Part 16

(6) The Budge-Budge riot and the considerable loss of life that resulted therefrom was another case of stupid management and utter incapacity to handle a delicate situation.

(7) For the Lahore Conspiracy 28 persons were hanged, and about 90 sentenced to long terms of imprisonment and transportation for life. But for the interference of Lord Hardinge the hangings would have exceeded 50. In addition some mutinous soldiers of two regiments were tried by Court Martial and a few murderous robbers and train-wreckers were dealt with by the ordinary courts. The reader may well compare this with the record of convictions relating to Bengal.

Now, we have not the slightest intention of justifying the conduct of those who conspired to overthrow the Government by force, or who committed murders, robberies or other offences in the furtherance of that design. In our judgment only madmen, ignorant of the conditions of their country, could have been guilty of such crimes. Nor are we inclined to blame the Government much for the sharp steps they took to preserve order and maintain their authority during the war. But, after all has been said, we must reiterate that the underlying causes were economic and were the direct result of Government policy.

FOOTNOTES:

[1] There never was a continuous steamer service between India and Canada.

XIV

RECOMMENDATIONS FOR REPRESSIVE LEGISLATION

The Committee has said all that it could against individual publicists, Indian public movements and the native press. They have found no fault with the Anglo-Indian press and the Government. The whole force of their judicial acumen has been applied in recommending fresh measures of repression and suppression which they have divided into two kinds:

Punitive Measures, Permanent, (_a_) Points of General Application. The measures which we shall submit are of two kinds, viz., Punitive, by which term we mean measures better to secure the conviction and punishment of offenders, and Preventive, i.e., measures to check the spread of conspiracy and the commission of crime.

We may say at once that we do not expect very much from punitive measures.[1] The conviction of offenders will never check such a movement as that which grew up in Bengal unless all the leaders can be convicted at the outset. Further, the real difficulties have been the scarcity of evidence due to various causes and the want of reliance whether justified or not, on such evidence as there has been. The last difficulty is fundamental and cannot be remedied. No law can direct a court to be convinced when it is not.

Punitive Measures (Permanent).

Legislation directed better to secure the punishment of seditious crime may take the shape either--

(_a_) of changes in the general law of evidence or procedure which if sound would be advisable in regard to all crime, or

(_b_) changes in the substantive law of sedition or modifications in the rules of evidence and procedure in such cases designed to deal with the special features of that class of offence.

The recommendation under (_a_) does not amount to much and we will not mention it.

Under (_b_) they recommend:

In the first place we think that a permanent enactment on the lines of Rule 25A under the Defence of India Act is required. That rule provides for the punishment of persons having prohibited documents (which may have to be defined anew) in their possession or control with (as we read the effect of the words used) intent to publish or circulate them....

We also recommend that the principle of section 565 of the Code of Criminal Procedure (which provides for an order requiring notification of residence after release in the case of persons convicted a second time for certain offences) should be extended to all persons convicted of offences under Chapter VI of the Penal Code (offences against the State) whether previously convicted or not. Such persons might be ordered to give security for a period not exceeding two years for good behaviour so far as offences under Chapter VI are concerned, and in default be directed to notify their residence to Government, who should have power to restrict their movements for the period of two years after their release and prohibit them from addressing public meetings,--the term "public meetings" including in its scope political subjects as in section 4 of the Prevention of Seditious Meetings Act of 1907.

Lastly, we think that in all cases where there is a question of seditious intent, evidence of previous conviction for seditious crime or association (of an incriminating kind, of course) with persons so convicted should be admissible upon written notice to the accused with such particulars and at such a time before the evidence is given as might be fair. What we have called seditious crime would of course have to be accurately defined.

Now it is evident that after such legislation all liberty of speech and action becomes extinct. These recommendations will we fear directly lead to secret propaganda and secret action.

