The agreement and after

SINCE the announcement of the South African agreement in a Simla communique published in our issue of Saturday, two statements of substantial value have been made. One is that the report of the Select Committee on the anti-Asiatic Bill, approving of the agreement reached and recommending that the Bill be postponed until the result of the Conference is available, has been adopted with a virtual unanimity. The statement is of obvious importance because the agreement arrived at between the two Governments was made expressly subject to the approval of the Select Committee and the Union Parliament. The other is the long statement made by General Hertzog on the international status of South Africa. In this statement he declared, among other things, that the Union had secured a complete international status equal to that of any other dominion or any other part of the British Empire. South Africa, he added, was in a position of absolute equality even with Great Britain, and even with regard to the question of secession, but it would be very unwise and ill-advised for them to exercise the right of secession except by deviation through the agency and means of Great Britain.” No Indian patriot who believes in the freedom of his own country and wants for it absolute equality with any other member of the Empire not excepting Great Britain herself would grudge South Africa the international status which she claims to have secured for herself. At the same time, the reference to the right of secession acquired by South Africa at this moment, when a decision about a Round Table Conference between the Union Government and the Government of India on the Indian question has been reached, is of obvious significance.