The reforms report

AT last, the report of the Reforms Enquiry Committee has been published. As will be seen from the summary of recommendations, the general anticipation not only as regards the two reports, one signed by the three European members as well as Sir Mahomed Shafi and the Maharaja of Burdwan, and the other signed by the four independent Indian members, but as regards the main lines of the reports is substantially fulfilled. The majority report is literally a case of the mountain in labour producing a mouse. There is not in this voluminous document, covering over 103 pages of print, one suggestion of fundamental or far-reaching change, not one suggestion of which it can be honestly said that by itself it goes far enough to satisfy even an appreciable section of the public. It is dominated far more by the determination not to amend the Constitution radically than by a desire to satisfy the legitimate aspirations of the public, far more by a determination not to make any recommendation inconsistent with “the structure, the policy and the purpose of the Act” than by a desire to subject the present Constitution to a proper and thorough examination so as to find whether it can possibly be rendered workable and satisfactory to those principally concerned. Apart from the Constitution of the Central government which by general consent was the weakest and most unsatisfactory feature of the reforms, the most important question before the committee was whether dyarchy in any form could possibly be permitted to continue to exist. And it is on this point that the finding of the majority is most unsatisfactory.