Under the head of emergency punitive measures the committee recommends:

Emergency Provisions for Trials. Coming now to the measures themselves, we are of opinion that provision should be made for the trial of seditious crime by Benches of three Judges without juries or assessors and without preliminary commitment proceedings or appeal. In short, the procedure we recommend should follow the lines laid down in sections 5-9 inclusive of the Defence of India Act. It should be made clear that section 512 of the Code of Criminal Procedure (relating to the giving in evidence under certain circumstances of depositions taken in the absence of an absconding accused) applies to these trials, it having, we understand, been questioned whether section 7 of the Defence of India Act has that effect.

We think it necessary to exclude juries and assessors mainly because of the terrorism to which they are liable. But terrorism apart, we do not think that they can be relied upon in this class of cases. They are too much inclined to be affected by public discussion.

We omit the detailed discussion of these provisions in which the committee has attempted to soften the sting of these recommendations by giving their reasons and by suggesting certain safeguards against their abuse. The most startling of their recommendations are however made under the head of emergency preventive measures.

Emergency Preventive Measures. We have been forced to the conclusion that it is necessary, in order to keep the conspiracies already described under control in the future, to provide for the continuance after the expiry of the Defence of India Act (though in the contingent form explained and under important limitations) of some of the powers which that measure introduced in a temporary form. By those means alone has the conspiracy been paralysed for the present and we are unable to devise any expedient operating according to strict judicial forms which can be relied upon to prevent its reviving to check it if it does revive, or, in the last resort, to suppress it anew. This will involve some infringement of the rules normally safeguarding the liberty of the subject. We have endeavored to make that infringement as small as we think possible consistently with the production of an effective scheme.

Existing Temporary Powers. The powers at present temporarily possessed by the Government are so far as material for the present purpose to be found in rules 3-7 inclusive and 12A under the Defence of India Act, 1915. We do not refer for the present to the Foreigners Ordinance, 1914, or the Ingress into India Ordinance, 1914.... Shortly stated, their effect is to give power to require persons by executive order to remain in any area to be specified or not to enter or remain in any such area, with penalties for breach of such requirements. These orders may be made and served on the person affected, whereupon they become binding upon him, or the person may be arrested without warrant and detained for a period not exceeding in all one month, pending an order of restriction. There is also a power of search under search warrant. It will be observed there is no provision for an examination of the cases of such persons. The decision lies solely with the Local Government. There is also the power of confinement under Regulation III of 1818.

Again:

"Two Grades of Powers Desirable.--We now proceed to elaborate ... the scheme we suggest.

"We think, as we have already indicated, that the powers to be acquired should be of two grades capable of being called into operation separately, possibly under different forms of notification.

"The first group of powers should be of the following nature:--

"(i) to demand security with or without sureties;

"(ii) to restrict residence or to require notification of change of residence;

"(iii) to require abstention from certain acts, such as engaging in journalism, distributing leaflets or attending meetings;

"(iv) to require that the person should periodically report to the police.

"The second group of powers should be--

"(i) to arrest;

"(ii) to search under warrant;

"(iii) to confine in non-penal custody.

"In Article 196 they provide "that in respect of acts committed before the Defence of India Act expires (or an earlier date if preferred) and danger apprehended by reason of such acts in the future it should be lawful to proceed against any person under any of the provisions which we have outlined without any notification. In other words, the new law is to be deemed to be operative for that purpose immediately."

Articles 198 and 199 suggest measures for restricting "Ingress into India" and also for regulating and restricting "Inter-Provincial Movements."

Need it be said that if these recommendations are accepted there will be no liberty of press or speech in India and the Reform will fail to suppress the revolutionary movement at all. Indian opinion is unanimous in condemning these recommendations as has been proved by the unanimous opposition of all sections of Indians in the Viceroy's Legislative Council to the bills that have been introduced to give effect to them.

FOOTNOTES:

[1] The Government of India have been on the inclined plane of repression as a remedy of discontent, which sometimes leads to crime, for now more than twenty years. They have in the interval placed on the Statute Book the Penal and Criminal Procedure Codes, the Post Office Amendment Acts, the Official Secrets Act, the Seditious Meetings Act, the Incitement to Offences Act, the Criminal Law Amendment Act, the Press Act, the Conspiracy Act, and the Defence of India Act. Have they attained their object? The very introduction of the two new Bills ... is the eloquent answer. What is it but a confession of failure?... _Leader_, Allahabad.

