INDIAN STUDIES INDIAN STUDIES BY GENERAL SIR O'MOORE CREAGH V.C., G.C.B., G.C.S.I. LONDON HUTCHINSON & CO PATERNOSTER ROW, E.G. y CONTENTS CHAP. - PAGE I. BRIEF GENERAL DESCRIPTION OF INDIA . 9 II. HINDUS ....... 15 III. MUSALMANS. ...... 28 IV. SIKHS 44 V. OTHER RACES 74 VI. THE INDIA OFFICE 84 VII. THE GOVERNMENT OF INDIA ... 92 VIII. LOCAL GOVERNMENT ..... 122 IX. LOCAL GOVERNMENT (continued) . . . 136 X. THE LAND 156 XL THE LAND TAX . . . . . " . 173 XII. THE VILLAGE 188 XIII. FEUDATORY STATES . . . . . 217 XIV. THE ARMY IN INDIA ..... 233 XV. THE INTELLIGENTSIA ..... 284 XVI. THE MONTAGU-CHELMSFORD REPORT . . 293 XVII. THE MONTAGU-CHELMSFORD REPORT (con- tinued) . . . . . .310 411 5 INDIAN STUDIES CHAPTER I BRIEF GENERAL DESCRIPTION OF INDIA TO enable my readers to follow what I shall say hereafter, it is necessary to take a brief view of India and its peoples. India is an immense peninsula, triangular in shape and having an area of over 1,800,000 square miles, or some sixteen times greater than that of the British Isles. Its length from Cape Comorin to the north of Kashmir is over 2,000 miles, and its breadth from Mekran to China is some 3,000. On the north-west, north and north-east its land frontier borders on Persia, Afghanistan, the Russian and Chinese empires, Siam and the French territory on the Upper Mekong. Its coast line is 4,000 miles in length and is washed by the Indian Ocean. On the north it is guarded by the great mountain ranges called by Oriental geographers the Stony Girdle of the Earth, the peaks of which, above an altitude of about 12,000 feet, are the abode of perpetual snow. The outer or northern ranges of the Stony Girdle of the Earth are the Hindu Rush, the Kera- goram and the Himalayas, across which the passes are at a great elevation and impassable for modern armies. The only roads by which armies of to-day can enter India are through Eastern Afghanistan ; they traverse the Sulaiman or Sufaid Koh ranges, via the Khyber Kuram, which is closed by snow for five months annually, the Gomul and Bolan passes. Through one or other of these the various conquerors of India from the land side have always passed. This frontier is undoubtedly very strong, but military history gives no example of the successful passive io INDIAN STUDIES defence of a mountain' fan'g'e against an efficient offensive attack. The future. Development of railways in Afghanistan, and more especially in Persia, may adversely affect our military position, and certainly will do so if we don't see to it that the alignment of those in the south of Persia are so arranged as to suit us strategically. In^the perennial snows of the Stony Girdle of jthe Earth the two great navigable rivers of India, the Indus and the Ganges and their great tributaries, take their rise. These rivers are in flood during the hot season when the snow melts, and their waters are then also increased by the seasonal rains. Thejnountain tribes and people of the interior of India call all great expanses of water, whether rivers or lakes, " The Ocean " (darya), which few of them, even to-day, have ever seen. -.^There is a very old Pathan legend which says that Alexander naving conquered the world arrived on the banks of the Indus ; his ambition was so great that, not satisfied with his achievements on land, he resolved to conquer the ocean and all its inhabitants also. ^ His Wazir, who was named Ayaz, tried to dissuade him from such a dangerous enterprise and one which no human being had hitherto attempted, but without success. Ayaz then requested him to take some carrier pigeons with him, so that, at least, the King could inform him, whom he left behind, when he got into difficulties. To this Alexander agreed. He started with his army on inflated hides, but had not proceeded far before they were all swallowed by sea monsters. Before the King was taken into the belly of one of these a la mode de Jonah, he loosed a carrier pigeon which flew back to his house carrying a message from him to his Queen telling her of his dangerous predicament. She, in great trepidation, at once consulted the wise Ayaz, who recommended the collection of an immense amount of cotton, which he ordered to be thrown into the river. He said the sea monsters would swallow it and become so buoyant that they would be forced to ascend to the surface, on which Alexander and his men could be rescued. The Queen accepted this advice and events occurred as the Wazir said ; the King and his army were rescued, both he and the Queen showered honours and rewards on Ayaz, whose advice they ever afterwards acted on. The moral drawn is that what Alexander could not do, no one else can, and that the wise will leave the ocean severely alone. BRIEF GENERAL DESCRIPTION OF INDIA 11 The Pathan is not a sea-faring man to-day, although in recent years he has learnt much about the ocean, for he travels much, but when he takes to a sea life he prefers to do so as a stoker. Alexander (Sekander) is a name given by the natives of the Punjab to conquerors. In my youth when wandering round the ruins of Taxila I got into conversation with an old Musalman who lived in the neighbourhood. He assured me he well recollected the invasion of Alexander. I replied " You must be a very old man, for it occurred some two thousand years ago." His answer was, " I don't know how many years ago it was, neither do I know how old I am, but I recollect his coming quite well. He was a good Musalman and so were all his soldiers." I didn't dispute the correctness of what he said as I had no doubt he mixed up Alexander with Dost Mahomed Khan, who invaded the Punjab in 1813. The interior of India consists of immense plains intersected by mountain ranges and lofty plateaux which have been strong- holds for the defeated inhabitants during all the foreign invasions. The internal mountain ranges are the Eastern and Western Ghauts, which run parallel to and at short distances from the east and west coast, almost meeting in the south ; the Aravalli range, which rises at the Delhi ridge and runs through Rajputana to the borders of Goojerat and the Vindhia, which runs through the centre of India almost east and west. These internal moun- tains are without snow, the rivers which rise in them depending for their water on the seasonal rain. During the dry season they are, almost to their mouths, merely a succession of pools, while in the rainy season they are raging torrents ; at no time are they navigable for more than a few miles from the sea. In all Indian rivers there is a good supply of wholesome fish, which greatly contributes to the food of the people, and would do so to a larger extent but for the objection held by so many millions of Hindus to taking life or eating flesh. In them also are many alligators, which also frequent all tanks and lakes, and devour many people bathing in them and destroy sheep and goats and sometimes kine. The rainy season is called in India the Barsat Ki mosam.; mosam meaning season and barsat rain the rainy season ; this name has been abbreviated by foreigners to Monsoon. The Monsoon usually commences about the end of May and lasts to the end of September or the beginning of October ; the rainfall 12 INDIAN STUDIES varies greatly, being greatest in the south and east ; in some places it descends in torrents, in others it is very scanty. North of the Jhulem river and the Aravalli range there is little Monsoon- rain. Except during the south-west Monsoon and for about a week in winter, when the north-west wind blows, there is no rain throughout the whole of India, which is parched in those parts where irrigation works do not exist. These obviously cannot be constructed where there are either no rivers or scanty rainfall. The south-west Monsoon originates in the Southern Ocean, whence great masses of cloud are blown over the Indian Ocean by the south-west trade wind ; on striking the south coast of India, where the Eastern and Western Ghauts meet, they are, after breaking into copious rains, diverted north along these ranges, giving moisture to the whole country south of the Aravalli range and carrying rain and snow to the Stony Girdle of the Earth. With good south-west Monsoon rains the whole parched country becomes green as if by magic and, where the rainfall is good, water is available for storage in artificial tanks and lakes to irrigate the crops in the dry season, and to fill the wells by sub-soil drainage. The cost of building these irrigation works and of their upkeep is a very great strain on the cultivators and accounts for much of their poverty. The crop grown during the south-west Monsoon is called the Kharif ; that grown in winter, mostly by water from irrigation works, but greatly improved by the winter rain, is called the Rabbi. Generally speaking it may be said that, for human food, the Kharif crop is the least important but of inestimable value for fodder ; on it and that of grass in the vast jungles depends almost entirely the food for cattle ; while for human food the Rabbi is all important, but for fodder it is not so. India offers every variety of climate from temperate to tropical. In the Stony Girdle of the Earth it is that of an exaggerated Switzerland ; the general level of these mountains decreases from north to south, the well watered valleys and pine-clad slopes of the north are replaced in the south by arid, waterless hills where the heat of summer is almost unbearable. Through- out this borderland the climate varies according to the altitude ; in winter it is good throughout. In the great plains the heat is excessive in summer ; all day long and well into the night a hot, dry, dust-laden wind blows BRIEF GENERAL DESCRIPTION OF INDIA 13 from the south-west, which ceases during the south-west Monsoon and is replaced by a tepid atmosphere like that of a Turkish bath. In the winter, in the plains of the Punjab, Rajputana and Central India the climate for some four or five months is tem- perate. In the two former provinces pools are frozen over, but the length of the winter decreases the further south the latitude. The climate of the internal mountain ranges and high plateaux above an altitude of 4,000 feet is temperate in summer and cool in winter, below that altitude it is similar to that of the great plains. The climate naturally re-acts on the people, where the winter is temperate they are fairer, of better physique and more manly. It is from the Stony Girdle of the Earth that the virile faces have for long ages gone forth as conquerors of India, and the further south they have migrated in the country the quicker they have -lost their virility, till in the south and the Ganges - Vallft little. India, with its immense coast-line, furnishes no sailors, in the sea warrior sense, equal to those of other lands. Good sea warriors are only made in cold seas. The sailor classes of India are only fit for employment on merchant ships under foreign command. Because of its mountain ranges, high wooded plateaux, rivers, water-courses, deserts and morasses, inter-communication was formerly difficult at all times and impossible during the Monsoon. Now owing to railways and good roads this is only so in very remote parts of the country. In former days defeated tribes or races found refuge from their conquerors in the fastness of Central India, the deserts of ^Sindh and Rajputana and in Southern India, or else became ^ their slaves ; the conquering races came from the north, where bravery has its home. Nowadays modern armies can march almost anywhere, and with the introduction of the telegraph, railways, good roads, mechanical transport, modern aeroplanes, guns and rifles, there is no hope for the rebellious or no place of refuge for them in case of defeat ; such a mutiny as that of 1857 ^ s an impossibility ; even local riots on any great scale cannot occur if promptly dealt with at the beginning ; the great scourges of foreign conquest, anarchy and revolution are no longer possible as long as the British 14 INDIAN STUDIES Empire is not defeated. .This is well understood by the warlike classes who know what war means ; it is only among a few of the unwarlike classes, who don't, that a windy sedition prevails which may cause riots among ignorant or innocent people if not kept within bounds. Famine, cholera and plague still remain ; the suppression of the two latter diseases lies to a great extent in the hands of the people themselves and much is being done to mitigate their severity, but much more in the way of sanitation is required, which I will refer to in detail later. Famine, that is to say general scarcity of human food and forage for cattle, is caused by local or general failure of the rains. This no Government can prevent; I will allude to it hereafter, here I will only say that the Famine relief arrangements of the Government of India are such as any Government may well be proud of, and the Indian peoples that I know are extremely grateful to Govern- ment for its sympathy and foresight in this matter, as they always are for any kindness or sympathy shown them. CHAPTER II HINDUS ON the 20th August, 1916, Government made the following announcement in Parliament : " The policy of His Majesty's Government, with which the Government of India are in complete accord, is that of increasing the association of Indians in every branch of the administration and the gradual development of self-governing institutions, with a view to pro- gressive realization of responsible government in India as an integral part of the British Empire . . . progress in this policy can only be achieved by successive stages." The Secretary of State's report as to the manner in which he proposes to carry out this policy has been put before the public for criticism, and he has promised that ample opportunity for its discussion will be given, which will in due course be sub- mitted to Parliament. It is on Parliament that the final responsi- bility rests for the welfare of the Indian peoples. I will say nothing as to the wisdom of the time selected for making the pronouncement or for carrying out the subsequent inquiry. It is with the report itself that I will deal in my final chapter, but before doing so, to enable my readers to judge of what I say, I will give them some information on India generally. The question which will agitate the public mind is whether the recommendations of the Secretary of State and the Governor- General, or as the former erroneously calls him the Viceroy, will benefit the Indian peoples or not. There will also be a question as to whether the methods resorted to by them for obtaining that Indian opinion on which their proposals are said to be based were satisfactoiy. Forms of government are rather the result of racial and 16 INDIAN STUDIES religious temperament long acting on peoples than the means of producing any durable alteration in the disposition of those subjected to them. All history records that no calamities are so great as those arising from forcing on the people of one race the institutions of another. One of the many examples of this truth is close by in Ireland. The contrast of the different degrees of civilization existing among the different races, languages and religions in India, Inany of which possess an ancient civilization, while others are in a state little better than savages, afford decisive evidence that it is to the disposition of the peoples themselves to which wise men will look to find out the suitability of political institutions for them. Especially is it so when these differences have been emphasized from time immemorial by the effect of climate, locality, morality and characteristics. It is not by the opinions of a few selected individuals or small bodies of self-constituted representatives of " all India " that the views of the masses can be gauged. These masses in India are the agricultural classes and those who live indirectly on agriculture, who compose nine-tenths of the population. They are mostly ignorant, only six per cent, in British India are literate in the various verna- culars, and only half per cent, are so in English. It is necessary that those who propose new methods of govern- ment for Indians should know both their individual and political psychology. This means having a knowledge of the past history, religion, language and social customs of the numerous sects and castes composing them. For any one man, British or Indian, to attain this knowledge regarding all India is im- possible, to do so regarding one province only is the study of years. Politicians who don't understand the psychology of a foreign race display a dangerous tendency to evolve a theory out of their inner consciousness and to look on it not as it is, but as they think it should be. What they think it should be generally coincides with their own political views. That such has been so in the present case appears quite evident from Mr. Montagu's report in another case. We have a good example before our eyes. Our politicians refused to believe in the enmity of Germany. Politicians of one race who are educated by another and are out of touch with its customs and prejudices adopt their political views from their " spiritual home ; " they are not safe guides regarding their own countrymen, yet so far HINDUS 17 as I can see they are the Indians who carry most weight with and were chiefly consulted by Mr. Montagu, the Governor-General of India, and many high officials. I firmly believe that the opinion of India as a whole can only be obtained by the democratic method hitherto avoided by our democrats of enfranchising each religion and caste, and " allowing only its own members to represent it ; all would thus express their views, which could be focussed by the Govern- ment of India, and those of the majority should alone guide great constitutional changes. I have spent over forty years of my life in India. I have often lived months together with natives without associating with Europeans ; during that time I travelled in all parts of the country, living in both agricultural villages and great towns. I have many friends among all classes, high and low ; several of them have asked me to put their views before the British people who they believe will do them justice. It is in com- pliance with their request that I write this book. I regret that I do not wield a more able pen. I will relate what I know of the Indian peoples, and I trust what I say will enable my readers to judge of many things which are not known generally, and so to be in a better position to form an opinion on the policy put before them by the Secretary of State. I don't profess to know all India, but I do know certain parts of it extremely well ; other parts well and the rest but in- differently. The parts which I know extremely well, and to which my remarks mainly apply are in the Punjab, " The ^5 word of India," the home of its most warlike peoples, and the adjacent districts of the United Provinces of Oudh and Agra, and also^ Rajputana, the home of ancient Hindu chivalry. I Jiave a considerable knowledge of the history, religion, languages, literature and folk-lore of these provinces, so I may claim ""acquaintance with the psychology of their peoples. I know Central India and the Dekkan well ; the rest of the country but indifferently^ It is obvious that, if one does not know the psychology of a people, it is quite useless to hope to understand their psychology, either individually or in mass. Especially is this the case in India ; for Indians are unusually suspicious of strangers, and both Indian etiquette and the innate courtesy of most Indians forbid them to say anything disagreeable to one they regard as a superior. Moreover, their previous ex- 1 8 INDIAN STUDIES perience of changes many of them not for the better renders them diffident in giving their views to itinerant reformers. Let us just consider what India is, when reasonable beings will at once recognize that it is impossible for one man whether native or foreign, however great his ability and acumen may be to know it all, even after the five years spent in the country by a Viceroy or Governor from home. Let us compare India with Europe : Europe has an area of 3,750,000 square miles and a population of 400,000,000 ; while India has an area of 1,850,000 square miles and a population of 314,955,000. That is, it is equal in size and population to the Continent of Europe, European Russia excluded. Who will credit anyone with knowing the peoples scattered over such a vast and diversified area ? Of this immense population, two thirds are under direct British rule. About one third enjoy a modified home-rule, in some 500 feudatory states, scattered all over the land, and varying in size and population from that of an European second-class Kingdom to that of an English parish. The princes who rule these feudatory states are of different race and caste from the majority of the peoples over whom they hold sway. The great Musalman state of Hyderabad is ruled by a dynasty of Turkish descent ; that of Bhopal by one of Pathan origin, though the majority of the inhabitants of both are Hindus or aborigines. The Sudra Mahratta rulers of Central India are natives of the Dekkan, and amongst their subjects, in whose eyes they are foreigners, there are practically no Mahrattas. Although these states enjoy home-rule, their Government is autocratic, but the British Government is responsible for its not being unduly tyrannous. I will now give a very brief resume of Indian history, and describe the principal religions of the country, without some knowledge of which it is impossible for anyone to appreciate the existing conditions. The original inhabitants of India were various Turanian tribes, who carried on perpetual wars with one another, so that from remote ages the population has been disunited. These aborigines professed an animistic form of worship ; they had no caste system or hereditary priesthood ; they buried their dead ; they drank fermented liquor and ate flesh of all kinds, including that of kine, considered sacred by Hindus, and pigs, forbidden to Musalmans. The descendants of these aboriginal HINDUS 19 tribes who are outside the Hindu pale numbered, according to the census of 1872, some 20,000,000 ; they are now said to number 60,000,000 ; they are spread throughout the length and breadth of the land. They are treated as beasts by Hindus, and this has been so from the most remote ages. They are regarded by them as out-castes, and are only allowed to fill menial offices, such as those of village scavengers and the like. Hindus regard them as unclean and to touch one means social defilement. After their conquest, the Hindus enslaved those aborigines who could not find refuge in mountain, desert, or forest fast- nesses. To-day the aborigines may be divided into two cate- gories, viz. : those who were enslaved, and those who maintained a rude independence. On the institution of caste, the enslaved aborigines were accepted into Hinduism in its Sudra, or servile, caste. Those who kept their freedom are still to be found in mountains, deserts, or forests, all over India. Many forests and deserts were reclaimed and populated in the course of time, when those Turanian tribes, who took refuge in them, became either predial slaves to Hindus, or remained hereditary criminals or wander- ing tribes in a very low state of civilization. Some, however, have in recent years been civilized by British missionaries and officials, and many are Christians. Rather than submit to the yoke of their age-long oppressors, these aborigines would fight to the last drop of their blood. They hate Hindus with an undying hatred, except in Rajputana, where some Rajput rulers have accorded them fairly decent treatment. The Arians now represented by the Hindus descended on india~from the North, in successive conquering hordes, and, after long and bloody wars, they conquered most of the Turanian graces. In these wars they were assisted as every subsequent conqueror of India has been by some of the native tribes whom they took into their fold, even in the higher castes, and these are now considered Arians. There is no doubt that, among * Brahmans and Rajputs, there are many sub-tribes of Turanian descent. The Hindus also intermarried with the subject race. The Hindus having conquered most of the Turanians set out to fight one another for supremacy, and those of the defeated people who had retained their independence took sides in the fray as suited them. 20 INDIAN STUDIES During one of the short periods of peace which came from time to time amid the general anarchy, the Hindus invented the caste system. They did this some 2,500 years ago, and from 'that time present-day Hinduism may be said to have been established, for the system then introduced has changed very little ever since. XJie _astersystem is the most perfect one that the wit of man has ever invented for the purpose of enabling the few to oppress the many, and it has had dire results on Hinduism. Since its institution Hindus have been disunited. The warrior-class has been limited to very small numbers, and the vast majority having become pacific both by creed and habit, Hindus have ever been an easy prey to the invader. .JBudhism at one time prevailed over the greater part of India, but little trace of it now remains, except in its influence on Hinduism. The effect of this influence has been to further increase the pacificism of the un warlike tribes. The caste-system is the string which binds Hinduism together, for Hindus have no obligatory religious belief. The penalty for a serious breach of caste rules was formerly outcasting, but it rarely happens nowadays that anyone breaks caste rules to such an extent as to necessitate it. Nowadays offences against caste-regulations are usually met by fines, with the exception of those regarding the sanctity of Brahmans and kine and inter- marriage between persons of different caste, which meet with no mercy. Out-caste-ing is a terrible punishment. It means that the offender is thrown out of the community into which he has been born, and must live apart, rejected by men and gods. A myth was invented which gave the caste-system divine sanction, and it has taken such deep root in Hindu social institutions that it forms the vital part of Hinduism, which nothing but a religious revolution can upset. The caste-system, as originally established, consisted of four castes, as follows : (A.) The Brahmans, or sacerdotal and ruling caste, were also the custodians of all knowledge, religious and secular. Brahmans are supposed to have imparted all knowledge to mankind, and against their decisions there is no appeal. (B.) The Rajputs, or people of royal descent, who were the onTy warlike caste. Their duty was to guard and protect the people, and for this purpose they fought among themselves in HINDUS 21 support of contending factions. They often fought for no other reason than to keep their hands in. (C.) The Vaisya, or agricultural class, who tended the herds, tilled the fields and carried on trade. (D.) The Sudra, or servile caste, formed from the vanquished aborigines who accepted Hinduism, served the three other orders in menial capacities. The first three castes were called the twice-born, and males wore the sacred string, or janeo, next the skin and over the shoulder, to distinguish them from the servile order. This only Brahmans, Rajputs, and some of the trading class said to be of Rajput descent, wear to-day. Boys are usually invested with it with great ceremony by Brahman priests, between the ages of seven and nine years. They must assume it before marriage. The language of the three first orders was originally Sanskrit. Nowadays the Brahmans, except a few of the most learned, know nothing of it ; they speak the numerous vernaculars of the countries they inhabit, whilst the Rajputs speak various dialects of Hindi, which are to Sanskrit what French or Italian is to Latin. The Vaisya caste, in the course of time, mingled with the Sudra caste, and has now disappeared, being only represented by the small mercantile non-Hindu community called Jains. Agricultural duties are now divided among all castes, except 'that of the Banias (traders and money-lenders). There are Brahman, Rajput and Sudra agriculturists ; the majority being of the latter order. Trading and banking is carried on largely by a caste now called Kshatri, which was the ancient name of the Rajputs, from whom it claims descent. In virtue of this claim, Kshatris ^are considered twice-born and wear the sacred string. They are now merchants, bankers, village-shopkeepers and usurers. They are generally known as Banias the word is synonymous among the rural population with that which may be translated as " Mean, cowardly, skin-flint." They are except in the Punjab, where many of them have become Sikhs a timid and unwarlike class. Brahmans also keep shops, especially at the great Hindu "~snrmes, at which all classes of Hindus attend. All castes can eat food prepared by Brahmans, or drink water from their hands. The military profession has long been adopted byBrah mans 22 INDIAN STUDIES and Sudras. Amongst the latter, the Jats and Mahrattas have done so in the greatest numbers. During the long years of anarchy, Brahmans have almost disappeared as rulers. In ancient days, Rajputs replaced them in the princely office, and, In recent times, Sudras of now warlike castes have done so. The various castes have split up into sub-castes, whose interests, customs and languages are different one from the other in the different parts of India which they inhabit, as are also their religious rites and ceremonies. Each caste has its own caste-rules, decided by its religious council. Rajputs are the least divided, and also the least under Brahmanical sub- jection, to which all, however, bow in a greater or less degree. The Sudras are sub-divided into the greatest number of sub- castes, and each of which is quite distinct from the others. There are said to be over 250 sub-castes of Sudras, and some are generally allowed to be socially superior to others, and are so in reality. There is a vast social difference between the agriculturist who owns the land and the artisan who works for him, though both may be Sudras. The majority of the Hindu petty officials serving under Government are of Sudra caste, though many are Brahmans and Kshatris, and some few are Rajputs. A great majority of the Hindu politicians ars Sudras, but they mostly try to prove that they really belong to a superior caste, which, however, doesn't go down with other Hindus. The fact is, that Sudras greatly differ in status. Some are ruling princes such as the Maharajas of Kolhapur, Indore and Gwalior, and the Jat rulers of Dholpur and Bhurtpur ; others are artisans and sweepers, but however great a Sudra may be, the taint of his servile caste is always with him, and, on this account, Sudras are looked down upon by the twice-born, who if orthodox will neither intermarry with them, eat food cooked by them, nor drink water from their hands. In recent times there have been many modifications as regards men in the caste-rules of all castes, in order to suit the advance of modern civilization ; but they have not affected women, whose deplorable condition is a disgrace to Hinduism. The practice, which is almost universal especially among the urrwarlike castes -of marrying girls of a tender age, from seven to nine years, to old men often with many wives is nothing short of barbarous. In some castes, children in the mothers' HINDUS 23 womb are married if on birth they prove to be of different sexes. Polygamy is practised by all classes, and an unlimited number of wives is sanctioned by Hindu religious law. The life led by Hindu widows, of those who have never even seen their husbands, is one of untold hardship. Their enforced celibacy leads to disgrace and crime. In other days the remedy was that called Satti, or the burning of widows on the funeral pyre of their deceased husbands. It has been stopped by the British Government, but I have known cases where a widow, actuated partly by grief and perhaps to a greater extent by dread of her future life, has with the consent of her relations starved herself to death. The secrets of the Zenana are not known outside, but there is every reason to believe that such as well as female infanticide is common. The religious belief prevailing generally amongst Hindus is that of the transmigration of souls. There is they say no deliverance from a future existence until the soul is re-absorbed in Brahma, from whom it emanated. It must appear and disappear in the world in different forms, mineral, vegetable, animal, human or divine, before it attains purity. The doings of the soul in each existence are called its Karma, and in this state it is affected by good and bad actions. If the soul has behaved badly, it reappears in an inferior state of existence, if well, in a superior one, in the next stage of its journey to purity, on which it passes through various temporary abodes in another world. Brahman priests are the vehicles through whom the conditions of deceased persons in these abodes can be improved. Comforting Brahman priests means comforting the deceased ; a gift to a priest means a gift to the deceased. There are various methods of ameliorating the Karma. They consist in religious rites, visits to sacred shrines, feeding Brah- mans, sacred monkeys and other sacred animals, including alligators and fish, which live in sacred waters. It would make those who direct the Pilgrimage to Lourdes die of envy if they saw the hundreds of thousands of Hindu pilgrims who visit the great shrines, much to the profit of millions of Brahmans. An immense post-mortem advantage is secured by nourishing the sacred cow, which animal is nearly as sacred as a Brahman. Its urine is used for religious lustrations and as a medicine. A cow-dung-washed floor is necessary for some religious cere- monies. The best remedy of all, however, to defeat a bad 24 INDIAN STUDIES Karma and attain purity of soul, is to subject the body to priva- tions of all kinds, to withdraw from all worldly concerns, and to take the life of no sentient thing. In pursuance of this dogma many of India's best Hindumen have abandoned worldly con- cerns, much to the public detriment, and the land has been filled with religious ascetics, who go about naked, torturing their miserable, attenuated bodies in ways too disgusting to relate, and who are, moreover, a heavy tax on poor Hindu villagers, whose charity is unbounded. There are many castes the members of which are supposed to be civilized and who are wealthy, well-educated and shrewd in business who will not take the life of even a bug. In the great city of Bombay there are men, who, before going to rest, will pay a coolie to lie in their beds and give these insects a meal, so that their own repose may be secured they will on no account destroy the creatures ! Modern Hindus formerly worshipped a triad, consisting of Brahma, the Father of the Gods ; Vishnu, the Preserver ; and Shiva, the Destroyer, each associated with a Sakti, or consort. Brahma- worship has now fallen into disuse. There is only one shrine existing that of Pushkar in Rajputana which is dedicated to him. The cult of Vishnu, the Preserver, and his Sakti is now the most popular, while that of Shiva, the Destroyer, and his Sakti, is now affected chiefly by religious ascetics. The Sakti side of Hindu worship is carried on in the hot regions of Bengal and the South, with orgiastic ceremonies of the most disgusting kind ; Sakti-ism, or Tentraism, as this disgusting worship is called, is not practised among the warlike classes or the hardy peasants of the colder regions. Besides this triad, there are thousands of other gods, any of which a Hindu may select. When he has done so, he is devoted and zealous in his service. He is ever trying to accumulate spiritual wealth, but he is uncritical, and rarely pictures any- thing truly or concisely in his mind. Sometimes he exaggerates ; at other times, belittles, which probably accounts for the varieties of the objects of Hindu worship. ^At the bottom of the Hindu mind is always reverence for force. It is this that makes Hindus "worship kings and princes, and induces them to take their ideas of their deities from the forces of Nature. They regard with awe all things grand or uncommon in the universe ; the creating, preserving and destroying forces of Nature ; great men, such HINDUS 25 as the deified heroes, Rama and Krishna, who are incarnations of Vishnu ; the sun, planets, great rivers, large shade-giving trees ; beautiful birds, such as the peacock ; monkeys, large or ferocious animals, such as the elephant or tiger ; peculiar stones ; snakes ; the cow, and various other things. The use of flesh as food and of fermented liquors is forbidden to all Hindus, but the prohibition is not adhered to by many of the warlike castes, or by most of those of the Sudra caste, many warlike and Sudra castes as well as some sub-castes of Brahmans eat the flesh of goats or sheep, which they kill by striking off the head with a knife, in contradistinction to the Musalman practice of cutting the throat. All Hindus a few religious, mendicant classes excepted cremate the dead. Hindu religious rites, prejudices and festivals are innumerable, and interfere with the ordinary routine of their lives, especially those regarding births and deaths, which involve considerable periods of seclusion. Their prejudices are very detrimental to their agricultural operations. They regard dogs and asses as despicable and unclean, and will not use them ; fowls are only kept by the very lowest classes ; few castes will eat eggs. Hindus are ever in fear of evil spirits ; especially those of deceased aborigines, who they believe work untold mischief on them. They dread the evil eye, and spend much money on astrologers, who cast horoscopes and decide on the auspicious hour for starting on journeys, the suitability of marriages, the days for sowing the crops, etc. Hindus are perhaps the most superstitious people in the world ; there are inauspicious days for nearly all undertakings ; some villagers believe birds can give them much useful informa- tion, and there are castes who profess to know their language and to interpret it for a consideration. Practice amongst the Hindus is a profitable business for astrologers, people supplying charms, fortune-tellers, quack-doctors, cheats and liars of all sorts. As there is no Mendicancy Act, all these rascals roam the land at their pleasure. There are whole castes of them ; some aris- tocratic and " twice-born," who have the best practice ; others menial and Sudra, who don't do badly. _Jt is quite evident that, if the activities of any community be restricted for long ages to certain vocations, the principle of heredity must influence its thoughts and physical condition. ie hereditary caste-system inflicted grave injustice on the 26 INDIAN STUDIES great majority of Hindus, but they find the remedy in the doctrine of Karma. They look on this life merely as an episode in the career of the soul, and they are assured that its defects will be remedied in due course by their own actions, good for good, evil for evil. Thus, for long ages, they were content to accept unquestioningly what came from above, be it from Government or God. Now, year by year, the railway, the telegraph, the newspapers, the school-master and other agencies are dis- seminating new views, and ancient traditions, social ones ex- cluded, are modified in different degrees amongst various classes. But of one thing we can rest assured, and that is that unless a complete revolution in Hinduism be effected, of which there is no sign caste itself will never be upset to the extent of abolishing the rigidity between the various orders ; but caste- rules may be and have been modified as far as men are con- cerned in a less or greater degree, to suit some of the requirements of modern civilization. Without a knowledge of Hindu philosophy called Yoga no one need attempt to fathom the Hindu mind. This philosophy has affected Hindu thought throughout the ages, and has left an indelible impression on it which can never be removed from it by Western systems, which compared with it are but of yesterday. However educated a. Hindu may t>e, his education will never efface the influence of Yoga ; it will always be at the back of his thoughts. The Hindu caste-system has not as some have imagined been the production of Brahmans alone. This is shown by the fact that it has from time immemorial been influenced by the worship of three great men who were Rajputs, worshipped as incarnations of Vishnu ; they are : Rama, Krishna and Budha. "The two former were warriors and legislators, and their influence among the warrior caste is now and has ever been greater "than that of Brahmans. Budha was practically an atheist, who preached the abolition of caste, the equality of all mankind, and the sanctity of the life of all sentient things. Xhe Brahman jpriests, and it must be recalled all Brahmans are not such, who also preached the sanctity of life, have their greatest influence among the unwarlike castes who, since the time of Budha, neglecting his other tenets, adopted his pacificism and have become more pacific than they were before. It will be easily seen that, in a philosophy derived from the teachings of such HINDUS 27 divergent characters, there are many contradictions, but these are got over by the orthodox, who insist that all the ancient books have both a hidden and an obvious meaning. All those which corroborate ancient traditions and customs contain the obvious meaning, with a great deal which is hidden from all except Brahman priests. Other passages have a hidden meaning which can only be discerned by their rightful interpreters, the Brahman priests. These, they say, are those passages which are used by innovators who seek by their false interpretation of them to bolster up new-fangled, blasphemous, so-called reforms, in order to support their atheistical views. The Brahman priests alone are divinely initiated into the mysteries of these ancient writings, and all the troubles of the world are caused in this, the Kali Yug, or Age of Ignorance, by innovators, who are void of all respect for what is sacred, with which Brahmans alone can deal. The orthodox Hindu mind always looks back- wards, and puts down all the troubles of the world to perverted modern knowledge, which is at the disposal of the many, and not as it should be at that of the divinely-appointed few alone who are its only lawful custodians. They say that all will be put right when Kalki comes. He is the expected Messiah and an incarnation of the Creator. He will restore all things including caste to their original state, and then the world will return to the golden age, called Sat Yug, when all will be happy because Brahmans will then regain their lawful authority. This belief gives Brahmans complete control over the mind of all other Hindus, especially women. Original Hindu philosophy teaches belief in a personal God, and self -surrender to Him, as the only means of salvation, and this is the belief of some enlightened Hindus. But the com- mentaries on this doctrine are of equal authority with those inculcating it. They explain it away or confuse it, the general result of which is that a religious system has been evolved which it is impossible to act upon, or even to comprehend. This system is followed by the great majority of Hindus. Its tenets differ everywhere, according to the decisions of the various local Gyanis, or religious experts, or the views of individuals. But no religious belief is binding on any Hindu. Each one can believe what he likes, provided he does not repudiate caste, the supremacy and sanctity of Brahmans and the sanctity of kine. CHAPTER III MUSALMANS DURING the period between the final conquest of the greater part of India by the Arians or Hindus and the first wave of Musalman invasion, many other conquerors came "*to~"India from the North. They left no permanent impression on jthe_peoples outside the Punjab, in which province the result was an. admixture of new Tartar, Hun and Greek blood with that of its inhabitants, which added not a little to their warlike qualities. Even Punjabi Banias (trading class) in later times N have shown war-like qualities not to be found in people of this caste elsewhere. Each Musalman conquering wave recruited its forces among the Punjab warrior tribes, many of whom they converted to Islam at a very early period, and the conquest of that province from the North has invariably been the prelude to that of the other and less warlike parts of India. Eixu^jtime immemorial the Punjab has been called " the sword of India," and it has ever been the home of her bravest warrior races. In this war two-fifths of the troops India has sent into the field are Punjabis, although the population of this province is only - one-twelfth of that of the rest of the country. Musalmans in India to-day number some 70,000,000, nearly all of whom are of ancient Hindu or Turanian race. The few of foreign race who have not amalgamated with them arrived in India in comparatively recent times, ancLonly a proportion of these_hav(L preserved their riorJJiejQi_ valour ,_and_ the__purit y of their blood. Most of those who have done so are to be found in Northern India. The Musalmans of Hindu and Turanian race are descendants of ancestors converted forcibly, or who accepted Islam volun- 28 MUSALMANS 29 tarily, to improve the low social status to which, as Hindus, they were condemned in perpetuity by the caste system. ... Spine of these Musalman converts, were ofjyarlike Hindu castes ; the "gfeal majority were of uriwarlike Turanian castes. Their descendants still retain the characteristics of their ancestors, and many of their caste customs ; the varied castes have never blended. The unwarlike form by far the largest proportion of Indian Musalmans. The best known of the warlike castes are those now called Musalman Rajputs in the Punjab, and else- where Rangers or Kaim Khanis and others. Musalman foreign conquerors came into India from Persia, the " stony girdle of the earth " and neighbouring countries, in successive waves ; their armies were small in number , they consisted of soldiers of many different nationalities, Usbeks, Persians, Turks, Afghans, Pathans and Moghuls, wi&~li~Tew Arabs, the whole commanded by a leader of renown of one of these races, by the name of whose nationality his army was designated ; but this by no means always implied that those of his race were the most numerous in it. The soldiers from these cold or barren regions were hardy and brave ; the children of the soil, although numerically much superior, could never resist the invaders, who conquered them and settled in their midst, but never blended with them. 4^ er one wave had resided some years on the rich Indian land, with its hot climate, its soldiers degenerated and although assisted by those natives they had conquered they always fell a prey to succeeding waves. Each wave was tempted by the facility with which its predecessors had conquered their possessions, and thus, as one wave conquered and degenerated, it was succeeded by another. The natives and their degenerate foreign rulers were never able to resist new invasions. But there were occasionally exceptions to the normal procedure, as some invaders, such as Mahmud of Ghuzni, Timour the Tartar, Nadir Shah the Persian, and Ahmad Shah Durrani the Afghan, came merely to plunder and destroy and never settled in India, returning to their own countries laden with spoil and slaves when they had attained their object, so they left little racial effect behind them. Musalman conquerors treated the Hindus much as they had the Turanians ; jnost of the warlike Hindu tribes and their Brahmans were driven into mountain, desert or forest fastnesses, 30 INDIAN STUDIES where they maintained their independence and religion unim- paired and continued for long ages to wage war against the intruders, who sometimes were strong enough to force them to acknowledge their suzerainty, though in most cases it was but of a shadowy nature. In the part of India they subdued Hindus accepted Islam in large numbers ; those who did not do so were forced to pay the jazia, or poll tax on infidels, and submit besides to many other forms of religious persecution ; they were fre- quently massacred in large numbers and their holiest shrines and images destroyed or looted, many Hindu shrines being converted into Musalman masjids. In fact, the treatment meted out to the conquered Hindus varied at various times, according to the power or fanaticism of their Musalman masters. Musalmans of foreign races lived apart from their Hindu subjects in cantonments, much as the English do to-day ; their cantonments in time developed into towns, and in the districts in their immediate neighbourhood Hinduism was prohibited. Those Hindus who did not accept Islam, or escape elsewhere, were slaughtered. It is noticeable to-day that in all the villages in the immediate neighbourhood of towns once the seat of Musal- man kings or great nobles, the inhabitants are Musalman, while further afield, in the districts which princes, kings or rulers dominated but could not effectively conquer, Hindu villages are the most numerous. A succeeding wave of invaders seized the territories and towns of its predecessor, massacred its kings and nobles, but interfered little with existing Musalman villages, confining its religious activities to making new conversions among Hindu villages. The oldest seat of Musalman Government in India is Delhi, which has ever been that of their greatest power, but various invaders established other independent Musalman kingdoms throughout the land, which subsequently fell to the Moghul rulers of Delhi not very long before their decay. The best known of these were the kingdoms of Bijapur and Ahmadnagar, in the Dekkan, Ahmadabad in Goojerat, Mandu in Central India, and Gaur and Jaunpur in Bengal. Their deserted capitals remain almost intact to-day, with their beautiful palaces, masjids and tombs built in the Indo-Saracenic style, which the Musalmans introduced into India. These ancient cities contain India's greatest archaeological treasures, which are monuments to the wealth and taste of their builders. MUSALMANS 31 The Musalman rulers were avaricious, and their conquests provided them with wealth beyond their dreams. In their native homes they were poor and needy ; in their new ones they adopted the luxurious habits of the former great ones of their adopted land ; they lived in sumptuous palaces, adorned with gardens and fountains ; they took many wives and surrounded themselves with women servants and body-guards ; their clothing, arms and accoutrements glittered with gold ; their persons were adorned with gems, no one was admitted to their presence without presenting them with a valuable offering and giving large douceurs to their servants. Inferiors paid the greatest reverence to supe- riors, before whom they knelt ; they prayed to a king as to the Deity ; subservience to superiors was reduced to a fine art in imitation of Hindu customs. Happy and fortunate events, such as marriages, the birth of a son, visits from distinguished guests, were all occasions on which inferiors came to " humbly view," the ceremony is called " darshan," at which gifts were presented called " nazars," or those from an inferior to a superior, a practice universal in India to-day. The humbler Musalmans followed, as far as they could, the example of the great, and few were so poor as not to have sycophants. As the rich alone can do, kings and nobles, Hindu and Musal- mans, lived, as they do to-day, in immense seraglios, called in Upper India mahels ; surrounded by numerous wives, or concubines, which are prohibited by neither religion. The seraglio covers a large area within the palace walls ; it contains numerous suites of halls, and chambers opening on gardens replete with fountains. Each lady within its walls has a separate suite, with her own establishment, consisting of hereditary women servants, bought originally from their parents, who are still in a position little better than that of slaves ; but they are usually well treated. Besides the wives and concubines of the owner, the widows of all his predecessors live in it. Except for a few lady visitors from outside and their nearest male relations, the ladies of the seraglio are dependent for communication with the outside world on their handmaids ; the seraglio is strictly guarded by eunuchs and females ; I once asked a ruling chief how the supply of the former was kept up ; he said they were born so I The adjacent palace is crowded by licensed familiars, some of whom are paid, and others live by their wits, but both classes are provided with the best of everything. Their sons, nearly all of whom are 32 INDIAN STUDIES young profligates, are employed as companions to the male children of their masters, when they attain an age at which they are allowed outside the seraglio doors. From these official sycophants the retinue of a young prince or noble is formed ; those selected usually do their best to ingratiate themselves with their young masters, whose musahibs, or companions, they are called, by initiating them at an early age into a career of vice. To-day every ruling prince and great noble has his mahel ; those who are educated build new palaces on European lines in which they live themselves, perhaps with their favourite lady ; they sometimes receive distinguished foreign guests in them, but the ancient palace and its mahel remain as of old, and the musahibs are still the companions of their sons. The mahel has ever been a network of intrigue, as it is to-day, though nowadays this is not so financially profitable to the ladies and their attendants as it was of yore, when large presents were brought to its inmates from those officials who wished to secure their interest to further their own ends, or from others who wished to escape from tyranny, extortion or injustice. In such an atmosphere manhood is killed in its cradle, and in a few generations those men living in it become degenerate and childless. Many great families have no direct heirs, and others would have been extinct long ago but for the practice of adoption so commonly resorted to. Some distant relative, often living an obscure life of poverty in a remote village, is selected, who restores the vitality of the family into which he is taken, for a few generations. The polygamous life of the mahel, which has adversely affected all the great and rich in India for untold ages, quickly had the same effect on each successive wave of new rulers, whose decadence was further accelerated by the change from their own cold climate to the great heat oHheir new country. In a short time they lost^ "Their northern energy and valour, while, what was perhaps worse, when they were so few, the constant intrigue carried on in the mahel rendered them disunited and they engaged in internecine strife in which sides were taken by their independent Hindu enemies and their Hindu subjects ; anarchy ensued, which re- sulted in a fresh invasion and a new conquest, till the arrival of the British on the scene, when they stopped further invasions from outside. The mahel of a Delhi emperor was inhabited by some two thousand women, about most of whom no one besides the MUSALMANS 33 Emperor, his eunuchs and a few visitors from outside, knew anything. Those of persons of less degree were smaller ; to-day they are of every size, from those of ruling chiefs to those of private individuals, some of which consist of only about half a dozen inmates. In the villages, the people being poor, there are no mahels ; women who are secluded confine themselves when in public to wearing the burka, a garment which completely covers them, except for an eye-hole ; at home they have the run of the house, till men, other than their nearest relations, appear, when they retire into a back room and remain there till they have departed. Musalman rulers, nobles and their personal retainers, who were mostly of their own race, confined themselves to the business of war. When not engaged in it they devoted themselves to pleasure ; rulers and nobles neither knew nor cared anything about fiscal matters, beyond extracting as much money as they could from the villagers and traders, who inhabited the crown lands of the former or the estates of the latter. For the purpose they appointed Hindus of the Bania (trading) caste, as farmers of their revenues, the contract of -which they sold to them ; a revenue farmer was called a diwan (minister), if employed by a ruler ; if by a noble he was usually called a wakil (agent) ; these titles gave them much izzat (honour) among their kind, and also gave them, which such classes valued more, the opportunity of profitable employment under themselves for a large number of their relations or caste fellows in what was government, or quasi- government service ; this was especially valued as such service, like every other in India, under native rule became hereditary. These revenue farmers were allowed to assess taxes as they liked, and they fixed them as high as they possibly could without killing the goose that laid the golden egg ; they used the most brutal methods of extortion to exact payment, assisted when necessary by the armed retainers of their masters. Diwans of rulers and of some of the greater nobles were frequently allowed to maintain their own mercenary troops, and were given un- limited powers over the villagers ; in times of anarchy, by taking sides judiciously, many of them became almost independent. The competition for the position of revenue farmer became so great that the money paid for it was excessive and quite beyond what could be reasonably expected to be recoverable from the agriculturists and traders, who toiled hard but were only left a 3 34 INDIAN STUDIES bare existence, so trade and agriculture were at a very low ebb, and would have been destroyed but for the system of bribery and corruption existing throughout the land. The agriculturists and traders bribed the rent and tax collectors for a quid pro quo ; the revenue farmers, when they found the sum they were under obligation to pay too great, bribed the ladies, eunuchs and other parasites of the palace, and got a reduction. The incidence of the agricultural taxes, legal and illegal fell equally on all, for they were assessed in a lump sum on the cultivated land of each village, and the village council allotted the share of the individual according to his wealth and the amount of land he cultivated. From time immemorial till the advent of British rule, the Indian village was ever a small autonomous republic, ruled by its own council, or panchayet. In the towns the Musalmans lived in their own quarters, directly under the ruler by whom they were granted allowances ; other classes or castes lived in their own quarters and had their own panchayet, much on the lines of that of the village, but these being near the oppressor, never enjoyed any independence, although they could represent caste grievances to the ruler, but when they did so they got no redress except they could pay for it. In former days the share of the produce of the village fields assigned to the ruler varied in amount according to the cupidity or power of the diwan of its over-lord ; previous to the days of British rule it varied in the crown lands of the Delhi emperors from one-third to one-half of the produce ; but on the estates of their nobles there were no fixed rules, each took what he thought fit. A half ~hare was the greatest taken in the crown lands, and that only by one Emperor, Ala-ud-dun Ghilzai, an Afghan, who reigned from A.D. 1296 till A.D. 1316. In days of anarchy, when taxation became excessive and every species of tyranny increased, villagers who had been previously peaceful, such as the Mahrattas, Sikhs and Jats, resisted their tyrants in arms, and thus became inured to war ; in time, under the guidance of their village panchayets, they formed confedera- tions of autonomous villages, under a local chief, which eventu- ally prevailed against their oppressors and brought them to ruin ; this shows the strength of the village communities. It is in the village that the secret of the stability of society in India is to be found ; from the earliest times one foreign invasion MUSALMANS 35 followed another, each causing wide-spread devastation ; in the intervals between these frightful scourges, never-ending oppression existed, varied by famines and plagues of cholera and other diseases, which carried off millions for whom the rulers cared nothing, and they did nothing to alleviate their sufferings. It seems surprising under such a series of calamities that the population was not exterminated. Invasion succeeded invasion, horde after horde swept through the land, murdering and plundering ; dynasty succeeded dynasty, calamity succeeded calamity, cities were destroyed or abandoned to the owl and jackal, but the village republics, although they bent, never broke under the various storms. Jat, Goojer, Mahratta and other ancient races, through all the passing changes, have remained absolute proprietors of their holdings, and the village communities, although many have changed their religion and have become at various times Hindu, Musalmans, Sikhs or Christians, remain the same. In them alone there has been durability and in them alone lies the future of India , any system of local self-government under the British Crown to foster the advancement of the Indian peoples must be based on the autonomous village. To introduce anything like home rule in the present condition of India would simply mean a return to the worst of those evils which British rule ended. It is useless to talk of the unity of the Indian peoples ; they are not united and never will be, as far as can be foreseen ; from the earliest ages there has been strife between the various races or castes, and those of one or more have oppressed the others, and their mutual cruelty and animosity is of ancient date ; the effects of this have not ceased ; the various races and castes are to-day such as their long history of foreign conquest and inter- necine strife has made them. Their jrru_tual_animosity is latent under strong British rule ; the way to remove it is not by ignor- ing it and raising cliques and individuals of one race or caste to power over others, but by giving those, of each race and caste internal local self-government under the British Crown, and allotting to it its due proportion of the employment necessitated thereby and by bringing the elected representatives of all races into the council chamber together ; by the British . ^Government treating all alike, their animosity may be kept latent, but unity among all races, which so many hope to see, will never go beyond this, and even this is prevented by exalting one race, 3* 36 INDIAN STUDIES caste or clique above others. That this is so is amply demon strated in the army ; in those, regiments of which people of '"inimical races and religions, such as Sikhs, Punjabi Musalmans, Pathans or Rajputs serve and fight together, they keep their ancient animosities in abeyance as long as they are serving, but on return to their homes it. revives-. If their British officers do not treat all with equal impartiality and justice, it breaks out at once, and even military discipline cannot prevent it doing so. It will be obvious to persons of the meanest intellect that in such a collection of inimical races, castes, religions and languages as forms the heterogeneous population of India there can be no such thing as a universal public opinion. Each section of a religious sect (for^aUJLndians are actuated by religion, not race feeling) has its own, and that of one has no validity in the others ; the difference between that of the Bengali and the Sikh is as great as that between a Levantine Greek and an Englishman. Those ignorant of Indian psychology fail to read the secret of the stability of Indian village society. They obstinately insist, often guided by interested English educated Indians, in thinking that every question appears to the Indian mind in the same light as it does to the British, which is not the case. Western statecraft rests on the axiom that the primary division of mankind is dete-n-njned-hy. raHa] and geographical considera- tions, and that the peoples of the earth group themselves into ' nations, which form states for purposes of government, and these states act as corporate bodies in accordance with their own code of morality ; patriotism, that is, the devotion of the individual to the state, is the highest virtue. Among the races and castes of India this idea is not prevalent. The unit is not the nation ; what, replaces it is the caste or reli- gion [^neither ol which themselves are even united units through- out the land. They differ in customs, belief arid interests, according to the different parts of the country they inhabit, and the languages they speak. The Musalman Pushtu, speaking ~ ^aThan'"5^"trlE"*^folth ~ West " "Frontier Province, will not even acknowledge the Madrasi Hinduized Tamil-speaking Musalman as a co-religionist ; the orthodox Sunni Musalmans take a similar view regarding the Sheia Musalmans who are their townsmen ; the Rajputs of Rajputana wiU not intermarry with those of Oudh, whom they do not acknowledge as their equals, nor will they acknowledge Hindus of Bengal as even co-religionists. The MUSALMANS 37 Brahmins are divided into innumerable sub-castes, some of which look on the others as low caste. The Brahmins of Bengal and the South have for long ages looked on those of the Punjab and Kashmir as " excluded," and will neither eat nor intermarry with them. Hostility between the different religions is regarded by those professing them as perfectly natural and, indeed, as inevitable. The English word " patriotism " is untranslatable by one word into any Indian language ; what Europeans express by it is obviously unmeaning where there is no such thing as a nation in their sense of the word. The devotion of the various peoples of India is not to the State but to their religion, and in the case of the agricultural population, to their village home and the ruler who protects it and gives them justice. That is in their language he whose salt they eat ; to them this is the King- Emperor alone ; they care nothing for parliaments or councils, but they think that except the King-Emperor or his representa- tives consult their local headman, be they nobles or religious dignitaries, they are not likely to get justice, in which I quite agree with them ; these people should be given the consideration which is their due. The history of Islam in the towns of India, which have been trie seats of dynasties or of great nobles, is one long record of bloodshed, treachery and debauchery. In rural India its followers Jrom time immemorial have led simple, honest lives, and have been invaHably'Toyai to their rulers as long as they received reasonable justice and freedom from oppression. The tenets of Islam are generally well-known ; they are explained in its creed, viz. : " there is no God but the God and Muhamad is the prophet of God." But this simple profession of faith has not been adhered to by Musalman Sectaries and Islam has long ceased to be an united religion. It is a tradition that the Prophet predicted that his religion would eventually be sub- divided into seventy-two sects, all of which except one would end in hell. Whether its different sects have reached that number or not I do not know, but they are very numerous, and I will not go into them in detail, suffice it to say that each considers itself the orthodox one and that all the others are destined for hell a view not conducive to unity. Islam is divided into two main divisions ; they are the Sunni, or orthodox, and the Sheia, or sectarian, each of which is again sub-divided into minor sects. The Sunni sects differ from one 38 INDIAN STUDIES another in points of ritual only, but not in belief. The Sheia sects differ in both ritual and belief. The religious belief of all Musalmans is based on the Koran, which contains the religious and civil law ; this book is more than inspired, it is the direct word of God conveyed to the prophet Muhamad, and is therefore immutable ; it teaches that there is only one God, eternal, infinite, incomprehensible, and that he is the God of Adam, Abraham, Moses, Christ and the other prophets, to whom he revealed his will several times previously in the form of books, the most important of which are the New and Old Testaments and the Psalms of David. The current versions of these became corrupted and the Koran was in consequence revealed to Muhamad, the last of the prophets, and supersedes all other revelations. Its moral code is that of the ten command- ments and its civil code is based on the Old Testament modified by traditional sayings of the prophet, collected some years after his death and contained in several books called the Sunna ; belief in the Koran is an article of faith, but belief in the Sunna is not so, although it is more or less unreservedly accepted by orthodox Musalmans. The difference between the Orthodox and Sectaries is the result of a political quarrel between them regarding the succession to the kingly and sacerdotal office on the death of the prophet. The Orthodox, who are in a great majority, hold that it devolves naturally on the most powerful prince, for the time being, in Islam, irrespective of either his descent from Muhamad or his nationality. After the break-up of the Arabian empire and the division of its territories into many different kingdoms, the ruler of each proclaimed himself Commander of the Faithful in his own kingdoms ; the Moghul rulers of the Delhi empire were the Commanders of the Faithful in India as the King of Afghanistan is in his kingdom to-day. The word " Kaliph " means successor ; the successor to the prophet Muhamad was Abu Behr, on whose death the title was changed to that of Commander of the Faithful. The Sectaries, who are numerically few compared with the Orthodox, the chief seat of their power being Persia, hold that the kingly and sacerdotal office is for ever vested in the descend- ants of the prophet through his daughter Fatima and her husband, his cousin Hazrat Ali. They believe that Ali was wrongfully deprived of his rights as Kaliph by the Kaliph Abu Behr, and the MUSALMANS 39 succeeding Commanders of the Faithful, Omar and Osman, the latter of whom he succeeded and shortly afterwards was killed in battle by Moawiyah, who usurped his throne. Ali left two sons, named Hassan and Hossim, whom Sheias believe to have been his lawful successors ; the lineal descendants of Hossim to the ninth generation they consider the true successors of the prophet, the twelfth of this line is called the Mahadi, or guide ; he lived for a long time a retired life in a cavern near Baghdad ; the time and place of his death are unknown. Sheias believe he still lives and will appear in due course to overthrow Djlal, or anti-Christ, and restore peace and religion to the world. Sheias call the lawful successors of Muhamad the Twelve Imams, and they hold the title of Commander of the Faithful, to be in abeyance till the Mahadi reappears ; the title taken by Sheia rulers is Shah, or Imam, but the latter word also denotes a leader at prayers among both sects ; Muhamad propagated his religion by the sword ; the Koran says " the sword is the key of Paradise and Hell. A drop of blood shed in the cause of God, a night spent in arms, is of more avail to the Faithful than two months of fasting and prayer. Whoever falls in battle is forgiven his sins ; in the day of judgment his wounds shall be resplendent as vermilion and odoriferous as musk, and the loss of his limbs shall be replaced with wings of angels and cherubim." In Paradise nymphs of fascinating beauty impatiently await the approach of the Warriors of the Faith ; there, too, wine (forbidden in this world) is in plenty. This doctrine, which justifies the Jehad, or holy war against infidels, is held by all Sunni Musalmans, but not by Sheias, who do not consider a purely religious war legal, anyway till the re- appearance of the Mahadi. The Sunni faith divides the world into two divisions, called Dar-ul-harb, or the house of war, and Dar-ul-Salam, or the House of Peace ; the former is that part of it where infidel rule, including Sheias, prevails, the latter where the rule of Islam, or Orthodox Sunnis, prevails. In Dar-ul-harb it is lawful for Sunni Musalmans to do all they can to overthrow infidel rule ; the question arose some years ago whether British India was Dar-ul-harb or not ; according to the strict rule of the Sunni faith it certainly is, but orthodox doctors considered that this is not so, as it forms an exception. They argued that in old days in Dar-ul-harb the infidel rulers persecuted the Sunni Musalman faith, while under British rule to-day it is everywhere 40 INDIAN STUDIES protected and equal justice with that meted out to others is given to Sunni Musalmans, therefore they decided that British India was neither Dar-ul-harb nor Dar-ul-Salam, but was an exceptional country where it was illegal from the religious point of view for them to set themselves in opposition to the Govern- ment ; this is the opinion of most Sunni Musalmans in the country, lay and ecclesiastic. In India Musalmans are as loyal to the King-Emperor as are the other classes of His Majesty's subjects, but amongst them- selves the animosity between Sunnis and Sheias is violent, though latent, and is, apart from religious differences, kept alive by political memories of the times in the decadence of Moghul power, when Sheia nobles invited foreign invaders, notably the Persian Nadir Shah, into the country. The Sheias number somewhere about 10,000,000 among India's Musalman popula- tion ; they are most numerous in the province of Oudh, the ruling family of which was Sheia till its annexation by the British in 1856. It is not possible to know the exact number of the Indian Sheias, because where they are in a minority many pretend to be Sunni. Although the numerous Sheia sects differ from one another more on points of ritual than belief, nevertheless the animosity existing between them is great. The Sunnis are much more united religiously, but politically in different parts they are as much divided as are the followers of all other religions in India. Descendants of the prophet through Ali and Fatima, called Syeds, are found amongst both Sunnis and Sheias, by whom they are treated with great veneration. In India they are in all positions of society, from nobles to beggars. There are many of those posing as Syeds who are impostors, but they can be easily recognized by their dark skins and plebeian appearance ; they are usually descendants of low caste Hindus and their pretensions never deceive true believers. Wine or fermented liquor is forbidden to all Musalmans in this world ; in former days many Indian Musalman rulers prohibited its manufacture or use in their territories, not only to those of their own faith but to others. For a long time this was so in the Punjab, to the great benefit of its non-Musalman peoples, but at various periods, and mostly in the towns, Musalman rulers and those of their faith, as well s others, drank heavily. India in all ages has suffered much from drunkenness. To-day many MUSALMANS 4 1 Musalmans are addicted to liquor, but they are usually people with extremely lax ideas of their religious duties, and are most numerous amongst those of the town-bred, English-educated classes. Musalmans everywhere sacrifice kine on certain religious occasions, and also use their flesh as food. When they do so they are not permitted in British India to hurt the religious feelings of Hindus, so they are obliged to slaughter them in private or in secluded places. The ill-feeling between them and Hindus is very great, not only because they have for long ages oppressed Hindus, but because they kill and eat the sacred kine. When worked upon by agitators the latent animosity easily gives rise to open strife. In many feudatory states, the rulers of which are Hindus, the slaughter of kine is prohibited, in some, beef for British soldiers cannot be provided in consequence. In all native states agitators using kine-killing as their theme are quickly suppressed ; this is not so, unfortunately, in British territory, where such people are allowed undue licence. Musalmans are not allowed by their religion to eat the flesh of any animal, the killing of which is not made lawful by its throat being cut by a true believer, " in the name of God." This process is called halal. Fish, however, are supposed to be naturally halal, and so, in regard to them, this ceremony is not necessary. Hindu-Musalman riots have recently occurred owing to quarrels as to whether the flesh of goats or sheep exposed for sale is halal (lawful) or whether the animals have been slain by the Hindu custom of striking off the head, called jhetka, for mistakes are liable to be made by the purchasers. Masjids are not consecrated buildings in the sense that churches are. According to the Musalman religion prayers can be said anywhere, all places being equal in the sight of God. Prayers are said with certain observances, which consist in bowing and genuflections. When two or more people assemble to pray, one, generally the most respectable, called the Imam, is selected to lead them. Masjids are really religious clubs, in which the utmost decorum is observed ; in them friends meet to talk or pray ; travellers find repose and the weekly sermon is preached on Fridays, before which the prayer called Kutbah is said, in which a blessing is invoked for the Commander of the Faithful. The Sunni belief, or Kalima, is as follows : " There is no God but the God and Muhamad is the prophet of God ; " that of the greatest 42 INDIAN STUDIES number of Sheia sects is the same, with the addition " and Ali is the friend of God." In Sheia masjids the tragic story of the death of Hossim, which occurred in A.D. 680 at the hand of Shomar, a name hated by all Musalmans, is recited by some venerated man, around whom the listeners assemble ; when he relates certain incidents they weep or howl with grief, as ancient custom dictates. In the month of Moharram, on the anniversary of his death, a model of his tomb is carried in procession, when the Sheia processionists abandon themselves, in religious frenzy, to sorrow and indignation ; they beat their breasts, tear their hair and clothes, and even inflict wounds on their bodies with knives in token of their grief. Sunnis rightly regard these extravagant performances with contempt ; not so low caste Hindus and Hinduized Musalmans of the towns, who love any tumasha (show), the more exciting it be the better pleased they are. They join in this procession in crowds, and from their doing so, Mr. Paget, M.P., draws the false conclusion that there is nothing but love and sympathy between all Indians. Hindus also have many religious processions, in which they carry round gods surrounded by musicians armed with the most ear-splitting musical instruments in creation ; in British Indian towns, again instigated by agitators, for such are not permitted in those of either Hindu or Musalman feudatory states, they insist on leading these with their noisy crowds around the precincts of masjids, selecting the days of the most holy Musalman cere- monies to do so. The closer they are to the masjid the greater the noise they make. Such aggravating interference with the decorum of their religious clubs naturally infuriates Musalmans, with the result that they frequently attack the aggressors, when they are persecuted and usually come off second best in the legal battle which follows, for the Hindu agitators are more subtle of mind than they are. In the rural districts in British India the villagers are too sensible to bring themselves within the law, except when specially incited by agitators, who spend much money for the purpose, or are people of high caste or of local influence, such as those Hindus who recently got up riots in Bengal. The latent animosities between the followers of different creeds in the rural districts of British India and everywhere in feudatory states become active much less frequently than in British Indian cities, where agitators are allowed to excite the different religions against one another with impunity. The agitators in such cases MUSALMANS 43 are always educated Hindus or educated un-orthodox Musalmans of the Congress or Moslem League brand. The position of women among Musalmans is very much better than it is among Hindus. Although polygamy is permitted by the Koran it is not enjoined, while chastity is specially recommended ; widows are allowed to re-marry ; if illtreated by her husband, a wife is entitled to divorce him, in which case her dowry and provision for any children she may have is secured. Infant jnarriage is not allowed ; the bride has to signify to the priest who performs the marriage ceremony that she is willing to accept the bridegroom as her husband. Neither the prophet Muhamad nor the Koran is responsible for the seclusion of women, which is to-day even in Arabia only practised in the towns ; the Bedoween (rural Arabs) women do not wear the veil. Seclusion of women was only introduced into Islam during the reign of Omar, the second successor of Muhamad ; it was in force in India B.C. 300. Hindus of a certain class are given to telling their English friends that the seclusion of women was introduced into India by the Musalmans, which is quite untrue. The greatest oppressors under Musalman rule have been, not always the rulers, but the Hindu Bania diwans, and the petty officials they employed : the hatred to these classes is common to both Hindus and Musalmans, who have for long ages suffered from their tyranny and corruption. CHAPTER IV SIKHS THE Sikhs are the most warlike community in India ; in pro- portion to their numbers, about 3,000,000, they have ever put the largest armies of any warlike race into the field. They played a great part in bringing about the ruin of the Moghul Empire. On its fall they conquered the Hindus and Musalmans of the Pun- jab, who were at least seven times more numerous than they at the time, and they made that Province into a Sikh Kingdom. During their rule they not only annexed the trans- Indus Afghan pro- vinces, but successfully defended their new frontiers from repeated Afghan attacks. Their kingdom was the last in India to lose its independence, which it did in 1849 as the result of an un- provoked war on the British made by their rulers to divert attention from internal strife. They are the only native com- munity who ever succeeded in freeing itself from Hindu super- stition and caste oppression and in attaining at the same time their military importance. The Sikh religious teachers who preached reform, toleration and enlightenment, are the only men, once Hindus, who have left any mark on India outside Hinduism. On the death of all other reformers their followers were over- whelmed in the atmosphere of lust, bigotry and superstition which surrounded them. It is probable that the religion of the great religious reformer, Nanak, who first preached Sikhism in the Punjab in the fifteenth century, would have gone the way of others had he not been wise enough to establish an apostolic succession and thereby provide a personal leader at the time one was most required. Nanak is the only Indian reformer who did so. He and his successors, nine in number, are called the Ten Gurus, or religious guides, of the Sikhs. The later Gurus became their apostolic and princely rulers, and the last Guru left his 44 SIKHS 45 authority to a State Council ruling a confederacy of clans. It is remarkable that all the Gurus were men of ability, with qualifica- tions admirably adapted to the times in which they lived. Nanak preached to a community of pietists and was a man of great learning and tact ; subsequently, when their religion was per- secuted by their Musalman rulers, his successors, men of valour and great military skill, created a spirit of emulation and ambition ^ among their disciples which converted a peaceful . community of pietists into a powerful military confederacy and ensured their success in resisting their enemies, who were much more numerous than themselves and whose resources were much greater. Gibbon truly says the history of all Oriental peoples is " a perpetual round of valour, greatness, discord, degeneracy and decline." It is, however, equally noticeable, and a fact which all concerning themselves with Indian questions should never forget, that with the disappearance of external enemies decline has invariably been ' brought about, not by the general resist- ance of the .many to the despotic rule and oppression of the few, but by the struggle for power of rival candidates for supremacy, which again results in the despotic power of the successful competitor. The offspring or successors of despots nursed in the harem, surrounded by women and flattery, become sensual, capricious and tyrannical and are unable to maintain the structure which was raised, so it falls to pieces and the usual round begins again. The heads of the various clans of the Sikh confederacy having overcome their Musalman enemies, and having forgotten the precepts of the Gurus, commenced the usual struggle for supre- macy, and long and bloody wars occurred between them. They acted towards one another with the greatest treachery, and used assassination to attain their end, till the father of the Maharaja Raiyjit Singh became almost supreme, and complete supremacy was attained by his son, who was not only most superstitious but addicted to drink. B rah mans surrounded him, many of whom professed to have accepted Sikhism, but their one object in doing so was to bring *it into the Hindu fold, and with the assistance of Ranjit Singh they did so to the extent of obscuring its pure doctrines by the introduction of idolatrous and superstitious Hindu rites, so that it was in great danger. 