§ MR. SWIFT MACNEILLTo ask the Secretary of State for India, is he aware that, while not only any European British subject, but even any European or American, whether British subject or not, placed on trial before the High Courts in India, can claim to be tried by a jury consisting of not less than one-half of his own countrymen, no such claim can be made by a native of India in a similar case. And, seeing that the Indian National Congress has for some years past asked for a similar concession to the natives of the country, will he ask the Government of India to make suitable alterations in the Code of Criminal Procedure.
(Answer.) I am aware that the law is substantially as stated in the Question. The point raised was very fully considered by the Legislative Council of the Governor General when the Criminal Procedure Code was last revised in 1898, and it was then pointed out that the law in respect of juries at trials before the High Courts has been uniform for over a century. No miscarriage of justice has ever, so far as I am aware, been alleged to result from the law as it stands in respect of the trial of natives by jury in High Courts, and as the jury panel of these Courts always includes a large number of native jurors, I believe that cases in which natives are accused are almost always, if not always, heard by a jury containing an adequate proportion of natives. I am not prepared to instruct the Government of India to make any alteration in the law.—(India Office.)