SIR J. COMPTON RICKETT (Yorkshire, W.R., Osgoldcross)To ask the Under-Secretary of State for the Colonies whether he is aware that, in removing Mr. Ghandi from Volksrust to Johannesburg, 950 on 25th October, he was marched in daylight through the streets in convict dress; whether part of his prison duties is to do scavenging; and whether, if these statements prove to be correct, the Secretary of State for the Colonics will feel it his duty to advise the Transvaal Government to avoid this aggravation of punishment for the political offence of resisting the Government demand for digit impressions, particularly in view of the resentment felt in India against the regulations of the Transvaal for the registration of our Indian fellow subjects.
(Answered by Colonel Seely.) Mr. Ghandi was convicted of failing to produce the certificate required under Act No. 36 of 1908, and was fined £25, or in default of payment two months imprisonment with hard labour, subject, however, to review. He was brought from Volksrust as witness in a case at Johannesburg 27th October. Escort was provided from Johannesburg gaol, and he travelled from Volksrust under ordinary conditions in his prison kit. He arrived at dusk, and was conducted from station to fort without handcuffs. When in Court as a witness he did not appear in prison clothes. He has never done scavenging, but worked on agricultural show ground digging holes for trees, and weeding in municipal plantation, and gaol garden. He never performed hard labour on public streets.