46 INDIAN STUDIES On the death of the Maharaja he left no capable successor. Inter- nal strife again ensued, ended by the British conquest which saved the Sikh religion. Many Sikhs were enlisted in the Army, but the British officers only accepted those Sikhs whose religion was pure and undented. Sikh soldiers gave up all Hindu practices, the}- returned to their villages, where their example emboldened the many who had always objected to Hindu innovations, and in a short time all Sikhs throughout the land returned to their Jrue faith. To the British officers who so greatly assisted them Sikhs are ever grateful, and this reason as well as the friendship which existed between the Sikh chiefs and nobility influenced the Sikhs greatly in their loyalty to British rule. Sikhism has, however, now fallen into another danger. In many of the Sikh schools and colleges the teaching staff is mostly composed of Hindus. They either ignore the Sikh religion, or, what is infinitely worse, they are secretly hostile to it. To-day Sikhism can stand the shock of modern thought and remains unaffected by it. All Hindu forms of faith have been obliged to make some attempt to change their customs and suit themselves to modern conditions of civilization, but none have gone far enough. With all the vicissitudes Sikhism has undergone with the quarrels regarding the succession to the Guruship and the en- mities caused between the various clans during the long civil wars which were carried on with appalling treachery and bitter- ness, there are hereditary.animosities between the various sections, and the Sikhs are to-day far from being a united people. Even the ruling dynasties of the Sikh feudatory States have latent animosities with one another. Great as their internal animosities are, those between them and Musalmans and Hindus, especially Brahmans, are greater. They are latent under strong British rule, but with any weakening of it they would become active. All concerned know these things very well, the Sikhs know that such a small community as , theirs in the midst of deadly enemies in far superior numbers could not exist without British rule on which they quite under- stand their welfare depends, and they have been consistently loyal in consequence. I will now give a short resume of the principal events of Sikh religious history. Nanak, the founder of Sikhism, was born in A.D. 1460; he SIKHS 47 was the son of a village shopkeeper of the Bedi sub-division of the Kshatris (bania). His father, though not wealthy, was a respectable man. He is said to have commenced preaching when a little over ten years of age and so to have reigned as- Guru over sixty years. He died in A.D. 1538, aged about seventy- one. As is the custom of Hindus, he married early and had two sons, who, with his wife, he left in his father's house in the village of Talwandi on the Ravi while he was a wanderer. He travelled for several years through India, Ceylon, Afghan- istan, Persia and Arabia. He was accompanied in his travels by his village mirasi (musician), a Musalman named Mardana, whom he had converted to his views, and Lahna, a man of his own caste who subsequently became his successor, Bala, a Jat, and one Budha. These names are venerated among Sikhs. Nanak was devoted to music and poetry. His praise of the Divinity and his admonitions to his disciples he put into verses and sang them to his followers to the accompaniment of the rabab, a kind of guitar, played by Mardana, who was a skilful musician. In the Sikh worship to-day music is a necessity. In his travels, in which he spent several years, returning home periodically, he mixed with people of all religions and studied their various beliefs. Many stories are told of him while on his wanderings. To relate them all would take volumes. I will relate two which are characteristic. It is said that while at Mecca he was found sleeping with his feet to the Kaaba and brought before the Kazi (judge), who said, " Infidel ! how dare you dishonour God's house by turning your feet to it ? " Nanak replied : ' Turn them, if you can, in a direction where the house of God is not." On his return home after a long absence on one of his journeys, his father, mother, father-in-law, uncle and other relatives entreated him to abandon his wandering habits for the sake of his wife and children. He refused, replying as follows : " For- giveness is my mother, patience my father, truth my uncle ; with these as my companions I have controlled the mind." After many years of wandering and preaching he had con- verted a large number of people to his doctrines, especially in 'jthe Punjab. They were nearly -all Hindu castes, mostly jats, Gugers and other aboriginal tribes ; his faith was accepted by few Musalmans. All his converts regarded him as a saint and patriarch. About A.D. 1526 he changed his wandering habits 48 INDIAN STUDIES and settled down on the banks of the Ravi at a place now known as Dera Baba Nanak (the residence of the venerable Nanak), where he was joined by his family. He lived there in great state, which he was enabled to do by the large contributions brought to him by his disciples. He established almshouses in which thousands of poor people were fed ; his example has made charity a religious duty to his followers ; he was visited by immense numbers of persons of all creeds from every part of Central Asia who were drawn to him by his eloquence and learning. He acquired much wealth and founded the town of Kirtarpur (holy man's town) in the Jallandar District, where he built a Dharamsala (religious rest house) which exists to-day, and is a place of great sanctity. The life of Nanak was devoted to endeavours to remove the religious and social differences between the warring sects of India, especially between Hindus and Musalmans, by inculcat- ing peace and brotherly love to one another and to all mankind, but in this he attained no success. He opposed the custom of Satti and all superstition. He preached the unity of " God who is all in all, the Creator, the Lord of Hosts, the one God, self -existent, incomprehensible, omnipotent, without beginning and everlasting." Good deeds, he said, are nothing in themselves, the knowledge of the true God is the only way to salvation. He strictly prohibited idolatry. No prophet or holy man, he taught, has the power to do good or evil to anyone everything comes from God, who alone must be depended on. Holy men could only interpret His commands. He said he had read the Koran, the Vedas and Puranas, but true religion he could find in none of them. Yet he respected all these books as containing some truth which he recommended his dis- ciples to seek out and act on. He believed in the transmigra- tion of souls and maintained that after undergoing the prescribed course of punishment for sins committed in this life, the soul will eventually find a blissful rest in God. He maintained that there was only the one true and pure religion, which he taught, and that all men were equal before God. He said that, excluding it, the numerous religions and castes which had sprung up in the world were the device of men. Although in his early life he had been a wanderer and had lived an ascetic life, he did so only the better to search for truth. After he had seen SIKHS 49 the world and gained much knowledge by his great experience of mankind he renounced asceticism and wandering, from which he had derived all the advantages he sought. He then lived with his family among his disciples as a patriarch. He taught them that abandonment of the world was quite unnecessary as God treated all with equal favour, that " between the fakir in his cell and the king in his palace no difference is made by Him." The doctrines of this great reformer, written by himself, are con- tained in the Granth Sahib, or holy book "of the Sikhs, and are included in the first part of it which is called the Adi Granth, subsequently compiled by one of his successors, the Guru Arjan, to distinguish it from the second part, composed by another of them, Sri Guru Govind Singh, which is called the Daswin Badshah Ka Granth (the holy book of the tenth King). Nanak never professed to possess miraculous powers. Never- theless his credulous followers ascribe various miracles to him. One of these is supposed to be the origin of the national Sikh salutation, " Wah Garuji ! " It is said that these words, meaning " Well done, Garuji ! " were imparted to him by a voice from heaven. Another miracle is related as follows to account for the sanctity of Amritsir, the holy city of the Sikhs. It is said Nanak, becoming thirsty, asked a man attending cattle to bring him a drink of water from a tank close by. The man replied that he had just passed it and found it dry. Nanak said, " Go and see." He went and found it full of water and at once became a disciple. How Nanak confounded some Brahmans shows him to have been a man of much humour. They were engaged in offering an oblation of water to the dead. With their faces to the East, as their ceremonial dictates, they threw handfuls of water towards the sun. Nanak was standing close by and, facing the West, began to imitate their actions. They indignantly asked him what he was doing. He replied : r ' I am irrigating my fields in Kirtarpur." They answered : " At such a distance how can a handful of water reach them ? " The reply was : " If the hand- ful of water cannot reach my crops which are in this world, how can your handfuls reach the dead in the next ? " Nanak called his followers Sikhs (disciples) ; he never con- templated that the Guruship should become hereditary, which it did subsequently. Some time before his death he had con- sidered the question of his successor ; he had devoted his life 4 50 INDIAN STUDIES to the preaching of virtue and righteousness, he was quite unselfish and only had the good of his religion and the prosperity of his people at heart ; he therefore selected the man whom he con- sidered most fit. His choice fell on Lahna, a Kshatri, to which caste he himself belonged, who had not very long been a Sikh, but in whose devotion and sincerity he had complete reliance. The final test Nanak put to his devotion is thus recorded. " See- ing the dead body of a man lying on the roadside, Nanak said : ' Ye who have confidence in me partake of this food.' All, including the Guru's son, shrunk from such an act, except Lahna, who was about to carry out the order when Nanak stopped him. He then embraced him and decreed that from the moment he had done so his spirit had gone into Lahna's body and he must be regarded as himself. He changed his name from Lahna to Angi Khud, shortened to Angad, meaning ' my own body.' ' From this incident the Sikhs consider the spirit of Nanak was inherited by his successors in the Guruship. Nanak died aged seventy-one years in A.D. 1538 at Kirtarpur. A samadh (memorial) was erected to his memory, but it has long since been washed away by a change in the bed of the Ravi. Many relics of him are shown in this town. On his death it is said that there was a dispute between the Hindus and Musalmans as to who should perform his obsequies. The former burn their dead and the latter bury them, so to prevent trouble it was resolved the Guru should be neither buried nor burnt, but that his remains should be consigned to the river. When the funeral party arrived, on raising the sheet under which the body had rested, they found it had gone. It was- then decided, to avoid a fracas, that the sheet should be divided and each sect should have a part and dispose of it according to their respective rites. This story shows the great respect in which the Guru was held by both Hindus and Musalmans. The Guru left two sons ; his descendants are called Nanak-- putras, or descendants of Nanak, and are treated with great respect to-day by all Sikhs, who give them the title of Sahibzada. JThe religion of Nanak continued to spread peacefully. The Sikhs met every six months at Amritsir and, continuing to follow the pure and mild tenets of their religion, formed a religious commonwealth the object of which was to peacefully propagate their faith by preaching. The Guruship had now become SIKHS 51 hereditary. ereciitio_ii_was, however, soon to drive them into other methods and force their religious commonwealth to become . a military one. The fifth Guru Arjan, who succeeded to the cushion in 1581, probably foresaw this ; his predecessors had been priests, he converted the Guruship into a combined princely and sacerdotal office. He made his headquarters at Amritsir, where he lived in great splendour, maintaining a large armed force. He performed two great works for Sikhism, viz., the building of the Harmandar Temple of Amritsir and the compilation of the Adi Granth. In 1589 he laid the foundation of the Har- mandar, the beautiful temple of " the pool of immortality," also called the Durbar Sahib, and known to English people as the Golden Temple. It is said that while it was being built a mason displaced a brick in the foundation, on which the Guru prophesied that it would have again to be laid. His words subsequently came true. In after years Ahmad Shah Durrani, the Afghan king, destroyed the temple and desecrated the tank. Two years after he had done so a Sikh army recovered possession of Amritsir, when the foundation of the Harmandar was relaid and the temple reconstructed. When compiling the Adi Granth he invited the principal Hindu and Musalman saints and men of letters to attend and suggest for incorporation in it the choicest literary productions of their respective creeds. Those which were not inconsistent with the teaching of the Gurus were accepted and included in it. The Guru, when the work had been concluded, considered it a code which united all Sikhs by a common tie. He himself wrote the conclusion, to which he affixed his seal. The translation of this conclusion is as follows : " Three things have been put into the vessel (the Granth Sahib), truth, patience and medita- tion. ' The ambrosial name of God, the supporter of all, hath also been put therein. " He who eateth and enjoyeth it shall be saved. This pro- vision should never be abandoned, ever clasp it to your hearts. By embracing God's feet we cross the ocean of darkness ; Nanak, everything, is an extension of God." (Macauliffe's " History of the Sikhs.") The Guru told his Sikhs that the Granth Sahib was the em- bodiment of the Gurus and should therefore be held in extreme S 2 INDIAN STUDIES reverence. A copy was kept in the Harmandar and parts of it recited each day to the crowds who came to bathe in the holy tank. Bands of musicians also sang daily of the deeds of Nanak and his successors which are recorded in it ; this infused a new national spirit into the Sikhs. Arjan organized a system of nazaranas (presents from an inferior to a superior) and sent his deputies to the faithful in all parts to collect them, thus the Sikhs became accustomed to a regular system of contributing to the welfare of their Commonwealth which tended greatly to their unification and common action. He encouraged his followers to engage in an extensive trade in horses with Turkestan which improved the breed of horses in the Punjab and added, sub- sequently, greatly to the military efficiency of the Sikhs. 1 his great Guru did much to weld the Sikhs into a brotherhood. He, however, fell into evil times, for the persecution of himself and his religion by the Moghuls began. He was charged with treason in having offered up prayers for the success of Prince Khushru, the Moghul Emperor's rebellious son, and was im- prisoned and brutally tortured. He remained in prison suffering cruelly till his death in 1606. He never grumbled or complained. When taunted by his persecutors he merely replied : " Oh, fools ! I shall never fear such treatment. It is all according to the will of God, therefore it affords me pleasure." The treatment of their late Guru greatly incensed the Sikhs, who, under his son and successor, .Guru Gpbind, organized them- selves into an efficient military body to defend their religion should it be necessary to do so. Gobind was treacherously seized and imprisoned for twelve years, during which he was kept in a state of semi-starvation until released on the accession of the Emperor Shah Jehan. During his imprisonment the Sikhs, being without a leader, remained quiescent. On his release there were repeated quarrels between him and the Moghul Court. His conduct at Amritsir drew on him the emperor's displeasure. He sent a force of 7,000 men to seize the Guru and disperse his followers, which were completely defeated by the Sikhs. This was the first combat between the Musalmans and Sikhs. It was fought in the open, where both armies were on equal terms. The victory was hailed with the greatest joy by the Sikhs, whose religious and corporate spirit it greatly strengthened. They now called the Guru the " true king " ; he was thus SIKHS 53 publicly recognized by them as both their secular and religious ruler. He was, however, in no way puffed up nor unconscious of the power of the Moghul Government and his own comparative weakness. He retired into difficult jungle country so as to avoid a collision with the Imperial Army. There were many causes of enmity between the Sikhs and their Moghul rulers ; the cruel death of the late Guru and the long imprisonment of the present one, the status he had assumed and the retaliation of the Sikhs for injuries inflicted on them- selves and on their secular and religious chief had aggravated them ; their success in the recent combat under his leadership had encouraged their military spirit, so it was not likely that the peace which had been patched up through the intervention of Prince Dara Shikoh would be durable. The Emperor and his nobles strongly resented the pretensions of the Guru ; a large Moghul Army under distinguished Omrahs was sent against him. It crossed the Sutlej and followed him into his jungle retreat. The scarcity of provisions and the difficulties of the march disorganized it. It was attacked by the Sikhs under his command and completely routed, its most distinguished com- manders being killed. The remains of the Moghul army fled to Lahore quite dispirited. The Guru, having twice defeated Imperial armies in the open field, now became bolder and occupied Kirtarpur. He was not, however, allowed to remain there long with impunity. He was attacked for the third time by a fresh Moghul army which the Guru signally defeated, behaving with the greatest personal valour, killing many Musalmans in single combat, and among them the Commander. His success and the valour of their Guru greatly increased his prestige among his followers, in whose eyes he became not only their military and religious leader but a hero and a skilled general. These victories greatly enriched the Sikhs, who captured immense booty from their enemies. Towards the end of his life the Guru retired to his fortress of Kirtarpur, where he died in peace in 1645, having reigned as Guru for thirty-one and a half years. He was loved and respected by his Sikhs, two or three of whom burned themselves with him on his funeral pyre, and more wculd have done so but were forbidden by his successor. Har Govind had three wives. His eldest son predeceased him, leaving a son named Har Rai, whom the Guru appointed his successor. 54 INDIAN STUDIES The mother of his second son, whose name was Tegh Bahadur, was much annoyed at her son not being named and remonstrated with the Guru, but it is said that he pacified her by prophesying that her son would succeed in due course to the pontifical and princely office. He bequeathed his arms to her, telling her to give them to her son when he became old enough. Har Rai on succeeding remained at Kirtarpur, where he lived peacefully, not meddling with politics. The military spirit of his Sikhs did not, however, decrease ; they were continually engaged in war with their neighbours, the hill Rajputs, and in carrying on feuds with their Musalman enemies. Prince Dara Shikoh in the war of the succession for the throne, which occurred on the imprisonment of Shah Jehan, was greatly aided by them. On the victory of Aurungzeb over his brothers he demanded the presence of the Guru at Delhi, but the latter made excuses which were accepted on condition that his eldest son, Ram Rai, who carried them to Aurungzeb, should remain as a hostage at his court. The Guru died after a peaceful reign in 1661, leaving two sons, the youngest, Har Kishan, being only six years of age. A violent quarrel now broke out among the Sikhs as to the succession. One party considered Ram Rai, whose mother was a handmaid, illegitimate, and so disqualified. They thought that as the late Guru had always spoken in public of Har Kishan as his successor that therefore he was so by right and nomination. Another party favoured Ram Rai. The quarrel was referred to the Emperor Aurungzeb, who ordered Har Kishan to Delhi, where he decided in his favour. Har Kishan shortly afterwards died of smallpox. Before his death he was asked to name his successor, to which he replied : " Your Guru is in the village of Bakala." It was in this village that Tegh Bahadur lived. A schism again arose as to the succession. There were three parties, viz., that of Tegh Bahadur, that of the Sodhis, to which sub-caste a former Guru had belonged, who set up a Guru of their own, and another which supported Ram Rai. Tegh Bahadur's party eventually prevailed, and he reluctantly accepted the cushion of the Guruship, on doing which his mother gave him the arms left with her by the Guru Har Govind, whose prophecy was thus fulfilled. With the succession of Tegh Bahadur, which ended the schism, numbers flocked to the banner of the new Guru, who became more powerful and lived in greater SIKHS 55 state than any of his predecessors. He meditated extirpating the faction of the Sodhis, but was persuaded by some of his influential supporters to desist from doing so ; they, however, and the Sikhs generally never forgave the Sodhis for their oppo- sition to Tegh Bahadur, and to-day a stigma rests on their descen- dants. Tegh Bahadur commenced his reign by adding to the forti- fications of Kirtarpur, where he established his court. His pro- ceedings created suspicion in the mind of Aurungzeb, instigated, it is said, by Ram Rai, who was still at his court. The Ram Rais, now a small sect, are held in disrepute to-day because of the treachery of their leader to Tegh Bahadur. Aurungzeb ordered the Guru to be arrested and brought to Delhi. On his arrival there the Raja of Jaipur, in whose custody he was placed, interceded for him, declaring that he was a peaceful fakir with no evil inten- tions. He was allowed to accompany the Raja, who was going to Bengal. On arrival there he took up his residence at Patna, where he remained some five or six years, during which he founded a college for Sikhs and devoted himself entirely to religion. While at Patna his son, Govind Singh, was born. He was to be his successor, the tenth, last and greatest of the Gurus. From Patna this Guru returned to the Punjab. At the time of his return the fanatical Emperor Aurungzeb was engaged in his plan for forcibly converting Hindostan to Islam. He had thrown thousands of Brahmins into jail in the belief that if people of their high caste could be induced to accept Islam the lower castes of Hindus would follow their example. His surmise was founded on a correct idea, for what high caste Hindus do, carries great weight with those lower, but he never had the chance of testing it, for the Brahmins, notwithstanding the most cruel tortures, refused to accept Islam. He had apparently the same idea regarding the Guru and his Sikhs. He had him arrested and carried to Delhi for the second time. The Guru felt quite convinced that he would not escape death. Before leaving for Delhi he had his son, Govind Singh, brought before him. Embracing him, as he said, for the last time, he put the sword of Har Govind into his hands, saluted him as his successor and told him he was in honour bound to avenge his death, which his going to Delhi certainly meant. On his arrival at Delhi he was brought before Aurungzeb, who endeavoured to induce him to voluntarily accept Islam. 56 INDIAN STUDIES He at once refused, upon which he was thrown into jail, where he underwent the most severe tortures by order of the Emperor. It is said by Sikhs that while in jail he one day looked stead- fastly to the West. It happened that in this direction lay the house of a Musalman Kazi under whose orders he had been much persecuted. With a view to increasing his punishment his jailers accused him of looking into the women's quarter of the Kazi's house. To which he replied, " I am not looking to the West for that purpose, but because I see that from that direction shall come a fair people wearing hats who will destroy the Moghuls and bring justice to this land, which they will rule, and they will give justice and prosperity to my Sikhs." This prophecy is remembered and frequently repeated by the Sikhs, who deduce therefrom that they are religiously bound to be loyal subjects of the King-Emperor, Sikhs have certainly in this war acted up to it, and given their lives valiantly fighting for him in propor- tionately greater numbers than any of the other warrior castes of India. Failing to induce the Guru to'accept Islam, the Emperor ordered him to be beheaded, in 1675, after he had reigned as Guru for a little over thirteen years and seven months. He was universally acknowledged by the Sikhs as their Sachha Badshah, or true King. After his death Aurungzeb ordered the tortured body of the Guru to be publicly exposed in the streets of Delhi. It was eventually rescued from dogs and vultures by Delhi scavengers and taken to Anandpur, where Guru Govind Singh performed its funeral rites and erected a great shrine to his martyred father. The head was burnt by some Sikhs in Delhi, and on the spot where this was done a Gurdhwara, or Sikh temple, has been built. Owing to the respect the Delhi scavengers had shown to the Guru's body they were adopted into the Sikh community as v Mazabi Sikhs, that is Sikhs by religion. Although according to the tenets of the Sikh religion all men are equal before God and no such thing as caste is admitted, the Mazabi Sikhs to-day do not enjoy the same social status as Sikhs converted from ""good Hindu castes, by whom both they and the Ramdasis are looked down upon. Both are enlisted in the Army in regiments, mostly Pioneers, which are composed wholly of them. They are good soldiers, who have served the King-Emperor gallantly " in many previous wars as well as in the present one. On the martyrdom of his father, Govind Singh, then about SIKHS 57 fifteen years of age, succeeded to the Guru's cushion in A.D. 1675. Being surrounded by enemies, he retired to that strong forest region of the Siwalik Hills through which the River Jumna runs, which was difficult of access to his enemies. There he lived for many years, laying his plans, educating himself and hunting big game, the tiger and the boar, during his leisure. He had a perfect knowledge of Hindi, Persian, and his native Punjabi. Persian he learnt under the tuition of one Pir Mohamed, a Musal- man Kazi (judge). During the years he spent in these jungles he gave himself up to reflection and consideration of how he could benefit his people. Ee resolved to raise his Sikhs socially and politically, to abolish caste distinctions and, making equality a fundamental religious principle, to admit converts from all castes, tribes and religions except Minas, an aboriginal tribe ; " to arm the whole population, and to make wealth and positions of dignity objects to which all might aspire. He saw clearly that his sect could no longer follow the peaceful tenets of Nanak, which merely inculcated self-protection, but that, suffering as they were under gross persecution by their Musalman rulers, it was necessary to enable them to live peacefully that they should raise themselves by deeds of valour and become a power which could resist tyranny and overthrow the rule of tyrants, and he recognized that to do this united action was necessary. After much preparation he embarked on his great work at the age of thirty-five years. He was admirably fitted to undertake it ; he had trained him- self mentally 'and physically for the part. He reminded his followers of the cruel death of his father and his promise to avenge it. He reminded them of their own long persecution by their Musalman tyrants, and by his great eloquence he worked on their deep sense of their wrongs, and he urged them to resist and avenge the tyranny under which they were then suffering and had done so for so long. He, as their Sat Guru (spiritual guide), preached that the only way they could attain this object was by turning their rosaries and ploughs into swords ; the result of their doing so, he said, would be rewarded both in this world and the next. This great teacher, who in himself combined the qualities of a legislator, soldier and devotee, infused his own noble ardour into his disciples, xhe awoke in them that spirit of self-sacrifice and senftfi f>f flllty T 1 ^ T***"**r* r *w>~~ , 58 INDIAN STUDIES true religion and of military success.. He roused their hitherto latent energies, directed them in right lines and formed his Sikhs into a military-religious commonwealth admirably suited to resist the tyranny of their oppressors. Many English and Indian writers state that this great Guru . transformed degenerate Hindus into an aspiring race ; this is I not so. Those of his disciples from whom he drew his best and / most numerous warriors were in no wise degenerates. They were / mostly hardy Jats and Goojers, with many Brahmins of fighting k / sub-castes, Rajputs, and other warlike people who were inhabi- / tants of the Punjab and neighbouring districts, the climate of which, alternating between extremes of heat and cold, produces virile races such as are not to be found in the tepid plains further south where cold is unknown. What he really did, and it was no light task and could only have been done by a man of the greatest genius and personality, was to induce a certain number of brave peoples to abandon internecine strife and selfishness and act together for the welfare of the common- wealth. The peoples in this part of India had ever been virile beyond those of other provinces and they are so to-day. Their military virtue has been proved on many a stricken field. There are people of similar castes in many other parts of India, but climate has had its wonted influence on them. Further south, living in the hot plains, they are of inferior physique and less military virtue. The caste to which the Gurus themselves belonged, viz., the Kshatris of the Punjab, have produced many distinguished military leaders, but as soldiers they have been in no wise equal to the Jats or Rajputs of that province. This is accounted for by their having been for ages scribes and merchants, who in early ages abandoned their ancient warrior habits. Although the Kshatri caste is spread all over India, nowhere outside the Punjab have any of its members shown the slightest military virtue, and those of the Punjab itself have only done so when uplifted by the pure religion of the Gurus. Govind Singh, having matured his plans before embarking on them, resolved to test the staunchness of his followers. He convoked a great meeting near Anandpur, and having explained his doctrines called upon some of his Sikhs to come forth and make a sacrifice of their lives in proof of their sincerity. Among the many who did so he selected five ; they were taken successively SIKHS 59 into a tent, and after each had entered the Guru came forth and exhibited the bloody sword which had been ostensibly used for their sacrifice. After he had gone through this procedure in the case of each the Guru came forth with the five and explained that what he had done was to test the courage of his Sikhs. He said that the blood on the sword was that of a goat he had procured for the purpose and that he was now satisfied with the devotion of his followers. He then announced that the five men, whose names have been carefully preserved, had proved their devotion, and that he would now before the whole assembly bestow on them the pahul of the true religion. He then poured water into a vessel and putting sugar into it stirred it up with the sacrificial sword, he recited some inspiring verses, when each drank some of the sugar and water, which he called amrit (water of life), and the remainder he sprinkled over them. He then cried aloud, " Repeat the Khalsa of the Wah Guru ! Victory to the holy Wah Guru ! " They were then hailed as Singhs or lions, a name hitherto only applied to Rajputs, and he declared them to be the Khalsa, or purified. He then had himself in- augurated with the pahul and exclaimed : " Khalsa Guru se aur Guru Khalsa se ho Ek dusra ka tabadar ho," which means, " The Khalsa is from the Guru and the Guru from Khalsa, They must be obedient to one another." The Guru further declared that whenever in future five Sikhs should be assembled together it should be considered that the Guru Govind Singh was himself present, and that whenever any of his followers wished to see him they could always do so in the Khalsa. He further declared that all who were his true followers must never be without five things, all commencing with the letter K, and whoever was without them was no true disciple of his. These five things it is to-day incumbent on all Sikhs to wear on their person, they are the Kangi (comb in the hair), Kesh (shorts down to the knee), Kherd (knife), Kes (long, uncut hair of the head) and Kirpan (sword). 60 INDIAN STUDIES Sikhs who dress in European fashion wear the Kesh as drawers and a miniature Kirpan, the latter they also carry where arms are prohibited, but in most cases, to their disgust, even the minia- ture Kirpan was, when I left India, prohibited by Government, which illustrates how out of touch it is with the peoples it rules. They might as well prohibit carrying a penknife ! In a short time all the Guru's disciples received the pahul, which it is necessary that all Sikhs should do before becoming Singhs or warriors. There are many Sikhs who do not take it, but they are not considered as true warriors or champions. The Guru, having done these things, entirely abolished caste among the Sikhs and preached the equality of all men before the Supreme Being whom they adore. He directed that all families in which there were four adult males should send two for military service under him, and in a short time 80,000 assem- bled at Makhowal, where he had established his Court. The Guru, seated on his golden cushion, gave an address to his assembled Sikhs which made the deepest impression on them. He commenced by praising God, the Omnipotent, Almighty, Invisible, Incomprehensible, and All-merciful. God, he said, must be worshipped in truthfulness and sincerity, and no image must be used. He told them He could only be beheld by the eye of faith in the general body of the Khalsa. He declared his mission, on which he had been sent by the Lord, was to save and liberate the Khalsa and to unite all Sikhs in one common brotherhood. He said the spirit of Nanak had been inherited by him, transmitted as one lamp imparts its flame to another. He added : " There must be no caste among you and you must all be equal, no man greater than the other. All must eat at the same table and drink from the same cup ; caste must be for- gotten, idols destroyed ; the Brahmin thread broken, the graves of so-called saints must not be worshipped, Korans must be torn to pieces. The only way to salvation is initiation into the pahul of the Sat Guru, a true belief in the holiness and purity of the Khalsa and praise and glory given to the Creator. Words must be in accordance with deeds, all superstitions must be abandoned and the true religion of the Sat Guru adopted." From this time the Guru tied up his hair, which he previously wore long, in a knot, and changed his own name and the names of his warrior disciples to Singhs. He called the commonwealth SIKHS 61 the Khalsa and required all its members from birth or initiation to dedicate themselves to the profession of arms. All Sikhs, regardless of caste, were allowed to bathe in the sacred tank at Amritsir and to assemble at the holy temple there for prayers and to hear the Granth read. These principles of equality caused some of the Sikhs of the twice-born castes, Brahmins, Rajputs and Kshatris, to abandon the Guru, whose main strength, however, lay in Jats, who flocked to receive the pahul in thousands. The Guru then abolished all prohibitions enforced by other religions or caste rules in regard to food ; he forbade the shaving of the head because it was a custom adopted by Hindus, and the smoking or chewing of tobacco ; his followers were directed always to carry steel in some shape to remind them of their military obligation ; this is usually done to-day by wearing a steel bracelet. He established a new form of salutation different from that of Hindus and Musalmans to be used by his followers, it is, " Wah Guru ji ka Khalsa ; shri Wah Guruji ki fateh," which means, " The Khalsa is of the Lord, Victory be with the Lord." He did so to awaken religious fervour in their minds and to always remind them of their obligations to God and to one another. He then organized his Sikhs into military units and built and garrisoned forts along the skirt of the hills between the Sutlej and Jumna, extending his operations into the plains. He defeated his local enemies, some hill -Raj as and their Afghan allies, and assumed the title of " The True King," by which he meant -the King who not only ruled in the world but showed his subjects the way to salvation in the next. Aurungzeb, alarmed at his pretensions, sent an army against him which he resisted desperately, but he was eventually defeated by superior numbers and forced to take refuge in his fort of Makhowal, where he was besieged by the Moghul army. His mother and two sons escaped and took refuge in Sirhind, but were discovered and arrested. The two sons were cruelly murdered in that city, when his mother died of grief. Provisions being now short in Makhowal, that part of its garri- son which had not been killed broke through the besiegers and dispersed ; the Guru himself, accompanied by only forty followers, and his surviving two sons escaped. After many vicissitudes, which he bore bravely, and during which his sons and their 62 INDIAN STUDIES mother were killed, he again collected his followers in the Feroz- pur district, where he defeated a Moghul force of 7,000 men. The scene of this combat, in which the losses on both sides were great, was near a tank, now called Muktesir, or Salvation Pool, by the Sikhs, who hold it in great reverence and attach religious importance to bathing in it. The Guru, after this combat, retired into the country to the east of the Sutlej . The Moghul forces did not molest him ; there he remained in peace, for some time occupying himself in making converts. While so engaged he built himself a house which he called Damdama. He gave it his blessing and it is to-day a place of pilgrimage. It is now inhabited by religious people who after a life of wandering settle there in their old age. It is a seat of Punjab learning where the best Gurmukhi is written. Gurmukhi is the character in which the Punjabi language is written. It is said that a visit to Damdama inspires wisdom. Issuing from Damdama, the Guru conquered Sirhind. His followers wished to destroy the town in revenge for the murder of his two sons, but the Guru refused his sanction to such a procedure saying that all that was necessary was for any of his followers who in future visited the place, which should be known to Sikhs as Guru Mar, or the place where the Gurus were killed, was to take from the city two bricks and to throw them into the Sutlej in detestation of the crime committed on his innocent children. All religious Sikhs when they pass Sirhind carry out these orders. They have built a great shrine there, which is visited by many pilgrims. From Sirhind the Guru retired to Anandpur, where he remained in peace till the close of Aurungzeb's reign, when that Emperor summoned him to appear before him. He replied in a poem in Persian in which he set forth the vicissitudes he had undergone and the calamities he had endured from the Musalman Government ; in it he said he had, owing to its tyranny, lost his family and his dearest friends, but a day of reckoning would come when the tyrant would have to answer to the Creator for the wrongs he had done to the weak and helpless. That for himself he was weary of life and despised death, he feared none, but if he was killed his death would be avenged. Shortly after the receipt of this reply Aurungzeb died and was succeeded by his son Bahadur Shah. On the succession of this Emperor the Guru repaired to the Dekkan and assisted him in his war with his brother, Kam Baksh. While in the SIKHS 63 Dekkan the Guru was badly wounded by a Pathan who attempted to assassinate him. He was careless of his health and travelled about before his wound had healed. The result was fatal, and he died at Nadir, on the banks of the Godavery River, in A. 0.1708, aged forty-eight. When his Sikhs saw his death was near they mourned greatly, saying : " Oh, true Guru ! Who will inspire us with truth and lead us to victory when thou art gone ? " The Guru replied that the mission of the appointed ten was now done, and he entrusted the Khalsa to the care of God, the Never-Dying. " I entrust my Khalsa/' he said, " to the everlasting Divine Being, whoever wishes to behold the Guru let him offer Karah-pershad (sweet- meats), worth one rupee four annas, or less, bow before the Granth Sahib, and open it, and he shall have an interview with him. Whatever is then asked will be given. The Granth Sahib shall support you under all your troubles and adversities in this world, and be your sure guide to the next. The Guru shall dwell with the Khalsa, and wherever there shall be five Sikhs gathered together there shall the Guru be also present." Feeling exhausted, he then warned them against impostors, who would try to lead them from the right path, and told them they must have firm belief in the One God and the Granth Sahib, in which was the law of the Khalsa. He directed that they were to bathe him and arm him with his weapons, which were to be burnt with him. He then mounted the funeral pyre without assistance and expired, uttering prayers to God, the Merciful. The death of the great Guru was deeply mourned ; his followers erected a memorial and dharamsala (religious rest-house) at Nadir, which is to-day called by Sikhs Akalnagar, " the immortal city." It is a place of pilgrimage ; many devotees are attached to the shrine. Whenever the devotees of Akalnagar are in need of money they send out some from among them with a request for a subscription from all Sikhs. This request is called an " order " (hukumnama) and is sealed with the seal of Govind Singh, which they possess. It is never ignored ; every Sikh gives according to his means. This great man instituted the " Gurumatta," or " State Council," to which all Sikhs were ad- mitted and given an opportunity of expressing their opinions on political matters. It met periodically at Amritsir. He modified the Adi Granth and compiled a code of his own, as well as a record of his actions ; his Granth is called the " Book 64 INDIAN STUDIES of the Tenth King " to distinguish it from the Adi Granth of Guru Nanak. Govind Singh was highly educated, and a poet of no mean order. He held wealth in contempt, but was strict in maintaining his personal dignity, as well as that of his apostolic position. He was ever thoughtful for the welfare of his subjects, as the Sikhs had become, for he was both their pope and king. He severely punished tax-gatherers or other officials who were found guilty of oppression. Some of these he excommunicated, others he imprisoned, and the most hardened culprits he threw into boiling oil. These severe punishments were, he considered, necessary to prevent the iniquities which were innate in the official and tax-collecting classes, but drastic as they were, they did not altogether prevent the abuse of power, as those who exercised it often trusted to their subtlety to evade punishment for their misdeeds. Before his death he met in the Dekkan a Hindu ascetic of the Byragi order, who had a large following. His name was Banda ; he became a Sikh, took the pahul, and was a firm adherent of the Guru, who reposed great confidence in him. Previous to his death the Guru told Banda that he was to remain a warrior and avenge the death of his father and his four innocent sons, which Banda faithfully promised to do. He repaired to the Punj ab, and on arrival there at once issued orders to the Sikhs, in the name of the Guru, to prepare for possibilities with the object of overthrowing Musalman rule. They flocked to his standard in large numbers, attacked and frequently defeated the Imperial troops, with great slaughter, and took, pillaged and destroyed the town of Sirhind. On the death of Bahadur Shah in 1712 the usual war of suc- cession occurred, which facilitated the operations of Banda ; he wreaked full vengeance on the Musalman oppressors, and for some five years the whole of the Punjab was ravaged by his faction. Large numbers of the Sikhs, objecting to his religious innovations, refused to join him. Sir John Malcolm says : " It is unnecessary to state the particulars of this memorable incursion, which, from all accounts, appears to have been one of the severest scourges with which a country was ever afflicted. Every excess that the most wanton barbarity could commit, every cruelty that an unappeased appetite of revenge could suggest, was in- flicted upon the miserable inhabitants of the province through which they passed. Life was only granted to those who conformed SIKHS 65 to the religion and adopted the habits and dress of the Sikhs." As the Sikhs had been done by so did they do to Musalmans. Not till the reign of Farukhseer, in 1713, were they suppressed, and then the feeble Moghul Government was only able to defeat the small but brave party of Sikhs who had joined Banda, and only did so with the aid of thousands of mercenary Afghan troops, whom it was able to enlist. Banda, when defeated in the field, took refuge in the fort of Gurdaspur, which he had previously built as a place of refuge in case of necessity. Besieged there and oppressed by hunger, most of his followers broke through their enemies and dispersed, on which he surrendered with the remainder, among whom were most of the chiefs, on the promise of good treatment. His followers were hunted down indefatigably by the Musalmans, who put all they caught to death without mercy. Banda and seven hundred of his chiefs and followers were taken to -Delhi. There they were treated with the greatest cruelty; one hundred of them were executed daily, amidst the jeers of the city mob. Banda himself had his son placed on his lap, and was ordered to cut his throat, with a knife given to him for the purpose. He complied without the slightest hesitation ; he was then torn to pieces with red-hot irons. He died bravely, remarking that power had been given to him by the Almighty to punish evil- doers, but now the Almighty had given the same power to others to punish him for his transgressions. He was opposed by many of the orthodox followers of Nanak and Govind ; numbers of the followers of the latter he slew for refusing to conform to innovations and changes introduced by him in the precepts of that great Guru. On his death most of the Sikhs who had followed him returned to the religion of Govind. Banda's memory is held in detestation. A small sect of his followers called Bandais still exists in the Punjab, they follow the Adi Granth, but not the Granth of the Tenth Guru Govind. During these troubles the Sikhs conquered many districts on which they levied contributions. They built forts in which they could take refuge in case of defeat by their Musalman oppressors. The chief Sikh in each district was called a Sirdar ; his importance varied with the numbers of his followers, which depended on his prowess and success in looting and consequent ability to pay them. They waged perpetual war against Musal- mans, whose masjids they destroved and desecrated. They 5 66 INDIAN STUDIES named the territories they appropriated after their native village, or according to the peculiar habits of their followers, who adopted the territorial name of the Sirdar. Thus the Sirdar whose native village was Ramgarh called his followers Ramgarhias, while he who lived in the village of Ahluwal called his Ahluwalias. Another chief whose people were given to the consumption of Indian hemp (Bhang) called his followers Bhangis. If the followers of one Sirdar were not satisfied with him they could at any time leave his service, and enlist under the banner of another. So each Sirdar had an interest in making himself popular with his retainers, by attend- ing to their wants and wishes. In this way the Sikhs increased their numbers and resources and strengthened the foundation of their confederacy. It was a point of honour with all Sirdars to assist one another against the common Musalman enemy, although they often fought amongst themselves when not so engaged. The principal Sirdars at this time were as follows : The Ahluwalia was a Jat distiller. He was the founder of the present ruling House of Kapurthala. The Bhangi was a Jat peasant. The Daliwala was a Kshatri shopkeeper. The Fyzulpuria was a Jat landowner. He was a man of great ability and organized the Dal, or army of the Singhs. He was a deadly enemy of Musalmans, of whom he boasted that he had slain over five hundred with his own hand. Curiously enough, he adopted the Musalman title of Nawab, instead of that of Sirdar, and was the only Sikh who did so. The Kanhia was a Jat peasant. The Nakai was a Jat peasant, who took his clan name from the Nakka country, south-west of Lahore. The Nishanwala (standard-bearer) was a Jat, who was heredi- tary standard-bearer of the Dal, or assembled army of the Khalsa, hence the name. The Phulkia Sirdar was a Jat of Bhatti Rajput descent. From him are descended the present ruling chiefs of Patiala, Nabha and Jhind, generally known as the Phulkian chiefs, from Phul Singh, the name of their common ancestor. The Sukerchakia was a Jat, said by some to be of Bhatti Rajput descent, by others to have been a man of the aboriginal gipsy tribe of Sansis. From him was descended the Maharaja Ranjit Singh, who subsequently obtained supreme power over SIKHS 67 all the misls except the Ahluwalia and Phulkia, which were saved by obtaining British protection. The Shahid and Nihang Sirdari was a combination of the descendants of Martyrs who had been murdered by Musalmans, and of certain soldiers called Akalis, or Immortals. The two misls were founded by Guru Govind Singh, and were so called because in their prayers they invoked the divinity under his name of Akal, or the Immortal. They were the special champions of Sikhism and its bravest fighters. The Shahids and Nihangs, the bravest among the brave Sikhs, elected their Sirdar from among themselves. Besides these, there were many other Sirdars whose descendants are to-day highly respected landowners in various parts of the Punjab. After the defeat and death of Banda, the Sikhs, nothing de- pressed, quickly issued from their fastnesses, overran the Punj ab in all directions, and, shutting up the Afghans in Lahore and Sirhind, amply avenged themselves on their enemies in the open country. In the spring of 1761 they convened a great Guru Matta, or Grand Council of the Khalsa, at Amritsir, which was attended by all the Sirdars and their followers and the Dal of the Khalsa, or army of the Singhs, of a strength of some 60,000 men. It was unanimously agreed to lay siege to Sirhind, which decision was at once carried out. On hearing of these proceedings Ahmed Shah, the Durrani King of Afghanistan, at the head of a large army, advanced from Kabul in 1762, and completely defeated the besieging' force at Kot Rahira, a severely contested battle, and relieved the .besieged town. This battle is called by the Sikhs the Ghula Ghara, or great visitation, on account of the severe losses they suffered. In it the Sirdar of the Phulkias was made prisoner and taken before the Shah, who received him favourably, and on his paying a large fine dismissed him with the title of Raja. His name was Ala Singh, he was the first Raja of Patiala. The Shah then marched on Amritsir, ravaging the country through which he passed, and revenging himself on the Sikhs for the indignities they had put on Musalmans. He blew up the temple of Harmandar and defiled the sacred tank, round which he erected pyramids of the heads of thousands of Sikhs whom he executed. After this, to him, pleasing religious duty had been 5* 68 INDIAN STUDIES accomplished, he retired to Kabul, leaving an Afghan Governor in Lahore, who depended for support on the Musalman tribes of the surrounding country. The Sikhs, nothing daunted, and thirsting for revenge, convened a Guru Matta at Amritsir, in which they decided to vigorously carry on the war. In 1763 they defeated the Afghans and again took Sirhind, which, this time, they razed to the ground in revenge for the murder of the sons 'of the Guru Govind Singh. They then conquered and divided among themselves the country between the Sutlej and the Jumna, the ruins of Sirhind falling to the Raj a of Patiala. Enraged at their proceedings, Ahmed Shah in 1764 for the seventh time appeared on the scene at the head of a large army. The Sikhs, following their usual custom, retreated before him, leaving him free to devastate the country through which he passed, which he did to the full. After he had been about two months so engaged, he retired precipitately to Kabul, where his presence became necessary on account of disturbances which had broken out there. Previous to his departure he confirmed the Raja of Patiala in his possession of Sirhind, and appointed him his Governor of the surrounding country, on his agreeing to pay an annual subsidy. Ahmed Shah's retreat was, as usual, harried by the Sikhs, who, issuing from their fastnesses, caused him great loss, killing many Afghans, and no sooner had he crossed the Ravi than they captured Lahore. They again assembled a Guru Matta at Amritsir, which pro- claimed the Khalsa as the ruling power in the Punjab, and the Sikh religion as supreme. It decided that the various chiefs and their followers, although ordinarily independent of one another, should consider themselves not only bound in honour, but that it was their paramount religious duty when the Khalsa was attacked to act in unison in its defence. They ordered the levy of " protection money " on the inhabitants of the country they had conquered, and formed themselves into a feudal con- federacy for mutual protection. They had, in 1767, conquered the whole country, from the Jhelam on the east to the Jumna on the west. Enraged at their rebellions, Ahmed Shah resolved to wreak vengeance and exterminate them. He left Kabul for the purpose in 1767 at the head of a large army, and advanced unopposed to the Sutlej, the Sikhs retreating before him, according to their SIKHS 69 usual practice. On arrival on the banks of that river he became very ill, and to add to his troubles a body of his Afghan troops, 12,000 strong, deserted him and marched back to Kabul. Influenced by these circumstances, he changed his plans, and tried to conciliate the Sikhs, whom he felt unable to exterminate as he had intended. In pursuit of this policy he conferred the title of Maharaja on the Rajah of Patiala, and made him his governor of the territory he had seized. He treated several other Sikh leaders very graciously, and having re-installed the Afghan Governor of Lahore, retreated to Kabul, where he died a few years afterwards of cancer of the nose, a disease which had long afflicted him. On his retirement the Sikhs, not in the least influenced by his conciliatory treatment, pursued his retreating army as far as Atok, causing it great losses. They then set about the conquest of the Afghan tribes; of the Punjab and their native Musalman adherents, and meeting with little opposition, soon made themselves masters of the whole country, from the Indus on the west to the Jumna on the east. They converted large numbers of Hindus to Sikhism, thereby greatly increasing their numbers. The Singhs then became known by territorial names, as well as those of their misl. Those living between the Jumna and the Sutlej, mostly converted Jats and Gujars, were called the Malwa Singhs. Those between the Bias and Sutlej, Doaba Singhs. Those between the Bias and the Ravi, Manjha Singhs. Those between the Ravi and the Chenab, Dharapi Singhs. Those between the Chenab and the Jhelam, Dhanigeb Singhs. Those of Multan district, Naki Singhs. The strategy adopted by the Sikhs in their then unorganized state was admirably adapted to their circumstances. The country in which they fought was, at that time, one of vast, roadless jungles, or low, forest-covered hills. Their troops consisted of Cavalry armed with a sword, lance and musket and of Infantry mostly armed with the cross-bow. They had no Ar- tillery. Their enemies were much better organized than they were, they were better armed and had a numerous Artillery ; it was therefore hopeless to oppose them in the open field. They therefore decided to erect forts as places of refuge in the recesses of the jungle at long distances apart. These they garrisoned with their infantry, while their well-mounted cavalry hovered round the enemy armies, never giving them any rest and attacking them when at a disadvantage. If defeated or 70 INDIAN STUDIES threatened by superior forces, they dispersed to their various jungle refuges, where it was difficult for a large force to penetrate on account of bad roads and scarcity of provisions. If a small one attempted to do so they quickly assembled and attacked , it with superior numbers, making full use of their mobility, Every Sikh was proficient in the use of arms, such being a necessary qualification for membership of the Khalsa. The various Sirdars were despotic rulers of the territories they conquered. In its administration they were guided by the laws of the Gurus, and by the necessity of obtaining the approval of their followers. These received no regular pay, but were given grants from a fund made up from the revenue of their district, and booty taken in war. If the fund was rich, they were well paid, otherwise they were not. It was incumbent on each Sirdar to be ever on the watch to increase the fund to enable him to pay his followers well, who would not remain in his service if he did not do so. It was optional with them to abandon the pro- fession of arms or to transfer their services from one Sirdar to another, or to set up as Sirdars on their own account. Many adventurous persons adopted the latter course, and, if unsuccess- ful in attracting a sufficient number of followers, they amalga- mated with some Sirdar more fortunate than they were. In the course of time and as the power of the Khalsa increased and became stable the office of Sirdar became hereditary, when the Sirdar and his following formed a clan of which he was the chief. No clan was allowed any superiority over others ; to emphasize this they were called misls the word misl meaning equality or similarity. Over all was the Guru, who was both king and pope. With the death of the Guru Govind Singh, who had no successor for the Guruship, the Khalsa was left without any personal leader. As a substitute a Council of the Khalsa was established at Amritsir. It was the duty of this Council, called the Guru Matt a, guided in its decisions by the " Granth of the Tenth King," to deal with home and foreign affairs, war and religious education. Its spiritual guide, who interpreted the Granth, had immense power, as everything was supposed to be done in accordance with the orders of Guru Govind Singh, and in his name, and the spiritual guide was the interpreter of his wishes and orders, as laid down therein. The Akalis, or Immortals, also exercised great influence with the Council, for they were the specially devoted and most fanatical soldiers of the Guru. When united SIKHS 71 action was necessary it was agreed to by common consent of the League of the Khalsa, as expressed by the Guru Matta. Each Sirdar himself, or a panchayet, or Council of Elders, guided by the maxims of the Granth, administered civil and criminal law in the territory of the misl. The methods adopted by these dispensers of justice were crude. Their decision de- pended on a payment of some kind. If the accused was acquitted, he paid a thank-offering ; if he was guilty, a fine. If he refused, or was unable to pay up, he was thrown into a dungeon, where he languished till he produced a sum of money sufficient to satisfy the greed of his judges. Murderers were, on conviction, handed over to the relatives of the deceased, to be treated by them as they thought fit. Mutilation was the common punishment for theft, the hand of a thief being commonly amputated on conviction. Forced labour without pay, called kar begar, was exacted from the villagers. It was very oppressive. The Sirdars claimed as revenue half the production of the soil. Grain they took in kind, but for all other crops revenue was paid in cash. The severity of this exaction was much mitigated by a small bribe to the revenue collectors. Each Sirdar took transit dues from all merchandise passing through the territories of his misl. They were numerous ; such a system would have killed all trade had it been rigidly enforced. The difficulty was, however, got over by entrusting all goods in transit to Nanakpotras, or descendants of the first Guru Nanak. These people, on account of their illustrious ancestor, were greatly revered and enjoyed many privileges, among which were immunity from attack by robbers and lenient treatment from the various custom house officials. Goods under their charge were either lightly taxed or not taxed at all. Thus they passed through the territories of the various misls without danger from highway robbers or the robbers of the custom houses. In this way trade was freed from undue taxation. Those who do not understand local customs cannot compare the laws prevailing in states under native rule with those in force in British territory. In the latter the laws are hard and fast, while the bribery and oppression by petty officials is more severe. In the former, severity of the law is mitigated by many ancient customs, which even petty officials dare not ignore. Satti, which was from time immemorial obligatory on the widows of 72 INDIAN STUDIES all Hindu castes, except a few of the lowest, is deprecated by the Sikh religion, although permissible if carried out voluntarily. It was common among Sikhs, undue influence being doubtless used, in most cases, to induce the widows concerned to conform to the rite " voluntarily." It was not finally suppressed in the Punjab till the British annexation of that province. With the decline of the Moghul Empire and the disappearance of the Afghan danger on the death of Ahmed Shah, the Sikh misls, having no fear of external enemies, engaged in internecine strife for supremacy. During this period of anarchy the Guru Matta lost all influence. Internal strife continued till 1801, when Sirdar Ran jit Singh, the chief of the Sukerchakia misl, vanquished all competitors and became ruler of the Punjab. In that year he proclaimed himself Maharaja at a great Durbar held at Lahore, which was attended by the trans-Sutlej Sirdars and headmen, to whom he announced that he was their Sirkar, or government. He struck coin in his own name, which bore the following in- scription : " Hospitality and the sword and victory unfailing are got from Nanak Guru and Govind Singh." He was addressed by his courtiers as Khalsaji, or Lord of the Khalsa. The cis-Sutlej misls, the Phulkian, and one or two of lesser note, escaped him by becoming merged in the British Empire by the treaty of 1809. By that treaty the British Government recognized the Maharaja on terms of equality, he and they mutually agreed to accord one another " the footing of most favoured powers." The Maharaja engaged to limit his activities to the country to the north of the Sutlej ; that to its south became part of the British Indian Empire. The British bound themselves to have no concern with the territories or subjects of the Maharaja. The Maharaja had previously invaded Patiala and had hoped to subdue the cis-Sutlej States ; he reluctantly abandoned these plans, in deference to his desire to keep on good terms with the British ; he was not then quite firmly established on his new throne, and he greatly feared that a quarrel with them would upset his hopes in other and more important directions. The British Government were at the same time anxious to secure his friendship, and so made -things as easy for him as was compatible with their interests. They did so because they did not ignore the danger of Napoleon's threatened invasion through Asia Minor, Mesopotamia and Persia, in the event of which the SIKHS 73 friendship of the Ruler of the Punjab would have been of great moment. When such a great soldier as Napoleon thought the operation quite feasible in the beginning of the nineteenth century, in the beginning of the twentieth the construction of the Berlin-Baghdad railway and the invention of mechanical transport has made such an operation quite feasible, if no efficient means were taken to resist it. The subsequent history of the Maharaja Ran jit Singh as a ruler and conqueror are well known. Many Sikhs go to foreign countries in search of employment. They are to be found in large numbers in Burma, the Straits Settlements, China, and all the United States, and in less numbers in Manchuria, Eastern Siberia and the Argentine. I commanded the Indian troops, among whom were the I4th Sikhs, in Shanghai in 1900-01. On my arrival there I found some two thousand Sikhs in Shanghai itself, and in the neighbour- hood. Many of them were employed as watchmen by British, Foreign and Chinese merchants, and others were serving in the International Settlement Police. There was no British official who knew anything about Sikhs, or who took any special interest in their social condition. They were nearly all living very dis- reputable lives, according to Sikh ideas. Many were drunkards, few attended to their religious duties, while a goodly number had come under the evil influence of emissaries sent for the purpose by Indian Seditionist Societies in the United States. I got the Indian officers of the I4th Sikhs to take them in hand, which they did with complete success, and as long as that fine regiment was in Shanghai the civilian Sikhs there were all that could be desired. Feeling sure that when it left they would relapse, I reported the situation and recommended that, not only in Shanghai, but elsewhere in foreign lands where Sikhs or other Indians congregate, a man of their caste, of position and assured loyalty, should be appointed as Consul to look after them. My recommendation was ignored, to which I attribute much that subsequently occurred in India when these emigrants returned home. CHAPTER V OTHER RACES T3ESIDES aborigines, Hindus and Musalmans and Sikhs, JLJ there are many other races in India, some of whom I will describe briefly ; to describe all would be impossible in the space at my disposal, even did I know them, which I don't. Each of them have interests peculiar to themselves. The most im- portant of these, both politically and militarily, is the British domiciled community, from which I exclude the Army and Civil Service, the British serving in both being only temporary resi- dents, although some few reinforce it from time to time, by making their home in India on retirement. Individuals change periodi- cally, but the community some three hundred years ago first made its home in India many of the families composing it have been there for several generations. It has been domiciled in India longer than any of the Musalman dynasties ruling feudatory States to-day, and longer than many of the present-day noble Musalman families of Persian, Turkish or Pathan descent. Polygamy, inter-marriage with natives and the effect of climate have adversely affected the physique of all conquering races who have been long in India, the domiciled British except ed. They have been immune, because they live as their countrymen at home do, they do not inter-marry with natives or make their permanent homes in the hot parts of the land, but in the temperate mountain regions, where they have established their own schools for the children of those who are too poor to send them to England, while those who are better off periodically visit the homeland themselves, and send their children there to be educated. Since 1833, when the East India Company lost its trade monopoly, the Biitish domiciled community has greatly increased in numbers. It is made up not only of commercial men, but also of professional 74 OTHER RACES 75 men, planters, missionaries, retired officers of the Civil Service and the Army, house and land owners, engine drivers, firemen, pensioned British soldiers and others of all classes, rich and poor, the latter largely predominating. It can be safely said that owing to the improvement in communications due to the inven- tion of aeroplanes, this community will increase after the war to a much greater degree than previously, if peace and good govern- ment are maintained in the land. It is therefore of primary interest to all belonging to it to take part in Indian politics, for on the peaceful and orderly progress of India their lives and capital depend. India has benefited enormously in her commer- cial development and social progress from their efforts, nor is the benefit less, as agitators say it is, because it was incidental and not their main purpose. I know of no conquering or intruding race who went to India for philanthropic reasons alone. But the British domiciled community have identified themselves altogether with Indian interests, they have used their capital and opportunities in a way which makes all loyal Indians grateful to them. They have contributed at all times to the Indian civil and military services, in which many of them at various times attained high distinction. They have given of their best in this war, as they did previously in others and in all cases of internal trouble. Their manhood have largely served in peace time in the Volunteer force, some of the regiments of which, when I was in India, depended almost entirely on their generosity for financial support, which the Government refused to give to a sufficient amount to secure efficiency. Besides the Civil Service and Army, its members serve the Government in many provincial posts of responsibility, such as the Forest, Public Works, Police, and other departments. Though small in number, when compared with India's millions of other races, languages and religions, the British domiciled community have done much more for the progress and advance- ment of its adopted land than all the rest put together. It has produced the leaders of the other races in great industrial enter- prises and it has provided the capital which made them possible which could not be got elsewhere ; its members have been India's scientific experts, its most enterprising traders, its foremost engineers, doctors and lawyers ; its great shops and stores were started by them. It has given India numerous Christian missionaries, who have been India's best educators, to whose 76 INDIAN STUDIES unselfish exertions and love of their adopted land the progress of the despised servile classes is almost entirely due. In comparison to what they have done for them, the Government has done very little ; it has preferred to devote its attention almost altogether to the higher education of the few oppressors rather than to the primary education of the many whom they oppress. For obvious reasons the British unofficial community have ever been the most loyal supporters of British rule, also for obvious reasons the agitators have directed their activities against it. The so-called Indian National Congress and " All " India Moslem League have been most consistent in doing so. Their more violent members have quite recently gloated in Bombay and Calcutta over the fact that, as soon as they get the power, they will kill by taxation those industries, such as tea and indigo and others, in which the British community are chiefly interested, and so commence their endeavours to drive them from the land. The British domiciled community know these home-rulers well ; a large number, such as planters, engineers and others, with their wives and families, live isolated among ignorant peoples, easily incited to tumultuous riots, the occurrence of which jeopardizes British lives and capital, as well as the lives and capital of peaceful natives. They well know that these agitators have in the past incited riots with this object, and they also well know such people will do so in the future. They are not prepared to admit that submission to them means " to identify themselves with the interests of India." The gentle words of Sir Satyendra Sinha in London, re-echoed by the Maharajas of Bikanir and Patiala and others, will not convince them to the contrary. The British community in India, whether commercial men, land or house-owners, planters, mechanics, engine drivers or others, have a very great stake in their adopted land, many of them take a great part in its political affairs, both municipal and general. They are all prepared to see Indian political development proceed on right lines, for such can only be to their advantage ; it alone can, to such of them as take an interest in politics, give a greater scope for their political activities, for which they have no other sphere. They have never been opposed to India's political pro- gress, nor have they ever asked for or received partiality, favour or affection from the Government. They are well-known to loyal, educated Indians, with whom they are very often closely associated in the pursuits of their various trades and businesses. OTHER RACES 77 They move freely among them, and are on much more friendly relations with them than the British official community. The great majority of educated Indians know well the immense benefits the British unofficial community have conferred on India, and they are strongly opposed to the few English-educated agitators who are bent on their destruction. The British, in common with all in India, have as security for their lives and property the following words, which are part of the late Queen Victoria's proclamation of 1858 : " It is our earnest desire to Simulate the peaceful industry of India, to promote works of public utility and improvement, and to administer its government for the benefit of all our subjects resident therein." They have taken up their abode in a foreign land on the firm reliance that the British nation would see to it that politicians ignorant of India did not indulge in experi- ments which would result in power being given to any one race or clique, to the detriment of others. The Anglo-Indian community are descendants of British men and Indian women of all castes. It was, till about five or six years ago, known as Eurasian, when, at the request of its repre- sentatives, the Government of India sanctioned its being called Anglo-Indian, a name previously applied to both the British unofficial domiciled community and to those British officials who had passed most of their life in the Services in India, but were not domiciled there. The Anglo-Indian community are of all shades \ from white to black. To it also India owes much. Many of its I members fill Government appointments in the provincial Civil Service. They almost entirely work the railways as engine- drivers on goods trains, firemen, permanent way inspectors, and in many other posts, for which pure-bred Indians of the classes who would undertake such work, owing to their physical weak- ness, carelessness, indecision and want of self-reliance, are totally unfitted ; it is safe to say that without the Anglo-Indian com- munity the effective working of the Indian railways could not be maintained. Before the war the British domiciled and Anglo- Indian communities supplied some 30,000 efficient volunteers, who formed a reliable reserve to the British garrison in India, which other races could not do without the danger of their using their arms against one another. Since the war large numbers have joined the Army. The native Christian community is composed of all sects of Christians converted from every Indian race, but mostly 78 INDIAN STUDIES from those of the lower Hindu castes, Hinduized Musalmans and aboriginal tribes. According to ancient legend, Christian- ity was first preached in India by St. Thomas in the ninth century. The seat of his missionary work was the Malabar coast, where Indian Christians, said to be the descendants of the original converts, still follow the Syrian rite. Christianity has since greatly spread throughout the land. In Madras alone there are one and a half millions. In pre-British days native Christians were subjected to much persecution from their Musalman rulers, and even from their Portuguese co-religionists, when they were not of the Church of Rome. Hindus having no special religious dogma of their own, the Hindu rulers of Christian people did not interfere in matters of dogma, but they only allowed them the free exercise of their religion on condition that they paid due veneration to Brahmins, refrained from eating the flesh of the sacred kine, and accepted the same position as that of the servile Hindu castes. It is quite certain that had they the power, there is a great danger that both Hindus and Musalmans would persecute all Christians in the way peculiar to each. The Parsis came to India from Persia early in the eighth century on the conquest of their country by the Musalmans of Arabia. They were granted a refuge in a Hindu State of Goojerat, on the usual condition that they could practise their religion, which is Zoroastrianism, if they abstained from killing the sacred kine, eating beef, and paid due respect to Brahmins. They have not intermarried with Indians, so have kept their blood pure, but in the course of ages they adopted many Hindu customs. They are a highly educated community, and under British rule have abandoned most of their Hindu customs and prejudices. They have, however, imported a very unsanitary one of their own which they rigidly adhere to. They neither bury nor burn their dead, but expose corpses on a tower, called a tower of silence, to be devoured by birds of the air. These birds occasionally drop parts of deceased persons in the neighbourhood of towers of silence, which is certainly conducive to the spread of disease. The Parsis are, next to the British, perhaps the most enter- prising traders in India, and amongst their community are some of India's richest men. They are now to be found in the greatest numbers in Bombay and the neighbouring cities, but they are in small bodies in all trading centres throughout the land. Some in the Bombay Presidency are agriculturists. They are a very OTHER RACES 79 progressive race and do not practise polygamy. They are a \ fair people, like their Persian ancestors, but they are unwarlike, do not take to soldiering and have never done so. The Jains are a numerous sect, distinct from all others ; they will on no account take the life of any sentient thing. They are well educated, all are bankers or traders. The community is probably the richest in India. Buddhism, according to the Chinese pil- grim Hienan Tsieng, was extinguished in India between A.D. 700 and 900. The Jains may be the result of a compromise between it and Hinduism, but its caste rules are closely analagous to those of Hindus, and Jains themselves say they are the result of a Hindu revival. They have had many tumultuous riots with Hindus. The Jews are numerous. Their headquarters are at Kochin ; when they first arrived in India, or how they did so, I don't know. The head Rabbi at Kochin showed me, some five or six years ago, a document, which he said was eight hundred years old, and was an agreement between the then Hindu ruler of Kochin and the ancestors of the Kochin Jews, guaranteeing them certain privileges and the free exercise of their religion, provided they agreed to the usual terms, viz., abstention from killing kine or eating their flesh, and paid due respect for Brahmans. . The Jews at Kochin are both black and white. The Rabbi ; told me the white Jews, who are the aristocracy, were the de- ; scendants of the original settlers, and the black were the descen- dants of Hindu servile classes, whom they had converted to act as their menials. White Jews, I believe, are to be found only in i Kochin. Black Jews have increased greatly, they are found all over the Western coast of India as traders and agriculturists. In other days many enlisted in the armies of the Madras and Bombay Presidencies. When I left India the practice of enlisting them had for some years been discontinued, as they were con- sidered unwarlike. Pathans and Baluchis inhabit the country trans-Indus com- prised in the North West Frontier Province and the Chiei Commissionership of Beluchistan. They are both of Semitic descent and claim Asia Minor as their original habitat. Both are Sunni Musalmans of the most orthodox kind, although" among the Pathans there are some few Shia tribes. They both.' despise Indians and strongly resent being considered as such* 8o INDIAN STUDIES India before the days of British rule was always the happy hunting ground of both, and in it they founded dynasties and acquired much land by conquest. The Pathans conquered the Delhi Empire more than once, and seated their own rulers on the throne. During the decline of the Moghul empire both founded principalities in India, some of which exist to-day. Some tribes of both are under British rule, others are outside the British administration, but inside the political border. The latter are known as the Trans-Frontier tribes, over whom the Government of India exercises a protectorate and deals with through its political officers in a more or less ill-defined manner, mainly to prevent them engaging in war with one another. This interference has not always been judicious, more especially in the way of road-building, which the independent tribes, who are particularly jealous of their independence, regard with much suspicion. The ill effects of useless road-building is specially exemplified in our relations with two Pathan tribes, the Mahsuds and Afridis, in this war. In 1894 the Indian Government built a road through the centre of the Mahsiid country, and garrisoned it throughout its length. The Mahsuds have never been recon- ciled to this, and the result has been repeated attacks made by them on British subjects, necessitating many wars against them. Notwithstanding this, something like a thousand Mahsuds have enlisted in the Army, who are second to none of its fighting men. Quite recently it has been found necessary to carry on military operations against them. In 1908 there was an expedition against the Zakka Khel section of the Afridis. The Indian Government at once sent proposals to the Secretary of State for road-building in the Bazaar valley, their home. Lord Morley, the then Secretary of State, fortunately refused to entertain them. Had he not done so the Afridi tribe, who have been quite peaceful, would certainly have given trouble during this war, and as it is the most important tribe on the frontier, whom it took 60,000 men to partially defeat in 1878, the country owes a debt of gratitude to that Statesman. The Afridis are in somewhat close relations with the Amir of Afghanistan, and had there been a war with them it would very probably have caused much friction with the Afghans. The Pathans are the most numerous inhabitants of the North West Frontier Province, in which there are also numerous people of Afghan descent. Their language is Pushtu. OTHER RACES 81 To the south of the Pathan country is Baluchistan, the most numerous inhabitants of which are Baluchis. They speak two distinct languages, viz., Baluchi, a Persian patois, and Brahni, a distinct language. In the territory of the independent tribes, both Pathan and Baluchi, Hindus are treated as an altogether inferior race. They are only tolerated to do the shop-keeping and accounts of their superiors ; as a distinguishing mark they are forced to wear reel trousers, such as are only worn by Pathani and Baluchi women. Pathans are torn by feuds, both inter-tribal and between families of the same tribe. The Mahsuds are the only frontier tribe which has ever made any endeavour to put a stop to internal strife. They agreed to a money valuation being placed on every part of the human frame, men being appraised more highly than women. Instead of a family blood feud being carried on from generation to generation, as it is in other Pathan tribes, it is ended by a money payment in accordance with the decision of the jirga, or Council of Elders. Although the two races have so much in common they differ materially in one respect. The Baluchis are aristocratic and each tribe is under a hereditary chief, so their blood feuds are few ; the Pathans are democratic, all are equal, each tribe or sub-tribe is ruled by a Council of Elders, whose decision is final but subject to an appeal to arms ; their blood feuds are perpetual. From this brief description of the population of India it will be at once realized that it is absurd and mischievous to call such a congeries of races, tribes and languages a nation. Those who do so are either ignorant or wilful perverters of the truth. Let us believe those English politicians who do so are ignorant, but they are also fanatical, for fanaticism is ignorant faith. The faith that is in us overcomes their mental coup d'ceil, as we have seen in their pre-war belief, notwithstanding the clearest evidence to the contrary, in German friendship. It has caused their country lamentable loss of life and treasure. The nationality of Indians of the various races and castes is I not, as it is in Europe, determined by racial or geographical j considerations, but solely by those of religion. The various a tribes, races and religions regard only those of their own religion / or rite as compatriots. The small educated minority composing | the Congress and League are an exception, they profess to regard themselves as of the Indian nation., which they pronounce to 82 INDIAN STUDIES a unified body in the British sense of the word, regardless of religion, but their own " nationality " is only skin-deep ; their religion, when they have any, always being what really appeals to them most. As long as the activities of these bodies are confined to claiming special political privileges for " Indians," which means themselves, and endeavouring to extort them from the Government by devious methods, the two bodies are united ; but directly they gain a concession they at once fall to quarrelling over the spoil, as was illustrated by the claim of the All India Moslem League for special representation for Musalmans in excess of that given to Hindus ; yet their prominent men en- deavour, by dining together and cooing sweetly in London to one another, to make the British public falsely believe that all Hindus and Musalmans in India love one another and are united, whereas the love between them is about the same, in reality, as that of the Czechs and Germans in Austria, except that in India religious animosity is greater. Excluding these few educated men of all communities, who are mostly socially in the same degraded state, especially as regards their women, that their ancestors were in five hundred years ago, the result of the spread of Western ideas in India is to make the lower classes bitterly resent the oppression of the higher, especially of the Brahmans, who condemn large numbers to perpetual infer- iority. The peoples of India have no mind to be put under the control of the small, educated minority largely composed of Brahmans or of people of recently invented socio-political religions who are now demanding Home Rule, and are not only a minute minority of Indians, but of the English-educated Indians. These educated pseudo-democratic people of the Indian National Congress and All India Moslem League have never made the slightest endeavour to raise the status of the masses, either socially or politically ; they have devoted all their energies to advancing their own interests only. It is to the British alone that the masses owe the justice that has been meted out to them, and to the British they are grateful, and to this gratitude is due the internal peace of India and its loyalty to its British rulers. The masses well understand the situation ; they know that the members of the Congress and League in the main come from unorthodox Musalmans and from the Brahman, Kayasth and Bania castes, who were before the days of British rule the agents of the foreign Musalmans who oppressed them. OTHER RACES 83 All, then, of these castes now demanding Home Rule have been the age-long oppressors. Hindus, Musalmans, Sikhs and aborigines and the last-named peoples have no mind to exchange their British rulers for their former oppressors. To-day nearly all Government appointments are given to members of the Brahman, Kayasth and Bania castes. In the Madras Presidency, for example, the Brahmans, who number only one and one- third million, against thirty-five millions of other races, have almost a monopoly of them. The corruption and oppression of the native officials, both Government and municipal, are well known. The Indian masses strongly object to being put further under their control : this is more especially the case as far as the millions banned as outcasts are concerned. It is incumbent on sane politicians to see that the fanatics, basing their proposals on the false premise that there is an Indian nation in the European sense, do not reduce peaceful, loyal India to a state of chaos. (>* CHAPTER VI THE INDIA OFFICE is the heart of all political organization, and without some powers of uncontrolled expenditure, no Government can govern. Where all financial power is cen- tralized, there all functions of Government will be centralized also. The Government of India Act of 1858, by which the Govern- ment of India was transferred from the East India Company to the Crown, has placed all financial powers in the hands of the Secretary of State for India in Council, consequently all the functions of the Government of India are centralized at the India Office. The Secretary of State is both the ruler and banker of India ; without his consent no taxation can be imposed, nor can a single penny be spent from Indian revenues, either in India itself or on its account elsewhere. He sells council bills in London to obtain funds for meeting disbursements for purchases made by him on