EAST INDIA REVENUE ACCOUNTS.

HC Deb 11 August 1898 vol 64 cc930-1020

On going into Committee on East India Revenue Accounts, Mr. Herbert Roberts moved— That, in the opinion of this House, the recent alterations made in the law relating to sedition and the control of the Press in India, being a distinct departure from the traditional policy of the Indian Government in regard to the Press and to public criticism, demand the immediate attention of Parliament; and that, having regard to the conditions of British rule in India, and to the exceptional part played by the Indian Press as the only medium for expressing the opinion of the people as to Government measures, and to the fact that such a policy of restriction and intimidation must, if persisted in, result in producing elements of danger to the Government of India, it is desirable that the legislation in question should be repealed at the earliest opportunity.

MR. J.H.ROBERTS

I make this Motion in order to raise a matter of considerable importance, but before I state briefly the ground upon which I make the Motion. I desire to make one reference to a very important event which has recently occurred with regard to India. I allude to the appointment of the right honourable Gentleman the Under Secretary for Foreign Affairs to the Viceroyalty of India, and I express, not only my own opinion, but the opinion of all those who sit upon this side of the House, when I say, though we congratulate him upon his magnificent appointment, we also regret that for some period, at all events, we shall lose one of the most distinguished Members of this House. We sincerely hope that the career upon which he is now entering will be distinguished and successful, and will also be remembered in years to come as having been a Vice-royalty which was a wise and sympathetic and peaceful one in the administration of Indian affairs. Now, I will explain very briefly the grounds upon which I make this Motion. I do not think it is necessary for me to make any explanation to the House as to why I, under the present unsatisfactory conditions, bring such a Motion forward, because the question raised by my Motion is not one with regard to a single incident of the administration of Indian affairs. It does not concern any particular act of the executive Government of India, but it deals with a question which involves important principles and alterations in the law which materially changes the criminal procedure of that country. First of all, I would like to draw attention to the Parliamentary facts. Last year Parliament was well aware that the Government of India contemplated making changes in the Penal and Criminal Code in India. In July, 1897, my right honourable Friend the Leader of the Opposition asked a question as to whether the House of Commons would have an opportunity of discussing these alterations before they became law. The noble Lord the Secretary of State for India replied that the House of Commons would not have an opportunity of discussing them before they became law, but they would have an opportunity of reviewing them afterwards. In February last I moved an Amendment to the Queen's Speech calling attention to the question of Press legislation in India, and in his reply the noble Lord said he had not at that time decided whether the alterations should stand or not, but that when he had decided that question he would present the Papers to the House, and that that would afford a convenient opportunity for the Debate. Those Papers were presented to the House before it rose for the Whitsuntide Recess, and that being so how comes it that we are driven to the expiring moments of the present Session before we have an opportunity of discussing this important question? I do not blame the noble Lord, and I do not say that he had any desire to shirk the discussion, but we certainly have been prevented from discussing it until to-day, and I regret it extremely, not only in the interest of India, but also because it will create the impression that there has been a violation of the promise of the noble Lord the Secretary of State for India. I cannot leave this point without expressing my dissatisfaction—and I think I am reflecting the views not only of those who sit upon this side of the House, but of many who support the Government—where I say that it has almost become a public scandal that our Parliamentary procedure compels us to have relegated to this particular period of the Session the discussion of important questions regarding India. It is impossible to conceive why the Budget of an Empire larger than, that of the first Napoleon should form the annual annoyance and despair of the House of Commons. One of the most useful lessons to be found in that admirable work upon India, written by Sir Courtenay Ilbert, is the fact which he drives home with irresistible force that the Indian Empire, in regard to its territories, law, and constitution, is the direct outgrowth of the will of the British Parliament, which, in the long run, is responsible to the Government of India. In the interest of India, what I think is required is not constant friction and conflict between the official element of the Government of India and any political section of this House, but that the House of Commons as a whole should be awakened to a sense of its responsibilities and obligations towards India. That is the spirit, at all events, in which I desire to approach the discussion of the Indian question. There is not a Member of this House who is prouder of the splendid achievements which have resulted in our present position in India than myself, and there is no one who is prouder of the conduct of the Indian Government, having regard to the great difficulties which have, especially of late, surrounded the Indian Administration—difficulties which have been met with a courage and an untiring devotion worthy of the best traditions of the Indian Service. But, Sir, although I hold those opinions, I think I should be acting falsely, holding the opinions that I do as to the great and perilous mistake which the Government of India has made, in my judgment, with regard to the legislation to which my Motion refers, if I did not, under the present disadvantageous circumstances, bring the matter before the House and ask the House to pass its judgment upon it. Before I proceed to deal very briefly with two or three of the principal alterations which have been made in the Codes, I desire to make one or two general observations as to the character of the legislation passed and as to the circumstances under which it was initiated. I think that it will be admitted upon all sides that the effect of this legislation in regard to the Press will be to restrict the native Press of India and the right of public criticism of Government matters. One or two points will hardly be disputed, first, that the policy of the Indian Government in this matter in respect to Press legislation is undoubtedly directly opposed to the policy of the Government of India during the last half century. Secondly, it will be admitted, because it is well known, that the previous attempt to restrict the native Press of India, made in 1878 by Lord Lytton's Act, proved a failure, and that Act was repealed, after three years, in 1881; and I think it will be generally admitted that it is unwise in India to repress the expression of public opinion, as that will inevitably lead to disaffection, all the more serious and dangerous because of its hidden character. I would not, however, be surprised to hear a supporter of that legislation get up and support it by the argument that in this case the circumstances of India called for exceptional treatment, that the usual axioms as to the liberty of the Press did not hold good, because the native Press of India during the past year and a half had been the exciting element in the recent disturbances which we all so much deplore. I should like to examine that statement for a moment. It seems to me that to get up and say that the native Press of India has been during these disturbances an irritant in the case is to confuse cause and effect. What are the facts? All those who know anything of India know that the Press of India, both English and native, are written and circulated for a comparatively small section of the community. India, as a whole, cannot be said to contain a newspaper-reading public. What is written in the papers is written mainly in order to express to the Government the feelings of the people in regard to Government measures, and when and where dissatisfaction exists it is the duty of these papers to say so as plainly as possible. What, then, will be the result of the suppression under these circumstances? It will not cure all this evil, but it will prevent the people going to the Government and telling them what they think, and keep the Government in ignorance of the opinion of the community. Some honourable Gentlemen will remember the graphic phrase which the honourable Gentleman the Member for Cardiff made use of when pointing out the folly of thinking that by suppressing the Press the Government would suppress disaffection; he described India as "one huge whispering gallery," and said that it was folly to suppose that if every paper in the Empire were suppressed to-morrow it would have any practical influence whatever in controlling the disaffection, if it exists, in regard to the Government policy. That seems to me to be a perfectly true description of the case, and it seems to me to be foolish, if not dangerous, when Her Majesty's administrators in India are doing their utmost to understand the motives and the inner workings of the mind of the mass of the people of that country, to deliberately destroy the only channel through which any light can come. About a year ago the plague was raging in Bombay and Poonah with all its attendant, horrors, and the Government of Poonah immediately took steps to keep away any epidemic. All their measures were conceived for the best ends, but some of them aroused the Greatest abhorrence and deepest indignation among the people of the country, and the native Press wrote strongly against them, especially the measures adopted for instituting search for plague patients by European soldiers. The Government took steps to suppress that expression of native opinion through the papers, and though I think it will be admitted that the Press was intimidated to a large extent, the disaffection remained, and, as events proved, found relief in disturbance, and even murder. What has been the result? The Government have now seen the effect of their plague policy, and they have, as the House knows, very materially modified that policy both in Bombay and in Poonah, and in Calcutta; modified it in such a way as to virtually concede all that was demanded by the native Press. Now, with regard to the special disturbances referred to, if the Government had recognised the true effect of that plague policy in its early stages and the effect upon the native feeling, and had modified it, then much of these disturbances would not have taken place. I am very glad the Government of India have seen their way to modify their plague policy and bring it into line with the feelings of the people of the country, but I regret to think that this change on the part of the Government will show the people that the way to reform is not by constitutional methods, but by the method of disorder and even of outrage. I will now refer very briefly to the three or four alterations made in the two Codes. I will first of all take the Penal Code. There are a great many alterations disclosed in the Blue Book, but, I should only weary the House by going through them one by one. I only desire to refer to two of the principal alterations made in the Penal Code. The first alteration that I notice is made in section 4 of the Criminal Code, which provides that the provisions of this Code shall apply in future to any native Indian subject of Her Majesty in any place without or beyond British India. Now, the result of the alteration of that section is that the provisions of the Code will in future apply, not, as before, only to servants of the Queen in States in alliance with the Government of India, but to all native Indian subjects anywhere outside India. It is certainly a new principle of the law so far as India is concerned, that a native subject in India, or over here, is to be subject to the risk of being tried in India by an Indian magistrate for making a speech on an English platform. I asked the right honourable Gentleman a Question in March last upon this point. I asked him whether the alterations in this section would carry that power, and he replied that I could understand the section as well as he could, but that he should not think such a case was conceivable. If it is not conceivable, what is the use of exercising the power. The inevitable effect of that change will be to create the impression in India that proceedings will be taken against native Indian subjects for making speeches in England when it would be obviously impossible to take proceedings in this country with any hope of convictions being obtained. I have read the Blue Book, and I cannot see any reason for any desire upon the part of the British Government that an alteration of such a character should be made. Now, I have just one other alteration to which I wish to draw attention, and that is the alteration made in section 124a of the Penal Code. The section as it originally stood as drafted by the late Sir FitzJames Stephens was as follows— Whoever by words, either spoken or intended to be read, or by signs, or by possible representation, or otherwise, excites, or attempts to excite, feelings of dissatisfaction, to the Government established by law in British India, shall be punished with transportation for life, or for any term to which line may be added, or with imprisonment for a term which may extend for three years to which fine may be added, or without fine. The explanations of the section are as follows— Such a disapprobation of the measure of the Government as is compatible with the disposition to render obedience to the lawful authority of the Government, and to support the lawful authority of the Government against unlawful demands to subvert or resist that authority is not disaffection. Therefore the making of comments on the measures of the Government with the intention of exciting only this species of disapprobation, is not offence with this clause. The alterations made are of two kinds. In the first place, there is in- serted in the body of the section the words, "to bring in to hatred and contempt," which materially adds to the scope of the section, and has the effect of bringing under the powers of this section not only those charged with exciting feelings of disaffection against the Government, but also anyone who does anything calculated to bring the Government into hatred or contempt. It also omits the salutary explanation provided by Sir FitzJames Stephen, and attaches another which, in my opinion, is very unsatisfactory. What are these explanations? They are, first— that expression 'disaffection' includes disloyalty and all other feelings of enmity. The obvious query upon that explanation is the question, "What else beside disloyalty is included in the offence of disaffection?" The second explanation ran as follows— That comments expressing disapprobation of the measures of Government, without exciting, or attempting to excite, hatred, contempt, or disaffection, do not constitute an offence. I put it to the House whether the offence disaffection is not left, under these circumstances, in a dangerously vague condition, for how could any hostile comment be made upon any Measure of the Government without incurring the risk of exciting contempt for that Government? How would such a law operate in this country, where it is the acknowledged business of half the House of Commons to bring into contempt the Measures of the Government which are opposed to the principles which they hold? I have one further remark to make upon the alteration made in this section. I would refer honourable Members of the House to the fact, revealed in paragraph 5, page 6, of the Papers, in the statement of the views of the Government of India addressed to the Secretary of State upon the whole question. In that paragraph the Government of India distinctly state that it was not necessary to amend this section 124a of the Penal Code. I will read one sentence only from the paragraph, but it is a sentence in which a most important statement is made. It is as follows— Since then two of the highest courts of India have laid it down that section 124a of the Indian Penal Code does in substance reproduce the law of sedition in force in the United Kingdom, we consider that it is not necessary or desirable to amend the section. It might, indeed, be possible, by re-drafting it, to make its meaning more clear, but we think it unwise to undertake any revision of it so long as the interpretation hitherto placed upon it by the courts in India is maintained. It is clear from the unmistakable language of that paragraph that no alteration was required in the section to which I have referred; that the Government of India, the authority responsible for the maintenance of law and order in the country, considered section 124a as it stood sufficient to deal with all cases of sedition. They did not ask for any change; how came it about then that this alteration was made in the section to which I have referred? By whom, and at whose instigation, has the change been made? A perusal of the public papers must lead to the conclusion that the change was dictated to the Government of India by the noble Lord opposite, who represents the Government of India. If any Member will read paragraphs 3 and 4 in the letter of the Secretary of State to the Government of India, conveying his views to them, they will see this very clearly. I will refer to one extract only from the letter of the noble Lord. It is in paragraph 3 of his letter, and is to this effect— Your Government, however, admits that the section is somewhat intricate and perplexing, and that its meaning may be elucidated by better drafting. It is therefore desirable that the definition of the offence may be made as simple and clear as possible, and I [note the personal pronoun] have come to the conclusion that the section should be revised; and, this being so, it seems better to make the necessary alteration simultaneously with a change of jurisdiction. As to the exact form which such an alteration should take, I should be glad to receive by telegraph the views of your Lordship's Government, but I request that you would consider the draft which I enclose. That draft, despite the opinion of the Government of India that no change was required in the section, was in substance adopted, and it seems clear to me that this important change in a vital section of the Code has been carried out at the instance of the noble Lord and contrary to the views of he responsible authority in India. So much for the Penal Code. Before I sit down I will refer very briefly to two of the principal changes made in, the Criminal Procedure Code. The first of these is the alteration made in section 108 of that Code. Previously, Indian magistrates possessed powers to require substantial security for good behaviour from Vagabonds, and intending criminals and bad characters, and upon their failure to give such security they had the power to imprison with hard labour. This power rested obviously upon the exceptional character of the offenders, and was given to them in order to enable them to deal with the worst elements in Indian society. By this alteration in the law, newspaper editors were to be henceforth classed with those previously considered the scum of society in India. Again, these editors were to be tried in future by district magistrates. Let them consider the position. A district magistrate in India was the head of the police of his district; he therefore must virtually be the prosecutor in such cases. He, as head of the police, would hear that an editor of a newspaper had been attempting to disseminate seditious matter, and would order a prosecution. When this had been done, he himself would be empowered to try the case, and if the editor was unable to find sufficient bail to satisfy the magistrate, he would be empowered by section 122 to decline the security offered, and by section 123 to imprison him with hard labour. The liberty of the Press under such a system ceases to exist. By a change of this kind you abolish trial by jury, and place the judicial power in the hands of men who are bound to be the prosecutors as well as the judge. That is a serious extension of power. Before concluding, I should like to allude to the character and the extent of the feeling which exists in India with regard to these changes. They have profoundly affected the mind of the people of India, and the feeling of opposition and of emphatic protest against this legislation is entertained no less by the English Press than by the native Press. On a previous occasion, in February, I produced quotations drawn entirely from the English newspapers in India of emphatic protest against the changes. I will only weary the House with one more opinion in reference to this legisla- tion, and which was expressed in the pages of The Statesman, to the effect that the extension of section 109 in the Criminal Procedure Code to editors of newspapers, would place in the hands of the executive an engine for the control of the Press of the most formidable description, and one which in many cases might be so used as to stifle free discussion. I think that was in January. I have not time to refer to the opinions of native members of the Viceroy's Council when this legislation was being passed into law, and neither need I remind the House of the emphatic protest passed against the legislation by, in the first place, the Calcutta Bar, the Anglo-Indian Association, the Calcutta Chamber of Commerce, and by the British Indian Association; and resolutions were passed by a large number of gatherings all over the country. Neither, again, need I refer to the leg-al opinion expressed by the judges of the Calcutta and Bombay High Courts with reference to the undesirability of making any change in section 24 before alluded to. But I submit, Mr. Speaker, that all these expressions of public opinion in India against the legislation to which I have referred is a body of evidence which the House of Commons cannot afford to disregard; and I only regret, as I have said before, that an earlier opportunity has not been given us in order to discuss, under more favourable conditions, the details of this important question. I would, in conclusion, sum up what I have said by reminding the House that I have attempted to describe the circumstances leading up to the legislation. I have tried to describe to the House what we think will be the real effect of these changes upon the relations between the Government of India and those whom they govern. There has undoubtedly been a clear departure from the law of India as it stood before the changes were carried out; and I wait with some interest the opinions of the law officers of the Crown on this subject. Sir, I am no alarmist, and never have been; but lately we have heard a great deal about Russia, especially in regard to Indian affairs. The fear of Russia and the thought of Russia have loomed very large on the Indian horizon, and they have had a great deal to do with shaping of policy of the Indian Government. At the present time the shadow of famine and plague still hangs over the country; and I put it to the House whether this is, to say the least of it, an opportune moment for the Government of India to take up in a matter of this kind an antagonistic attitude to the feelings and the opinions of the people whom they rule. I hope the Government of India themselves will, at no distant date, decide in wisdom and expediency of repealing this legislation. But with regard to myself, and those who sit on this side of the House, we could not allow this opportunity to pass—holding the views we do in regard to full liberty of the Press in every quarter of Her Majesty's dominions—without a protest, even at the eleventh hour, against this legislation, and I would express the hope, nay, the demand, that it should be repealed at the earliest possible opportunity. Mr. Speaker, I beg to move.