XV

THE REVOLUTIONARY PARTY

Revolution is a fever brought about by the constant and reckless disregard of the laws of health in the government of a country.

DAVID LLOYD GEORGE

"Causes and Aims of the War." Speech delivered at Glasgow, on being presented with the freedom of that city, June 29, 1917.

The authors of the report remark:

"There exists a small revolutionary party deluded by hatred of British rule and desire for the elimination of the Englishman into the belief that the path to independence or constitutional liberty lies through anarchical crime. Now it may be that such persons will see for themselves the wisdom of abandoning methods which are as futile as criminal; though if they do not, the powers of the law are or can be made sufficient for the maintenance of order. But the existence of such people is a warning against the possible consequences of unrestrained agitation in India. We are justified in calling on the political leaders, in the work of education that they will undertake, to bear carefully in mind the political inexperience of their hearers; and to look for further progress not to fiery agitation which may have consequences quite beyond their grasp, but to the machinery which we devise for the purpose. In every country there will be persons who love agitation for agitation's sake or to whom it appeals like an intoxicant. It is the duty of the leaders of Indian opinion to remember the effect on people not accustomed to weighing words of fiery and heated speeches. Where ignorance is widespread and passions are so easily aroused, nothing is easier than for political leaders to excite a storm; nothing harder for them than to allay it. Breaches of the peace or crimes of violence only put back the political clock. Above all things, when the future of India depends upon co-operation among all races, attacks upon one race or religion or upon another jeopardise the whole experiment. Nor can the condemnation of extremist and revolutionary action be left only to the official classes. We call upon all those who claim to be leaders to condemn with us and to support us in dealing with methods of agitation which drive schoolboys to crime and lead to religious and agrarian disturbance. Now that His Majesty's Government have declared their policy, reasonable men have something which they can oppose successfully to the excitement created by attacks on Government and by abuse of Englishmen, coupled with glowing and inaccurate accounts of India's golden past and appeals to race hatred in the name of religion. Many prominent Indians dislike and fear such methods. A new opportunity is now being offered to combat them; and we expect them to take it. Disorder must be prejudicial to the cause of progress and especially disorder as a political weapon."

We are in general agreement with the sentiments expressed in this extract but we will be wanting in candour if we fail to point out that, though the revolutionary movement in India is mainly political, it is partly economic and partly anarchic also. In the first two aspects it is at present the product of purely local (Indian) conditions. In the last, it is the reaction of world forces. While we are hoping that the change in the policy, now announced, will remove the political basis of it, we are not quite sure that that will ensure the extermination of the party or the total destruction of the movement. The growth of democratic political institutions in India must inevitably be followed by a movement for social democracy. The spirit of Revolution which is now fed by political inequalities will, when these are removed, find its sustenance in social inequalities. That movement may not be anti-British; perhaps it will not be, but that it will have some revolutionary element in it may be assumed. The lessons of history make it clear that the most effective way to prevent its falling into channels of violence is to have as little recourse to coercion as may be consistent with the preservation of general order and peace. The preservation of order and the unhindered exercise of private rights by all citizens is the pre-requisite condition to good government. Every government must see to it. It is their duty to use preventive as well as punitive methods. There are, however, ways of doing these things. One is the British, the American and the French way.[1] The other is what was heretofore associated with the name of the late Czar. The third is the German way. We hope the lessons of Czarism will not be lost on either party. The governments have as much to learn from it as the peoples. The best guarantee against the abnormal growth of a revolutionary movement is to adopt and follow the British methods and to avoid scrupulously and without fail any approach to the discredited Russian or Prussian methods.

The Indian soil and the Indian atmosphere are not very congenial for revolutionary ideas and revolutionary methods. The people are too docile, gentle, law-abiding and spiritually inclined to take to them readily. They are by nature and tradition neither vindictive nor revengeful. Their general spirit is opposed to all kinds of violence. They have little faith in the virtues of force. Unless they are provoked, and that too terribly, and are face to face with serious danger they do not like the use of force, even when recourse to it may be legal and morally defensible.