account of the Government of India in England. He buys silver for the Government of India for its coinage. When he holds funds in excess of requirements for these pur- poses, he places short period loans on the London market from them. He manages the Indian gold standard and paper currency reserves. Modern requirements would be better met and commercial Indians better satisfied were the Secretary of State's banking operations transferred to an Indian State bank with a branch in London, and his system of purchasing stores in London changed, for inj their view both hamper the development of Indian industries. The Indian budget is prepared annually 84: THE INDIA OFFICE 85 by the Government of India for his approval. In it allotments are suggested for that Government itself, on account of Imperial services and for its subordinate Governments on account of local services. They are based on revenue collections, so that to get as much money as they can, taxing powers in India sanctioned by the Secretary of State are frequently appraised in a way which causes no little dissatisfaction, especially in regard to the land tax, while the rural peoples who pay it are unrepresented in the Legislative Councils, and have no legiti- mate method of representing their views or grievances, which is not in accordance with those democratic principles regarding the virtues of which they are perpetually being told. Every item of the annual budget submitted by the Government of India is minutely criticized at the India Office. When funds are asked for to carry out a policy which is favoured there and often initiated for English party reasons, they are found ; when the reverse is the case, financial difficulties are more frequently suggested, which the Government of India is bound to accept. As political reasons carry more weight at the India Office than those with regard to good administration, the latter are very frequently ignored in favour of the former. Many instances of this are notorious in India ; I will only mention two. In Bengal, especially in Eastern Bengal, the great rivers on which almost all the internal traffic of that province is carried, were for long years unsafe both for goods and life on account of river piracy. The only way in which this state of affairs can be remedied, is to make the river police efficient, to do this necessitated considerable expenditure. The policy of expend- ing money on the improvement of the police is, for mistaken political reasons, not generally favoured at the India Office, therefore, river piracy was not suppressed when I left India in 1914. The policy of establishing a Governor and Executive Council in Bengal was extremely popular at the India Office. The appointment of a Governor increased the patronage of party managers in England, that of establishing an executive council gave agitators in India, who are always treated very favourably, more Government employment, which is their main desire, and to meet their wishes was supposed to conciliate them. There was, therefore, no difficulty in sanctioning the necessary funds to meet the expenses of a governor and executive council, while many difficulties were suggested in doing so for the im- 86 INDIAN STUDIES provement of river police efficiency. There were doubtless many good administrative reasons which could be advanced for pro- viding the province with a Governor and Executive Council, but those for making river navigation safe were very much more obvious. The reasons for making the Army in India efficient are beyond argument ; I frequently asked for funds to enable me to do so, but those necessary were never granted. The policy of increasing military expenditure, even to secure military efficiency, was not then favoured at the India Office. The result was seen in Mesopotamia. The policy of the India Office changes with the personality of each succeeding Secretary of State, so it is never consistent, and consequently there can be no good administration. Parlia- ment gauges Indian administration almost wholly by the annual budget. Indeed, the only other means it has of doing so is by the stupid " Annual statement exhibiting the Moral and Material Progress and Condition of India," presented to it by the Secre- tary of State, a document the form of which is prescribed by the Government of India Act of 1858, and is quite obsolete, yet it continues without question as a hardy annual. To be of any use, the Secretary of State should present a clear and com- prehensive statement to Parliament for each year under review, showing in a lucid manner, which all could understand, the true character of the work done in India and indicating the policy which has actuated it. Such a statement should give succinctly, but in sufficient detail, the policy, work, and cost of each department under the so-called Supreme Government of India, which is not supreme, but the agent of the Secretary of State, as I will show later, and be drawn up in such a way that both British and Indian peoples would recognize the real character of British rule, which they certainly do not do at present. The secret methods of the India Office camouflages it, and few know anything about it. The Indian peoples are quite ignorant of the benefits they enjoy under British rule, yet they are expected to be grateful for them. It is curious that Parliament, which, I presume, sanctioned the Decentralization Committee of 1907, did not direct it to consider the financial relations between the Secretary of State and the Government of India, yet not being empowered to do so, its work was futile as it very soon found out. The Council of India, as the Secretary of State's Council at THE INDIA OFFICE 87 the India Office is called, consists of some ten or twelve members, some of whom are retired Indian civil servants, one or two are English business men, three are Indians and one is a retired officer of the Indian Army. They are nominated by the Secre- tary of State and appointed by the Crown, the tenure of appoint- ment is seven years retired officials may not be appointed after three years' absence from India. The Council of India has no executive duties, its members are not in charge of depart- ments of the India Office. Except as regards expenditure, it is a purely advisory body, whose advice the Secretary of State may accept or reject as he thinks fit. In cases of expenditure the Secretary of State's proposals must be sanctioned by a majority at its meetings, which take place when there is any business to be brought before it, but normally it meets weekly. On what principle members are appointed to it, it is difficult to say ; if it be for Indian experience seven years is too long, for the condition of India changes so rapidly nowadays that in a much less period of absence British officials become entirely out of touch with it. No Indian of good position will remain as long as seven years absent from his home, even though he be given short periods of leave to visit it. Selecting three men to " represent " India with its 315,000,000 inhabitants is quite ridi- culous. It is even more ridiculous to constitute the Council of India the Secretary of State's constitutional advisers on the administration and control of the Indian Army, yet it occupies that position. He certainly sometimes consults the Army Council, but as far as my experience goes, there was never any great desire to do so, while the tendency was, on the contrary, to keep it quite ignorant of the condition of the Indian Army, the collapse of which in Mesopotamia has for the present altered this very undesirable state of affairs. The work of the India Office is divided among its various departments, which in the main correspond to similar depart- ments of the Government of India. They are as follows : Finance, Revenue, Public Works, Political, Military, Medical, Legal, and that for the purchase of stores on account of the Government of India. They are each, with the exception of the Legal under a barrister, in charge of a secretary selected by the Secretary of State, on what principles I am unable to say. I was Secretary to the Military Department for over two years, and on taking up my appointment, found that it had been 88 INDIAN STUDIES under consideration to give it to a civilian, a proposal strongly supported by the then Permanent Under-Secret ary of State, but the Secretary of State decided it should go to a soldier, and this 'has since been adhered to, but, I presume, may be changed any time should the Secretary of State wish to do so. At that time, the Public Works and Revenue Secretaries were retired Indian officials, late of those departments in India, while the Medical Department was under a retired Indian medical service officer ; the other secretaries were all members of the India Office Civil Service. The Permanent Under- secretary of State belonged to the British Civil Service. The India Office has a special Civil Service of its own, recruited by competitive examination in England. Its members are quite innocent of any knowledge of India, and from it, with the exceptions I have mentioned, the India Office was then staffed. I should have thought it would tend much more towards efficiency to limit the tenure of appointments there, and consider those of a civil nature as staff appointments to be filled by members of the Indian Civil Service of the various provinces of India, while those of the Military Department should be similarly given to officers of the Indian Army, with the reserva- tion that the Secretary should not be of higher rank than that of Major-General, otherwise it is possible his rank might be used to unduly interfere with technical proposals emanating from the Commander-in-Chief in India, an officer of much greater technical knowledge and military experience than he is. Such a system would have a double advantage : it would broaden the view of those officers of the Indian Services who serve locally, for purely local service tends to narrow the mind, and it would create a liaison between India and the India Office which is practically non-existent at present ; it would do even more than this, for it would introduce into the India Office a knowledge of India, sympathy with its peoples and with the hard-working British officials outside the secretariats of the Government of India and local governments, who toil their lives away working devotedly among alien races, unrecognized and seldom rewarded. Such a centralized system of government, the headquarters of which is six thousand miles away from the Empire it rules, necessitates an enormous amount of correspondence ; the bill for telegrams is alone beyond belief, and this correspondence THE INDIA OFFICE 89 increases daily in volume, variety and triviality. Cases which are settled between the Governor General and Secretary of State direct by private correspondence are dealt with by the Secretary of State's private secretariat. When the Secretary of State is replaced, he removes private correspondence, of which no record remains. All other cases are dealt with, in the first instance, in the depart- ment to which they appertain, but the Finance Department has the final word in all those involving expenditure. In departments the atmosphere surrounding every reference from India is created, and through it the Secretary of State, Parlia- mentary and Permanent Secretaries and Members of Council see them. To create a wholesome atmosphere it is requisite that those who deal with such references, even in their initial stage, should have a knowledge of the provinces from which they emanate, and the psychology of the peoples whose welfare they affect, yet the India Office Civil Service officials possess neither. Even men with a life-long experience of India can know at most one or two provinces indifferently well, yet the army of clerks necessary to cope with the enormous volume of correspondence from India, on all imaginable subjects relating to all its various and diversified provinces, some trifling, some important, has no knowledge whatever of any part of India. Cases are worked up in their respective department under the supervision and orders of the Secretary. When this has been done to his satisfaction, he takes them before a small com- mittee denominated after the department with the work of which it deals, consisting of a small number of members of the Council of India meeting weekly. The number on each com- mittee varies according to the other business which the members of Council are called upon to attend to or the wishes of the Secretary of State. The Secretary of the Department may give his views to the members of his committee, and he is sup- posed to be able to answer all questions put by them regarding each case, but as they have had an opportunity of previously reading the file, these are not very numerous except it be a complicated one. Having gone through this process, which involves no little delay, the committee records its opinion on the file, which it then sends to the Permanent Under-Secret ary of State. ^ He takes it to the Secretary of State, who either allows him to issue 90 INDIAN STUDIES orders on it, does so himself or allows the Parliamentary Secre- tary of State to do so, or perhaps orders it to be taken before a full meeting of Council. As I have said, if expenditure is in- volved, the latter course is obligatory. If no expenditure is involved, the Secretary of State may deal with it as he pleases. Both the Parliamentary and Permanent Secretary of State have certain powers delegated to them by the Secretary of State which enable them to deal with most of the numerous trifling cases referred from the Government of India. Were this not so, the number of these is so great that they would swamp the Secretary of State. The Permanent Under-Secretary of State is the autocrat of the India Office Civil Service ; he is to it what a sergeant-major is to the other non-commissioned officers of a battalion, but the Secretary of State is his commanding officer, whose adjutants are his private secretaries. The secretaries of departments are not the constitutional advisers, technical or otherwise, of the Secretary of State. They do not attend meetings of the Secretary of State in Council, where they are represented only by the file they produce before their departmental committee. Of course he may consult them if he sees fit to do so, but he may do the same to his office messenger or anyone else. Lord Crewe, when he was Secretary of State, some five or six years ago, brought a bill before Parliament which proposed to convert the secretaries of departments into the Secretary of State's constitutional advisers, but the House of Lords rejected it. The time has arrived when the Secretary of State's control over the Government of India must be exercised differently ; it must be more revisory and far less executive in character ; he must concern himself with broad principles of Indian policy as they affect the British Empire generally, and, except in case of misgovernment, leave purely Indian internal affairs to the Government of India, which must be decentralized in its turn, so that it, too, will deal with matters of Indian Imperial concern only ; provincial affairs would thus except in case of mis- government be dealt with by subordinate local governments. It should, in fact, become what it is now in name, viz., the supreme Government of India. We are now at the parting of THE INDIA OFFICE 91 the ways when a change in India Office methods is necessary, it is out of touch with India, which it cannot rule according to Indian ideas because it knows too little of India. Its army of clerks are a ruinously expensive incubus on the Indian Empire, which, if not removed, will drag it to the depths. Above all, it is quite incapable of satisfactorily administering the Indian Army efficiently. CHAPTER VII THE GOVERNMENT OF INDIA LITTLE is known, even in India itself, of the system under which the Government of India is carried on ; while in England few people understand anything about it. It is based on rules of business and secretariat regulations kept secret or confidential ; till these are made public it is im- possible to describe it fully. They are not even alluded to in the Report on Indian Constitutional Reforms issued by the Secretary of State and the Governor General, whose omission to do so seriously affects its value. I will subsequently refer to this publication as the Report. I only attempt to give an account of the Government of India from practical experience, and, in doing so, must of course avoid quoting any confidential documents, which considerably adds to the difficulty. Formerly the Governor General was associated with a Council, of which most of the members were trained Indian administrators. He could take no action, except with the support of a majority, without incurring grave personal responsibility. The Governor General is selected for political party reasons and not for any previous knowledge of India, but the position of members of his Council who were trained Indian administrators was formerly one of independence ; there was, therefore, a check against his taking impulsive or impolitic action. During recent years the independence and responsibility of members of the Council of the Governor General have been whittled away to almost nil. Practically all that remains to them is that individual members may record their dissent on official despatches written to the Secretary of State by " The Governor General in Council " or " The Government of India " 92 THE GOVERNMENT OF INDIA 93 for either phrase has statutory sanction. However, so much is done, especially in recent years, by private correspondence between the Governor General and the Secretary of State, on both of whom members of Council depend for their future promo- tion, that this check has become of little value. It can safely be said that the Governor General's Executive Council has now become a shadow without the substance, and that the fate of India is in the hands of the Governor General and the Secretary of State, who have neither of them any sufficient knowledge of the country they rule to warrant its destinies being left to their sole discretion. The result has been that for long at the demand of a small clique of Indian politicians, supported by faddists and pacifists in England, who were strongly represented in the House of Commons extravagant and un- popular experiments have been forced upon India, often for the furtherance of party interests in England. This situation has arisen from the fact that the Legislature neither understands India's requirements nor has ever sufficiently considered beforehand the acts it passes and puts into force in that country. Nor has it even taken steps to see that its own acts are adhered to in both the letter and the spirit. The neglect of the Legislature in these respects is attributable both to the secrecy maintained regarding all rules and regulations made by the Governor General of India for the conduct of execu- tive business and by the ignorance prevailing in England regarding the great dependency. For instance, people at home are perpetually told by those who profess to know, that the life of India is centred in the great cities such as Bombay, Madras and Calcutta. This is not the case. The life of India is centred in its rural districts, the popula- tion of which comprises nine-tenths of the whole, including all the warlike classes from whom the Army is recruited and also by far the largest proportion of both the English-educated and those literate in the various vernaculars. Nine-tenths of the rural classes live directly on the land or gain their daily bread indirectly from it. The rural population cares nothing for Legislative Councils or constitutional govern- ment. If their taxes are light, their complaints readily heard and their grievances promptly redressed, they are contented and loyal, and on their contentment and loyalty the foundations of British rule rest secure. It is on the correct appraisement of 94 INDIAN STUDIES the feelings, hopes and aspirations of the rural peoples that Indian loyalty depends. The rural population cherish none of the new ideals of Home Rule or suchlike " cries for the moon " so uniformly shouted by the small town clique of professional politicians, whom the country folk detest but whom they well understand. They know that this clique is out for personal advancement to place and power for themselves alone, and that they have no regard for the general welfare. The best men among the rural communities wisely ask : " Supposing the politicians of this clique got Home Rule, how would such an unwarlike few enforce their orders on the masses, including the warlike classes, who certainly would strongly resist them ? " The reply to this question puts the Home Rule question and many others in a nutshell. This small town clique is alone ac- tuated by new ideals generated in the West ; its life is centred in the cities, but even in them it forms only a very minute minority. It is the foam and froth of the cities, but the masses of their population are very much as they are in the rural districts, where the deep under-currents, which for centuries have flowed unchanged, still govern the Indian mind. The Government of India, and most local governments, have their headquarters in the towns or on the hill-tops, where they live practically always surrounded by Indian English-educated professional politicians, and both are out of touch with real India. It is the failure to understand this that has induced certain English well-meaning faddists, ignorant of India, of any of its races, and, above all, of the psychology of the various Indian peoples, to support those wild projects and experiments which have been carried out at great cost, for which the rural population, who strongly object to them, has had to pay. A Governor General or Secretary of State is sure of immediate recognition in England of his action in passing some measure of so-called " popular representation " which merely gives more place and power to the small city clique of agitators. Yet the only real test of Indian statesmanship is found in the degree in which it has helped or contented the rural population. Land problems in India as in Ireland lie at the root of the political situation, and the opinions regarding India of those who do not understand them are comparatively valueless. The city agitators are for ever crying out that the rural peoples are illiterate. But this is no more the truth than it would be to say that those of THE GOVERNMENT OF INDIA 95 the towns are literate. The literates in each community are equally few. All over India those who are literate in the various vernaculars are about six per cent. ; those who are so in English are about half per cent. The difference between the English- educated in the rural districts and the English-educated small agitating clique of town people is that the English education of the former is based on Oriental traditions and they are orthodox in their various religions and in close touch with the peoples, while that of the latter is based on Western ideals and they are mostly unorthodox in their religions and are out of touch with the peoples and quite apart from them. There are, however, many English-educated people in the cities whose education is based on Oriental traditions. Many such people who join agitations only do so because they are afraid that, if they don't, they will be passively boycotted. I have never yet heard anyone explain the connection between illiterateness and intelligent voting regarding one's own affairs ; yet Congress and League leaders have convinced politicians in England that most of the peoples of India are too illiterate to vote on their own affairs and have thus secured the franchise for themselves and those who are under their control. More than this, they and their caste-fellows, all of un warlike castes, have got a practical monopoly of all Government service, except military, for which they have no ambition, at least in wartime. The British territories in India, towards the latter part of the eighteenth century, were administered by the three Govern- ments of Bombay, Madras and Bengal, called presidencies. Each was under a " Governor in Council " ; the Council consisted of three members. They were independent of each other and only responsible to the East India Company. They administered their own local affairs, including their finances and armies, and enjoyed local autonomy, subject to the control of their common masters in London. With the increase of British territories, the improvement in internal and external communications and the frequency of wars, in which other European powers were involved, it became necessary that a supreme authority should have control of British affairs in India and deal with matters affecting all India. It is, however, clearly shown by the wording of all Acts of Parliament, that it was never intended that this supreme authority should 96 INDIAN STUDIES deal with matters of purely local interest, which were left to local governments. With the subsequent supremacy of the British in India and the great extension of their territory, other local governments were created. Some were placed under Lieutenant Governors and others under chief commissioners selected from the Indian Civil Service. Some of those under Lieutenant Governors have been recently given executive councils. To-day, local governments, both those of the presidencies and the others, have lost all power of dealing with local affairs except of a purely theoretical nature, and all authority in India is centralized in the person of the Governor General. This, of course, must be so, under a system which centralizes all finance at the India Office, of which the Governor General is merely the Agent in India. It is true that the Government of India, the local governments and some high officials are given annual grants in the expenditure of which they are supposed to have a free hand, but this is so surrounded with vexatious and ridiculous restrictions that it is also purely theoretical. In order to enforce these restrictions, it is necessary to employ throughout India a host of petty officials guided by volumes of regulations in English, compiled by the Govern- ment of India, which are so badly worded that no two people interpret them in the same way, so that for the most trifling expenditure such numerous references and cross-references arise, that not only undue delay but an immense amount of writing is entailed. Very often matters of the most trivial nature have to be referred to the India Office, and everyone except the native clerks is disgusted with the triviality of the whole business and the enormous amount of office work it entails. This system of finance is deleterious to both efficiency and economy, in the name of both of which it has been invented. Owing to the necessity for a supreme authority the East India Company Act of 1772 gave the Presidency of Bengal supremacy over the others, and fixed the quorum of the three presidency governments as the governor and one ordinary member of Council. Although the Executive Council of the Governor General, with which alone I will deal, was subsequently increased in numbers till it is now six ordinary members and one extra- ordinary member, this quorum has never been altered. The Extraordinary Member, to-day, is the Commander-in- Chief and Army Member. He is so designated, apparently, THE GOVERNMENT OF INDIA 97 because, according to the Indian Councils Act of 1861, no person in the military service of the Crown, appointed to the Executive Council of the Governor General, may hold any military command or be employed in actual military duties. The difference between an ordinary and an extraordinary member is that the latter cannot be the one member of Council who, with the Governor General, constitutes the minimum legal quorum at a meeting of Council, neither can he preside at the Council during the absence of the Governor General, notwithstanding which, the Commander in Chief takes precedence at the Council Board next after the Governor General or the ordinary member presiding in his absence. If it is desirable to give the Commander-in-Chief this precedence it seems rather absurd that he should be disqualified from being counted in the quorum or presiding at Council meetings even in the temporary absence of the Governor General. The inadvisability of this being so is all the more apparent since it has become customary to appoint ordinary members of very junior rank or of inferior social position such as the Indian Member has hitherto been in the eyes of Indians. It is, to say the least of it, impolitic to place the Commander-in-Chief in a position which may be a very undesirable one for the head of the Army in India. The East India Act of 1793 further tightened the control of the supreme Government over the other governments then existing, and being unrepealed it equally affects those since created. Section 39 of this Act ordains that " all the orders and other proceedings of the Governor of Fort William (Bengal) . . . shall be expressed to be made by the Governor General in Council and not otherwise." Thus, the Governor General of India in Council, and no one else, is the legal Government of India. This Act is in force to-day. Long years afterwards it became customary to use the phrase " Government of India " almost as frequently as that of " Governor General of India in Council " and mistakenly, I think statutory recognition was given to it by the General Clauses Act of 1897, Sections 3-22, so that both phrases are now used indiscriminately although they have by no means the same meaning. Probably the Legislature did not realize the difference when it passed these Sections. Official despatches from the Government of India have to be signed by all Members of the Executive Council present, when they can exercise their power of recording a dissent from the 7 98 INDIAN STUDIES contents, but when the designation " Government of India " is used in official, telegraphic or private correspondence no one can say whether the Council was consulted or not, or if it has been so consulted, how many of its members have agreed or disagreed with such a communication to the Secretary of State, which may be sent privately from the Governor General alone. It has also become common nowadays to use the designation " Viceroy " for that of " Governor General," although it has no statutory authority and has never been employed in any act of the Legislature. Nevertheless, the Secretary of State, Mr. Montagu, is reported in The Times of the 2Qth May, 1918, to have said on the 28th May, 1918, in the House of Commons : " The Viceroy and I are presenting to the Prime Minister a report containing our proposals as to the steps which should be taken in fulfilment of the announcement of August 20th," thus quite ignoring, the Council. The designation " Viceroy " does not convey the same meaning as that of " Governor General." Under the English Constitution, a Governor in India is a member of a ruling body, viz., himself and Council. A Governor General is, similarly, also only a member of a ruling body, viz., himself and Council, which is vested with authority over other local ruling bodies, while the Secretary of State is constitutionally in control of the Government of India but is not empowered to exercise any of its executive functions of Government. I don't know what, under the English Constitution, a Viceroy is. The term, in so far as it refers to the Governor General of India, originated in Her late Majesty Queen Victoria's Proclamation of 1858, which announced the assumption of the administration of India by the Crown and in so doing referred to Lord Canning as " the first Viceroy and Governor General." But the warrants ap- pointing Lord Canning's successors have never styled them " Viceroys." Its use facilitates the practice of the Governor General acting under instructions of the Secretary of State without his Council, which has been already facilitated since statutory recognition was given to the phrase " Government of India " being used for that of " Governor General of India in Council." This procedure has considerably weakened the authority and responsibility of the Executive Council, if it has not reduced it to nil. The effect of trusting India to the sole discretion of two people, who know very little about it, is attended THE GOVERNMENT OF INDIA 99 with grave danger to the Empire. Indeed it has caused much mischief already. Under the Act of 1793, the Governor General was vested with " discretionary power of acting without the concurrence of his Council or forbearing to act according to its opinion, but only in cases of high importance essentially affecting the public interests and welfare, thereby subjecting himself personally to answer to his country for so acting or forbearing to act." This part of the Act of 1793 was repealed by the Government of India Act of 1870, Section 5, which directs that any difference between the Governor General and the majority of his Executive Council shall be referred to the Secretary of State. Thus the Government of India was completely handed over to the sole rule of these two politicians. The Government of India Act of 1833 vests " the superintend- ence, direction and control of the whole civil and military Govern- ment " in "a Governor General and Counsellors to be styled the Governor General of India in Council," and re-affirms that part of the Government of India Act of 1793 directing that all orders and other proceedings of the Governor General and Council " shall be expressed to be made by the Governor General in Council and not otherwise." It also directs that, in every dif- ference of opinion at meetings of Council " when there shall be an equality of voices, the said Governor General shall have two votes or a casting vote." The same privilege is accorded to any ordinary member appointed as President of the Council, either during the temporary or prolonged absence of the Governor General. In 1858, the Government of India was transferred to the Crown, and the Government of India Act of that year, read with the Government of India Act of 1833, Section 80, secured the general control of the Governor General in Council to the Secretary of State. The Government of India thus transferred to an executive appointed by the House of Commons became, as everyone then anticipated, a battle-ground of party politicians. The tendency has since been to make the Governor General and his Executive Council respectively less and less independent of each other and of the Secretary of State. The independence of the Governor General has been sapped by the Secretary of State and that of the Council by the Governor General, till to-day the Secretary 7* ioo INDIAN STUDIES of State can treat both the Governor General and the Council as he thinks fit. The Governor General is appointed by the Crown by warrant under the Royal Sign Manual, which of course means that he is the nominee of the party in power like the Secretary of State himself. The Government of India Act of 1858 provided that ordinary . members of the Executive Councils of the Governor General of India and of the Governors of Presidencies, who are usually nominated by English party politicians from among their sup- porters, should be made by " the Secretary of State for India in Council, with the concurrence of the majority of members present at a meeting " ; there might thus be some criticism as to the proposed members' qualifications. This part of the act was cancelled and Members of Council are now appointed by warrant under the Royal Sign Manual, which of course means by the Secretary of State personally, who generally consults the Governor General, but there is no legal obligation for him to do so. The whole tendency of all Acts of Parliament previous to the transfer of the Government of India to the Crown was to associate the Governor General with a Council of trained ad- ministrators, who had that good knowledge of India in which he himself was deficient, and who, being in an independent position, would be capable of informing, guiding and to a reasonable extent controlling him, but who would not be in a position to thwart or obstruct him. It was never intended that the Governor General should be a mere referee for his Council, but that he should be a man of open mind and balanced judg- ment who would initiate as well as adjudge. He has now become the agent of the Secretary of State, the independence of his Council is gone, and the Indian Empire is entrusted solely to their combined ignorance of India and is virtually handed over to a despotism. Such a state of affairs is a danger to the public interests. Although the East India Company itself was always under the control of the Cabinet, between it and the Government of India there was the Board of Control, through which the Cabinet acted in regard to Indian affairs. The Board was composed of men of ripe Indian experience and independent position who could not easily be over-ruled. When the Crown took over the control of Indian affairs, all THE GOVERNMENT' OF INDIA 101 power was delegated to an executive/ headed r by 'trie' Secretary of State, which is known as " The India Office," in which the Secretary of State is as despotic as his Agent, the Governor General, is in India itself. Instead of being a controlling institu- tion, the India Office is one of interference. It deals in an execu- tive capacity with the affairs of India and practically governs it from London. How it does so depends almost solely on the position of the members of the Governor General's Executive Council. If they have as is the case with many of them no knowledge of India, they are not qualified to oppose the wildest schemes emanating from the India Office. Neither are they in a position to do so if they are not independent of both the Secretary of State and the Governor General. j ; ^ The effect of life in the Indian Civil Services is to kill initiative in all save men of the very strongest individuality, and such rarely rise to high position because the training in respect for seniors is most rigid and a mental attitude of deference for seniority is required which becomes more and^more^exaggerated with each rise in grade. An Indian politician has no indepen- dence, he is directed by the clique to which he belongs. The mental attitude of Members of the Council to the Governor General is one of obsequious respect, which causes them with rare exceptions to treat his slightest wish as a Khat-i- Sherif, to be disregarded at their peril. When such a wish is prefaced in the Council, as is frequently the case, by the an- nouncement that the proposal under discussion emanates from the Secretary of State, there is rarely any opposition to it, no matter how impolitic it may be. I do not think that individuality or independence are wanted on the Council. While I was asso- ciated with it I certainly saw no display of either. A member who was not afraid to give his opinion was asked by the Governor General to resign because he differed from him on such a trifling matter as a proposed site for a part of New Delhi. The Secretary of State was made aware of the fact, yet he took no notice of the Governor General's action, but the said member did not either become a Lieutenant Governor or get a seat on the Council of India, to do which is the ambition of all those members of it who belong to the Indian Civil Service. More than once when I have opposed proceedings which I regarded as impolitic because they were opposed to Indian customs and prejudices some mem- bers of Council who remained silent inside the Council Chamber 102 INDIAN STUDIES have said -to me outside it that they agreed with what I had advanced. The Indian Councils Act of 1861 is mainly responsible for the existing state of weakness of the Executive Council and the despotic position taken up by the Governor General in those affairs regarding which he is left a free hand by the Secretary of State. Paragraph 9 of this Act allows the Governor General to assemble his Council from time to time at such place or places within the territories of British India as shall be appointed by the Governor General in Council. This, of course, enables him to assemble it as seldom as he sees fit. During the first fourteen months I was a member of the Council, it only met some half a dozen times, and only once can I recollect any important business being brought before it, although much had been done during that period of which, as a body, it knew nothing. Under Section 6 of the Indian Councils Act of 1861 the Governor General can exercise executive power when on tour and away from his Council. During the time I was a member of it, when on tour and separated from his Council, he transacted most contentious and important business, affecting, not only India, but the whole British Empire. So lax had the observances of Acts of Parliament become that, previous to going on tour, he did not even trouble to take the steps directed therein to be taken before separating himself from his Council, although his doing so would have in no way fettered his activities. Section 8 of this act empowers the Governor General per- sonally to make rules from time to time, as he sees fit, for the conduct of executive business, and any order or act done in accordance with them " shall be deemed to be an order or act of the Governor General in Council." Sir Charles Wood then Secretary of State for India evidently had qualms as to how the immense power which was put into the hands of the Governor General by this section might be used. In Paragraph eight of his despatch, dated " India Office, London, the gth August, 1861," forwarding the India Councils Act of that year to the Governor General in Council, he says with reference thereto : "I need hardly impress upon your Lordship the necessity of caution in passing the rules and orders so as not to exceed the limit of the discretion conferred upon the Governor General by this section of the act. The object to be kept in view is the more convenient transaction of business. There is nothing in the provision of a nature to detract from THE GOVERNMENT OF INDIA 103 the authority or responsibility of the Governor General or of the Council/' The rules framed by the Governor General under this section are " confidential/' and officials are bound not to divulge them. I can, however, say that the caution inculcated by Sir Charles Wood has not been attended to and the rules framed have detracted very materially from both the authority and responsi- bility of the Council. Lord Hardinge was accused of not con- sulting his Council regarding Mesopotamia. In his defence speech in the House of Lords, he stated that he had consulted the Finance Member and the Commander-in-Chief, and he con- tended that any ordinary meeting of the Governor General and one ordinary member may exercise all the functions of the Governor General in Council, and he proceeded to argue that he had therefore conformed to the law. Having regard to the legal quorum only, this was true enough, but that quorum was formed to meet fortuitous circumstances, such as the death or unavoidable absence of any member at a time when there were only three. Now there are seven. It was not intended to be used to arrange surreptitious meetings of the Governor General and a selected member or members, to the exclusion of others. This is clearly illustrated by the fact that there is a convening notification, which is directed to be sent to all members, giving them previous notice that a Council meeting will be held and so affording them an opportunity of attending it should they so desire. It runs as follows (vide Gazette of India, Home Department, Notification Number 2464, dated 26th November, 1897) : " In exercise of the power conferred by Section 9 of the Indian Councils Act of 1861 (24 and 25 Victoria), the Governor General in Council is pleased to direct that the Council of the Governor General shall assemble at , in the territories under the administration of the Lieutenant- Go vernor of " Except such convening notification be sent to all the members, no meeting of the Council can reasonably be considered to have been legally held. A consultation between the Governor General and one or two members in private cannot be so construed. Nevertheless, before I left India the transaction of important business by the Governor General and one member had become a common practice. I do not know whether or not the former used his casting vote ! 104 INDIAN STUDIES During that time the procedure was, if the Governor General concurred with the member in charge of a department to which the subject belonged, he decided whether the case should or should not be brought before a meeting of Council, or whether he and the member in charge should deal with it themselves. If it involved expenditure, the Finance Member's concurrence had to be previously obtained. The Governor General also decided whether, before action was taken, the papers referring to the case should or should not be circulated to all or only to some members. This procedure is not in accordance with the Acts of Parliament which govern the relations between him and his Council. Important business was ordinarily dealt with in this way, about which the Council as a body knew nothing. I believe this procedure was first introduced by the late Lord Minto just before I joined the Council, but before I left India it became the ordinary method of procedure. In a case in which the member at the head of a department to which it belongs and the Governor General disagree, the matter is dropped. All cases involving new expenditure in most cases even the transfer of expenditure from one budget sub-head of the sanctioned annual budget to another must be brought before the Finance Department. If the Finance Member does not agree with the member of the referring department and if the Governor General agrees with the Finance Member, the case is dropped. The referring member can, however, ask that it be referred to the Secretary of State, but this I never knew done. In the first place it would have to go before the Governor General of India in Council, where, opposed by the Governor General, it would have no chance. Even were it supported there it would have no chance of getting through the Secretary of State in Council, whose policy on any subject was always previously known, and guided the majority in the Governor General's Council. This procedure enables funds to be found for any policy which the Secretary of State favours and financial difficulties to be made when the reverse is the case. If the Governor General over-rules a majority of his Council, which, as I have already said, he can do under the Government of India Act of 1870, any two members of the dissentient majority may require that the fact that a majority has been over-ruled shall be notified to the Secretary of State. As, however, the policy of the latter is well known there is little use in this procedure, THE GOVERNMENT OF INDIA 105 recourse to which I never knew ; indeed, I never saw a majority against any proposal supported by the Governor General. Secre- taries to the Government of India attend Council meetings. There they present cases with a brief verbal statement, after which the member to whose department the subject belongs is allowed to make any observations which he may think suitable. Accord- ing to the decision arrived at by a majority an order is then written, and initialled by the Governor General. Such orders are known as " Orders in Council." No other record of the proceedings in Council is normally kept. Neither the Members of Council nor the Secretaries are required to take any oath of secrecy. I have often heard, not only the proceedings in Council, but the respective opinions given by individual members, freely discussed outside. The only business that I know of during the time I was a Member of Council, regarding which secrecy was observed, was the proposed transfer of the capital of India from Calcutta to Delhi, and the changes in territorial administrative limits consequent thereon, which didjiot become known until it was publicly announced by His Majesty the King-Emperor. To attain this end very special precautions were adopted, both in England and India. During the time I was a member of the Government of India, the members at the head of the Home, Public Works and Educa- tional Departments were officers of the Indian Civil Service. It is absurd in India to have any one person in charge of Education. To turn out good citizens it is or should be combined with religion and directed by a Board, which is the only safe method. The President might be a British officer, although I should much prefer to see an English-educated Indian of position and known loyalty occupy that post. The members should certainly be always Indians of high position, representing each religion of India. There should be similar subordinate Boards with each local government ; it is impossible for the Government of India to deal efficiently with Education through- out such a vast and diversified country. The Board with the Government of India should lay down only general rules for the guidance of local governments, who should be allowed to inter- pret them liberally so as to make them suitable to their own provinces. It is absurd to expect that education in India will progress as long as it is both purely secular and directed by men io6 INDIAN STUDIES of different religion from the peoples affected. Under such circumstances it will never meet with public support, which is necessary for educational success in every country I know. There were successively two Indian members who were at the head of the Legislative Department. The first was said to be appointed to " represent " Hindus, regardless of the fact that he was not a Hindu, but a member of the Brahmo Samaj religion, which is a protest against Hinduism. He was succeeded by a Musalman of Behar, who was looked upon by most Musalmans as unorthodox, because he did not usually wear a turban, drank wine and married a Christian lady in a Christian church. Both these Indians were English educated barristers, of no particular social position in the eyes of Indians, except those of the Indian National Congress and All India Moslem League, to which they belonged. Both were town-bred and quite ignorant of all matters affecting the rural peoples. The Legislative Department deals with procedure in the Legislative Councils. It is its business to see that these Councils do not grow into Parliaments, but retain their purely advisory character. It deals also with such matters as the legality of Press Acts and other Acts of the Government of India, the interpretation of Acts of Parliament, Right of Public Meetings Acts, and with many matters which the Congress and League are perpetually running up against. These bodies must have rejoiced to have their members or ex-members in such a position, but it was not appreciated by others, especially the princes, nobility, gentry and orthodox priesthood, who strongly resented the special favour shown to these bodies. The Members at the head of the Finance Department and the Department of Commerce and Industry were both appointed from the Home Civil Service, and, of course, neither had any previous knowledge of India. Doubtless they were experts, but to send an expert from England with no Indian knowledge to administer a great Indian department which deals with matters affecting the every-day life of the people is not very wise. The Finance Department deals directly, among other questions requiring an insight into Indian life, with taxation, and has a predominant voice in land revenue administration, provincial and local finance and borrowing by public bodies, such as agri- cultural co-operative societies. The Department of Commerce and Industry deals, among THE GOVERNMENT OF INDIA 107 other questions, with Indian merchant shipping, with internal trade, including coal and other mines, with fisheries and with the supply of stores from England. This question of the supply of stores excites much ill-feeling among Indian merchants and manufacturers. The Government of India is compelled to order stores from England or elsewhere abroad through the India Office, unless the Stores Department there is satisfied, of course under the orders of the Secretary of State, that the article produced in India is as cheap and good as that supplied by itself. It is small wonder that Indian manufacturers and merchants resent this process, which, as they rightly consider, hampers their trade and prevents the development of Indian industries. It is a curious state of affairs certainly. India purchases and pays, but the Stores Department at the India Office, which is its com- petitor, advises the Secretary of State as to whether the article it requires is good enough for it or not ! However expert an English official may be in dealing with business in England, it is ridiculous to imagine that he can deal satisfactorily with similar business which concerns large sections of the peoples of India of whom he has no knowledge whatever. Who would dream of sending an English business expert, say to Russia, who had no knowledge of that country and could not speak its language, to deal with its business ? In addition to dealing with such matters, Members of Council who are quite ignorant of India have a potential voice in its government. The allotment of business to each department, which is made by the Governor General, was peculiar. The Army Depart- ment, for instance, dealt with dangers to navigation, a work corresponding to that of the hydrographic section of the Ad- miralty, which I have always understood is highly specialist; but, although I was in charge of it for four and a half years, I confess my ignorance of everything appertaining to it. All technical and industrial education, which is certainly meet work for an industrial specialist, should have been in the hands of the Commerce and Industry Department, which, pre- sumably, possesses one with a knowledge of India. It was, however, under the educational department. The Governor General apparently thought that a department which turned out B.A.'s could also turn out mechanical engineers, for both must be literate ! I could give many such examples. It seems 108 INDIAN STUDIES as if the allotment of the business of the Government of India among other things appertaining to it requires reconsideration. : In the Secretariats of the Government of India, most things are marked secret or confidential. All governments have business which, in the public interests, must be kept secret or confidential, but in the Government of India there is little differentiation between what should really be kept secret or confidential and that which there is no necessity for keeping so. This, however, is not peculiar to the Government of India ; it is the same in all Government offices throughout the land. Little difference is made in the custody of documents which should be secret and those which there is no necessity to keep so. All are equally passed through the hands of under-paid clerks. The result is that there is nothing which is not whispered in the bazaars usually in a distorted form very shortly after it has been initiated. Even the proceedings in the Governor General's Executive Council are, as I have already said, discussed outside, within a very short time after they take place. Government offices throughout the country, from those of the Government of India downwards, are administered in such a manner that secrecy is impossible ; officials, even those in high places, are overmuch given to discussing confidential matters, without due regard to those in whose presence they do so. With proper precautions, secrecy can be maintained in India as well as elsewhere, though some people think that this is not so. I found no difficulty in maintaining it in the Army Department, except in the case of documents which had to be sent to others. Secret matters are divulged by both British and Indian officials, but their respective methods of doing so are different. British officials are prone to talk about them freely at their dinner-tables or in their drawing-rooms, for they mostly find few subjects of interest save " shop." Conversations are repeated " confidentially " from one person to another and soon their purport reaches the bazaar. The houses of British officials are replete with Indian servants ; they are themselves surrounded by red-coated Indian official messengers, called chuprassis ; both usually profess not to understand^ English, although most of them really do so. Eavesdropping in India is a fine art, and these people are its cleverest exponents. Everything reaches their ears and they at once take it to the bazaars. Native officials, from those of high rank to clerks in Northern India, usually belong to scribe THE GOVERNMENT OF INDIA 109 castes of Bengal, or whose original home was Bengal, whence they have spread far and wide. In Southern India, too, recruiting for Government Clerical Service is usually confined to similar castes. They are to-day the same castes as those which were employed by the Musalman conquerors of India, who were little addicted to clerical work themselves, and entrusted them with it. Under the Musalmans they learnt Urdu, the Musalman official language, but with it they imbibed none of the manly virtues of the northern conquering races, who, indeed, troubled little about their morals. When the English occupied Bombay, Madras, Calcutta and the adjacent territories, they also wanted subordinate officials and clerks who knew English. These scribe castes who came under their rule learnt English as easily as they had previously learnt Urdu and similarly did not imbibe with it English morals or sense of honesty. At that period beyond teaching English no system of popular education existed. The English-literate scribe classes of the territories first brought under English rule followed the British conquering armies and, with them, spread throughout the land. In the newly-conquered countries the natives knew no English, so these English-speaking foreigners, mostly Bengalis, obtained all the clerical subordinate Government appointments, to the exclusion of the local scribe castes, and where they were em- ployed, there they made their homes. Their descendants, who are now numerous, have remained foreigners to the natives, but they have ever since retained their monopoly of Government appointments among them, although many natives are now qualified by their knowledge of English ; this monoply has not conduced to the popularity of these Bengali and other scribe classes in the provinces which they have invaded. In time popular education came into vogue, but the system on which it is based was and is wrong. It was founded on the analogy of that of England, and is therefore ineffective because a totally different state of society prevails in England and in India. Under this exotic system higher studies are completely divorced from Indian history and traditions. Most of the " boys " at high schools and colleges are married men with families, who work under the terrible strain of long hours and poverty, which they are rendered incapable of resisting by their inferior physique, sedentary habits, and marriages when of i io INDIAN STUDIES tender years. Their sole aim is to pass examinations, failure in which makes Government employment impossible. Their only alternative to Government employment is starvation, or agitation, for the system of education fits them for nothing else except the profitable trade of politics. The course necessary for success in these examinations consists in memorizing text-books, but it never teaches the youths to think for themselves or instructs them in morals or the duties of citizenship. As all who pass these examinations cannot get Government appointments the scribe classes take to politics in large numbers. Their brains are choked with ill-digested ideas, entirely foreign to their environment. A standard of educational efficiency is demanded of them which is quite beyond their mental capacity and poor physique. The brains of most of them are either atrophied or inflated with noxious wind. They are not taught to think for themselves ; they mostly become merely a re-echo of the agitators or seditious newspapers they come across. They are unwarlike creatures, fitted for nothing better than the routine work of a clerkship or for professions which require no originality or initia- tive. When they become political " extremists," they talk most eloquently after the manner of Bolshevists ; if " moderates," in the most approved English pseudo-democratic style when among their English friends, but when addressing Indian audiences they adopt the tone of their Bolshevist confreres, with whom they are bound to compete. They think like parrots. Many of them have risen to eminence in professions where neither originality nor initiative are required others have become prominent politicians to whom high places have been given under the Government they live by defaming. Their minds, though subtle, are more feeble than their bodies ; their copy-book, pseudo-democratic politics are ever quite unpractical ; other Indian races despise them ; their morals and social customs make it quite impossible for English people who understand them to treat them seriously, and so they are for ever at war with them- selves and with everyone else. Even elementary education which in India should be primarily made suitable for the agricultural classes advantages the scribe castes alone, it gives no instruction in agriculture and is unattrac- tive. This is mainly because the schoolmasters in village schools, instead of being the guides, philosophers and friends to their fellow-villagers, belong to the despised scribe classes, the members THE GOVERNMENT OF INDIA m of which are quite unfamiliar with the simplest methods of agriculture, ancient or modern. Almost all the scholars in the village schools belong to the hereditary scribe or trading castes, whose vocation has ever been to prey on the villagers. It is from the " English-educated " scribe and trading castes that the Indian National Congress and cognate bodies obtain their talent, and it is from the high schools and colleges that they obtain most of their recruits. The prominent politicians of the scribe classes are considered by those ignorant of India to be the English- educated Intelligentsia of India, and they are given a political status in excess either of their numbers or their political value. They are un war like and have been so for long ages. The in- fluential and politically valuable class of English-educated Intelligentsia of India is found among the rural population and frequently among certain mercantile castes in the towns. Its 1 strength is, however, in the rural nobility, gentry and ecclesias- tics, educated privately or in special schools worked on a system ; suitable to the environment of the scholars, who have not been / converted into pseudo-Englishmen with impaired health and \ feeble brains. They are warlike and have ever been so. They j have done the Empire great service in the Army. The English- | educated Indian rural Intelligentsia remain as they have ever been loyal and honest Indians, at peace with themselves and with all mankind, to associate with whom is a pleasure to every- one. In their hands lies India's future, and the Government of India should take them into its confidence and make them its liaison with the various peoples whose natural representatives many of them are. It is necessary that they should have their due share in the Government of their own country and be given employment for which they are fit, always subject to the proviso that the mainspring of Government and the final authority should remain in British hands, because British, or some other foreign rule, is the only one possible in such a divided community as exists in India. Education has spread to some extent in the provinces in recent years. The rural English-educated men of influence instead of devoting their attention to agitation as those of the pseudo- democratic clique have done have devoted their endeavours to educate their people on lines suitable to their environment, but even they have had Government employment far too much in view and have thought far too little of modern agricultural ii2 INDIAN STUDIES and technical education. The Indian Government educational system is responsible for much mischief and it urgently requires reform. The provincials have never succeeded in breaking through the monopoly of Government appointments enjoyed by the scribe castes which settled in their midst at an early period. Among those of the scribe castes who are in Government service, an unhealthy sort of caste camaraderie has arisen, the object of which is to protect their monopoly. This is done by methods peculiar to the meaner Eastern peoples, which have been entirely successful. In their object they are not resisted by English officials because to do so would entail more work on these already over-worked people. The exotic hereditary clerical officials are at first more efficient as subordinates than those of other castes, even than those of local scribe ones, because of long hereditary practice and the material assistance they give to one another ; Indians of other castes and of local scribe castes are invariably obstructed by them in every possible way, both in and in trying to get Government service. The comparatively few who get it seldom are able to retain it long. Were British officials in the provinces to employ indigenous English-educated men of each province, although they might be put to some inconvenience at first, they would eventually be very much better and more faithfully served, as I have found from personal experience. They would also overcome much just resentment against Government felt by the English-educated indigenous provincials. In the Punjab, for instance, the natural leaders of the Sikhs have devoted much time to encouraging English education among their people, who, themselves, have contributed a good sum of money to that object. Yet the Sikhs are not " in it " as regards Government employment in their own province when compared with the exotic scribe castes. They have always like the other warlike classes of the Pun jab, fought most valiantly for the Empire. To-day, out of every ten Indian soldiers, the Punjab supplies six, yet its population, compared with the rest of India, is only as one to twelve. The loaves and fishes of Government employ- ment in the Punjab do not go to those who have fought bravely for the Empire, but to those who have talked against it. This is an^illustration of the Punjabi proverb which says : " The lion's kill is the jackals' feast." The whole question of employment of Indians in Government THE GOVERNMENT OF INDIA 113 service is one which requires urgent reconsideration. There are far too many subordinate employe's on small wages but with great power. They should be reduced in number, put under more efficient supervision and the wages of the residue improved. Thus only can their oppression and corruption be stopped. For it the Government is justly held responsible, and those who suffer under it attribute their misfortunes to British rule. The social position in the opinion of their countrymen of those Indians to whom high office is given, also requires con- sideration if the best people in the land are not to be offended. India is not democratic in the English sense, and can never be so as long as the caste system exists, even Musalmans and Sikhs, whose religions do not recognize it, are greatly influenced by it. There is much that is more democratic in the caste system itself than is practised by English democrats. The members of each caste or sub-caste, no matter what their wealth or social position may be, are by birth equal, and may eat, drink and intermarry without loss of dignity ; but at the same time, those of each caste pay reasonable respect to their social superiors in the caste. For example, Rajputs, whether princes or peasants, are always equal. An educated Rajput peasant may attain high rank in Government service, when the ordinary Rajput noble will not object to paying his respects to him, neither will a Musalman or Sikh of high social position, because they are all of " high caste." But the castes themselves are strongly demarcated, and one of a high caste will strongly object to being forced to pay his respects to one of a low caste. When a member of a low caste is put into such a situation that people of high caste, especially the feudatory princes and nobility, have to pay their respects to him, they are deeply offended and are put into a position, which, in the eyes of all Indians, is an outrage on their dignity and on the ancient customs of their country, which the Govern- ment is by honour bound to safeguard in accordance with the late Queen Victoria's promise in her declaration of 1858, which is as follows : " VICTORIA, by the Grace of God, of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, and of the Colonies and Dependencies thereof in Europe, Asia, Africa, America, and Australasia, Queen, Defender of the Faith. ii4 INDIAN STUDIES :< Whereas, for divers weighty reasons, we have resolved, by and with the advice and consent of the Lords Spiritual and Temporal, and Commons in Parliament assembled, to take upon ourselves the Government of the territories in India, heretofore administered in trust for us by the Honour- able East India Company : " Now, therefore, we do by these presents notify and declare that, by the advice and consent aforesaid, we have taken upon ourselves the said government, and we hereby call upon all our subjects within the said territories to be faithful and to bear true allegiance to us, our heirs and successors, and to submit themselves to the authority of those whom we may hereafter from time to time see fit to appoint to administer the government of our said terri- tories, in our name and on our behalf. " And we, reposing especial trust and confidence in the loyalty, ability, and judgment, of our right trusty and well- beloved cousin and Councillor, Charles John Viscount Canning, do hereby constitute and appoint him, the said Viscount Canning, to be our First Viceroy and Governor- General in and over our said territories, and to administer the government thereof in our name, and generally to act in our name and on our behalf, subject to such orders and regulations as he shall, from time to time, receive from us through one of our principal Secretaries of State. " And we do hereby confirm in their several offices, civil and military, all persons now employed in the service of the Honourable East India Company, subject to our future pleasure, and to such laws and regulations as may hereafter be enacted. " We hereby announce to the native princes of India that all treaties and engagements made with them by or under the authority of the Honourable East India Company are by us accepted, and will be scrupulously maintained ; and we look for the like observance on their part. " We desire no extension of our present territorial pos- sessions ; and, while we will permit no aggressions upon our dominions or our rights to be attempted with impunity, we shall sanction no encroachment on those of others. We shall respect the rights, dignity, and honour of native princes as our own, and we desire that they, as well as our THE GOVERNMENT OF INDIA 115 own subjects, should enjoy that prosperity and that social advancement which can only be secured by internal peace and good government. ' We hold ourselves bound to the natives of our Indian territories by the same obligations of duty which bind us to all our other subjects ; and those obligations, by the blessing of Almighty God, we shall faithfully and con- scientiously fulfil. " Firmly relying ourselves on the truth of Christianity, and acknowledging with gratitude the solace of religion, we disclaim alike the right and the desire to impose our con- victions on any of our subjects. We declare it to be our Royal will and pleasure that none be in anywise favoured, none molested or disquieted, by reason of their religious faith or observances, but that all shall alike enjoy the equal and impartial protection of the law ; and we do strictly charge and enjoin all those who may be in authority under us that they abstain from all interference with the religious belief or worship of any of our subjects, on pain of our highest displeasure. " And it is our further will that, so far as may be, our subjects, of whatever race or creed, be freely and impartially admitted to offices in our service, the duties of which they may be qualified, by their education, ability, and integrity, duly to discharge. " We know and respect the feelings of attachment with which the natives of India regard the lands inherited by them from their ancestors, and we desire to protect them in all rights connected therewith, subject to the equitable demands of the State ; and we will that, generally, in framing and administering the law, due regard be paid to the ancient rights, usages, and customs of India. " We deeply lament the evils and misery which have been brought upon India by the acts of ambitious men, who have deceived their countrymen by false reports, and led them into open rebellion. Our power has been shown by the suppression of that rebellion in the field ; we desire to show our mercy by pardoning the offences of those who have been thus misled, but who desire to return to the path of duty. " Already in one province, with a view to stop the further 8* ii6 INDIAN STUDIES effusion of blood, and to hasten the pacification of our Indian dominions, our Viceroy and Governor-General has held out the expectation of pardon, on certain terms, to the great majority of those who, in the late unhappy dis- turbances, have been guilty of offences against our Govern- ment, and has declared the punishment which will be inflicted on those whose crimes place them beyond the reach of forgiveness. We approve and confirm the said act of our Viceroy and Governor-General, and do further announce and proclaim as follows : " Our clemency will be extended to all offenders, save and except those who have been or shall be convicted of having directly taken part in the murder of British subjects. " With regard to such, the demands of justice forbid the exercise of mercy. ' To those who have willingly given asylum to murderers, knowing them to be such, or who may have acted as leaders or instigators in revolt, their lives alone can be guaranteed ; but, in appointing the penalty due to such persons, full consideration will be given to the circumstances under which they have been induced to throw off their allegiance, and large indulgence will be shown to those whose crimes may appear to have originated in a too credulous acceptance of the false reports circulated by designing men. ' To all others in arms against the Government we hereby promise unconditional pardon, amnesty, and oblivion of all offences against ourselves, our crown and dignity, on their return to their homes and peaceful pursuits. " It is our Royal pleasure that these terms of grace and amnesty should be extended to all those who comply with their conditions before the first day of January next. ' When, by the blessing of Providence, internal tran- quillity shall be restored, it is our earnest desire to stimulate the peaceful industry of India, to promote works of public utility and improvement, and to administer its Government for the benefit of all our subjects resident therein. In their prosperity will be our strength, in their contentment our security, and in their gratitude our best reward. And may the God of all power grant unto us, and to those in authority under us, strength to carry out these our wishes for the good of our people." THE GOVERNMENT OF INDIA 117 What the feudatory princes considered a gross outrage on their dignity was committed just before I left India. The custom previously was that, when they visited the headquarters of the Government of India, they called officially on the Governor General and voluntarily on those members of his Council whom they knew or wished to know, and this procedure worked perfectly well. It would have been much wiser to have let sleeping dogs lie. But the Government of India issued an order that on such occasions the princes were to call on all members of Council. The Member for the Legislative Department was then a Musalman barrister of Behar, whose social position in the eyes of Indians, what- ever it may have been in those of the Government of India was far beneath that of feudatory princes. They greatly resented what they considered a slur put upon their dignity, which they regarded as a breach of the promise of the Queen's proclamation of 1858, to regard the " honour of native princes as our own." They made no complaint, for such is not their custom, but they thought all the more, especially those of the highest caste. This order put the Government further out of touch with the great chiefs. I have frequently heard nobles and gentry in British territory complain bitterly because low- caste native officials were put into positions in which those of high caste and high position were obliged to call on them on ceremonial occasions, such as His Majesty the King-Emperor's birthday, or even before they could get an audience with the ruler of their province. It is surely advisable in such a country as India in admitting low-caste people to the service of the Government, not to put them in positions where they estrange the most important people from the Government. Government service is practically limited to the members of the scribe and trading castes. This is because the com- petitive examination for the Civil Service is so arranged that families of position are practically precluded on religious grounds from allowing their sons to compete, because doing so involves a residence in England at a tender age. The high positions out- side the Civil Service are given largely to politicians of the pseudo- democratic clique. While very many of those of scribe castes on Government service are loyal, many are far from being so. The disloyal, high and low, either from a desire for pecuniary profit or to assist some propaganda, sell or give away confidential information, which is spread abroad, usually in a very distorted ii8 INDIAN STUDIES form. There is said to be something mysterious in the way confidential matter leaks out and is scattered broadcast in India, but this is not so. The reason is that everything without any discrimination is allowed to pass through the hands of untrustworthy people, who use the telegraph and are skilled in the concoction of cyphers. As the Governor General can alter the rules of Executive business whenever he likes, no one knows what is done legally and what illegally. What is legal to-day may be illegal to- morrow. I doubt if Lord Hardinge's arguments in his defence speech were understood by his audience in the House of Lords. It would not be possible for them to do so if they were ignorant, which they must have been of the latest edition of the rules of Executive business framed under Section 8 of the Indian Coun- cils Act of 1861, and the Secretarial instructions which are based on them. Up-to-date copies of these rules and instructions should be placed on the table of both Houses of Parliament. Without a knowledge of their purport, the Legislature cannot tell how India is ruled, or how its own acts are administered. The Governor General apparently may decide that a talk in some secluded spot with one ordinary member of his Council is a meeting of the Governor General of India in Council, and by using his casting vote the thing is done. The Governor General is in charge of the Foreign Department, which deals amongst other business with external politics and the relations with foreign states ; with the control of relations with Frontier tribes and the administration of the Frontier Police and Militia, mostly raised among them and employed in connection with them ; with the whole Indian Political Ser- vice and the relations with native and feudatory states ; with the Imperial Service Troops ; with the control of the adminis- tration of the North West Frontier Province ; British Baluchis- tan ; the Province of Ajmere-Merwara in Rajputana, the Province of Delhi and all places, such as cantonments in feuda- tory states, administered by " The Governor General in Council ; " with the Chiefs' Colleges ; with ceremonials and with the Orders of the Star of India, Indian Empire and Crown of India. All this business which affects some 100,000,000 of India's population requires, if it is efficiently dealt with, a great know- ledge of India and affords an amount of work which no single man can control. THE GOVERNMENT OF INDIA 119 The ordinary Members of the Executive Council and the Extraordinary Member are at the head of the other departments, but they are not in charge of them, owing to the perpetual inter- ference of the Governor General and the ignorance of Members of Council as to the extent to which this power of interference will be exercised, for it depends on his ability, leisure, or on how the spirit moves him. His interference is consequently erratic and disconcerting to those nominally in charge of departments, for he deals with matters small and great, local or imperial, of which it is quite impossible he can have any sufficient knowledge. Each depart- ment is thus under dual control, which makes it impossible to fix responsibility and causes undue delay in the transaction of business. As an example of some of the trivial departmental business in which the Governor General takes a hand, Lord Curzon, in his speech to the secretarial clerks at Simla, in reply to an address they made to him on his resignation in 1905, said : " I can recall long night hours spent in the effort to unravel some tangled case of alleged misconduct, resulting in the dis- missal of some poor, unknown, native subordinate." Lord Hardinge when he decided to enter Delhi at the head of an elephant procession, in November, 1912 personally directed the local authorities, whose business it was to provide for his safety, to take no special police precautions for securing it. The Council knew nothing about this order till the attempt to assassinate him had been made. It had been for long well- known to everybody that assassins were about. It was well known that, for some few years previously, disaffected persons had been sent to Europe to learn the art of bomb-making for assassination purposes. It was then only two years since a bomb had been unsuccessfully thrown at Lord Minto. The result of Lord Hardinge's extremely foolish interference in this matter was that he himself nearly lost his life and that a few poor natives were killed, but the assassin or assassins could never be caught, notwithstanding the offer of a large reward for evidence which would lead to their conviction. The business of departments is much hampered by the position of secretaries. The Secretaries to Government Act of 1834 put them in somewhat the same position as that of permanent Under-Secretaries of State for Departments in England, with, however, the extremely important difference that, in India, 120 INDIAN STUDIES they are Secretaries to the Government of India in and not for a particular department to which they are appointed by the Governor General, and in which they are his personal repre- sentatives. They are not Secretaries to or for a department, or the member at its head. When they were created, the Government of India was " The Governor General of India in Council," and they were responsible that " all orders and other proceedings shall be expressed to be made by the Governor General in Council and not otherwise." As an authentification of the fact that this was so, such orders and other proceedings were signed by them before issue. They were also responsible for the careful observance of office rules and procedure, but in those days Members of Council were not in charge of departments. Since the statutory recognition of the phrase " Government of India " for that of " Governor General of India in Council," this bar to the Governor General's power to act without his Coun- cil has been removed. The Secretaries still sign all orders and other proceedings of the Government of India, but these are by no means always those of the Governor General of India in Council. A Secretary of the Government of India in a depart- ment had become, virtually, the Secretary of the Governor General of India, sitting within its portals, and their powers have been greatly increased. They have direct access to the Governor General, over the heads of the members in charge of the departments in which they are placed, and, at any stage any case may if the Secre- tary in the department to which the subject belongs thinks fit be submitted by him direct to the Governor General. The latter may either pass orders on it himself or send it for dis- posal to the member. The same powers are given to joint, deputy and assistant secretaries, so that the lot of the member is not always a happy one, and it is, under the circumstances, absurd to designate them as in charge of a department. Even breaches of departmental rules have to be brought by the Secretaries, not to the notice of members in charge of depart- ments, but to that of the Governor General. The only way in which Secretaries are bound to the members is that, ordinarily, they must submit to them cases for purposes of first perusal of papers and for the initiation of orders thereon. They can, under the members' authority, dispose of matters of minor importance, THE GOVERNMENT OF INDIA 121 but those of major importance and they decide which are of major and which of minor importance must be submitted, with the proposed orders of the members thereon, for the opinion of the Governor General before any action can be taken. The Governor General has, from the Foreign Department alone, more work than any one man can possibly do, especially one with little knowledge of India. He cannot efficiently deal as he attempts to do with all the business of the Indian Empire. It is imperative that Members of Council should be put in charge of each department, and that the Secretary should be Secretaries to them. Imagine the chaos that would ensue in England were the Permanent Under-Secretaries of State in the Government Departments in the same position as secretaries to departments in India. Were they not only allowed to go direct to the Prime Minister, and the Governor General is King and Prime Minister rolled into one, over the heads of the Ministers in charge, and were they not only allowed to do so, but specially appointed by him for the purpose ! Yet such is the case in India. All business is centralized in the person of the Governor General, which is really the cause of the proverbial delay, the indecision and the absence of any settled policy, for which the Government of India has become renowned. This system of centralization of all authority in the hands of the Governor General is supposed to be in the interests of efficiency. Yet it is efficiency's greatest enemy. It necessitates reference to the Governor General regarding all matters, great and small, from all parts of India. It overloads both him, the heads of departments of the Government and all high officials with an enormous amount of details. This might easily be avoided by a proper devolution of authority to high officials of the Govern- ment of India, and to local governments. The insane cen- tralization not only involves the employment by the Govern- ment of India of an enormous staff, but it disgusts that staff with the trivialities of its work. While it deprives everyone in India of all initiative, and it, at the same time, places far too much power in the hands of subordinate officials, whose work cannot be effectively supervised, and whose corruption and oppression is the talk of every village throughout the land. CHAPTER VIII LOCAL GOVERNMENT THE Indian peoples have no trust or belief in impersonal government which they can neither see, know nor approach ; which is afar off and no one can say in any particular matter who is its representative. To the masses the Govern- ment of India is merely a far off abstraction, of which they know little and care less. With local governments the case is different ; the provincials know them ; they are in touch with them and they look to their officials on the spot to deal quickly with their affairs. When these officials cannot do so, it does not add to the popu- larity of British rule. Owing to the centralization of all things in the person of the Governor General, no real authority is left to local governments, and consequently their district civil officials have become mere automata worked from afar. The people go to the district official on certain business ; they find that it rests with the commissioner ; then they find that it rests with the local govern- ment. They then, at vast trouble and expense, go to the local government, only to find that it rests with the Government of India. The Government of India is afar off ; the provincials cannot tell who it is in any particular affair. As the ancient native proverb puts it : " It is a far cry to Delhi ; " in other words, a hopeless job to approach the Government of India. So they regret the ancient days when there was an individual on the spot to whom they could personally appeal. Whether they gained their objects or not did not particularly affect their views, for they think all things are in the hands of God, and they are satisfied if they have had their " say " to their sovereign's representative. 