On Tuesday there was an unpleasant set-back to the Conference
when it appeared that the Hindus and Moslems were not so near to an agreement about the protection of minorities as they seemed to be last week. In the Federal Structure Sub-Committee, when Lord Sankey's draft of a Constitution was being discussed, the Moslem delegates dissented, not because they disapproved of the Constitution as such, but because they made every- thing depend upon an agreement with the Hindus on the communal question. Lord Peel and Sir Samuel Hoare also withheld their approval of the Constitution on quite different grounds. They declared that the Imperial safe- guards were inadequate, particularly in regard tcr finance. Lord Reading intervened to say that when he agreed last week with Sir Tej Bahadur Sapru's speech lie pre-supposed that there would be a Hindu-Moslem agreement and that there would really be an All-India Federation. He had, in fine, assented to Indian responsibility at the centre as the logical sequel to a Federal system, and he must point out that the situation would be once more changed if the States did not come into the Constitution. That, however, was obvious. Lord Reading was not really taking back anything. * *