SIR W. WEDDERBURN (Banffshire)

Sir, before I speak on the subject immediately before the House, I wish to associate myself with the expressions of opinion which have fallen from my honourable Friend, and I fervently hope that the right honourable Gentleman who has just been called to his high office will govern India in a spirit conducive to the well-being of the mass of its population with the same success and conspicuous ability which has marked his career hitherto. I am very glad that my honourable Friend has been successful in the ballot, and has thus been able to bring on his Amendment directed against the new sedition laws, because I consider that all the errors of the present Government culminate in this attack upon free expression of opinion. Within the last few years there has been a new departure in Indian policy. A policy has been adopted leading to aggression abroad and repression at home; and in order to carry out this policy we have hem obliged to abandon our time-honoured British methods, and to adopt Russianised methods. Thus we find ourselves compelled to take this final step, and to suppress freedom of speech. Criticism must be silenced because our doings in India will not stand the test of criticism. Fortunately it is not yet too late to trace our steps if the House will only look the facts properly in the face. I propose, therefore, to address myself to two points; first, to show that by this, new departure we have left the path of assured safety and success; and secondly, that the results of following the new Russianised policy have been disastrous to us both politically and financially. Now, first, with regard to the new departure, I say that the old policy was the right one, the wise and humane policy of Lord Lawrence and Lord Ripon. That policy was founded upon trust in the people, and its fruits were friendly neighbours beyond the frontier, a contented and grateful people within our borders, reduced taxation, and a full treasury. I was in India during the whole of that period, and I speak of what I know. Now all this is reversed. Instead of friendly neighbours we have established a blood feud with the brave tribes who inhabit the mountains beyond our borders, and have ensured their permanent hostility by an irritating and unjust occupation of their territory. I do not suppose that even now the noble Lord, the Secretary of State for India will admit that his forward policy has proved a disastrous failure, but that seems to be the universal judgment of public opinion in India, whether Indian or Anglo-Indian, whether official or non-official. As we know, the Indian Press and the Indian National Congress have always been opposed to this policy of wild military adventure; but the novel feature in the case is that Anglo-Indian opinion has now become converted to the same view, as shown recently at Simla, when the Honourable Mr. Thorburn made his memorable attack on the forward policy and was cheered to the echo by the élite of Simla society, as if, to quote Sir James Westland's words, they had been a meeting of the Indian National Congress. The importance of this Simla meeting will be understood when I remind the House that Sir Edwin Collen, the Military Member of Council, was in the chair, and among the audience were included the Viceroy, the Commander-in-Chief, the Lieutenant Governor of the Punjaub, and all the leading officials, civil and military. I should like to draw the particular attention of the House to the views expressed by Mr. Thorburn, who holds the responsible position of Financial Commissioner of the Punjaub. Nothing could be more graphic or more accurate than his review of the facts. This is how he describes the jerry-built trans-frontier schemes and their collapse:—— Speaking as a very old frontier officer, he claimed to know something of the ways of Pathans. He had watched the progress of that policy of expansion, which culminated last June, July, and August in a conflagration which extended from Peshawur to Kurram. The flimsy, costly, and inflammable jerry buildings which we had been running up, then caught fire, and were almost burned to the ground. The Indian fire brigade was summoned, and the fire was put out, but not before 2,000 lives had been lost and pauper India had been called upon to pay a bill of nearly 2½ millions sterling. In equally picturesque terms he pointed out that the true cause of the outbreak was the natural belief of the tribes beyond our frontier that they were being depraved of their independence:— We demarcated the hinterland of our districts, and announced that all within that boundary was within the political frontier of India. Naturally, the tribesmen thought it was the first step to annexation. This was the root cause of the trouble. Last year he had asked representative Mahomedans, Sikhs, and Hindus of the Rawal Pindi Division what they considered the cause of the frontier disturbances, and they almost without exception gave the same answer—the high-handedness and graspingness of the Government. Not only were the sentiments of Mr. Thorburn received with prolonged cheers by the audience, but they were also applauded by all the leading Anglo-Indian papers, such as the Pioneer, the Englishman, the Madras Mail, and the Bombay Gazette, and even the Times of India, which had been the principal advocate of the forward policy, had to admit that Sir James Westland's defence of the Government was "singularly lame and halting." Also the Pioneer, which is ordinarily regarded as a semi-official paper, was unkind enough to point out that in 1894 Sir James Westland signed a Minute, jointly with Sir Anthony Mac-Dowell and Sir Charles Pritchard, warning the Government that if they insisted on establishing posts in tribal territory they would be pursuing a course "eminently calculated to set the whole frontier in a blaze." Even the Simla correspondent of the Times has thrown over the Government in this matter, pointing out, with reference to the fresh troubles now brewing, that the Nawab of Dir, being subsidised by us, is on this account detested by every clan whose love of independence makes them resent the British occupation of Malakand and Chakdara. Looking at all these expressions of opinion, I think I may claim that, by general consent in India, the Government forward policy has been proved to De wrong in principle and disastrous in result. Now, I should like to say a few-words with regard to this forward policy—with regard to our home affairs; but before doing that I would like to ask the noble Lord a question, a practical question, with reference to his new Sedition Acts, and it is this: whether he proposes to take any proceedings against these Anglo-English papers for their attacks on the Government? For example, the Pioneer, referring to the Khyber incident, calls it "a shameful and inexcusable blunder," and all the Anglo-Indian papers seem to endorse the opinion that the 23rd of August, when the brave Khyber Rifles were left to their fate, was one of "pain, shame, and humiliation to every Englishman in India." Surely such expressions as these tend to bring the Government into contempt. But worse remains behind, with regard to the Anglo-Indian papers. I would draw the noble Lord's attention to a recent number of the Bombay Gazette, in which a very sinister suggestion is made with regard to the motives of the Government in abandoning the men in the Khyber Pass. It asks— What was the object of this singular inaction in presence of a known danger? And it replies— The suggestion has been made that the intention was to allow the movement of the tribes to develop, so as to furnish a reasonable pretext for lifting the purdah of the Tirah, and annexing that desirable sanitarium, as it was then believed to be. Could any suggestion be more damaging? The idea seems to be that the Government used these poor men as a sort of bait to lure on the Afridis in the same way as people tie up a kid in the jungle, in order that they may shoot the tiger and save its skin. I therefore ask the noble Lord whether he intends to prosecute these Anglo-Indian newspapers under his new section. He cannot fail to see that such imputations tend directly to bring the Government into hatred and contempt, but I doubt the noble Lord will be prepared to tackle such formidable adversaries. For my own part have the profoundest belief in the efficacy of Press prosecutions, but, after all, "sauce for the goose is sauce for the gander," and I do not see why all the terrors of the law should be reserved for the weak and defenceless. I now turn to the question of the evil effects of this forward policy on the internal condition of India. Mr Thorburn, in his address, points out that the vast expense of these trans-frontier wars has resulted in— the long starvation of the civil administration of India. What does that mean as affecting the masses of the population? I say that it means failure to provide against famine and pestilence by agricultural development, by fiscal reforms, and by sanitary improvements. But this vast expenditure has done more than this. It has resulted in an increased burden of taxation upon the necessaries of life. The unhappy, half-starved ryot has to pay tax on the salt he eats, on the oil he burns, on the strip of cotton cloth which he ties round his loins. On his salt, as we know, he pays tax at the rate of 2,000 per cent.—that is to say, for leave to consume one pennyworth of salt he must pay a fee of 20 pence to the Government. Besides being overtaxed, the man is overrated by the Government as universal landlord. I have the authority of Sir Bartle Frere for saying that in a large class of cases the Government demand not only takes the whole of the true rent, but trenches on the profit of stock and the wages of labour. I have given, again and again, figures in this connection, and I have brought to the notice of the Secretary of State, and even to the notice of his predecessor, cases where the rent had been raised tenfold at one stroke, but I was unable to obtain any redress. Now, what is the result? The result is the ruin of the great body of the peasantry, and the great proportion of the peasantry are now in a very bad condition. They have no credit to obtain food with, and as a rule the ryot possesses no store of food or of money. He not only possesses nothing, but much less than nothing, because he is hopelessly in debt to the moneylender. The consequence is that the peasantry are half-starved, they have no stamina to resist even the first attacks of famine and pestilence, and the failure of one harvest causes them to die in thousands and tens of thousands. Such being the result of the forward policy to the masses of India, why, in the name of humanity and common sense, not return to the kindly spirit of the older times, which brought rest and contentment to the people? The right and safe policy is the British one of trust in the people, for the Indian people are deserving of trust; they are gentle, intelligent, and law-abiding. The ruinous policy is the Russian one of trust in police repression. The police in India are a broken reed, which will pierce the hand that leans upon it. Does not the noble Lord yet see how true were the words of Sir Griffith Evans when he pointed out that the Government was habitually deceived by its informants? Has the case of the brothers Natu not been an object-lesson to him in this respect? He knows now how completely misinformed he was in that matter. He deported the Natus because he believed they were engaged in a conspiracy, which led to the assassination of Mr. Rand, and he told us that the murder was not the work of an isolated fanatic. He now knows that the deed was that of the fanatic Chapekar, acting by himself. Chapekar has been convicted and executed on that understanding, and Mr. Crowe, the judge, of Poona, who tried the case, has publicly declared that, after weighing all the evidence carefully, he found no indication of any conspiracy or design on the part of any section of the Poona community which could have prompted the crime. On the contrary, he states that under the plague infliction the people of Poona had set an example as law-abiding citizens, not only to the rest of the Presidency, but to the whole Empire. It is very extraordinary that, after this authoritative declaration, the Natus are still detained, and the punitive police in Poona have not yet been withdrawn. In conclusion I return to the point from which I began, and urge this House to drop these poor imitations of Russian methods, and revert to the good British principles upon which our rule is founded and which have always produced contentment and prosperity, and I solemnly Warn the noble Lord that in suppressing freedom of speech he is preparing for himself a world of trouble. What we need in our Indian administration is more light, and1 those who seek to extinguish such light as we now have are gravely endangering the safety of our great national inheritance. I beg to second the Amendment of my honourable Friend.

SIR A. SCOBLE (Hackney, Central)

The honourable Baronet who seconded the Resolution very wisely abstained from saying anything about it. I, therefore, do not propose to follow him in the very discursive remarks he has made. I propose, in speaking upon this Resolution, to devote my attention chiefly to the arguments used by the honourable Member for Denbighshire, who does not appear to have laid any stress upon the different parts of the Resolution which are most likely to make it acceptable to this House. His Resolution says that— In the opinion of this House, the recent alterations made in the law relating to sedition and the control of the Press in India, being a distinct departure from the traditional policy of the Indian Government in regard to the Press and to public criticism. But we have not heard a word as to what has been the traditional policy of the Government.

SIR W. WEDDERBURN

Did I not refer to that?

SIR A. SCOBLE

I did not hear my honourable Friend refer to it.

SIR W. WEDDERBURN

It was quite unintentional.

SIR A. SCOBLE

Probably it was unintentional, but it is still more probable that my honourable Friend felt that he could not support it by argument. Look into the matter as you like, and you will find that there has been no departure whatever from the old law of India relating to sedition. It is precisely the same as when the Indian Penal Code was first passed, and no new elements and no greater punishments have been introduced by recent legislation. The old law of India in regard to sedition was the English law before the year 1860, and when the Indian Penal Code was passed the framers of that Code limited themselves in this respect to following the law of England as it existed at the time they prepared the Code, and in the 113th section of the original draft were reproduced the exact words of the English law. Now, when the Indian Penal Code was passed in 1860, by some means or other—whether by accident or not I do not know—an omission was made, and section 113 was not introduced, and in consequence of that omission the old English law with regard to seditious libel remained in force in the Presidency until the Penal Code of 1870 was passed. As regards the Mofussil, it is very difficult for me to say what the law of seditious libel was, because before the introduction of the Penal Code the old Mahomedan law prevailed there. But in 1870 Sir James Stephen passed an Act in which section 124a, which is so much under discussion now, was introduced for all India. Now, as to that section, perhaps I had better read it, in order to show what the law was before the recent amendment was made. It reads— Whoever, by words, either spoken or intended to be read, or by signs, or by visible representation, or otherwise, excites, or attempts to excite, feelings of disaffection to the Government established by law in British India, shall be punished with transportation for life, or for any term, to which fine may be added, or with imprisonment for a term which may extend for three years, to which fine may be added, or without fine. The first thing to be noticed is that the punishment is the same now as it was when the Act was passed in 1870. The substantive law, as it has been altered, runs thus— Whoever, by words, either spoken or written, or by signs, or by visible representa- tion, or otherwise, brings, or attempts to bring, into hatred or contempt, or excites, or attempts to excite, disaffection towards Her Majesty or the Government established by law in British India, shall be punished with transportation for life. It thus appears that the only material words introduced into that section are the words— Brings, or attempts to bring, into hatred or contempt. My honourable Friend the Member for Denbighshire objects very much to these words.

MR. J. H. ROBERTS

Hear, hear!

SIR A. SCOBLE

Well, the honourable Member has a right to object, but I am surprised, considering the profession to which he belongs, that the honourable and learned Member is not perfectly aware that these are the commonest form of words used in all definitions of sedition. The interpretation put upon these words, as they originally stood, by the Chief Justice of the High Court of Calcutta, in 1891, was this— There is a very wide difference between the meaning of the two words—disaffection and disapprobation. Whenever the prefix 'dis' is added to a word, the word formed conveys an idea the opposite to that, conveyed by the word without the prefix. Disaffection means a feeling contrary to affection—in other words, dislike or hatred; disapprobation means simply disapproval. It is sufficient for the purposes of the section that the words used are calculated to excite feelings of ill-will against the Government, and to hold it up to the hatred and contempt of the people, and that they were used with the intention to create such feeling. That is the opinion of the Chief Justice of the High Court of Bengal as to the meaning of those words. Mr. Justice Strachey adopted the definition in Tilak's case given by the Chief Justice. But what is most important, and what appears to have escaped the notice of my honourable Friend, is this, that when the case of Tilak came before the Privy Council upon appeal as to the interpretation given by the Indian courts, they did not dissent from it. On the contrary, the said— There is nothing in the summing-up which calls upon them to indicate any dissent from it, nor any necessity to correct what is therein contained, looking at the summing-up as a whole, and looking at each part of what was said by the light of what else was said. Then we have that opinion on the authority of the highest appellate tribunal in this country that the definition and construction put upon the original section 124a was correct; and the new section does no more than embody the language used in judicially interpreting the old one. The same opinion has been held by other Courts. Chief Justice Edge not very long ago, in delivering a unanimous judgment in the High Court of Allahabad on this subject, said— In our opinion, anyone who by any of the means referred to in section 124a of the Indian Penal Code excites, or attempts to excite, feelings of hatred, dislike, ill-will, enmity, or hostility to the Government established by law in British India, excites, or attempts to excite, as the case may be, feelings of disaffection, as that term is used in section 124a, no matter how guardedly he may attempt to conceal his real object. To paraphrase is dangerous, but it appears to us that the disaffection of section 124a is disloyalty, and that is the sense in which the word disaffection has been generally used and understood during the century. Therefore we have the consentient authority of three of the principal tribunals in India who hold by their unanimous decision that the clause as it originally stood, means nothing more nor less than the clause as it now stands. And yet my honourable Friend comes down to the House and asks us to believe that important alterations have been made in the law of India with regard to the law of sedition. Well, Mr. Speaker, it only requires a little investigation to see that there is no foundation for saying that there has been any substantive alteration of the law, and that there is not the least foundation for the assertion that the law as it now stands is a distinct departure from the traditional policy of the Indian Government in regard to the Press and to public criticism. But, Mr. Speaker, my honourable Friend went on to say that the effect of this legislation was to restrict freedom of speech in regard to the policy of the Government on the part of the people. Now, my honourable Friend entirely failed to put before the House what are the exceptions to the operation of section 124a which are contained in the Penal Code. These exceptions—and I think the House will agree with me—do give full liberty to the Press and to any public speaker.

MR. J. H. ROBERTS

I read them myself.

SIR A. SCOBLE

I beg the honourable and learned Member's pardon. He intended to read them, no doubt. They are as follows— Comments expressing disapprobation of the measures of the Government with a view to obtain their alteration by lawful means, without exciting or attempting to excite hatred, contempt, or disaffection, do not constitute an offence under this section. Comments expressing disapprobation of the administrative or other action of the Government without exciting or attempting to excite hatred, contempt, or disaffection, do not constitute an offence under this section. I want to know what further liberty any decent newspaper can require than that contained in these exceptions? And I want to know how anyone can stand up before this assembly in the face of these facts and say that the freedom of the Press is not sufficiently safeguarded by the law as it now stands. A man may express his disapprobation of the measures of the Government, and of its administrative acts, and express that disapprobation in the fullest manner, provided that he does not do so with the view of exciting disaffection and disloyalty to the Government. Now, Mr. Speaker, there is one other point in the Resolution to which I will just refer before I come to the second part of my honourable Friend's speech with reference to the part played by the Indian Press. My honourable Friend claims special immunity, exaggerated immunity, for the Indian newspapers, on the ground that they are the only means of expressing popular opinion. The honourable Member asserts this in his Resolution, although he said nothing about it in his speech. The Resolution reads— having regard to the conditions of British rule in India and to the exceptional part played by the Indian Press as the only medium for expressing the opinion of the people as to Government measures.

MR. J. H. ROBERTS

I made a direct statement as to that.

SIR A. SCOBLE

I did not catch the honourable Member's statement, I am sorry to say, upon that point. The honourable Member has forgotten that in the Legislative Councils of India representatives of the people have as much liberty to ask questions and to make comments as is enjoyed by the Members of this House. They have the fullest liberty to ask questions, and the fullest liberty of discussion, not only upon the legislative but upon the administrative action of the Government. It can, therefore, no longer be said that the Press of India is the only means by which public opinion can be brought to bear on the acts of the Government. My learned Friend found great fault with the Secretary of State for not having acted upon the opinion of the Government of India in regard to the judicial interpretation put upon this section, and said that it was not absolutely necessary to make any alteration in the wording of the law. But in the paragraph which my honourable Friend quoted the Government of India go on to say that it may be desirable to re-draft the section, in order to make it quite clear.

MR. PICKERSGILL (Bethnal Green, S.W.)

Possible; not desirable.

SIR A. SCOBLE

"Possible"; that is precisely what has been done without any alteration in the substance of the law. Now, my honourable Friend made a great complaint of the extension given under section 4 of the Penal Code to offences committed by Indian subjects of Her Majesty outside British India; but he forgot that in 1860, when the Penal Code was passed, the Government of India had no power delegated to them by Parliament to legislate in such cases. It was not until 33 and 34 Victoria, cap. 98, that the power was given. It was, therefore, impossible, in the original edition of the Penal Code, to introduce such a clause, but it has been introduced now, and has been introduced into almost every Act of the Government of India since 1870 to which it is applicable. It is clear that such power should be given.

