Suicide as Policy

IT was only to be expected that the Morning Post, which in a special sense is the organ of the Die-hard party with regard to India, would condemn the authorities in India during the last few months — the release of political prisoners in the U.P. in accordance with a resolution of the Legislative Council. In a leader headed “Suicide as Policy” the journal tells it readers that “the release of Gandhi’s son to lead an agitation for the release of Gandhi will embarrass the Government of Bengal and encourage the agitators for the removal of the Lawrence Statue at Lahore.” Neither Mahatma Gandhi nor his son has anything to do with the Government of Bengal, and so far from the release encouraging the “agitators” for the removal of the Lawrence Statue, it is since that event that the City Congress Committee have definitely resolved to leave the matter, at least for the time being, in the hands of the Municipal Committee. But this is the least part of the matter. What the journal condemns is not merely the action of Sir William Marris, but the whole policy of governing India with the consent of the governed. Of that only right policy, we have seen precious little in India inspite of all the talk of the partial introduction of responsible Government, but even that little is enough to upset the Morning Post and its tribe. “If the action of Sir William Marris,” it writes, “was taken without consulting the Viceroy and approved by the Viceroy without consulting the India office, then we are faced with a system of administration which must be changed immediately.” Exactly so, the Government of India must remain an undiluted autocracy, with a Conservative Secretary of State as the permanent autocrat!

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