A New Constitution for India The Dilemma in India. By
Sir Reginald Craddock. (Constable.
15s.) •
Tins autumn, on the eve of critical decisions about India's future, many of its would be grateful for a short cut to the points at issue and the facts that bear upon them. It is hardly a short cut, this volume of four hundred closely printed pages, but it tells us much that we ought to know. At the present moment it is most opportune, and in any case it was badly wanted ; because in all this Indian controversy we suffer from ragged thinking on one side, and from frothy senti- mentalism on -the other ; whereas Sir Reginald Craddock brings us up against realities. He knows India as few other living Englishmen do ; he loves the simple unlettered folk of farm and village ; and he is miserably unhappy lest rash political changes should be their undoing. Hence the " dilemma which he discloses. In the Cabinet's announce- - ment of August, 1917, we promised India Self-government ; in her proclamation in 1858, Queen Victoria promised India good government, and under present conditions the two are incompatible. To demonstrate this thesis, he takes-us through the whole gamut of Indian problems. The major problem, he says, is not the framing of a constitution ; there are far graver questions to settle before India can be left to manage her own affairs.. With many of these Sir Reginald;deals fully and faithfully ; and it is here that we may readily-aeCept his guidance.
For the -changes that were introduced ten years ago the author has little sympathy. So strongly does he dislike dyarchy and all its works that his estimate of recent events is less judicial than the earlier part of the volume. In regard to the intentions of the 1919 constitution, its origins, the necessity for it. and the force of the intellectual movement behind it, opinion might sharply differ, in as good faith as his own, from the views which Sir Reginald holds. From his analysis, how- ever, of the trend of events in the administration since 1919, there are few who will dissent. In the public services, ". the .-poison- of corruption,- which: for- years had been steadily losing ground, is now as surely gaining it . . . . Government grants to aided schools . . . . are fraudulently increased, the managers of the schools pocketing the difference . . . . Embezzlements steadily increase, attempts to interfere with magisterial dis- cretion for political objects begin to occur." In municipal and local bodies there has been no progress, no sign of any public conscience ; " misappropriation of public funds," writes one Governor, " is a subject rather for mirth or envy than reprobation." But the worst and most dangerous portent " is the growing contempt for authority, and the weakening in the enforcement of law and order." These results the author attributes partly to the reduction of the British element in the administration, and partly to the inability of the new ministers to defy the forces of rebellion in the home-rule camp.
How, then, is all this mischief to be undone, or further dete. rioration arrested ? Many and various, but mostly foolish, says Sir Reginald, have been the answers to this riddle,—from the humble schemes .for smaller and more self-contained provinces to the demand of the Nehru project for complete Dominion status. The real remedy, argues the writer, is none of these. The whole theory of " responsible " government must lie in abeyance until some sense of responsibility is created ; this can come only from within, as education spreads, never artificially from outside. Meanwhile, we must get rid of the imitations of democracy. with which we have been toying. Keep the franchise now that it has been granted, but change the .constituencies, and have no carpet-bagging. Let the legislatures, so far as they are elective, represent interests -and not areas—racial minorities, the land, commerce, the professions, &c. Dispense with second chambers ; but as crown to the edifice, give the Viceroy a " Durbar " or Council of Notables, including a selection of the Princes, who will advise him how to handle his legislature. And, above all, let the executive governments be joint bodies of Englishmen and
Indians, so that the principle of partnership shall be the key- , note of future progress.
The sketch of a new constitution is avowedly-incomplete. The outstanding value of the book lies in its proof that the foundations, tangible and intangible, on which our Western democracies are based, have not yet been laid in India. The last ten wasted years have told us nothing as to hoir they are to be laid, or when. It has been a period of retrogression, such as public opinion would have sharply corrected in Europe; but Sir Reginald shows us how feeble and untrustworthy is that purifying influence in India. Failing a healthy public opinion, the country must rely on the leaderihip of Worthy men. Such men exist in abundance ; but they are forbidden to lead by the violence of the extreme home-ruler. And so Ike are brought back to the two fundamental questions : first, how far are we prepared with concessions to the home-ruler, in order to bring him into our scheme of government: ; and second, if he refuses to come in upon our terms, are we prepared to make him obey the law and respect the welfare of the State ? These are the questions which we shall 'shortly be obliged to'ansaer unless our association with India is to' end 'in ignominy:
MESTON.
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