122 LOCAL GOVERNMENT 123 Centralization is carried on in the name of efficiency, but the efficiency is not according to Indian ideals ; they may get justice under it more often than under the ancient rule, but this is doubt- ful. Justice certainly is much more expensive, while the delay in attaining it is far greater, and they conclude that the " game of seeking it is not worth the candle." Even if they are successful they are financially hampered for life ; if they fail they are usually ruined. The interference of the Government of India with local govern- ments is such that a theoretical authority is alone left to them. Their provincial administration is hampered and controlled in all things by the Government of India. When I joined the Government of India in 1909, this state of affairs was bad enough ; when I left it in 1914, it was infinitely worse, and then all the indications were that it was only a matter of time until the position of local governments would become wholly impossible ; that is if some definite policy of devolution were not quickly adopted. The insane craze for centralization was then in full swing ; it was daily being carried out to a greater and greater extent. The Governor General acted as if he knew the religious customs, habits and prejudices of all the numerous races and religions of which India is composed, as well as the different conditions, climatic and geographical, affecting them, which indicated, to say the least of it, a complete lack of sane imagination. There is no clear definition of the relations between the Govern- ment of India and local governments, nor is there any definite policy regarding it. It depends solely on the personality of the Governor General and the amount of control exercised over him by the Secretary of State. All that at present has statutory sanction is that presidential governments have some legislative powers (vide Section 43 of the Indian Councils Act of 1861, as amended by Section 5 of the Indian Councils Act of 1892), but even these are subject to " the previous sanction of the Governor General," and not even of the Governor General in Council. Centralization of power, especially financial, in the person of the Governor General as the Agent of the Secretary of State, is the chief cause of the meticulous interference by the " Govern- ment of India " with local governments. It is not to be attri- buted to lust of power in the departments of the Government of i2 4 INDIAN STUDIES India or their secretariats. No department can tell whether or not when some question no matter how trivial is referred to it for the orders of the Government of India, it will be dealt with by the Governor General personally, ordered by him to be considered in Council, or left to be dealt with by the department to which the subject belongs. The only thing departments do know is that if a subject involves any expenditure, no matter how trifling, it will have in the first instance to be referred to the Finance Department. For their own protection against accu- sations of carelessness or ignorance regarding the special local conditions affecting the questions referred to them which have to be most clearly explained to the Governor General who deals with most of them- the departments have to endeavour to acquaint themselves in detail with the business of local governments throughout India, and consequently to be au fait with the local conditions existing everywhere. It therefore greatly simplifies their impossible task if they aim at securing uniformity of administration throughout this vast and diversified empire. In pursuit of this very undesirable object they live in a perpetual state of calling for information and returns on all imaginable subjects, great and small. There is probably no government in the world that has so much information in its pigeon-holes as the Government of India, but there it usually remains until eaten by white ants or other insects, which destroy paper in India, so it has to be periodically renewed. There is no end to the process of doing this. The consequence is that the secretariats both of local govern- ments and of the Government of India are of enormous size, and the cost of their upkeep is immense. Native clerks, with an eye to the future employment of relations and caste-fellows, are ever actuated by a desire to increase correspondence, indeed, doing so with them is a fine art, so that throughout India there is an orgy of writing which is appalling. In the same office employes write volumes to the occupant of the next room. Once a file is started it is de rigueur for every clerk and subordinate to write a minute on it. The consequence is that British Secre- tariat officials, high and low, are overloaded with details, and this unfits them for the discharge of their really important duties. British district officials are tied to the desk when they should be moving about among the people, acquainting themselves with their languages, grievances, hopes and aspirations. They LOCAL GOVERNMENT 125 are out of touch with India, and worst of all, perhaps they have no time to supervise the work of subordinate native officials, who are left with far too much power, and the way in which they use it both in secretariats and districts brings discredit on British rule. In the pursuit of uniformity of administration many evil methods are employed. I will only mention two, as they are especially objectionable. One of these is the custom of referring all proposals from one local administration to all the others, whether they affect them or not ; the other is the entertainment of high paid officials called Inspectors General in the secretariats of the Government of India, who are the heads of great depart- ments, the activities of which are carried on within the provinces under local governments. Conditions are so varied in the various provinces that the opinion of one local government on most of the proposals of another is obviously quite useless. The average time which elapses before replies are received is about eighteen months, so the referring local government has to wait for at least that time before its reference is dealt with by the Govern- ment of India. If the Secretary of State has to be consulted, as is only too often the case, the delay is much greater. But, even worse may occur than delay : either the Government of India or the Secretary of State may accept some to them attractive suggestion of one of the local governments consulted, enforce its acceptance on the referring one, and so render an originally desirable measure quite the reverse. In this way mistakes are made and all local progress is hampered. The position of Inspectors General is attended with even worse results. Most of them have equally expert deputies with local governments, so they are a fifth wheel in the coach, with ill- defined functions. As heads of departments they exercise authority over their departmental subordinates in the provinces, whose behaviour with regard to the people they live amongst is a matter to which local governments cannot afford to be indifferent and for which they are responsible. There is thus an ill-defined dual control, in which the Inspector General is being with the supreme government the top dog. He is afar off and the " channel " through which he is approached is susceptible of being used in many evil ways by native subordi- nates locally employed who have many caste-fellows throughout its length. Thus they can freely oppress the people in the dis- 126 INDIAN STUDIES tricts where they serve and the district officers cannot easily bring them to book. Projects sanctioned by departmental heads afar off may very seriously injure the people in whose neighbourhood they are carried out. I will give an example of this from the Forest Department. A local subordinate, actuated by the sole desire to grow trees, annexes what he calls a bit of jungle land near a village. The jungle land is the only grazing ground available to the villagers for their cattle. Immense dissatisfaction is caused by depriving them of it. The local authorities are responsible for the contentment of the villagers, yet their recommendation that the proposal of the local forest officer shall not be entertained is liable to be over-ruled by the Government of India, on the recommendation of their Inspector General of Forests. I have known many such cases. Thus, should the Inspector General suffer from trop de zele, he may cause, unintentionally, much hardship. Under this system of departmentalism many very grave mistakes are made. An Inspector General cannot know the prevailing conditions as well as the local officials, with whom he interferes, so there is often much friction between them and local governments and their officials, among whom may be his own deputy, with an equally expert knowledge of forestry. During the period the Government of India settled itself for the cold weather in Calcutta, the provincial capital of Bengal, as well as the then capital of India, the condition of that province was worse than that of any other in India. The reason of this was because the Governor General had for long interfered with and hampered the local government in a way which I would not have believed had I not seen it. In addition to the normal interference through departments, the local Lieutenant Governor was had up before him and talked to as a schoolmaster would talk to a naughty school-boy, and given orders on matters with which the Lieutenant Governor was much more capable of dealing than was the Governor General. It was for this, among other reasons, that I welcomed the Delhi Durbar Despatch of the Government of India to the Secretary of State, which was made public in December, 1911, and of which I was one of the signatories. On this occasion the " Government of India " was really the " Governor General in Council." The Despatch said : " The only possible solution of the difficulty would appear to be gradually to give the provinces a large measure of self-govern- LOCAL GOVERNMENT 127 ment, until at last India would consist of a number of adminis- trations, autonomous in all provincial affairs, with the Govern- ment of India above them all, and possessing the power to inter- fere in cases of misgovernment, but ordinarily restricting their functions to matters of Imperial concern." Here " matters of Imperial concern " meant those which concerned India as a whole, not those concerning Indian matters as they affected the British Empire, which should be dealt with by the Secretary of State. To carry out any such recommenda- tions, it will be necessary for the Secretary of State to give to the Government of India itself a large measure of self-govern- ment, till it also becomes autonomous in Indian affairs, with him in control, but restricting his functions, ordinarily, to India affairs, which concern the British Empire, or to cases of mis- government. India must be ruled on the spot. It cannot be ruled from London, if its British rulers are to retain the affections of its peoples. The Report on Indian Reforms recommends that this should be done, and with that part of it all will agree. It is, however, a pity the recommendation of the Government of India, made over seven years ago, has been so long left unattended to. Section 9 of the Indian Councils Act of 1861 reads : "As often as the said Council shall assemble within either of the presi- dencies of Fort St. George or Bombay, the Governor of such presidency shall act as an extraordinary member of Council." When as I hope local governments become autonomous in dealing with local affairs, this section could be advantageously amended, so as to direct that Provincial Governors, by which name it is proposed to designate all provincial rulers, should be extraordinary members of the Governor General's Executive Council, no matter where it assembles. Some definite instruc- tions should be given as to such Members of the Council attending Council meetings at least twice a year. India is now so well supplied with railways that the* heads of local governments could attend Council meetings held anywhere with no inconvenience to the provincial administration. I will relate a case which illustrates, better than volumes of writing, the relations which existed between the Secretary of State, the Government of India and local governments. It was not an exceptional one ; only too many trivial matters were dealt with in the same way during the time I was a member of the 128 INDIAN STUDIES Government of India. In India it is a universal and long- established custom on certain ceremonial occasions, such as visits and on high days and holidays, to present nazarana, that is, a present from an inferior to a superior. The present itself is called a nazar, and consists in the case of ordinary natives of fruit, flowers or vegetables and a coin. The value of the former is very little, but it varies according to the dignity of the person making the present. It is the same with the coin, which may be of either silver or gold. The present is accepted, for to refuse it would be a gross insult. Most British officials distributed the fruit, vegetables, etc... among their servants. The coin is presented laid on a handkerchief, when custom directs that it be touched and remitted. Its presentation is merely formal. Great chiefs, nobles and people of high rank often present very valuable nazars to viceroys, governors and British officials of high position, which cannot be refused, but the valuables they contain, the cost of which is regulated by ancient custom, are made over to the Government treasury and disposed of on account of the Government or used as return presents to others of high rank, which is also a well-recognized custom. Natives of lower rank ordinarily present nazars of small value to all officials, British and native, high and low. Some British and native subordinate officials use the custom of nazarana for extorting money or vegetables, though those who do so are few, for such a method of extortion is dangerous, while there are many more profitable and less risky ways by which the corrupt can and do attain their ends. The Secretary of State, actuated by the laudable desire to prevent corruption, issued the very futile order to the Govern- ment of India that it was to see to it that no official accepted a present from anyone with whom he was officially connected, or who belonged to the district in which he served, which was of a greater value than four annas (four pence). When giving this order he probably knew nothing regarding the custom of nazarana, or if he did he apparently thought it was a trifling matter. He could not have realized the very great importance Indians often attach to many things which English people regard as trifles. He didn't even see for a great part of his time is spent in giving orders regarding them that it is better for him to leave matters which he considers trivial to be dealt with by the Indian authorities. LOCAL GOVERNMENT 129 The result of this order was extremely bad. British officials obeyed it. It is very difficult to fix the value of such presents as flowers or vegetables, and when they were in doubt, which was generally the case, they refused the nazar. Although in doing so they explained the reason, yet the Indians concerned failed to understand it, and would not be consoled for its refusal. All they knew was that their nazar had been rejected, and they carried it away discomfited and disgraced, for to refuse to accept a nazar is a grave insult to the person who offers it. Thousands of country gentlemen, yeomen and village merchants were deeply insulted. The subordinates still take their nazars " as usual," but on the sly, which makes the effect of the order all the worse. The Secretary of State of late years has taken to sermonizing young civilians, previous to embarking on an Indian career, as to the great advantage to the Empire of their getting on well with their Indian fellow-subjects, yet this order of his has done more to widen the gulf between the rulers and the ruled than anything else which has occurred within my recollection. One of the cases it raised which came under my notice officially was the following : A high official in Bombay got married. His British friends sent him wedding presents. Among his native friends was a Parsi gentleman, a rich merchant, who had frequently visited England and who had moved much in English society. He was English-educated and like many Parsis quite English in manner and habits. He was under the jurisdiction of his English friend to about the same extent as a London merchant may be under that of the Recorder of Lon- don ; he presented him with a wedding-present of six silver tea- spoons, the value of which I am not prepared to estimate, but it was certainly above four-pence. His English friend was there- fore put into a quandary. Should he accept them it would be a distinct breach of the Secretary of State's order. Should he refuse and return them, it would be a gross insult to the Parsi gentleman. He reported the case to the Secretary of the Bombay Government, whom his high rank enabled him to address direct. Had he been an officer of lower degree he would have had to approach that high official through several " channels." The Secretary to the Bombay Government " initiated " a file on the case, in which his head-clerk wrote a minute restating the case fully, and giving all previous precedents bearing upon it even remotely, for such is the method of initiating files, doing 9 130 INDIAN STUDIES which necessitates a long search through office archives. He then submitted the file for orders to the Member of Council to whose department the subject belonged. It being far too im- portant a matter for a Member of Council of a local government at the head of a department to deal with himself, that official minuted it on to the Governor for orders. The Governor thought it beyond his authority, so he directed his private secretary to send it before the Governor in Council. It was discussed at a Council Meeting, and an Order in Council passed to the effect that the Governor in Council had not authority to deal with an Order emanating from the Secretary of State, so it must be referred to the Government of India in the Home Department. There it was further minuted on and brought before the member in charge, who felt bound to send it on to the Governor General for orders. It was taken to the Governor General by the Secretary to the Government of India in the Home Department. The Governor General also considered that he could not deal with it, and directed that it should be brought before a meeting of the Governor General in Council, and that the file should be previously circulated to all the Members of Council. The file had by this time attained elephantine dimensions ; to wade through all its trivialities occupied a considerable time. Seven members of the Governor General's Executive Council had to read it. When it reached each man he had probably twenty or thirty files of similar rubbish waiting for disposal. After each member of Council had read it and either minuted it or initialled it, in token that he had digested its contents, it went in due course before a Council meeting. I as Army Member, with plenty of urgent military work waiting to be disposed of was one of those whose time was thus wasted. After a long discussion in a Council composed of the Governor General and seven members, myself included, all very hard-worked, mainly because of repeated references on trivial matters of the kind the decision was arrived at that the Bombay official could not retain the six tea-spoons without committing a breach of the Secretary of State's Orders, so the Governor General in Council could not sanction his doing so without reference to the Secretary of State ; that already a considerable time had elapsed since the present was given and it was necessary to decide the matter at once, because the longer the six tea-spoons were retained, the greater the insult of returning them would be ; that a reference to the LOCAL GOVERNMENT 131 Secretary of State would probably take months and there was no certainty he would consent to the six tea-spoons being accepted, it was therefore better to return them at once. An Order in Council to this effect was recorded on the proceedings, which were returned to the Bombay Government. The general result of all this was to grossly insult a Parsi gentleman ; to uselessly occupy the time of many high officials, and their subordinates, and to waste pens, ink and paper. The matter could have been compromised by the British official being directed to send the six tea-spoons to the nearest Government Treasury, but the Secretary of State's order must be carried out au pied de la lettre, and such a compromise was a risk which could not be accepted by the " Supreme " Government. It is with such trivialities that the time of high officials is mostly occupied ; they are over- loaded with them to such an extent as to leave them little time for important duties. On the other hand, the life is taken out of both the Government of India and local governments. Inter- minable delay is caused in coming to decisions and the secre- tariats are intoxicated with an orgy of ink-slinging, under the influence of which astute subordinates, whose work cannot possibly be supervised, have the opportunity to smuggle through many undesirable jobs for a consideration, pecuniary or other- wise. Under such a system good government is impossible. The finances of local governments are under the control of either a Board of Revenue or a Financial Commissioner. Finance Commissioners and Members of Revenue Boards are mostly officers of the Civil Service. As a rule they are men whose lives have been spent in offices and who know nothing of Indians. The territories of local governments are sub-divided into divisions called commissionerships, which are again sub-divided into districts. Commissioners exercise control over districts and are a " channel " of communication between the head of a district and local governments. The population of a district, of which there are some half dozen in a commissionership, varies from about three-quarters of a million to over two millions of people. Babu is a Bengali word, analagous to Mister. In the villages j in the north of India it is used as a term of contempt, to designate j the unwarlike, servile classes of the towns, who fill nearly all posts j in the subordinate Civil Service, and most of those of the higher J grades given to Indians. Warlike classes disgusted with the/ 9* 132 INDIAN STUDIES favour which they consider is shown by the Government of India to such people privately, in their wrath, allude to it as the Babu Raj (rule). At the head of the District is the Magistrate of the District ; he is called in some provinces the Deputy Commissioner, and in others the Magistrate and Collector. Under him are the District Superintendent of Police and his assistants, but the number of these officers in large districts is quite inadequate to exercise effective supervision over the horde of native subordinates who work in them, and whom I will later describe in a chapter on " The Village," for with Village Life they are more directly concerned. There are many Government subordinates of the various departments over whom the district magistrate has little or no control. They belong to departments such as the Irriga- tion, Forest, Educational, Post Office, Medical, etc., the heads of which are either with the headquarters of local governments, r with the Government of India, and who are as I have said uiider dual control. Each district has also a district judge, who is usually an officer of the Indian Civil Service. It is well known that Civil Service Officers who elect for judicial work are mostly those fond of a sedentary life and who have, consequently, not been able to attain any great knowledge of the province they serve in, to do which one must always be on the move among its people. English officials who know them best are those most devoted to shooting and hunting. However great the legal knowledge of the district judge may be, whether he be British or Indian, if he does not know the peculiarities of the people of his district, justice will suffer. It is notorious that, in district courts, undue latitude is allowed to the Bar ; more than this, native lawyers are allowed an extraordinary licence. There is great laxity in these courts in enforcing the laws of evidence, and the judge's ignorance of the manners and customs of the peoples disposes him very often to measure everything he hears in his court by English standards, on which both English and Indian judicial officers are educated. During the course of the recent Immingham Dock Trial at the Old Bailey, Sir E. Wild, K.C., is reported to have said : " The art of examination, cross-examination and re-examination is to turn nine people out of ten inside out in the discovery of truth, and to make them hypnotized blackguards." Cross-examination is used by native lawyers mostly to conceal the truth ; this is LOCAL GOVERNMENT 133 especially so in cases of oppression of villagers by subordinate officials, who besides belonging to the same castes as native lawyers realize the money to pay them with by corruption. Let any one imagine an ignorant Indian villager, who only understands some rude patois, bringing a case before an English educated judge, British or Indian, under such circumstances ; let him also recollect that the trial is carried on either in English or in a classical native language, equally incomprehensible to the peasant, and he will at once realize that there is but a scant chance of justice being done. The general result of such trials is that the poor villager becomes a " hypnotized blackguard " and stands every chance of being sent to gaol. Such is the result of introducing into all parts of India, except the North West Frontier, a uniform system of English law. Fortunately the villagers know their chances of justice in the law-courts are small, and they avoid them. In order to illustrate the methods of petty officials and the fate of agriculturists the following story is one which illustrates legal proceedings in an Indian District. It was told by the late Colonel Fendal Currie, a Commissioner in the United Provinces, as having been told to him personally by the man concerned. The latter said : " Some time after my father's death I got mixed up in a quarrel at a bazaar about two miles from my house, and was summoned to court as a witness. I stated what I had seen, and the opposite party were imprisoned. This raised ill-blood between their people and myself, and one day after the accused were let out of prison my house was burnt down. I reported the matter to the Police. I had much better not have done so. A police- man came and lived on me for a week, did nothing, and only left when I wished him to go. I was then sent for to the head- quarters of the district, some thirty miles off, and the Police said some suspects had been apprehended. But of these men I knew nothing ; evidently the wrong men had been taken up, but they bore me no good will for the policeman's mistake ; on being discharged they promptly revenged themselves by cutting down some of my crops and carrying off one of my goats. I knew not how to act, so consulted the Patwari (village accountant), who introduced me to a friend of his, who was a Mukhtear (attorney) at the Court. It took me two days to get to the Court, and I was anxious and upset, knowing all the time I was away my crops and land suffered. The Mukhtear refused to act with- 134 INDIAN STUDIES out being paid ten rupees down. Then he said I must buy a stamped paper, on which to write a petition to the Sahib, stating my case v What he wrote on the paper I know not, for I can't read or write. I was told to present the petition to the Sahib at Court the next day, but though I waited long I could never get near him. At last I gave a Chuprassi (lie tor) of the Court a rupee to get me a hearing. The petition was read out and an order passed on it for me to take it to the Deputy Magistrate in whose jurisdiction my village lay. I didn't know what to do or where to go, but the Mukhtear said I must take it next day to the Deputy Judge Sahib. I did so, and had to fee his Chuprassi. Again my petition was read over and the order made on it. This time it was made over to the Police for inquiry. After four days lost and thirteen rupees wasted, I trudged wearily home. A week passed, ten days passed, no one came to inquire. At last after about three weeks I was sent for to the Police post. The police officer said he had no time to go into the matter. I had to pay him ten rupees before he would act. He came to my village at last and I pointed out where the damage had been done. I told him who my witnesses were and he took down their state- ments, but before leaving that afternoon he said the accused had paid him fifteen rupees and unless I paid him ten rupees more he would report the case to the Deputy Sahib as a false and malicious complaint. I had not the money, so had to go to a neighbouring Bania (money-lender) and borrow it. A week later I was summoned to Court with my witnesses, but I could not attend as I was down with fever, so my case was struck off. When I got well I went and stated the facts to the Deputy-Sahib and I was told to return in a week with my witnesses to prove I had been ill. At last a day was fixed for the hearing of my case. I could not engage the Mukhtear, because I had no money, but stated my complaint myself and my witnesses were examined. After this the case was postponed for a fortnight, when the accused Munkoo's statement was recorded and his witnesses heard. On the day of hearing Munkoo claimed the land on which the corn had been cut as his, and produced a forged deed of sale. The Deputy-Sahib believed him and dismissed my case. I was at my wits' end. I had walked I don't know how many miles and spent over half a year's income in fees to the Police, Chuprassis and Mukhtear, and run into debt with the Bania all for what ? To find that Munkoo on the strength of the Deputy's judgment LOCAL GOVERNMENT and the forged deed had laid a case in the Munsiff's Court to oust me from my own land. This case I also lost, because Munkoo was able to outbid me in the amount he was willing to pay for justice. I then appealed to the Sub- Judge and won my case there, for, seeing that there was no chance of keeping my land fairly, I bribed the Patwari to forge me a deed of a later date than the one put in by Munkoo, and as Munkoo was played out and had no money to appeal further I kept my land. For some two or three years I had been wandering to and fro from the Magistrate's Court, the Munsiff's Court and the Sub- Judge's Court, wasting time, bribing and running into debt. I was tired of the law, sick of justice and determined to stay quietly at home, till my land, and take care never to see anything that was likely to have me called up as a witness. I was older and wiser, and oh ! I regretted I had not followed my father's advice never to go to law." The incidents related are not uncommon. CHAPTER IX LOCAL GOVERNMENT (continued] IN the rural and municipal areas there are a number of Indian honorary magistrates who are in much the same position as Justices of the Peace in England. Those in the rural districts are mostly men of good social position who are held in great respect. Those in the towns are usually quite the contrary, except in the great towns of Calcutta, Madras, Bombay and one or two other great commercial centres where they are usually highly respected members of the commercial community. A great drawback to village progress is the vile state of the roads. Only villages on railways and great trunk roads, which are comparatively few, have efficient means of communication. The state of village roads not only hampers education but trade, and, consequently, the progress and welfare of the peoples. So much money is spent on over administration that little is left for more useful measures. The happiness or misery of the people of the district depends upon the petty officials and the Magistrate of the district, who should be vested with authority to control them all. If the villagers' taxes are not excessive and their grievances promptly redressed they are grateful to the King-Emperor. Although he, like the Government of India, is afar off he is not an abstraction to them ; all Indian religions inculcate veneration for him ; to loyal Indians he is " the shadow of God," whose image they see on every coin they handle. They revere him and they are true to their salt, that is to him who gives them security to enable them to enjoy the fruits of their labour and to pursue it in peace. If they are taxed heavily, scoffed at, ill-treated and persecuted by subordinate officials and can get no redress, they think the King- Emperor, probably deceived by bad men, does not know about their sufferings, 136 LOCAL GOVERNMENT 137 but if these go on too long unremedied their views change : they consider the King-Emperor is indifferent to his first duty the protection of the poor and their nimak halali (fidelity to him who gives them salt) is severely strained. The administration of the district depends on the character, tone and temper of the Deputy Commissioner. In the eyes of the villagers he neither represents the Government of India nor the local Government, but the King-Emperor. As the King- Emperor is the " shadow of God," so he is the " shadow of the King-Emperor." If he is strong, sympathetic, accessible to the people, listens to their grievances and comes down with a heavy hand on subordinates who are corrupt or fail to do their duty, the people under his rule are happy and contented. If he is a slave to his desk, as under the present system he is bound to be to a greater or less extent according to his personality, and has no time to rule according to Indian traditions, the people feel they have no one to protect them. Therefore, so far as the masses of the people are concerned their happiness and welfare depends altogether on the Magistrate of the district and his capacity to control the subordinates in the district and administer equal justice to all. He should, therefore, have all the attributes of power. It is a great injustice to the people to keep him occupied with office routine when he should be among his " flock." He should have complete control of every official in the district, high and low. The dual control exercised by Inspector Generals and others over their numerous subordinates in the district should be abolished ; they should all be under the Deputy Commissioner, on whom their promotion, especially, should depend. I will give a personal incident in proof of what I say. The villainy of the Irrigation Department subordinates in canal colonies is well known. Some years ago, when Lord Kitchener was Commander-in-Chief, their oppression of the agriculturists in the Lyalpur canal colony was so excessive that serious distur- bances occurred there which were put down to sedition, of which there was none. The agriculturists in this canal colony, all of the warlike classes and many pensioned Indian officers and soldiers, are the most loyal people in India. The followers of the Indian National Congress and such bodies, however, loudly announced in their speeches and press that the trouble was caused by sedition, for they use every case of riot, from whatever cause, to make- 138 INDIAN STUDIES believe that the " Indian nation " is seditious because more " Indians," which means people of their own class, are not employed in Government service, and this propaganda obtains wide credence among those British politicians ignorant of their methods. They pervert the wishes of the rural peoples to suit their own objects, just as to-day they are claiming Home Rule, which no one else wants, because of the valour of the Indian fighting men, none of whom share their views, nor is there one Congress or League man fighting for the Empire. On Lord Kitchener's recommendation the Government of India took some steps to stop the systematic oppression which had caused the trouble. These steps, however, were merely of a temporary nature and did not go to the root of the matter, so oppression was very shortly resumed. In 1912 I visited this colony, where I had many old friends among the agriculturists. I was then Commander-in-Chief and many of them had known me as a junior officer, and they all knew I would help them if I could. They complained bitterly to me of the way they were ill-treated by the petty officials of the Irrigation Department, of whose oppression and corruption they said they had frequently complained of to the Magistrate of the district, who, they added, was a kind and sympathetic officer, and the ma-bap (father and mother) of all over whom he ruled, but he could get them no redress. They said these petty officials insulted and reviled them, calling them filthy names and destroying their izzat (honour), and, further, they destroyed their crops by either withholding irrigation water or flooding them unless they received bribes. They said these rascals adopted either method to suit the evidence they might wish to produce in Court to refute complaints. I had heard similar stories in the canal colonies in Sindh. I decided to do my best to get these Irrigation Departmental subordinates punished and to prevent any recurrence of such villainy. I therefore told the Magistrate of the district what the agriculturists had said and inquired why their previous complaints had not been re- dressed. He replied that such complaints had frequently been made to him, that he had personally inquired into them and had little doubt of their truth, but as Irrigation subordinates were not under his control he could only deal with such cases if brought into his court in the usual way, or by reporting them to the head of the Irrigation Department with the local govern- LOCAL GOVERNMENT 139 merit. If they were brought into court the Irrigation Depart- ment subordinates would produce false evidence, which was easily got ; the best lawyers were at their disposal and probably connived at their iniquities, while the agriculturists were ignorant, could not afford to pay lawyers and could not stand cross- examination, so they would be almost certainly defeated, in which case they would be put to useless expense which they could not afford and, in addition, they would suffer further oppression in the way of revenge pour encourager les autres, so, in their interests, he considered' that the best course he could take was to report the case to the head of the Irrigation Department with the local government, which he had done repeatedly without result. He added : " You are a member of the Government of India, I would suggest your bringing this case to their notice. There is no doubt whatever such oppression is very prevalent, and if you bring this case to the notice of the Government of India it may benefit the agriculturists not only in this district but everywhere else." I accepted his suggestion and reported the case to the Government of India in the Public Works Depart- ment, to which irrigation questions belong. The Member of Council at its head was most sympathetic and promised to deal with it in the best way he could, and I have no doubt he did so. I have equally no doubt that departmentalism and the " usual channel " defeated his efforts. The case was " lost " or camou- flaged somewhere, probably by some subordinate in sympathy with or bribed by his rascally local confreres, or perhaps its even- tual fate was to be sent by the Irrigation Engineer in charge of Lyalpur for " report " to his chief subordinate, whose reply would certainly not be of such a nature as to injure the delinquents, who were his caste fellows and probably his relatives, of whose iniquities he must have been well aware and in whose illicit gains he probably shared. Anyway my action had no result. An Indian soldier, a son of one of my agriculturist friends, came to London from France where he had been wounded. He told me nothing had been done in the matter when he left India, and added : " Sahib, when we can get no redress with the support of a high official like you, which we were fortunate to obtain, just think of the position of poor friendless villagers. What can they do against the Babus ? " What indeed ? are many iniquitous departmental subordinates besides INDIAN STUDIES those of the Irrigation Department. The Army Department have a voluntary system of registration under which carts or animals required on general mobilization to reinforce the permanent transport maintained by the Army can be called up. Those whose animals or carts are registered receive payment for them, which is made under the supervision of British or Indian officers, and under it the agriculturists do not suffer any oppression. So there is no excuse for allowing such to continue on the civil side. The permanent transport maintained in peace was not sufficient to meet the requirements of troops marching in the ordinary course of relief. To supplement deficiencies it was necessary to impress the bullock carts of villagers. As reliefs take place at the time when farming operations are in full swing this is very hard on the agriculturists, especially so on those whose farms are very small and in provinces, such as the Punj ab, where the movements of troops are frequent. It means ruin to a small farmer to be absent with his bullocks at a critical period in his farming operations. The transport for this purpose, and also for the use of officials going on tour, is requisitioned through the Magistrate of the district and impressed by his subordinates, who pay the agriculturists, and themselves fix the rate ; a large portion of the money remains in their hands. They also often select a most critical time for a farmer, and then impress the services of himself and his farming cattle if he does not pay them to let him off. They often even impress bullock carts and their owners ostensibly for Government purposes, but really to carry their own fuel or fodder. Impressment of transport may be necessary in war. During peace it should be stopped. In many parts of India forced labour is legal. The Govern- ment of India insisted on this being put a stop to in the Feudatory State of Kashmir, but they have not seen fit to do so in their own territories. By means of it much oppression is caused, especially to the warlike races at the hands of the unwarlike scribe caste subordinates. I personally brought a very bad case of this to the notice of the Government of India, which affected the whole arm} 7 , but I failed to get any redress. It was as follows :- In 1912 I went to Lansdowne in the hill district of Garhwal, which is one of the districts of the United Provinces of Agra and Oudh. The 39th Garhwal Rifles were quartered there. This regiment has since covered itself with glory in France and elsewhere. Its LOCAL GOVERNMENT 141 men are Rajputs of the noble clan of Rathors, of which His Highness the Maharaja of Jodhpur in Rajputana is the head and to which Lieutenant-General His Highness Maharaja Sir Pertab Singhji, aide-de-camp to His Majesty, belongs. The Rathors of Rajputana also serve in many other regiments with high distinc- tion ; one of them, Jemadar Gobind Singhji, of the 2nd Lancers, recently received the Victoria Cross for an act of the most con- spicuous gallantry in France. Rajputs, however poor they may be, will not do coolie work. Soldiering and agriculture are the only vocations their noble race and warrior caste permit them to adopt. To make a Rajput carry a load on his head is specially insulting to him. The Government of India has for long years granted exemption from forced labour to soldiers on leave, reservists and soldiers on pension, a privilege greatly valued by the Indian Army and one which much facilitates recruiting in certain districts where forced labour is legal. Many men of warlike castes enlist on purpose to avoid what they all naturally regard with the most extreme aversion. The fact that this privilege is granted is recorded on the reserve and pension certificate of every soldier on his leaving his regiment. The Indian officers of the 39th Garhwalis complained to me that the subordinate civil officials in the Garhwal district, where there were a large number of reservists and pensioners, ignored the orders of Government, and when the men drew their atten- tion to the orders on their certificates they treated them with contempt. They said these subordinates impressed them, not only to carry the baggage of British officials, but also their own as well as that of other Babus and of miserable Banias (money- lenders and shopkeepers), which they were forced to carry on their heads. The pay for this for each stage was four annas (pence), and although they were permitted to supply a substitute they could not get one for the money and they were too poor to pay any more, so this privilege was of no value. They also said that if they did not bribe the subordinates, which they declined to do, they were persecuted and impressed out of their turn. The Commanding Officer of the regiment told me he had repeatedly complained to the Commissioner but failed to get any redress. I thought the case so bad for the Army and so disgraceful.|to British administration that I personally brought it before the 142 INDIAN STUDIES Government of India, who listened to me with evident reluct- ance. I said that the Government of India should either cancel the order and the record of it on each man's discharge certificate, a procedure which I strongly deprecated, or stop the breach of it which caused the warlike classes to doubt their bona fides and adversely affected recruiting. The Governor General decided that he could not interfere with the discretion of the Lieutenant Governor in such a matter, which took away my breath, for I knew he was perpetually interfering with him in most trivial cases. He decided it was best that I, personally, should address the Lieutenant Governor on the subject, and no member of the Government of India raised a voice to support my demand for action by the Government of India. I therefore did so, pointing out to the Lieutenant Governor that the honour of the Government of India and the welfare of the Army was affected by the illegality of his sub- ordinates in the Garhwal district. In due course he replied to my letter enclosing one he had received on the subject from the Commissioner of Garhwal, to whom he had referred my com- plaint for report ; in it that official said that the Garhwali soldiers were too " uppish " and it did them good to make them sub- missive to the " civil authorities," while the forced labour I complained of soldiers, reservists and pensioners being made to do was not the class of forced labour from which they were exempt under the orders of the Government of India, and in proof he referred to many enactments regarding forced labour which my legal knowledge did not enable me to follow. To me forced labour is forced labour no matter what other names lawyers may give it : he added that labour in the district was scarce, while most of its inhabitants were discharged soldiers or reservists, and were they held exempt from carrying travellers' baggage travelling would be impossible in the Garhwal district ; from which I concluded that both these Rajput soldiers and also civilian villagers of the same high caste were impressed for the menial work of carrying the baggage of low caste itinerant traders or Babus on their heads, as well as that of every British civil official who toured in this district, and that of their menials also. The Lieutenant Governor said he concurred in the Com- missioner's remarks. My Indian comrades-in-arms have, like myself, no sufficient legal knowledge to enable them to differen- tiate between the various sorts of forced labour : to them the LOCAL GOVERNMENT 143 fact remained that forced labour was being enacted from those who were specially exempted by orders of the Government of India. I felt very much aggrieved by this reply, e_specially as I strongly object to forced labour in any shape being made legal for any of His Majesty's subjects, and I thought both the Govern- ment of India and the local government would take this view. That they did not do so shows how completely out of touch, not only with Indian but with British feelings, they were. I knew the then Lieutenant Governor's time had nearly expired, that the Governor General had no sympathy with the Army or the warlike classes, or even with the rural peoples, and that his lead would be followed in Council, so I resolved to await the arrival of the new Lieutenant Governor and put the case before him in the hope that he would take a proper view of it. This I did shortly afterwards, but was disappointed ; he merely agreed with his predecessor and the same state of affairs continued till I left India and does so to-day for all I know. Both the Lieutenant Governors whose sympathies I solicited in my endeavour to get justice for these brave and loyal soldiers are men with a high reputation for knowledge of India and for great administrative ability. " All is not gold that glitters," especially in India. A short time after I came home I made the acquaintance of Mr. Charles Roberts, M.P., then Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for India. I related the occurrence to him ; he heard my complaint most sympathetically and said he would do his best to get it redressed. Whether he succeeded in doing so or not I don't know. It is often difficult to get simple justice for honest people in India. British officials there are too much occupied by the " cries for the moon " of the articulate minority. The lot of the rural people, surrounded as they are by parasites who belong to this minority, is not always a happy one. But it is not only in their villages that the agricultural classes are oppressed. It is the same when they travel by railway, which they very frequently do. Their religions compel them to visit many sacred places periodically, most of these are far off and they travel by rail accompanied by their families, many of the women being purdah (secluded). Their persecution and ill-treatment by subordinate railway officials is perhaps more shameless than that inflicted by those of other departments. When tickets are issued the name of the stations]between which they are available and the fare charged H4 INDIAN STUDIES is printed on them both in English and in a vernacular, but those who travel third-class are mostly illiterate. It is a common practice for ticket clerks to charge the fare between the stations of departure and destination and give the traveller a ticket to an intermediate one. When he arrives there he is unceremoni- ously bundled out of the carriage, perhaps in the middle of the night, at some wayside station where he is a complete stranger. There the ticket examiner, assisted by a railway policeman with whom he is in collusion, often beats the unfortunate traveller and always abuses him, and, if he does not satisfy his cupidity, the traveller probably finds himself locked up or his scanty belongings looted. The same swindling is frequent in the case of those despatching goods. If they are of a perishable nature their despatch will be delayed till the booking-clerk is bribed. So openly are these things done that I know a case in which a booking-clerk in the principal railway station in the city of Bombay offered to underweigh the baggage of a British military officer of high rank for a consideration. Where natives are concerned this is a common practice. Anyone who pays even a casual visit to a railway station in India on the arrival or departure of a train can see for himself the disgraceful treatment of poor people, especially purdah women, by railway Babus and police. They shove them about roughly and abuse them in the most vile language. Lord Kitchener noticed this and recognized the necessity of putting a stop to it. He proposed to the Govern- ment of India that pensioned Indian military officers should be appointed as Passenger Superintendents at all large railway stations. Their duties were to assist rural travellers generally, to see they got the ticket for the journey they paid for and to hear their complaints. These men are honest and not afraid of the Babus ; being themselves of the rural classes they are in sympathy with them. The Government accepted his pro- posal, which showed they knew what went on, but they left it to the Railway Department to deal with it as they saw fit. When I succeeded Lord Kitchener there were only about a dozen Passenger Superintendents employed on the 30,000 miles of Indian railways. The railway companies, actuated by a very short-sighted policy, objected to the cost of more, although I am quite sure their larger employment would have greatly in- creased the railway dividends, for traffic would have greatly increased with the greater popularity of railways, which un- LOCAL GOVERNMENT 145 doubtedly would have ensued. I took Lord Kitchener's proposal up warmly and personally endeavoured to induce railway managers to employ pensioned Indian officers in increased numbers. When I left India there were between fifty and sixty at work. I made a point of frequently visiting the railway stations at which they were stationed and interviewing them as often as I could, so that the Babus saw they were in touch with me. This greatly strengthened their position, which would otherwise have been difficult, for the railway subordinates would have plotted against them in ways with which they are familiar. I frequently talked with villagers and I have travelled incognito third class with the object of learning the opinions of humble passengers, who freely gave them to me. All were loud in praise of the Sirkar (Government) which had shown such a paternal interest in their welfare as to appoint honest and good officers to stop the villainies which were being perpetrated. Of course even fifty or sixty Passenger Superintendents is quite an inadequate number, and the remedy, though efficient to a certain extent, does not go to the root of the evil, which is to improve the pay of, and select railway employes more carefully, and above all to punish rapidly and effectively those guilty of corruption and oppression. The condition of the Indian Police forms a continued theme of vituperation among agitators and their English supporters, which draws down on the police force indiscriminately many extremely unjust rebukes from the Government of India, who, on the whole, it serves loyally and well. On the other hand certain English people and their organs in the Press in India maintain that all is well with the Police Force ; they justify any imputation made against it by pointing out that the state of the police in India before the advent of the British was con- siderably worse than it is now, which is undoubtedly true. It is, however, no excuse, that because the state of the police was worse under native rulers, gross abuses which undoubtedly exist should be tolerated under British rule. The police in India come from the people, and their morality is no better and no worse than that of the classes of people from whom they are enlisted. Morality varies greatly in different castes, as does military virtue. No one ever dreams of enlisting castes in the Army which have no military virtue. Why then should castes renowned for lack of civic virtues be enlisted in the police ? 10 146 INDIAN STUDIES yet this is commonly done. At the close of Lord Curzon's Governor Generalship a Commission, of which Sir Andrew Fraser, Lieutenant Governor of Bengal, was President, was assembled to inquire into police administration in every province in India, all of which, except Baluchistan, it visited in pursuance of its object. It presented its report after a most careful inquiry and it was published on the 30 th May, 1903. It was a severe indictment against the Indian Police system, which the following extracts from it show : ' There can be no doubt that the police force through- out the country is in a most unsatisfactory condition, that abuses are common everywhere, that this involves great injury to the people and discredit to the Government, and that radical reforms are urgently necessary. These reforms will cost much because the department has been starved. . . . " The police force ... is far from efficient ; it is defective in training and organization, it is inadequately supervised ; it is generally regarded as corrupt and oppressive and it has utterly failed to secure the confidence and cordial co- operation of the people. . . ." A good deal has been done since the publication of this report to improve Police training and organization, but the inadequate supervision and starvation complained of is much as it was before. A solitary police superintendent is often in charge of a district containing over a million inhabitants. The subordinate ranks of the police force is composed in the main of uneducated per- sons invested with official authority whose pay is a mere pittance. As a rule only those of inferior class can be got to join such a badly paid force, and they only do so because of the perquisites which all Indian Civilian Government underlings, and not a few in higher positions, regard as their right and which they obtain by " squeezing " the people. The police, although con- sisting of a majority of inferior men, contain a large number of good and honest ones : these do not receive fair treatment. They are subjected to perpetual bullying by the Government of India, instigated by the followers of the Indian National Con- gress and cognate bodies, who have its ear, and who naturally do not love them because of their attentions to their " ex- LOCAL GOVERNMENT 147 tremists " ; with " moderates " they dare not interfere. Under such circumstances the only wonder is that the police force is, as a whole, so faithful and loyal. I cannot recollect that a single member of the Force has succumbed to the attractive offers made to them by seditionists to induce them to join their ranks, while I remember that very many have been assassinated on account of their loyalty. The strength of the police force is some 170,000 officers and men ; the cost of adequately paying such a large number and putting them under proper supervision will be considerable, but however great it may be it is far better to incur it than to maintain the police force in a state which " involves great hardship on the people and discredit to the Government." The same remarks apply to nearly all the subordinate officials, they are all inadequately supervised and inadequately paid considering the authority given to them. The Government of India wastes its finances on creating highly paid administrative appointments and trying unpopular administrative experiments which do not benefit in any way those who have to pay for them and are not wanted by them. They only increase the length of the " proper channel " and the amount of office work and further widen the gulf between the Government and its subjects. By devolution of authority and economy in administration vast sums could be saved which would enable subordinate officials to be efficiently paid, supervised and suitably punished when guilty of corruption or oppression. It was in this way the late Earl Cromer dealt with the corruption and oppression of the sub- ordinate official class in Egypt, whose villainies, before he took them in hand, were as notorious as those of the same class in India are to-day. The remedy will not be effected by reports and committees which are used by weakness to camouflage evil but never to end it. This will only be done by the man when he is given sufficient authority and funds to enable him to deal with the evil. He is easily found, for such men are not scarce. The Indian soldiers who have been in France and England will on return home tell many stories in their villages which, when they have had time to soak into the minds of the villagers a slow process will render them more intolerant of those abuses of which they are now the victims. It will be well if they are remedied before this occurs, 10* 148 INDIAN STUDIES Some wounded Indian soldiers from France came to see me in London a couple of years ago. They were old friends of mine, two of them belonged to my own regiment, which has covered itself with glory in this war ; one of its men, a border Pathan, was the first soldier of the Indian Army who was awarded the Victoria Cross. I asked them what struck them most in Europe. They at once replied : " The honesty and civility of the police and petty officials in England and France. Had we such honest subordinates in India how different village life there would be ! We had thought of leaving the Army on our return and taking service in the police, which we could easily get into as ex-soldiers. This we planned to do not for the perquisites but because we believed by acting as the English and French police do we would make the people so happy that others would follow our example, and Indian policemen might in time become as decent and respected as those of France and England. We told our Subadar (native company commander) of our intention, when he said : ' Oh ! simple-minded ones ! do you not know that if you did so the Babus would at once become your enemies, they would trump up charges against you and you would have no chance of escape, but would surely go to jail/ The Subadar is a wise man, and on his saying this we regretfully abandoned our idea. What do you think of it, Sahib ? " I replied " The Subadar is, as you say, a wise man, so you had better follow his advice ; but your idea, however impracticable, is a noble one, of which you will have the religious merit." The separation of the judicial and executive functions of the Magistrate of the district, so loudly called for by the articulate minority, whatever it may be elsewhere and regarding this I am not prepared to give an opinion, is certainly most undesirable and a most unpopular proposition in those parts of India which I know, more especially in the Punjab. To carry it out would mean further licence for corrupt and oppressive Government subordinates. But his judicial functions should not be so onerous as to take up any considerable portion of his time and thus prevent his moving freely among the villages of his district and being at all times accessible to the villagers. Many Deputy Commissioners do not make good judicial officers. Many good Deputy Commissioners in their desire to do substantial justice and reduce litigation over-ride law and procedure, with the result that appeals against their orders are accepted and so their LOCAL GOVERNMENT 149 laudable object is defeated and litigation increased. It is because of the number of accepted appeals that justification is said to exist for the proposal. But such is not the remedy, nor is the reason advanced in favouring it a sound one for introducing a most unpopular measure. The effective remedy is to provide specially legally trained officers in each district for judicial work alone, who should take most of it off the hands of the Magistrate of the district, who, nevertheless, should have full judicial powers to use when he considers it necessary to deal with certain cases himself. A Deputy Com- missioner without both judicial and executive powers will not be considered by rural peoples to have the attributes of a ruler and he will not carry due weight. The time has come when the Indian Civil Service should be divided into a judicial and executive side. It is a great mistake to let young civil officers loose on India before they have attained any knowledge of the peoples among whom they work and before they can speak their languages, to remedy which they should, previously to being put on duty, be attached for a year to an Indian regiment recruited in the province in which their future career would be spent. During this year their time would be amply occupied in learning the vernacular and the habits, customs and prejudices of the class of Indians among whom they would serve, and perhaps, what is of even greater importance, the correct way to treat Indians of good social position, which nearly all Indian officers are. Their time would be thus amply occupied, so they should not be put on purely military duties, but only on those of an administrative nature, which would bring them into contact with the Indian ranks. The competitive examination for admission to the Indian Civil Service is no test of the candidate's tact or ability to get on with Indians. After a year spent with an Indian regiment the commanding officer could form an opinion regarding these most important matters and on his report on the candidates completing a year's probation final admission to the Civil Service should depend. Besides those admitted by competitive examina- tion in England the Civil Service is recruited to a considerable extent by young officers transferred to it from regiments after about a couple of years' service with them. They are usually alluded to in England as " soldier diplomatists," because most of them are employed in feudatory States under the Foreign 150 INDIAN STUDIES Department, but it is a misnomer, they are just ordinary civilians with a short previous military training in an Indian regiment. Their military promotion, although they have severed all con- nection with the Army and are no longer soldiers, goes on up to the rank of Lieutenant -Colonel, which in the interests of the Army is to be deprecated. Lord Kitchener tried very hard, but unsuccessfully, to get the practice stopped. I have observed that this class of civil official gets on much better with Indians than those sent out direct from England, which I attribute to their short service with an Indian regiment. When I was Com- mander-in-Chief I only consented to young officers who were well reported on for tact and for ability to get on with Indians being transferred to the Civil Service. I also drew the attention of the Governor General in Council to the very great advantage it would be if all members of the Civil Service had to serve a year with a regiment before final admission. The proposal was supported by some of the civilian members of Council, but it was let drop. It could not have met with support from the agitating classes, but loyal India would have greatly appreciated it. Were this plan adopted I feel sure we would hear less of the lack of mutual understanding between British officials and Indians than we do now, a question which was at that time under discussion as it has so often been since. The ruler of a district should be a man prepared to do justice irrespective of caste and creed, to be sympathetic and accessible to the villagers, and to be on terms of personal friendship with their nobility, gentry and religious leaders. Personal loyalty as a result of personal friendship, which is different from official friendship, has always played a great part in India. In recent times, only eight or nine years after the Sikh Kingdom of the Punjab had been annexed, all the leading Sikhs joined the British and actively assisted them in suppressing the Mutiny. This was mainly due to the friendly personal relations of the British officers first sent to govern the Punjab with the natural leaders of its peoples. Such friendships are now very rare between Indians and British. Those I refer to do not merely consist of " sympathy " which expresses itself in flattery on the one side and its acceptance by " superior persons " on the other, but in a spirit of true and equal friendship on both sides which is strong enough to stand any test. In the existing social state of India such friendships can only be cultivated at some sacrifices from both sides. But LOCAL GOVERNMENT 151 to British people, at any rate, it is well worth making the advance and from their side it must come. Indians, once they are friends, are the best in the world, even to the sacrifice of their lives, as history so frequently records. Nowadays Indians and British meet more frequently, perhaps, than they did of yore ; there is loud talk of the policy of sym- pathy, but real friendships between them are very rare. They are only made when both really understand one another's psychology and when they have something in common. What I have ever found most common to both is sport. In those parts of India I know, whatever may be the case elsewhere, the people desire that the ruler of the district shall be a British officer. They do not consider that an Indian, even though one might be found with essentially British attributes, is at all suitable for such a position, as they believe, and they ought to know, that it is impossible for any Indian to be impartial where people of other castes are concerned. There is no district in which there are not people of different castes. The people of one never trust a ruler if he be of another, even though he may be essentially British in character, as some few Indians are. They certainly most strongly object to one in such a position % who is a native of another province, for to those of one those of another are foreigners. Though of the caste or religion of some of the people, they will all, if he be a native of another province, look upon him in this light, for the language as well as the social and religious customs of the same castes or religions differ in the different provinces of India. The villages in the province of Merwara in Rajputana are inhabited by a tribe called Mers, of whom about two-thirds are Sudra Hindus and one- third Musalmans. They are a warlike people. Previous to their conquest by the British in 1818 they had never been subdued by any former rulers of India or local chiefs, but had always maintained their independence by force of , arms. They were faithful to the British in the Mutiny of 1857, > during which they saved many British lives and by their active loyalty prevented the mutinous soldiers from seizing Ajmir, then an important arsenal, which they garrisoned by order of the British authorities ; they also denied admission to their countryN or free passage through it to the mutineers. Since their conquest ) they have ever been faithful and loyal. They are very proud/ of the fact that they were never subdued by any Indian ruler. 152 INDIAN STUDIES They voluntarily sent a regiment to fight for the Queen-Empiess in the Afghan war of 1879-80, which gained much honour in that campaign. For their services in the Mutiny, and in consideration of the fact that the British were their only conquerors, they were promised by the Agent to the Governor General on the part of the Government of India that the magistrate of their district should always be British, and that they would never be put under an Indian ruler, a promise which was subsequently forgotten and the position was given to a native. I knew them well in former days. I had served some ten years in their regiment, I had frequently visited all their villages, in which I had many old friends. In 1913, when I was Commander-in-Chief , the headmen sent me a petition in which they reminded me of the old promise the Government had made to them. They said I knew it would destroy their izzat (honour) if a " black man," as they put it, were left to rule over them, and they asked me to remind the Government of India of the promise it had made to them as a reward for their loyalty in the Mutiny, and to ask, in accordance therewith, that the " black " magistrate should be replaced by a British magis- trate. This I did and strongly supported their request. The Government of India replied that as soon as the Indian magistrate could be provided for elsewhere it would be complied with. Whether it was or not I don't know, for I left India shortly after- wards. It is not well to ignore the wishes of the people by going out of the way to provide appointments for " Indians " to meet the cries of agitators for more employment. I believe the " black man " was a Bengali of some sort, and the Bengalis are as much foreigners in Rajputana as Englishmen are, but their character is not very British. The Mers complained that the black man sent to rule them was rude and tyrannous, quite inaccessible, and treated them as inferior beings on account of their caste. The constant transfers and the reservation of the best appoint- ments in the Civil Service for men who do much service in secretariats is not encouraging for district officers, whose work is far more important than secretarial work. On district officers the welfare and content of the people of India almost solely depends, while at least half of the secretarial appointments could be advantageously abolished. The salary of officers of districts is not sufficient to enable them to live as they should. LOCAL GOVERNMENT 153 The Indian nobility and gentry are most hospitable. To main- tain proper relations with them district officers should not only accept their hospitality, but be in a financial position to return it. Travelling about the district is also expensive, and although a travelling allowance is granted it is quite inadequate. The salary of District Magistrates especially is inadequate to enable them to maintain their position ; it should be increased and it should be made worth their while to stay long enough in districts to enable |them not only to know the people they rule, but to form an attachment for them, otherwise they will always be on the lookout for a better paid appointment elsewhere. Each district for judicial, executive and fiscal purposes is sub-divided into three or more sub-districts, according to its size ; they are called in some parts of India tehsils, each under a native subordinate official called a Tehsildar ; in others talooks, when the native official at their head is called a Talookdar. In their sub-districts Tehsildars or Talookdars represent the magis- trate of the district ; they occupy somewhat the same position as the sous-prefect does in France, and in the official hierarchy rank above all subordinate officials ; they usually deal with revenue and criminal cases, while civil cases are dealt with by a sub- judge, called a Munsif, whose rank and position is very much the^same as that of a Tehsildar or Talookdar. The pay of these officials in the Punjab varies according to their grade from about 12 to 16 or 17 a month. In other parts of India it is about the same, I believe. Some of these men can rise by selection to be extra assistant commissioners at a salary as high as from 55 to about 66 a month, taking the pound as fifteen rupees. They are honest and efficient officials, but mostly town bred men of non-agricultural castes ; their tours round their sub-districts are not always unattended with inconvenience to village headmen. Indians are invariably accompanied on such occasions by a ragtag and bobtail who have to be fed up to the neck. Village headmen are usually most anxious to be in the good graces of the subordinate officials, so they vie with one another in incurring great expense in showing Tehsildars or Talookdars hospitality. Their village hosts do not therefore usually welcome them as guests, but are very often obliged to accept them as such on pain of their displeasure. The District Superintendent of Police, who is usually a British officer, and should always be so in the parts of India I know if 154 INDIAN STUDIES the wishes of the people are to be considered. He is assisted, mainly for supervision purposes, by one or more assistant superin- tendents, mostly British, and also by inspectors, mostly Indians. The district is divided for police administration into a certain number of divisions called thanas, each of which is under a sub- inspector whose pay ranges, in the Punjab, from about 4 to 7 a month. At each thana there is usually a posse of police. There is thus not a single tehsil or thana directly under a British ruler. British officials are mainly for supervision, but they are far too few to carry it out effectively and to prevent oppression. This rule is despotic, the people have no voice in their own local government while the Indian rulers are usually as much foreigners to those they rule as the British are. That this system is popular in the parts of India I know is not true, the peoples would muchjprefer to be under direct British rule, but they well know it is impossible. What they desire is that Indian subordinates should be under the direct control of a British District Magistrate, that he should exercise better supervision over them, and that the people of the district should be given a means of expressing their grievances and aspirations in a legitimate manner. In every district there is a district or local board, the function of which is to advise the Dis- trict Magistrate or Deputy Commissioner regarding local affairs. He or one of his assistants presides at its meetings and they are generally the only British official members, but in some of the larger districts the Forest, Public Works, Police and Medical officers are so also. Its Indian members are the Tehsildars or other subordinate native officials, with a certain number of non-official members elected by voters nominated by the Deputy Com- missioner, which in practice usually means by the Tehsildar, whose wishes they are obliged to merely agree with or take the con- sequences. The District Board is the greatest parody in the world on local self-government. When it was initiated a great opportunity was missed in not using it to develop the village council system of self-government and bring it up to date. Tehsils and thanas consist of groups of villages, their headquarters are usually at the largest or most important of the group. The ad- ministration^of towns is usually"carried on by municipalities, the members of which are elected~by voters whoTiave a definite qualification, which is either a property one or based on the LOCAL GOVERNMENT 155 amount of income tax paid. Some municipalities elect their president, those of others are nominated by local governments ; all municipalities have a bad reputation among the people they rule for corruption. They are nearly all "run" by a caucus of political agitators or other self-seekers. Except the towns with municipalities, and those only represent a minute fraction of the population of India, there is no electorate in the land. CHAPTER X THE LAND THE vital importance of the land question is not understood either in England nor even by the Government of India itself. Although legislation about land is unceasing, it is not guided by any broad policy or intimate knowledge of the require- ments of the dumb teeming millions who live directly or indirectly on agriculture, and, moreover, it has become quite mechanical. The main object which the present land policy has in view is to screw money out of the land. The officials who carry it out think daily more and more of this and less and less about the condition of those who live on the land. The ever-increasing complexity of administration, its insane over-centralization, and the frequent introduction of new, uapopular and costly administrative experi- ments are causing continual demands for more and more money. These new experiments, framed on principles of benevolence or ignorance, are unpopular, not only on account of their expense, but because they are unsuitable to India, as all those borrowed from the analogy of England must be, for there an altogether different state of society and of social conditions exist. Like all institutions borrowed from the analogy of other nations and a different state of society, they have proved altogether ineffective for the object their authors had in view. They are forced on India in the belief that Indian ideas can be converted into British by mere laws and regulations, and those introducing them completely ignore India's ancient civilization and its age- long customs and prejudices. There has been much discussion as to whether the tax taken from agriculture is too heavy or not ; certainly it is the heaviest direct tax on that industry taken in any country in the world, and the worst of it is that it maintains 156 THE LAND 157 an ever-increasing tendency. Taxes in India, like everywhere else, play a chief part in moulding the opinion of those who pay them and forming their relations with their rulers. In describing the land revenue system, which varies more or less in the different provinces, I have mainly in view the conditions prevailing in the Punjab, which is almost entirely a land of peasant proprietors whose ancestors established themselves there in the dim past and their descendants have been, through all the passing ages, proprietors of their holdings. The Govern- ment of India claims to be the universal landlord of all the soil of India, but, whatever its rights may be elsewhere, as far as the Punjab is concerned this term can only be a metaphoric one. There is no doubt that whatever rights the Government of India may have over the land in this province, private property rights in it have been known from time immemorial, and in this all authorities agree. As I have already said, according to ancient Hindu law the tax on agriculture was generally from one-tenth to one-sixth of the produce of the land, which was liable to increase in time of war or special necessity. Up to the middle of the sixteenth century the universal custom of collecting the land tax was to take a share of the harvested produce, which was heaped on the threshing floor for the purpose of assessment, and to appraise the standing crops in the fields and take a certain portion of them. The Pathan emperor of Delhi, Sher Shah Sur, who reigned from A.D. 1540 to A.D. 1545, when he was killed in war with the Rajputs of Central India, directed for the first time a complete survey of all Crown lands to be made and fixed the king's share as one-fourth of the produce of all cultivation, but it had not been completed on his death. The share of the whole cultivated land of each village was assessed by the king's officials, but the allotment of that of individuals was left to the village council, or panchayet, who levied the contribution of each farmer according to his wealth. The incidence of the tax thus fell pretty evenly on all. From the death of this great emperor wars of invasion or civil wars were continuous, during which his survey work fell into abeyance. It was not resumed till A.D. 1556, when, with the accession to the Delhi throne of the Moghul emperor Akbar, internal peace became fairly well secured. At .his command his Kshatri (Bania caste) Finance Diwan (minister), whose name 158 INDIAN STUDIES was Todar Mul, completed the survey Sher Shah had initiated. He raised the land tax from one-fourth to one-third of the produce, which, for the first time, he ordered to be commuted by a money payment. Payment in kind has never since been resumed. The tax at one-third of the produce continued, with some varia- tions, till the break up of the Moghul Empire, when its successors, the Mahrattas, levied a quarter, known as the celebrated Mahratti chouth, as their tribute. When India passed to the East India Company it perfected the land system of the Moghul dynasty of Delhi and made a regular settlement throughout the land. Its necessities were then great, it had to finance many and expensive wars as well as to satisfy its shareholders as regards dividends, and to enable it to do so it was imperative on it to charge land revenue at as high a rate as it possibly could. It took two-thirds of what was roughly assumed to be the landlord's assets. It has been fully admitted that this rate was far too high ; it was conse- quently reduced to as near as possible fifty per cent, of the land- lord's assets. The survey and re-assessment of rent of a district is called its settlement. New settlements of all cultivated lands take place periodically, usually at intervals of between twenty and thirty years, but sometimes at shorter periods. They are always going on. When they do so rates are worked up with great care and the rent or revenue is assessed as near as possible to the fifty per cent, of the landlord's assets, which is still the standard on which the land tax is levied. There have been many settlements since the original one, but the land revenue ever maintains an upward tendency. In one part of India alone there is an exception to this perpetual re-settlement with its tendency to enhanced rents. A permanent settlement was made in 1793 by Marquis Cornwallis, then Governor General, in a part of the province of Bengal which comprises some 200,000 square miles of its richest lands. When that province was ceded to the British by the Moghul Emperor of Delhi they found the land revenue was collected for the Moghul rulers by agents called diwans, appointed to certain districts by their masters for the purpose. They were paid by a percentage on the amount they realized and were assisted in screwing the uttermost farthing out of the agriculturists by a Moghul military force, with whose aid they committed the most fearful barbarities THE LAND 159 on the helpless cultivators. Marquis Cornwallis, misled by the analogy of British institutions as others in the same position have so frequently been since then, formed the idea of transforming these grasping land agents into landlords on the then existing English model. In pursuit of it he permanently settled the rent of the districts of which they were land agents, and conferred on each one and his descendants the indefeasible right over it of ownership in perpetuity so long as payment of the land revenue then fixed was made to the British Government. Needless to say the object he had in view, based on the usual principles of benevolence and ignorance of India, was not effected. He granted estates to people who had no right to them on a permanent quit rent by virtue of which they escaped rendering many services, such as that of police due, according to the custom of the country, by a tenant to his lord paramount. These have now to be paid for by the State. He laboured under the mistake that the rent collectors, mostly Bania (money lending) caste Hindus, whom he had created overlords to thousands of helpless cultivators who were the real owners of the soil, would act towards them in the same way as benevolent English territorial magnates of that time mostly did to their tenants. The result was disastrous to the rightful owners of the soil. The new landlords were not trans- formed into English territorial magnates, they retained their congenital oppressive habits. For long years they grievously oppressed their tenants, in doing which the only change was that they used their newly- acquired riches and the English law- courts for the same purpose as they had previously used the Moghul military force and they were much more effective. The experiment was long attended with the gravest abuses. The agriculturists for many years suffered gross oppression and extor- tion, which were only terminated by many enactments, some of quite recent date, passed to give them a great measure of tenant right. The descendants of these diwans, to-day the richest landlords in Bengal, are educated men, some of whom have done well by their tenants, of whose welfare they are thoughtful ; but broadly speaking not only great landlords throughout India, but the Government of India also, consider it reasonable to extract, not the maximum share of the income