MR. J. H. ROBERTS

I do not deny the power.

SIR A. SCOBLE

Then we come to the question whether it is desirable to exercise it, and there is no doubt that it is desirable that that power should be exercised. If you look at the illustra- tions given, it is perfectly clear what the object of this extension of the Penal Code to offences committed outside British India means. A coolie commits a murder in Uganda. Supposing he escapes, and goes to India, he can be tried at any place in British India. A European British subject commits a murder in Cashmir. He may be tried in any place in British India where he may be found. Because my honourable Friend fears that somebody, carried away by his feelings in London, may make an inflammatory speech, and that, if he goes back to India, he will be prosecuted there, he opposes this useful provision.

MR. J. H. ROBERTS

What I said was that material alteration was made in section 4 of the Code, which, in my judgment, was undesirable.

SIR A. SCOBLE

I think I have just shown excellent reasons why the operation of the Code should be extended. If my honourable Friend does not know, the honourable Baronet the Member for Banffshire [Sir W. Wedderburn] knows very well that there are places in India, under foreign jurisdiction, in which formerly it was not possible for the English criminal law to operate. There were Chandernagore and Pondicherry, both belonging to France, and Goa and Daman, belonging to Portugal, and were practically Alsatias until the Act of 1870 was passed. Then, Mr. Speaker, my honourable Friend, having done with the Penal Code, turns to the Criminal Procedure Code, and he complains that it puts newspaper editors on a level with the dregs of the population. Well, if newspaper editors like to degrade themselves, they cannot expect to be treated otherwise. Besides, it is not the fact that they are reduced to the level of the dregs of the population. Section 108 does not apply merely to newspaper editors or to people who write leading articles, it applies to a number of other people. For instance, I suppose my honourable Friend knows very well that the recent trouble on the frontier was stimulated by the action of certain fanatics preaching rebellion and sedition among the tribesmen. Does anyone venture to say that it would be right to let these people go about India preaching sedition, without having recourse to the law to stop them? What does the law propose to do? To call upon them to find security to keep the peace if they contravene section 124a of the Penal Code by stirring up rebellion against the Government, or f, under another section of the Penal ode, they attempt to stir up animosity between contending classes, of which there have been frequent instances. Does anybody mean to say that such persons ought not to be called upon to give security for their good behaviour? You do not want to institute proceedings in every petty case, but what you do want is to have some means of bringing these agitators before the proper authority and making them give security for good behaviour for some considerable time. If they do not do that, they must, like other offenders, go to gaol. I cannot see how the introduction of this law is any unreasonable infraction of the liberty of a free Press. If a newspaper writer chooses to limit himself to such liberty as is allowed by law, he does not bring himself in the slightest degree within the purview of the Criminal Code. On the contrary, he can say as much as he likes, and use as strong language as he likes, so long as he keeps within the limits that the law has laid down. Moreover, the prosecution of newspaper writers can only be undertaken with the leave of the Government, and the High Court has the power of revision. I think I have now shown that my honourable Friend has entirely failed to make out the grounds upon which this Resolution is based, or to prove there has been such a material alteration of the law as would prevent the free expression of opinion. There is only one other remark I desire to make. I believe there is a sort of impression prevailing that Press offenders can be tried without a jury. But no right that anyone had to be tried by a jury before the passing of this Act is in the slightest degree impaired by the Act, and in all cases in which trial by jury could be had before the legislation of 1898 it can still be had. Before I sit down I should like to associate myself with the good wishes expressed by my honourable Friend for the new Viceroy, and in doing so I desire to take the opportunity of expressing my extreme admiration for the manner in which Lord Elgin has discharged the duties of his high office. Everyone must recognise that Lord Elgin in most arduous circumstances has shown firmness of mind of a rare quality. I desire to make this public recognition on my part—and I am sure it is the feeling of the House generally, as well as of the country—of the high appreciation in which his character and services are held by all who have watched his career in India.

MR. HALDANE (Haddingtonshire)

I desire to join in the generous tribute which has been paid by the honourable and learned Member to Lord Elgin, and to say, with reference to the distinguished Member who is leaving us, that, whatever the character of the views which separate sections of the House, all will join in expressing their best wishes for his future in the great post he has been called upon to fill. If I intervene in this discussion for a few moments, it is because I wish to recall to the minds of honourable Members the situation in which the House is placed. After all, the House of Commons is the only forum in which the action of the Secretary of State for India can be examined and considered. The government of India is undoubtedly a very difficult matter, and it is hard to judge of it from a distance; but the question before the House at present seems to be a very plain one. We are asked to express our approbation of a certain course of policy. My criticism upon it is this; the policy is a retrograde policy. While in India we have an increase of civilisation and education among the people, while the daily Press, conducted by highly educated men, is rising in the standard of knowledge, you are passing a law which would not be tolerated here, and which would only be tolerated in India because of the nonexistence there of the same public institutions which we have here. Although I feel that it is extremely difficult to govern a great country like India, with its conflicting races and opinions, I am inclined to look with considerable misgiving on an alteration of the law which is distinctly retrograde in its tendency, and which deals with a class of men who are rising in educational capacity, and are becoming more and more the guardians of the liberties of the people, in the absence of popular institutions through which those liberties can be defended. I listened with great attention to the speech of the honourable Gentleman who spoke last, and I heard it declared that clause 124a in the new law, as it now stands, is substantially the law under the old Code. If that is so, then it seems to me that the Government is in a peculiar position, because, with the knowledge that the judges have interpreted the law, the Indian Government, in speaking of the wording of the section, said that it might indeed be possible, by re-drafting, to make the meaning more clear, but they think it unwise to make any revision of it as far as the interpretation put upon it by the courts of India, was concerned. The expression "disaffection" is wide enough to include all the things necessary to put down sedition in India. It also includes "hatred or contempt." The Indian Government drafted a new clause which imported words something quite different from the opinion of Mr. Justice Strachey, and made an addition to the law as it stood before. "Disaffection" also includes "disloyalty and all feelings of enmity"; so that four things are penal—hatred, contempt, disloyalty, and all feelings of enmity. Now, Sir, I think this is a very grave extension of the words of the section. While I am not afraid of such an extension in this country on account of the jury standing between the prisoner and conviction, in a country like India, where trial by jury is not an institution, the situation is a very different one. The Government accompanies this alteration of the Penal Code with an alteration of the Criminal Code, which enables a judge, without the security of a jury, to send a person to prison. The House of Commons has a great responsibility in this matter. The Secretary of State acts by Order in Council, advice is taken over here, and the Indian Government is overruled, in so far as any attempt at definition and any alteration of the Penal Code which the Indian Government were not willing to undertake themselves are concerned. Under these circumstances it is our business, as the guardians of the liberties of the people of India, to scrutinise this clause Very closely, because, after all, our position in India is not such an easy one. India is a great country, but it is an isolated country, and one in which we must depend very much on the good will and affection of the people. It is removed from us, and we cannot easily reach it, and accordingly we have the difficult duty of governing it across the seas; and therefore I think that the House of Commons is under a particular obligation on this occasion to scrutinise this new law in the most careful fashion, with a view to securing that nothing is done which is calculated to do an injustice to the people whom we have to govern.

SIR R. FINLAY (Inverness Burghs)

It was with some regret I heard the honourable Baronet opposite state that the effects, of this legislation would be to put the Government of India into a position of antagonism to the people of India. I do not think that is a sentiment likely to be echoed in any part of the House. There is no such antagonism, but I am afraid, if the statement of the honourable Baronet were repeated and circulated in India, it might cause some mischief.

SIR W. WEDDERBURN

I do not think I used that phrase.

SIR R. FINLAY

I am very sorry if I have misinterpreted the honourable Baronet. But it was certainly said by the honourable Member who moved this Amendment.

MR. J. H. ROBERTS

The phrase I used was that, in my judgment, it was a most inappropriate time for the Government of India to take up legislation of this kind, which was repressive in its character and antagonistic to the feelings of the people of India.

SIR R. FINLAY

That is what I said. But there is no such position. The desire of the Government of India is to prevent actual mischief being wrought in that country, owing to such agitation, and to maintain order. The legislation which forms the subject of this Amendment has really been introduced, not merely in the interests of the British Government in India, but in the interests of the people of India themselves. There are in India a great variety of races and religions, and between the various sections of the inhabitants there prevails a state of feeling which requires most careful management. Things may be said or written in this country without producing any particular evils which, if said or written in India, might have results of a most disastrous character. I am not mistaken in attributing to the honourable Baronet, the statement that the Government of India were having recourse to Russianising methods. Perhaps the honourable Baronet does not realise that the law as enacted in India is precisely the same as the law in England at the present time. I would venture to call the attention of the honourable Baronet and of the House to the definition of sedition given by that distinguished authority, Sir James FitzJames Stephen. He said that sedition was anything which excited, or attempted to excite, disaffection among Her Majesty's subjects, or promoted ill-will or hostility between different classes of such subjects. There is absolutely nothing in the legislation introduced by the Indian Government which is not embodied in the law of England as stated in that definition by Sir James FitzJames Stephen, and this is what the honourable Baronet calls introducing Russianising methods.

MR. PICKERSGILL

There is not a word about intention in the clause.

SIR R. FINLAY

Perhaps I had better call the attention of the House to the clause. It states that whoever, by words, either spoken or written, or intended to be read, or by signs, or by visible representation, or otherwise, shall bring or attempt to bring into hatred or contempt Her Majesty or the Government as established by law, shall be punished.

MR. PICKERSGILL

There is not a word about intention.

SIR R. FINLAY

Certainly not. It is not necessary to say anything about intention. The article defines the act, and a man intends to do that which he does.

AN HONOURABLE MEMBER

Hear, hear!

SIR R. FINLAY

The interruption of the honourable and learned Member is, if he will permit me to say so, perfectly invalid. Now, the honourable and learned Gentleman the Member for Haddington did not, I think, dispute that the law as embodied in these articles was the same as the law in England.

MR. HALDANE

Substantially, yes; but I laid great stress that in England such offences were invariably tried before a jury.

SIR R. FINLAY

I am not forgetting that; but I think it is worth while that the House should take note of the fact that the honourable and learned Member for Haddington does not dispute that these articles embody what is substantially the law of England. That is a very important point, and should be noted both in India and in England. My honourable and learned Friend expressed doubt as to whether these articles did not somewhat extend the law as it existed in India before. If that were done I do not think anyone would be apprehensive of legislation which brought the law into conformity with the law of England. The honourable and learned Member quoted certain expressions from authorities in India, expressing a doubt whether it would be wise to alter the wording of the section, having regard to the interpretation put upon it by the judges. Those expressions were clearly an opinion upon the policy of attempting to put into still plainer language the interpretation put upon the section in the courts. There were no opinions against the policy of the enactment. On the contrary, but they were opinions against putting into plainer and clearer language the effect of the Code as it stood already. That is, of course, a very important point, but I think my honourable and learned Friend did not quite appreciate what was the effect of the summing-up of Mr. Justice Strachey, which was afterwards confirmed by the Privy Council. It had been contended that nothing was disaffection within the meaning of the Act unless it amounted to an attempt to stir up active opposition to the Government. Mr. Justice Strachey reflected that interpretation, and his action was confirmed by the Privy Council.

SIR W. WEDDERBURN

Is it not rather strong to say that the Privy Council confirmed Mr. Justice Strachey's action?

SIR R. FINLAY

I must beg the honourable Baronet's pardon. Unless I am very much misinformed the Privy Council found nothing to find fault with in Mr. Justice Strachey's summing-up. Surely, then, I am not inaccurate in saying that that amounted to a confirmation. That being so, it was deemed advisable—and I think everyone in the House will admit that it was—that the Code should be put into plainer and clearer language, and that is all that has been done. But my honourable and learned Friend says, even if no change is made, even if the law in India is identical with the law in England, still we must recognise that in England there is trial by jury, and in India there is not. That is perfectly true. Trial by jury is not by any means universal in India. There are many parts of the country in which it does not exist at all, and, looking at India as a whole, trial by jury is rather exceptional.

MR. HALDANE

That is not quite my point. I did not say we should have trial by jury, but that there should be a more careful and a closer definition of an offence if it is to be left in the hands of a judge.

SIR R. FINLAY

That is exactly what we have done. Section 124a is identical with English law, my honourable and learned Friend himself admits. If he will allow me, I will endeavour to satisfy him that there is no extension whatever. The express word in the old Code was "disaffection." That has been explained by Chief Justice Edge, I think, as well as by other authorities quoted by my honourable Friend behind me, to mean "disloyal," stirring up feelings of native dislike towards the Government. That is the meaning of" this term. Well, what has been done here is simply to adopt the language of Sir James FitzJames Stephen, and say— Whoever, by words," and so forth, "brings into hatred or contempt, or incites, or attempts to incite, disaffection towards Her Majesty, or the Government established by law of England,' shall be punished in a certain way. What is there beyond stating explicitly what is comprised in the term? There is really no substantial alteration at all, and the only suggestion that my honourable and learned Friend makes in this matter, so far as I could follow, was that, because the words "hatred or contempt" were used, they must mean something which would not be covered by "disaffection" in the old section. I do not think that follows at all. The framers of this section merely express clearly what the old section has been, judicially interpreted to mean. That is the view which I present to the House for its consideration. Well, having to deal with a country in which, to a great extent, the law is not to be administered by what is called by a very distinguished judge "that natural court of equity," a jury, but has to be administered by judges, according to law, he will see that a right and reasonable course was taken when it was determined that there should be a very clear and explicit statement of the law; not altering it, not in this section in any way extending it, but putting before all those whose duty it is to administer the law in this very important and delicate matter a clear and definite statement of what the offence is. That has been the object of this definition. I will only say, in conclusion, one word as to the provision, especially attacked by several honourable Gentlemen on the other side who have spoken, that enabling a magistrate to require security from anyone who is known to be plotting sedition in his district. Surely that is a most important and most beneficial provision. You have got to deal with a state of things in India, where you have fanaticism always smouldering, ready to be blown into a blaze. A magistrate knows that there is a preacher of sedition in the district, and if sedition is unchecked disaffection will break out into open flame, which may entail a vast expenditure of blood and money before things are put right; and yet, out of a pedantic regard to circumstances, which may be applicable to this country, he is to stand by with hands folded, and not take a step which would inflict no substantial hardship upon anyone, but which might prevent a great evil to the community. I ask honourable Gentlemen opposite to have regard to the spirit of English law rather than to the letter, and I do ask that these magistrates should have powers to be exercised in conformity with English law, which, though not as regards administration identical with English law, yet can do no harm, and may do a most enormous amount of good. As regards those who are so very sensitive about the liberty of the Press, I would remind them that special exception was introduced in fevour of editors. The Press in India, by this legislation, have actually been put on a sort of pinnacle. One honourable Member said it reduced editors to the level of dregs of society. Why, the section itself provides that anyone propagating sedition may be required to give security to desist from his evil practices, but this is qualified in favour of the Press. If it is in a newspaper that this offence is committed, security is not to be required, except with the sanction of the Government. I do think that in this matter the Government of India and my right honourable Friend here have acted in the most perfectly reasonable fashion, with the sole desire of promoting the interests of that vast dependency, of which we are all so proud.

MR. PICKERSGILL ( Bethnal Green, S.W.)

I may assure the learned Solicitor General that we upon this side of the House are very keenly alive, and respond very readily, to that appeal which he made, that we should respect the spirit of English law. It is because we do respect the spirit of English law, because we are true to the traditions of English history, that we strongly object to the propositions of the Government. Now, I was glad that the learned Solicitor General read the definition of seditious intent, because really that goes to the very root of the matter, and brings into very prominent relief the characteristic defect in the new clause—namely, that there is not a word about intent in it from first to last. May I point out that when the clause was before the Viceroy's Council the Indian members made strenuous efforts to import into this new definition of sedition a clear indication of intent, and in doing that they were perfectly true to the spirit of English law, because, since Fox's Libel Act of 1792, which absolutely revolutionised the law of sedition in this country, the gist of the offence of sedition has been that there shall be in the mind of the person who is charged a seditious intent. Now, what is that seditious intent? We need not go to the pages of a text-book, which, of course, is no real authority, to know what, in the present day, is seditious intent. It has been declared within the last few years, on the highest authority, undisputed, so far as I know, by Mr. Justice Cave, at the Old Bailey, in the case of the Queen, v. Burns, and by Mr. Justice Fitzgerald, in Ireland, in the case of the Queen v. Sullivan, and it has been declared that the gist of sedition is incitement to public disorder, or to resist the lawful authority of the Government. That is the latest authoritative declaration of what the gist of sedition is. I do, therefore, think that at this time of day to take a passage out of a judgment by Lord Kenyon a hundred years ago, and to pitch it into an Act of Parliament and say that represents the law of sedition, is ridiculous. The Solicitor General saia1— Oh, it does not matter that there is nothing about intent in this clause, because it is a rule of law that a man intends the natural consequences of his act. Yes, but the learned Solicitor General ought, I think, to know, and no doubt does know, what was said by Mr. Justice Cave in the trial to which I have alluded, that this so-called rule of law, that a man intends the natural consequences of his acts, is only a kind of working rule with which you start, but if circumstances show that the man who is charged had not the intent which otherwise might be inferred from his act, then, said Mr. Justice Cave, it is idle and cruel to say that, in that case, you are to act on what has then become a legal fiction. Therefore I say the question of intent is most material, and that the Indian members of the Council were well advised in pressing this point, that intent ought to have been clearly defined in this new clause. But, Sir, whatever the English law may be, it is obvious that we do not rely in England upon the mere letter of the law, so much as we rely upon this, that we have a jury which will bring a little common sense and a little fair play into the discussion of the matter. I do not hesitate to say that, even taking English law as it is to-day, if it were not for the intervention of the jury, and if judges or magistrates had to decide, it might be possible for a writer in any Opposition journal, I care not what Government might be in power, to be exposed to a conviction under the law of libel. Now, one aspect of this case, one consequence of the new attitude of the Indian Government, so far as I have heard, has not been referred to by any speaker to-day, and I should like to draw from the Secretary of State for India, if I may, some further information upon this subject. I refer to the establishment of Press Committees. I think there can be no doubt now that, as a matter of fact, Press Committees have been established—at all events, in the Presidency of Bombay—and I was personally told a few days ago by an Indian gentleman that in one case, at all events, one of these Committees had sent for the editor of a newspaper, and taken him to task for something that had appeared in the columns of his paper. Then we have the explanation of Mr. Lamb, as to the part which these Press Committees have to play. Mr. Lamb says—Mr. Lamb is an official, and speaks with authority— The Committee is available for use, if the magistrate thinks fit, as an intermediary between himself and the Press of his district. If that is true, I must say that through the medium of these Committees it is clear a Press censorship has at this present moment been established in India. Well now, are the conditions of India such that it is safe to entrust this enlarged law of libel to be administered by courts in India? May I give the House just one illustration of what was done, not in the case of an inferior magistrate, but in the case of a very high official in India, Lord Harris? Now, in order that there may be no suspicion with respect to the source from which my information is derived, I will quote from an article in the current number of the Asiatic Quarterly Review, which is signed by Sir John Jairdine, who is one of the most highly credited judges in India. This is the quotation, which I am sure the House will let me read— Lord Harris some time ago craved sympathy in the Times newspaper because of the acquittal of a Pindaric poet in 1893 by the High Court. He had got this man convicted by a magistrate on the ground that the string of psalms and odes contained a line or two of sedition. Lord Harris may well feel sore at the ignorance of the Gujerattic language shown by his advisers. The prosecution believed that some lines lauding the Hindus for beating off a crowd of murderers, were a praise of them for attacking a regiment called out and under arms to preserve order. Lord Harris had no literary witness, and the person who smelt the sedition was a European policeman. That is a striking example of the grave injustice that may be done under your Press law. I think Lord Harris ought to be mercilessly chaffed to his dying day for being humbugged by this policeman, and, secondly, for his incredible folly of years afterwards sitting down and inditing a letter to the Times newspaper recalling the trick which had been played upon him. I want to refer for a, minute or two to the circumstances under which this Bill was passed through the Viceroy's Council. There can be no doubt now—I do not think the Secretary of State for India, will for a moment deny it—that he, sitting in Council, is responsible for this change in the law of sedition—that the Indian Government, after having carefully considered it, said they thought it would be unwise to make any revision; that then the noble Lord, sitting in Council, considered the matter; that he overruled the Indian Government, and sent out to India a draft clause which is practically the clause which has now become law. Then, secondly, the whole of this legislation has been carried into law with the most indecent haste.

