Reforms and untouchability

THE views expressed by the “submerged classes” in their farewell address to Lord Willingdon are a clear index of the immense danger of the continuance of untouchability to the cause of India’s political advancement. The address emphasised that the depressed classes “were entirely opposed to the controlling hand of the British Government being removed from India”. They also expressed themselves against the immediate Indianisation of the services and strongly desired that no nation-building department should be entrusted to a minister, but should be in charge of a senior European officer working under a European member of the Executive Council. We do not know of a single instance in which a minister or any other responsible Indian officer in any part of India has neglected the interests of the so-called “submerged classes”; and the address is nothing more or less than an attempt to exploit the depressed classes for the purpose of thwarting the legitimate aspirations of politically minded Indians, who have done, and are doing, everything in their power to improve the condition of the people on whose behalf the address purports to speak. But it must be admitted that unless the educated classes make more strenuous efforts to deliberate on untouchability and improve the lot of the untouchables, this sort of thing will continue and their past sins will terribly recoil on them. It is, indeed, a most lamentable thing that a large section of Indians should be forced to live under conditions that could be successfully exploited by the enemies of political reform.