of the soil, but the maximum share of the income of the peasant who cultivates it. These permanently settled Bengal landlords, paying, as they 160 INDIAN STUDIES do to-day, an extremely low land rent fixed at the rate customary one hundred and twenty-five years ago, while now immensely rich, do not pay an adequate tax to the Government, but in virtue of the agreement with Lord Cornwallis their land rent cannot be increased, although they can increase that of their tenants to the standard taken by Government elsewhere. The administration of Bengal is the most expensive in India, the revenues of the province do not meet its cost. Other and much poorer provinces have to contribute to its expenses, which is most unjust, and this injustice will of course increase with time. The word zamindar means landholder. It is applied to landholders both great and small. In Bengal the great landlords, many of whom are now dignified by the British Government with the title of Raja or Maharaja, are called zamindars by natives. In the Punjab and throughout the North and Central India small farmers who hold direct from Govern- ment are also so designated. The word is, in many parts of India, synonymous with " cultivator," but in the Punjab and some other provinces it is generally applied to those agriculturists who hold their land direct from Government, and they are usually held in more respect than those who do so from a great landlord, who are considered as tenants only, while they are considered by other Indians as landowners. There are many different tenures under which land is held throughout India, which would take volumes to describe even had I the requisite knowledge to enable me to do so, which I have not. In what I say hereafter I have the Punjab mainly in view, but what occurs there does so elsewhere with slight varia- tions. Before I describe fully the working of the land revenue system I will briefly refer to forest operations, to irrigation and to farming itself, because to understand it fully a knowledge of these is necessary. I will, however, at once say that capitalist farming in India is quite exceplional. A supply of food for the household is the primary object of agriculturists, although the minority, whose holdings are comparatively large, also raise farm produce for sale. When they do so it is for a distant market, and their ignorance places them at the mercy of astute and well-informed buyers, who secure the support of subordinate officials for a consideration and generally, between them, arrange that the agriculturist comes off second best. These buyers THE LAND 161 are mostly of scribe or trading castes of the towns, but they are often Greeks or other Europeans. In order to grow the better and more remunerative crops, such as wheat and cotton, the climate of the greater part of India renders artificial irrigation a necessity, but inferior staples, such as millet, which thrive on little moisture, can ordinarily be grown without it and can depend on the seasonal rain. Agricul- ture is everywhere subject to frequent periods of disorganization, consequent on the failure of the seasonal rains, the vagaries of which are extraordinary. The downpour, even in good years, is very partial even in the same district. Sometimes an irriga- tion lake in one locality will be filled to the brim by heavy rain in its catchment area, while a few miles away in the catchment area of another there will be none and it will remain empty, so that the crops of those agriculturists depending on the former may be splendid, while those doing so in the latter may be a complete or partial failure, according to whether the wells supplied by its sub-soil drainage hold out or not. Insects, fungi and locusts also cause failure of crops, usually partial and in limited areas. There are rules for the suspension or remission of land revenue in case of total or partial failure of the crops over a large area, but they are too mechanical and don't meet individual cases. When there is a complete failure of the seasonal rains famine is the result in non-irrigated districts. Where artificia irrigation exists failure of the rain means deficient crops, for no crops mature to the full without rain. Famines are no longer attended with the terrible human mortality which formerly marked their progress. This is because the increase in railway and road communications, by facilitating the transport of food, has enabled the Government of India to make most efficient arrangements to meet these calamities by affording immediate relief to the people in the affected districts, in which famine relief works are started almost automatically. The arrangements of the Government of India to meet famine are very perfect and such as it may well be proud of. In large feudatory States famine relief is on the same lines, but when not under British supervision is not carried out so well. Famines, however, result in a great mortality in cattle, for whom, even with the aid of railways, it is impossible to provide such a bulky article as fodder. They have consequently to be driven by their owners to grazing grounds afar off, and on the road to them these refugees ii 1 62 INDIAN STUDIES are not welcome, because grazing grounds are everywhere scarce. On these migrations, cattle die in large numbers, while the herds- men and their families who accompany the cattle frequently do so as well ; this is especially the case with those who are old or ill-nourished. Loss of cattle means a loss more or less complete of the peasants' meagre capital. It has been argued in official reports that the peasant-farmer class are rarely seen on famine relief works, therefore the land rent cannot be too high. This is fallacious. That class after even a; partial failure of crops are left with either a very small margin or none whatever. At the best of times it is quite im- possible for those with small holdings to save. It is obvious that, even in the case of those with larger holdings, the higher their rent the less their power of resistance must be. When the bad time comes those with larger holdings may escape absolute ruin, but only by getting into perpetual debt to the village money-lender, which is very nearly as bad. Famine usually means that a large number of peasant farmers lose their holdings and descend into the ranks of village labourers, and as such subsequently appear on famine relief works. The Indian peasant is the most economical of a class which is all the world over economical. Throughout the greater part of India he is a vegetarian. His staple food is mostly cheap grain, his only luxury is milk and ghi (clarified butter), with a little cheap tobacco which he usually grows himself. Capital for agricultural purposes is as scarce and dear to-day in India as it ever was, which clearly indicates that the peasant farmer's financial position is so precarious that his security is bad. Obviously the higher his rent the more precarious his financial position must be and the more helpless he must be to resist the effect on it of famine or even of partial failure of his crops. Besides being hampered by climatic and other adverse conditions in his farming operations, he is also hampered by his caste or religion in a way unheard-of in other countries. The production of meat and even butter and milk for the market is not and cannot be in his hands, because it belongs to those of a separate caste. It does not enter into the business of the agri- culturist. Pigs, so valuable to the European peasant farmer, are unclean to almost all Indians and can only be kept by a very few low caste Hindus, but as none others will eat their flesh they are unprofitable. Only the very lowest caste of Hindus may keep THE LAND 163 fowls, and with few exceptions only Musalmans will eat their flesh or eggs. No Hindu will breed mules, for it is considered disgraceful in the eyes of Hindus to cross a high caste animal such as a mare with a donkey, which is the lowest and meanest of all animals and only on a par with a dog. Few Hindus will take the life of any sentient creature. In- numerable birds, great and small, parrots, pigeons, peafowls and cranes, devastate the crops with impunity. Hinduized Musalmans either defer to or share their prejudices, which have not been completely overcome by Sikhs. Agricultural lands are parcelled out into small fields of irregular shape, whose size is ever decreasing, for the religious laws of both Hindus, Musalmans and Sikhs involve the sub-division of a holding among the heirs of the deceased occupier, so that a pro- gressive reduction in their size and an increase in the number of those too small to be worked economically goes on continually! and this it is difficult to prevent as the practice has religious sanction. The fields are separated only by a narrow strip which serves as a footpath or watercourse. Fencing material is so scarce and expensive that fencing-in fields is exceptional. Wild beasts, such as deer, pigs and monkeys take heavy toll from the crops, especially in many feudatory States where they are preserved for sport by the rulers, often quite regardless of the injury they do to cultivators. Village children are usually employed all day and well into the night n herding cattle or in driving wild birds and beasts and also straying tame ones away from the cultivated fields. This occupation is neither con- ducive to their physical nor mental development, yet the people are too poor to spare their services and so enable them to attend school, or even to feed or clothe them properly. Primary schools, indeed, are quite too few in the rural districts, they are only to be found in the larger villages, the roads between which and the smaller are mere tracks which in the rainy season are often impassable. In the hot season the heat of the sun is so great, hard-worked children cannot be expected in their spare time to trudge on long journeys to school over dust-laden tracks in the intense heat, even could their parents afford to let them do so. Those schools that exist are unpopular among the agricultural classes, partly because the instruction they give is purely secular and also because they do not turn out men content to be peasants, but better equipped for their work than u* 1 64 INDIAN STUDIES their forbears, which is what the rural classes require them to do. Village schools are usually only attended by the village money-lender's children, or those of scribe castes, who are turned out of them more efficient at pillaging the peasants than their forbears. Their education in this line is already all that could be desired. Regarding the methods of combating locusts, insects, fungi and other enemies of their crops very prevalent in India agricul- turists are quite ignorant, and even were they not so the objection of the great majority to taking the life of any sentient thing would intervene ; they are quite ignorant also regarding the selection of good, bad or indifferent seeds, or the keeping good seeds from deteriorating by judicious rejection. The Agricultural Department tries to teach them improved methods of agriculture and a better knowledge of the treatment of cattle, but as its subordinate employes, who alone come into contact with cultiva- tors, are mostly of the scribe castes, and being themselves landless have only a theoretical knowledge of what they expound, they carry no influence with the villagers. They are, moreover, badly paid and increase their salaries by taking toll of the villagers, who in consequence avoid them as much as they can. While the Forest Department does immense good by its operations in the vast forest regions in the highly cultivated districts its activities have been attended with little result other than oppression of the villagers. It has pounced down on many such districts and, on the part of the Government as uni- versal landlord, annexed, without paying any compensation which makes the procedure worse, many scrub jungles near villages and in close proximity to their cultivation. The prickly bushes of these jungles were previously used for fencing the village fields to prevent the depredations of wild animals. The jungles themselves were used for grazing the village cattle, sheep and goats. Their annexation has entailed great hardship on the villagers, and as far as my own experience goes has done no good. Although these so-called forest reserves have been fenced in, and all access to them forbidden to man and beast under pains and penalties, I have known many for forty years in which the " forest " is no more developed than it was when first annexed. Grievously injured as the unfortunate villagers feel themselves to be by being deprived of their immemorial THE LAND 165 rights over their village jungles, they feel even more the trouble caused to them by the corruption and oppression of the Forest Department subordinates who have been quartered in their neighbourhood and who perpetually bully and pillage them with impunity. Preserving these tracts as forest has also increased the number of wild animals in their neighbourhood. The scarcity of wood has been further increased by the reclamation of jungle land for cultivation by means of irrigation works. The waters of the snow-fed rivers of the north and of the great rain-fed rivers of South and Central India have been enclosed in immense storage reservoirs, from which, as sources, some fifty thousand miles of artificial channels are maintained which irrigate some 20,000,000 acres of land. The jungle lands now brought under the plough were formerly the grazing grounds of immense herds of cattle. The initial cost of these great works, some of which, however, have been failures, was about 45,000,000. I have seen it stated in the press that Government recovers a nett annual income of 1,500,000 from this initial expenditure by the charges it recovers from agriculturists for the water it supplies to them. Water rate is not levied on the quantity of water supplied, but according to the different crops grown. The peasants in the Punjab contend that they are charged something like ten to sixteen per cent, on the capital outlay, and, in addition, the State, as supreme or universal landlord, claims a share in the increased produce due to irrigation beyond the full rate charged for the water conveyed direct to the crops. As an Indian friend of mine put it, " The State is levying a water advantage rate in addition to the full rate for water, which is another addition to the land tax which the landholder is obliged to pay." I am not prepared to say whether this water advantage rate is thus correctly described or not, or whether or not Government recovers such large interest on the initial cost of its irrigation works, but what I have stated is the general belief of every peasant proprietor in the Punjab, where it causes much dissatisfaction. It is incumbent on Government to explain fully to the peasant agriculturists how the water rate is calculated and what interest it recovers for the capital expended on irrigation works. It is not well that people should think the Government of India is "out " for extortionate profits on works carried out ostensibly for their benefit, or that those of one province should be called upon to pay for failures in others. That the people should believe such 1 66 INDIAN STUDIES things of the Government is a great evil due to its habit of secrecy. It should let the people know all the details of what it does for their good. Unless it does so it cannot expect them to be grateful to it. The net annual income derived from the initial cost, considering the high price of water, would seem to indicate, presuming the figures I give are correct, which I do not guarantee, that there have been an excessive number of failures in irrigation projects, the cost of which has been levied all round. The jungle land reclaimed by irrigation in the Punjab has been peopled by the overflow agricultural population from other parts of the province. This new arable land has been divided up and villages have been built on it ; they and the surrounding land are called canal colonies. Even the great increase in arable land has in no way assuaged the severe land hunger prevailing in this province as well as everywhere else in India, although greater in it than elsewhere. Agriculture being an hereditary occupation, as the agricultural classes are rapidly increasing in numbers this is bound to be so ; nevertheless those of one province show no desire to emigrate to another, in which the languages spoken and customs prevailing are different, even if they can get good land in it. Nearly all possible jungle land has now been brought under irrigation, a process not always attended with success. Some soils when impregnated with water for any lengthy period suffer from a disease called oosur in the Punjab : it consists of an alkaline exudation which, in a mild form, adversely affects crops and if severe destroys them. It has caused much loss. The only waste land on a large scale now remaining in the plains of India is the Thur, or Indian Desert, which is situated south-east of the feudatory State of Bahawalpur ; it is the terri- tory of other feudatory States. Promising projects for bringing large parts of it under the influence of the river Indus or its tributaries have for long been under consideration, but no decision regarding them had been arrived at, and nothing had been done to carry them out when I left India. The extension of irrigation is not the unmixed blessing which some good people consider it to be. The vast jungles now under the plough were previously the source of a great supply of scrub wood, which was not only the chief fuel, but the only fencing material available. The immense herds of cattle which formerly used them have now very seriously THE LAND 167 diminished in number owing to scarcity of grazing grounds, while the quality of those that remain has greatly deteriorated for the same reason, and large classes whose business was cattle raising have been impoverished. Owing to the operations of the Forest Department and the increase of cultivation round the villages, in many districts the cattle that remain have now to go long distances to graze, and herding them has greatly increased the already heavily taxed labour of the agriculturists, who are obliged to employ children, often of tender years, in even greater numbers than before to do this work, who in other lands would be attending school. The difficulty and expense of feeding cows and calves has been also greatly increased, while the milk yield of cows has, owing to their scanty food and deterioration in quality, greatly decreased ; agriculturists are much too poor to think of stall feeding them. The price of milk and ghi (clarified butter) has consequently become so dear as to have become prohibitive to large classes who formerly consumed them, to the detriment of their physique, which, in the case of the warlike classes, reacts on recruiting. The diminution in the number of cattle and the deterioration in their quality seriously hampers agriculturists in their work, for tillage, drawing water from wells and carting is done mainly by oxen, although to a small extent by buffaloes, which, however, suffer under the same evils. The cramping of village grazing grounds everywhere, which is excessive in those cultivated districts in which " Forest " reserves have been established, necessitates huddling the cattle up together. This, with their poor condition, owing to the state of semi- starvation in which they live except, perhaps, during the seasonal rains when grass grows exuberantly, causes severe outbreaks of cattle disease to occur periodically almost everywhere, which is absolutely crippling to individual peasants. The slaughter of infected or suspected cattle is the only sure prophylactic, but this is not possible among Hindus, who regard the life of cattle as sacred, while even segregation is- difficult where all are immersed in ignorance. Preventible loss of cattle life is thus very great, although something is being done to prevent it by inoculation ; but this, too, is in the hands of departmental subor- dinates whom the agriculturists detest, and it will not be a practical remedy till the departmental subordinates are taken from the agricultural classes and are under the control of Magis- trates of districts, who alone can prevent malpractices, for the 168 INDIAN STUDIES agriculturists will not make complaints to departmental officials, whom they do not know and consequently in whom they have no confidence. Formerly scrub jungle wood supplemented by dried cow dung was used as fuel ; owing to the scarcity of wood the reverse is now the case. Agriculturists have no fer- tilizer except cow dung, which is no longer available since it must be used mainly as fuel. The fields are deprived of it, and even of liquid manure for cattle litter, formerly used as a fertilizer, is, now that fodder is so scarce, consumed by the cattle. Fields in consequence are becoming exhausted, notably in the old cultivated districts, and the same will soon be the case in the canal colonies. Although the Government has done much in the way of irrigation works, the agriculturists themselves have done a great deal. Considering their poverty and the high rate of interest prevailing on capital for agricultural purposes, it may be conceded that they have done all they possibly could. Were they as stupid and recklessly extravagant as they are so frequently described to be they most certainly would have been neither willing nor able to have done nearly so much, but they are neither one nor the other, although they are ignorant of many things, which is not their fault, for they have never been given any fair educational opportunity. Over the greater part of India they have utilized the smaller sources of surface water for irri- gation. They have stored the water coming from minor rivers or streams, on which they have erected barrages forming lakes, often of very considerable size. Using them as sources, water is drawn off by channels for surface irrigation. The lakes have benefited underground sources, which have been tapped by millions of wells from which water is drawn by bullocks and conveyed by channels to neighbouring fields. These wells, in the aggregate, are the mainstay of the most important agricultural operations in India. The upkeep and repair of barrages and wells, which are periodically greatly damaged and often totally destroyed by excessive rainfall, is a heavy tax on agriculturists. Although Government has erected many minor irrigation works, the cost of which it recoups itself for by a charge on water, much more might be undertaken by it which agriculturists, owing to lack of capital, cannot do. In British India agriculturists themselves have carried out minor irrigation works by means of which some 27,000,000 acres have been brought under the THE LAND 169 plough. Those carried out by Government irrigate some 18,000,000 acres, and in this direction it could do much more. Caste or religious customs make certain extravagances obliga- tory on all classes of Indians, much against their will, but they cannot resist public opinion till an example is set by those in the highest positions in each caste. These customs consist of obligatory feasts to Brahmans and caste fellows on such occasions as deaths, marriages, or the birth of a son, and to satisfy the manes of deceased relatives or friends in other worlds. The amount spent on them, even the fare provided in the case of those given by people of inferior castes, is dictated by precedent, from which there is no escape. Daughters have to be provided with dowries ; pilgrimages are expensive, but have to be under- taken, and priests must be fed and paid in India as elsewhere. All these are heavy taxes even on the rich, and they often ruin the poor. This expenditure cannot be avoided, but it can be reduced very much with encouragement by men in high places, both British and Indians, if the latter be of high social position and caste. Short of a complete religious revolution, of which there is no sign, it is idle to think such ceremonies will ever be completely abandoned. It should be recollected that such customs are not peculiar to India, they prevail among all peoples whose social and educa- tional status is low. They are, however, more harmful in India, not because Indians are more extravagant than other peoples, but because they are poorer and in a worse social and educational condition than people in most other countries. For the low social and educational state of the rural classes the Government is responsible. It should know well that no social reform can succeed in India till it is supported by the high and priestly castes and has also its own support. Men of such caste, orthodox English-educated patriots of high attainments who remain Indians, have done their best to effect social reform, but they have never had the slightest support from the Government of India or the pseudo-democratic clique of Indians who are Indians only in name, complexion and social habits. Government has preferred to begin at the wrong end and devote their energies to experiments in democratic politics carried out on false premises. Education has not spread generally among the Indian peoples, because the system on which it is carried out is not suited to their 170 INDIAN STUDIES environment. It is idle to think it will ever do so until this state of affairs is altered. This being so, instead of merely putting down, falsely as I know, the poverty of the small landowner class to their extra- vagance, it would be more reasonable as well as politic for the Government of India to direct its land settlement officers, in fixing the land rent, to make a reasonable reduction, not only to enable the agriculturists to save to meet bad seasons but also to marry their daughters and carry out the other customs and traditions of their country passed down to them through long ages. In business, as distinct from social affairs, the agricultural classes, as well as all orthodox Indians, are ever ready to consider new ideas and to adopt them on good reasons being shown, when, by so doing, no departure from caste or religious custom is involved, and most small desirable] reforms would be effected without in the least interfering with either. Indians, as a rule, are completely lacking in initiative, but they are clear thinking and have ample aptitude in dealing with their own affairs either individually or in communities. When they have been allowed to do so this has been amply illustrated. With a few individual exceptions, new projects, either of business or social reform, have not prospered without Government support. This is well illustrated in the case of Agricultural Co-operative Societies. They were much talked about approvingly by influential Indians, but beyond this they never got till supported by Govern- ment officials. They have in view the organization of credit, the insurance of farm cattle and co-operative production, sale and purchase. In a very short time after the Government had started them it was found possible to free them to a great extent from official control. Their detailed management and propaganda work was then undertaken by patriotic leisured Indians, gentlemen of position in their districts. The attitude of the yeoman farmers towards them was all that could be desired. Each Society can borrow for agricultural purposes to meet its members' needs on the joint security of all the members. The high cost of capital has been greatly reduced for their members. A condition of joining must obviously be financial stability, a happy state in which only a very small proportion of the 40,000,000 heads of peasant-farmer families find themselves. When I left India there were over 16,000 Societies, with an aggregate THE LAND 171 membership of over three-quarters of a million, handling over 3,500,000. Officials connected with them are unanimous in saying that the co-operator is distinguished from the unorganized peasant by a steadily growing breadth of vision, and that he is generally the pioneer of those improvements which are suggested by the Agricultural Department. In fact he is the " source " from which ideas flow which do much good. The poverty of the agriculturists is the one preventive to the spread of these most valuable societies, and this will continue as long as they are subjected to such a very heavy land tax and while, as is now the case, they have no security that some part of the value of their improvements will not be included in it by the State or by a great landowner. Improvements made by agriculturists are protected, but only to a certain extent, by laws and regula- tions which vary under the different local governments. These laws only contemplate tangible improvements such as wells or drains, but they do not contemplate the new conditions in re- claimed lands such as those of the canal colonies of the Punjab, which are quite different from what they are in the old settled districts, and it is wrong to treat both in the same way. Settlers in the canal colonies still remember the day when they walked from their old villages to the land which was given to them ; there they built new villages, rooted up the jungle, broke the virgin soil, and made themselves new homes. All the Govern- ment provided was flow irrigation water, which the farmer is charged for, but it was the labour of the sturdy peasant which made the earth yield bounteous crops, yet the value of his labour is not credited to him in assessing his rent ; it is annexed by the " universal landlord," which he naturally regards as a very great injustice. A change of practice on the part of settle- ment officers is necessary. They should receive and recognize the weight of such expert evidence as will ensure that the peasant shall retain the full extra income not only due to his outlay but also to his labour. Much of the hardship inflicted on peasant landholders is caused by the definition of the land tax. " I know of no idler or less interesting war of words," writes Baden-Powell, a great authority on land settlement in India, " than that which has raged over the definition whether the tax is revenue, rent or land tax." He defined it as a " tax on agricultural incomes," 172 INDIAN STUDIES which is according to fact, and the sooner the Government of India accepts it the better. As far as the peasant is concerned it is immaterial to him under what name it goes ; he knows he has to pay it, and that it absorbs the largest share of his produce. Were its correct designation recognized by Govern- ment, settlement officers might assess it with some more con- sideration for the peasant than they do at present. CHAPTER XI THE LAND TAX T T NDER Musalman rulers, Mahratta plunderers and various \^J military adventurers who established principalities at different periods, the land tax varied from one- third to one- fourth. Under British rule it is to-day as near as possible one- half. It is, however, now levied with much more severity than it ever was under previous rulers, when not only was the in- cidence of the tax fairer, but the cultivator escaped a good portion of it by " illegal gratification," according to the custom of the country. As soon as his grain crop commenced to ripen, he surreptitiously collected the ripe heads, which he secreted in a private store untaxed. When the remainder was assessed, he gave the King's officials a bribe, in consideration of which they let him off easily, and so he got a quid pro quo. Revenue is now assessed with scientific precision, and the landlord's asset appraised with all the ingenuity the Settlement officer can command. Each kind of soil that the cultivator possesses is carefully measured and classified, the yield per acre is recorded, and a commutation price applied to work out its value in rupees. In doing this the improvement made by rail- ways and canal irrigation is brought under review, and then a sum, which generally approximates 50 per cent, of the land- lord's assets, is fixed as the tax. In addition the cultivator has to pay 13^ per cent, on the land rent as cesses. This he has to do on fixed dates, whether his crops be good, bad or indifferent. In the case of indifferent or bad crops, the tax may be suspended or remitted, but this is only done when the failure is sufficiently widespread. The land revenue and irrigation departmental subordinates take bribes as they did under former rulers, but the cultivator i?4 INDIAN STUDIES gets no quid pro quo in the way of relief of taxation, he only secures himself from persecution. The Government of India issued a resolution, dated October I7th, 1882, indicating certain principles regarding the land tax and ruling that it was to be enhanced at periodical Settlements on the grounds of : a. Rise in prices. b. Increase in cultivation. c. Improvements made by Government. The land revenue policy was again denned by Lord Curzon's Government in a resolution dated January 6th, 1902, in which attention was drawn to the advisability of making a larger use of progressive enhancements, but with all the changes in policy and different methods which prevail the land tax is still levied on the old lines. It is enforced on Asiatic, not British traditions, which govern every other tax levied throughout the British Empire, both in India and elsewhere. The periodical revision of settlements with their upward tendency goes on all the time in one part of India or another. Questions which are raised and hotly debated in Legislative Councils and the Press when any other tax is to be increased or reduced are completely ignored in the case of the land tax. In 1913 some of the central districts in the Punjab had been recently settled. The increase on certain individual holdings was as high as 50 per cent., and in the canal colonies as high as 100 per cent., so that Lord Curzon's recommendations as to the advisability of making a large use of progressive enhance- ments were totally ignored. The Settlement report of the Ludhiana district, published about 1913, reveals the fact that the Settlement officer concerned was under no control and raised rents as he saw fit, and no one knows whether or not this is exceptional ; I believe it is not. It appears from this Settlement report that after careful inquiry the Settlement officer sub- mitted a forecasted increase of two and a half lakhs of rupees. The Financial Commissioner, the first " channel " through which it passed to the Government of India, thought it should not be less than three lakhs of rupees. The Government of the Punjab, the next " channel/' fixed it at two and a half lakhs, and pro- posed to limit the total increase to 33 per cent., which was accepted by the Government of India. The actual result of the THE LAND TAX 175 Settlement was to increase the rent of the district to Rs. 3,94,620. The demand on the cultivators was thus raised from Rs. 11,05,352 to Rs. 14,999,72, which is an increase of nearly four lakhs, or 35.70 per cent., and the limit of 33 per cent, ordered by the Government of India was ignored. Under such a system there is no security against large enhancements on individual holdings. In the central districts in the Punjab there has not been much increase of cultivation. The land is parcelled out in small holdings, cultivated by the proprietors themselves, who consume their produce. Here, and in all the other old districts, the holdings of a good class of peasants vary from seven to ten acres, while in other old districts they vary from a fraction of an acre to five acres. In the canal colonies the average holding of a settler is 27.9 acres. When all the land worth cultivating has been brought under the plough, there can be no increase of production due to im- proved methods of agriculture, for the peasants are too ignorant. On the contrary, owing to the soil being exhausted from the want of manure, caused by the larger use of cow dung as fuel, it is well known that the produce tends to decrease, yet rent in these districts has been increased between 25 per cent, and 33 per cent, and over. In the canal colonies, by the settlement made some ten years ago, I was informed the increase on certain individual holdings was as much as 100 per cent. The land in them will soon be exhausted also from the want of manure. In addition to the heavy land tax and cesses, the cultivator pays for the Government irrigation water he uses at full rate, which he says is something like 12 to 16 per cent, on the capital outlay of the sources from which it is supplied. The water rate is not levied on the amount of water he gets, but according to the crop grown. Even on this, Government, as the supreme landlord, claims an additional share in the general increased production due to irrigation works for the water for which it has already charged a full rate. Certainly the heavy direct taxation on the agricultural industry is extracted with uncommon ingenuity. In the United Provinces it is so great that a single failure of the crop sends thousands to relief works, while the village labourer is always hungry. The Punjab is the most prosperous province I know in India so far as the peasantry are concerned : this is due to the great amount of land reclaimed by irrigation in recent years. But this province, too, is begin- 176 INDIAN STUDIES ning to feel the pressure. The villagers suffer already from deficient nourishment, and their physique, to my knowledge, has decreased, which re-acts on recruiting. The cost of living has increased, the peasant has to travel more by rail, he has to clothe himself and his family in Manchester cloth or cloth from the mills in the cities of India, which is more expensive than the village-made article he formerly used, but the village weaving industry has been killed. He has become the slave of his fields, narrow of outlook, with nothing to relieve the monotony of his dull and laborious life. The land interest, very disproportionately represented on the various legislative councils, is only represented at all by great landlords nominated by Government or elected by the pseudo- democratic minority, into whose hands all political power has been thrown. The interests of both nominated and elected great land- lords are opposed to those of the peasant agriculturists, who are unrepresented and unheard. They feel they are bound down by the imposition of this enormous taxation, and they know not how to obtain relief from a burden ever becoming more intolerable. They have not yet learnt to have a voice and demand a hearing, but the awaking of consciousness is surely coming. The return to the villages of soldiers and men serving in labour corps abroad will change things more rapidly. There were murmurs in the villages before I left India, the people resented being ruled according to the ideals of the pseudo- democratic minority whom they detest. Year by year the newspaper, the railways and travel abroad in many lands, are disseminating new ideas among the village people and slowly modifying those traditions of unquestioning acceptance of what- ever comes from above, be it from Government or God, and yet }^ear after year their rent and squalid condition goes on increasing. If something be not done very soon to give them relief, they may seek redress in ways which will not be creditable to an enlightened Administration which founds its right to rule on the will of the majority of its subjects. It is idle to talk of education or other measures of social reform when whole families in those parts of India I know have to work day and night to eke out a bare existence. Even in normal years the grain disappears before the harvest is over, and then the fight with hunger and the illness it causes commences. There are millions, who, even in good years, fail to get a full THE LAND TAX 177 meal, and they would die in droves in a bad one were it not for public relief. The peasant digs, sows and reaps, the rain falls and the crops prosper and are reaped, but no sooner is the harvest over than the crop is divided. The landlord, be he Government or a great landlord, takes the lion's share, the village shopkeeper and the village servants are paid from what remains, when the producer has nothing left. He again gets credit for his food and seed for the next crop from the village shopkeeper, which costs him dear, and he goes home to plough, sow, and live in hopes of better times, which never come. When after long years of toil and favourable crops he may have got clear of the village shopkeeper, the Settlement officer pounces down on him and skims off all profit by taxing him on a rigidly defined standard which throws him into the hands of the village shopkeeper once more. He takes his misfortune as best he can, but he does not, nor can he be expected, to accept the sudden large increase on his rent as just. It is not possible for anyone who has got used to spending a certain income for a term of years to effect a reduction in his expenditure all of a sudden, and meet an increased revenue demand, should it exceed, in the case of the poor, 10 per cent., and in that of the more affluent, 20 per cent, at the outside, yet an increase greatly in excess of this is made at each Settle- ment, and it falls on all alike on the rich as well as the poor. g| The Indian peasant looks at the actual increase of his rent, and not at the arithmetical standard by which the Settlement officer justifies and determines it. If he has paid, say, 10 for between twenty and thirty years as rent and is suddenly called upon to pay 15 on re-assessment, he cannot understand or appreciate the motive of the Government in increasing his tax. He merely grumbles at its greediness, which he compares to that of the village shopkeepers, and he lets off steam by cursing it for a Babu raj (Babu-ruled Government), but knowing no remedy he accepts the inevitable. It is no consolation to him to be told by the Settlement officer that he paid over 50 per cent, of his assets on the former settlement, and his tax now, notwith- standing the apparent increase, has really been reduced, for the 15 he is called upon to pay in the future is only 48 per cent, of his present assets, while the 10 he formerly paid was 50 per cent. The demand, its explanation and justification by percentage is quite beyond his comprehension. 12 178 INDIAN STUDIES The peasants only know that their relations with the Govern- ment are solely based on some kind of payment, either in the direction of rent, tax, water rate, toll, fine, forced labour or voluntary subscription. They have to pay for justice or in- justice in the courts, they have to bribe the petty officials who surround them in order to escape their persecution, when they travel by train they are cheated by Government Railway officials, when they sell their grain the traders who purchase it cheat them, while they have no security that the value of improve- ments carried out by their capital or labour will not be included in their rent. Who would expect agriculturists to be contented under such circumstances ? Yet those of India are, as this war has proved, conspicuously loyal, as was expected by all who knew them well. Mr. Purser, a well-known Settlement officer, when settling the Jullunder District, made an interesting inquiry some twenty years ago. Both it and the Lieutenant Governor's reply afford much light on the system under which a district is assessed. I will give a resume of both. Mr. Purser started with the pro- position that " as a maximum rate of enhancement has been laid down, and no minimum, it may be fairly assumed that the intention is that the Government demand is not to trench on the resources necessary for the successful prosecution of the various industries of the district among which agriculture is supreme without a rival." He divided the crops into five classes, accord- ing as they furnished food for men, food for cattle, clothing, agricultural gear, and luxuries such as tobacco, opium and sugar. He assumed that the necessary food consumption averaged 7 maunds (560 Ibs.) per head yearly, which is very low, for even the famine relief code allows j\. Working on this estimate, he concluded that the district did not produce enough food for its own support, so that the local supply had to be reinforced by imported grain. The fodder crops were all consumed by the cattle, and dairy profits were small and might be put against the cost of cattle purchased from other districts. Nearly the whole of the cotton crop was used for clothing, and all the hemp for ropes for drawing water from wells. The only crop of any importance that remained was sugar- cane, the value of which to the cultivator, at Rs. 70 per acre grown (about 4 los. at the then rate of exchange), with a trifling THE LAND TAX 179 addition on account of opium, spices and the like, and a small share of the cotton crop, provided the margin out of which the land revenue, the cost of repairing wells and irrigation, barrages and channels, buying carts, making good the losses caused from time to time by cattle disease, and also any domestic expenditure over and above the barest necessities of life had to be met. Sir James Lyall, the Lieutenant Governor of the Punjab, of which Jullunder is one of the districts, remarked : " An argument of this character is useful as a check or test, but it must be admitted that Mr. Purser gave too much pro- minence to it and seemed to rely on it too much. . . . His facts were, no doubt, broadly true, and they indicated the diffi- culty of taking a considerable increase without running the danger of reducing unduly the already scanty subsistence fund of those peasant proprietors, earned, as it is, by much thrift and unceasing industry. As Mr. Purser remarks in one of his reports, the district seems to be in a position where it would take very little to convert its fairly prosperous condition into distress. It must be remembered that in a district like Jullunder our assessment is only in theory one upon rents, and that with the very small holdings of the peasant proprietors, Government is practically taking from most of them all that they can really pay, and live in a frugal way in decent comfort. It is, His Honour (Sir James Lyall) believes, the general fact that the smaller proprietors have to sell their wheat as well as their sugar and cotton, and to live mainly on the coarser grains, of which large quantities are imported from other less highly cul- tivated districts. Mr. Purser's argument in his assessment reports against taking too much account in a rise in prices in a district like this is, in Sir James Lyall's opinion, generally sound ; his remark as to the ease with which the petty pro- prietors may be plunged into debt by the loss of plough and well cattle, which are now largely imported from other districts, deserves much consideration." The progressive reduction in the size of holdings, which is ever going on, results in a perpetual increase in the number of those which cannot be worked economically, and those from which their owners cannot gain a livelihood, which is a great political danger. The Government has never dealt with this question of morcellement, probably because of its extreme 12* i8o INDIAN STUDIES difficulty, but delay and the periodical rise in rents in- creases it. The rise in prices is against the agriculturist in nearly every instance ; in the few cases where some of those who produce for sale might get some advantage, their ignorance prevents them doing so to its full extent. Cattle raising not being a part of the business of agriculture, farmers have to purchase their oxen, in which most of their small capital is invested. The rise in the price of cattle and its products is clearly to their disadvantage, as is also the increased cost of labour, the price of which follows that of everything else. The rise in the price of wood increases the cost of the rude farm appliances used which are made of it, their component parts being kept together by strips of raw hide. These appliances are such as have been used for long ages ; they are clumsy and heavy, entailing much unnecessary labour on both man and beast, but the peasants cannot afford to substitute modern appliances on account of the increased cost of iron ; even could they do so, they could not use them owing to their ignorance of rudimentary mechanics. Modern farm appliances are useless to those who do not understand bolts, bearings, cogwheels, nuts and such things, of which the Indian peasants have not the foggiest notion, for which reason they will not use them, but prefer to stick to the ancient implements they understand. Owing to their ignorance regarding the selection of seed, their crops are not as good as they should be : for example, most of the cotton they grow has a very low percentage of lint to seed ; raw sugar and tobacco they prepare for the market themselves in its initial stages, and their methods of doing so are inferior. Their threshing is done by their oxen, who stamp out the grain on the threshing floor, so it is dirty. They sell direct from the land and so lose the offals. Their ignorance is almost as heavy a handicap on their industry as the rise in prices, yet this is not their fault, for they have never received any education suitable to their requirements and environment ; still they have to pay for both in ever-increasing taxation and to make an additional payment to the various Government subordinate officials, with whom departmentalism has surrounded them, while those who sell produce are at the mercy of the astute buyers, and changes in the demand or supply in other countries, the name of which they have not even heard, may bring their enterprise to naught. THE LAND TAX 181 Those who do not know them call them mulish, because they prefer to stick to ancient methods till good reason is shown to them for change. Those who suggest change often do so in complete disregard of the peasants' ignorance and poverty, of both of which the peasants themselves are painfully aware. It must be recollected that besides all these disabilities they have in addition those caused by the vagaries of the seasonal rains, attacks on their unfenced crops by wild and straying tame beasts and wild birds, by insects and disease. Truly their lot is not a very happy one. One time their rulers held the view that " increased securitv of fixed property and comparative freedom from the fiscal officers of Government will tend to create a class, which, although composed of various races and creeds, will be particularly bound to British rule, whilst under proper regulations the measure will conduce materially to the improvement of the general con- dition of the Indian Empire." To-day other views prevail, which consist in futile attempts to conciliate the irreconcilable pseudo-democratic minority at the expense of the peasantry, who are by nature intensely loyal and very easily conciliated. It is recognized everywhere that the internal trade is the most profitable of every country, and in India it depends on a flourishing agricultural industry. A prosperous peasantry would demand more and more in the way of manufactured articles of necessity or luxury, or both, according to the degree of their prosperity, when the Government could reap the benefit in the way of indirect taxes on those articles locally manufactured or imported from England or other parts of the Empire. The advantage to Indian and Imperial trade from a prosperous Indian peasantry would be enormous. It is well recognized that reasonable indirect taxes on manufactured articles are defrayed by economy, skill, improvements in machinery and such like in the many trades and persons who manufacture them, amongst all of whom their burden is divided so as to become almost imperceptible. Most branches of manufacturing industry thus possess means of compensating fiscal burdens, while the rude produce of agricultural industry does not. This is summed up in the aphorism : " Paysans pauvres, pauvre royaume." The rulers of Turkey, Persia, India and other Asiatic countries rely almost entirely on direct taxation, which they pile on so 1 82 INDIAN STUDIES heavily as to almost totally ruin industry, yet the sums they extract are inconsiderable when compared to the immense revenue derived from the customs and excise in European States without injury to their industries. Asiatic countries are poor because their main industry is agriculture ; the cultivators, nearly all peasant-farmers, cannot lay any part of the tax on the consumer of their rude produce, and those in India are mostly in that position themselves. The heavy land tax is a direct burden on their rude industry, which almost crushes it and reduces them to abject poverty and a life of squalor. They can neither purchase necessities or luxuries they have no money themselves and that they pay to Government does not put the manufacturing industrial activities of others into action, for it is all taken direct by the Government treasury, and before it gets there does not have an opportunity of doing so, as is the case with indirect taxes. There are some 300,000,000 people in India connected directly or indirectly with the agricultural industry. Probably two-thirds of these are living in a state of squalor, ill-clothed by day and with insufficient blankets at night, ill-fed, and the sole furniture of their miserable hovels is a few brass cooking pots. I have seen it stated in public by an " Authority " on India, that the want of clothing is not a hardship owing to the heat of the climate. This may be true in some of the tropical parts. I cannot say, for I do not profess to know " all India." It is a grievous hardship in the Punjab, Rajputana, the United Provinces and Central India, in large parts of which water freezes in pools in December January, and in the Dekkan high plateaux, where, although I have never seen the pools frozen, I have felt it intensely cold. In all these regions the ill-clad people, especially the children, feel the cold acutely, especially when it is combined with hunger. India is not growing poorer, as some say ; the trade of the country has grown, but the internal trade has not done so to the extent it should ; it is the external trade which has greatly prospered by the export of raw materials ; the value of land is rising greatly, stimulated by earth hunger, for the profit of the farmer is mostly taken by Government ; labour earns better wages, but the ever increasing cost of living counteracts the advantage of high wages ; the towns alone are prosperous. Maharajas, great landowners and bankers were always rich, for they throve on the misery of the masses, whose condition is THE LAND TAX 183 to-day little ameliorated. An affluent professional class, mainly lawyers, has arisen, which is very wealthy ; bankers, money lenders and merchants are richer than ever ; there are more rich people in India than there ever were before, and among these classes wealth is better distributed. The position of the peasants, both agriculturists and labourers, however, remains much the same as it ever was, and there is little probability of improving it until the land revenue system be changed and a reduction made in the heavy direct land tax. To sum up the situation, there are large areas protected by irrigation, a network of railways facilitates the distribution of food. The arrangements of Government to save life and help districts in which the crops have suffered " if the area is suffi- ciently widespread," are perfect, yet a single failure of the crop means the ruin of many individual cultivators, because they are so poor that although they work from dawn till dark, few have enough to eat or can clothe themselves properly, and the reason is that land is over-taxed to an extent altogether above the standard obtaining in any other civilized country. Half the landlords' assets is too much, which is aggravated by the assess- ment being calculated with the utmost severity, and no allow- ance being made for the food of the producer and his family. It is oppressive, for it does not leave the cultivator a sufficient margin of profit to allow him to tide over a year of scarcity and give him an incentive to enterprise. Sir Thomas Munro, Governor of Madras, a man renowned for his Indian knowledge, wrote so far back as 1826 : " Agriculturists, I think, cannot thrive at the present rate of taxation. Half the gross produce of the soil is demanded by Government, which is really too much to leave an adequate provision for the peasant, even with the usual frugal habits of Indians. Still more, it is an efficient bar in the way of improvement. It keeps the people, even in favourable years, in a state of abject penury, and when the crops fail it involves the necessity on the part of Government of enormous outlays in the way of remission and distribution, which, after all, do not prevent men, women and children dying. ..." The continuous rise in the land tax since 1826, which is all against the agriculturist, has been used to slowly reduce the margin of profit left to the farmer till it has almost reached the vanishing point. No one can assert that land rent is solely 184 INDIAN STUDIES responsible for the poverty of the Indian peasant, but no one will deny that it is the main contributory cause. In not a few places the peasant has been reduced by it to the position of a serf. The peasant families work the whole day, even little children have to share in the labour. They weed the crops, drive away beasts and birds and take the herds to graze. Millions of families live in hopeless ignorance and destitution. The agricultural labourer cannot as a class get any relief except he goes to a city or town, and although many do so, there is not employment in the towns for them all ; they are only fit for the calling of their fathers. They only know how to dig, plough, sow, reap, soldier and carry burdens, and the latter is forbidden to those of high castes. To learn new trades, even did their caste rules permit, they are too ignorant. To remedy the evils of the agricultural classes, the ratio of the tax on agricultural incomes should be fixed after deducting a food allowance for the producer and his family, and a sufficient sum to enable him to retain a small margin to fulfil the customary social requirements of his country. The forecast prepared by revenue officials and approved by Government should be dis- cussed in the Imperial Legislative Council and Local Legislative Councils, and sanctioned by the Governor General in Council or Governor in Council respectively. At periodic Settlement revisions land rent should never be raised on individual holdings by more than 20 per cent, on the larger holdings, except for special reasons, such as war or other calamity, while on the smaller this should be much reduced. In fixing assessments the cost of consumption of food for the family, for the ploughing oxen, for the next year's seed, for the village servants, etc., should be deducted, and the tax should be fixed on the residue ; that is, on the agricultural income derived from the farm. Settlements should be definitely fixed for thirty years, and enhancements should be spread over six quinquenniums and not have effect at once. No one recom- mends a permanent Settlement, the evils of which have been amply illustrated in the permanently settled districts of Bengal, where they have enriched the great landlords, but done the tenants no good, if not positive injury. The present standard of 50 per cent, of the landlord's assets urgently needs revision to bring it on a level with taxes in civilized countries. The THE LAND TAX 185 British Government of India cannot continue a land revenue system which has lost all flexibility under the scientific and money-extracting energy of the officials of Government, who forget they are taxing human beings and not acres alone. Moderation in demand, said Lord Lawrence, is not only due morally and actually to the people, but is also conducive to the best interests of Government, and Sir James Lyall held that it was impossible to assess peasant proprietors up to half their income. The revenue from irrigation and railways is increasing apace, and under efficient management railway revenue especially might be largely increased. The rates charged are the lowest in the world. The tariffs are the result of slow growth, but this growth has not been directed with intelligence, and they are so com- plicated as to be incomprehensible, not only to the public, but to Railway Traffic Staffs, who are obliged to refer them for inter- pretation to a special staff kept for the purpose. It would be small sacrifice to accept some immediate loss of land revenue, when by so doing it would bind the peasantry to Government by strong personal interests. More especially is this so as the loss, if any, would be amply repaid by in- direct taxes on the increased requirements of a prosperous peasantry. An Indian friend of mine, who is a large landowner, in 1913 gave me an estimate of a peasant farmer's budget, and although the prices change, (and also the value of the rupee, which was then one shilling and fourpence) periodically, it gives a good example of the state of poverty in which peasants live, even those of a good class. I give it in my friend's words : "In the canal colonies, the most productive land in the Punjab, accord- ing to Mr. Dobson, the Settlement officer, the incidence of taxes which a holder pays on good land are : Revenue 600 Water rate 3 12 o Losses 12 9 Rs. 10 8 9 per acre 3 " In addition to revenue the cultivator pays cesses on the land revenue as follows : * There are 16 annas ia a rupee and 12 pies in an anna. 1 86 INDIAN STUDIES Lombardari 5 per cent. Local 8 per cent. " Let us take a peasant who owns ten acres and assume that his whole holding is under wheat, which is, on the whole, the best paying crop in the country. The average yield from an acre is 13 maunds, therefore he will have 130 maunds.* Before we proceed further let us see what a farmer needs for food daily. If we take five families we shall find that a family generally consists of five members, viz., the farmer, his wife, his mother, sister ,or aunt, and two or three children. " The consumption of food per head yearly according to the famine relief code is 7^ maunds, therefore 8 maunds per head yearly would not be a high estimate : Food for the family at 8 maunds per head = 40 Seed for 10 acres at i maund per acre = 10 Village menials =15 65 maunds which leaves a surplus of 65 maunds on the holding of ten acres. The price of wheat ranges between Rs. 2.8, Rs. 2.12 and Rs. 3 per maund. Taking the average of Rs. 2.12, the surplus yield will be Rs. 178.12 a year, from which has to be paid : Land revenue, water rate, cesses, etc., on good land roughly Rs. n per acre = Rs. no which leaves hardly anything (Rs. 68.12.0) for the peasant to clothe himself and his family. This, of course, does not include the labour of the farmer himself or the hire value of his plough- ing cattle. For reaping the crops at a critical time he has some- times to pay Rs. i a day to a single labourer, and the village artisans, the blacksmith, carpenter, the washerman and the * A maund is 80 ft>s, THE LAND TAX 187 barber, who are not included in the sum paid for village menials, have to get their pay. The poor peasant has to deny himself the barest necessities of life to marry his children and pay for his other social-religious amenities. Then his ploughing ox may die and have to be replaced : a single ox costs Rs. 100. It is no v/onder the peasants are in debt, and have to pay exorbitant interests." I will describe the revenue and irrigation subordinates in the chapter on the village. CHAPTER XII THE VILLAGE VILLAGE life varies in the different provinces. In all of them an ancient civilization is found in close contact with the most primitive barbarism ; in many parts there is little sign of civilization at all. This ancient civilization is most preva- lent in the neighbourhood of towns and military cantonments ; the farther afield from which one goes, especially in mountain and forest districts, the more primitive is the state of the people. To this, however, there are many exceptions. In Bengal, not far from the great town of Calcutta, the Santals, a very numerous, semi-civilized aboriginal tribe, inhabit the Rajmehal hills ; in the civilized Punjab are to be found, among many other similar tribes, the gipsy Sansis, who live in sheds in the jungles, are almost naked, and subsist on mice and such other small animals as they can catch ; not far from the great city of Bombay are to be found thousands of villages inhabited by Kolis, Bhils and Mhars, who are aborigines in a little higher state of civilization than the Sansis ; near the city of Madras are the Carambers, Tirulars and Paliars, all aborigines, who live in a very primitive state, while in the forests of the Andamans some of the villagers are still cannibals. The villagers everywhere are such as is to be expected in f countries which have suffered from ages of violence and rapine. In India from time immemorial hostile foreigners established themselves in the heart of the various provinces, who were ever f at war with some of their inhabitants ; the vanquished were H enslaved and became servile. Throughout India's long history, 1 before the establishment of British rule, the normal condition was despotism at the centre and weakness at the extremities ; the collection of revenue was everywhere enforced by arms and 188 THE VILLAGE 189 justice was non-existent ; hereditary governors frequently usurped the provinces they ruled ; the warlike peoples were ever in a state of rebellion although quite incapable of freedom, while the vanquished never blended with their conquerors, the various waves of whom are as distinct to-day as they always have been. Broadly speaking, the hotter the climate in which villages are situated, the more numerous and ignorant are the peoples, scribes and Banias excepted, because for long ages these castes have been literate and were in consequence employed by all the conquering races as revenue collectors and agents to extort money. They are to-day servile to superiors and oppressive to those over whom they have power. In all the villages throughout the land sanitation is completely ignored, and here, again, the effect is much worse the hotter the climate. The question of village sanitation is perhaps the most important and difficult in India, because it cannot be separated from religion ; to the filthy condition of villages must be attributed the origin and spread of ever-present epidemic diseases, such as plague, various fevers, cholera, etc., which cause such unnecessary loss of human life. In all those countries I know the Churahs, or scavengers, and the Chamars, or workers in leather, both aboriginal tribes, do the filthy work of villages, on the outskirts of which alone aborigines are allowed to live ; no man will touch them ; they are treated worse than the most inferior beasts. Each class in the village perform their hereditary allotted tasks, and no servile or menial caste can ever rise superior to that in which it has been born. In Musalman and Sikh villages the menials are nearly everywhere Sudra Hindus, yet these poor people, treated little better than non-Hindu aborigines, when riots occur between their masters and Hindus, although only within the Hindu fold in the lowest class, are nearly always faithful. The sanitary evils from which the villagers suffer are badly constructed, ill-ventilated huts, impure water supply, the keep- ing of village refuse in the lanes, unclean, stagnant pools from which the people drink and in which they wash themselves and their clothes, and water and wash their cattle, and the age-long habit of using the neighbourhood of the village as a latrine. The village cattle eat the human excrement, so that milk is tainted, and spreads disease such as fever;, cholera and plague, 190 INDIAN STUDIES if it does not cause them ; but Hindus, even those educated, see no objection to their doing so, for they do not believe any evil can be produced by the sacred kine. Hinduized Musalmans and Sikhs in these matters are little better than Hindus. The mortality from such diseases, some of which are always present, is frightful. During the last twenty years plague, a disease spread by bad sanita- tion, has devastated large tracts, especially in the Punjab. These epidemics would be much worse, but they are mitigated somewhat by the heat of the sun and the numerous scavenger birds and animals, such as pigs, dogs and jackals, which make their home in the village, in which the dogs and jackals are responsible for frequent cases of hydrophobia. The ill effects of this almost total disregard of even the rudimentary principles of sanitation have in some cases been increased by the stoppage of the natural drainage of the country caused by railways and canals, which have been constructed with a total disregard to the public health such as would not be tolerated under any other civilized Govern- ment. The question of village sanitation, always difficult, is much more so in India than elsewhere, not only on financial and physical, but also on socio-religious grounds, but one thing is quite certain, and that is that all modern methods of sanitation cannot be introduced. The improvement in drinking water is a matter of the least difficulty. It only means, in the first instance, inducing human beings to reserve certain wells, banks of rivers or large tanks for themselves and keeping their catchment areas clean. A water-borne system of sanitation is impossible, on account of both expense and scarcity of water. The septic tank system, which includes chemical precipitation, requiring lime, iron-salts, etc., which are very costly, is also impossible. The only feasible one is the dry earth system. It is not too costly, but needs care. If it is not efficiently worked it is useless, especially in a country such as India, where flies, rats and other disease-carriers abound, with which the masses of the people, those whose religion forbids their taking the life of any sentient thing, live on terms of friendly familiarity. Sanitation of any kind involves some interference with age-long socio-religious customs, especially those of females, but with tact and comprehension of the psychology of the people, this difficulty could be overcome in time ; rushing sanitation would certainly lead to much trouble. The dry earth system has been in force THE VILLAGE 191 for many years in all cantonments and towns in which there are municipalities ; it is fairly widely understood, but different methods would have to be employed in the villages. The creation of a vast sanitary department, with a large staff of corrupt and oppressive native subordinates, who would enforce sanitation by pains and penalties and harass the people, would be viewed in the villages with general dismay. Sanitation in the villages must be carried out with the co-operation and support of the villagers themselves, under the guidance of the magistrate of the district, who should only use persuasion. In those parts of India I know the best way to inaugurate a system of village sanitation would be to allot for the purpose to every district a reasonable sum from funds levied by the District Board by existing taxation, supple- mented from provincial revenue and village cesses. A fund so created should make a fixed annual grant to each village for its own sanitation, which could thus be financed without any direct additional cost to the villagers who are far too poor to be able to defray it. A model house should be built in each village, for the houses are ill-ventilated and dark ; those who desire to build on its lines should be encouraged and given a small grant in aid, if they require it, to be repaid by annual instalments. Pails for the reception of filth, pits for the reception of refuse, and latrines should be provided from the sanitation fund ; unnecessary stagnant pools should be filled in, and the catchment area of those retained, where necessary for drinking water, should be kept clean. Ground for trenching should be arranged for. These measures should be carried out through village agency alone, and a prize presented annually, with some ceremony, by the magis- trate of the district to the village or villages which had made satisfactory progress, the man most worthy to receive it being selected by the District Magistrate in consultation with the villagers themselves. Sanitary missionaries as required should be entertained to visit each village periodically, and explain to the villagers what steps they should take in the interests of their own health and that of their children. These missionaries should be well-known men of the district they work in ; pensioned Indian officers would be the best to start with ; they are villagers themselves and are honest men whose life in the army has taught them the rudiments of sanitation. Sanitation if carried out on these lines would soon become popular ; sani- tary ideas would quickly spread, but it is essential that they 192 INDIAN STUDIES should be advanced slowly and with the goodwill and consent of the villagers. The Government is much to blame for having so long neglected village sanitation, and for the complete ignorance in which it has left the villagers regarding it. It has devoted its attention almost entirely to the higher education of the trading and scribe castes, moneylenders, lawyers and professional men, for whose education the villagers have had to pay. Were the villagers not so ignorant they would have taken steps themselves long ago to remedy the frightful state of filth in which they live, which has caused the loss of so much human life in the past and will continue to do so till it be remedied. The question of village sanitation cannot be separated from that of education. Such a thing as compulsory education, so loved by the educated town classes, in the present state of village society is quite im- possible. The people are too poor and their children cannot be spared to attend school, moreover caste differences intervene, which prevent those of one caste sitting in the same room with those of another. Till the general prosperity be increased and caste differences be mitigated compulsory education on the present lines would only create misery and violent discontent. The exotic English system of education which has been very sparingly offered to villagers has never been and never will be popular. Without the confidence in and support of an educational system by the people affected, education in no country has ever been a success. It is the same in India as elsewhere. In other times schools existed in Indian villages for people of the superior castes, although they were few and far between. Children were instructed in them in reading, writing and the tenets of their religions by teachers who were respected by both the parents and pupils. The teaching profession was then held in the greatest respect, and the village teacher was the guide, philosopher and friend of those he taught ; he was almost always a native of the village. This was the indigenous system. The exotic one teaches reading and writing indifferently, and eliminates religion ; it is only taken advantage of by the village scribe classes. The Indian Government has promised to abstain from all interference with the religious belief or worship of its Indian subjects, but depriving them of religious education interferes indirectly with religion and destroys it. Such education will never receive popular support from the agricultural classes. The educational THE VILLAGE 193 department employs ignorant teachers on pay little better than that of coolies, the classes it selects them from are not respected ; in many villages they are half-timers, and run the post office as well as the village school ; they are strangers in the village, and few enjoy the confidence of the villagers, who are very suspicious of strangers, so they never are or can be the guides, philosophers or friends to their pupils, while many of them are disloyal propa- gandists. Until the teachers are properly trained for their work, and, if not natives of the village, at least natives of the district, who are respected in the village, they will not be acceptable to the agricultural classes. To get suitable men necessitates special training schools for teachers, and their being sufficiently well paid to enable them to keep up a respectable position, and thus make the teaching profession attractive. It is essential that religious teaching should be included in the curriculum, and in this opinion all India's best men are agreed. Here, too, caste difficulties occur. The only way to get over them is to fix a certain number of youths as necessary to form a primary school, and to provide a teacher, if this can be done. If any caste is unable or unwilling to guarantee the necessary number, it should wait for a school till it can do so. If education be made attractive it will often happen that two or more castes whose caste differences are small will themselves combine and ask for one, but no compulsion should be used to make them combine. Anyway, one good school would do more to spread education than a hundred bad ones. There are schools for different castes in England, although many will not admit it ; but nevertheless the son of a dustman, no matter how much wealth he may possess, would not be very welcome at Eton. Till the exotic is blended with the indigenous system of education in a way to gain the confidence of the rural classes, it will not be the success which all well-wishers of India desire. I have talked on the subject with thousands of agriculturists, and they all agree that it is much better to have no education, much as they value it, than to have it without religion. As they put it, " educating the head and not the heart results in the production of a rascal." History everywhere proves this opinion is correct. If popular education be offered the villagers on healthy lines, and no purely secular education can be so, all people who could possibly afford to do so would send their children to the schools most willingly, notwithstanding the many difficulties in sparing their services. 