THE SECRETARY OF STATE FOR INDIA (Lord G. HAMILTON, Middlesex, Ealing)

What do you mean?

MR. PICKERSGILL

If the noble Lord will only allow me, I will tell him what I mean by indecent haste, and will add something to that, and say that for that indecent haste the person responsible is the noble Lord himself. In order to quicken legislation, the noble Lord actually suggested to the Indian Government that the changes in the law of procedure with regard to sedition should be included in the Bill relating to the Penal Code, or, in the alternative, should re brought forward in a Bill by themselves, although at the time there was before the Council a Bill dealing with the whole law of procedure. But that was simply proposed in order that these laws respecting sedition might be carried—I repeat the phrase—with indecent haste, and it was a suggestion which the Indian Government did not accept. The noble Lord has challenged me, not unfairly perhaps, that I should justify what I have said with regard to this being carried into law with indecent haste. I take up the challenge, and I will give chapter and verse. That charge, let the House understand, applies to the change in the law with regard to sedition. Now, the Bill in which these obnoxious clauses were ultimately introduced was, I admit, before the public of India for many months. Perhaps that is what the noble Lord has in his mind. The Code Bill, the Bill dealing with the Penal Code, was before the public of India for some months—from, I think, August of last year. But at that time the Bill did not contain those obnoxious clauses of which we now complain. It was not until the 28th December that the public of India generally learnt that there was to be this legislation, for it was upon that day that Mr. Chalmers introduced the particular clauses before the Viceroy's Council. I may add something, too, upon that. It is, I believe, a statutory obligation that new legislation for India shall be advertised in a certain number of newspapers. How was that statutory obligation fulfilled? Why, it was fulfilled by advertising the original draft of the Bill, and, as I say, these obnoxious clauses did not appear at all. When these obnoxious clauses had been introduced, the Indians who were members of the Council pressed, and I think very properly pressed, that there should be a re-advertisement, but the Government declined to re-advertise the Bill. So far as the spirit is concerned—whether the letter has been violated or not I am not sufficiently acquainted with Indian regulations to say—but I do say distinctly that, so far as the spirit of that statutory obligation is concerned, it has been grossly violated in this case. Then I complain that this Blue Book does not contain all that we had a right to expect. We have in the Blue Book some of the dissenting minutes, but we should have had them all, on the subject of the Criminal Procedure Bill. Then we ought to have had the full text of the proceedings in the Legislative Council. One very distinguished member of the Viceroy's Council stated that the Indian officials, who were consulted respecting the Penal Code Bill, spoke with one voice against the measure. I say that that advice given by Indian officials who had been consulted ought to have been included in the Book. Lastly, I say that the whole ground upon which this Bill was put forward by Mr. Chalmers, the legal member of the Council, has broken down. He said language may be tolerated in England which is unsafe in India; look at the Poona murders! Well, but now it is clearly proved—I am sure, to the unprejudiced mind, most clearly proved—that that cowardly crime, which everybody deeply regrets, proceeded from a quarter where the influence of Press criticism and of constitutional agitation had never penetrated. Therefore the ground upon which Mr. Chalmers put forward this legislation, and which, I think, was to some extent, at all events, adopted by the noble Lord, completely breaks down. In these circumstances, Mr. Speaker, I think we have a right to challenge the action of the Indian Government. I am only sorry that the right honourable Gentleman the Member for Wolverhampton is not here this afternoon. I think we had a right to expect that, as he has been responsible for the government of India, he would have been here to-day, in order to express his opinion on the action of the present Government with regard to the Press law in India.

THE SECRETARY OF STATE FOR INDIA (Lord G. HAMILTON)

Mr. Speaker, before the House comes to a decision, I wish to say a few words on the Amendment. I desire to speak on this subject entirely from the administrative point of view. I wish to lay before the House what were the reasons which, from the administrative point of view, led us to make the alterations which are embodied in the law under discussion. But before I proceed to the point perhaps I may be allowed to reciprocate the kindly expressions which fell from various quarters of the House as regards the new Viceroy of India. This House is always generous in recognition of ability; and Mr. George Curzon in an exceedingly arduous position has not only shown remarkable ability as a Parliamentary debater, but, in addition, he has shown the higher qualities of resource, courage, and perseverance. I am sure we all combine in hoping that his health may be perfectly restored to him, and that the ability which he has shown in this House in connection with the Foreign Office may be instrumental in developing the prosperity of India and its resources, and in binding her still more closely to the great Empire of which she forms part. Now, Sir, the discussion to-night mainly turned upon certain alterations of section 124a of the Penal Code of India. I have been accused of all kinds of arbitrary ideas and intentions because, after the fullest consultation with the ablest legal opinion in this country, I came to the conclusion that, under the circumstances, that clause ought to be re-drafted. Now, Sir, the honourable Gentleman who spoke last, and who has indulged, I think, in a good deal of violent language, is perhaps not aware that for 17 years past the re-drafting of this clause has been under the constant attention of successive Administrations, and the Administration which expressed the strongest opinion upon the necessity of re-drafting was Mr. Gladstone's. What was laid down in 1880 has been represented by some to be a view deserving of the highest respect. What was said by the Secretary of State for India in 1880 was that the criminal law as applicable to India was practically unworkable, and the then Secretary of State in his dispatch on this subject went on to state that if this was the case he saw no reason why the existing defect in the Code should not be remedied without recourse to such exceptional measures as those provided by the Act of 1878; and he suggested, for the consideration of the Government of India, whether, in the event of the repeal of the Act of 1878, it might not be desirable to propose suitable amendments in some of the provisions of the Penal Code relating to seditious and libellous writings. Now, Sir, this section—section 124a—with its explanation, as it then stood, and as it has stood until the present alteration of the law, was, I think, unworkable for this reason. I hope I may be able to put it in lay language, so as to make intelligible to every Member of the House what is the main objection. The explanation confuted of conditional negative assertions. The result was that every counsel who defended a prisoner always tried to twist these conditional negative assertions to positive proposition, limiting the definition of the section to which it was attached; and that attempt was made right throughout Mr. Tilak's case. The proposition which counsel endeavoured to establish was this—that a man might say and do almost anything in India, provided he did not appeal to violence or suggest recourse to violence. Mr. Justice Strachey effectually disposed of that contention. His summing-up was endorsed by the full Bench of Bombay and by the highest legal tribunal in the Empire. Now, the honourable Baronet the Member for Banff perhaps forgets what some of his associates have been doing in connection with this clause, because when the National Congress met in India it was announced by one speaker that the natives of India would never accept the interpretation which Mr. Justice Strachey put on that clause, though that interpretation had been accepted by the highest courts of the Empire. I therefore felt that inasmuch as it was proposed to give power to the magistrates in the lower courts of jurisdiction to apply section 124a, it should be drafted in such a way as to make its meaning absolutely unmistakable, and I am informed by the highest legal authorities that the present section merely confirms the old law as judicially interpreted, and goes no further. I am quite satisfied that anybody in my position would have taken the course I have done, and have put absolutely beyond doubt what, the highest legal interpretation of the clause is. Complaint has also been made of that section of the Penal Code which enables magistrates under certain conditions to require those individuals whom they believe to be propagating sedition and stirring up discontent to find security. There have been riots between Parsees and Mahomedans in which hundreds of people have lost their lives, and the almost unanimous conclusion of the administrative authorities is that if they had got a clause of this sort they could have stopped many of these riots and disturbances. When gentlemen get up and talk about the liberty of the Press I do not think they understand what the liberty of the Press means. A Pressman is not exempt from the law of the land because he is associated with the Press. If a Pressman commits a murder I assume he is liable to the law. If he incites to sedition is he not liable to the law? It must be borne in mind that in India many of the so-called Pressmen are the editors, printers, and compositors of their newspapers, and that many of the so-called newspapers are little sheets of paper which are written by one individual; but if they are small they are none the less dangerous. The honourable Gentleman who introduced this subject informed the House that these proposals had caused deep discontent in India. I never heard a more absolutely unfounded statement. A certain limited section of the semi-Europeanised natives, with whom the honourable Gentleman and other Members of the House have associated themselves, have tried to get up discontent, and have totally and entirely failed. When the proposal was first made that there should be a certain alteration in connection with the law of sedition it naturally caused a certain flutter of apprehension, and I admit that at the outset there were in certain newspapers articles antagonistic to the proposals of the Government. Little by little, as the intention of the Government became clearer, the opposition gradually diminished. When I am accused of pushing these proposals forward I should like to know what honourable Gentlemen mean. The proposals were introduced in the Legislative Council, and they were given the widest publicity. They were sent to a large number of public bodies, and they were then referred to a Select Committee. The Select Committee made a number of changes, and amongst the changes were alterations to section 124a. The proposals came back to the Legislative Council after an interval of some1 weeks, and they were then discussed in full Council. The greatest publicity was given to the proceedings, and that is what is called pushing legislation. Every precaution, and every form associated with legislation in this House was absolutely followed in the present instance. Any tyro in politics knows that if it is necessary to legislate on such a subject as sedition, it is essential that the Measure be passed without any unnecessary delay. Now let me go back to the agitation. After a little while the whole of the European Press were in favour of the proposals of the Indian Government. The Chambers of Commerce, who at first demurred, were satisfied. The British India Association, after they had considered the Committee's amendments, were so well satisfied that they agreed. There was a large petition against the Bill presented to the Viceroy purporting to be the opinion of Calcutta, but on that petition there was not a single European or Mahomedan name. The Mahomedans went further. I ask the House to listen to their opinion, because that opinion, I know, represents not merely Mahomedan opinion, but the opinion of the great mass of respectable, well-to-do Hindoo gentlemen. The Honorary Secretary of the Central National Mahomedan Association wrote to the Chief Secretary to the Government of Bengal to the effect that he was directed to state that in the opinion of the Association the proposed amendment of the Penal Code was a salutary measure, and should be adopted. It was a mistake, the secretary of the association added, to suppose that the amendment, if adopted, would in any way interfere with the liberty of the Press. There is another great body, which is well known, the Mahomedan Literary Society. They express a stronger opinion. Mr. A. F. M. Abdur Rahman, writing on the 11th of January last to the Chief Secretary to the Government of Bengal, said— I have the honour to acknowledge with thanks the receipt of your letters dated the 28th December, 1897, requesting the Mahome- dan Literary Society to submit their opinions on the Bill to consolidate and amend the law relating to criminal procedure as well as amendments in the Bill to amend the law relating to criminal procedure, and further amendments of the Indian Penal Code to be proposed for the consideration of the Select Committee on the Bill to amend the Code in relation to extra territorial offences. I am directed by the Committee of the Mahomedan Literary Society to inform his Honour that they are of opinion that circumstances fully necessitated the introduction of the Bill to consolidate and amend the law relating to criminal procedure, and that they have no opinion to offer on the same. I am further directed to inform his Honour the Lieutenant-Colonel that the Committee have, after due deliberation, come unanimously to the conclusion that the proposed new clause, to be inserted after clause 108 of the Criminal Procedure Bill, and the further amendment of the Indian Penal Code, to be proposed for the consideration of the Select Committee, will undoubtedly prove beneficial to the public. The Mahomedan Literary Society has long felt the want of such a measure as has now been brought forward by the honourable and legal Member. Class and sectarian animosities have been known to prevail for many years, which have in recent years been aggravated by various circumstances. The intelligent and educated portion of the Mahomedan community have sadly felt the seditious effusions in respect of Government officials and Government measures which have characterised and disgraced the columns of a certain class of newspapers. The Committee entertain the hope that when the law of sedition is placed on a clear footing the evil which seems to be the sole object of a certain class of newspapers and agitators to disseminate among the ignorant people of the country will be effectually prevented. For these reasons the Committee venture to accord their loyal and unanimous support to the proposed measures. Next we come to the classes who were opposed to this legislation. There was scarcely in the petitions or memorials a Hindoo gentleman well known in commerce, who took any part against these measures. The agitation, I am sorry to say, is exclusively confined to two classes—pleaders and editors of newspapers. It must be borne in mind that they are classes whom we have trained; they are the product of our rule. We have given them an education they never possessed before, and looking ahead, as one must do, I feel strongly that the greatest difficulties which we shall hereafter have to encounter are not those which we inherited or which are inherent in the system, but which we of our own free will created. Undoubtedly one of the most difficult classes we have to deal with is the result of higher education. For years we have turned out thousands of young men with a purely literary English education. They have practically no means of self-support after they leave college, and the result is, they have either to look to Government employment, which can only be given in infinitesimal quantity, or they have to take to newspapers, as many of them do, or to become teachers. It frequently happens that they look upon the Government which does not provide them with employment with disfavour, and some of them undoubtedly indulge in language which, to say the least, is ungrateful. It is not merely that these gentlemen indulge in most extravagant language in speeches and articles which are not intended bona fide to criticise individual officers or promote some reform or stop some unpopular act of Government, but their intention is and their language is such as to strike at the very root of British rule in India. These gentlemen, who never in the past had any liberty of speech or freedom of action, now, as British subjects, put forward the most exaggerated pretensions as to what they are entitled to. Everybody knows who has been brought up in a civilised country, that the amount of liberty of speech or freedom of action given to an individual must be governed by considerations of the general security of the community. The name of one gentleman has been mentioned, the honourable Rai Bahadur P. Ananda Charlu, a member of the Viceroy's Legislative Council. Now let us hear what his views are. India, as we well know, is full of explosive matter. The old simile that you cannot allow a man to smoke a cigar in a powder-magazine happened to be used in a debate in the Council by another member of the Council, and what did Mr. Charlu say on the subject? He said— The honourable Mover (Mr. Chalmers) has facetiously described what he proscribes behaving recourse to a simile. I thank him for it, as it also exactly depicts the injury that the public have a right mainly to complain of. He says that there is no objection for a man to smoke a cigar on the wide maidan, but that no person will be permitted to do so in a powder magazine. I join issue with him there. In the first place, I ask what right has he to deny to anyone the right to smoke, even in a powder magazine? Anyone that does so takes the risk of doing so. It is his look-out. So long as he takes care not to throw away the stump carelessly in the powder magazine and controls the sparks from escaping, what does it matter? Why should he lose his right? I do not know if the honourable Member for Bethnal Green endorses that, but I rather think I should like to confer upon Mr. Charlu the right which he claims, on the condition that the honourable Baronet and the honourable Member opposite sat on the powder barrels. I do not think we should ever hear anything more about the inherent right of a British Indian subject to smoke a cigar in a powder magazine. So far from wishing to stop criticism, I welcome it. The honourable Baronet read out some extracts and asked me whether I should prosecute the authors. The honourable Gentleman must be profoundly ignorant of what appears in native newspapers. It is my business to read them, and I find that language immeasurably strong, directed against myself and every member of the Government, habitually appears in them, and nobody dreams of taking any action in respect of them. The native Press may criticise and censure reasonable or unreasonable acts of the Administration. They may call attention to anything they choose, but we cannot allow them to indulge in general attacks which tend to sap the foundations of English rule in. India and subvert our Empire. I would only too gladly encourage any machinery which would indicate to the Indian Government some idea of the silent, subterranean forces when we know are at work, or bring to the attention of the Executive the feelings and opinions of the voiceless millions of India, but those papers which come in collision with clause 124A do not represent the poor natives of India; they represent a class which is an excrescence of our rule in India, the semi-Europeanised class, who seem to think the British Government exists for no purpose whatever but to put them in a position in which they can administer the affairs of India without incurring any of the responsibilities of a Government. Sir, I am sure everybody in this House desires to promote the prosperity and welfare of our Indian fellow-subjects; but of this I am equally certain, that no man who ever holds the post I have the honour to fill would hesitate to act if he had undoubtable evidence of movements which might endanger the maintenance of our Indian Empire. We must look ahead. I do not pretend that what the Press may say or do is likely to become a real danger in our day, but unless something is done to indicate what the views of the Government are, perhaps years hence these evils will become formidable. What is wanted is not coercion, but an expression of the1 attitude of the Government. I have now been three years in office, and, with scarcely an exception, I find absolute unanimity of opinion upon this matter. All the educated, all the intelligent native gentlemen I have come in contact with feel equally strongly about it. Unquestionably, the Press of India does require guidance, and unquestionably agitation has sprung up in connection with it which renders it necessary to make the alterations we suggest in the law. At the present moment we are engaged in trying to extend the area of British influence in countries which do not belong to us, where commerce may develop

