§ SIR WILLIAM WEDDERBURNI beg to ask the Secretary of State for India (1) whether he has received confirmation of the news telegraphed from Bombay to the effect that Damodhar Chapekar, convicted of the murder of Mr. Rand and Lieutenant Ayerst, has been executed; and (2) whether there is evidence of any general conspiracy having existed leading to those murders; and, if not, whether he will now direct the withdrawal of the punitive police costing the city of Poona Rs.230,400?
§ THE SECRETARY OF STATE FOR INDIAI have not received any official confirmation of the news referred to in the first branch of the Question, nor have I been officially informed as to the evidence adduced at the trial. But the Question at issue related to Chapekar alone, and I do not consider that the absence of evidence of a general conspiracy in any war disproves the necessity for maintaining a special force of police.
§ SIR W. WEDDERBURNBut were not the punitive police sent to Poona because the persons who committed the murder had not been discovered?
§ THE SECRETARY OF STATE FOR INDIANo, Sir; there were various reasons for placing the police force there.