13 i 9 4 INDIAN STUDIES Text-books for village primary schools should be drawn up in the vernacular by Indian gentlemen of known loyalty : they should inculcate the duties of good citizens, contain a summary of Indian history, and teach the agriculturist to be not only contented with his lot, but to be ambitious to be a better farmer than his father. The whole system of primary education requires alteration. There is a great difference in the prevalent opinion regarding British rule in the villages inhabited by warlike and unwarlike peoples. The latter regard the peace they enjoy under it as their birthright and not as due to it alone. The former, on the contrary, fully understand that the peace they enjoy is solely due to British rule. This is so because the unwarlike races, for the most part, have been longer under British rule. At no time in their long history of oppression, have they resisted their oppressors by force of arms, or dreamt of fortifying their villages. Their method of self- protection has been chicanery or flattery, that ever employed by the weak, who shrink from bold exertion, seldom engage in per- sonal conflict other than tumultuous riot, and never use lethal weapons in disciplined conflict. In both chicanery and flattery the unwarlike races of India are singularly expert from long ages of practice ; in them they are pertinacious and loquacious beyond all other peoples. The unwarlike classes have forgotten the oppression from which British rule rescued them, and only recollect the oppression and corruption of present-day native officials under which they suffer. The complications of British law, however, enable them very frequently to use chicanery and flattery in their own interests, or to the detriment of the warlike races amongst whom they live. They never serve in the army, except in non-combatant positions, in which many of them realize much money dishonestly. They almost all approve of British rule and are loyal, for under it they know that they enjoy advan- tages such as they would not do under any other. In all villages the inhabitants are composed of both warlike and unwarlike classes, but in those of some very large areas, such as Bengal, the villages of warlike races are few, of unwarlike many, while in the Punjab and in some other parts of India the reverse is the case. The warlike races mostly became British subjects at a later date than the unwarlike, some, such as those of the Punjab, THE VILLAGE i 95 did so only some seventy years ago. In days of anarchy they everywhere resisted their oppressors when opportunity offered* The Jats, Mahrattas, Sikhs and others were driven to do so by the gross tyranny of their Musalman rulers, on the decline of whose power from simple agriculturists they became warlike peoples, "who formed distinct and separate kingdoms, each animated by a policy of its own, which actuates their feelings with regard to their oppressors and one another to-day under British rule. In the days of anarchy the warlike peoples fortified their villages, and the old walls and keeps, now crumbling and decayed, serve as a daily reminder of times gone by, during whicha state of affairs existed which made their lives miserable and from which they were only released by British rule. They have ever since taken service in the Army, and in its ranks have fought victor- iously in many foreign lands under British leaders. In almost all their villages there are army pensioners, men of good social position, who are either possessors of, or shareholders in, landed property. They have much influence, and they know all about ^var and its horrors, and have no desire to see a return of anarchy to their villages, which the warlike peoples fully realize is pre- vented by British rule alone, and they are its most loyal, active jsujpparters. In some of the villages of the warlike classes the ancient keep is to-day occupied by those whom British people call the lesser gentry, which is a term without meaning to an Indian. The word gentleman means either a polite or a well- bred man, while the latter may mean either a man well brought up or one of ancient family. All Indians, even the lowest classes, are polite and courteous to a degree unequalled in any other land. To be well bred in Hindu eyes means to be a man of good caste. Sikhs and Hinduized Musalmans take the same view, notwithstanding that their religions inculcate equality. The Sikhs consider the descendants of the sirdars of the misls (con- federacies) to be now of good birth, regardless of the caste of their ancestors. The Kapurthala ruling family, for instance, was founded by a Khalal, or liquor distiller, a very low caste among Hindus, but the low origin of its founders attaches no stigma to it. Musalmans of foreign descent view birth much in the same way as the English did three hundred years ago. In the matter of social status, wealth has little consideration, except among the Bania caste, who love gold, as a Bania alone can, which prevents them expending a penny on themselves, for they worship 13* 196 INDIAN STUDIES their beloved metal for its own sake. There is no single word in any Indian language to express the idea conveyed by our word " gentry " or " nobility." The expressions found in dictionaries, which do so are merely the nearest equivalent for the idea con- veyed by them. It is the same with many other English words conveying social, religious and political ideas, the translation of which into vernaculars causes many misconceptions between the rulers and the ruled. I will, with this explanation, describe the occupants of the village keeps or forts as gentry or nobility, although neither term is really applicable to them. They are primus inter pares in their community in the sense the chiefs of Irish and Scotch clans were in the olden time. They support all their near relatives and contribute to their marriage or other religious obligations. They are very generous to their retainers, of whom they keep as many in the shape of hangers-on as they possibly can for the greater the number the greater is their izzat (honour) . Religious mendicants never go empty from their doors, and they are extremely hospitable to everyone. In former days they were large landowners. Many are the descendants of princely or royal houses whose ancestors' estates were granted as a reward for military service, or because of their relationship with some ruler. Most of them to-day are poor, but they are much respected in their villages and communities ; much more so than those great landowners who are neither of ancient family nor good caste. How they have become poor is a sad story little remembered to-day. Just as it is now believed by some fanatical politicians that the progress and welfare of India depends on making the masses of the population over to the politically-minded, minute, vociferous minority, because, they say, " they are intellectually our children," so some seventy years ago certain politicians who influenced the Government of India induced it to adopt a policy of ignoring the existence of all governing classes except its own officials. The Government of India believed then that the obliteration of the aristocracy of the land and the placing of the masses of its peoples under the direct control of British officials was the greatest benefit that could be conferred on them. In pursuit of this grand levelling policy, with the assistance of astute native functionaries of the classes now so largely represented in the Indian National Congress, the landed gentry in many pro- vinces were either swept away or the size of their estates greatly THE VILLAGE 197 reduced. The authors of this policy plumed themselves on the thing they had done, but many of the most experienced British officials deeply deplored it, and prophesied the future trouble it would cause. I have vainly tried to find out some reason for the action then taken by the Government of India, with the complete concurrence of the greater part of the Indian Civil Service, but beyond " the faith that was in " those who directed it I can find none. Their policy was deeply resented by all classes of Indians, and in those provinces where it was enforced, such a hatred was engendered for British rule that a few years later the nobility, gentry and people, acting in concert, risked all they possessed in the world by joining in the military Mutiny of 1857, with the object of shaking off the British yoke. In other parts of the land where the nobles and gentry had not been unjustly dealt with all were loyal, and in them the mutineers were actively opposed. This lesson should not be forgotten. I Many of those nobles and gentry who remained after the Mutiny suffered financially from their own carelessness and the complexity of English law. They were often passing rich, but following the old customs of their military caste and having no turn for business, they employed stewards or agents of the Bania caste to manage their affairs. When a rich noble needed money the agent supplied it with a smile, but some of it always remained in his hands, for, as such people say to excuse their robberies, " a poor man must live and I have only taken my customary share." So common is this form of robbery by agents and employes of all sorts that it is looked upon as no crime ; it is universal among the Bania scribe and menial castes ; so usual is it that it is called dustoori, which means customary. In due course the agent of the noble accumulated a goodly sum, his master was extravagant, trusted him, and soon had to borrow from him. He asked him for money as he required it till the day came when the agent replied that the resources of the estate were exhausted, and he then offered to lend it himself on a mort- gage ; this was the beginning of the end, the agent charged com- pound interest at a very high rate. He soon owned the whole or the greater part of his master's estate, and set up as a rack- renting landowner, while continuing his profitable trade of money lending, and so became very rich, and by subscribing much money to objects in which high officials took an interest, or by syco- phancy, he obtained a title and was, in due course, counted among 198 INDIAN STUDIES the landed aristocracy by the Government, but to Indians he and his descendants will ever be rascally Banias. The landowner's ignorance of business and his izzat combined could not compete with the legal knowledge and business aptitude of the agent, so it was quite hopeless to obtain justice in the Courts. In some pro- vinces the law now precludes the expropriation of landed estates for debt, and land cannot be mortgaged for a longer period than twenty years, while trading castes are precluded from acquiring its possession. It would be well if this law, which was passed by Lord Curzon's Government, was made applicable to all India outside the towns. It has done immense good in the Punjab, where the agricultural classes are most grateful to Lord Curzon for having introduced it. The village nobles are wiser to-day. Although few know English, most of those in the parts of India I know are highly educated, and are good business men who no longer allow them- selves to be cheated ; in addition to their own vernacular most of them know Persian and Urdu. They are courtly gentlemen, enlightened and loyal, and they expect and are entitled to be treated by Britons as their equals ; they are certainly much better bred than most British and nearly all Indian officials. Those British officials whose manner with them is over-bearing and rude are usually not very well bred themselves ; such as offend not only nobles but other classes in this way, should be removed from service in India. I have rarely found military officers among them. The bullet is a wonderful leveller. Many of the scions of the village nobility and gentry serve as Indian officers in the Army. Since Lord Curzon's promise that King's commissions would be open to Indians, made some fifteen years ago and until quite recently " under consideration," they have done so in large numbers. They do not as a rule care for civil employment, the Army and agriculture are the only honourable vocations in their eyes. I hope, both in the interest of India and of these worthy gentlemen themselves, who are the most influential and best class in the land, that the contemplated reforms will open up suitable careers for them, which will enable those who wish to do so to take part in civil and political life. This the English electoral system certainly will not do. It is quite unsuited to India, and is specially so to people of their class, whom it deters from all political activity because it entails soliciting the votes of their inferiors, doing which, in their eyes, THE VILLAGE i 99 entails a loss of izzat, only exceeded by rejection at their hands. I see on the 23rd July, 1918, Mr. Montagu stated in the House of Commons that during the war ten Indian gentlemen will be nominated for military cadetships at Sandhurst. This will exclude the rural nobility and gentry, who have hitherto been the backbone of the Indian officer class. They will not send their youths to England at the age when their mind is most plastic, for they rightly fear that by doing so their religious belief and family traditions would be undermined, and their young men would be turned into irreligious Babus. At the time Mr. Montagu announced that ten cadetships would be given to Indians after a course at Sandhurst, he also said provision existed for giving military training in India, so why he should have thus handi- capped the rural nobility and gentry I don't know. I think his action in this matter is to be deplored. To whom he proposes to give these ten cadetships I don't know ; his method of doing so certainly will not secure the best of the warlike classes. I fear he made the course at Sandhurst obligatory under War Office pres- sure, and the Army Council had not sufficient Indian knowledge to enable them to judge of the mischief their action would cause. Great as is the earth hunger for arable land, that for land in the villages for sites for houses is even greater. Quarrels about boundaries are perpetual between village families ; indeed, in all Indian families there are many quarrels, as the natives say : " In their own house there will not be two brothers who have not in their hearts a thousand quarrels." The nearest relations are either secretly or openly at feud with one another, and the feuds are always, sooner or later, taken into the Law Courts. They are fanned into flame most skilfully by the village attorney class, aided by subordinate officials. Both support their clients by forgery, perjury and general chicanery. The party with the longest purse gains the day, with his purse considerably lightened, while the defeated party is ruined and not infrequently ends in jail. Among the warlike classes such quarrels frequently result in assaults and murder ; those regarding the boundary of a field, although it may only involve a yard of land, the direction of an irrigation rill, or a footpath, are carried on with great vehemence, but it is nothing to that in which quarrels regarding the boun- daries of a site or the height of a compound wall are pursued. The reason is that a site may involve the curtailment of the 200 INDIAN STUDIES women's quarter, while the height of a wall usually involves the woman's quarters of one house being overlooked from another, which is a deadly insult. Both involve the izzat (honour) of the rival parties, who will proceed to any extremities rather than allow it to be " injured " in either their own eyes or that of their neighbours. These quarrels ruin untold numbers of agricultural families, and are one of the greatest curses of rural life. The complexities of British law aggravates them. The procedure, expense, delay and the powers of appeal given to litigants are all unsuit- able to the conditions of life in an Indian village. Under former rulers the village council, elected by the villagers according to methods they understood and responsible to them, was legally empowered to deal with village quarrels. Both history and village tradition to-day say it seldom betrayed the trust reposed in it, and if it did the member or members who did so were removed by those who appointed them, to their eternal disgrace and to the loss of their most precious possession, their izzat. So long ago as 1670 there was a British Governor appointed to rule the territories of Bombay, which then had a population of only some ten thousand souls. His name was Gerald Aungier, and it deserves to be remembered. When he was appointed Governor he had had long experience in India and spoke the vernacular of the country he ruled ; the small population he ruled was then, as it is to-day, heterogeneous. How to govern justly and harmoniously and in accordance with the wishes of the people was the problem he set himself to solve. He found its solution in the panchayet, or council, which he did not reject because it was indigenous, but he improved upon it. In this case, as he was legislating for the town oi Bombay only, the Council he selected was a caste one. To the Caste Council of each caste he left the duty of deciding caste quarrels, he gave it the power of inflicting fines and of representing the grievances or aspirations of the caste to which it belonged to himself or his officials. But to prevent it being unjust or oppressive he decided and here was the improvement if the aggrieved parties did not agree with its decision they should be allowed an appeal to the British Courts. Inter-caste differences were decided by the combined Caste Councils concerned, who, if not in agreement, were allowed to appeal to himself. The combined Caste Councils of all castes were consulted on all matters affecting the general welfare of the THE VILLAGE 201 Indian population. He thus was the first English ruler to introduce local self-government into India, but self-government, as started by him, was subsequently allowed to drop by his successors, more is the pity. For the welfare and contentment of the rural peoples it is an absolute necessity to restore the village council, improved to suit modern conditions, and to give it well-defined authority, which must vary in the different parts of India, so as to be suited to the respective social conditions of each and to leave an appeal in case of the miscarriage of justice, but an appeal should, in the first instance, be to the district board, the members of which should be elected by village councils, with a final appeal permissible to the magistrate of the district. Lawyers should be prohibited from appearing in all cases origin- ally within the cognizance of the village council. The lawyer politicians and others belonging to the Indian National Congress and its under-study, the All India Moslem League, would not approve of this procedure, but every villager in India would bless the British ruler who introduced it. There are few measures more beneficial to them that could be carried out. When I was Political Resident and Judge in Aden, some twenty years ago, lawyers were not allowed to practise in the Courts, much to everyone's benefit. Seeing they were not required in this large seaport, surely they can be eliminated from village life in India. I will now describe a sample village in Northern India ; in such an one I have passed many happy days, in company with the honest, simple, good-natured people, whom I have ever found most friendly and easily influenced, once they knew me and felt sure that in me they had a friend whom they could trust and need not be afraid to speak to candidly, one who did not in the least resent their disagreeing with him, but was patient with them and reasoned with them when he thought they were wrong. Indians of all classes, from the highest to the lowest, will never speak freely on matters of any importance when other Indians are listening. If one wants their candid views on such subjects one must interview them alone. The character of the Indian villager is paradoxical. So adverse are its combined qualities that they are apparently irreconcilable. He is extremely simple, yet designing, but in a way which those who know him can easily see through. He is obstinately tenacious of his inbred convictions, which are the result of heredity, and of 202 INDIAN STUDIES the songs, ballads and tales which are his only education. To one who knows these and who can quote them in support of any argu- ment he advances, success in securing concurrence therewith is assured. The pity is that so few British officials know anything about village folk-lore. The villager is usually as docile as a child, but when his inbred convictions are upset, or he is in fear of their being so, as is frequently the result of seditiousjDropa- ganda, he becomes morose and cruel, and in that state can be roused to acts of violence. He will brood over imaginary wrongs, and will obstinately cling to a delusion which can only be removed from his mind by those he knows and trusts. Normally, he is extremely courteous and genial, and his bad traits remain in the background, but like my own countrymen, he, though usually light-hearted, is easily depressed. He is ordinarily most abste- mious and hard-working, but on occasion self-indulgent. This is especially so in the case of those, such as Sikhs, who are often addicted to strong drink, and others, who are addicted to drugs. In the Punjab the numerous liquor and drug shops in the village do immense harm, and to them most crimes of violence are attri- butable. I tried by personal influence, and I was supported by many leading men and villagers, especially retired Indian officers, to induce people to take the pledge to abstain from both, and I was fairly successful, but the evil will only be remedied when " local option " is introduced into villages. Indians cannot drink or take drugs, such as bhang, prepared from Indian hemp, in moderation ; they do so only for the pleasure of getting intoxi- cated, and the harm done by drink and drugs in India to both people of high and low degree is enormous, and this has been so from time immemorial. The drink and drug habits have been prevalent for ages. The drink habit mostly affects Hindus and Sikhs, the drug habit mostly affects Musalmans, to whom drink in this world is prohibited, although the hope of plenty in the next forms one of the tenets of Islam. Britons in their association with villagers usually take their popularity for granted, they forget that with no peoples are foreigners popular for their beaux yeux alone, that domineering manners don't make for popularity, while kindness, patience and sympathy do. It is only by a knowledge of the psychology of any people that foreigners can gain their esteem and respect. That of the Indian villager can only be known to those who make it a special study. THE VILLAGE 203 Village fanners in those parts of India I know, being land- owners both in their own estimation and in that of all other villagers, whatever the view of Government on the subject may be, are called zamindars, and in virtue of their being so they are treated by others with great respect. It is from the rural nobility\ and the zamindars and village labourers of their caste that the j Indian Army is recruited. In the Punjab Hinduized Musalman and Sikh zamindars are the descendants of the same ancestor, and the same races have, throughout the various religious and political changes, remained for ages owners of their land. Originally Hindus, some races have become Musalman and others Sikh, but their home throughout the ages has ever been on the same land. Among Hindus and Sikhs the descendants of a common ancestor are called a gotra ; the members of a gotra cannot intermarry, being considered as of too close a blood relationship ; in fact, they regard one another as brothers and sisters, and men of one gotra seek their wives in another. Among many of the Hinduized Musalmans, who previous to conversion to Islam were high caste Hindus, this and many other Hindu customs prevail. Few Hinduized Musalmans have given up astrology, which is strictly prohibited by the Koran ; in making marriage and other arrangements they largely consult astrologers. Besides agriculturists, that is, Zamindars and village labourers of their caste, there are people of many other castes in each village wha depend for their daily bread, directly or indirectly, on agriculture. In the villages of the warlike races there are also many military pensioners, and in those larger ones, which are the headquarters of Thanas or Tehsils, there are several subordinates of the Government in civil, revenue, engineer, police and other services. Each village has its own priests, artisans, servants and menials, who are hereditary. Some have also a doctor. I will give a brief description of each class and their various functions, which will convey some idea of village life. In Hindu villages there is always a mundir (Hindu temple), dedicated to the village deo* (ikon), whose effigy or emblem it contains, and attached to it are the requisite number of Brahman priests, who are usually hereditary. In addition to the village mundir, every Hindu Zamindar family that can afford * Deo is often translated as god, but it has no such meaning. The word I have used is the nearest to it in English. 204 INDIAN STUDIES the expense has its own household deo, with a Brahman priest to attend it and another to teach the youths of the family to read and write, and to give them religious instruction. The temple priests early in the morning visit each house, to tell their flock the number of days in the month and months in the year, to collect alms in kind, and give their blessing. They are in Northern, Central India and Rajputana held in great respect, especially by the women, and are generally simple-minded, good men. Most of them are uneducated in Brahminical lore, but can read and write in their own language. Like the Zamindars, they hate useless innovations, but are quite willing to adopt new ideas when convinced of their advantage. When they do so, the Zamindars always follow their lead. I have frequently explained innovations I wished to introduce to them, and asked them to help me, and have always found them willing to do so, but as they are mostly treated with scant politeness or even civility by British officials, they naturally don't put themselves forward. A British officer may live many years in India and never even speak to one of them. Brahman priests preside at all ceremonies, such as marriages, funerals and the presentation of the sacred string to boys of the twice-born castes. They have immense influence over their flock. In some parts of India, especially in the Madras Presidency, Brahmans are much more numerous, bigoted and oppressive than in others ; as they occupy an undue proportion of appointments under Government, they are enabled to tyrannize over those of other castes to an extent almost incredible to those unacquainted with village life. In a Sikh village there is always a dharamsala (place of religion), which serves as a place of worship and a resting-place for passing Sikh travellers. Part of it is reserved for the Granth Sahib (the holy book of the Sikhs) and it has a Bhai (brother) attached to it, or perhaps, if the villagers can afford the expense, a grunthi (reader of the Granth Sahib) , who conducts religious services and looks after the dharamsala generally. He goes his rounds daily among his flock, and collects unleavened bread to distribute to poor villagers or to feed passing Sikh travellers. In many Sikh villages there is a Musalman takia, to which a fakir is attached. A takia (resting-place) is more modest than a masjid, and a fakir is a sort of lay-brother, of less dignity than a mullah. The takia is used for passing Musalman travellers, who are fed there with unleavened bread, collected from the Zamindars THE VILLAGE 205 by the fakir. To Sikhs charity is especially enjoined as a religious duty, and a takia is maintained usually in those villages on roads frequented by Musalmans. In a Musalman village there is always a mas j id, to which a mullah is attached, who makes the five orthodox calls to prayer daily, and, when the worshippers have assembled, acts as Imam and leads the prayers and genuflections. The Government servants in a village are as follows : A Chowkidar, or Watchman, who holds the lowest position in the administration of the country. He is the village constable, but is supposed to be a " half-timer " and is paid miserably in consequence. His duties are nevertheless onerous and respon- sible, they leave him no time for anything else. He represents the police force in the village. His pay is Rs, 4 (five shillings and fourpence) a month. His duties are to patrol the village all night long and keep away thieves and burglars. This he does, to the great discomfort of the villagers, for to let them know he is there he emits loud, husky coughs when on his rounds. These set the village dogs barking, and they are always very numerous ; the combined noise disturbs the slumbers of the villagers, especially on hot weather nights, but he is feared and no one will remonstrate. He has to report thefts and other crimes, and also births, deaths and marriages, and any other events of importance, to the nearest police-station, perhaps ten miles or so distant from the village, and get the report signed by the police officer in charge, to whom he makes it. Should he arrive in the morning, which he probably does in the hot weather, to avoid the sun, that official will most likely delay signing it till the evening ; meanwhile, as likely as not, he sets the wretched Chowkidar to pull his punkah, or do some other private job for him. The Chowkidar dreads the day he has to make his report, both for the labour entailed and also because he is usually in league with bad characters, burglars, thieves and such-like, whom he has to cultivate in order to live, for they pay him to shut his eyes, and he fears the police may extract a confession from him by a method which both he and they understand, and which is not legal. His powers are great, his pay ridiculously small, and he has to live, poor devil ! Thefts or burglaries are usually effected at the expense of the village Banias (shopkeepers and usurers), and he salves his conscience if he has any with the reflection that, after all, he is only assisting one set of thieves to rob another. 206 INDIAN STUDIES He is supposed to assist the police and village headmen (Lumberdars) in their investigations of crime or complaints, and he helps the latter in arranging for the supply of provisions to officials on tour. Here, too, he makes a little money, which is deducted as dustoori, from payment made for the articles supplied. He is usually a great rascal, and with his small pay and great powers one can hardly expect him to be anything else. The next important official is the Lumberdar, or Panch, as he is sometimes called. There is no fixed number of these, it depends on the amount of land belonging to the villagers, and also on the number of pattis it contains. A patti is a group of families within the gotra, who trace their descent from a common ancestor, though not necessarily so distant as that of the latter. His duties are to help the police and other officials, especially in work connected with their patti, and to see that supplies are provided for officials on tour camping near the village. This power of demanding supplies through the Lumberdar is very much abused by most of the subordinate native officials of the various depart- ments, who are perpetually touring in the performance of their duties, and by the native servants of British officers, when their masters do not take special steps to prevent it. When British officers' servants commit abuses their masters get the obloquy of their villainies, so it is most important, but most difficult, as all look upon dustoori as a right, to prevent their doing so. The villagers are called upon to supply grass, grain, milk, fowls and firewood, and any labour required, which are not paid for on delivery, but at the time the recipient leaves the village, when some petty official probably gives a receipt for the goods and labour provided, on which payment is made to him by the British official, but the full amount never reaches the villagers, for dustoori here comes in. Departmental petty native officials, more frequently than not, never pay for anything. The unfortu- nate villagers are afraid to complain, as they know if they did so they would have all the other petty officials up against them, so there is very seldom any redress. Whenever I camped near a village from which I procured supplies I invariably paid myself on delivery, or got a trusted military Indian officer or non-commissioned officer to do so for me. Being themselves of the Zamindar classes, and honest men, they will not rob the villagers under the name of dustoori. Petty officials of the Irrigation Department both Eurasian, THE VILLAGE 207 that is, country-bred half castes, and natives have their own special method of pillaging the villagers. They very frequently give standing orders for grain, clarified butter (ghee) and chickens, etc., for which they fix nominal prices. These things have frequently to be brought by the villagers to the purchasers' headquarter stations, often a long way off, where payment is made at unremunerative prices, through servants, or through the village Patwari, and the money sticks on the way, so that the sellers get very little or nothing, but they are afraid to complain. The Lumberdar collects the land-tax, for doing which he receives 5 per cent, on the amount he pays into the Treasury. The statistics on which assessments are made are usually at any rate in the first instance made by a petty native revenue official, who is ambitious of promotion, so he errs on the " right side," which results in great loss to the Zamindars. Even the Lumberdar is very often " squeezed " on what he pays in ways which may seem incredible to those who do not know India. He has to pay the sum he collects for Government into the Tehsil (sub-divisional Court House) Treasury, on a fixed date. There every clerk and chaprassi (lictor) looks on the receipt of bribes as part of his legitimate perquisites or dustoori. If the Lumberdar did not give them a bribe he would probably be kept hanging round for many days before they would find time to accept the money he wishes to pay in so the date on which it was due would then be passed, when worse consequences might result for him. Sometimes in counting his money, if he does not treat them suitably in the way of bribes, these rascals substitute a bad coin for a good one and get him prosecuted for trying to pass it. I have heard of such cases in which the Lumberdar has been convicted. In paying in the revenue they have collected the Lumberdars have to undergo many indignities at the hands of petty officials, to whom a considerable portion of their commission goes ; they return to their villages from the Tehsil with their hearts filled with rage, and wondering when Government will put an end to such tyranny. The office of Lumberdar is hereditary. I have heard many intelligent Zamindars strongly object to its being so ; they say it is a responsible office, requiring a good and clever man to carry on its duties, who should be specially selected. Under the heredi- tary system they contend that there is no guarantee that the 208 INDIAN STUDIES occupant has the necessary qualities, but, on the contrary, many of them are mere tools and plastic in the hands of petty officials well skilled in chicanery. The Zamindars, therefore, are greatly averse to having hereditary Lumberdars, and I agree with them. Above the Lumberdar is the Revenue Department Zaildar. Like the former, he is a yeoman farmer, but one of higher status. There is only one Zaildar for several villages ; neither Zaildars or Lumberdars are whole time Government servants. The status of the Zaildar depends on his social position and on his tact. His office is not hereditary, he is selected by the District Magistrate from among the Zamindars, and is always looked up to by his neighbours on account of his position under Government. His duties are very similar to those of a Lumberdar, except that he does not collect revenue. A Patwari is a village accountant. The Revenue and Irriga- tion Departments have each one of their own. These officials are whole-time servants of Government, and are very poorly paid considering their great powers. Their salary varies from Rs. 8 (ten shillings and eightpence) to Rs. 20 (/i is. 8d.) a month. They are probably the greatest rascals among the numerous petty officials who tyrannize the Zamindars, and this says a good deal for them. They are the representatives of their depart- ment in the village, and have a good deal to do with the assess- ment of revenue, and are consequently dreaded and hated by the Zamindars. They are mostly ignorant, low-caste men, who usually live in quite good style, which they are able to do on account of the bribes they extort. The Patwari is thus described by the late Colonel Fendall Currie, who was a Commissioner in Oudh : "He keeps the village accounts, forges receipts, procures false evidence in rent-cases, sells his services as a witness in any case where a practical liar is required." This is also my experience of him. The Irrigation Department Zaildar differs from the revenue official of that name ; he is a sort of inspector under the Irriga- tion District Engineer, whose business it is to look after the distribution of canal v/ater to the Zamindars. Few people in England can realize the importance of this petty official, who having regard to the insufficient or disproportionate rainfall, and the extreme heat of the sun has the fortunes of thousands of Zamindars in his hands. On the supply of a little water at a critical time or its non-supply depends their year's labour, THE VILLAGE 209 whether it be profitable or wasted. If it be wasted, they are probably ruined, and certainly in debt for life, because their margin of profit is so small few can stand the loss of a year's crop. On critical occasions the Irrigation Zaildar, through his agent the Patwari, extracts bribes in proportion to the Zamindar's necessity. These are freely paid through sheer anxiety for the precious crop. The Zamindars seldom complain for fear of future vengeance, and also because of the difficulty of getting redress. I have already related a case where some of those at Lyalpur did so to me, and its result. The pay of the Irrigation Zaildar is about 6 a month, which is large, as Government subordinates are paid. No doubt some of them make money by other methods than robbing the Zamindars ; for instance, they lend money at usurious interest, but I have never known one who does not live as if he had ten times his salary. Forced labour in provinces where it is legal causes much hard- ship ; one case I have already mentioned ; as does also the impressment of the villagers' carts and bullocks, which is legal throughout India ; both are sources of illicit profit to petty officials. In the smaller villages, such as ^describe, there are no other Government servants, but in the larger, which are the head- quarters of Tehsils and Thanas, they are more numerous. A medical practitioner usually practises in several villages. Hindus and Musalmans have a different system of medicine ; that of the former is called the Yoga system, and the latter the Yunani, or Greek, which was brought to India by its Musalman conquerors. It is, I -believe, based on the supposition of a hot and cold class of diseases and remedies. Hindu medicine is based on Yoga philosophy, according to which the brain is the seat of intellect, while the functions of the mind are volition and doubt. It is the faculty of perception which produces the consciousness of external objects to the internal individuality. This faculty is called Bhoodhi, and has certain powers, which cause the projection of an image into space. The receivers of sensation are the nerve centres of the backbone. Within the hollow of the backbone and outside it on each side are slender nerve threads. They start from behind the eyebrows and descend down the twenty- seventh bone of the spine. They form a knot, also called Bhoodhi, and they also form similar knots in five different places, called 210 INDIAN STUDIES Chakras, which are each the seat of a particular sensation. Sensa- tions are excited in all the Chakras simultaneously, and instantly transferred to the knot Bhoodhi, whence they are projected into space. The individual then becomes conscious of what is taking place outside his ego. The Yoga system considers blood as propelled by a current of wind which, warmed by the heat generated in the umbilical region, is constantly in motion through the arteries and veins, and thus circulation occurs. There is another current which draws in the external air, sends it down into the small lung tubes, after it has given oxygen to the blood and extracted carbon from it. Thus the process of respiration is accounted for. These systems of medicine are orthodox, but there are many quack ones to which almost equal value is attached. One is speci- ally popular, but has few orthodox Musalman practitioners, because it is allied to astrology, which is strictly forbidden to Musalmans. Those who practise it consider that the planets have a direct influence over the body and every disease originates in a molecular disturbance in- some planet or another. The physician has therefore only to know the horoscope of the patient and need not see him, when, by a process of calculation, he arrives at a correct knowledge of the cause of the illness, which he treats accordingly. The great advantage of this system is that, as the practitioner need not see the patient, he is in request for purdah women. Purdah women will not, as a rule, consent to see a male doctor. If they consent to consult a male, which few will do, he must not see them, but treat them behind the veil, and even to this they submit with great reluctance. I once got stung by a very large and venomous scorpion, which caused me great pain. A village Zamindar, who was with me at the time, besought me to call in the village doctor, who practised this kind of medicine. I did so, and he cured me in about an hour by peculiar methods of his own, which consisted in applying a wet poultice inside of which was an earthen vessel filled with red-hot charcoal. I asked him how he managed to cure me, seeing he had not got my horoscope. He replied : " The horoscope of a sahib so renowned is well known to me," so whatever his skill or lack of it may have been he was " all there " as regards a good bedside manner. I am not a judge of systems of medicine, so will say nothing THE VILLAGE 211 regarding those I have so briefly described in the way of comparing them with the Western methods of treating disease ; most villagers much prefer to be treated by a British doctor, who is not often available, except they happen to be in towns when taken ill. There are a number of hereditary servants paid and main- tained by the Zamindar village families ; the most popular are Mirassis, who are expected to be good singers, well versed in classical music, and also to be familiar with the popular songs and ballads of their caste and district. They and the Bharais, who are both singers and reciters, in the villages inhabited by warlike castes, sing and recite stories of the deeds of chivalry performed by the ancestors of the Zamindars in the brave days of old, or in modern times under popular British commanders. They also commit to memory and pass on from father to son the genealogies of the Zamindar families of the village. At marriage ceremonies they are in great request. The general tenour of their songs and recitations is to prove the nobility of their master's family, its purity of descent and the honour it confers on the family with which it contracts a marriage. Among the unwarlike classes these singers and reciters substi- tute for songs of chivalry those relating to religion and others of doubtful morality. Barbers are also hereditary village servants ; besides the ordinary duties of a barber in Western lands, they perform certain customary religious ceremonies at births and deaths ; they are also used as go-betweens in arranging marriages. They play a great part in village social life, and are expected to know the latest village gossip or scandal, and to carry errands for the Zamindars. There are hereditary families of washermen, oil-pressers, water- carriers, carpenters and blacksmiths, all of which are considered menial trades. Those carrying them on are paid for the work they do by the Zamindars who utilize their services. These classes are socially inferior to Mirassis and Bharais. The lowest of all the village servants are workers in leather, such as shoe-makers ; scavengers, who dispose of dead animals, the carcases of which many classes of them will eat, and sweepers, who collect and store manure for the farms and do the little cleaning that is done in the village, which consists chiefly in carrying filth from Zamindars' houses and throwing it down close 14* 212 INDIAN STUDIES by, and sweeping the village lanes vigorously, more with the object of raising dust than removing dirt. All these servants are usually paid in kind, but on occasions of holidays or other ceremonies, such as marriages, they are given a small douceur in cash. The houses of the Zamindars, which really do not deserve that name, are miserable huts, built ol sun-dried bricks, with a roof of mud laid over rough jungle-wood rafters. They usually consist of two or three dark, ill-ventilated rooms, with a hole in the roof to permit the escape of smoke when fires are used. The doors and windows are of unseasoned wood, for few can afford either seasoned wood or glass. They rarely shut sufficiently to prevent dust and rain from coming into the rooms. In front of each Zamindar's house is usually a compound, surrounded by a high mud wall, in which the family kitchen is placed, and which is shared at night between the cattle and family, except during those periods of the year, the rains and cold weather, when the family is obliged to occupy the rooms. These huts are little changed to-day from what they were five hundred years ago. They have no plinth, it is too expensive a luxury, and the rooms are dark and ill-ventilated. The women, when not engaged in farm work, grind the corn and cook the scanty meal. They carry water for the household, to draw which is about the only time purdah women leave the house, except when they go on a pilgrimage, or accompany their husbands to a marriage ceremony in another village. White ants and other wood-destroying insects destroy the rafters and sun-dried bricks, so when the seasonal rains set in many houses fall down. This is taken advantage of by the neighbours whose houses escape to heighten their walls, or annex a bit of the site, the result of which is, as I have said, bitter feuds and lawsuits. The furniture of the Zamindars' houses is extremely scanty ; it usually consists of a few brass cooking pots and a bedstead made of rough jungle sticks, while, for the mattress used in more prosperous lands, rough, home-made cord is strung across it. This bedstead is used by the head of the family, the remaining members of which sleep on straw laid on the floor. In the rainy season, the house having no plinth, the floor is always wet or damp ; in the cold weather it is extremely cold in Northern India, so that rheumatism and THE VILLAGE 2I 3 chest diseases are very prevalent. The clothing of the Zamindars and their families is very scanty ; children, more frequently than not, having none whatever. The huts of the village menials are mere hovels and they themselves are destitute of the barest necessities of life. Their only real comfort is in the temporary oblivion of sleep, when they forget their hunger and misery. Banias, though rich, live in much the same kind of houses as the Zamindars. They expose food for sale on a low platform in front of their houses, where it is contaminated by thousands of flies and passing dogs. The Bania is a wonderful character, for meanness he has no equal in the world. He cringes to and flatters Zamindars who are not in his debt ; when he addresses them he calls them Mir (Chief) Sahib, Thakur (lord) Sahib, or Sirdar (head man) Sahib, according to the titles customary in their respective castes. Those who are in his debt he addresses in the second person singular, which, in India, is only permissible when talking to the very lowest classes, such as sweepers or scavengers ; he is then harsh and makes the lives of those in his debt a burden, but he rarely takes them into Court, for it pays him better to keep them in lifelong slavery, which his education and their ignorance makes it easy for him to do. His methods of getting the villagers into his clutches are various, but besides the ordinary one, common among usurers in all lands, he has even a more pestilent one. He advances a small sum in ready money on the promise of being repaid at the next harvest by a share of the crop in kind, of double its value. In default of payment for any reason, the failure of the crop being the usual one, but also very often because the Zamindar forgets the date on which payment is due, the value of the debt is commuted to its money value. An agreement is then signed by the Zamindar to repay it by monthly instalments, with the promise that if one instalment remains unpaid on the date when it becomes due, all previous instalments that have been already paid are null and void, and the debt commences de novo, all the instalments which were paid between the date it was incurred and the date of failure to pay an instalment due being forfeited to the Bania. The debtor is usually careless regarding dates, and even if he has the money he often brings it a day or so late, but the penalty is then incurred, and the Bania is merciless; the interest is excessive, and many village Zamindars are in debt till they die, having paid large sums, yet with the debt a hundred- 2i 4 INDIAN STUDIES fold greater than it was when first contracted. It is mainly to prevent the lapses in payment of instalments that the Brahman priest daily tells his flock the number of days in each month and the number of months in the year. It is most unfortunate for millions of poor villagers that they were put under complex British laws before they were educated sufficiently to understand them. The Banias, who have robbed them for ages, even under the simple law of native rulers, have been given educational advantages which enable them and their colleagues, the scribe caste lawyers, to use a complex legal system to practically enslave large numbers of ignorant villagers. There is now no help for the mistakes of the past, but there is no excuse for continuing them in the future. Education, the only remedy, should be pressed forward in the rural districts, but it should be such as the peoples will accept. Till it spreads the laws regarding indebtedness and usury in the villages should be simplified. Co-operative societies have been started in many places, as I have said, and have done much good, but only to those few who are financially sound. They do not, and never can, help those who are not so. Each village has an open space used for various purposes. In the morning the cattle, goats and sheep, which have been byred in the compounds of houses, are there mustered and taken to their grazing grounds, usually afar off. In former days, when I first knew that province, in each Punjab village there were bi-weekly wrestling matches for the men and the village children played games, which were held on the village open space while the elders sat round, talked and applauded. In those days this " common " was a scene of gaiety in the evenings when the day's work was done. This gaiety has now disappeared. I often asked the villagers why it is so, when they would reply : " Sahib, times have changed." I knew that they meant owing to the general rise in prices, the greater cost of living, and the high land rent they are now too hard-worked in order to make both ends meet, so that they have become slaves to their fields and have no time for amusements. Each village has a club shed called a chaupal. It consists of a thatched wooden frame covered with grass, which forms the roof, and is supported by four wooden sticks. There the village elders and headmen meet to discuss village affairs or gossip, and to hear news that may come from outside. Here passing travel THE VILLAGE 215 lers, such as journeying hawkers, religious mendicants and wandering puppet showmen assemble who bring almost the only news to the village from outside. Some are, perhaps, emissaries of seditious societies, whose precepts the Government are either turning into ridicule or giving undue weight but hitherto the seed of sedition, which in recent years has been broadly scattered, found no good soil in the villages in which to take root. These wandering visitors are to the villagers what newspapers are in other lands but their business has, only too often, been to en- deavour to corrupt the village mind by lying stories, in doing which, beyond getting up occasional unimportant riots, they have had no success. The riots they have succeeded in inciting have in a very few cases only been seditious. They have been nearly always due to the fear caused to the villagers for their caste or their lives. In 1907 trouble occurred in some villages near Rawalpindi in the Punjab, which were affected by plague. Seditionists spread the story that the deaths from plague then prevalent were caused not, as they imagined, by that disease but by the Government of India poisoning the wells, because it wished to reduce the population, and so make more wheat avail- able for export to England. There might have been very serious trouble, but pensioned Indian officers and soldiers, who are trusted by the villagers, convinced them of the absurdity of such a story which was propagated by emissaries of the " extremist " party sent from Calcutta for the purpose. Few in England can realize how credulous the ignorant Indian villagers are. At the same time it must be recollected that the lies which seditionists propagate are cleverly concocted and contain, in the ignorant village mind, an element of truth. In 1902 a great scheme of inoculation Jor the prevention of plague was inaugurated by Government. In the village of Malkowal, in the Punjab, a place of pilgrimage"for Sikhs which is visited by large numbers, nineteen persons inoculated from a single bottle of plague serum died of tetanus. The " extremists " spread a story that they were poisoned purposely ; it was well propagated and obtained some credence, confirmed by the inoculation scheme being at once stopped, when the " extremists ".^announced that they had frustrated the evil intentions of Government. All this was well known in the villages round Rawalpindi. When great public works are undertaken by Government, seditionists often spread stories that villagers or their children 2i6 INDIAN STUDIES will be seized to be slaughtered for the purpose of shedding their blood on the foundation stone. Many English officials in India treat this story with contempt, saying no one in his right mind could believe it. Ignorant villagers, however, take a very different view. From time immemorial till comparatively recently Hindu Rajas were accustomed to slaughter human beings on the foundation stone of new buildings. Hinduized Musalman rulers adopted the same custom. Northern Indian villagers, and probably those else- where, know very well that when the Moghul Emperor Shahab- ud-dun Shah Jehan founded the new city of Delhi in A.D. 1631 several persons were slaughtered and their blood sprinkled on the foundation stone of both his new palace and the new city. They know such has been the custom from time immemorial, and the more ignorant, when told that the Government is about to resume it, see nothing very extraordinary in this being done. They, however, determine that no one shall be taken from their village for the purpose. A British engineer from the projected work appears in a village : in abject fear that he has come to select the victims the villagers attack him. A riot occurs which agitators at once announce in their Press as the result of dis- satisfaction with British rule. Country roads are merely unbridged tracks, most of which are quite impassable in the rainy season, while village lanes are the same. There is only one school and one post-office to every five or six small villages. The delivery of letters in these villages is very casual. Little has been done by the Government of India for the improvement of the smaller villages in the rural districts, the requirements of which are almost completely neglected, while the recommendations of British officials who work hard in them are mostly ignored owing to want of funds, caused by the excessive cost of administration and brought about by the creation of new, highly-paid appointments the money to pay for which is extracted from the villagers to satisfy the demands of the All India Moslem League, the Indian National Congress and such-like people. This the villagers well know, and detest these bodies in consequence. The Government has to decide whether or not it will continue its mad race for an imaginary efficiency. If it does it will alienate the rural peoples. CHAPTER XIII FEUDATORY STATES EXCLUDING Nepal, the home of the gallant Gurkhas, and Bhutan, which are independent except as regards their foreign relations, there are some seven hundred feudatory States, whose territories, in the aggregate, embrace two-fifths of India, with a population of about 70,000,000. They are spread throughout the land from Kashmir, in the north, to Travancore, in the south. Some, such as those in Rajputana and Central India, occur in groups, with a British district in their midst ; others are isolated and surrounded by British territory ; others again, such as Kutch., many Kathiawar States, Kochin and Travancore have seaboards on the Indian Ocean, between which and British territory they intervene. In most of the important States and in the centres of groups there are cantonments, occupied by British-Indian garrisons, which are British territory, where feudatory States have no jurisdiction. In some cantonments there are towns, called bazaars, many of which are of considerable importance as trading centres, in which many subjects of feudatory States reside. It will be obvious that under these conditions numerous ques- tions must arise between the feudatory States themselves and between them and the British-Indian Government, such as those regarding boundaries, extradition, excise, customs, rail- way communication, and many others. Feudatory States are of all sizes ; some, for instance the Musal- man State of Hyderabad, the premier State, with a population of about 11,000,000, have a large revenue, and an area equal to that of an European second-class kingdom ; others are smaller 217 2i 8 INDIAN STUDIES in varying degrees, while many of the smallest consist merely of a few villages and a revenue as minute as 60 a year. fThe population of each State is composed of the same variety of peoples as the neighbouring districts of British India. In Jhose States outside the Punjab and Baluchistan the unwarlike classes are in large majorities. Ruling dynasties, too, vary greatly in race, religion, caste and language, and although States are designated Hindu, Musal- man or Sikh, according to the religion of the ruling family, this by no means implies that it is of the same race, religion or language as the people it rules, or that these people are homogeneous. During the long wars and anarchy resulting from the decline and fall of the Moghul Empire, many States rose and fell. When the British became supreme in India, they found those then existing very much as they are now. Most of the Rajput States were of ancient origin, but some of their nobles had declared their independence and formed new States ; others had been formed out of territories seized from them by Musalman and Mahratta adventurers. Jats, Sikhs and Mahrattas had formed States out of the debris of the Moghul Empire, and Brahmans had done the same out of that of the Mahratta confederacy on the fall of the Peishwas ; satraps of the Moghul Empire had thrown off their allegiance and become independent. In each State of any importance there were semi-independent feudal nobles and small feudatory States of various degrees of inde- pendence of the State rulers. The position of rulers and their feudatories depended on military force. Wars between States were frequent, as also were those between States and their nobles and feudatories. The British Government recognized the status quo and guaran- teed the integrity of existing States, and the dignity, honour, privileges and prerogatives of their rulers and feudal nobles. Age-long years of war carried on with the greatest treachery, aggravated by caste and religious enmity, have left their mark. Most ruling dynasties have hereditary feuds with one another ; their feudal nobles and feudatories are often in the same position with regard to them and to one another. This enmity is inbred, and is latent under British rule, but it shows no sign of being for- gotten. As an example : since the Chief of Alwar rebelled from his overlord, the ruler of Jeypur, over one hundred years FEUDATORY STATES 219 ago, no ruler of Jeypur has had or will have any intercourse whatsoever with the ruler of Alwar. Rajputs in Mahratta States strongly resent being under their low-caste Mahratta rulers ; those in Musalman States resent probably more so being under the rule of their hereditary enemies ; the feeling between Musalman and Hindu rulers is much as it is between the peoples of those religions in British India. It is not to be wondered that this is so. The same enmity exists between Catholics and Protestants in Ireland, although both have in common the Christian faith and neither are distinct races but an admixture of the same two races. The Christian religion inculcates forgiveness ; while Indian religions do quite the con- trary. It is indeed an unpractical optimist alone who expects to see people of different nationalities, speaking different languages and professing different religions separated from one another by ages of mutual injury, forget their animosities and fall in love with one another all of a sudden, and thinks that joint delibera- tion between them will be either possible or agreeable to the majority. The relations of the paramount Power with the feudatory States are based on treaties, sanads (official communications), and in many cases on custom. The treaties and sanads, owing to changed conditions, are out of date, and some of their terms are difficult, if not impossible, to carry out to-day. Many of the words used in them are difficult, to translate accurately from the various vernaculars into English, so that differences of opinion between the Government of India and its feudatories regarding their interpretation are of frequent occurrence. In cases where custom is the only guide these differences are even greater. Ruling chiefs are not sovereign rulers ; they are in subsidiary alliance with His Majesty the King-Emperor, and are sub- ordinate to the Governor General of India as his representative. They may not make war or enter into political agreements with one another without his consent, they must submit all dis- agreements between one another for the arbitration of the Governor General, who also decides any differences between them and the Government of India, but an appeal lies to the Secretary of State for India. They are not allowed to employ Europeans or Americans in their service without the sanction of the Governor General. British subjects, both European and Indian, living in feudatory States are outside their jurisdiction 220 INDIAN STUDIES and under that of the British representative at their Courts, who transacts all business between them and the Governor General. Rulers of feudatory States are bound to rule their own subjects with justice, which is a very important condition. Feudatory States have no constitution, and there is no other check whatever on the decrees of their rulers. It would, of course, be quite impossible for the British Government to permit 70,000,000 people in India to be under the rule of some hundreds of petty despots. The chief duty of the representa- tives of the Governor General in feudatory States is to see that the subjects of feudatory rulers are not unjustly treated by them. Of late this duty has been rendered difficult. I know- feudatory rulers who are allowed to commit grave tyranny with impunity. The affairs of feudatory States are dealt with by the Foreign Department of the Government of India of which the Governor General is personally in charge. Some of the more important States communicate with the Governor General through his representative at their Courts. In the case of others they do so through him with local Governments as the intermediary. I have always considered an intermediary is most undesirable. The system which admits of one causes unnecessary delay, difficulties and misunderstandings, and prevents continuity of policy. I am glad to see that the author of the report recom- mends that all important feudatory States should be placed in direct political relations with the Central Government through its representative at their Courts. I think all States should be so, except perhaps those of very minor importance, whose special situation or circumstances might require that they should be dealt with by a local Government. I do not, however, agree that this is necessary only as the report says, " because of the changing conditions of the time." For long years, owing to improved railway and telegraphic communication, an inter- mediary has become unnecessary. The post of Agent to the Governor General should be abolished as a useless expense. Some of the important ruling chiefs exercise, always subject to the proviso that they rule justly, unrestricted rights of civil and criminal jurisdiction over their own subjects and the power of making laws for them. The powers of the less important chiefs decrease in varying degrees till those of the smallest are little more than that of a Justice of the Peace. The repre- FEUDATORY STATES 221 sentatives of the Government of India with feudatory States are called Political Officers ; they belong to a department called the Political, which is recruited partly from the Indian Civil Service and partly from the Indian Army. The position of a Political Officer at a feudatory Court is one requiring the greatest tact. If he has not the support of his local Government or the Government of India, as the case may be, his position becomes impossible. There is, then, no guarantee that the feudatory Chief rules justly so he may become, and sometimes is, a tyrannous despot. There never has been any consistent policy in dealing with feudatory States. Governor Generals deal with their Chiefs direct on some matters, others they leave to local Governments. Of late years the Political Officer has often not known whether the Chief with whom he is posted had, or had not, the private ear of the Governor General. While it is obviously most important that the Governor General should be the guide, philosopher and friend of all the ruling Chiefs, it is deplorable and causes much ill feeling when he selects one or two as his special friends, and accepts them as the exponents of the views of " My brother Chiefs," and showers honours on them. In the East the disposition of a courtier for such they become when so selected is tame and submissive ; he never presumes to deviate from the sentiments, or at least from the words, of his despotic patron. There are grave objections to a Governor General entering into detailed business relations with ruling Chiefs, who do not like it at all ; especially this is so when he is their guest or they are his. In such circumstances they are at a great disadvantage. There are very few, if any, well-ruled States in which the Chief decides any matter of importance without consulting his advisers, who are usually hereditary, and to spring business on him when he is alone, and a guest or host, is most unfair. Indian etiquette makes it very difficult for a Chief to refuse a request made by the King-Emperor's representative so if he cannot agree he gives some evasive reply which is mistaken for acquiescence by those who do not understand Indian psychology. The result is intrigue or misunderstanding. Just before I left India, a Chief said to me, " The Viceregal Court is now like an Indian durbar," and I knew he was right. No good ever comes in any business system by short-circuiting 222 INDIAN STUDIES orders, this is so both in the political and other departments ; nor is it conducive to friendship to mix it up with business, especially when the business is more or less contentious. The " courtiers " get wind in the head, they talk of their " Sovereign " power and of being " Allies " of the King- Emperor. During Mr. Montagu's recent tour, three or four Chiefs of second-rate importance gave him a memo /setting forth " the points to which ruling Chiefs attach J^impor- tance." In it they referred to themselves as " Sovereign Princes " and " Allies," and added : " With reference to the Sovereign States, the position of the Political Officer is and should be recognized as resembling that of an ambassador." That such a document should have been accepted without comment by the Secretary of State for India was a cause of astonishment to the ruling Chief who told me about it. The use of loose language of this kind in India is much to be deprecated ; when translated into the various vernaculars, it is much worse than it is in English. The inbred enmities which exist between ruling feudatory Chiefs are kept alive by the way the Government of India deals out titles and honours. I will give a few reasons why conferring honours without considering their general effect, and without full and impartial consideration, tends to increase existing enmities. The dignity of each State is gauged by the number of guns allowed for the salute of its ruler. If one ruler gets a gun added to his salute, and it be not given for some very special public service which is generally known to the public, probably a hundred others feel insulted. It is the same with military rank which Lord Curzon long ago wisely decided was to be given for military reasons alone, and not for political. Among Rajputs, the heads of the great clans, such as the Rathores, Kachhwas and Sisodhias alone for ages have held the title of Maharaja. They do not acknowledge the right of any of the Chiefs of sub- ordinate clans to that title the greatest of whom has never held other than that of Raoraja. The Maharajas of Alwar and Bikanir, the former the head of a sub-clan of the Kachhwas, of which the ruler of Jeypur is the Chief, and the latter the head of a sub-clan of the Rathore, of which the ruler of Jodhpur is the Chief, were acknowledged as Maharajas ; all the other members of these two great clans were deeply offended and this was aggravated by the latter being selected, for no particular FEUDATORY STATES 223 reason that anyone could see, to represent the feudatory Chiefs at the Imperial Conference. This way of dealing out titles and selecting " representatives " without regard to clan feeling reopens old sores especially when Chiefs of no special importance profess to speak in public for their " brother Chiefs." No one who hasn't been behind the scenes both of the Govern- ment of India and native States can have any idea of the intrigue and heart-burnings that go on in regard to honours. I feel quite certain the way they are dealt out does nearly as much as caste and religious differences to keep up mutual jealousy and rivalry between Chiefs. Those between Musalman ruling Chiefs and dynasties are not nearly so pronounced as they are between Hindu and Sikh rulers. Hitherto ruling Chiefs have had no voice in the Councils of the Government of India com- mensurate with the importance and magnitude of the interests they represent. But that no satisfactory arrangements exist whereby their wants and disabilities, as well as their claims, can be collectively brought to the notice of the Government of India is their own fault. Over thirty-five years ago, Lord Lytton, when Governor General, proposed to form a Chamber of ruling Chiefs, and since then the same proposal has been made by Lords Curzon and Minto, but it came to naught on account of their mutual enmities and jealousies and of the difficulty of the question of precedence between Chiefs themselves. According to Hindu ideas the greatest ruler and the one of highest dignity in India is the Maharana of Oodeypur, or Meywar, who is the head of the Sisodhia clan of Rajputs. He is called " the Sun of the Hindus." His rank and dignity has ever been disputed by the Maharaja of Jodhpur, the Chief of the great Rajput clan of the Rathore. According to the precedence code of the Government of India, the Sudra Hindu Mahratta rulers of Gwalior, Indore and Baroda have precedence over both, which the Musalman ruler of Haiderabad enjoys also. This is only one example of matters of precedence which will have to be decided before any Chamber of ruling princes is possible. There are hundreds of others which offer insuperable difficulties. Mr. Montagu and the Governor General base their proposals for a Council of Princes on Conferences of Princes held at the invitation of the latter, but they say : " We believe most of the princes desire to see such a Council created, although 224 INDIAN STUDIES some of the most eminent among them have not taken part in the Conferences of 1916-17 " (the italics are mine). He does not apparently recognize that caste, war and religious strife have left such inbred animosities that neither ruling Chiefs nor their communities will act together, and that the more eminent the Chief the greater he is affected by them. Were the British Government to cease to arbitrate between them, their latent feuds would at once become active. The Political Officer with each State is the arbitrator in the first instance in differences between the State and the Government of India and the State and its feudal nobles, tributaries or subjects. His original opinion necessarily carries great weight with those through whom it passes in the long official channel between him and the Governor General or the Secretary of State. He usually arrives at it by secret methods, and is often aided by expediency or influenced by the local atmosphere which exists or has been purposely created around him. There is no place in the world where local atmospheres are created so easily as India. He may even be influenced by his own predilections or it may be by the views of his superiors ; in any case, the opinion he arrives at is ex parte. The preliminary inquiry is confidential, and in no sense judicial. In such circumstances, appeals are of little use, but, nevertheless, they are nearly always made. The intrigue, bribery and corruption that goes on between the officials of the State and the numerous Indian petty officials in the various offices which constitute " the usual channel " are beyond belief. When the appeal goes to the Secretary of State, the appellant, if he can afford it, sends an agent to London to put his case to a lawyer or barrister who is in Parliament. He has a great belief in lawyer M.P.'s, especially if they belong to the party in power. There should be some means of meting out justice between feudatory Chiefs and the Government of India other than the primitive system now in force. Whenever there is any dispute of either a civil or political nature, involving, as all such do, questions of a technical nature, either of the disputants should be entitled to have it settled by a properly constituted judicial tribunal. The only just one, one can imagine, would be presided over by a high British judicial authority with Indian experience and knowledge of the vernacular of those concerned, assisted by two assessors to be nominated, one each by both parties in the dispute, The decision of such a tribunal should be final FEUDATORY STATES 225 Ruling princes should not be nominated as assessors, for their inbred prejudices are so great that in cases involving the depriva- tion of power, temporarily or permanently, of another ruling Chief, or depriving him of his rights, dignity, honours, powers or privileges, they could not be expected to be impartial. With the Government as prosecutor, judge and executioner, cases of injustice, or alleged injustice, are always likely to occur, especially when evidence is not given in public and subjected to cross-examination. The military value of feudatory States to the Empire varies greatly. Some Musalman States are ruled by alien dynasties, and their subjects are all of unwarlike classes. Others are ruled by alien dynasties and the majority of their warlike subjects are Musalmans. Obviously the latter are much more likely to preserve internal peace and are in a better position to aid the Empire than the former. Some Hindu States are ruled by low-caste dynasties, while the whole of their warlike subjects are high-caste Hindus, who resent being subjected to them. Others are ruled by high-caste Hindus of the same race as the majority of their warlike subjects. The Sikh States are probably the most valuable, for the majority of their warlike subjects are of the same race as the ruler, and they are of greater military value than any other warlike race in the State. The feudatory States are now only allowed to enlist men for military service who are their own subjects but when I was in India this rule, except in the case of Imperial Service troops, was not always sufficiently rigorously enforced. Imperial Service troops, which most important States maintain, are for the defence of the Empire and in case of serious war are sent to its theatre ; for internal defence special troops are maintained. Excluding Imperial Service troops, nearly five hundred States have " armies " of sorts, whose strength in each varies from 4,000 to 20 men. The whole aggregate some 300,000 Infantry and Cavalry, with probably 5,000 guns. They are of no military value ; the guns are old, obsolete, and only fit for a museum of military antiquities. The men, except in the Punjab, Baluchistan and Rajputana States, are of semi- warlike races and are of little military value. Their duties are mainly cere- monial and police. 15 226 INDIAN STUDIES The feudatory States have for long years enjoyed the great advantage of being practically free from tribute or military expenditure except such as they incur voluntarily. The State of Alwar has devoted a larger proportion of its revenues to the maintenance of Imperial Service troops than any other. Many of the rulers are given to hoarding. For a long period many of them, who now only maintain small Imperial Service forces or none, have been in a specially favourable financial position. Before deciding whether they have contributed generously to the present war or not, we should remember the vast sums they have been saved by the Government of India's guarantee of their territorial integrity. The amount of this no one knows but their rulers. Some years ago, on the death of the late Maharaja Sindhia, 4,000,000 was found concealed in a hole in one of the palace walls. Minorities are of frequent occurrence, and States have been put, often for long periods, under the administration of British officers or of Indian Statesmen from other provinces, who not infrequently took the opportunity to introduce new and un- popular measures into the State administration. This might have been necessary in other days ; it is now no longer so. Most ruling Chiefs of important States have an Executive Council composed of heads of departments who are frequently State nobles. Business as a rule is carried out carefully and well, with an elasticity in the disposal of work which might well be followed by the Government of India. In future, when a minority occurs, a State noble should be appointed as regent and president of the State Council. The influence of ruling Chiefs is not generally very well gauged. They are all educated, many of them are English educated. Among the latter the English education of most is based on Oriental traditions though there are a few with whom this is not so and they are not respected by orthodox people of their religion. Those whose education is based on Oriental traditions are highly respected by people of their own religion, with whom they have great weight, but their influence is shared by nobles and gentry in British territory, who are equally well educated, and often of more respected family. Ruling Chiefs carry little political influence outside their own States and none do so outside their own provinces. In the case of the great Rajput Chiefs FEUDATORY STATES 227 of Rajputana the case is exceptional. They are the purest blood of their race, and, in social matters especially, their influence among all Rajputs from Kashmir to the south is very great. If they set the example in social matters in due course Hindus of lower castes will follow their lead. The portion of the land revenue of the ruler of a feudatory State is derived from that part of the State he owns as such and this is greatest in those States where there are few or no nobles, religious communities or institutions holding " jageers," which means estates in freehold, for which the holders pay only a small quit rent, often merely nominal. In ancient States these are much more numerous than in those of modern date. The revenue of the ruler therefore depends, not on the size of his State so much as on the part of it owned by him as Chief. He also derives revenue from customs, the profit from public works, State-built railways and other sources. The expense of administration in feudatory States is small compared with that of British India, and the salaries of officials are much lower. On account of the small military expenditure of most States, the annual balance credit remaining is usually very considerable ; most rulers, deducting from the State revenue sufficient for their personal expenditure and what they consider necessary to hoard, devote the remainder to education, public works and improvements in administration. Should the Chief be extravagant or penurious, the share he takes for these pur- poses is large, and there is little left for administrative improve- ments. Great functions, such as Imperial Durbars, State visits from Governor Generals and suchlike, when the Chiefs attempt to outvie one another, are frequently heavy burdens. Formerly many Chiefs were given to excessive extravagance, and wastefully lavished most of the money they extracted from their subjects. This is no longer so ; in fact, the reverse is the case, and they are either very careful or actually penurious. I have known one with a revenue of 300,000 a year groan at having to spend 2,000 on a holiday of six months to a cooler climate which he considered necessary for his health. Their subjects now frequently complain of their stinginess, they rightly con- sider that while ordinary prudence is praiseworthy, a great man should not live as a Bania (trader and moneylender), and that most of the Chiefs, particularly Hindus and Sikhs, have become skinflints. The Government of India would be aston- 15* 228 INDIAN STUDIES ished did it know how many of the Chiefs who contribute, apparently so willingly, to the numerous subscriptions they are called upon to make, grumble at having to do so. The fact is, whether on account of the education they receive or not I can't say, very few are spendthrifts some are generous, but the majority are extremely penurious, and those who don't hoard are always on the look-out for some profitable investment for their money. Their stinginess or generosity cannot be judged by the way they entertain distinguished guests ; the money so spent being often out of gratitude for favours to come or ex- pected to do so. Before forming an opinion, one has to hear the subsequent remarks made privately to their friends, the purport of which depends a good deal on whether they get the expected return for the money expended or not. Neither can they be judged by their manner of spending money when taking a holiday in London or elsewhere. The most penurious are then naturally somewhat lavish. In fact, one has to know each one intimately before being in a position to decide whether he is penurious or not. Those usually called " backward " are mostly those who spend prudently and in a manner their people consider their high rank necessitates. Nearly all devote money to the embellishment of their capitals, and are animated by a desire to associate their names with some public or private building in it, such as a palace, a hospital, dispensary, school or museum which they show proudly to their visitors. Many also take great interest in education, and in those schools which I have seen they have introduced a most admirable system of State education of which religious instruction forms a part : it is a modification of that of the Indian Government to suit local conditions. The scholars are taught in their own vernacular and English is encouraged, every opportunity being given for learning it. Irrigation works and railways are in great favour because they pay well. A telephone system would be introduced much more largely than it is but the Government of India's objections, which I think quite absurd, prevent this being done on any great scale. On the whole, feudatory Chiefs may well be proud of the advance made in their States in recent years under the guidance and encouragement of the Government of India, which may itself be justly proud of what it has done for them. Both should be ever grateful to the British officers, political and engineer, who have locally served them so tactfully and loyally. In many FEUDATORY STATES 229 things these States set an example to the Government of India which it might well follow, notably in the way of delegation of authority. Everywhere, but especially in such an immense country as India, the evil of excessive centralization is great and deleterious to good government. It was running riot when I left India. The feudatory States were being invaded by it and I saw much evil caused thereby, notably in attempts to establish a uniform system all over India of installing Chiefs, and thereby ignoring local ceremonies, which although trifling matters in the official eye are most important in the eyes of Indians, and any abolition or curtailment of them causes intense dissatisfaction to most loyal classes. Centralization further leads to ignorance of the local manners and customs, without a knowledge of which the dignity of the Chiefs, which the promise of the King-Emperor binds him to cherish as his own, cannot be maintained in its integrity. The feudatory Chiefs were deeply aggrieved by Lord Hardinge's order, issued in 1912 or 1913, directing them, whenever they came to the Headquarters of the Government of India, to call personally on all the Members of the Executive Council. Such an order was an innovation. The ruling Chiefs owe allegiance to the King-Emperor and to his representative, the Governor General. They are neither by treaty, sanad or custom, officially subordinate to the Government of India. At the time when the order was given, the native Member of the Executive Council was a Bengali Musalman lawyer of no social standing in their eyes, and they strongly resented being obliged to call on such a person, doing which was contrary to their customs and most derogatory to their dignity. They had always been in the habit of calling voluntarily on those English Members of Council whom they knew, who took the trouble to make their acquain- tance. There was no necessity whatever for the order, which was issued to flatter the vanity of Indian politicians. It served, merely to further alienate the Chiefs from their Over-lord's representative and his colleagues ; except those of the " courtier " class, the Chiefs did not visit the Government of India when they could avoid doing so. The affairs of the feudatory States are dealt with in the Foreign Department of the Government of India, of which the Governor General is personally in charge. It is a great mistake that he should be so in these days when the affairs of feudatory States 2 3 o INDIAN STUDIES are so complicated and multifarious. Shortly before I left India, the work of the Foreign Department was so heavy that one secretary could not cope with it, so that it was split up between two : one to deal with what is really foreign policy, that is with affairs relating to Persia, Afghanistan, China, Thibet and the Dominions, Crown colonies and numerous European Powers with which India has dealings through the Secretary of State for India, and the other to deal with the feudatory States and their numerous questions regarding commerce, finance, succession, law, boundary disputes and etiquette, which are ever increasing in numbers and technicality. Yet the Governor General in addition to his duties of despotic ruler of India, tempered only by the control of the Secretary of State is considered to have enough time at his disposal to be in executive charge of this Department. In feudatory States departmental work and the administration of justice is much more elastic than in British territory, and delay in deciding cases is never so protracted. In the smaller States it is almost unknown, as the Chief usually deals personally with his subjects, which is greatly appreciated by them, for all Indians love per- sonal rule. Except delay in deciding cases is inordinately protracted beyond the life of man, as is often the case in British territory, natives do not object to it as we do. Our proverb says, " Delay is dangerous ; " theirs says, " Delay means success ; " they are never in a cast-iron hurry, but there are reasonable limits to all things. The land tax, that most important politically of all taxes in India, is as heavy as it is in British territory, but the villainies of the petty officials who are employed in its collection are not so great because they are more tempered by religious and local customs, and by the severity of the punishment of those who are caught offending. The laws, though based on those of British- India, are simpler and well suited to the people ; offenders are much more frequently brought to justice than is the case under British rule. Great hardship is often caused to the cultivators by the large numbers of wild birds and animals they are not allowed to kill, which eat their crops and cattle, and not infrequently them- selves. In some places peacocks, large cranes and monkeys range in shoals, as do deer and wild pigs, while tigers are numerous. The birds are not allowed to be killed for senti- FEUDATORY STATES 231 mental reasons, the monkeys in Hindu States for religious, while the deer, wild pigs and tigers are preserved for the sport of the Chief and his friends. Sometimes when the ravages of game become unbearable the Chief pays some slight compensation to the sufferers, which is not sufficient to nearly cover the damage done but seems to pacify the cultivators when they become enraged by losses they can no longer support, when a trifling sum is given merely to assuage their wrath. Frequently, how- ever, they get nothing but are punished for making complaints. No compensation is paid for the depredations of wild birds and animals which are prohibited from being killed for sentimental or religious reasons. Verily the lot of the Indian cultivator is not a happy one. I have frequently asked cultivators whether they thought life was easier in British territory or in a feudatory State. The reply was always much the same, viz., that their condition was extremely hard in both, but as to where it was the least so opinion was divided. Those who lived in British territory, far from the borders of feudatory States, thought that life with them was so hard it must be better under native rule ; those in feudatory States, who lived far from British territory, gave the same reason for saying life in British territory must be easier. Those who lived in feudatory States which were infested by wild birds and wild animals, and of course there are many which are not so, plumped for life in British territory where such did not exist in sufficient numbers to ruin their crops and frequently eat themselves or their cattle. They also said, in some places I have been to in feudatory States, that in addition to the trouble from wild animals and heavy taxation, " Our Chief, who is a screw, takes the population of whole villages out to beat for his shooting parties and keeps them away from their fields for days at a time at most critical periods for the crops, without ever paying them anything." All were, however, unanimous in their belief that the " Babu log," by which they meant petty officials, were not so oppressive in feudatory States as they were in British territory ; those who lived in the former saying, " The-shodas ! " (illegitimates) " have we not run against them on the railway ? We know all about them." Railways in feudatory States are under British jurisdiction. My inquiries extended over the Punjab, Raj put ana, Central India and a large part of the United Provinces of Oudh and 232 INDIAN STUDIES Agra, so they covered a large part of India. My informants, living as they did long distances apart and being quite un- animous, it is safe to conclude that their opinions were correct, and that the lot of the cultivator in the provinces I have men- tioned, and probably all over India, is not a happy one, and also that the methods of the " Babu log " in both British terri- tory and feudatory States is such as to necessitate the immediate attention of the rulers of both. The unrest prevailing in certain parts of British India has affected the feudatory States, but in a more healthy way than it has British territory. There is no sedition in them at present because spouters of sedition and their newspapers are sum- marily dealt with : the former are either imprisoned or expelled and the latter prohibited. But while there is no sedition in them, as is the case in British India, the peasants no longer accept without question the decrees of their rulers ; they feel that they are being ground to death by the high land tax and the venality of many of those employed to collect it, but their unrest is not seditious, it is a healthy desire to be consulted regarding their own affairs and be enabled to represent their grievances in a legitimate way to their rulers in the hope that they may escape from burdens they can no longer bear. The)' now realize that the custom of their rulers is not to extract a fair share of the profits of the soil after leaving them a reasonable margin to live on and to repay their labour, but to exact the maximum amount that can be screwed out of them. They see plainly that they have to pay exorbitantly for irrigation and other public works ostensibly carried out for their benefit, but really for the benefit of the ruler, who takes usurious interest on the initial cost of such works and prides himself on the bene- volence which pays him so well. As in British India, the agri- cultural situation is becoming daily worse by the custom of dividing up farms. The cultivators and their forefathers have lived through the ages in a state of penury and semi-starvation, and they are now only able to eke out their miserable existence by hard work and the skill gained by experience. It is cus- tomary to call Indian cultivators obstinate and mulish ; they are neither, they are intelligent, as all people are who live in close touch with Nature. . In recent years this intelligence has developed, and they kick against being predial slaves, which is what they really are. CHAPTER XIV THE ARMY IN INDIA authors of the Report on Indian Constitutional Reforms 1 say very little about the Army in India. They acknow- ledge as axiomatic that " so long as India depends for her internal and external security upon the Army and Navy of the United Kingdom, the measure of self-determination which she enjoys must be inevitably limited." Some explanation is needed as to why, with her immense population and resources, India cannot defend herself and keep the internal peace. Broadly speaking, this is because of her deficiency in good coal and iron, and also because of her immense population only some 25,000,000 are warlike, and this small minority is disunited by differences of race, language and heredi- tary feuds which render combined action quite impossible to it. .. Climate and physical circumstances have exercised their wonted influence on the Indiari peoples. In the hot, flat regions, of which by far the greater part of India consists, there is no winter cold. In the hot regions are found races, timid both by religion and habit, servile to their superiors, but tyrannical to their inferiors, and quite unwarlike. In other parts, the area "of which is relatively small, where the winter is cold, the war- like minority is to be found, but its component peoples vary greatly in military virtue. Nowhere, however, are they equal in that respect to Europeans or Japanese. There is as great disparity between the peoples of the Punjab, Bengal, Madras and Bombay as there is between English, Por- tuguese and Levantines. It is from the warlike classes only that the armies of India have for long centuries ,t>e.en recruited, and for equally long centuries the warlike peoples have been at 233 234 INDIAN STUDIES enmity with one another, but they have, nevertheless, always ruled the un warlike majority which suffers under the same disunion as they do. Certain castes of the un warlike majority have for long ages been used by the conquering races as their agents in oppression and it is because of the tyrannical dis- position of such castes to those who were placed at their mercy that the peoples of India will strongly resent being again put under them. Especially objectionable on this account are the Kayasth, Brahmin and Bania castes, and it is of these or other unwarlike classes that the Indian National Congress and such bodies are almost altogether composed. No Indian race has ever shown any capacity as sea- warriors, although, as merchant seamen some few of them are of undis- puted value. As sea-warriors Indians are, and ever have been, inferior to every other Asiatic people, while the number, all Musalmans, who take to a sea-life is very small ; therefore to expect that Indians will ever be able to man a War navy seems to me absurd. As everyone knows, the Army in India is composed of both British and Indian soldiers, but what is not generally known is that the proportion is fixed at one of the former to two and a half of the latter. This proportion has been decided upon both for military and political reasons. The military reason for it, in which all authorities agree, is that a stiffening of Indian soldiers by British is necessary to ensure success against either a European foe or an Asiatic foe organized on modern European ^methods... The political reasons for this proportion were deter- mined by the experiences of the Mutiny of 1857 and subsequent events. Previous to that catastrophe the British Army in India numbered some 37,000, while the Indian Army numbered about 265,000. Most of the artillery were Indian. The experience of the Mutiny proved that the Indian Army was far too powerful compared with the British, especially when it was well provided with artillery. After the Mutiny the most distinguished soldiers and administrators with large Indian experience decided on the relative strength at which both should be maintained in the future, so as to render impossible a recurrence of such events. They were of opinion that the artillery of the Army should always be British ; that the country should be disarmed, feudatory States included ; that the import of modern arms should be prohibited except under licence. Licences were, and are, freely THE ARMY IN INDIA 235 given to all respectable Indians for rifles for sporting purposes but not for military fire-arms. Any other course would render the maintenance of internal peace quite impossible. They decided that, under these circumstances, the margin of safety would be secured by maintaining a relative proportion of one British to two and a half Indian soldiers. That decision has been adhered to ever since, except that it has been modified to the extent that some twenty batteries of light artillery are now manned by Indian gunners. The strength of the Army in India before the War was about 70,000 British and 170,000 Indians, but it varied slightly at different times. In the relief season it was usually under strength in British soldiers, and it was almost invariably so as far as Indians were concerned, chiefly for financial reasons. In addition to the Regular Army there were some 30,000 volunteers, recruited from the European not exclusively British portion of the population, including Anglo-Indians ; but Indians are admitted subject to the approval of officers commanding volunteer corps. The principle that the volunteer force is for the protection of life and property in case of an armed rebellion has long been accepted by Government. If this principle be maintained, as it should be, any material increa.se. of the number of Indians enrolled in it is to be strongly deprecated, especially as, in case of internal trouble, loyal Indians can always be immediately enlisted while the reserves of British troops are afar off in England. Service in the volunteer corps by men employed on railways was practically obligatory but these men have to carry on their ordinary work so long as the railways are in use, so they would not then be available for military duty. The volunteer corps formed from them are among the best in India. It must not be forgotten that, so late as 1907, armed resistance to Government was rife in Bengal and in the Southern Mahratta country. The Report says : " So long as the two communities " (Musal- mans and Hindus), " maintain anything like their present views as to the separateness of their interests, we are bound to regard religious hostilities as still a very serious possibility." This is so, and it cannot be ignored ; but there are other communities also, such as Sikhs, the different sects of Musalmans and Hindus, 236 INDIAN STUDIES and the aboriginal tribes, who have no less ardent ideas as to the separateness of their interests. Against the volunteer force^there^has to be balanced some 33,000 armed police, who are not under equally good discipline as the Indian soldiers, and also 18,000 Imperial Service troops, under the command of feudatory chiefs, who are armed with the same rifles as the Regular Army. The normal duties for which the Army in India was maintained before the outbreak of the War were primarily : (i.) To assist the civil power in maintaining order in the Indian Empire, and to protect its main ports from attack by sea, with the assistance of the Royal Navy. (2.) To maintain peace on the land frontier by resisting any rising of the tribes. Those of the North West Frontier alone can put over 300,000 men, of whom about 65,000 have modern arms, into the field. To undertake such military operations on or beyond the Burma Frontier as might be necessary. (3.) To meet eventualities in Afghanistan, and, in regard to these, there are treaties by which we are bound, in certain cir- cumstances, to afford aid to His Majesty the King of that country. Besides these normal duties which the Army in India was expected to perform without aid from any other part of the Empire, it had the following additional obligations : (4.) To maintain order on the Persian Gulf littoral. (5.) To withstand an advance on India, should war break out with any great power, until such time as the aid that might be required could come from elsewhere in the Empire. (6.) Overseas operations, great or small. In 1908 the strength of the Army in India had been decided by the Government with reference to the Anglo-Russian Agree- ment, and few will admit that, even in the full strength of 70,000 British and 170,000 Indian soldiers, it was excessive. x Shortly after I assumed command new, factors arose ; pro- posals had been then made for the construction of a through railway from Europe to India, which threatened a considerable increase in Indian military responsibilities. The approach of the Baghdad Railway to the Persian Gulf, under German auspices, had greatly developed, while the ulterior motives that might underlie that German policy became quite apparent. A most important factor was the preponderating influence THE ARMY IN INDIA 237 which Germany was acquiring over Turkish affairs, which was greatly facilitated by the Anglo- Russian Agreement. This obverse side of the medal escaped the view of political optimists, although it was quite evident to every one else that the British Empire could not make such a treaty with the hereditary foes of Turkey without incurring Turkish enmity and throwing the Turks completely into the hands of Germany. I drew the attention of the Government of India to these dangers, but the Governor General with, I presume, the con- currence of the Government at home, decided that as far as human foresight could see, there was no chance of our being at war with a European power, and in consequence I was called upon to reduce the strength of the Indian part of the Army. None except the Indian National Congress and All India Moslem League ventured to suggest the reduction of the British part of the Army, already at the lowest ebb compatible with the defence of India against attack from outside, and the maintenance of its internal peace. This proposal I strongly resisted, and a long discussion ensued between Army Headquarters, the Governor General and Secretary of State, which became public property and caused much anxiety to Indian soldiers. It only ended with the Army in India ^Committee, presided over by Lord Nicholson, the proceedings of which are kept confidential, after the usual fashion, so I can't quote them. All I can say is, that had the Report of the Majority been accepted, the Army in India would have been in a worse "state than that in which it was proved to be in by the operations in Mesopotamia. These discussions had a very bad effect on the warlike-peoples from whom the Army was recruited. They saw in them every prospect of .a reduction of their military em- ployment under Government ; the one they most value. " They put it down to the demands of the Indian National Congress and the All India Moslem League, which they had always ."disliked ; and their views as to the separateness of their interests from those represented by such bodies were further accentuated. The Congress and League have recently emphasized their political , claims by pointing to the gallant services of Indians in the War. Such impudence has further widened the previously existing gulf between them and the warlike classes. At the time of which I write, Mr. Montagu was, I believe, Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for India. Are we 238 INDIAN STUDIES now justified, after the error of judgment he and those politicians who support him, made regarding Germany, in accepting without very critical examination his and their views regarding such a difficult question as reforms in India ? I think not. The en- deavour to rush them through Parliament is greatly to be de- precated. The Army in India, for the performance of its duties, was divided into two parts, the designations of which indicate their respective roles. One part, the Field Army, is for service in the field outside India, and the other part, the internal Defence Force, is for the maintenance of internal security in India during its absence. The relative strength of each cannot obviously be fixed permanently, for it depends primarily on the internal con- dition of India. If that is bad the Field Army must be reduced in numbers, when the help that India can give to the Empire in case of war would be, consequently, much lessened. The Report admits that " there exists a small revolutionary party, deluded by hatred of British rule and desire for the elimina- tion of Englishmen into the belief that the path to independence or political liberty lies through anarchical crime." Few will disagree, but the authors of the Report do not state the fact that whether the revolutionary party is small or not depends on circumstances. Revolutionary parties are not of recent birth in India ; they have existed there from the most ancient times, and they have been large or small according to the strength or weakness of the Central Government, and such is the case to-day. One thing is quite certain and is amply proved by experience in India and elsewhere and that is that concessions in the way of conciliation to revolutionaries result, when extorted by criminal acts, only in increasing both their demands and their numbers. T will now give the various castes from which the Army for v long years has been recruited. Soldiers recruited from any other classes, are quite useless except perhaps for internal defence, when no formidable enemy JsJiQjbs met. Those who are Hindu are the following : Srarimans of the Punjab and the United Provinces of Oudh and Agra. Only some few Brahman sub-castes take to a military life ; these are numerically small and can supply only com- paratively few men ; they are quite distinct from the priestly or ruling and clerical Brahmans of other parts of India. Their THE ARMY IN INDIA 239 military virtue, those of the Punjab excepted, is not great, while in the field there are always difficulties regarding their food, and especially its cooking, which their religion compels them to do naked except for a loin-cloth, so that everywhere and especially in cold climates their employment in the field is attended with many disadvantages. Rajput soldiers are inhabitants of three separate provinces, the military virtues of each being different. These provinces are Raj put ana ; the United Provinces of Oudh and Agra ; the Punjab and the independent Himalayan state of Nepal. Those from Nepal are known under the generic name of Gurk- has ; the best of those from the United Provinces and the Punjab under that of Dogras and the provincial one of Gharwalis, under "which names they have earned undying glory in this War. Other Rajputs from the United Provinces and Rajputana are usually known by their caste name of Rajputs, but, to those well-ac- quainted with them, they are also known by their sub-clan names. "Rajputs belong to the second of the twice-born classes, and although the Hindu social system classes them after Brahmans they admit no inferiority to them. The number of Ghurkas allowed to enlist in the Indian Army by the ruler of Nepal is limited by treaty. He permits as many to do so as he can spare from the ranks of his own forces. Jats inhabit the Punjab, United Provinces of Oudh and Agra and Rajputana. Those from each of these provinces are much the same. They are either of Rajput or of mixed Rajput "ancfVaisya descent, but, owing to their mixed blood, are classed as Sudras in the Hindu social system. They are known among other natives of the provinces they inhabit for their excessive vanity. The ambition of some of the Jat classes is to be con- sidered twice-born. The Arya-Somaj Society, a small socio- religious political one mentioned by Mr. Montagu as among the most highly educated in India, traded on the vanity of the Jats and by promising to recognize them as " twice-born " induced some few to join in a seditious movement in 1910. Jat Indian officers gave me timely warning, on which I took the necessary steps without causing any enmity, to bring those who had been seduced to reason. The military virtue of the Jats is very high ; they have gained well-deserved renown in the present War ; the Jat regiment in which this sedition appeared has been among the most distinguished of the Indian regiments. 