AYES.
Atkinson, Rt. Hon. John	Gedge, Sydney	Purvis, Robert
Barton, Dunbar Plunket	Gibbs, Hon. V. (St. Albans)	Quilter, Sir Cuthbert
Bemrose, Sir Henry Howe	Godson, Sir Augustus Fredk.	Richards, Henry Charles
Bethell, Commander	Gordon, Hon. John Edward	Roche, Hon. J. (Kerry, E.,
Bhownaggree, Sir M. M.	Hamilton, Rt. Hon. Lord G.	Ryder, John Herbert Dudley
Blundell, Colonel Henry	Hanbury, Rt. Hon. R. Wm.	Scoble, Sir Andrew Richard
Brassey, Albert	Heath, James	Sharpe, William Edward T.
Brodrick, Rt. Hon. St. John	Henderson, Alexander	Smith, Hn. W. F. D. (Strand)
Bullard, Sir Harry	Hoare, Edw. B. (Hampstead)	Start, Hon. H. Napier
Cavendish, V. C. W. (Derbysh.)	Hozier, Hon. J. H. Cecil	Talbot, Lord E. (Chichester)
Chaloner, Capt. R. G. W.	Lafone, Alfred	Thornton, Percy M.
Chamberlain, J. A. (Wor'sh)	Lawrence, Sir E. D. (Corn.)	Tomlinson, Wm. Ed. Murray
Chaplin, Rt. Hon. Henry	Lawson, John Grant (Yorks)	Welby, Lieut.-Col. A. C. E.
Coghill, Douglas Harry	Loder, Gerald Walter Erskine	Whiteley, George (Stockport)
Cohen, Benjamin Louis	Long, Rt. Hon. W. (Liv'pl.)	Williams, J. Powell (Birm.)
Collings, Rt. Hon. Jesse	Lorne, Marquess of	Wortley, Rt. Hn. C.B. Stuart
Curzon, Viscount	Lowles, John	Wyndham, George
Doughty, George	Lyttelton, Hon. Alfred	Young, Comm. (Berks, E.)
Douglas, Rt. Hon. A. Akers	Macartney, W. G. Ellison
Drage, Geoffrey	Maclure, Sir John William	TELLERS FOR THE AYES—
Fellowes, Hon. Ailwyn Edw.	Morrison, Walter	Sir William Walrond and Mr. Anstruther.
Finlay, Sir R. Bannatyne	Murray, Rt. Hn. A. G. (Bute)
Fisher, William Hayes	Nicholson, Wm. Graham
Flannery, Fortescue	Palmer, Sir C. M. (Durham)

and where we may reap the benefits of that commerce. Surely we would be very foolish if at such a moment we were to disregard what is going on in India, and to ignore attempts which are made to undermine our rule there. We can never hope to establish in other parts of Asia so satisfactory a system as that we have established in India, and it is our bounden duty, by vigilance and caution, to take care that in India nothing is done to render our task hereafter one which posterity cannot bear. The alterations we have made in criminal procedure will, I believe, be sufficiently effective to enable the Indian Government to deal with the evils I have suggested, while they at the same time leave absolutely untouched the liberty of the subject and freedom of action which our native fellow-subjects enjoy under British rule to an extent which is unknown in any other part of the vast continent of Asia.

Question put— That the words proposed to be left out stand part of the Question.

The House divided:—Ayes 66; 30.—(Division List No. 310.)

NOES.
Barlow, John Emmott	Jones, Wm. (Carnarvonshire)	Ure, Alexander
Caldwell, James	Kilbride, Denis	Wallace, Robert (Edinburgh)
Cameron, Robert (Durham)	Langley, Batty	Walton, Joseph (Barnsley)
Channing, Francis Allston	Lough, Thomas	Williams, J. Carvell (Notts)
Clark, Dr. G. B. (Caithness-sh.)	Macaleese, Daniel	Wilson, Henry J. (York W. R.)
Clough, Walter Owen	Maddison, Fred.	Woods, Samuel
Curran, Thomas (Sligo, S.)	Moss, Samuel
Davitt, Michael	Pickersgill, Edward Hare	TELLERS FOR THE NOES—
Doogan, P. C.	Souttar, Robinson	Mr. Herbert Roberts and Sir William Wedderburn.
Griffith, Ellis J.	Steadman, W. C.
Haldane, Richard Burdon	Stuart, James (Shoreditch)
Hayne, Rt. Hn. Chas. Seale-	Sullivan, Donal (Westmeath)

SIR M. BHOWNAGGREE (Bethnal Green, N.E.)

Mr. Speaker, I have been in some doubt whether by the forms of the House I should be able to speak to the proposition which appears as an Amendment in my name on the Order Book this afternoon, treating of a subject which has a very important bearing on the future of India, if I had spoken in the course of the Debate upon which a Division has been just taken. Otherwise I should certainly have made a few remarks on the new Press legislation which has been under discussion, and would have especially liked to comment on the reference made to Lord Harris by the honourable Member for South-west Bethnal Green, when he said that Lord Harris had got a man convicted by a magistrate in Bombay with respect to certain statements made in a language with which he was unconversant.

MR. PICKERSGILL

I did not use those words, Sir.

SIR M. BHOWNAGGREE

The honourable Member quoted words to that effect from an article in a journal, which has not a large circulation, in order to gratify a desire to level an accusation against Lord Harris, and added— Lord Harris deserved to be chaffed to his dying day for permitting himself to be bamboozled.

MR. PICKERSGILL

I used it as an illustration in my argument, Sir.

SIR M. BHOWNAGGREE

The statement, Mr. Speaker, at all events contained a very serious accusation against an English statesman who occupied the very important position of Governor of Bombay. In the first place, Lord Harris was accused in that extract of having brought about a conviction in a Bombay magistrate's court, which anybody who knows the conditions of administration in India would regard as a very grave imputation to make against the Governor of a Presidency. That was the accusation which the honourable Member for South-west Bethnal Green brought against Lord Harris.

MR. PICKERSGILL

Mr. Speaker, I made no accusation against Lord Harris. I simply read an extract from an article by Sir John Jardine, an Indian judge. Let Lord Harris settle matters with Sir John Jardine.

SIR M. BHOWNAGGREE

Mr. Speaker, if quoting one-sided insinuations were a permissible form of attacking the characters of persons within this House, I have here a bundle of cuttings with which I could attack the reputation of several honourable Members by reading scurrilous references and extracts from obscure papers. My reason for referring to the subject is this, that the article quoted contains scurrilous allusions to a matter which had been the subject of controversy between gentlemen engaged in different capacities in the administration of India, and the accusations made by the honourable Member for South-west Bethnal Green——

MR. PICKERSGILL

I made no accusation.

SIR M. BHOWNAGGREE

It is a serious thing to repeat a statement in this House, where Lord Harris could not defend himself, that "he had got a man convicted by a magistrate," who was an officer subordinate to his government, on a charge of sedition uttered in a tongue with which Lord Harris was not conversant. If not knowing the Gujarati language was a taunt that applied to Lord Harris, that would he equally applicable to the judges to whom the honourable Member seemed to refer with approval. Lord Harris's connection with the affair was simply that he was head of the local government when the prosecution in question took place in the ordinary course of justice in Bombay. I have thought fit to refer to the absurd attack made by the honourable Member for South-west Bethnal Green on Lord Harris, as, knowing the circumstances of the case on which the accusation was based, I could scarcely allow it to remain unrefuted. This is easily done by stating to the House what Lord Harris's share in the matter really was. Now, Mr. Speaker, the discussion which took place upon the Amendment, on which a Division has been just taken, relieves me of the necessity of saying much on the defects of the system of education which has been in vogue in India in the last half-century. I need not dwell on that side of the results of the system after what has been already said on it in the course of the preceding Debate, and especially after the significant views expressed on it by the noble Lord the Secretary of State for India in the statesmanlike speech to which we have just listened. He has particularly referred to the defect of that system in having failed to direct the energies of those whom that education has reached to those independent industrial pursuits which form the basis of national prosperity. After many years of personal observation and close study of the question, I have come to the conclusion that our system of education, benevolently initiated no doubt, and followed out on the lines which its framers designed, has entirely failed in the influence which they must have intended it should exercise on the solid well-being of the people of India. I find that my Motion has caused some alarm in a particular quarter, which is always easily frightened at the suggestion of any change in the present system of instruction, on the hasty assumption that a blow is aimed at what is known as high education. I would, however, at once disarm such suspicion, by alluding with approval to the Amendment which stands in the name of the honourable Member for Dumfriesshire, and by stating that, in asking for remedies to be adopted for the cure of the evils I complain of, I have not the slightest intention of suggesting anything which would justify the second half of his proposition—namely, that it would be calamitous if, in effecting the cure, the Government weakened either elementary or higher education. I thank the honourable Member for agreeing with me that it is extremely desirable that the Government of India should earnestly direct the attention and energies of the people to technical and industrial pursuits. I have always been an ardent advocate of European education in India, been actively associated with some of its educational establishments, and am myself a product of that system. It would, I grant, be in the highest degree injurious to the interests of India to lessen the volume of public instruction, and if the ultimate uses of the so-called high education, at present given there, were to be of the kind which best fulfils the purpose and aim of all national education—namely, the attainment of national prosperity—I would willingly have every one of our fellow subjects become a B.A. or an M.A., if possible. But my main contention is that the work of public instruction for the 50 years that it has been in operation has failed to develop in the slightest degree the vast industrial resources of India. As the rules of this Debate will not allow of my asking the decision of the House upon my proposition to-night, and as it cannot be put from the Chair, I shall take the opportunity here of reading the words in which I have couched it— That, in the opinion of this House, the system of education at present pursued in British India has proved ineffectual to direct the attention and energies of its people to technical and industrial pursuits, with the result that the productive power of the country has been arrested, making it more and more dependent on foreign manufactures; that as a consequence considerable sections of its population are rendered helpless, and a sense of discontent is growing up among those classes who, having come under the influence of such education, look to Government only to provide them with the means of livelihood; and that therefore this House considers that the time has arrived when a change should be made in the system of public instruction in India, and other adequate measures adopted with a view to remedying these evils. Now, Mr. Speaker, perhaps it might be asserted that this is a singular opinion—that the view expressed here with regard to education only expresses the sentiment of the Anglo-Indian portion of the inhabitants of India—and therefore I shall take the liberty of reading a few short quotations from native authorities, whose claim to speak on the subject cannot possibly be impeached. I make my first quotation from a lecture delivered by the Maharajah of Travancore some time ago. Perhaps even my honourable Friend opposite will admit that he is one of the most enlightened princes of India. In the course of that lecture, which was entitled "Our Industrial Status," the Maharajah thus referred to the students that flocked to the State schools— Almost without exception, all these, I suspect, look to Government employment. If our Government must provide for all the youths that receive education, our public offices will have to be extended miles, and public salaries to be increased by thousands of rupees, and after all to entertain a host of discontented, disobedient, and sometimes troublesome young men. Sir Madhava Rao, a statesman of vast Indian—I was going to say European—reputation, also, in a speech delivered a few years ago at a distribution of prizes, expressed the following sentiment with regard to our educational system in India:— At the present day, the cultivator, the weaver, the trader, the soldier, the artisan, the Brahman, and perhaps even the barber, one and all were fired with a desire to train their sons for Government employment or other sedentary intellectual employment. Hence, the schools were crowded, and more schools were called for. The phenomenon was the effect of a huge popular delusion, and not the effect of a genuine thirst for useful knowledge. Government could not possibly find employment for such vast numbers. Even the best educated men were already finding it difficult to get a footing in the public service, and some of them would be glad to have wages equal to those of a good carpenter maistry. I may quote another statement, on the same subject by an authority who, although guilty of the sin of being Anglo-Indian, is certainly entitled to great weight, being one whom the educated natives regard as a special friend. Mr. H. S. Cotton, Commissioner of Assam, says:— Numbers of young men yearly issue from our institutions who find they can obtain neither practice in the law courts, nor places in the public service. They look back on all the mental toil they have endured, and are chagrined on discovering that in but too many instances it leads to nothing. This accounts mainly for the discontent and restlessness which are perceptible in the rising generation. Then, again, we have the high and impartial authority of Sir Monier Williams for the following:— Those who are unsuccessful in getting appointments will not turn to manual labour, but remain discontented members of society and enemies of our Government, converting the little real education they have received into an instrument for writing seditious articles in native journals. Mr. Speaker, I beg to assure the House that, in placing these opinions before it, it is not my purpose to make any imputations against what are called, with doubtful accuracy, the educated classes of India. My sole object is to demonstrate, on the strength of opinions expressed by high authorities, both native and English, whose competency and impartiality cannot be for a moment doubted, the second proposition, contained in my Motion, that the result of the education we give at present in India is to make considerable sections of its population helpless and discontented, because it leads them to look to Government only to provide them with the means of livelihood. Without finding fault with the standard or volume of public instruction—indeed, while pleading for the extension of elementary, and even the higher grades of education among a larger number of our fellow-subjects—it can be contended that, unless some exceptional measures are adopted and changes introduced to modify or supplement the present system, it will fail in future, as it has failed in the past, to attain the one main object aimed at in the pursuit of healthy education in every country—namely, the development of its material resources and consequent growth of its prosperity. Now, Mr. Speaker, I confess one is at a disadvantage in this House in speaking upon an Indian subject involving such complex problems as this does, because, and I say it with all respect to the House, it often lacks that elementary knowledge of the conditions of the country without reference to which one cannot adequately treat such a subject. However, I hope to make my meaning clear as to the present condition of skilled industrial pursuits in India by placing before honourable Members a few comparative figures. The value of the export trade of India in 1895–96, the latest year for which the official figures are available, was Rx.109,545,161, and of that amount Rx. 15,333,588 was the whole value of manufactured articles; or, in other words, less than one-seventh of the whole trade. In the same year the value of foreign imports into India was Rx.69,316,395, of which Rx.10,197,255 was raw material, or about one-seventh of the whole imports. Thus it can be seen that in a given year India receives and consumes of foreign manufactured produce seven times the value of the raw articles imported. On the other hand, it sends out, in raw material, seven times the value of its export of manufactured articles. Again, we find that, whereas out of a population in England and Wales of 22,000,000, no less than 7,000,000 of people are engaged in industrial pursuits, or nearly 33 per cent., in India, out of a population of 300,000,000, about 3,000,000, and that on a liberal computation, are reckoned to be so employed; that is to say, 1 per cent. In giving these figures, I would not be understood to say that the productive power of the country has lessened under British rule, nor would I for a moment venture to assert that the policy of the British administration is antagonistic to the development of industries. In fact, I have myself on more than one occasion argued that the peace and security which have been established throughout India under that rule have multiplied its producing capacity as far as raw materials are concerned, that consequently its export trade has increased eighty-fold, and the prospects of unskilled labour employment have been greatly enhanced. It is to the production of skilled industries that my remarks have reference, and I contend that the figures I have just given, few as they are, demonstrate the dismal condition of the reproductive manufacturing capacity of India, and make it evident how heavily it suffers by having to pay to foreign countries for those manufactured articles it needs and consumes, but cannot, or will not, manufacture itself. It has unlimited wealth of natural material. It had varied industries in the olden times, embracing sculpture, architecture, woodwork, embroidery, carpet-making, jewellery, and many others of varying degrees of excellence, showing that the necessary intellect for such pursuits has never been lacking. But these have now mostly disappeared, and even such manufactures as require but little skilled manipulation have ceased to be a source of wealth or revenue for the benefit of the country. I could name numberless instances in proof of this, but I would not venture to trouble the House with such details, for I think that a committee of inquiry would be the proper agency to examine into these particulars. But to illustrate my meaning as regards this part of my argument, I would just give a detail or two. Hides, for instance, of which there are an abundance, and which would require very little labour indeed to manufacture into useful articles, are sent out of the country without any native labour being bestowed upon them, except that required to flay the skins from the carcasses and to wash them and pack them for shipment. The same skins come back from Germany manufactured. Tea, again, which is an essentially Indian product, in that its growth is favoured by the soil, by virtue of the conditions of its climate, and grown by Indian labourers, who only get a coolie wage, makes wealth for the planter, who is, generally speaking, not a native. Even the retail sale of tea, is gradually passing into hands which take away the profits out of India, because the native neglects the trade, as being mean or not suitable to his tastes. Now, Mr. Speaker, it might be asked, what has the system of education to do with this condition of things? My answer is that it has, indeed, a great deal to do with it. A main function of the public instruction of a country is, or ought to be, to teach people the dignity of labour, and in a country like India to awaken in them a sense of the influence which skilled industry has upon national wealth and prosperity, and to fit them in various ways for its pursuit. The present system does not perform this function. The education is too literary, and only fits the youth who get it to adapt themselves to the medical and legal professions, which are overstocked. It fails to point out to them that the instruction which they receive is for the purpose of fostering the original industries of the country, and acquiring others which Western culture opens out to them. It goes further in that evil direction, and drags the younger men away from those profitable pursuits in which their fathers were engaged, but which have in many cases already diminished and in others altogether disappeared. I shall allude to the medical profession to show how the education we give now has a tendency to divert the people from following the more substantial side of their work in life in a given department of useful occupation. The universities in India turn out medical men by the hundred every year; but there is not in all India to-day a manufacturing chemist, not even of saltpetre, of which the soil in many parts of India is full. The academic degree, and the prospect of earning a living by visiting patients and writing prescriptions, is no doubt, more alluring than the prospect of doing hard, persevering work in a manufacturing depôt or laboratory; hence this strange result, that while medical practitioners multiply, the less attractive pursuit of operative chemistry is wholly shunned. This is just a casual illustration of how our teaching fails to indicate that for diligent work, based upon the instruction received in technical schools and colleges, there are remunerative fields of activity which have been wantonly neglected. On these grounds, which I have but briefly enumerated, I submit that changes in the system of instruction, and in the methods of imparting it, have become imperative. I am aware that it is the people themselves who must find out these drawbacks from which they have suffered so far, and take a new departure as regards the application of the education they receive under a benevolently-framed scheme. But I contend that the Government in India must take the initiative in guiding the people. Whenever and wherever they can, they must show their appreciation of manual skill, by introducing technical and scientific subjects into the curricula of schools and universities. It is essential that both under the local governments, and in the India Office itself, departments should be organised for the special purpose of fostering skilled industries, and placed under the charge of experts acquainted with the capability of the material resources of India, and with the methods by which the people's energies, both mental and physical, could be directed to their proper exploitation. I cannot hope to dwell at length just now on the various ways and means by which this useful purpose could be attained. This is, again, as I have said before, a subject on which due inquiry could be made, and remedies suggested, through the agency of a Committee or Commission. But if the view I have feebly tried to lay before the House could be acted on, I am sure it will prove beneficial both to the people and the Government, in more ways than one. The economic gain to the country would be enormous, if we could get the people to earn their living by operating upon those unlimited raw materials, which they at present bundle away to foreign countries, and buy back in innumerable manufactured forms at a heavy cost. One of the main arguments used with the native population to persuade them that so long as they are under a foreign domination they can never be prosperous, is that the drain upon their finances for administrative and military charges must continue to suck the life-blood of the country year after year. They are told persistently that their poverty and helplessness are due solely to this drain, and that all the evils of famine and other natural calamities from which they periodically suffer are the outcome of that helplessness. Arguments like this have been at the bottom of most of the disaffection that is invoked against British rule, and of much of the internal disorders against which we have had to contend in the last few years. The literary education which we give the people of India, instead of enabling them to inquire into the truth or otherwise of such representations, only fits and inclines them to imbibe ideas by no means friendly to their Government. Now, the home remittances are, I believe, about £16,000,000 a year, half of which is the amount of interest payable on the capital advanced by Great Britain for the construction of railways, canals, and other works of public utility. Therefore, the other eight millions, which, if we leave out of reckoning all considerations on which the remittance to that extent can be wholly or partly justified, is the so-called burden upon India, to which is attributed its comparative poverty. But, as I have stated before, the people of India pay every year for the manufactured articles which they import a sum of no less than 60 million tens of rupees. Now, if by teaching the people to manufacture not more than one-fifth the articles they receive from foreign countries, in their present state of industrial incapacity, we can at once save them that proportion of the purchase price of such articles, and thus counterbalance the supposed inequitable burden of eight millions of the home remittances: by just doing this we immediately extinguish the reason, or pretext rather, on which some of them base a great grievance. And in this one way alone we should secure a great political gain, beside the great economic good that would accrue to the people. I am persuaded, Mr. Speaker, that by adopting the obvious necessary measures, without further delay, for fostering the development of skilled industrial pursuits, we should be conferring upon India great blessings, and not only justifying British rule, but making its foundations firm and permanent. Government can do much to lead the way in that direction, and the people are sure to follow. In saying this I do not make any complaint against the Government. They have heretofore expressed much sympathy for, and even endeavoured to actively foster, the material resources of the country, as, for example, by taking an imposing part in the Paris Exhibition of 1878 and the Colonial and Indian Exhibition in 1886. The remarkable increase in the tea industry of India is mainly due to the prominent attention drawn to Indian teas at Paris in 1878. But that is not enough, nor does that sort of fitful and superficial activity go to the root of the matter. It is the training of the Indian youth to technical and industrial pursuits on a systematic basis that is wanted, and it is essential that a thorough inquiry, with the object of obtaining suggestions for a properly organised scheme for that purpose, should be instituted. I trust, Mr. Speaker, that before you leave the chair the noble Lord the Secretary of State for India will express himself in sympathy with the objects of my proposition, and also promise that the views which I have but too feebly set forth here to-day will actively engage in the immediate future the attention of the various Governments in India. In conclusion, Sir, may I claim the indulgence of the House for a moment longer just to express my hearty concurrence with the widespread approval with which is regarded the appointment which Her Majesty has just made of a successor to Lord Elgin? The Prime Minister and the Secretary of State for India have to be congratulated on the happy selection they have made. The right honouraole Gentleman the present Under Secretary for Foreign Affairs [Mr. Curzon] will take to the discharge of the duties of his onerous but splendid position as Viceroy an intellect of the highest order, and a commanding grasp of the most essential problems affecting India and the Far East. In congratulating India on the new ruler it is going to have, I pray that his career may be successful and brilliant, unmarred by any of those visitations of nature and other difficulties which have so afflicted the country in the past two years.

