New Congress president

AT a general meeting of the Reception Committee of the Indian National Congress held at Kanpur on Wednesday, Sarojini Naidu was elected president of the party. Under the Congress Constitution, the Reception Committee is, in this matter, a coordinate authority with the majority of the Provincial Congress Committees, and although it cannot set aside the verdict of the majority, it can differ from that verdict and refer the matter to the All-India Congress Committee for final disposal. Naidu was elected president by 16 of the 19 Provincial Congress Committees, and the Reception Committee itself has acted gracefully in confirming the election without any dissentient note. The election is notable for more reasons than one, but chiefly because for the first time in its history, the Congress has conferred this great honour, the greatest in its gift and in the gift of the country at present, upon a richly endowed and highly accomplished Indian woman. Naidu will not, of course, be the first woman president of the Congress. Annie Besant, who is an Indian by everything except her birth, and whose love of India and services to her are unsurpassed by those of any living Indian, was admitted to that sanctum before her. But she will be the first Indian woman to occupy the coveted place. We need scarcely say that the election will be acclaimed by the country both on personal grounds and as a tribute to the gentler sex, of whom Naidu herself once declared that it is women and not men who are the makers of the race. The influence which women exercise in the direct shaping of national affairs and the destiny of the nation is apt, by reason of its very obviousness, to be overlooked, but it is none the less great.