240 INDIAN STUDIES Hindu Mers come from the small province of Merwara in Raj put ana. They are of mixed Rajput and aboriginal descent ; the latter predominating. They are Sudras. Gujars and Ahirs are from the Punjab, United Provinces, Rajputana and Central India. They are aboriginal tribes who have accepted Hinduism and are classed as Sudras. The Tamils inhabit the Madras Presidency. They are of Dravidian descent, have accepted Hinduism and are Sudras. Christians and Paraiyas (or untouchables) inhabit chiefly the Punjab and Madras Presidency. They serve together in some units. Most Christians are descendants of converts from the aboriginal races. The Mahrattas are., from the Bombay Provinces of the Dekkan and Konkan. They are Sudras, who speak a distinct language and have separate interests of their own. Minas are aborigines of Rajputana. They are enlisted in small numbers in special regiments, and are Sudras. The Musalman races and tribes from which recruits are ob- tained are : Pathans who inhabit trans-Indus British territory and the neighbouring independent territory. They are of pure Semitic descent and mostly Sunni Musalmans, according to the rite of the Imam Abu Hanifa ; some few are Sheia. They are not Indians, and they resent being called so ; their language, Pushtu, is an independent one. A few Baluchis are also enlisted, but this tribe do not take to military service readily. They are Sunni Musalmans. Multani Pathans and Musalmans of the Derjat and cis-Indus are Sunni Musalmans of the rite of the Imam Abu Hanifa. They are mostly descendants of old Pathan and Afghan families who conquered Multan and the neighbouring districts in days of old, while some few are descended from the ancient Arab con- querors of Sindh. They are very strict in their religious duties ; more so than any Musalmans I know. Pathans are of high military virtue, and have gained great renown in this War. Punjabi Musalmans. Those enlisted are taken from Rajput tribes converted to Islam at a very early period. They usually call themselves Rajputs and adhere to their ancient Hindu sub-caste name such as Ghakkar, Chib, etc. The sub-caste of the Jenjuas is the only one that has changed it. They account for their calling themselves Jenjuas because on conversion to THE ARMY IN INDIA 241 Islam with one accord they threw away the Hindu sacred string of the twice-born (Janeo),and, to commemorate the event, assumed their present sub-clan-name. All these Rajput-Musalman tribes are very proud of their pedigree. They are Sunni Musalmans of the rite of the Imam Abu Hanifa. They have retained many Hindu social customs. Their marriage-ceremonies follow those of Hindus in many respects. They consult astrologers which is absolutely forbidden to orthodox Musalmans and in the higher families, following the Hindu custom, the re-marriage of widows does not meet with approval. They are a liberal and unbigoted people, but attentive to their religious duties. Some few other classes of Punjabi Musalmans are enlisted, but only in small numbers ; these are Moghuls descendants of old con- " querors and aboriginal tribes converted to Islam. A few Sheia castes ara, also, enlisted. The Punjabi Musalmans are of high military value, and have gained great renown in this War. Musalman Jats. These are mostly from the United Provinces and the Punjab. They were in days of old converted from among Hindu Jats, many of whose social customs they have retained. Hindustani Musalmans are inhabitants of Hindustan proper. They are converts to Islam from all Hindu castes. Those from high castes, such as Rajputs, call themselves Kaim Khani, Ranger and similar names ; those from low castes call themselves simply Musalmans. They retain many more Hindu social customs ,than do -the Punjab Musalmans. Their military value is not as high. Raj put ana Musalmans are much the same. The Musalmans of Central India, of the Bombay and Madras Presidencies, are similar to those of Hindustan, but the religion of the lower classes is a mixture of. the tenets of Hinduism and Islam, varying in degree in different parts. In the North as a rule those of Islam predominate ; in the South, those of Hinduism, but there are many things in common in their religious rites, and they join in one another's religious processions on certain holidays. Sprinkled sparsely all over India are to be found nobles and gentry, who are descendants of the former conquering races, or of Persians or Arabs who followed in their train, many of the scions of whose families take service in the Army. In some cases mostly in the Punjab and adjacent districts they have retained the vigour of their respective races, but further south, climatic conditions, polygamy and luxury have 16 242 INDIAN STUDIES brought them to the same physical condition as the indigenous inhabitants. Everywhere they have shared the fate of a race (JiPEastern nobles living under a peaceful Western Government. JMusalman Mers are from the province of Merwara, which is also the habitat of the Hindu Mers, to whom they are similar except in religion. The Sikhs are of a distinct religion, of which I have already given an account. Here I need only say that jn^prorjcj^o^tc their numbers they have supplied a far larger number of recruits to the Army during the War than any other Indian people. They have fought throughout with conspicuous valour, and as soldiers they are second to none. Mr. Montagu, in a speech made in the House of Commons on the 7th of August, 1918, says : " Indian troops had played and were playing by far the larger part in Mesopotamia, Pales- tine and East Africa, and at the beginning of the War they played a very large part in France." This is a well-deserved tribute to these gallant soldiers. He adds : " This has been solely possible by the increase in the number of recruits. Before 1914 the annual intake of recruits for combatant purposes was about 15,000. Last year the figure exceeded 285,000, and, reckoning non- combatants, 440,000. This year it was proposed to raise 500,000 combatants, besides a large number of non-combatants, and those responsible for recruiting had no doubt that India would obtain the men necessary to complete the new establishment which had been sanctioned by the War Office. The recruiting figure for June reached the figure of 50,000, and it was remark- able that the provinces from which recruits had never come before races which had never yet shown martial instincts, or only to a small degree were providing . their contribution to those numbers. The new recruits were not being asked to come to the War only as privates. They were to have an op- portunity, comparable to the opportunity given, he thought, to every other soldier raised for combatant purposes for the Empire, of receiving His Majesty's Commission." This is very satisfactory, but it must be recollected that before 1914 the intake was only so small because Mr. Montagu and those associated with him not only reduced the strength of .units and reserves of the Indian Army, but were loudly calling for a reduc- tion in the number of these units. Jn India the number of men that can be got for military service is only limited by the pay THE ARMY IN INDIA 243 ^given ; since the War broke out both it and the prospects in the Army have been made much more attractive. The difficulty is not to get increased numbers, but to get increased numbers of the warlike classes, who alone are fit for combatant services against formidable foes. The long over-due opening of His Majesty's Commission which I recommended as long ago as 1910, but my recommenda- tion was rejected has no doubt made Indians more willing to enlist, but, till the castes of those enlisted are known, people with a knowledge of India will keep an open mind regarding their value as soldiers. I\Ir. Montagu's remark as to provinces which have never produced a recruit before, or have never previously shown a military instinct, makes one fear that men are being enlisted for combatant services who will not do credit to the Army. I have seen this happen before. Indians without 'martial, instincts do not attain them in a brief period of time. Only recently an Indian of an old military family told me regret- fully that a regiment enlisted in Bengal had a third of its men down with venereal disease, couldn't march five miles and would certainly not face shell-fire. Venereal disease was previously very exceptional in the Indian Army, and those who suffered from it were held in disrepute by their Indian comrades. It seems strange that in the House of Commons no one asked that such doubtful matters should be cleared up, yet there are many mem- bers who pose as authorities on India. The administration of the Indian Army is the same to-day as it was when I left India, but its financial starvation has ceased under the pressure of English public opinion, since the Mesopo- tamia scandals drew the attention of the British public to the military methods of the India Office and the Government of India. Civilian interference in its command has also ceased, so we now hear no complaints of inefficiency. It is true that the control of Indian overseas operations has been transferred to the War Office, whose administrative methods, as I shall show, are practically the same as those introduced into the Indian Army by the late Lord Kitchener in 1905, but the men at the head of affairs there have changed since the Mesopotamia scandal occurred. The letter of the written law, which guides those now in power and should have guided their predecessors, is the same to-day as it was when introduced by Lord Kitchener, 16* 244 INDIAN STUDIES which clearly indicates what has always been the view of men versed in affairs, that, important as the written rules undoubtedly are, less depends on them than on the efficiency and harmonious co-operation of those who carry them out. The administrative system introduced by the late Lord Kitchener is, in the main, similar to that in force at the War Office. Under it the work is divided among several autonomous branches, or, as they are called at the War Office, divisions, which are called the Army Headquarters Staff. They are the Chief of the General Staff's Branch and those of the Adjutant General ; Quartermaster General ; Supply ; Transport ; Ordnance ; Medical ; Military Works and Military Secretary. Each deals with similar matters to those dealt with by the corresponding division at the War Office, except that at the War Office the Military Secretary's Division is a sub-division of the Adjutant General's Division. The chief of each branch is directly responsible to the Commander-in-Chief who is the head of all for the internal business of his branch. For purposes of co- ordinating business, the Chief of the General Staff is primus inter pares, but he has no right to interfere in the internal work of any other department than his own. He is in continual communi- cation with the heads of other branches, because on the General Staff Branch lies the duty under the Commander-in-Chief of preparing plans of campaign, while the other branches are responsible for the supplies, clothing, recruits, ammunition, guns, transport, intelligence, and the other necessaries of an army in peace and war. The Chief of the General Staff is also responsible for the keeping of a correct up-to-date Policy File, which contains a full record of military policy, and it shows how every case has been pre- viously dealt with, and in which branch the record of it has been filed, so that, on a change of Command6rs-in-Chief, or Chiefs of branches, their successors can at once tell the actual state of the Army or Branch, and the policy which has guided their pre- decessor. The Policy File shows deficiencies, and the steps, if any, which have been taken to remedy them ; why these steps have not been successful, and to whose action the failure to make them so is due. The Headquarters Staff of the Army can only deal with matters sanctioned by the Government of India for which funds have been allotted. The consent of the Government of India THE ARMY IN INDIA 245 must be previously obtained for any change in regulations, or for any proposals involving new expenditure. The sanction of the Government of India must also be obtained for all promo- tions or for action taken in disciplinary cases regarding officers, British or Indian, which are not directly ruled for in the Army Act, Indian Articles of War, King's and other Regulations, and also for matters regarding questions of pay and pension. For this purpose the Army Department of the Government of India is the channel of communication between the Commander-in- Chief and the Government of India. Briefly, it deals with mili- tary finance and the policy of the Government of India regarding the Army. It is divided into two sub-divisions, both nominally subordinate to a military officer, usually a Major General, who is a secretary to the Government of India in the Army Department, appointed and selected by the Governor General with the sanction of the Secretary of State for India. He exercises no military command. One sub-division, that of Finance, is under the direct control of a Finance Officer, called the Military Adviser to the Army Member, who is nominated by the Finance Member of the Governor General's Executive Council with the approval of the Governor General. His sub-division is not as in the War Office a part of the Army Staff ; it is a detachment of the Government of India Finance Department, which corresponds more or less to the Treasury in England, sitting in Army Head- quarters. Its members do not look to the military authorities for promotion for the work they do on the military financial side ; they owe no allegiance to the Army Member. The Finance Mem- ber thus controls all Army administration, for without funds it cannot be carried on. I have already described the position of a Secretary to the Government of India in the chapter on " The Government of India." The Commander-in-Chief, besides his position as such, is Army Member of the Governor General's Executive Council. I have already described the position of Members of this Council in the chapter on " The Government of India." The Com- mander-in-Chief had thus a dual position, as are also the heads of all the branches of the Headquarters Staff, who are subordi- nate, when dealing with questions of finance and policy to the Secretary of the Army Department of which they are for such cases considered members. All business, before being decided on definitely, is submitted 246 INDIAN STUDIES to a Council somewhat on the lines of the Army Council. It is called the Advisory Council ; the Commander-in-Chief is the President ; the heads of all branches of the Headquarters Staff are members, as are also the Secretary to the Government of India in the Army Department and the Financial Adviser to the Army Member. The Secretary of the Advisory Council is the officer in charge of the Military Operations Directorate of the Chief of the General Staff's Branch, who is directly responsible for the Policy File. The business brought before the Advisory Council is decided, as a rule, by a majority of votes, but the Commander-in-Chief may over-rule the decision of the majority. A record of its proceedings is kept which shows the votes given by each member and, in a case where the majority is over-ruled by the Commander- in-Chief, his reasons for doing so. All business passed at the Advisory Council, which requires expenditure or entails change in the existing regulations, in fact, practically everything that comes before it of the slightest importance requires the sanction of the Government of India, so, after it has been approved by the Council, it is sent to the Army Department, by whom the sanction of the Government of India is solicited. There the case is again reviewed from the point of view of finance and policy. As the Army Secretary and Financial Adviser have heard the matter fully discussed in the Advisory Council, they are, of course, aware of all the arguments for and against it, which they can elaborate with reference to the special desires or policy of the departments they represent, as well as from previous precedents records of which are kept in their offices, and in doing this they were, during the time I was Army Member, actuated by the views of their own chiefs, viz., the Finance Member and the Governor General, whose sole object was the reduction of military expenditure. The Govern- ment of India was thus in a very strong position to enable it to maintain complete control of the Army. Should both the Secretary to the Government of India in the Army Department and the Financial Adviser to the Army Member be supported by their own chiefs, it was quite impossible for the Army Member to get funds to make the Army efficient. When the case had been reviewed in the Army Department, it was sent for the orders of the Army Member. If he still adhered to the opinion he had given as Commander-in-Chief, it THE ARMY IN INDIA 247 was sent to the Governor General for his orders and then dealt with by him, as I have described in the chapter on " The Govern- ment of India." If any fresh matter had been brought out by the criticism in the Army Department, which induced the Army Member to change his mind, the case was dropped. Since the outbreak of this War the undue interference of the Finance Member and the Governor General has, I hear, ceased. The heads of branches of the Headquarters Staff has, there- fore, two distinct functions, viz., (a) that of ascertaining from the Commander-in-Chief whether proposals which one of them may deem advisable are, prima facie, in accordance with his views, and should be discussed further, and (b) the subsequent working out and elaboration of such proposals, with a view to further consideration from the Finance and Army Department point of view, before final submission to the Army Member. Two criticisms have been advanced against this system : they are (a) that the Commander-in-Chief cannot without either binding or stultifying himself desire one of his chief Staff Officers to consider from the purely military and technical point of view a question which will necessarily demand further con- sideration from the point of view of his financial and political advisers ; and (b) that one of his chief military advisers must not ask his opinion as the highest military authority in the country as to whether he thinks a question should be taken up, because, if he agrees to its being examined in its purely military and techni- cal aspect, it will eventually come before him, as Army Member, to be again examined in its wider financial and political aspect. Were these criticisms legitimate one would be forced to the conclusion that an officer in the position of the Commander-in- Chief must be held incapable of differentiating between the military and administrative aspects of a case, and that he cannot hold an open mind till it has been examined in all its bearings. I have always considered myself fully capable of looking at such matters from both points of view. There is nothing to be gained by time and labour being spent in branches in working out military proposals before ascertaining whether they would commend themselves to the Commander- in-Chief, who in giving sanction for the examination of any proposal put forward does not in the least pledge himself to accept it afterwards as Army Member. The rejection in one capacity of a proposal approved conditionally in another is no 248 INDIAN STUDIES real anomaly. It is the outcome of the duality of functions, which comes into the experience of most senior officers, especially in India. As Resident at Aden I had sometimes, in my political capacity, to reject proposals which as General Officer com- manding the troops I had accepted. The same is the case with the Governors of Gibraltar and Malta. It is the same with the many brigade commanders who officiate in command of divisions, or regimental commanders who do so as brigade commanders. There must be very few officers who have not found that proposals which they strongly supported in the junior rank have had to be rejected by them in the higher, for the very good reason that they then come under the consideration of a staff which examines their merits from a higher standpoint, thus bringing to notice considerations of the highest importance, which have previously been outside the scope of their outlook. Again it has been said the office work entailed on the Commander-in-Chief and Army Member was so great that he was always at his desk. I did not find this so. The office work took me, on an average, one hour daily. How long it takes depends, of course, on the man. Some men will trust no one, and attempt to do everything themselves, which results in the short-circuiting of orders and in general confusion, in which the individual re- sponsibility of the heads of autonomous departments is lost sight of. Men who work in this way are quite impossible in the command of modern armies. The general commanding a large body of troops cannot, at any time least of all in war encumber himself with minor details, although their consideration and proper arrangement may be often of the very highest importance. Apart from the fact that the mental and physical powers of no man are equal to such a task, the comprehensive supervision of the forces under his command would suffer should he devote himself to working out all his plans and policies in detail. He must consequently have assistants, who form his staff, and the work of each department must be co-ordinated by someone. That, in modern armies, is done by the Chief of the General Staff. Previous to the re-organization of the Headquarters Staff by the late Lord Kitchener, the executive work of the Army alone was under the Commander-in-Chief who was responsible for the success of military operations. He was an extraordinary member of the Governor General's Council. THE ARMY IN INDIA 249 Army administration and finance were under the command of another officer of less experience and lower rank. Under him were all the administrative departments of the Army, except the Adjutant General's, Quartermaster General's, and the Medical Department, which formed the Staff of the Commander- in-Chief. This officer was called the Military Member, and was an ordinary member of the Executive Council of the Governor General, but his position was purely a civil one, and he was supposed to exercise no military command. He was in no way responsible for the success or failure of field operations. It was a queer situation. If the Army took the field it was under the command of one officer, while all its auxiliary services in peace time were under another, who, though supposed to exercise no military command, even in war retained considerable control over them. There was no co-ordination of work, which was consequently carried on without method. There were no plans of campaign worked out in time of peace ; no mobilization arrangements were made till war was in sight ; no useful intelli- gence regarding a probable enemy was collected. On the out- break and during the continuance of war all was confusion, both in the field and at Army Headquarters. One has only to read the account of the Afghan War of 1878-80, or the Tirah Campaign of 1897, the only two on a large scale carried out under this system, to see that this was so. What occurred in Mesopotamia was not the result of the system introduced by Lord Kitchener, but of the refusal of the Govern- ment of India and Secretary of State to provide funds for the effectual up-keep of the Army in peace so that it would be efficient for war, of their interference with the rules under which promotions were made and of the neglect of the then Commander- in-Chief and the Government of India to act in accordance with Lord Kitchener's system. But perhaps the worst feature of the old system, which Lord Kitchener destroyed, was that both the Commander-in-Chief and the Military Member were the military advisers of the Govern- ment of India, and between them and their respective depart- ments there was continual friction, which varied in degree according to their respective personalities ; the general result of this was that the Army suffered and also that sedition was encouraged, as it always is in India, when there is enmity between high British officials. 250 INDIAN STUDIES As everyone knows, Lord Curzon opposed Lord Kitchener's reorganization on the grounds that, if it were sanctioned, it would result in a military despotism in India ; but, from what I have said, it will be quite apparent that it did nothing of the kind. The fact was that as is often the case with politicians- Lord Curzon failed to differentiate between the command and control of the Army ; the former is the soldiers' business, the latter, that of the Government. Others more correctly appraised the financial starvation of the Army that would result from practically placing the Finance Member in charge of military administration and for this Lord Kitchener was in no way responsible. He recommended, as part of his reorganization, the formation of an Army Finance Branch of the Headquarters Staff, to administer under his control the annual grant for the up-keep of the Army, which, however, he was careful to state should be spent and audited under the rules of the Government of India Finance Department. This would have put Indian Army Finance on the same footing finance is on at the War Office. This part of Lord Kitchener's scheme, however, was not accepted by the Secretary of State for India. The result was that the Finance Member of the Governor General's Executive Council obtained complete administrative control of Army Finance in its most minute details. He, supported by the Governor General and the Secretary of State, starved the Army during the time I commanded it, to a greater extent than had ever been done before ; in fact, between them they bled it white. The detachment of the Finance Member's Department sitting in Army Headquarters took up the position of mere critics and controllers of the Army from the view of the Finance Department of the Government of India. They regarded all expenditure on the Army as " showing no remunerative return," and so they financially starved it, oblivious of the fact that the remunerative return of the Army is the security of the country. They criti- cized military proposals from the military point of view, they never aided the Army by giving the military authorities sound financial advice, or by their co-operation. Their one object was to curtail all military expenditure. The sanction of all expenditure was centralized in the Finance Member and the Army was strangled by financial red tape. This state of affairs continued till its result was brought to the THE ARMY IN INDIA 251 notice of the British public by events in Mesopotamia. It then, I hear, ceased under pressure of English public opinion, since which there have been no complaints of military inefficiency. Shortly before I left India, in my final endeavour to remedy this financial oppression, I reported the state of affairs to the Government of India in the following words, which are a para- phrase of those used by the Esher Commission some years before, when the Army in England suffered similarly : " The Army Department is divided into two camps whose occupants regard one another with mutual suspicion. The responsibility of the military heads has been rendered almost nominal, except in time of war, when the Finance Branch is effaced as a controlling power. The Finance Member has been led to give decisions on partial presentment of cases. The members of the Finance Branch, not contenting themselves with purely financial criticisms and the framing of estimates, have acquired the habit and claim the right of freely expressing their opinions on questions of military policy." There was then no settled system of financing the Army, which lived from hand to mouth, and this was not conducive to economy in peace and decidedly promoted extravagance in war. Military administration was confused and action delayed, while military efficiency decreased in proportion to the increase in unfulfilled demands. When the demands of the military authorities were so obvious that they could not be refused outright, they were sanctioned by the Government of India and Secretary of State " when funds were available." Some of these had been sanctioned two years before I assumed command, yet the funds had not been made available when I left India. In this way each Governor General and Secretary of State bequeathed an immense burden to his successors. The entire power of finding funds when a policy was favoured and suggesting difficulties when it is not was in the hands of the Finance Member. The promotion and discipline of the British officers of the Indian Army were supposed to be carried out in conformity with the rules of the British Army as directed in the Army Act, Royal Warrants and the King's Regulations. The Secretary of State for India is empowered to make such subsidiary regulations as he thinks necessary to suit Indian conditions, provided they do not interfere with the letter or spirit of those I have mentioned. 252 INDIAN STUDIES The Commander-in-Chief is the constitutional adviser of the Government of India in regard to them. It is supposed to accept his advice, subject to the approval of the Secretary of State, who only interferes should procedure be wrong. Under the Rules of Business, framed under Section 8 of the Indian Councils Act of 1861, the Governor General of India had long constituted him- self the " Government of India " in this connection, and dealt personally with the Commander-in-Chiefs recommendations, which he usually accepted. After I had been about two years in command the then Secretary of State began to issue instruc- tions which were directly opposed to the King's Regulations and the custom of the War Office, which struck at the root of discipline and brought promotion under a system of seniority regardless of efficiency. It then became impossible for me to get rid of inefficient officers. Even disgraceful offences, which happily were very rare, were treated with undue leniency. It is not profitable to go into such matters further but I must give an example of a case regarding promotion which occurred just before I retired, and is typical. There was a Brigadier General who had been four times superseded by my predecessor for inefficiency. I agreed with his reasons for doing so, and twice recommended this officer's supersession, my recommendations being accepted. The second time I did so he appealed to the Secretary of State, who rejected his appeal and concurred in what I had done. I then thought the case had ended. Not so, how- ever. The Secretary of State sent me through the Governor General, who had previously agreed with me as to the officer's supersession, a request to withdraw my objections to his promo- tion to Major General. I indignantly refused to do so. The Secretary of State then himself recommended this officer to His Majesty for promotion, when, to my astonishment, I saw him gazetted as Major General. He shortly afterwards retired with an increased pension of 100 in virtue of his promotion to that rank. The then Secretary of State originated the system of com- manding the Indian Army from London, which reached its climax in the Mesopotamia Campaign, and judging from the Report of the Mesopotamia Commission he used the Military Department of the India Office as his Headquarters Staff, regardless of the Council of India, which is, however, equally ill-adapted for such work. The Mesopotamia Commission says : " There is a Mili- tary Department of the India Office under the authority of the THE ARMY IN INDIA 253 Secretary of State for India and with whose control and advice he controls and decides the military policy of India, but this department is not organized for the purpose of directly managing a campaign. It was, however, through the instrumentality of this department that the Mesopotamia Campaign was started." Even the House of Commons failed to perceive this irregularity. I believe it was said in it that the Secretary of State for India who originated this unfortunate campaign was guided by the advice of his constitutional military advisers, but the Report of the Mesopotamia Commission is not in agreement with this statement, and says (vide page 3) : ' The other persons responsible were . . . the Military Secretary at the India Office (Sir Edmund Barrow), the Secretary of State for India (Mr. Chamberlain), we put these names in the order and sequence of responsibility ... we do not attach any share in the responsibility for the advance on Baghdad to the Councils of the Secretary of State and the Viceroy, as we have been unable to ascertain from the evidence laid before them that the advance on Baghdad was ever brought before them in such a manner as to enable them to give their personal advice and opinion upon it." The Secretary at the Military Department of the India Office is not and never has been the Constitutional military adviser of the Secretary of State for India. As I have already said in the chapter on the India Office, the bill introduced into Parlia- ment to make him so was wisely rejected by the House of Lords, notwithstanding which their decision does not appear to have been accepted by the Secretary of State. Probably it was for this reason that Sir Edmund Barrow was subsequently acquitted of all blame in the matter. The same disregard of constitutional procedure seems to have occurred at Army Headquarters, India, and in the Government of India. The Mesopotamia Commission says in reference thereto : ' There were indeed almost daily meetings of the chief military officers at Simla, but we have no evidence to show that there was ever a free discussion of the dangers and difficulties of the advance on Baghdad. Sir Fenton Aylmer, at that time Adjutant General, did hear a conversational reference made by the Commander-in-Chief to the Chief of the General 254 INDIAN STUDIES Staff upon the subject at one of the daily meetings of the Head- quarters Staff. He at once expressed his apprehensions at such a move, but no notice was taken of his objections." Had constitu- tional procedure been observed at Army Headquarters, the question of the advance on Baghdad would have been fully dis- cussed at the Advisory Council, whose proceedings would have gone through the Army Department to the Governor General in Council. The Governor General in Council would then have had all the arguments for and against it before him and probably the calamities incurred would have been avoided. Only a couple of years previously I had worked out a plan of campaign for such an eventuality as the occupation of Basra, and gave reasons for all I said therein. I put the necessary minimum force at one cavalry brigade and two infantry divisions, with artillery in sufficient quantity to enable it to meet a foe organized on modern lines ; I said in addition to the cavalry brigade and two infantry divisions, it was necessary to hold in reserve a full division mobilized in Bombay, with shipping ready, so that it could embark at a moment's notice if required, but in detailing this force no advance beyond Basra was contemplated. Had the question been brought before the Advisory Council, the Policy File would have had this on record. I can hardly believe that either the Advisory Council or Government of India would have accepted the proposal of the General Officer Commanding in Mesopotamia, that a weak division should be sent to Baghdad with no reserve immediately available, had they been aware of what I said regarding the occupation of Basra. The Mesopotamia Commission attributed the failure in Mesopotamia to what they called Lord Kitchener's Dual System. I have no hesitation in saying that the Mesopotamia Commission was absolutely wrong in attributing the failure in Mesopotamia to Lord Kitchener's System. It was caused by the Commander- in-Chief in India failing to adhere to the rules of procedure laid down by Lord Kitchener, and by the Governor General and Secretary of State failing to see that he did so, but most of all it was caused by the Secretary of State's action in commanding the Army in India from the India Office. The state of the Army itself was due to a regime of pacifists, who refused funds to keep it efficient and treated the repeated warnings of myself and my Staff with scorn. THE ARMY IN INDIA 255 Since the calamity in Mesopotamia occurred new men have replaced those who caused it ; we now hear no complaint regard- ing Lord Kitchener's System, which has in no way been changed, so far as I know, except that the financial oppression under which the Army laboured has been removed, which is sufficient proof that there is nothing wrong with that system. I will not refer to the British portion of the Army in India. It is a detachment of the Home Forces lent to India, which defrays its cost and administers it on lines laid down by the War Office. The Indian Army when I left India in 1914 that is the part of the Army in India which is composed of native soldiers consisted of light artillery, cavalry, sappers and miners, infantry, and some few technical units, such as wireless telegraph com- panies. There was no air force, although I had long asked for funds to enable me to establish one. The number of the units of each arm can be seen in the Army List of January, 1914. They have since been much increased, but I do not know how they now stand, and, even if I did, it would not be permissible to publish it. Nearly all units and the scanty army reserve were much under strength, " for financial reasons." The units of all arms, except as regards the number of men in each, which was much less, were organized on the model of British troops of the same arm. Sappers and miners and pioneers were organized in the same way as battalions of infantry. The cavalry is maintained under two systems, viz., the Silla- dar, or irregular, which is peculiar to India, and the non-Silladar, or regular, which is that of all European armies. Only three cavalry regiments are maintained on the non-Silladar system. The remainder of the cavalry is on the Silladar system, under which the Government only supplies the soldier with his rifle and ammunition ; the rest of his equipment, including his horse and house, he provides himself, and, in addition, every two men are obliged to keep a pony or mule between them to carry grass or as regimental transport as may be required. A groom is paid by Government to look after the pony or mule, also to help to groom the troop horses and to act as servant to the troopers. The pay of the soldier is supposed to cover the cost of his equipment, the feed of his horse, and of half the mule or pony, and to 'leave him sufficient money to keep himself and his family. 256 INDIAN STUDIES The cost of horse, house, equipment, etc., varies in different regiments from about Rupees 400 to Rupees 500, because of differences in uniform and the class of horse. In order to provide the men with regimental necessaries of all kinds, there is a regimental fund run on co-operative lines, which is managed, under the orders of the commanding officer, by a committee of British and Indian officers, on whose com- mercial ability the price of all necessaries, from a horse to a horse-shoe, depends. Some of these regimental funds are managed with wonderful ability and on their management the sum which the soldier receives as pay depends. Some funds are richer than others, either because they have had a better start, or are better managed. For example, the nth (King Edward's Own) Lancers realized a large amount of prize-money in the China War of 1862, which it invested, on the part of its regimental fund, in waste land, which it reclaimed. This land has since come within the range of canal irrigation, so its value has increased greatly. Some of it is let out to Zamindars and the remainder used as a horse-breeding farm, thus horses are bred pretty cheaply, and the fund also realizes a good revenue. When regiments have an affluent fund, recruits are more readily obtained. Theoretically, every reciuit joining is supposed to bring with him money enough to pay the initial cost of his outfit, and subsequently to subscribe about Rupees 5 monthly, as long as he serves, for its up-keep. In practice, few can afford to bring such a large sum ; the greater number can only provide a portion of it ; some nothing at all. The portion the greater number bring on joining varies from Rupees 200 to Rupees 250. The difference between the sum the recruit provides and the cost of his outfit is advanced from the regimental fund and repaid by the soldier by monthly instalments deducted from his pay ; the amount of the deduction on this account varies in different regiments. Such instalments are paid in addition to the monthly subscription for up-keep of outfit. As long as the soldier con- tinued under the obligation to pay the instalments on the money advanced to him, he was often very badly off, and had to deprive himself and his family of many of the necessaries of life. This is not the fault of the system, which is in itself a good one, but of the Government in riding it to death " for financial reasons," without paying any regard to the fact that in recent years all THE ARMY IN INDIA 257 articles of equipment have more than doubled in price, while the cost of horses has increased even more, so that the pay of the trooper is quite inadequate to meet his expenses and allow him a living wage. The cost of feeding the soldier's horse and half his mule or pony was long years ago estimated at Rupees 13^ per month. This estimate is now much exceeded, but the Government relieves the soldier by paying him as compensation the difference between the actual and estimated cost. It is the same with his ration. When the price was fixed, years ago, it cost Rupees 31 a month. To-day it is much more expensive, so Government pays the soldier the difference. Had this been done in the case of his outfit, it would have been only fair, and instead of many troopers being half starved they would have been well off, but, for financial reasons, the Government of India considered that this could not be done. The Silladar system, per se, is very popular with the classes to which the cavalry soldiers belong. The men themselves, who are yeomen, take a great pride in being the owners of their horses and equipment, the value of which they receive from the regimental fund on discharge. It is the cheapest method of raising cavalry in the world, but it is quite impossible, owing to the increased price of every- thing, to work it satisfactorily except the pay of troopers be increased to about forty-five rupees, or three pounds a month, which would of course involve a proportionate increase in the pay of other ranks ; surely three pounds a month is not a high price for a cavalry soldier, mounted and equipped. Besides the regular cavalry, separate detachments are main- tained as bodyguards for the Governor General of India and the Governors of Bombay, Madras and Bengal. They are, respec- tively, of the strength of about a squadron, and are under the control of those officials. Except, perhaps, as a reserve, if those functionaries will spare them when wanted by the military authorities, they are useless as soldiers, being insufficiently trained, as they are used for ceremonial purposes alone. These high officials, in former days, travelled by road through dis- turbed districts. Nowadays their journeys are mostly confined to the railway. It seems curious, that, when such energetic demands were perpetually made for the reduction of military expenditure, these body-guards have been allowed to continue. They are magnificently mounted, clothed and housed. The 258 INDIAN STUDIES expense of their maintenance is much higher than that of any other Indian cavalry unit. They are not the only pseudo- military bodies attached to the households of these satraps, who also kept up strong bands composed of ex-British soldiers. This is an extravagance for which there is no excuse ; if these officials require bands and body-guards for ceremonial occasions, they could get them temporarily, when required, from the nearest garrison. The light artillery of the Indian Army is pack artillery, mis- named mountain. The guns were supposed to be quick-firers, but were not so when I left India ; they are carried on mules, because they are for work over terrain which does not admit of the use of wheels. The cavalry soldiers' equipment in peace-time is renewed as required from time to time by the regimental fund, but all losses in the field are made good by Government. Many of the classes from which the non-Silladar cavalry are recruited such as Dekkani Musalmans and Rajputs of Raj- putana, are too poor to enlist under the Silladar system, which is the cheaper of the two to Government ; therefore, it was proposed to abolish it. This I strongly resisted because to do so would have excluded these classes from military service as they will not enlist in any other arm than cavalry regarding it as infra dig. to do so. Under both systems service in the cavalry is hereditary in some of the best families of the warlike classes, so the starving of the ~ "Silladar system and the bad pay given to the men on the regular system were having the worst political effect. The pay of the men under each of these systems is different, for in one he has to supply himself with everything, while in the other he is supplied by Government. The following is the pay of each rank under both systems. A rupee was one shilling and fourpence, at the then rate of exchange, but it has since in- creased, and the higher its value the greater is the loss to the Indian soldier, much of whose equipment comes from abroad. There are sixteen annas in a rupee, and twelve pies in an anna. Non-Silladar. Risaldar-Major Rs. 230 per month The senior Indian officer. Risaldar 180 corresponds to Captain. THE ARMY IN INDIA 259 Resaidar Rs. 140 per month corresponds to Captain. Jemadar 68 corresponds to Lieu- tenant. Duffadar 29 Sergeant. Lance-Duffadar 24 corresponds to Lance- Sergeant. Sowar i 4 J n Trooper. Silladar Cavalry. Risaldar-Major Rs. 300 per month Risaldar 250 Risaidar 150 Jemadar 80 Duffadar 45 Lance-Duffadar ,, 40 ,, Sowar 34 There are a few staff appointments available to men of cavalry regiments which carry small additional pay. There are also decorations which carry money rewards, but both only affect very few. To lessen the cost of the Silladar system to itself, the Govern- ment of India took, in 1905, to giving each regiment a grass farm. This no doubt saved the Government some money but it greatly reduced military efficiency because it takes half the time of a British officer and the whole of the time of an Indian officer, two non-commissioned officers and some forty men to look after the regimental grass farm doing which adversely affects their military training. The methods adopted in regard to horse-breeding by the Government of India have resulted in either killing the indigen- ous breeds or replacing them by inferior ones which I attribute mainly to injudicious crossing. Anyway, we know that over one hundred years ago the Army in India was horsed by Indian- bred horses and a small percentage of Arabs. When I left India it was not possible to mount one British cavalry regiment on Indian-bred horses, and none could be found fit for the artillery. As the Indian cavalry horse is required to carry less weight than the British, the Silladar cavalry can, to some extent, mount itself on Indian-bred horses, but, in the main, both it and British 17* 26o INDIAN STUDIES cavalry and artillery are dependent on imported horses, mostly from Australia, which of course greatly increases the cost oi mounting these arms. During recent years the price of both Indian-bred and imported horses has greatly increased, and that of the latter has, during the last twenty-five years, increased by seventy-five per cent. The artillery, sappers and miners, pioneers and technical troops are paid at about the same rate as infantry. Pioneer battalions, however, often take contracts for non-military work such as road-making by means of which they earn extra money as well as obtain useful practical training. These arms are raised on the regular system, much in the same way as troops at home, and receive both uniform and equipment from Govern- ment, who also provide them with barracks. The pay of the various grades of sappers, miners, pioneers and infantry is as follows : Subadar-Major Rs. 150 per month. Company Commander or Subadar ,, 100 ,, ,, Company Lieutenant or Jemadar ,, 50 ,, ,, Sergeant or Havildar 18 ,, ,, Corporal or Naik ,, 16 ,, ,, Sipahi or Private ,, n ,, There are also some staff appointments and decorations, to which extra pay is attached, but they only affect the few. Battalions are organized into eight companies, each commanded by a Subadar, assisted by a Jemadar. These are again organized into four double companies, each commanded by a British officer, with another as subaltern. When I left India there were five different establishments for battalions of infantry, varying in strength from 912 of all ranks to 600, and each had a reserve varying from 250 to o. Most of the latter were old, worn out and ill-paid, and consequently underfed. They received only about Rs. 3, or 4 shillings a month, but when called up they received the same pay as men in the ranks. The sanctioned strength of the reserve was then very low but I never could get sufficient funds to maintain it at a greater strength than about two-fifths of what was supposed to be its strength. With some few exceptions, infantry battalions composed of men of the same races or castes are linked together in groups of THE ARMY IN INDIA 261 three battalions. The Link System has in the past supplied the Government of India with an excellent reason for reducing the Reserve. Under it internal defence units have been used to fill up deficiencies in units mobilized for service, oblivious of the fact that doing so has frequently rendered the internal defence unit inefficient for the task allotted to it, which in India may be of as great importance as that of the unit it is called upon to fill. All units are usually much under regulation strength, owing to recruits, men on leave, in hospital, etc. Some years ago, in the Madras Presidency, a very serious local insurrection broke out. The Civil authorities called sud- denly for the services of a battalion ; one quartered in the local area with an establishment of 600, was selected and ordered to turn out as strong as possible to suppress it. Only a few over 100 men turned up ! Soldiers were enlisted for three years from the date of attesta- tion, but with the option of serving on to eighteen years. When they completed this term they were granted a small pension, that of a private being only five shillings and fourpence a month. There was an increase with each step of rank, but the pension, especially in the Indian officers' grade, was quite insufficient. Recruits took on an average about ten months to complete their training, after doing which they were attested. Attestation is the form of oath administered to every Indian soldier on taking which he agrees to serve His Majesty the King- Emperor faithfully by land or sea in any part of the world. The ceremony is a very solemn one ; the soldier swears fidelity on the sacred book of his religion, under the regimental colours, on a full dress parade. Should he be of a religion, such as the Hindu, which has no sacred book suitable for such a purpose, he takes the oath according to the form most binding to him. Indian soldiers are enlisted from agricultural classes, of warlike races only, except in the case of about half a dozen special batta- lions, which were used for internal defence or against a foe who was not very formidable, such as Somalis, or other peoples who are badly armed. In the chapter on the villages I have said that smiths, carpenters and such classes of mechanics arc menials. When such were required for military purposes they were enlisted as " specials," and could not be mixed as combatants with their superiors ; who would not willingly serve alongside them. 262 , INDIAN STUDIES " Lines " is the name by which the Indian soldiers' barracks are known. They consist of a double row of huts, facing one another, with a road between them, for each squadron or com- pany. The houses of the Indian officers are on each flank. There is a separate row for married men. Jn some regiments such as Ghurkas almost all the men are married, so the huts in the lines are arranged with a small compound in front and the men and their families live together there being no special row for married men. In regiments enlisted in Northern India the accommodation for families is usually fixed for about five per cent, of the strength. Excluding Ghurkas, the better the classes from which the Army is enlisted the fewer are the men who bring their families to trie lines. Pathans, men of the Punjab and the northern parts of India rarely do so ; those enlisted in the Bombay Presidency do so in larger, numbers, while those in Madras do so for as many as they can find accommodation, which is provided on a more liberal scale in lines in Southern India. The lines except those in Baluchistan and a few other recently annexed provinces where they were built by Govern- ment have been mostly erected by the labour of the soldiers themselves ; line building is a most distasteful work, and un- dignified in the eyes of most warlike races. Government paid a small and totally inadequate sum for building materials and up- keep. Lines were so badly built and so fragile that many of them usually fell down on the first shower of rain. The soldiers then, after much loss of kit and some danger to life, had to patch them up in the best way they could ; they were really quite unfit for human habitation. In the Silladar cavalry the men provided their own and as they could not afford either to build new lines or to properly repair those already in existence they were, if possible, in a worse state than those of other arms of the service. The result was that the hovels in which the Indian soldiers lived were insanitary, dangerous to life and disgraceful to Government. I have no words to describe the filthy and dilapidated condition of some of them, many had no windows or doors, and the roofs were so low one had to crawl on the hands and knees to get into them. I resolved many years ago if I ever had the chance to provide the soldiers with lines fit for habitation by human beings which they had not had from the time I entered the Army. As a regimental officer, as a THE ARMY IN INDIA 263 staff officer and as a general officer, my representations on the subject had been completely ignored. When I became Com- mander-in-Chief this was among the first questions I took up. After much writing and opposition from the Finance Department I got the Government of India to acknowledge that the existing state of affairs was unsatisfactory and should be discontinued. I proposed that new lines for both cavalry and infantry should be built on a decent pattern and kept in repair by Government, and I submitted plans and estimates of the cost. After much quarrel- ling over the cost my plans were eventually accepted but the Finance Department refused to agree to the floors being boarded, so the Indian soldiers' new lines have earthen floors, which make it impossible to keep them clean, and they are unhealthy in consequence. Another typical decision of the Finance Department, concurred in by the Government of India, which I was obliged to accept was as follows : they said which was quite true that the Silladar System contemplated that the men should provide their own houses and they contended that if they got them free it would be a blow to that system which would be against the policy of the Government of India. They therefore insisted that it should be maintained intact and that the only way this could be done, if the lines were built and repaired by Government, was by charging rent for them I They couldn't extract any rent which would bear comparison with the cost of the buildings, to have done so would have completed the ruin of the Silladar soldier. But they were determined to have something out of him towards the " reduction of military expenditure." After much battling, cross references, and strife, they agreed to accept a rent of eight annas, for they saw it was impossible to extract any more. Eightpence a month from the pittance of each cavalry soldier ! In the old lines it was impossible to maintain well-regulated military discipline. In the new, this has been arranged for. In the cavalry and infantry respectively, troop or section rooms are arranged for, with separate quarters for the non-commissioned officers from which they can supervise their men. In case of alarm the men turn out in organized units instead ofv-as of y 0re like rabbits running out of their burrows. The rate at which the new lines were being built when I left India was much too slow ; the Government of India, which un- hesitatingly forked out 5,000,000 as a commencement of its 264 INDIAN STUDIES building operations at New Delhi, and were at the same time spending lakhs of rupees in erecting a Council Chamber as an annexe to the Viceregal Lodge at Simla, had only a small sum available, " owing to financial reasons," for removing the long- standing disgrace to its name caused by the way it housed its soldiers. The housing of the Indian Army demands immediate atten- tion. The Government of India should be forced to press on with the utmost speed the building of new lines to replace all the old ones still in existence. The Mesopotamia Committee attributed much sickness to the Indian soldiers' ration. They are right, and I will explain fully all about the ration, but I think the question of the lines is even more important, both politically and in respect of the health of the Army. In the China Field Force in 1901 there was a bad epidemic of tuberculosis in the 4th Ghurkas. Many soldiers died ; many more were invalided. I held a medical inquiry into its cause. The medical officers attributed it to the over-crowded and in- sanitary condition of the regimental lines in India which had predisposed the men to this disease. I sent a full report to Army Headquarters but no one there took the slightest notice of it. In each set of the old lines there is a Quarter-Guard, Armoury, Quartermaster's store and hospital, built by Government. Although these buildings were not very pretentious, their con- trast with the surrounding squalid, dirty, insanitary and tumble- down huts in which the rank and file lived, made their scandalous condition more apparent to the ordinary passer-by. The houses of the Indian officers were in but little better con- dition than those of the men. Regimental lines should have offered a splendid opportunity of spreading the principles of sanitation among the villages. Their sanitary condition was so bad that this opportunity of inculcating sanitary principles was lost but that the new lines will do so I have no doubt. There were no decent schoolhouses in the lines, and the system of education in the Indian Army was disgraceful. The highest pay of a schoolmaster- qualified to teach English is i 135. 4d. a month, while the highest pay of one without a knowledge of English is i 6s. 8d. Even at this wretched pay, so small is the clerical establishment allowed to native regiments the accounts THE ARMY IN INDIA 265 of which are complicated and intricate that the schoolmaster is often put for part of his time on duty of some kind or another in the Adjutant's or Quartermaster's office. I tried to get this state of things remedied, but I was not successful although I succeeded in doing a little in that direction. The whole time I was Commander-in-Chief the sole idea was to do things that appealed to the Indian National Congress, Leagues and other political agitators, who take no interest whatever in anything from which they derive no personal advantage. They have no regard for the Army or the peoples from whom it is recruited, because of their consistent loyalty and the contempt in which they hold these bodies ; so I failed. The hospitals in native regiments were long a disgrace to civilization. They were managed on old and obsolete methods. There was no system of dieting, the sick fed themselves on the ordinary ration ; there was no provision of -hospital clothing, or of decent bedding for the sick Indian soldier. There was no operating theatre ; there was no room for segregating infectious cases. The only way this could be done was either to screen off a part of the one long room of which the hospital consisted, or to put such cases outside in all weathers in single fly tents. The hospital was like a British railway station cow-shed. Medical instruments were deficient ; medical comforts were non-existent. During my whole service the same had been the case. My atten- tion had been drawn to the disgraceful state of affairs by medical officers when I was a regimental commandant, a brigade com- mander and a divisional commander. I had frequently through- out my service drawn the attention of my superiors to this dreadful state of affairs, and my reports had been strongly supported by all the medical authorities concerned, but they all resulted in nothing. In 1912, as Commander-in-Chief, after I had had time to collect all the statistics which the Finance Department insisted on before it would listen to any military proposal whatever, I appointed a committee of medical officers, the best and most efficient I could collect out of an efficient corps, to make proposals for the abolition of the obsolete regimental hospital system and the substitution of the modern station hospital one. I was ham- pered by the Finance Department at the very commencement of my attempt to arrange that sick Indian soldiers should get decent hospital treatment. 266 INDIAN STUDIES They made it a condition of any change that the cost should be kept within that of the existing military budget, and should, if possible, show a saving. My committee drew up its report, strongly supporting my recommendations, and showing by figures that they could not be adopted without some small extra cost. I forget the exact amount, but in a case of the kind both humanity and policy dictated the necessity of its being met. When I put my proposals forward for sanction by the Govern- ment of India the Finance Department rejected them on the grounds that it was not the policy of the Government of India to provide the Indian Army with hospital institutions similar to British station hospitals. They therefore blocked the proposal with the support of the Government of India. The result has been bad. What a contrast the Indian soldiers who have been in English hospitals will find when they return home if the state of affairs I left has not been altered ; how they will compare notes with their comrades in India ! At a short distance from each set of lines there is usually one or more places of worship, which have been erected at various times by the soldiers quartered in them. These are either Hindu temples, Musalman Mas j ids, or Sikh Gurdhwaras. After a long struggle, I succeeded in getting the Government to recognize in principle, but only in principle, the necessity of a regimental priest, or priests if a unit was composed of men of more than one religion. Owing to the objections of the Finance Department on the score of economy, which were concurred in by the Government of India and the Secretary of State, it was ruled that no priest would be allowed in cavalry regiments, and only in those infantry regiments in the case of Hindus .and Musalmans where there were not less than three companies composed of men of these .beliefs, and, in the case of Sikhs, where there were not less than Jtwo. It is difficult to understand why the spiritual requirements of two companies of Sikhs were considered equivalent to those of three of Hindus or Musalmans, or why those of the cavalry were considered as of no account. These authorities also decided that for only twenty-one infantry battalions in the whole army would a priest be allowed. Now economy is all very well, but this kind of economy is detrimental to the best interests of both the Army and Government. If the men are not supplied with THE ARMY IN INDIA 267 good priests they are extremely likely to supply themselves with bad ones, for a priest they will have. The ill effects of bad priests can well be imagined ; although they can be and are kept out of the lines by the Indian officers, they cannot be kept out of the temples by them. The only person who can do this is an orthodox, good priest. The pay sanctioned for priests, when allowed, is altogether ridiculous. For a Musalman or Hindu priest it is ten shillings and eightpence a month (eight rupees) ; for a Sikh, thirteen and fourpence (ten rupees) ; while in status they are classed with menials and other low-caste fol- lowers. Verily ! the Government of India doesn't go in for popularity with those who count, although it is very partial to its few " intellectual children " who don't. It forgets that in an army almost purely mercenary this must be replaced, apart from good pay and treatment, by honour and religion the throne and the altar in mutual support. But the Government of India is without that sane imagination which appeals to Oriental peoples, for its lack of which it suffers greatly in the opinion of the peoples it rules. In cavalry regiments the horses stand between the rows of huts forming the lines. Whenever the trumpet or bugle sounds the Fall-in, the troops of each unit do so in front of the Quarter-Guard, which faces the regimental parade-ground. The daily ration of combatants and non-combatants was fixed in 1845. It was as follows for combatants ; for non-combatants the quantity of flour was half a pound less, and that of clarified butter one ounce less : Flour 2 Ibs. Clarified butter 2 oz. Dhall (which is a pulse) 4 oz. Salt f oz. I have never been able to discover why the appetite of a non-combatant was supposed to be smaller than that of a com- batant. At the time this ration was fixed the Army was com- posed of men who were nearly all vegetarians by religion. Since then, Ghurkas, Sikhs, Pathans, and many others have been enlisted as combatants who are meat-eaters. No one will main- 'tain that this ration is sufficient for them, or even for vegetarians, while that for non-combatants is much too small. The result is to fill the hospitals when as is the case on field service the men's duties are onerous, As I have already said, at the time 268 INDIAN STUDIES when this ration was fixed its cost was calculated to be three rupees eight annas a month ; now it greatly exceeds this sum, and so Government pays the difference to both combatants and non-combatants. This, however, is not full compensation to the soldier for he has to feed his family which is a heavy addi- tional expense, especially to those who do not, for caste or religious reasons, bring them to the lines. Those who do not do so, excluding Ghurkas, are the best soldiers in the army. If the pay be not greatly increased, as it certainly should be, men absent in the field should get separation allowance. In the " Report on India Reforms," paragraph 329, we are told that " the grant of free rations, which in the case of Indian ranks was formerly restricted to those serving in the field, has now been extended to all combatants serving in India . . . while general officers commanding have been authorized to increase combatants' rations in special circumstances." This is not correct. Combatants serving in Baluchistan, Chitral, and some other trans- Indus stations, in peace-time have received free rations for long years, while general officers commanding in the field have always been allowed to increase the ration of combatants in special circumstances, which were, when the climatic conditions of the country in which the troops are serving necessitates doing so in order to prevent disease. The per- mission to increase or vary the ration was, however, surrounded by so many regulations that few general officers were bold enough to act on it. Even so, the situation of non-combatants, always worse than that of combatants, has under the new rules, which only apparently apply to combatants, become compara- tively much more so. I am glad to hear of the other concessions said in this para- graph to have been granted, but it would have been more satisfactory if we had been told exactly what they amount to in money. I have already said that when I was in India the progress in the improvement of soldiers' housing was being made much too slowly ; we are not told whether it has been accelerated. Then, also, the state of the Indian subordinate Medical Department was lamentable. It was so inadequately paid, and the prospects were so bad compared with the civil subordinate Medical Depart- ment, that undue pressure had to be exercised on the students of Government medical colleges to practically force them to join THE ARMY IN INDIA 269 it. This service was actively discontented in consequence a fact which I brought to the notice of the Government, but which it refused to remedy for financial reasons. It was the same with the Stretcher-bearer Corps, for which the small number of men allowed could not be got at the pay sanctioned. It is said in this paragraph that " special measures have been taken to ensure the prompt payment of separation allowance." Does separation allowance here referred to mean what it does in England, or does it merely mean the payment to the family of the soldier in the field of a sum deducted from his pay ? It is welcome news to hear that arrangements have been made to expedite the settlement of soldiers' accounts generally. When I was in India I made many efforts in this direction, but I was not successful in attaining my object, owing to the fearful cir- cumlocution of the Finance Department. I will quote from " 1060, Army Regulations, India," Vol. I., which explains better than anything I can write the delay then caused by the Military Finance Regulations. It ran as follows : " The Govern- ment of India will decide whether the wound or injury rate shall be granted for an injury caused by an accident during action with an enemy ! " An injury pension is at a lower rate than a wound pension. In India men of good class will not mention the names of their wives, daughters', or other female relations to other than their nearest male relations ; nor may these ladies appear before strangers, asking them to do either is a gross insult. Officials of the Army Finance Department (Pay) refused to pay soldiers' female relatives or to record their names as heirs except they either appeared before them or their relatives, acting for them, gave their names. Soldiers would not complain officially because to do so would mean to drag their shame to further public notice. I received privately many remonstrances on the subject from Indian officers who were my friends but I was not able to help them because the Finance Department refused to alter its rules. The only way to obviate the Indian soldiers' objections in a prac- tical way is to appoint retired Indian officers of each caste as pension pay-masters and allow them to pay females what is their due without offending their modesty. There are hundreds of qualified men who have been troop or company pay-sergeants before promotion who could be fully trusted to do this honestly 270 INDIAN STUDIES and without giving offence. Such a proposition the Military Finance Branch would never entertain. They failed even to realize the discontent their methods were causing. The state- ment made in this paragraph regarding the Victoria Cross may lead people to imagine that Indians have only become eligible for it because of this war. This is not so ; they were made eligible for it in 1911, which was announced by His Majesty the King- Emperor at the Delhi Durbar of that date. No Indian before this war had, however, the opportunity of earning it. I regret to hear, as is stated in this paragraph, that " The Indian Army (Suspension of Sentences) Act, 1917, provides that in certain circumstances an Indian soldier sentenced by court martial may be allowed to rejoin military service in a corps or department other than his own while the sentence of the Court remains in abeyance." This order will not be popular in the Indian Army of whose honour Indian soldiers are very jealous. It is not the principle of the order to which they will object, but the way it is carried out. Any sentence by a court-martial of ninety days' imprisonment or over involves dismissal, which is a very unfair rule. The principle could have been carried out by changing it so that no sentence should involve dismissal, which the Court did not clearly decide should form a part of it. To have a soldier doing duty with a sentence of dismissal .hanging over him is not. to the advantage or honour of the Indian Army. The Report also says in this paragraph that special considera- tion to the soldier is given in the Law Courts. This I have always strongly advocated. Indian soldiers enjoyed it before the Mutiny, so it is no new thing. Most of them belong to the lesser yeomanry, and are owners- or shareholders in small farms. They formerly had a right to be heard before other suitors, and, if absent on duty, their case was held up till they could get leave. In India, where the peoples are inordinately given to litigation, this was an enormous boon which many men enlisted expressly to obtain. In the general scramble to attain uniformity the privi- lege was abolished by the Government of India doing which caused extreme dissatisfaction among the warlike classes. The ancient privilege should be restored in full and not during the war only. The Report is not clear as to whether this is so or not. The fact of the matter is that up to the outbreak of this war Indian soldiers of all ranks were badly paid and pensioned ; they were also treated without due consideration by the civil authorities when THE ARMY IN INDIA 271 in their villages, and their ancient privileges were either disre- garded or withdrawn. Whether this state of affairs has been remedied in full or not the Report does not say enough to enable one to judge. I can only say, however, that no private soldier's pension should be less than eight rupees a month after eighteen years' service, no non-commissioned officer's less than twelve rupees a month after eighteen years' service, and no commissioned officer's less than fifty rupees a month after twenty-one years' service, while the pay of all combatant ranks should be raised at least by one-third. The Report, however, says it has been increased twenty-five per cent., which is not enough. The in- crease should be permanent, and not for the war only. British civil and native officials should be obliged to treat Indian officers and soldiers with due respect in their villages. When I was Com- mander-in-Chief Indian pensioned officers, wherever I went, complained of the way they were bullied by petty Civil subordi- nates ; they said British Civil officials did nothing to prevent it, and were not themselves too polite to them. I reported the matter to the Governor General frequently, who issued orders on the subject as frequently ; but, with the exception of a few magis- trates of districts, his orders had no effect. The concession Indian soldiers value most is grants of land. Indian officers value nearly as much assignments of land revenue being made to them. Both greatly increase their izzat. Men from the Punjab were given only nine small grants of land per annum among them when I was in India, which was a quite inadequate number. Soldiers enlisted in other provinces got no grants of land. Large tracts of country have been reclaimed in the Punjab ; on dis- tributing this land soldiers should get the greater part of it and should certainly be given preference over civilians in doing so. Arrangements for grants of land to soldiers in the other pro- vinces which supply recruits to the Army should also be insisted on. Hitherto their local governments have invariably opposed doing so. Regiments of cavalry and- .battalions of sappers and miners, pioneers and infantry, are composed of either men of one class or of mixed classes, in the former the squadrons, companies and double companies are often composed of different sub ^divisions of the caste enlisted, \\hen men of only one caste are enlisted, which is the case in certain units, they are called class ~ regiments or battalions; those which enlist men of different 272 INDIAN STUDIES castes are called class-company or squadron regiments or batta- Jions. Companies of light artillery are composed of men of different castes, as also are technical troops, such as wireless telegraph ^companies, in some of which the soldiers are half British and half Indian. As an example of a class-squadron regiment, I will give the loth (Duke of Cambridge's) Lancers. Its composi- tion is : Sikhs, two and a half squadrons ; Dogras, half a squadron ; Punjabi Musalmans, one squadron, and Pathans, half a squadron. In each class promotions are given in the class itself, and each class is entitled to the promotions due according to its strength in the unit. Take the loth Lancers. Suppose the senior Jemadar is a Pathan, and the next vacancies for promotion to Risaidar occur in the Sikh, Dogra, or Punjabi Musalman troops, then the Pathan Jemadar's juniors of those classes will be promoted over his head ; not because they are better soldiers, but because it is the acknowledged right of one of these classes to the promotion. .It is the same in the class- company or class-squadron regiment as regards the different sub-castes. As long as this system is adhered to all goes well ; when it is not there is always trouble. To British ideas it does not seem just that a good man should be superseded simply because of his birth. Indians take a contrary view. In dealing with them their view has to be considered ; otherwise they think justice is not done when discipline suffers and race-enmity is increased. All Indian soldiers, when they enlist, hope to become Indian officers. To become Risaidar Major or Subadar Major is the baton de marechal, to which all aspired before King's Commis- sions were opened to them. There only being one Risaidar or Subadar Major in each unit, selection for this rank often creates much ill-feeling, leading sometimes to murder. As direct commissions as Indian officers led to supersession of aspirants in the non-commissioned officer grade they were very unpopular. Those who talk of giving them as " great conces- sions " little know the heart-burnings they cause to many war- worn non-commissioned officers whose life-long ambition they not only destroy, but they also cause discontent among all the men of the class of the non-commissioned officer adversely affected. Most of the serious crime in the Indian Army is due to disappointed Hopes STregard to THE ARMY IN INDIA 273 In 1903 Lord Curzon publicly announced that Indians would be made eligible for King's Commissions. The matter was let drop till 1910, when I put forward a scheme for complying with the promise made so long before, and drew it up after private and confidential conversations with some feudatory chiefs holding high military rank and many senior Indian officers, all of whom I consulted separately. They were unanimous in the opinion that the proposals I made would meet the wishes of those concerned. It is no use discussing them now, because the proposal was rejected. It was a great pity this was done, as changes in military organization should be made in peace time This .change had to be made sooner or later, for a Governor General's official promise must be kept ; but it was delayed, for politicians love handing over contentious questions to their successors, and this moral cowardice has necessitated a somewhat difficult problem for those ignorant of India being left for solution during this war. Experienced officers differ greatly as to the relative merits of class-company and class-battalion systems. I have always been of opinion that the class regiment or battalion is the best. If men in a unit are all of the same class and religion, they will eat the same food, which, in the field especially, is of great advantage. Their education and morality can be much more easily guided and one priest administers to all. But even when the men in a unit are of one race the various sub-classes of the same race and religion have as many inbred feuds and cleavages between one another as those of different races and religions so that the system of promotion cannot be changed. It is a point of honour among the warlike classes to keep their internal feuds in abeyance while in the Army, but this does not materially affect their quarrels outside although it mitigates them -to..