MR. SOUTTAR (Dumfriesshire)

Mr. Speaker, before I begin to deal with the main subject, I feel that I must say a word on some remarks that have been made across the floor of the House about an Indian judge who happens to be a personal friend of mine. I know nothing of the merits of the case, but I do feel, knowing him so intimately, that Sir John Jardine, a retired judge of the High Court of Bombay, a gentleman who received his title from the present Government recently, and who was thought by them to deserve it, is a man who is absolutely incapable of saying anything which is not strictly honourable and strictly true. Well, having said that, I would go on to say a few words upon the subject of education. We have listened to one of those attacks upon higher education in India which come periodically. I do not mean to say that the honourable Member made any violent attack upon higher education. He said that he was not going to attack it at all, but as a matter of fact he did not keep to his assertion. In an insidious way—I do not mean to be offensive—he did give higher education a good many stabs in the dark. Well, there is no novelty in these attacks, and since higher education was introduced 50 years ago, they have been pretty frequent; but there is this novelty about the present one, that mostly attacks on higher education in India have been made by Anglo-Indians. The cold-weather visitors have been heard, but here we have a native attacking himself. I do not mean to say that lie did it in a violent way, but he did it. In this country many of us think that it is good for us to defend our alma mater, and I do not think that he himself felt that he was quite in his right position, nor is it an edifying thing to see a man kicking down the ladder by which he himself has climbed to fame. At the same time, I think it is right that every man should state his opinion, especially in this House; and it is also right that full light should be thrown upon every subject, and upon no subject is it well that fuller light should be thrown than upon an Indian subject. I agree entirely with the honourable Member——

MR. MADDISON (Sheffield, Brightside)

I beg to call attention to the fact that there are not 40 Members present.

House counted. Forty Members being present,

MR. SOUTTAR

resumed: Well, I was saying, Mr. Speaker, that I quite agree with the honourable Member who introduced this subject in what he says about the sad lack of appreciation of the dignity of labour which undoubtedly exists in India. There is, undoubtedly, an idea in India that labour of a manual kind should be confined entirely to the lower orders, and that it is degrading for a man of spirit to use his hands for any heavier work than driving a quill. I had five years of bard work myself in India, and I must say that because it is absolutely true, and men must live in India before they can realise how entirely true it is. I also agree with what the honourable Member said when he pointed out that this sort of thing diminishes the producing power of India. I do not agree with the manner in which he proved his contention. He seemed to be very much saddened, because the imports of India were so large. Sixty millions. I think he said they were, and he wanted to cut them down to thirty.

SIR M. BHOWNAGGREE

What I said was that the proportion of the imports of manufactured articles was very large in comparison with the proportion of raw material imported, thus proving its great dependence on foreign manufactures.

MR. SOUTTAR

That is what I understood. I am not going into the political economical question with regard to this at all, but the honourable Member need not be afraid of any amount of imports. No man was ever impoverished by getting anything. It is by what you give that you are impoverished, and if India was giving a great deal more than she was getting, there might be some reason to complain. India wants all the imports she can possibly get, because the more imports she gets the richer she will become. We also must not exaggerate the influence that this particular question has upon Indian labour and producing power. After all, the honourable Member will agree with me that it affects mostly the young men in the cities, and the young men in the cities are an extremely small fraction of the Indian population. The great mass of the population of India consists of poor ryots (peasants), who have no very fine-drawn distinctions about the dignity of labour, and who have to toil from morning to night, from year's end to year's end. At the same time I quite agree with what the honourable Member said, that there might be a great deal more industry in connection with manufactured articles, especially those which might be produced in India. I think that this weakness in connection with India arises very much from the prejudice that exists among the better class of Indians against labour. You may labour without education, but you cannot have any progress in connection with labour except as the result of education. I believe that India stands still to-day, and allows nations like Janan to go past her by leaps and bounds, because the men who should be building factories, the men who should be developing new industries, the men who should be the pioneers to guide their countrymen to the promised land of civilisation, stand aside, and are ashamed to soil their hands with honest toil. We talk a great deal about English capital, but what India wants is not so much capital as that pioneers should arise amongst her own people. We know that in our own country, and in every civilised country, ignorance is the parent of prejudice, and that ignorance is best counteracted and prejudice is best counteracted by the acquisition of knowledge. I do not hesitate to say that it is seen in its most extended form in India, not amongst the highly educated classes, but amongst the poor. I remember a case in my own experience in Calcutta, where numbers of tramps congregate. I wanted a little bit of work done, in the way of light timber being removed. I said to my engineer, "Could not you ask some of these men to do it?" He looked at me, smiled, and said, "They would not do it." He was right; though we offered these tramps as much money as they would earn in a fortnight they would not do it. This form of leprosy is not the result of European education at all. An honourable Member spoke of education having arrested industries in India, but education has not arrested a single industry in India; on the contrary, it has developed it. The disease is of longer growth than higher education in India; it is to be found in the very foundation of Indian society. These things have been in the minds of the Indians for century after century, and it is these, and not the higher education, that have produced such an evil. An honourable Member spoke of our education as if Europeans foisted upon India a system of it. We know perfectly well that the object of education in India is not so much to give men a little bit of knowledge of this or that thing, but to train the intellect, so that a man may be able to do anything that may be necessary for him. That is the education that has been given in India. The education we think good enough in England or Scotland surely is good enough for India. I know that at present there is a movement amongst high-class young men in India, and they are slowly breaking through this prejudice, with the result that they now do work which before was only done by the lower classes. I think we ought to give all honour to these young men who are standing in the breach. I have not a shadow of doubt that their courage is due to their higher education. If you tamper with higher education you will check it, and India will be thrown back to her original state. I think, therefore, that higher education is not a hindrance to the development of industries in India. But, whatever views may be held as regards that, I wish to point out that higher education is becoming essential; it is essential to the existence of European administration, because I want to point out that the government of India would be absolutely impossible but for the educated natives, by whom subordinate posts must be filled in greater numbers as time goes on. If their places are taken by Europeans the administration of India by this country would soon become impossible for financial reasons. The services of educated natives are needed in banks, in shipping and railway offices, and in all other commercial houses Their salaries are lower than those of Europeans; and, secondly, because speaking the native language, the educated native forms the necessary link between the country that supplies and the country that demands. You see, therefore, there is no use talking of the educated native as if we could dispense with him, because it is necessary that we should have him. There is another ground I would indicate. I think the higher education of India is necessary for its moral well-being. I believe there has been a great improvement in the moral tone of the natives since the extension of higher education. Now, I have the highest authority for saying that there is no difficulty whatever in getting pure natives to fill any appointment; education has raised the moral character of those who have partaken of its advantages. There is just one other advantage I might indicate, with reference to the treatment by the Indians of their women; and higher education has been proved to have brought about a reform in this direction, but I trust it will even have a better effect later on. I agree entirely with the honourable Member opposite as regards the evil prejudice that exists in India against honest manual labour. I disagree with him when he said that higher education has had anything to do with that subject. I would ask the noble Lord, cannot the Government themselves do something to help to break down that prejudice? I think they can, not by departing from the policy they have been carrying on, but by carrying it out with more generosity. The real education difficulty in India is simply the inadequacy of the educational grant. Well, now, there are two things I think the Government might do. First, I think that they might make a much more serious effort to promote industrial education and to encourage young men to attend technical colleges which might be established. It is, however, impossible to do it out of the present funds, but I do think that, considering the bright and rosy Budget of this year, it might be possible to find an increased grant. What a blessing a South Kensington would be to India! The second thing I think the Government might do is to encourage young men to learn trades. I believe they could do this and without any expense, simply by giving high marks to those who show the most knowledge of any particular trade, and in that way the Government might show India that it had taken industry under its special protection. Sixteen years ago the Government appointed an Educational Commissioner, and I think that perhaps the time has come when there might be an inquiry into that particular sort of education which would bring the people of India into habits of industry. I do not presume to say how this can be done, but there must be great care taken so that no injury will accrue to higher education.

MR. VICARY GIBBS (Herts, St. Albans)

Sir, if the honourable Member desires technical education, what does he desire it for? It is that the people may devote themselves to manufacture, and by manufacture get a living. But how can they get a living from manufacture unless foreign capital comes into the country, and how can this desideratum be obtained so long as the Indian Government persists in tampering with the currency? However, what I rise particularly for is to call the noble Lord's attention to a matter which I think is well worth consideration. I refer to the conduct of certain Civil servants in India at the end of June last, and the circumstances are as follows: A lecture was given at Simla by Colonel Hutchinson, the Director General of Military Education there. To the lecture itself I have no objection, but he was followed by a Civil servant, Mr. Thorburn, the Financial Commissioner of the Punjaub, who made a violent attack on the recent policy of the Indian Government, and I consider that for a man in his position he had not the slightest right to make such an attack, and I invite the opinion of the noble Lord, as to how he thinks Civil servants should conduct themselves. Mr. Thorburn was answered by Sir James Westland, who also made a speech on that occasion. Sir James Westland, in defending the Indian Government, expressed opinions with which I am inclined to disagree, and he said things certainly of doubtful accuracy. He expressed opinions for which he could have had no authority from the Indian Government, and yet those opinions must go forth to the people of India, and must create the impression that the Indian Government has spoken. If Civil servants in India are to be allowed to enter into angry debate on public matters, I say there is an end to all discipline in India. I will refer to the subject-matter of their speeches. Mr. Thorburn said that Captain Barton, whom he referred to as Commandant of the Rifles, was recalled from Lundi Kotal. He described that as a desertion of the Khyber Rifles by the Government, and said that these men fought quite as well as men could be expected to fight until they were deserted by their leaders. Sir James Westland stated in reply that we recalled Captain Barton, whose duty it was, not to command, but to superintend, the Khyber Rifles. Now, in the Army List of last April, Captain Barton figures as Commandant of the Khyber Rifles. Sir James Westland also said that these were not soldiers of the British Army. That may be true or it may not, but what I will point out is that the fort which these men defended was built by British engineers, that these men were armed and accoutred by the English Government, and that they had been commanded by an English officer. When Sir James Westland went on to say we were entitled to leave them to look after themselves, I say his remarks were indiscreet, and that he was not so judicious in the choice of his language as he might have been. One of the causes of complaint that I have raised on previous occasions is that the Indian official element is represented on the Currency Committee, so that they are judges in their own case. At Simla, on the 8th July, Sir James Westland said— It was well known that the whole question of the Indian currency was now under examination in London, and it was hoped that following this examination a measure would be taken to establish something that might be called a gold standard in India. If the measures relating to the Indian currency had the effect (as the Government hoped and believed they would have) of establishing a gold currency in this country, etc. Well, I consider that that language perfectly bears out the objection I have raised before to the Indian officials, being represented on the Currency Committee. I must leave it to the House to consider whether it is desirable, while these discussions are taking place in Committee, that these expressions which are calculated to influence its decisions should be made public. Then, Sir, there is another point to which I should like to direct the attention of the House and of the noble Lord the Secretary of State, and that is a remarkable letter which appeared in the Times, on the 3rd of August, entitled, "The Currency Question from a Native Financier's Point of View." It points out in the very strongest way the injurious effect of the recent monetary legislation of the Indian Government. I will just read two or three lines of that communication— The scarcity of silver is so great that the banks are said to be refusing to open accounts with natives who deposit so many thousands of rupees in currency notes, and then try to draw the money in small sums of silver. Sir, that raises another important point, and I shall hear with great interest what the noble Lord has to say upon it, and how far his inquiries bear out these statements. Then the letter goes on to refer to the illicit coinage which has been promoted by the legislation of the Indian Government. It says that the sonari or goldsmith-made rupees are now passing current in many states, nave not the late discoveries in Bombay, Delhi, and Lahore shown that you cannot have a currency with an artificial face value without demoralising the people, and turning the women's department of every Indian gold or silver smith, or worker in brass, of whom there are hundreds of thousands, into a secret mint. Now, the Times very properly says that it has not the means of testing the accuracy of that statement, nor have I; but the Times adds that the man who makes these statements is a person of high position and character, and competent to speak with authority about the subject. I think it is most important that the noble Lord should inquire most closely into this matter, because if it is at all what he says, it represents an appalling danger. Further, the same letter speaks of Rs.60,000 being seized at one time, and says that seizure did not represent one week's coinage. Sir, this is a startling condition of things to arrive at in any country, and I shall anxiously listen to what the noble Lord can say as to whether this statement is exaggerated or unfounded. There is another effect which has been produced by the currency policy of the Indian Government, and that is upon the credit of the country. When there was last a Debate somewhat on these lines in this House I heard the right honourable Member for Wolverhampton congratulate the Government On the condition of their credit and the ease with which they could obtain money. If we look back to 1896 we shall find the 2½ per cent. Indian loan went at 103, and yet last July it only realised 88½. I am not saying for a moment that the whole of that drop is caused by the Indian experiments in currency, for, of course, I know, as a man of business, that there has been a general fall, I might say, in all high-class securities since 1896. But I do say that this great, great drop from 103 to 88 is very startling, and I think it must point to a want of confidence on the part of the financiers and merchants of London in the wisdom of the currency experiments of the Indian Government. There is only one other matter on which I should like to say one word to the noble Lord, and that is to express a hope that he will use his influence to secure as early as possible the printing of the evidence taken by the Commission as far as it has gone. I should like to point out to him that all the proofs of the witnesses have been returned corrected by them, and that it is not a question of preparing any Report, but purely a matter of printer's work. Many of us are going away for our holidays, and it will be a great inconvenience to us if we do not et these papers into our hands at an early date, and therefore I would ask the noble Lord to be kind enough to bring pressure to bear upon the printers to produce these papers promptly as a mere matter of business.

