* INDIAN PERPLEXITIES SIR,—On reading your article under this head certain
questions spring to one's mind, indeed, the leader in the News Chronicle of April 2nd suggests that they may disturb more Britishers (not to mention Amcricans) than you appear to think.
Here are some : I. Is it British to publish, and to discuss in Parliament, an indictment of a man in confinement with no opportunity of facing his accusers or answering the charges? 2. Is it cricket to judge (and condemn) a man on excerpts taken from his sayings and writings on various occasions and relating to differing circumstances? Equally, is it right to condemn a man on an assertion severed from the conditional clauses which govern it?
3. Can Indian leaders fairly be expected to put up any promising proposal if they are not only prevented from intercourse with those who are confined on account of their wide influence, but are also refused an interview by the Viceroy?
4. Can Butishers feel comfortable about a situation in which our firmest friends are the autocratic Princes, and our opponents—rightly or wrongly—are those who are struggling for the full freedom now which we have taught them to love these last hundred years?
5. Is sabotage in India, carried out by Indians as they believe for freedom's sake, different in kind or intention from sabotage in European countries overrun by Germany?
6. Is not the Christian Church in India right and reasonable in urging that, with a view to future good relations between Britain and India, Christian statesmanship consists in seeking a way of negotiation rather than in sitting down before a political deadlock and just getting on with
the war?—I am, faithfully yours, G. E. HIL1CMAN JOHNSON. "White Shack," 12 Oakley Road, Wcrrlinghant, Surrey.
Previous page
