. 547 (#587) ############################################

ELECTORAL SYSTEM
547
Although the act was criticised by the congress of 1892 for not
containing an explicit recognition of the right to elect, the regulations
made under it had the practical effect of instituting an elective
system, and the other changes it made indicated that the councils
were no longer to remain, as they had been under the act of 1861,
bodies which met only when legislative business was on hand. In the
thirty years which had elapsed since they were constituted it had been
possible only on sixteen occasions to discuss financial matters, while
now the budget was to be presented annually whether taxation was
being altered or not. And the right to put questions was a definite
enlargement of the powers of members.


## p. 548 (#588) ############################################

CHAPTER XXX
THE RISE OF AN EXTREMIST PARTY
On 5 August, 1832, Mountstuart Elphinstone predicted to a select
N
committee of the House of Commons that if the Indian press were
free we should, as time went on, find ourselves in such a predicament
as no state had ever yet experienced.
“In other countries”, he said, “the use of the press has extended along with
the improvement of the country and the intelligence of the people; but in India
we shall have to contend at once with the more refined theories of Europe and
with the prejudices and fanaticism of Asia, both rendered doubly formidable by
the imperfect education of those to whom every appeal will be addressed. ”
Similar views had been expressed by Munro and Malcolm. " A free
press, Munro thought, would inevitably generate "insurrection and
anarchy". But such warnings were disregarded by Charles Metcalfe
in 1835, when, as acting governor-general, he removed all press restric-
tions on the ground that whatever the consequences might be, this step
was requisite for the spread in India of Western knowledge and civi-
lisation. Twenty-one years later, after the licence enjoyed byindigenous
newspapers had liberally contributed to the causes of the Mutiny,
Lord Canning imposed temporary restrictions, which remained in
operation for a year. In 1878 Lord Lytton's government, holding that
the seditious tone of the vernacular newspapers compelled some cur-
tailment of the "exceptional tolerance” accorded to journalists, and
that freedom of the press was rather a privilege to be worthily earned
and rationally enjoyed than “a fetish to be worshipped”, passed a
Vernacular Press Act which was severely criticised in England and
repealed by his successor in 1882. In 1883, when the Ilbert bill
controversy was raging in Bengal, Sir Alfred Lyall, lieutenant-governor
of the North-Western Provinces, observed that the tone of the native
press in that province was daily growing more vicious and insulting
and might end by “leavening the mass” to a greater degree than was
fancied. He was constantly speculating as to how far it could possibly
“be despised as impotent and absurd”. 3
It is clear that from early days the congress included two parties of
Hindus. There were the Western-educated followers of Gladstonian
liberalism," loyal to British rule but anxious to press on politically,
who drew much inspiration from English literature and history and
gathered strength from their power to appeal to English democratic
sympathies. There were also reactionary and irreconcilable Hindus,
1 Malcolm, Political History of India, 11, App. vi.
? See Lord Canning's speech to his legislative council, 13 June, 1857, quoted ap.
Donogh, Law of Sedition, pp. 182–3.
• Durand, Life of Lyall, p. 283.
Idem, p. 305.


## p. 549 (#589) ############################################

REACTIONARY HINDUISM
549
who regarded the memories of Muslim supremacy and the intrusions
of British rule and Western culture with rooted aversion. Prudential
considerations, the respect generally enjoyed by the government, its
ability to guard the country from the obvious menace of Russian
invasion and from the feuds of India's numerous factions1 dictated
caution; but the will to strike was there and found a vent in bitter and
slanderous passages in congress publications. To Hume these were
justifiable weapons in a “war of propaganda”. : To the government
8
they seemed unworthy of serious notice. But to the great Muslim
leader, Sir Sayyid Ahmad, the congress publications represented a
grave danger. He impressed on his co-religionists that the promoters
of the movement desired that the government of India should be
English in name but their own in fact, and that if the agitation spread
from the unwarlike to the warlike classes, it would go beyond writing
and talking and would lead to bloodshed. If the Muslims joined in
“unreasonable schemes” which were disastrous for the country and
themselves, the viceroy would realise that “a Mohammedan agitation
was not the same as a Bengali agitation”. 4 and would be bound to
take strong measures. He implored the Muslims to have nothing to
do with the congress.
The congress, however, gathered a few Muslim adherents, as time
went on; and gradually its extreme section discovered a leader. In
the meantime the death of a Hindu child-wife in Calcutta led to the
prosecution of her husband for culpable homicide and to the passing
in 1891 of an Age of Consent Act which prohibited cohabitation before
a wife reached the age of twelve. This legislation produced violent
excitement among the Hindus of Calcutta, who complained that their
religion was in danger; and articles in the Bangabasi newspaper pub-
lished there led to the prosecution of the editor, manager and printer
for sedition. But reactionary Hinduism found its chief exponent in
Bombay.
The Konkanasth or Chitpavan Brahmans of Western India have
always been remarkable for ability. It was under a Chitpavan
dynasty that the Maratha empire had reached its highest point and
afterwards declined to its fall. Chitpavans had adapted themselves
to calmer times and were prominent at the bar, in education and in
government service; but some there were who mourned the fallen
glories of the Peshwas; and prominent among these was Bal
Gangadhar Tilak, educationist and journalist. Elected to the subjects
committee of the congress of 1889, he soon established a leading
position. His determined character, his Sanskrit learning, his mastery
1 Durand, Life of Lyall, p. 300.
* See, for instance, certain passages in the Report of the congress meetings in 1890.
• Wedderburn, A. O. Hume, pp. 68, 76-7:
• Sir Sayyid Ahmad, on the present state of Indian Politics, p.