MR. STUART (Shoreditch, Hoxton)

I do not desire to follow the honourable Gentleman who has just sat down into the various matters which he has gone into, but I wish to call the attention of the Secretary of State for India to the present position of the question which was brought before the House and the country some years ago with respect to the health of the Army of India, and mere particularly to the action which has been taken by the Government of India in consequence of the dispatch which the noble Lord addressed to them on the 26th of March last year. Now, Sir, I raised the matter a short time ago in the form of a Question to the noble Lord as to whether he would be so good as to lay on the Table of the House the circular issued by the military authorities of India with respect to the question of venereal disease in the Indian Army. The noble Lord was at first in some doubt, I think, as to whether the circular should be given or not, but after further inquiry he stated that it would be laid upon the Table of the House. I think the noble Lord will admit that it has not been laid upon the Table, but through the courtesy of a Friend I have obtained a copy from the India Office.

THE SECRETARY OF STATE FOR INDIA

I thought it had been laid upon the Table.

MR. STUART

I found no fault with the noble Lord, who has treated us with every respect and courtesy upon this question. No doubt that circular will soon be in the hands of the Members, but it raises the point of the present, position of this matter in India. It will be remembered that when the Report of the Commission of which Lord Onslow was chairman was issued a dispatch of great importance was sent by the Secretary of State to the Indian Government indicating his desire that the treatment of the diseases should be placed on all fours with the treatment of other diseases in the Army. He said that there must be no registration of prostitutes or compulsory examination, and I am sure that is a view in which the House generally will concur. But, Sir, I took occasion to convey to the noble Lord privately, or quasi-privately, an opinion which had been previously expressed, that the situation would lead to the development of evil practices which we must all condemn, and to which attention was called, particularly in the Report of the Departmental Committee of 1893. Now, Sir, I frankly admit that my fears last year as to the right honourable Gentleman's proposals were based upon the ground that what had occurred before would occur again. I was unwilling then, as the right honourable Gentleman knows, to bring the matter forward in this House because I felt that I was not justified in finding fault merely on the basis of my own or other people's suspicions and fears, however justified we might ourselves conceive them to be. But, Sir, I felt the more justified from my own point of view in taking that line, because I was aware and the House was aware that these practices which the right honourable Gentleman condemned were actually prevented by an Act of the Indian Legislature passed in 1895. It was a very short one, and it stated that regulations respecting disease of any kind might be made, Provided that no such rule shall contain any regulation enjoining or permitting any compulsory or periodical examination of any woman by medical officers or others for the purpose of ascertaining whether she is or is not suffering from any venereal disease, or is or is not fit for prostitution, or any regulation for the licensing or special registration of prostitutes, or giving legal sanction to the practice of prostitution in any cantonment. This Act of the Indian Legislature was passed with the sanction of the late Secretary for India and of his predecessor, and it prevented by law precisely those things which the right honourable Gentleman indicates is his desire should not be done. On the occasion of the Indian Budget last year it was my duty to point out to the right honourable Gentleman that that Act of the Indian Legislature had been at that time recently repealed, and I asked the right honourable Gentleman why he had sanctioned the repeal of that Act, when its existence had prevented precisely the things being done which he desired should not be done. Now, I will say that the right honourable Gentleman answered me perfectly fairly. Here is what he said, that— The Indian Government, in their reply, showed that if the Act was not repealed, the medical officers would not be able to carry out the regulations they had submitted for approval. These regulations were entirely in accord with his dispatch, and did not go an inch beyond it, and as the Indian Government wished to repeal the Act, he gave his consent. But if the honourable Member thought they were going to take any action that was inconsistent with the dispatch, he was in error. That, I am sure, represented the right honourable Gentleman's views accurately upon the matter, and from his point of view was a perfectly fair answer to' make, and, accepting that answer, I have awaited the result. Now, Sir, I could not expect an answer entirely from the right honourable Gentleman, even at that stage of the proceedings, because the regulations had not come in force in their final form. I find that there is a provision to this effect— that if a medical officer should have prima, facie grounds for believing that any person living in the cantonment is suffering from infectious or contagious disorder, he can order her up for examination, and if she does not come she can be expelled from the cantonment. I myself submit that I think most people would think that, as many of the cantonments contain a very large number of people, even to the extent of 50,000, banishment from the cantonment is a very severe punishment. However, I do not wish to enter into that matter, I merely make the statement to show that I accept the position taken entirely in that reply by the right honourable Gentleman. But, Sir, I now come a step further in the development of the matter. That was why I was anxious to have in my hands the instructions issued by the Government of India, to which I called the right honourable Gentleman's attention, and which no doubt will be in the hands of honourable Members, but which was sent to me from India some time ago. The document to which I refer is a document issued by the Military Department of India, and is dated the 28th of November, which is after the discussion took place between myself and the right honourable Gentleman in this House. That document has this clause in it, and the importance of that document will be seen as soon as I read this clause, which says— To give full effect to these rules Act V. of 1895 has been repealed by Act XV. of 1897, and it therefore becomes desirable to state explicitly the policy of the Government of India with respect to the future treatment of venereal diseases in cantonments. That, of course, is of very considerable importance, whatever view we may take of these rules. In the first place, I should like to call the attention of the House to the fact that in the regulations published for the cantonments, which were laid upon the Table of the House some few weeks ago by the right honourable Gentlemen, they refer to all manner of diseases in precisely the same terms, and they rightly place them upon absolute equality, and they also treat with absolute equality all persons who may come under the operation of those regulations. Now, Sir, I take it that that alone is what would carry out the views of the right honourable Gentleman when he formulated his dispatch, and justified that dispatch upon various occasions. But when I look at the instructions issued by the Government of India in connection with these regulations. I find in the 6th paragraph of that record of the 20th of November, 1897, to which I have referred, that it is distinctly limiting the operation of a portion of these regulations, so far as the venereal diseases are concerned, to the women of the prostitute class. I call the attention of the House to paragraph 6 of that document, which says— It should be carefully borne in mind by those concerned that the powers conferred by these rules are permissive. And then it proceeds to say that— It is not the intention of the Government that they should be exercised in the cases of the respectable persons who can arrange for private medical attendance, and who are willing to take any necessary precautions to prevent the spread of the disease. It is clear that these powers were not intended to be exercised in the case of the women to whom I have referred. Well, Sir, I say that that is not treating this particular disease on an equality with others. I come now to the point which I wish particularly to call the right honourable Gentleman's attention to, and it is in the 4th paragraph of these instructions. It has been stated, as the House sees, that the Government of India desire to state explicitly the policy with respect to the future treatment of venereal diseases in cantonments; and they go on to say that the Governor General in Council is of opinion that venereal diseases should, as far as possible, be dealt with on the same lines as other infectious diseases. But it proceeds further to say that the new rules do not revive the system which was in force up to 1888. They do not authorise the provision of prostitutes for the troops, or the compulsory examination of prostitutes, or any scheme of registration and licensing for the purpose of prostitution. Now, all that, if it were correct, would be in accordance with the right honourable Gentleman's proposals. But there is one remarkable omission in that state- ment, and that omission is supplied at the end of the paragraph, but, in a contrary sense, I am sure, to that which the right honourable Gentleman intended. In his dispatch the right honourable Gentleman said that there must be no compulsory examination of women, and this paragraph states that although there is to be no compulsory examination of women, medical officers may make arrangements to carry out from time to time the examination of women who voluntarily present themselves. Now, Sir, I ask the right honourable Gentleman to pay particular attention to that in the light of one of his own statements in his dispatch of the 8th of July, 1897, in which he sanctioned the rough draft of the regulations. He says— Very much will depend on their being worked with zeal and intelligence. Then follows this very important statement— Great care will also be necessary to ensure that the action of the military authorities is kept strictly within the limits of the rules. Now, Sir, I think I have shown the right honourable Gentleman that there exists a very strong necessity for him remembering that paragraph in his own dispatch, and that there actually is that going beyond the rules which he has laid down by the military authorities, which is exactly what my friends said would happen when we brought this matter first before the right honourable Gentleman privately, and afterwards, when I referred to it in the House on the same occasion last year. Now, Sir, let me be quite frank with the right honourable Gentleman when I say that the carrying of that clause, which the Government of India, indicate, as part of the policy of the Government making arrangements from time to time for the examination of women—that is the whole essence of the case against which I and those whom I have the honour to speak for in this House contend. Sir, it is not a question of whether these women voluntarily present themselves or not, although I think expulsion from the cantonment renders that presentation practically voluntary; whether it is voluntary or not is a matter that affects the women, and does very seriously affect them, but it is the fact of the periodical examination of the women by the Government medical officers, quite irrespective of whether it is voluntary or not, which is what affects the troops. Now, Sir, I have endeavoured very concisely to put that matter before the right honourable Gentleman, and I am sure he will acquit me of any endeavour to exaggerate the case, or deal with the position unfairly. I do say, however, that we now see a third step taken in the development and re-establishment of the system against which we have contended, and which I believe the right honourable Gentleman really also agrees with us in contending. We now see the re-establishment of the system which we had before. Now, with regard to this system of the examination by the State of women who present themselves, what is the object of it? It is not to cure the disease, but simply the provision of healthy women by the Government for the soldiers. Now, Sir, I want to make it perfectly clear to the right honourable Gentleman, and to the House, that that system has, in my opinion, and in the opinion of this House of Commons, at an early period of the history of this movement, created and increased the disease and increased immorality. Now, that is not what might be called a partisan view. It is the opinion expressed for a period of over 25 years, from time to time, by the highest authority in the Army—the Army Sanitary Commission. I hold in my hand their Report for 1895, which takes the matter to the latest date at which the figures have been dealt with in this House, and they prove that this system of providing that periodical examination of the women should take place has been a failure in India. Now, just let me read one sentence, because I am sure that there is a good deal of misunderstanding this point, and I take this, not as the opinion of a partisan, but from the Report of the Army Sanitary Commission. I am not going to trouble the House with the whole of the argument, but I will take the first point with which they deal. The Report says— For this unexpected issue three causes seem to be mainly responsible. First, there was the difficulty of being able to tell when a woman of the prostitute class is incapable of causing disease. The opinion so commonly held that this cannot be easily determined on examination is one of those popular errors which need correction. And a little further on they say— We can deal only with the facts, and there was ample evidence in the course of the Indian Lock Hospital experience to show that a woman's passing the periodical examination was no guarantee that she might not communicate disease. Now, Sir, the result has been an increase of immorality, and an increase of the disease. As a matter of fact, the House is no doubt aware that during the 25 years when this system was in full force in India the disease increased almost steadily, and on the whole very greatly, so that in the course of that time it doubled in the Indian army—an increase which has not been paralleled since the repeal of that Act. The House will perceive that the position taken up by myself and others in this matter is that which was taken up by many Indian authorities, and which was taken up by the Army Sanitary Commission, and by M. Lecour, the late Prefect of Police in Paris, on the same subject. The question of this disease is one which can only be dealt with from, a moral point of view. Now, I have pointed out that we have reached the third stage in the return to the position which has been described, and which I have endeavoured to indicate. Not only has that system led to an increase of disease, but it has led to increased immorality. Besides that, I want to point out to the right honourable Gentleman that, on this slippery path on which we are again travelling in India, there are many pitfalls which we must encounter. When once the Government have undertaken to provide healthy women in this manner for the troops, the essential consequence of this position is that the Government itself becomes the procurer of these women. Everyone will remember in this House the events which took place in the year 1888, when the circular of the Quartermaster General of 1886 was read, ordering a larger number of women to be provided in the different cantonments. Everyone who remembers that will recall to their minds the sequence of events, and will see the consequences of the State entering upon a step which is described in the paragraph. I have read. Everyone who remembers those things will see that we are led inevitably from that position to being the providers also, as well as the supervisors of women for the troops. What I ask and hope upon this question is that the right honourable Gentleman will bear this in mind, because on this matter I am sure the forces against him are stronger than he is aware of, and that he will bear in mind his own statement in the dispatch of the 8th of July, 1897, that great care will be necessary to ensure that the action of the military authorities is kept strictly within the limits of the rules. With regard to these Indian cantonments, there is scarcely an opportunity in this House except upon the present occasion, which occurs but once a year, of calling public attention to the serious character of this matter: and, Sir, I do urge, and strongly urge, the right honourable Gentleman to exercise that immediate supervision which his own dispatch shows, I believe, to be necessary. I have no confidence whatever in, and I absolutely condemn, both from hygienic and moral grounds, the step which has been taken of re-establishing the periodical examination of women which is indicated in the policy of the Government of India. What, then, do we desire to do? I am very glad to see that the right honourable Gentleman himself, in his dispatches upon this matter, has called attention to much that ought to be done. I put a question to him the other day as to what further steps have been taken by him, or by the Indian authorities, to carry out the wishes expressed in the last paragraph of his dispatch of the 8th July, 1897, and he says— I am in communication with the Secretary of State for War, and his Excellency the Commander-in-Chief, regarding the proposal made in paragraph 9 of your Lordships' dispatch, for the medical inspection of soldiers, penal stoppages for admission to hospital on account of venereal disease, and the punishment of men concealing the existence of this disease. I should be glad to know what further steps the right honourable Gentleman has taken in that direction. I have seen the official document, which is promised to be laid on the Table, in which the Commander-in- Chief in India, some time age gave some advice to the soldiers which the right honourable Gentleman the Secretary of State had suggested should be given. It stated that young soldiers should be warned, and other steps should be taken to guard against this growing evil, and with the Commander-in-Chief's circular—or general order, I think it was called—none of us can help but have the greatest satisfaction. There is another document which bears out the position taken up by the Commander-in-Chief in India, and to which I should like to call the attention of the right Honourable Gentleman, and that is the memorandum issued by the Commander-in-Chief of the War Office, in which he brings forward a series of proposals to the men through the officers, with which I, for one, wish to express my most hearty and complete approval, and which I welcome as a departure in the right direction, and which goes a good deal further, as the right honourable Gentleman will see, than the Commander-in-Chief in India proposed, and that is why I call attention to it. But before I pass from these two documents, the former of which is very germane to the issue which I raise, and the second of which is a corroboration of it, I wish to call the attention of the House to a point which occurs in both of them which is of extreme importance. Sir, a report in the Times on Wednesday last gives the general order issued by the Commander-in-Chief in India, extracting it from some document on the Table of the House, which is not yet in the hands of Members. The following passage occurs in it— The records of many station hospitals in India show that the majority of cases are confined within a narrow circle of men who are admitted again and again and thus swell the number of admissions. Such men, it is held, are fitting subjects for all the restrictions of discipline that can be imposed upon them, as they habitually render themselves unfit to fulfil the engagements with the State into which they have entered. There occurs in the circular by the Commander-in-Chief the following sentence— The Commander-in-Chief is confident that officers, non-commissioned officers, and men in the Queen's service will spare no pains to remove from the Army the reproach which is due to a want of self-restraint on the part of a comparatively small number of soldiers. I call the attention of the right honourable Gentleman and the House to that statement, because I, for one, have never been a party to the indiscriminate abuse of either the habits or the morality of our soldiers generally, and I do believe that both of these statements, coming from the source they do, point to the fact that the disease, which is so large in the Indian Army, is not due to the admission of an immense number of different men, but is, as the right honourable Gentleman has shown, very largely owing to the repeated admission of the same small group of blackguards. Now, Sir, that is pointed out by both those high authorities, and, while it vindicates largely the character of our soldiers generally, I think it also shows the propriety of those repressive and punitive measures in the Army itself which I have indicated, which the right honourable Gentleman has himself suggested, and which are suggested also by the Commander-in-Chief himself. Now, Sir, these are the main points that I wish to bring before the House, and the House will see that it is a most undesirable thing for me, or anyone else, to take up, and I am sure the right honourable Gentleman will say that I am not unduly detaining the House on this matter, because those two documents to which I have referred contain so much of what I must call the positive proposals which I and my friends are called upon to make. But the right honourable Gentleman has in his hands further suggestions which we and others have made to him, and which I need not go into now; but let me say this to the House, that while disease in the Army in India has been increasing for 25 years by leaps and bounds, so that, under the operation of this system, it has doubled, and since this system has been more or less in ruins, it has still increased by something like 40 per cent.: still, while that has been the case in India, where we have what I venture to believe is the State sanction of this immoral practice, yet in England since the repeal of a similar system in the year 1886 this disease in the Army in England has steadily and continuously decreased, and admissions there now stand at this moment 40 per cent, under what they were in the year 1886. I do not attribute that altogether to the repeal of the system which I have con- demned, but I attribute it to the increased moral sense arising in the Army when the public authorities in this country ceased to present vice, or this particular vice, as a patronised and State-provided thing. I believe that no improvement in India will occur until the Government adopt similar moral methods of dealing with this question, whereby more decent employment, more reasonable habits of life, and better surroundings altogether may be presented to the soldier. I know that the right honourable Gentleman and others may say that we can do the two things together, we can present a State-regulated prostitution to the Army and at the same time carry out and encourage moralising influences. That is not possible. I believe that experience shows, and it has shown in England and is showing elsewhere in many other parts of the world, that it is not possible to blow hot and cold at once, and you must take the one line or the other in this matter. Now, we have distinctly taken the one line in England, where you have a diminution in this disease marked and distinct, and we have taken, I am sorry to say, the other line only quite recently in India, under which you have exactly the contrary result. Sir, I have avoided going into any unnecessary details, and I now, in conclusion, wish to put one or two definite points to the right honourable Gentleman for his consideration when he replies. The first is the very important point which he calls attention to in his original dispatch, and in a subsequent dispatch by the Government of India itself, and which was first of all called attention to by Sergeant Law-son before the Committee, the result of whose labours was the repeal of the Contagious Diseases Act. The point is this, that there is a great inequality in different stations and between different regiments. Let me remind the House that the action which has recently taken place has been based upon what was believed to be a considerable increase of this disease in India; but when we come to dissect what that average is caused by—and the right honourable Gentleman knows as well as I do that it is an average resulting from the most extravagant divergencies—we have, as a matter of fact, stations in India where these diseases are four times as much as at any other station, apparently under pretty nearly similar circumstances. We have between 1894 and 1895 two years which wore compared by Lord Onslow's Committee, and there were many stations where between these two years these diseases were double, and other stations where between these two years these diseases were reduced to half the number: in other words, they go down in some stations and up in others, and Florence Nightingale was the person who, I think, called the right honourable Gentleman's attention to this fact, that it was necessary to throw some light upon these variations before you could see what was the real position of matters. Now, Sir, these variations are of extreme importance, not only between station and station, but they are of extreme importance between regiment and regiment; and what we really require to get is the statistics and facts about the increase or the decrease of this disease in different regiments and in different stations, because both are necessary. The right honourable Gentleman himself has suggested in his Report that a small Commission should be appointed in India for investigating this question. That was suggested a year and a half ago, and perhaps the right honourable Gentleman may have some light to throw upon the result of that investigation: but while I have given him the facts as between station and station roughly, just let me remind the House that it is still more apparent between regiment and regiment. Here is the Report, which I hold in my hand, which was presented by Dr. Laborde, an eminent physician in Paris and a member of the Academy of Medicine in Paris: for it is not only in this country that these matters have been discussed, but it is all over the world, and he quotes from Dr. Lawson, whom I referred to a few minutes ago, who is the Inspector-General of Military Hospitals, who gave in his evidence before the Committee of the House of Commons in 1881 in respect to the variation of this disease in Aldershot, a camp which then contained 12,000 men, the following result of his investigations. He tells us this, that during a visit of inspection extending over many months, he found that the amount of venereal disease in one regiment was 23 per thousand, in the second 42, in a third 84, in a fourth 114, and in a fifth 142. It will be observed that these enormous differences between regiments were manifested in the same camp, at the same time, and all under the strictest regulation. Yet one regiment has six times as much disease as another. To cut a long story short, the same facts under exactly the same conditions have been described by an eminent French, doctor as existing in various sections of the French Army. What I learn from the right honourable Gentleman is that he has recognised the necessity of taking steps to deal with this evil. The only other point I desire to draw the right honourable Gentleman's attention to is one that I brought before him at an earlier period of the Session, and that is what has been done with the Presbyterian Mission Hospital at Nus-serabad because I am informed that the physician in charge of that hospital, Dr. Huntley, was approached by the Government surgeon and asked whether he would carry out the new regulations in this hospital. This hospital has been for 25 years in that cantonment managed by him, and the building was granted to him by the Government at a small rent. Dr. Huntley replied that the Mission Hospital had beer, treating all persons affected with the disease in question, and that he was prepared to continue such treatment, but that any examination of women such as that authorised under the Contagious Diseases Acts was out of the question. Shortly afterwards six months' notice was revved upon Dr. Huntley that the Government would take away this building from the Mission. I brought this fact before the right honourable Gentleman and he asked me for the grounds of my information, which, he will remember, I handed to him, and I shall be very glad to know if he has got any answer to this question, which was before him in April last. I thank the House for having listened so patiently to this matter, which I think is somewhat contentious: but the importance of it is very great, and I can assure the House that there is, both inside the House and outside the House, a very determined feeling that we should not under any circumstances whatever—cannot under any circumstances whatever—permit it, so long as we are able to pre- vent it, the re-establishment in India, or anywhere else, of the system which I have referred to.

