Date: 7 November 1929
Location: London
Speaker: Aga Khan III
Source: Speeches of Aga Khan III – K K Aziz
Full Text
AnArtic/,e London: 7 November 1929 History of British rule in India – the will of the British nation to establish dominion status – problems to be solved – adjustment of relations between the Indian States and a Dominion India freedom for Burma – federalism as a solution of the Hindu-Muslim question – withdrawal of the British Anny – need for Indian states manship.
The announcement made by the Viceroy last week cannot be considered by any serious student of the history of the British connexion with India as anything more than.a natural and inevit able development in this marvellous episode in world history, designed to remove doubts which have arisen in India as to the ultimate aim of British policy.
Clive and Hastings, and those associated with them, were little concerned with the final destiny of the Empire in the East they were creating. But soon afterwards Sir John Malcolm thought deeply regarding the ultimate goal of Britain’s work in India, and came to certain definite conclusions. From this time onwards there have always been prominent Englishmen, either in India or in Parliament, who have held whether consciously or sub consciously, to the views of Malcolm and Mountstuart Elphin stone. Those great administrators realized that permanent dominion of a foreign people was an impossibility. The question they propounded was whether India should be prepared to take her place united to England by ties of political alliance and cultural and commercial pupilage, or whether a new era of chaos and invasion such as they had themselves witnessed was to succeed the British connexion.
Then came a long period when the declaration of equality of opportunity in the Act of 1833, confirmed by Queen Victoria’s Proclamation of 1858, came to be regarded by political-minded Indians as the charter of their liberty. They asked for equality of opportunity in the service of the Crown, for administrative improvements, such as the separation of judicial and executive functions, for the spread of education, and for reforms in land tenure and assessment, rather than for political freedom and power to govern.
A disastrous break took place when Lord Dufferin, after at first encouraging the newly-formed Indian National Congress, turned his back on this policy. From that day to the end of Lord Curzon’s rule there was little understanding and sympathy between the Biitish rulers and the Indian intelligentsia. As a member of the Viceroy’s Legislature during Lord Curzon’s time, I saw at close quarters how foreign the Government was in spirit and atmosphere, and how, on the other side, dissatisfied at not having succeeded in obtaining the earlier demands, Indian leaders began to clamour not so much for administrative reform as for the control of their political destiny.
A little later Lord Morley and Lord Minto came to realize that the spiiit of dominance had done its work in India and that it was impossible to stand still. Accordingly they introduced their reforms. Lord Hardinge’s Viceroyalty was the continuation in letter and in spirit of the Morley-Minto regime. Though his constitutional powers were retained under the reforms, he was most successful in his efforts to govern with the people at his back.
There is a widespread idea in England that the declaration of August 20, 1917, was due to the initiative of statesmen in White hall. This is not correct. Like the declaration of last week, it was made at the instance of the Viceroy, then Lord Chelmsford. The Biitish officials who were members of the Government of India considered it necessary and inevitable, as did the British heads of Provinces. The declaration and the preamble of the Act of 1919 leave no doubt that it is the will of the British nation to biing about the establishment of what is now known as Dominion status – which is, in truth, actually nothing more or less than autonomy and alliance under a common Sovereign.
Dominion status cannot be anything more than an ambition and a goal till a great many practical problems have been settled.
Indian leaders have now to show the courage, the forbearance, and the fundamental liberalism that the highest type of British statesmanship has shown towards India. The problems which have to be settled are many, and I can mention only some of the outstanding considerations.
For instance, the adjustment of the relations of the Indian States to a Dominion India will need the patience, courage, and tact that are essential to true statesmanship. It cannot be successfully undertaken without British guidance. Again, is Burma to be India’s Ireland? I hope that our statesmanship will repair the injustice of the absorption of Burma in British India, and allow that nation the fullest freedom which its leaders may desire. I, for one, would encourage her becoming a Dominion within the British Commonwealth.
The trans-Indus question is as delicate and difficult as that of Burma. In a famous phrase Mr. Lloyd George spoke of Austria Hungary as “a ramshackle Empire”. It had grown as a personal estate of the House of Hapsburg. British India today is ram shackle in its grouping: great nations like the Marhattas are divided, small ones like the Sindhis are submerged. I cannot conceive of any final and satisfactory solution of the Hindu Muslim question except by the establishment of federalism on nationalistic, racial, and linguistic principles throughout the self governing provinces.
Of one thing I am convinced: if Indian statesmen will take as their models Malcolm and his successors down to Willingdon and Irwin rather than the men who lost the American colonies, they will ultimately be able to dispense with the British Army in India. Without its withdrawal there can be no real Dominion status: the term is not consistent in the full sense with depen dence on Great Britain for protection from internal chaos and external invasion.
Thus a dispassionate survey of the history of the British connex tion compels the conclusion that the Viceroy’s announcement is an affirmation of facts made at the time when Lord Irwin (who after all is the most responsible authority and in the best position to judge) considered it necessary that the ultimate aim should be restated to the whole world. As a practical step towards Dominion status no settlement and no resolution of those in authority can take India farther. The declaration in itself, though it has removed any doubts that may have been entertained as to the goal of British intentions, cannot bring Dominion status any nearer unless Indian statesmanship rises to the occasion.
Source: The Times, London, 7 November 1929.
The trend of this article bears a very interesting comparison with the ideas running throughout the text of India in Transition published eleven years earlier.