IS IT TOO LATE?

We concluded our leading article yesterday with the expression of a hope that wiser counsels would prevail, and that the authorities would not only call a halt, but retrace the wrong steps they had already taken. We know it would require courage for the Government and its officers to follow the course we suggest. The only prudent course for the Government from the beginning has been either to make non-co-operation impossible by taking away discontent, or to leave the issue to be settled by the ripening of opinion, confining itself to preventing and, if and where necessary, punishing deviations from the principle of non-violence, and especially actual breaches of the peace. The first was the more statesmanlike alternative of the two. It was the one course that could provide an effective remedy for the situation with which the Government found itself confronted sixteen months ago. If at that time, the Government had called a small round table conference consisting of half a dozen leaders of the first rank and had tried to explore the possibilities of a settlement, either non-co-operation would never have been declared or it would have been declared in circumstances far less favourable to its growth than those in which the movement was actually started. Even after that moment had passed, there were two occasions when the same remedy might have been tried, first, when the Duke came with his message of reconciliation and again when Lord Reading assumed the reins of Viceroyalty. Much has been said of the alleged desire of the Government to exploit the Prince’s visit for its own purpose. The allegation has been made by practically every non-co-operation leader of the first rank, commencing with Mahatma Gandhi himself. It has been repudiated by more than one high official, commencing with the highest, the Viceroy.

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