One of the causes of the growth of the revolutionary movement in India has been the insolence and the incivility of the European Community towards the Indian Community. The charges of cowardice so often hurled against the Bengali have played no insignificant part in the genesis of the Bengal revolutionary. The distinguished authors have put it rather mildly:

"If there are Indians who really desire to see India leave the empire, to get rid of English officers and English commerce, we believe that among their springs of action will be found the bitterness of feeling that has been nurtured out of some manifestation that the Englishman does not think the Indian an equal. Very small seeds casually thrown may result in great harvests of political calamity. We feel that, particularly at the present stage of India's progress, it is the plain duty of every Englishman and woman, official and non-official, in India to avoid the offence and the blunder of discourtesy: and none the less is it incumbent on the educated Indian to cultivate patience and a more generous view of what may very likely be no more than heedlessness or difference of custom."

We admire the dignified way in which they have addressed their advice to the educated Indian. But we hope they do not ignore that except in a few scattered instances heretofore the chief fault has lain with the ruling class. The proceedings of the Royal Commission on the Public Services of India are full of that racial swagger which the authors of this report have mildly condemned in the above extract and it is an open secret that that spirit was one of the dearly cherished articles of faith with the bureaucracy. We hope the war has effected a great change in their temper and both parties will be disposed to profit from the advice given to them in the report.

As to the duty of the educated leaders in the matter of suppressing the growth of the revolutionary movement in future, we beg to point out that all depends on how much faith the governing classes place in the professions of the popular leaders. Open public speeches and meetings appealing to racial or religious animosities have not played any important part in the development of the revolutionary spirit. It is not likely that the educated leaders will in any way consciously and voluntarily digress from the limits of reasonable criticism of Government policy, nor have they very often done so in the past. What has so far prevented the educated leaders from exercising an effective check on the growth of the revolutionary movement is their inability to associate on terms of friendship with the younger generation. This has been due partly to a false idea of dignity and partly to the fear that any association with hot-headed young men might bring discredit on them or might land them in hot water if, sometime or other, any one of their friends might do anything violent. Public speeches denouncing the revolutionary propaganda and the revolutionary activities or public condemnation of the latter in the press are good in their own way, but they are not quite effective. The revolutionist may ascribe it to fear, timidity, or hypocrisy. What is needed is that educated leaders of influence should be free to mix, socially and otherwise, with the younger generation so as to acquire an intimate knowledge of their trend of thought and bent of mind. It is in these intimate exchanges of views that they can most effectively exercise their powers of argument and persuasion and use their influence effectively. They will not succeed always, but in a good many cases they will. This cannot be done, however, unless the Executives and the Police relax their attentions toward them.

The bureaucrats' want of confidence in any Indian leader reached its limit in the attentions which the agents of the secret service bestowed on such men as the late Mr. Gokhale. It is an open secret that the secret service records have assigned a particular number to every public leader in India. Religious preachers and teachers of the type of Lala Hansraj and Lala Mûnshi Rám receive as much attention in the records as the writer of this book or Mr. B. G. Tilak or Mr. Bepin Chandra Pal. The "Servants of India" are as much the objects of solicitation on the part of the secret service men as the members of the Arya Samaj. Of course, agitators are agitators. All the great progressive souls of the world have had to agitate at one time or another in their lives. Agitation is the soul of democracy. There can be no progress in a democracy without agitation. Sir Denzil Ibbetson could pay no greater compliment to the Arya Samaj than by his remark in 1907 that, according to his information, wherever there was an Arya Samaj it was a centre of unrest. We hope the Governments are now convinced that the Arya Samaj has never been revolutionary. It is one of the most conservative, restraining forces in the social life of the country. Yet it cannot be denied that its propaganda has been and will continue to be one of the most disturbing factors in the placid waters of Indian life. The bureaucracy could not look upon it with kindness. Any attempt to persist in this kind of control or check or persecution will be fatal to the success of the appeal which Mr. Montagu and Lord Chelmsford have addressed to the public men of India in the extract given above.