§ MR. FAWCETTasked the Under Secretary of State for India, Whether, before any charge is thrown upon the revenues of India for the erection and maintenance of an Indian Museum in London, the House will be afforded an opportunity of considering whether it is just to make the people of India contribute to the expense of erecting and maintaining such a Museum?
§ LORD GEORGE HAMILTON,in reply, said, that at present no definite proposals were before the Secretary of State for India as to the erection and maintenance of an Indian Museum in London, and therefore the Question of the hon. Gentleman was, to a great extent, hypothetical. He might add that the Secretary of State would not give his sanction to any scheme by which the whole cost of erecting and maintaining such a Museum would be thrown on the Indian revenue. It would only be in the event of some arrangement being made by which that cost would be shared between the Imperial and Indian exchequers that the Secretary of State would sanction any disbursement on that account from the Indian revenues. In such a contingency a Vote would have to be taken in this House, and the hon. Gentleman would have full opportunity of expressing his opinion upon the whole subject.
§ MR. FAWCETTwished to know whether, if the Secretary of State entered into any arrangement by which part of the cost was thrown on the Indian revenues, the House would be afforded an opportunity of discussing the expediency of that arrangement?
§ LORD GEORGE HAMILTONsaid, the procedure under which money from 618 the Indian revenues could alone be voted was laid down in the Act of Parliament, from which the Secretary of State alone derived his powers, and he saw no reason why in this particular case there should be any departure from the practice of the past 18 years.
§ MR. FAWCETTgave Notice that on the earliest opportunity he would move—
That, in the opinion of this House, it is unjust to make the people of India contribute wholly or partially to the erection or maintenance of an Indian Museum in England.