THE SECRETARY OF STATE FOR INDIA (Lord G. HAMILTON, Middlesex, Ealing)

Several questions have been brought to the notice of the House in the naturally discursive discussion which occurs on the Motion that the Speaker do leave the Chair. I will deal first with the Motion of my honourable Friend the Member for Bethnal Green. The honourable Member has moved a Motion declaring that the present system of education in India has proved ineffectual in directing the attention and energies of the people to technical and industrial pursuits. His contention is that under the present system the higher branches of education are too literary, and that a large number of young men are turned out without any adequate means of obtaining employment subsequently, and that if the attention of the universities were more directed towards technical and industrial education a great development might be made in the commercial and industrial resources of India, and those who might otherwise prove a serious danger to the Government be converted into useful members of the community. The honourable Member for Dumfriesshire who seconded that Motion, I think, gave us a great deal of useful information on the subject, and I think he, on certain points, did not quite agree with my honourable Friend. I do not think it is true to assert that the productive powers of India have been arrested by the present system of education or that the country is more and more dependent on foreign manufactures than it was. I was Under Secretary of State nearly five and twenty years ago art the India Office, and I know that then a very considerable number of stores which the Indian Government requires had to be purchased in this country. Now, a very considerable proportion of those stores can be obtained in India, and therefore I think it is perfectly clear that not only in respect of Government stores, but in other branches of industry there has been a very considerable development of manufacturing enterprise in India. My honourable Friend seemed to think that the Indian Government have not given much attention to this subject, but I have, been looking into the matter, and they have given to it perhaps a closer attention than he is aware of. My honourable Friend pointed out that only a small percentage of the total population of India are engaged in industrial pursuits—I think he said something like 3 per cent.—but that industrial population is steadily increasing, and it must be perfectly clear that if we attempt suddenly to divert a large number of young men whose aim now is to obtain degrees into the technical and industrial branch of the colleges, all these young men will not be able to get employment if so small a proportion of the population are engaged in such pure suits. Therefore, I think my honourable Friend must not anticipate too great a benefit from the change which he suggests. Every university, I understand, at the present moment offers facilities for training in technical subjects. Engineering schools and electrical schools have been associated with all these institutions, and there is a steady increase in the number of students who attend those classes. Neither do I think my honourable Friend is quite right in his contention that the lack of industries in India is due to the purely literary education which is gven in the universities. What is going on in India is going on in every other part of the civilised world. But I am in entire sympathy with my honourable Friend as regards the object of his Motion. I do think it would be a very great advantage if we could get the rising generation in India to take more interest in technical and industrial subjects, and if we could persuade a large proportion of the students now receiving a, literary education to devote themselves to other subjects which would be more likely to enable them to obtain a livelihood than they can from the purely literary studies which they now pass. There was a thorough examination into this question made in, 1882, and a long Report by the Commission was then made. I propose to look into the matter. I will do anything practicable to give expression to the views of both my honourable Friend and the honourable Gentleman opposite; but they must bear in mind that the governing bodies of these universities are necessarily composed largely of native gentlemen, and that their tendencies unquestionably incline to a purely literary education, and the first thing we have got to do is to change the taste and inclination of those who go to the universities. Until we do that we cannot hope to make any material change in the number of students who now pass through the universities with nothing but a purely literary education. I pass to the second subject that has been brought to the notice of the House, and that was the subject of my honourable Friend the Member for Hertford shire. My honourable Friend is very much interested in Sir James Westland, who made a speech at Simla. He passed very lightly over Mr. Thorburn——

MR. VICARY GIBBS

Not lightly.

THE SECRETARY OF STATE FOR INDIA

Well, he passed over him, and then fell heavily upon Sir James Westland, who he said had given utterance to some sentiments which he thought were likely to influence, if not to intimidate, those Indian officials upon the Committee to which had been relegated the duty of inquiring into the currency system of India. As regarded Mr. Thorburn's utterances, I have already expressed my opinion upon them in an answer which I gave in this House. They are unquestionably a breach of the rules which regulate civil servants, both in this country and in India, and I think there is nothing which the House, in the public interest, should more zealously guard than the maintenance in its present integrity of the pre-eminence of the Civil Service. Few countries are so fortunate in being so well served, and think that unquestionably we ought to adhere to the principle that no public servant has any right publicly to criticise the policy of the Government of which he is a servant. If he conscientiously differs from the heads of the Departments, it is always competent for him to resign his appointment; and if it is necessary to enforce that principle in this country, it is much more necessary to enforce it in India. Well, Sir, as regards the other point to which my honourable Friend referred, the particular subject of which Mr. Thor- burn spoke, I have only to say there is a wide difference of opinion as to whether or not the recall of Captain-Barton from Jamrud was a proper step or not. The military authorities on the spot, or most of them, approved it, and the Commander-in-Chief, after full consideration, came to the conclusion that it was the best course to adopt. I do not propose in any way to express any opinion, but I shall shortly have before me the final arrangements for the future safeguarding of the Khyber Pass, and no doubt the raising and officering of local levies will form an integral part of that scheme, and then I will take care to lay down in clear and unmistakable language what are the relations and duties of any British officers to the corps to which they may be attached. As regards the comments my honourable Friend the Member for St. Albans Division made upon the currency proposals, what I would suggest is that my honourable Friend should tender himself as a witness before the Committee. My honourable Friend will have an opportunity of placing his views before, and of being cross-examined by, a, body which thoroughly understands the subject. Now, Sir, I turn to the question to which the honourable Gentleman the Member for Shoreditch has directed the attention of the House. I am entirely in sympathy with him on some points, but I differ from the honourable Gentleman in his conclusions. I am bound to say, however, that I fully and firmly appreciate the sincerity of the motives which actuate him, and those who co-operate with him. We unfortunately differ, and as time goes on we may differ more; but, still, I will always endeavour in any controversy to conduct it with the utmost courtesy, and to recognise that they are moved by good and sincere motives. Now, the honourable Gentleman must recollect that when we came into office we found a rather remarkable state of things—a state of things which is almost incredible. A certain body of ladies and gentlemen, with the desire, of promoting social purity and public morality, had actually contrived in their zeal that it should be enacted in India that venereal disease should be the only disease that should be exempted from the regulations and restrictions applicable to other contagious diseases. In, India, where the executive is probably more powerful and better organised than in any other country in the world, the only persons who could absolutely snap their fingers at the Government of India were diseased prostitutes, and there was absolutely no power to stop that class of women from spreading disease. Now, that condition of things seemed to me absolutely in tolerable. I do not want to go into any general discussion of principles and motives. I would simply say I have always looked on this, not as a military, but as a national question. We have to promote the health of the people. We have a magnificent Army in India, an Army capable of great performances. It must not be forgotten that, during the past two years, not only have they distinguished themselves on the frontier and elsewhere, but when the Warren Hastings transport was in danger all these young soldiers—for all our soldiers in India are more or less young—these young soldiers, in a sinking ship, stood there for hours, and not one of them moved until every woman and child on board was removed. Therefore I say that they are young men full of chivalrous instincts towards the weaker sex; and I do think it an absolute disgrace to the Government of this country that it should allow a condition of things to exist in India under which this superb Army becomes a sewer by which the worst of all diseases is brought into this country. That being the position of things, I thought we ought to do something to get rid of this terrible disease. What I proposed to do was simply to put the venereal on the same footing as other contagious diseases; and I expressly laid down certain conditions which should not be infringed, and I do not think honourable Gentlemen can complain of our subsequent action But, Sir, the Act had been passed in 1895, and it was passed —honourable Gentlemen will excuse me for saying so—for the express purpose of putting this disease on a different footing than other diseases. Therefore, when we determined that it was advisable that these diseases should be treated on the same footing and put in the same category as other contagious diseases, we had to repeal the Act of 1895. An honourable Member has called attention to the carrying out of the regulations in the case of certain women; and I may say that instructions were given to inspecting officers that they might make exceptions in the case of women who might properly be excused from inspection. It was exactly in this way: in the cantonment area, where there was often a very large population—over 50,000 people—it was represented to us that there might be cases of perfectly respectable women who, by some means, had come into contact with the disease. In those cases we did the only possible thing we could do. After consulting the best legal authorities on the subject, and in deference to native opinion, to which, I feel sure, most of us in this House would feel bound to pay attention, we permitted the exemption from the regulations of ladies coming under the conditions described, provided we had evidence to show that they were under proper medical treatment. Well, then, Sir, the honourable Gentleman went on, a little unconsciously, perhaps, to indulge generally in arguments about these regulations, and he adduced what purported to be evidence to show that the regulations had not reduced the disease of the country. Well, Sir, I have taken the utmost care to test the accuracy of these figures; and I can assure the honourable Member that there is indisputable evidence to show that the removal of all regulations has largely increased the disease in India, and that disease has been greatly augmented. For 11 years—that is, from 1873 to 1884, during the period the regulations were in full force—the increase in India was about 10 per 1,000 per annum, being from 181 to 293 per 1,000. In the whole of this period great changes ware taking place in the Army system, the tendency of the short service system being to increase the liability of the soldiers to the disease, but we had the satisfaction of seeing the increase of disease amount to only 10 per 1,000 per annum. Now, between 1885 and 1895, the restrictions were gradually removed, while a great deal of trouble was taken to promote morality among those with whom the disease is most common. During this period, 1885 to 1895, the increase per year was 22 per 1,000, as against only 10 per 1,000 in the period 1873 to 1884; while in the worst forms of this disease—constitutional syphilis —the increase was from 24 to 84 per 1,000. Therefore these figures, which I have very closely investigated, prove conclusively and absolutely that the removal of regulations tends to intensify and augment the disease. Reforms have been suggested and acted upon, and with regard to the inspection of the men, that has been put in the hands of the military authorities. Again, memoranda have been issued by the Commander-in-Chief in India, and the Commander-in-Chief at home, in which they have impressed upon regimental officers the necessity of giving good advice to young soldiers, and pointing out the evil consequences flowing from vicious habits, and the Commander-in-Chief, as the honourable Gentleman is aware, has in these memoranda directed that in the recommendations for promotion care shall be taken to see that those selected are free from, vicious habits. Sir, I quite appreciate that close criticism may well be given to all our proposals in a matter of this kind, and to any alterations or departures from established rule. I will only say for myself that I look upon this question as one of national importance, and one which must not be looked at from a merely political point of view. An honourable Member calls my attention to the fact that, although we have all these statements as to the principles laid down in the original dispatch, there was an instruction to medical officers as to the women who voluntarily offered themselves for inspection. Now, I ask, what would be said of the Government whose officials, when these women voluntarily presented themselves for inspection, shrunk from their duty? Surely, that would lay the officials under a charge of gross inhumanity. I believe, Sir, that the regulations which we have laid down can, from every point of view, be justified. They are in accord with one of the highest precepts of the Christian religion, which exhorts us to heal the sick.

MR. H. J. WILSON

The noble Lord has really not touched the point raised by my honourable Friend. In his dispatch of the 26th March the noble Lord laid down that certain things were not to be done; those things were already prohibited by the Act of 1895, to which my honourable Friend referred; and why an Act which prohibited the very things which were prohibited by the noble Lord should be repealed is beyond my comprehension.

THE SECRETARY OF STATE FOR INDIA

What things does the honourable Gentleman refer to?

MR. H. J. WILSON

I was referring to the passage my honourable Friend cited, as to periodical compulsory examination.

THE SECRETARY OF STATE FOR INDIA

I said there was to be no periodical and compulsory examination.

MR. H. J. WILSON

Does the noble Lord lay stress on the word "and"? Because the country at large understood that there was to be no compulsory or periodical examination.

THR SECRETARY OF STATE FOR INDIA

The honourable Gentleman then would have no examination at all.

MR. H. J. WILSON

I am talking of the periodical examination, and the terms which my honourable Friend quoted from the recent Circular, authorised examination "from time to time." I should like to know what distinction there is. Before I go any further, Sir, I should like to say what I had intended to say at the beginning; I desire to associate myself entirely with my honourable Friend with reference to the unvarying courtesy with which we have always been treated by the noble Lord. I have had occasion to put to him a great many questions, and to ask him for a number of papers, both publicly and privately, and I can say that from no Minister on that Bench, belonging to one Party or the other, have I received greater courtesy than I have from the noble Lord. Then, Sir, the noble Lord spoke about the increase of venereal disease, but I am perfectly unable to understand the figures that he gave us just now. If time permitted I could quote figures taken from Lord Onslow's Committee of an entirely different character. I agree with the noble Lord that in certain years when the regulations were in constant operation there was an increase of about 10 or 11 per cent. yearly, but during the subsequent period, when, as he said, the regulations were in partial or entire suspension—I think very partial, indeed—the rate of increase was less. But, as my honourable Friend says, we do not found ourselves on statistics; our argument is independent of statistics; but we say that they do not bear out the statements made by the noble Lord and others on that side. I should like to point out that the Army Sanitary Commission (although its members appeared to waver and change their minds recently) did not pretend that these regulations would stamp out the disease; they only said that with the regulations the disease would spread less rapidly. However, Sir, what I rose to say chiefly was this: these diseases are on a different footing to other diseases. There is no moral question connected with smallpox or typhoid fever, whereas there is a moral question connected with these diseases. We entirely agree with the noble Lord about healing the sick, but we draw the widest distinction between healing the sick and making provision for the consequences of immorality. John Stuart Mill laid it down, before a Committee of this House, that, it was no part of the business of the State to make provision beforehand for the consequences of immoralities of any kind; and a higher than John Stuart Mill laid it down that we had no business to make provision for the flesh to fulfil the lust thereof. If the noble Lord gives the great weight of his influence in pushing on those kinds of moral reforms which have been laid down as essential by two Commanders-in-Chief, he would help to accomplish a reform in the diminution of disease in the Army which never has been accomplished, and never will be accomplished by the regulations to which we now object.

Considered in Committee.

(In the Committee.)

Resolved— That it appears, by the Accounts laid before this House, that the Total Revenue of India for the year ending on the 3ist day of March, 1897, was Rx.94,129,741; that the Total Expenditure in India and in England charged against the Revenue was Rx.95,834,763: that there was an Excess of Expenditure over Revenue of Rx.1,705,022: and that the Capital Outlay on Railways and Irrigation Works not charged against Revenue was Rx.4,984,422."—(Secretary Lord George Hamilton.)

Resolution to be reported.