- a. certain -extent. Service in the Army is certainly as conducive as anything possibly can be to mitigate race hatreds and that it has been so unsuccessful in the Army clearly proves the admonitions made and methods proposed in the " Report on Indian Constitutional Reforms " are most unlikely to succeed in this respect where service in the Army has failed. They will, on the contrary, most certainly aggravate feuds and cleavages, especially by the partial rejection of .caste representation on which military service is,, and ever must be, based for very 18 274 INDIAN STUDIES obvious reasons. What makes the abeyance of feuds possible in the lines is the even-handed justice meted out to all, especially as regards promotion, by British officers. "^jm_jnt!-asj feuds do break out, as is sometimes the case, it is almost invariably because one class thinks the other is favoured ; but so great is the trust in the justice and impartiality of British officers, "that when one class feels it has been unjustly treated, they attribute it, often incorrectly, to Indian officers. Indian officers, in consequence, are occasionally murdered, while the murder 'of a British officer "is very rare. Indian soldiers much prefer serving under British officers, for they refuse to believe those of one Indian race will, or possibly can, deal out even-handed justice to those of another. So bitter are the feuds between even the sub-clans of some races and the sects of religions that they cannot be enlisted in the same units. Hitherto Indian regiments have been commanded by from ten to fourteen British officers under whom Indian officers have served in subordinate command of troops or companies ; and even over these their command has been very limited, for in all matters they are directed and controlled by their British superiors to a much greater extent than captains and lieutenants in the British Army are controlled by their colonels or majors. On some occasions in the field, when the British officers have all been killed, higher duties have fallen temporarily on Indian officers, who have occasionally really commanded larger units than companies or squadrons, and have done it very well ; but, nevertheless, ^Indian military history proves that Indian leaders have ever been inferior to Europeans. It shows that Indian soldiers of inferior military value have, under European leaders, defeated vastly superior numbers of Indian soldiers of the highest military value under Indian leaders. Therefore it is quite safe to say that Indian soldiers under Indian leaders will not have the same military value as they have under British, the best of all European military leaders, and the /most successful in gaining their confidence. Paragraph 330 of the " Report on Indian Constitutional Reforms " says : "... British commissions have for the first time been granted to Indian officers. The problem of commis- sions is one that bristles with difficulties. Government after government have considered and found no practical solution, but the war afforded a convenient opportunity for making a THE ARMY IN INDIA 275 definite break with the past, and a beginning that may be fruitful of large consequences has been made." This is rather vague, and requires considerable explanation for those who wish to understand the question. As I have said, I myself offered a practical solution, which was accepted by the Government of India eight years ago. The question only bristles with difficulties to those ignorant of India, and I can see nothing in the Report which indicates that either British military officers of rank combined with Indian experiences, or senior Indian officers, have been consulted. I think the war is the very worst time that could have been selected for giving a decision on the subject for doing so will upset the Indian Army to a certain extent, which will depend on how selections for commissions are made and on the way the concession is dealt with by the authori- ties. I have seen some chiefs and many Indian officers and sol- diers here in London since the war began who have had war experience in France. Among them were some of those whom I consulted in 1910. A most experienced chief and all these Indian officers and soldiers had changed their views and were unani- mously of opinion, which they gave me confidentially so I can't mention any by name, that this war had clearly proved one thing to them, and that is that an Indian regiment should not be sent into the field without at least a British Commanding Officer. The detrimental effect on the Army of inferior leading can be minimized in many ways without affecting the value of the concession in Indian eyes. I do not mean here Indians of the congresses and leagues type, who are not fighters, but in those of the war-like classes. The authors of the Report say : 'If he (the Indian soldier) is otherwise qualified, race should no more deter him from promotion in the Army than in the Civil Service ; nor do we believe it is impossible to carry this principle into effect without sacrificing military considerations." jiudi-._.a_ remark ignores the root principle which guides the life of all "Indians in consequence of which promotions have been made, in the way I have described, in the Indian Army ever, since the northern races, who are its best soldiers and will strongly resent any change, have been enlisted in.it Take the loth (Duke of Cambridge's Own) Lancers. Ignoring differences of race might lead to the Pathan half troops being commanded by a Sikh, to the Sikh two and a half squadrons being commanded by Pathans, the Dogra half-squadron by Punjabi Musalmans, and the Pun- 18* 276 INDIAN STUDIES jabi Musalman half-squadron by Dogras. Everyone, with even a rudimentary knowledge of these castes, knows full well that were such a thing attempted, it would le.ad to murder and would destroy discipline and with it the efficiency of the best part of the Army. It may be said that this would not be so if all ' races, instead of being kept in distinct units, were mixed up together promiscuously. In that event the state of affairs would be infinitely worse for the best of 'the war-like classes would not enlist on such conditions. They will not consent to be mixed up with either those with whom they have strong race or caste cleavages, nor will they serve under those they regard as inferior races, which each of the races I have mentioned considers the other to be. The warlike races must be kept in their own units, and therefore race must frequently be a bar to promotion. Ignoring this fact will increase the bad effect of inferior leading. But there is v a Jurther objection to mixing all classes up together. Neither Sikhs or Pathans speak the same language, * while the Sikhs, Punjabi Musalmans and Dogras respectively speak Punjabi of a different patois. The weakening in leadership caused by giving King's Com- missions to Indians must be reduced by being limited to people of warlike classes. It is quite clear to everyone that for political reasons the command of the Army must be mainly in British hands, even " when India is a nation," which it certainly is not at present, if it is to be a part of the British Empire. It is there- fore incumbent on the Government to lay down honestly and at once the limit of the percentage of Indians to whom King's Commissions will be given and also to rule that they shall only be given to those of the classes serving in the Army who may be fit for them in proportion to their numbers. If King's Com- missions be given promiscuously, they will fall in large numbers to the unwarlike classes who are very brave when the enemy is far, but who will fail an premier coup de canon. The warlike classes will be greatly disgusted if commissions are given to the Babu classes, and they will fail under their leading even should they accept it, which they certainly will not do willingly. Besides these military reasons there are social reasons which have almost equal prominence, for if they be not given due consideration, it will not only create ill-feeling, which is non- existent at present, between British officers and Indian officers and the classes to which they belong, but it will preclude the best THE ARMY IN INDIA 277 British officers from serving in the Indian Army and on them its efficiency depends almost entirely. In saying this, I in no way undervalue the Indian officer class, who forms the liaison between British officers and the rank and file and on whom the loyalty of the Indian ranks so very greatly depends. I will say at once that it was owing to my great friendship with Indian officers that I was able to stamp sedition out of the Army when I assumed command of it, and keep it out till I left India. It was in consequence of what they told me that I was able to dis- cover many plots on the part of revolutionaries to sap the loyalty of the soldiers by money and other bribes, and by lies told to the ignorant. I am deeply indebted to them, and they all know very well how I valued and trusted them. Excluding inbred feuds and age-long hatred, which are latent under just British rule, and will not become active as long as it remains just and impartial and favours none at the expense of others, the social relations between the various races of Indians themselves and between them and British officers leaves little room for improvement. It must not, however, be thought that the relations between the various races of the Army and their British officers can be ever quite the same as those which exist between British people themselves. The different Indian races do not maintain the same relations between one another. How- ever friendly they may be, a Sikh, for example, will not main- tain such friendly relations with a Pathan or Dogra as he would with another Sikh, nor will their racial and religious cleavages disappear till ancient feuds are forgotten and there is a com- plete revolution in all the religions of India. Excluding the few who have become declasses, each race and religion fully approves of the others adhering to their respective caste and religious cus- toms, doing which is regarded as perfectly right and proper ; those who abandon them are despised by even the lowest so com- plete social fusion is impossible. The socio-religious customs which keep the different races and religions apart are as follows : Hindus are precluded.. from eating or drinking with or from the hands of those of different castes. Individual exceptions to this rule are to be found in "some Rajputs of Rajputana who, however, only make them in the case of British people, and among some Sudras of high posi- tion such as a few Mahratti chiefs. Hinduized Musalmans adhere to many Hindu caste prejudices and so differ greatly from 278 INDIAN STUDIES Musalmans of the trans-Indus districts and of Central Asia and Arabia, who do. not do so and who do not regard them as co- religionists. No Hindu may eat beef, few may eat meat. .Musalmans may not eat the .flesh of any animal which is not slaughtered in the orthodox way by a Musalrnan. They may not eat pork. Their religion enjoins the slaughter of kine and eating their flesh. Sikhs, although by religion not forbidden to eat beef or pork, rarely do so, and they also adhere to many other Hindu caste customs. All Indians, Parsis, Christians and Brahmo-Somajists excepted, are _ pplygamists by religious sanction. Musalmans are limited to four wives ; Hindus can marry as many as they like ; both can keep an unlimited number of concubines. Polygamy is little practised among the rural classes, for they are too poor and it is an expensive luxury; but" the marriage tie is not as it is with us. Divorce is the simplest of simple matters among Musalmans. Among Hindus, although this is not so when they get tired of one wife, or if she do not bear a son, they simply ignore her existence and take another. Both Hindus, Musalmans and Sikhs keep their women in Purdah. No one can tell except the person concerned and his immediate relatives, whether the lady he calls his wife is so, or is only a concubine. Under such circumstances English ladies do not care to associate with Indian ladies whose social position they do not know, which is not to be wondered at. Except the ladies of one race can freely associate with those of another their men cannot very well do so either. Here, there- fore, the differences in the treatment of women and rules regard- ing food come in, which prevent Indian officers sharing. regimental social liie with British officers. The social life of British regimental officers of Indian regi- ments centres in the regimental mess ; bachelors have nowhere else they can get their meals for there are hotels in only very few Indian stations ; married officers there find the only con- genial society, especially in small stations. Both subscribe to the upkeep of the mess for which Government contributes a small and totally inadequate sum. If an Indian be posted to a regiment, he will not join the mess, for he cannot eat there, and his ladies, even if they so desired, being Purdah, could not go there. Besides the interruption to social life in the mess by the decrease in the number of those belonging to it, which would be caused by posting Indians to the regiment, the expenses of THE ARMY IN INDIA 279 the other members would be increased. British officers of the Indian Army are badly paid. Although their actual pay in pounds compares favourably with that of officers serving at home the latter get furnished quarters and servants free which is not so in India ; horses and forage are much cheaper for officers serving at home while they get much better allowances when travelling or attending camps of instruction. On the whole, the pay of a bachelor regimental officer serving at home compares very favourably with that of one serving in India. While in India the expenses of a bachelor officer are greatly in excess of those of an officer serving at home, those of a married officer are very much heavier ; he has to send his children home to school when they reach a certain age, and in the hot weather neither his children nor his wife can support the great heat of the plains, so they have to go to the hills, thus obliging him to keep up two establishments. Any increase in the expenses of the mess would be much resented. Indian officers know that were they to join the mess, it would be very unpleasant for them to be where their social and religious customs would be liable to be unintentionally offended, and they would much prefer to be in a separate unit of their own. For these reasons, and in conformity with the unanimous opinion of the many Indians I had consulted, I recommended that the necessary number of units should be specially told off and be .eventually officered altogether by Indians. There were certain objections advanced to this by Indians of the warlike classes, who said their people did not wish to serve under Indians of different race or religion, because they could not trust them to deal out that even-handed justice to all which they were accus- tomed to under the command of British officers who were not influenced by either caste or religious cleavages. This difficulty could be got over best by constituting units to which Indian grocers are posted on the class-regiment system ; but even then .there, will be others between the various sub-divisions of the same caste to get over which the Indian officers must be men of specially good tact and discretion. If they be posted to units with British officers the same British Indian Army officer class, hitherto the pick of Sandhurst, will not be forthcoming for the reasons I have given ; it is absolutely essential that the British officers should be of the best. The Indian nobility and gentry will strongly resent the decision that to qualify for a direct commission they must send 28o INDIAN STUDIES their sons to Sandhurst. They strongly object to sending their youths to England at an age when the mind is most plastic for they rightly fear the youths would return having rejected their religion and accepted nothing in its place. They will not appre- ciate such a " concession." With the desire, so frequently expressed in the Report, to do away with caste differences these views will be further reinforced, and I feel quite certain the effect on the most loyal supporters of British rule will be very bad. The decision will most certainly prevent the best classes in India from accepting service in the Army. I believe this con- dition was insisted on by the War Office but I can only conclude it was done in ignorance, for they could not have been actuated by any intention either to make recruiting unpopular or to exclude India's best from the Army. Such a condition is, more- over, quite unnecessary, for Mr. Montagu stated in the House of Commons that there were ample means of giving military training in India. A certain proportion of direct commissions should be offered to the nobility and gentry in British India but the rule making a course at Sandhurst obligatory should be abolished. The scions of families of ruling chiefs should only be offered them in excep- tional cases. Feudatory chiefs having warlike subjects should satisfy their military ambitions in their Imperial Service troops. If they do not maintain them they should not be considered in this respect. Those who do, pay their officers very badly, and, as a rule, only promote them by favouritism which makes service under them unpopular. It is for this reason so many of their subjects prefer service in the British Indian Army. Indian officers who are given King's Commissions should be placed on exactly the same terms as regards entrance examination and examinations for promotions as British officers. For regi- mental officers up to the rank of major English should not be an obligatory qualification ; their entrance and promotion examinations should be in the vernacular. For Staff appoint- ments and for rank of and above that of major, an English qualification is necessary. To make English obligatory to all will mean to exclude many highly educated and most distin- guished Indian officers, and will be really offering a commission with one hand and taking it away with the other. As all British officers, on the Staff and in regiments, know at least the Indian language most prevalent in the Army, there is really no necessity THE ARMY IN INDIA 281 that regimental Second Lieutenants, Lieutenants, Captains and Majors who are Indians should know English. It is, however, of the first importance that the Government should decide at once, and announce that a certain percentage only of commissions will be given to Indians, and also whether the intention is to keep special units for them, or whether they are to be promiscuously mixed up in all units among the British officers. On the 22nd of July, 1918, Mr. Montagu announced in the House of Commons that King's Commissions would be granted to Indians under four categories, as follows : First, a certain number of substantive King's Commissions in the Indian Army will be given to selected Indian officers who have specially distinguished themselves during the present war. To this class the greatest number should go ; they will be young men many of whom have joined the Army in the hope of getting a King's Commission, relying on Lord Curzon's promise. Many of them are well educated and of suitable position, being sons or scions of the country nobility, gentry, or better class of yeomanry, and they are in every way suitable. Some know English, but to make a knowledge of it obligatory will be most unjust to them as a class. In the second category he said : "A certain number of King's Commissions conferring honorary rank in the Indian Army will be given to selected Indian officers who have rendered distin- guished service, not necessarily during the present war, and who, owing to age or lack of educational qualifications, are not eligible for substantive King's Commissions. Such honorary commissions will carry with them special advantages in respect to pay and pension." Here again we come up against the educational qualification. Is no one to be considered educated who does not know English ? Do we consider a Frenchman, Russian, or Italian uneducated because he does not know English ? If it be insisted on that no Indian is educated who does not know English, it will mean rejecting practically all those Indian officers who are the best. I cannot believe such to be the intention. If it be, it is indeed a cruel one. Giving King's honorary commissions in the Indian Army is no new thing. It has been done for years, but they previously carried no special advantages in respect to pay and pension. 282 INDIAN STUDIES I hope the new rules may be made retrospective in regard to the special advantages in this direction now sanctioned. The third category is : ''A certain number of temporary but substantive King's Commissions in the Indian Army to selected candidates nominated partly from civil life and partly from the Army." I presume these are given to Indian officers serving with^new raised troops. Some of these, I have heard, are enlisted from unwarlike classes for internal defence, in which case they may be of some use, but I hope the opportunity will not be taken, " for political reasons/' to introduce permanently into the Indian Army unwarlike classes who are quite useless as soldiers against any formidable or .decently armed foe. " Poli- tical reasons " have caused much harm in the Indian Army before now. I hope they will not be allowed to do so as regards the classes enlisted. The fourth category says : "A certain number of King's Commissions will be given to Indians on qualifying as cadets at the Royal Military College, Sandhurst. For this purpose ten Indian gentlemen will be nominated annually during the war from cadetships." As I have already said, I think, for reasons which I have given making the course at Sandhurst obli- gatory is greatly to be deplored. It is not said by whom aspirants for commissions are to be nominated. I hope this will be left to the Commander-in-Chief in India ; otherwise the nominations will be made for political reasons by the Civil Authorities, and, as I have some experience of these political reasons, I greatly fear the result. I sincerely hope the concession of King's Commissions will not be allowed to interfere with the authority of Commanding Officers of units, or with the system of promotion of Indian ranks prevailing in them. Doing these things has before had disastrous results, and, if they be allowed, will again. No officer should be posted to an Indian regiment without the concurrence of the Commandant. The natives of India serve a master well when he shows himself capable of wielding authority ; but when the substance of his power vanishes and the shadow only remains it is otherwise. The routine system which suits an English regiment, formed of men who from long ages past have by heredity been taught to obey the law, no matter by whom administered, is not suitable to Indians bred to obey the man in whose hands they see THE ARMY IN INDIA 283 authority centred, and him only. Caste and race prejudices cannot be ignored. If, for example, a Hindu or Sikh officer be placed in command of Pathan soldiers, it will surely lead to trouble. I could give a long list of other races and religions whose inbred hatreds are so great that to put men of one under officers of another.would surely mean bloodshed. CHAPTER XV THE INTELLIGENTSIA IT is a common practice among politicians and " authorities " on India to support undesirable innovations by saying they are in accord with the views of the Intelligentsia of India, but they never tell us of whom that class consists I will presume they mean educated people ; but educated people, though few compared with the whole population, are to be found in millions scattered over the length and breadth of the land, and by far the larger number have hitherto been voiceless. There are two classes of educated people, viz. : those literate in various vernaculars and those also literate in English. The former number about 19,000,000, or six per cent, of the population ; the latter about 1,600,000, or a half per cent, of it. Among both are to be found people of all races and of all classes, from prince to peasant. There are about 2,400 distinct tribes or castes who speak about 170 languages, and belong to about forty-five different races, amongst most of which literates are to be found. Some, literate in vernaculars, are highly educated ; others can only read or write in their own script indifferently and have no real education. It is the same with those literate in English : some are highly educated, others can only read or write a letter in that language very indifferently, and their education other- wise is in a very rudimentary state. The best educated caste, both in English and vernaculars, is naturally the priestly class of Brahmins, who number some ten millions, scattered through- out British India, against over one hundred millions of other Hindus and fifty millions of " untouchables." Nearly eighty per cent, of the lawyers, teachers and Govern- ment officials are drawn from Brahmins ; therefore, politically, 284 THE INTELLIGENTSIA 285 they are already in a very strong position. Brahmins jealously guard their privileges, both sacerdotal and civil, and by the aid of their Press extol their own virtues. The wealth of the agri- cultural classes is being slowly transferred to them, for they combine usury with their other vocations. Large numbers of them are Congress politicians, and those who are so are mostly " extremists." One of the most prominent leaders of the Con- gress Brahmins was the chief opponent of India's gift of one hundred million pounds to the war expenses of the Empire. Politician Brahmins can get up any kind of agitation, and keep it going as long as they like. The grant of a parliamentary system to India will simply mean the setting up of a Brahmin oligarchy which will trade on the ignorance of the Hindu masses, and further accentuate the differences between them and other races. History affords an example of what they can do in the way of intrigue by their usurpation of the Mahratti kingdom which was founded by Sivaji, a_Sudra Hindu, from the ruins of Moghul Empire. The only way to counteract the intrigues of politician Brahmins among Hindus and to prevent latent animosity among other races from bursting into activity, is to grant communal repre- sentation, and even doing so will be of no avail if each caste is merely represented according to its numbers, and not according to its political and military value. The Sikhs, for example, are only some three millions yet they are the most warlike race in ,cis-Indus India. The only safe system of representation for India in its present backward state is one by caste on the lines of the Roman constitution, which gave all the people votes, but in separate centuries in which they were classed according to their respective value to the state. It combined the two great objects of constitutional government, viz., the representation of numbers and worth, and it imposed an effectual restraint on the few tyrannizing over the many. For this reason such a system has been strenuously opposed by the Congress-League on the absurd grounds that it would divide the people who are already hopelessly divided. Literates in both English and the vernaculars are divided into two classes one, which forms the vast majority, is composed of the rural people and those who live directly or indirectly on agriculture and the masses of citizens of towns ; the other is composed of a portion of the middle-class English-educated people 286 INDIAN STUDIES of the towns, and of their caste-fellows elsewhere, most of whom are in Government service, in service on the railways, or are lawyers, money-lenders and traders. Each class is actuated by totally different ideals. The rural literates no longer accept, in the unquestioning spirit of other days all the measures con- ceived by their rulers for their benefit. They rightly desire to have a voice in the management of their own affairs, and to be in a position to legally represent their grievances and aspirations to their British rulers, under whose guidance and control they desire to travel along the road to further progress. They recog- nize that, although they have outgrown their childhood, they have not arrived at the full age when they can be advantageously abandoned by the guardian to whom they willingly acknowledge they owe so much. They are, and ever have been, loyal to British rule. Among them arelall the fighting races who have shed their blood for the Sirkar (Government) . in this and previous, wars. ... They feel much just resentment at the way they have been ignored, especially in recent years, during which the views of the small town Congress-League party have alone been considered. They strongly object to the claim of Congress and League literates to represent the views of " united India." They, of course, well know India is not and never has been, united, and it is because it is not so they see that if British rule is weakened anarchy will ensue. They are neither vociferous nor seditious, but, all the same, it is not just or politic to ignore their views. They suffer under many grievances, some of which I have already stated, and they will not meekly consent to these being much longer un- redressed ; nor will they for ever submit to the opinions of the Congress and League being accepted by their rulers as either their opinion or that of " united India." .The time has come to. show them that the reward of their valour is not to go to the jackals, and that the lion's kill will no longer be the jackals' feast. The great majority of town literates, represented by the so- called Indian National Congress and the All India Moslem League, does not wish for British control or guidance. Their sole object is to get rid of the British altogether and rule India themselves. The rural literates pertinently ask : "If the unwarlike Babus of the Indian National Congress and All India Moslem League succeed in getting Home Rule whom will they get to enforce their. orders which we will certainlyjresist.'' The idealsj*of the town literates are governed by thought-currents THE INTELLIGENTSIA 287 generated in the West which are unacceptable to the rural peoples. This party is said by Lord Sydenham to number, at the outside, 250,000, but I think he places them at too high a figure. However that may be, there is no reason, except their vociferousness and sedition, why the ideals of this small town clique should be allowed to outweigh those of the rural masses. The town clique have methods of creating an artificial public opinion which were exposed in The Times of the 2gth of April, 1918 but were long known to everyone in India except perhaps the members of the Government. They own the greater part of the Indian-managed Press ; they are well organized but their organization is not of Indian origin ; it is an exotic which was originated and financed by the late Mr. A. O. Hume, a retired Indian civilian. Since his death it has been greatly assisted by English politicians of the class who are friends of every country but their own. The Congress-League is managed on the lines of the party machine in England, and for many years it has enjoyed the favour of successive Secretaries of State for India and Indian Governments. They are a pseudo-democratic party which, professing democratic ideals, does not act up to them. They are a small minority, who, without a blush, in the best aristocratic style claim to be the spokesmen of the vast majority. With the exception of those who belong to the small and un- influential socio-religious Brahmo-Somaj Society who are opposed to Hinduism and outside its fold, the members of the Indian National Congress have never dreamt of abandoning the caste system ; they practise polygamy, infant marriage, and refuse to allow the remarriage of widows ; they have never done other than oppose social reform when attempted by such prominent Brahmins as Mr. Justice Renade and others ; their civiliza- tion is merely on the surface. They lack a political feeling of duty or rectitude ; they have no knowledge of mankind, and have failed to see that their supremacy can only be attained by force exerted on their behalf by the British whom they wish to get rid of. Under the influence of selfish personal ambition they have freely engaged in seditious propaganda resulting in numerous murders and outrages. Many of the members of the All India Moslem League ignore those tenets of Islam which do not suit their personal con- venience while professing a belief in that faith so that they may pose as its representatives. The object of both these bodies 288 INDIAN STUDIES is to bring British rule into disrepute ; their religious views never interfere with their political objects because Jlindus h^ye, no dogma beyond caste, and the so-called Musalmans of the League "are untroubled by religion ; the League and Congress quarrel over the division of the spoil which they extort from the weakness of their rulers in the way of " conciliation." They are only united in challenging the right of the British to rule India. The Indian National Congress and All India Moslem League combined are divided into " moderates " and " extremists," but there is really little difference between the two. The " extremists " of to-day become the " moderates " of to-morrow. As is usual in such societies, the most violent and outrageous soon acquire ascendancy. When the " extremists " extort a concession from the weakness of Government, " moderates," who get the loaves and fishes, accept it gratefully for a short time ; but those who remain unprovided for quickly become " extremists," and demand further concession, and so the game goes on. The " extremists " of the Congress-League are the only class in India who have consistently endeavoured, since the war began, to embarrass the Government of India in order to secure more personal advantages ; the rest of the population have been consistently loyal. The game goes on merrily ; the " moderates " profess to accept the proposals of the Montagu-Chelmsford Report " gratefully." The " extremists," emboldened by long impunity, demand Home Rule and they will surely attain ascendancy and the more they get the more they will demand. The orthodox of both religions refuse to accept the members of the Congress and League as either Hindus or Musalmans, and in proof they are of neither religion they refer to their leaders. Mrs. Besant, they say, is an European woman, and they ask how can Hindus accept the leadership of a woman and a mlechha (foreigner), to do which is against the principles of Hinduism. In Madras, where Brahmin Congress politicians are numerous and powerful, they have got over the difficulty of accepting the leadership of an European woman by making the ignorant believe that she is an incarnation of an ancient Hindu sage, whose soul is ever working for the good of Hinduism, for which purpose it has been frequently reborn throughout the ages. In one rebirth the sage's soul, they say, committed a sin in expiation of which it was reborn in the body of a Western woman ; but the soul of the sage is the same, and still actuated by the same motives, so THE INTELLIGENTSIA 289 it does not matter in whose body rebirth takes place. This dogma has been accepted by the ignorant, and as direct evidence of its truth, it is pointed out that if it were not so Mrs. Besant could not flout or have attained such influence with the " alien Government " as she has done. Brahmin politicians are espe- cially dangerous, because they can give religious sanction to what- ever they please. Sunni Musalmans point to the fact that the All India Moslem League accepted the leadership of His Highness the Aga Khan, and now that of one Mr. Jinnah, who is one of their prominent leaders. They say, if the All India Moslem League were Musal- mans, they would not accept men of their faith in that position. The Aga Khan is the religious head of the Khoja caste of traders who are governed by Hindu law and Mr. Jinnah is a member of it. About a couple of centuries ago the Khojas, in accordance with the Hindu doctrine of incarnations, accepted Hazrat AH, the son-in-law and cousin of the Prophet Mohammed, as an in- carnation of God. Their descendants to-day accept the Aga Khan in a like position as Hazrat Ali's successor and descendant. They pay him tribute, and consider that the post-mortem advan- tages of doing so are great. Such a doctrine is scarcely conceiv- able among intelligent traders in the twentieth century and is, of course, horribly blasphemous in the eyes of all Musalmans, both orthodox Sunni and sectaries of the Sheia faith. They think his position as religious head of a heretical sect should be well known, for only some few years ago the Bombay High Court decided that the Khojas were governed by Hindu religious law, which is clear proof they are not Musalmans. Yet, in spite of even this decision, which merely reaffirmed what was well known in India, a large part of the English Press and many prominent English politicians and " authorities " on India accept the Aga Khan as a leader of the Indian Musalmans, which they very naturally resent. Educated Musalmans resent the fact that so little of Islam is known in England, where it is not even recognized that Sunnis and Sheias differ from one another in religious belief, and that both consider the Khoja doctrine of incarnations as blasphemous. Both the Indian National Congress and All India Moslem League are small self-constituted coteries of political agitators, neither of which carries any weight in India outside their own small party. The sooner this is recognized the better for the country 19 290 INDIAN STUDIES Most literates in vernaculars are bilingual ; they know both the language of their habitat and that spoken by the majority of those of their own religion. For instance, the language most common in Northern India to Hindus is Hindi and to Musalmans Urdu. Literate Hindus frequently speak Hindi in addition to the language of their habitat, while literate Musalmans frequently speak Urdu in addition to that of theirs. The language question has been a subject of discord between Musalmans and Hindus of the scribe classes since early in the sixteenth century. At that time the accounts of the Moghul Government were kept by Hindu scribe caste officials in the Hindi character. As I have already said, on the Bania (trading caste) Todar Mul being appointed Finance Minister by the Moghul Emperor Akbar, he introduced the Persian character, in which Urdu is written, and his co-religionists were thus obliged to learn the Court language of their Musalman rulers. Since that time the language question has been a very bitter one ; it is only held in abeyance by agitators while they have more urgent affairs to deal with ; but with Home Rule it would certainly become most violent. There are some Indian vernaculars which are commonly spoken in very large areas ; in considering provincial autonomy the language question, which is not referred to in the Report, cannot be ignored, so that some rectification of boundaries is essential if future trouble is to be avoided. For example, nearly all Mahratti-speaking people are now in the Bombay Presidency, but some few are in the Madras Presidency. They should be all in one province. Although racial homogeneity is unattain- able by any method of rectification of territory, it is not the same as regards a certain amount of linguistic homogeneity, which is what should be aimed at. It is ridiculous to hope to substitute English for vernaculars, and attempting to do so is, moreover, most unjust to the Indian peoples. It means forcing them under the rule of those who con- stitute one-half per cent, of the population, and thus excluding literates in their own vernacular, no matter how high their attainments may be, from all positions of trust or importance. This has long been the aim of the Congress-League coterie who desire to prevent high English officials from coming into touch with Indians other than themselves. It was with this object that the late Mr. Gohkle invariably insisted that the governors THE INTELLIGENTSIA 291 of the new provinces which were to be created should be appointed from England/ They would, of course, be men who knew nothing of India and spoke no Indian language who would be absolutely in the hands of the Congress-League, through whose eyes they would see, and they would breathe the atmo- sphere created for them an atmosphere in which the Govern- ment of India has for long existed, and so it is out of touch with all other Indians, even those English-educated whose education is based on Indian traditions. Certain " advanced " Indians insist on the necessity of a com- mon language for India. When they are Hindus they maintain that it should be Hindi ; when Musalmans, that it should be Urdu ; the Congress-League being out of touch with both, wish it to be English. The Musalman feudatory state of Hyderabad, the great majority of whose subjects are Hindus who speak a patois of Tamil or Telagu, recently established a university, and decided that Urdu should be the medium of instruction up to the highest grades of study. There is much suppressed irritation in con- sequence among its Hindu subjects. The language quarrel does not get less violent with time. It seems quite apparent that English cannot be expected to supplant indigenous tongues, neither can the language of one religion or race supplant those of all others ; the only method is to so rearrange provincial boundaries that the various important languages shall be included in each province. The official business of each province can then be carried on in the most prevalent vernacular. Whatever may be the official language, the mother tongue will always be spoken in the homes, market-places, temples, villages and mas j ids. Education has been greatly set back because this fact has been neglected, and the medium by which it has been conveyed has been generally a foreign language. For example, in the Punjab Urdu is the medium of education to the neglect of Punjabi, which has a copious literature of its own. It is hard to imagine how the proposed self-government can be carried on satisfactorily anywhere if the politicians in high positions such as Ministers deal with political questions in a tongue which the electors do not understand. It is men who are well educated in the various vernaculars who are really exponents 19* 292 INDIAN STUDIES of the views of the peoples and their views can obviously only be obtained by those who speak their language. They could not possibly have been obtained by either Mr. Montagu or Lord Chelmsford, nor will they be obtained by any of their various committees presided over by men who have no knowledge of India. India has an old culture of its own which may be modified to some extent by English education but it will never fundamen- tally change old ideas inbred in the various peoples. No system of education can thrive in any land if it be divorced from the life of the people. According to Sir John Hewitt, an ex-Lieutenant Governor, the population of the United Provinces of Oudh and Agra is 47,500,000, of whom 1,250,000 are literate in vernaculars and 65,000 in English. Of this 65,000, more than 40,000 are either British or Anglo-Indians, the great majority of whom are in the Army or the Public Service, so that there are 25,000 people of Indian races who know English, and probably of these 20,000 are of rural classes. The remaining 5,000 are probably Congress- Leaguers. Is the political fate of the majority to be left in the hands of this small minority ? The United Provinces of Oudh and Agra, as far as education goes, are a fair sample of other provinces. It has become the habit, not only with English people who do not know India, but also with British high officials in India, to consider that Indians educated in their own vernacular are not educated at all. They thus class some 19,000,000 of people, among whom are many highly educated men, as illiterate. They think the minds of those Indians who know English work like those of Englishmen, which is not the case. Long before Indians commence to learn English the mind has received an indelible impression from the songs, tales and ballads which are the medium of education in the Indian home. Each caste receives it according to its heredity ; the warrior by the songs, tales and ballads of his race ; the scribe or priest by those of his. English education subsequently received never removes the early impressions of home education, although it very often confuses the mental attitude of the recipient. The Montagu-Chelmsford Report does not allude to the question of language, which is a strange omission. It is a question which exercises a very important influence on the political situation, not only in India, but all the world over. In South Africa and Canada it is doing so to-day. CHAPTER XVI THE MONTAGU-CHELMSFORD REPORT ^HE Report on Indian constitutional reforms consists of three hundred pages of very stiff reading which no one, save an expert on India, can follow and even then onlv after deep study, for which in these strenuous times few have leisure. It is from beginning to end a work of special pleading which professes to formulate a plan for the wholesale transfer to India of the Western system of democratic government for which that country is quite unprepared and at the same time to secure unimpaired both British rule and the interests of the great masses of the population. It is remarkable that such a document emanates from two gentlemen who can have but a very scanty knowledge of Indian conditions yet they ask the British public to accept their proposals without any other credentials than " the faith that is in us." When we recollect that they were amongst those who up to the day this war broke out, notwith- standing clear evidence to the contrary, had complete faith in the friendship of Germany, " the faith that is in us " is not a very convincing reason for accepting their proposals en bloc, some of which are extremely dangerous and others most desirable. It is necessary to differentiate between them, but doing so is not easy to those who have no Indian knowledge. A very brief perusal of the Report will make it quite clear to anyone acquainted with India that while the arguments used in support of some undesir- able proposals are excellent, the premises on which most of them are founded are wrong ; therefore some of their most important deductions are untenable. I do not for a moment suggest that reforms in the Government of India are not required ; on the contrary they are long overdue. This Report itself is an evidence that this is so, for it should not 293] 294 INDIAN STUDIES be possible for two politicians unacquainted with the psychology of India's peoples, no matter how great their ability or acumen may be, to attempt, with the sole support of their high official positions, to upset the existing government of some 2,400 inimical castes, speaking many different languages and made up of some 45 different races of whom they know very little, as is amply " shown by the fact that they treat this heterogeneous mass as one nation. Most people will agree that the proposals contained in the Report with regard to decentralization are sound ; it does not require an expert on India to see that this is so. No such system of centralized government has ever been carried so far, having regard to area and population, in any other part of the world ; its resultant evils become daily greater as the general advance- ment of the people proceeds and their needs increase. This system of excessive centralization has grown up unchecked in the complete absence of any realization of the changing conditions which have been going on in India since the opening of the Suez Canal in 1869. It is worthy of note that the Authors of the Report seem to think that conditions have only changed since the Russo-Japanese war. They insist that the result of their inquiry has not been to impede war effort in any way. This may be so in England, which is not the least of the dangers of their proposals, because here no one has had time to pay atten- tion to them and attempts are being made to rush them through Parliament before they can be studied. As regards India, whole tribes and races which have hitherto left political strife to the few are agitated from top to bottom, and there is no doubt war effort has been much impeded thereby. All loyal Indians, especially those of the warlike races, have long expected considerable reforms and looked forward to the introduction of some just system of representation by which they might legiti- mately put before their rulers their grievances and aspirations. -The. most ardent reformers among the loyal classes never wished or expected that reforms would be inaugurated during the war ; those of the warlike classes resent this being done at a time when their most responsible men are absent in the field. The loyal classes, moreover, strongly resent the freedom which has been given to the League-Congress clique, ever since the war began, to take the utmost advantage of the difficulties of the Empire for seditiously pushing their home rule propaganda. They resent most strongly the claim the Congress-League makes THE MONTAGU-CHELMSFORD REPORT 295 for the acceptance of their demands on the grounds of the valour of Indian soldiers, amongst whom these bodies are unrepresented and despised. The Authors of the Report, judging from paragraph 3, do not appear to have carried on their inquiries outside the towns of Delhi, Calcutta, Madras, and Bombay, in which they could only move in the artificial atmosphere of pseudo-Englishism long created round high British officials by the Congress-League. They say they have consulted representative men. Who are they ? The only indication they give is that " there is a corps of earnest men who believe sincerely and strive for political pro- gress, around them is a ring of less educated people to whom a phrase or a sentiment appeals, and an outside fringe of those who have been described as attracted by curiosity to this new thing or who find diversion in attacking a big and very solemn govern- ment, as urchins might take a perilous joy in casting toy darts at an elephant." Here the Congress-League extremists are clearly indicated, but the description would be better if it stated that there is a corps of pseudo-democratic men among whom the most violent soon attain ascendancy, around them is a crowd of less educated men who applaud those who are loudest in their abuse of British rule. There is also an outside fringe which is composed of ignorant rabble, easily incited to commit any outrage when they can do so with the impunity promised by the leaders. The Authors of the Report in reply to the question they ask themselves : " What ratio of the people really desires greater political power ? " say very justly that it cannot be answered with any accuracy. Notwithstanding this they propose to adopt the views of the " corps of earnest men " after the over-kind method of the Raja mentioned in Indian story, who showed his amiability to a discontented Brahmin under somewhat analogous circumstances by presenting him with an elephant which de- stroyed his hut and killed his children. They propose to placate the Indian Home Rulers without reference to essential conditions in the country. The result of their kindness to their friends is likely to be similar to that of the Raja to the Brahmin. On the demand of persons who are not definitely mentioned, but who are plainly indicated, they have constructed in secrecy a con- stitution which, if accepted, will lead to the establishment in India of a Congress-League-State governed by a Brahminical oligarchy 296 INDIAN STUDIES whose sole object is to get rid of British rule. If their demands are met, the Indian Empire will be converted into a torture- chamber for all its inhabitants except the followers of the Congress-League. This constitution will have to be enforced by the British themselves and the Indian Government, which has brought peace and justice, is to be pulled to pieces in the name of freedom and democracy by those who created it. The Authors of the Report do not give the opinion of individual members of the Executive Council of the Governor General, who are con- stitutionally responsible for the good government of India, or of the local governments, who are responsible for the good govern- ment of their respective provinces, and who presumably have been consulted. They say nothing whatever to enlighten the public regarding the very strong and passionate protests against their proposals that have been conveyed by the memorials and public utterances of immense numbers of Indians outside the Congress-League, among whom are prominent men of all castes and races. They allow their nominees in England, whom they call " representatives of India," Sir Satyendra Sinha and the Maharajas of Bikanir and Patiala and others, to freely support their proposals in public, while they muzzle Dr. Nair, who is the only representative of India's working classes at present in England, and who is a highly educated, loyal man of moderate views, but his views do not agree with those of the Authors of the Report. It is the same in India : there a section of the Congress-League had had ample time to organize its propaganda in favour of the proposals made in the Report, with the purport of which it has clearly been long aware, doubtless by " information received " from employes in the Government of India Secretariat, while these proposals have been suddenly sprung on the rest of India. No wonder the non-Brahman Hindu masses, the " untouch- ables," the loyal Musalmans and Sikhs, and others are agitated from top to bottom. In deference to the request of the Govern- ment of India these peoples have hitherto refrained from political agitation, while the Congress-League has been strenuously engaged in it, taking advantage of the war to press their demands. The non-Congress-League masses whom the proposals will subject to the Congress-League have ever been loyal, and have supported Government not only during the war but at all times. What has the Congress-League done ? As I have already said, THE MONTAGU-CHELMSFORD REPORT 297 one of the Brahman leaders opposed the grant of 100,000,000 towards the expenses of the war. Mr. Tilak, another Brahman leader, is reported to have said last January that the attitude of the British Government was : " We know we have to transfer our power, we shall do it gradually when our arrangements are complete." His comment on that supposed attitude of the British Government was : " That sort of defence ought not to have been allowed to stand : we are entitled to the possession of the whole estate at once. If we allowed you to share in that possession it was in the hope that you would clear off : you must acknow- ledge that we are masters." Other leaders of the " corps of earnest men " have been equally frank. At the Delhi Conference, called to consider how India could best increase her war effort, they tried to bargain on the basis of no home rule, no man-power. They did their best to stop recruiting for the defence corps and had some success among the unwarlike classes, who didn't want much encouragement to induce them to refrain from any form of soldiering ; but their seditious efforts were of no avail among the. warlike classes. There is another section of this " corps " who, when they get power to do so, intend to promote predatory legislation for the purpose of making it impossible for non-official Britons to make a living in India, regardless of the fact that doing so would mean the de- struction of Indian credit. The views of this section were expressed by the Hon. Mr. Jinnah, a Khoja lawyer leader of the Moslem League, in Bombay, not very long ago, and more recently by a President of the Indian National Congress, who gloated over the fact that European merchants dread a Home Rule Govern- ment, whose fiscal policy would be aimed at the destruction of industries such as tea and indigo, because British merchants are largely interested in them. The objects of the Congress-League, to whom a complete surrender has been made, are abundantly clear and it is sheer madness to ignore the danger. The main features of the scheme proposed are as follows : Every province is to have two executives, which may be called A and B. A is to consist of the Governor, one British and one Indian official, appointed by the Crown, which means that this executive will exist as it is at present, minus one British official. This system will work well till there is an anti-Government majority in the Legislative Council, which is what the Home 298 INDIAN STUDIES Rulers are now claiming, when trouble will at once commence. Executive B is to consist of two and eventually several more Indians, who are to be called Ministers. They will be selected by Government from the elected members of the Legislative Council, and they will be responsible only to an electorate which is still in the clouds, but which is to be settled by a committee consisting of two British and two Indians, presided over by a person with no knowledge of India. There is little doubt such a committee, if we are to judge from their predecessors, will be in agreement with the views of the Secretary of State, whatever these views may be. K The Ministers composing Executive B can only be removed at a General Election ; otherwise they would probably be changed once a week. To them two advisers without portfolio, status, pay, authority or vote may be added, who may give their advice if so disposed, and will certainly be ever employed intriguing for the position of Minister. ^Business of government is to be divided into two categories, called respectively reserved and transferred services. Those in the former are at first to be in charge of the Government of India, and those in the latter in charge of local governments, but they are not defined at present. This is to be eventually done by another committee ; progress is to go on in transferring reserved to transferred subjects, till eventually India becomes a sisterhood of States self-governing in all matters of purely local or provincial interest, with the Government of India, as a central government, presiding over a congeries of States increasingly representative of and responsible to the people, and dealing only with matters of common interest to the whole of India. In the course of time, " when the people, or at least the great majority of them, have reached the stage of full responsible government," which is to be decided by other committees, India is to take her place in the British Commonwealth on an equal footing with its other self- governing units. This is a very pretty picture, permeated throughout by the mistaken idea that India consists of one nation and not of many. The scheme is supposed to be in accordance with " Indian opinion," which the authors describe as that of " the majority of those who have held, or are capable of holding, an opinion in the matter with which they are dealing/' Now there are 19,000,000 of literates in various vernaculars. Let us suppose THE MONTAGU-CHELMSFORD REPORT 299 half are in such a position. There are 1,600,000 literates in English. Let us suppose 1,000,000 are in it. Here alone, ex- cluding the remaining 300,000,000 or so of the population, we have 10,000,000 peoples of diverse races, religions and languages. Is it to be supposed that Mr. Montagu in a six months' tour, and Lord Chelmsford in some two years' residence in towns and hill tops, where the atmosphere is artificially created, so as to allow only Congress-Leaguers to approach him, have gauged the opinion of the majority of them ? I think the only way of doing so is by granting a reasonable franchise and hearing the views of the elected representatives of the various nations of which India consists. I am told by Indians that the " views of the feudatory chiefs," as stated in the Report, are those put forward by four second- class chiefs who carry no weight. I believe this is so, for I have been sent a copy of their memorial, which tallies exactly with what is said in the Report. Accepting the views of these four second-class chiefs as expressing those of the " feudatory chiefs " has, I am told, created considerable anxiety in the minds of most of the great feudatories, who resent such a procedure. Religion or caste, which in the case of Hindus is the same thing, is at the back of every Indian question, and affects equally reserved and transferred subjects. Take sanitation, for instance, which is a transferred subject. Brahmins claim a right to refuse to other castes and to " untouchables " access to the village wells which they use for drinking or washing. Other castes are not permitted by Brahmins to cremate the dead on certain public cremation grounds ; they refuse to allow Musal- mans to kill kine for food or in pursuance of their religious cere- monies. Are they to be supported in such claims ? Here, alone, and it has been so for long ages, is a fruitful source of religious disputes, but they are far from being the only ones. I mention them, for at their back is the whole caste-system with reference to which Mr. Montagu said in the House of Commons that " he did not mean for one moment that caste would dis- appear, but the features of caste which make it impossible to regard India as a democratic nation might, with the flow of time, disappear ! " That anyone in his position or with the slightest knowledge of India could have made such a statement is amazing. Caste is an innate instinct, based on the deepest religious sanction, held by every Hindu for over three thousand 300 INDIAN STUDIES years. Education has only embittered the millions of non- Brahmins whom caste has so long depressed against their age- long oppressors, but it has not altered the essentials of caste. The caste-system will not be upset by the ballot box, as Mr. Montagu seems to think, but only by a complete religious revolu- tion, of which there is no sign. Even Musalman and Christian converts from Hinduism do not wholly abandon caste. Yet the authors of the Report propose to place in power what will really mean a Brahmin oligarchy, whose avowed object is to restore the Brahminical system, the most ingenious the world has ever known for the oppression of the many by the few, and secure a return to the mythical Sat Yug, or golden age, when Brahmins were supreme and all men bowed down and worshipped them. In each province Executive A is to have the control of reserved subjects, and Executive B of those transferred. When the whole Cabinet meets there will be three bodies serving under totally different conditions, the only link between whom will be the Governor. Executive A cannot deal with transferred subjects, Executive B cannot deal with those which are reserved, while Executive A is responsible for the maintenance of law and order, with which Executive B has nothing whatever to do. The Ministers without portfolio who are the third body in this extra- ordinary Cabinet may only speak if asked to do so. They have no other authority whatever. The Legislative Assembly is to have an elected majority, while certain of its members may speak, but not vote. If Executive A brings in a bill which is opposed, then the Governor may certify that its passing is essential to his responsibilities. Against this the majority of the assembly can then appeal to the Governor General in Council. They may also appeal to that body to decide whether or not a certified bill deals with a reserved subject or not. The religious question will always come in to support both sides in the controversy, and the result will be chaos in the Government and religious strife in the country. If the Governor General confirms the action of the Governor, a violent additional agitation will be got up against both ; if the Governor is not supported by the Governor General in Council, his authority will be gone and he will have no other course than to resign. No one worth his salt will accept such a position. If the Governor General in Council supports the certificate an extraordinary course has to be adopted. It is as follows : THE MONTAGU-CHELMSFORD REPORT 301 the bill will be again discussed in the Legislative Assembly as a whole, then it will be referred to a grand committee of elected members consisting of 40 to 50 per cent, of that body, and the Government is allowed to nominate a bare majority. The grand committee may then refer the bill to a select committee. It is then returned to the grand committee, which reports on it to the Legislative Assembly. After a certain time, which the Governor decides, the bill passes automatically ; but when it has done so the elected majority may send up their objections with the bill, and might succeed in stopping it from receiving final sanction. Such a procedure, apart from its dilatoriness, will put a premium on that intrigue in which Indians of the political scribe and Brahmin classes excel. But the most serious aspect is that Executive B, either by bill or executive action, may, and most certainly will, cause religious riots or other outbreaks. No matter how unjustifiable its action may be, Executive A must support Executive B, and suppress them by the use of force. Here the Indian Army, which is scarcely alluded to in the Report, will come in. If the action to be taken by order of the " Baburaj " is against those of the religion of the soldiers, they will be severely tried. In any case, discipline will suffer and the Army will ere long become an instru- ment in the hands of political factions. If injustice be com- mitted, and there is little security against it, the Central Government, viz., British Rule, will be brought into contempt and will suffer disrepute in the opinion not only of all Indians, but of every other reasonable being throughout the world. Indians will devote themselves to oppressing Indians, as they have done from time immemorial, and the result will be anarchy, as it was in the days before British rule gave peace and order to the land. The Army as well as the Civil Service will have two masters, and good men, both British or Indian, will refuse to serve in either. Finance quarrels between Executive A and Exe- cutive B are morally certain. The object of the Ministers of Executive B will be to create as many Government appointments as they possibly can, with the idea of providing for their own relations or caste fellows for such is a quasi-religious duty in India. If this tendency be not suppressed, the expense of administration will be excessive, but as the rural people alone pay nearly all the taxes, the city politicians will not mind. This will be a fruitful source of quarrels between Executives A and B, 302 INDIAN STUDIES Corruption is an inbred instinct with the classes from whom Indian officials come. Oppression and corruption will go on to an extent that will beat all previous records. The agricultural class will ever be in a state of suppressed or open insurrection. The Roving Commission which will appear every ten years to examine into everything, and the committees on franchise, for differentiating between reserved and transferred subjects and other matters will keep India in a state of perpetual excitement, which will increase the general unrest. Under the proposed system individual expert opinion is of no account, a committee composed of subservient officials or those ignorant of India must have a finger in every pie. However urgent a matter may be, it will never be able to struggle free of one. Members of committees will be all Government nominees, and the views of such are invariably a foregone conclusion. The present arrangement under which the Government of India is advised by a Legislative Council in which it has a majority is to be upset. It is to be replaced by two chambers. The upper, which is to be called the Council of State, is to consist of 21 elected members and 29 nominated, of whom 4 must be non-officials. The lower chamber, called the Legislative Assembly, is to consist of about 100 members, of whom two- thirds are to be elected and one third nominated, of whom one- third at least must be non-officials. Government measures are to be introduced in the Legislative Assembly and passed on to the Council of State. If they disagree, which they certainly will do frequently, on account of their divergent composition, then unless the Governor General certifies the amendments of the Council of State as essential, both chambers sit together, in which case, if the Government is defeated and refused leave to introduce the bill, the Governor General can fall back on the certification and return it to the Council of State, which may pass it, merely certifying to the Legislative Assembly that it has done so. Here again is every opportunity for that intrigue in which Indian politicians excel. Nominated members, reinforced by certification, appear in every important stage of procedure to suppress the " will of the people," which is not conducive to harmony. Such a form of Government is most unsuited to India or to any other country. In the Provinces Government will be neither British nor Indian, but the majority will be Indian, THE MONTAGU-CHELMSFORD REPORT 303 and with the classes who will dominate the Indian part failing to agree with their British colleagues, the revolutionary party will emerge with renewed vitality. The present revolutionaries will be reinforced by loyal people, who will become disloyal from despair at being treated as cattle and sold by one master to another. In India the strongest always has the greatest number of adherents, so the revolutionaries will emerge tri- umphant as they will appear the stronger. The result will be chaos, and a very serious set back to the advancement of India. The establishment of such a Government will not placate the lawyers, traders and money-lenders of the Congress and League, whose demands will increase with success, nor the Brahmins and other scribe classes of the towns, and the Brahmins really control both in their own underground way. Religious and racial enmi- ties will be resumed, and the condition of India, where the masses are more ignorant than they are in Russia, under such a Govern- ment will be extremely likely to rival the existing state of affairs in the latter country. As long as the safety of India from external dangers depends solely on England, she alone must be the judge of internal policy, for the internal condition will react on defence. If it be bad it will upset the efficiency of the Indian Army. External defence will undoubtedly be endangered by political changes of the nature proposed. The Authors of the Report propose to allow the Musalmans and Sikhs alone communal representation, but we do not know how it is to be arranged, whether according to numbers or political value. The Sikhs are already agitating on this subject, Non- Brahmin Hindus and " untouchables," over 150,000,000 people, have been ignored as regards communal enfranchisement, which puts them at the mercy of the Brahmins, who number only some 10,000,000, as is quite evident to those who know what caste means. In a former chapter I referred to the promise made to the people of the district of Merwara, that they would always be under a British ruler. Since their submission to the British in 1815 they have been consistently loyal. Apart from their services in the Mutiny, they not only sent a regiment voluntarily into the field in the Afghan War, but also undertook them- selves to carry out its police duties in their country during its absence. They did this in order to obviate the necessity of other Indians being sent into it, because they considered if this 304 INDIAN STUDIES were done it would destroy their izzat. In this war they have also fought bravely for their King-Emperor. The promise made to them was acknowledged by the Government of India so recently as 1913. Is it to be treated as a " scrap of paper ; " are the people of Merwara to be transferred like a herd of cattle from British to Indian rulers ? Nothing is said on the subject in the Report. That there are other tribes who have directly or indirectly been promised that they should ever continue under British rule I have little doubt. There are many tribes, who, like the Mers, were never subdued by other Indians. Are the British, their only conquerors, justified in handing them over, even without a tribal franchise, to their age-long enemies ? The North West Frontier Province is the habitat of Sunni Musalmans of Semitic race, the most democratic people in India, who have been for long ages accustomed to the rule of their own jirgas, or councils. They are excluded from the proposed system of this Government for " strategic reasons." I don't under- stand this reason : strategy is the employment of battles to gain the end of a war. It has nothing to do with forms of govern- ment provided that the peoples governed keep the public peace. These Musalmans would certainly not submit to be ruled by Hindus or by the pseudo-Musalmans of the All India Moslem League, which is doubtless the true reason for their exclusion from the scheme. It is a sound reason, but it is scarcely " strategic." The Semitic Musalmans of the Peshawar district will certainly strongly resent being placed politically in a worse position than Indians on whom they look down. They have provided many gallant soldiers in this war, and don't deserve such treatment. Many of the statements put forward in the Report regarding Musalmans will give dire offence to orthodox Musalmans. It is said, for example, in paragraph 55 that the door is not closed to such legislative modifications of the rules of the Koran as the public mind may become ripe for. This is flat blasphemy ; the Koran to all orthodox Musalmans is the direct word of God, and it is immutable. In Paragraph 26, " Indian Musalmans" are unjustly accused of disloyalty and of joining the Pan-Islamic movement ; they are said to have been irritated because England did not inter- vene in favour of Turkey during the Italian-Turkish war of 1911, because of the partition of Bengal, and again because of British action in the Balkan War. THE MONTAGU-CHELMSFORD REPORT 305 There are 70,000,000 Musalmans in India of various sects, 10,000,000 of whom being Sheia are religiously barred from taking any part in Pan-Islamism. Nor is the statement true regarding others, the great majority of whom, and certainly aU those Musalmans represented in the Army, who are the pick of the Indian Musalmans, have ever been altogether opposed to the Pan-Islamic movement which they consider solely Young Turk, and they regard Young Turks as irreligious wine-drinkers who have committed the mortal sin of revolting against their Commander of the Faithful. The Pan-Islamic movement in 1912 was supported by pseudo-Musalmans of the All India Moslem League alone, whose influence is very small outside that which it enjoyed with the Government of India. With the permission and approval of the Governor General, who subscribed Rs. 500 to the movement, the League inaugurated a Red Crescent Medical Mission, really to get into touch with the Young Turks, but ostensibly to aid Turkish wounded. I was warned against their procedure at the time by prominent Musalman ecclesiastics and other men of high position, and by all the senior Musalman Indian Officers of the Army, who greatly deprecated the Governor General identifying himself with it. They knew well it was a seditious movement organized by the " Young Turks of the All India Moslem League," as they said, to establish friendly rela- tions with the Young Turks in Turkey, and at the same time to make money for themselves, they doubtless deluded many into the belief it had a humane object. The originator of both Pan-Islamism and the Red Crescent Movement, who has since spent a good deal of his time in jail, and is there now, or was lately, asked me to issue orders authorizing Indian soldiers to subscribe. This I refused to do, saying, which was the fact, that he himself well knew Indian soldiers were permitted to subscribe to any legal movement they wished. I prohibited the entry into the Lines of his agents, for doing which the most respectable and trusted Musalmans in Northern India thanked me. This man also started the society called the Anjuman-i- Khuddan-i-Kaaba, whose members took an oath to sacrifice life and property in defence of the holy shrines in Arabia against non-Islamic aggressors. Those who did so were a few unwarlike followers of the League, who were quite sure that, as the holy shrine is a long way off, their oath meant nothing. The different methods of loyal Musalmans and those of the 20 3o6 INDIAN STUDIES All India Moslem League is well illustrated in the case of two masjids. I will first refer to that at Cawnpore, the story of which is incorrectly related in the Report, which says riots were caused there " by the partial demolition of a mosque." This is not true. What occurred was that the Civil authorities in Cawnpore decided to make a road, the alignment of which necessitated the demolition of a Hindu mandir (temple), and that the local Hindus objected. Upon this the Civil authorities on the spot changed the alignment of the road in such a way that the Hindu temple was saved, but it necessitated the demolition of a washing-place outside a masjid, to which the local Musalmans had no objection whatever till half a dozen All India Moslem League lawyers appeared on the scene and incited them to mischief. Under such circumstances religious strife, always latent, was easily revived, and riots occurred in which there was unfortunately some loss of life. When the occurrence of the riots was reported to the Govern- ment of India it decided that the local authorities must be supported and the riots suppressed. Uncertain and wavering as it was in all things, the members of the Government of India soon changed their minds and resolved on a compromise with the disturbers of the peace. They solicited the good offices of Musalman notables far and near, which were willingly accepted. Some men held in the highest respect took steps to bring the rioters to reason. Before they had time to accomplish anything beyond showing their strong disapproval of what had occurred, the Governor General personally went to Cawnpore and made a complete surrender to the rioters for doing which he received a telegram of thanks from the Secretary of State for India, which appeared in the Congress-League press. His action was a great score for the League but it disgusted and deeply offended loyal Musalmans, who rightly considered that they had been thrown over to conciliate the disloyal. The other masjid case occurred about the same time, and only affected loyalists. There is a small masjid outside the Delhi palace wall, situated between it and the Jama (Cathedral) Masjid. It is called the Sunari Masjid. When Delhi was captured from the mutineers in 1857 both this masjid and the Jama Masjid were taken from the Musalman community and placed in charge of the military. The latter was restored to them in 1862, but the Sunari Masjid remained in military charge. After the King- THE MONTAGU-CHELMSFORD REPORT 307 Emperor's 'visit the leading Musalmans in Delhi asked me to make it over to them to which I willingly agreed subject to the sanction of the Government of India which I had to obtain. I told them I would myself ask for it and that I had no doubt would obtain it. I was, however, wrong. The Governor General refused my request. I had, of course, to tell the Musal- man notables of Delhi the result of my efforts. They were naturally extremely disappointed. They referred to what had occurred at Cawnpore regarding a washhouse outside a mas j id, and they added : " Sahib, the Government of India is more intent on pleasing its enemies than its friends." I could not contradict them. During the time I had been a member of the Government of India I had found that this was so ; I fear it is so still. When I left India the Sunari Masjid, much to my regret, was still in military charge ; it may be so now. If it is it should be returned at once to the Musalman community. The Germans certainly hoped, as the Report says, to have stirred up disaffection in India. The Report does not add, however, that they were given ample opportunity. Prince Henry XXVII. of Reuss was their Consul General and his high rank alone should surely have made it plain that he was not merely intent on trade matters as he was officially supposed to be. His place was in the trading port of Calcutta, where he was appointed to reside, and to which place all his predecessors confined their activities, and they never left it for other parts of India without special permission from the Government of India. He was allowed to travel all over India as he pleased, and to take up his summer residence at Simla. To make a general accusation of Pan-Islamism against Indian Musalmans, which implies disloyalty to British rule, is most unjust and for a Secretary of State and Governor General to even infer such a thing in a public document is to say the least of it an indiscretion. The cry of religion in danger as far as Musalmans are concerned has been used by the " Young Turks " of the Moslem League alone during the last fifty years, and it has met with no success because no one outside the League itself pays any attention to its propaganda. I have no hesitation in saying that Indian Musalmans are second to none in their loyalty. Excluding Musalmans and Sikhs, communal representation i s refused to every other community. The reasons for this refusa^ 20* 308 INDIAN STUDIES are given in paragraph 228 of the Report, in which the Authors say : " We find it (responsible government) in its earliest beginnings resting on an effective sense of the common interest, a bond compounded of community of race, religion and language," and they infer that such a condition exists among all races and religions in India. No one except the Authors of the Report will be bold enough to say that such a condition exists in the smallest degree between 4he .different Indian peoples, who as every one knows consist of many inimical nations. The Report says communal representation is given to the Sikhs " because, in the Punjab, they are a distinct and important people ; they supply a gallant and valuable element to the Indian Army, but they are everywhere in a minority, and experience has shown that they go virtually unrepresented. To the Sikhs, therefore, and to them alone we propose to extend the system already adopted in the case of the Mohamedans." These are exceedingly good reasons, but they are equally applicable to other minorities who are to be treated differently. The Mahrattas, for instance, are a distinct and important nation, speaking their own language, but they are Sudra Hindus and will be in a worse position than the non-Hindu Sikhs, for they will be amenable to Brahminical spiritual coercion as to their votes in the same way that ignorant Roman Catholics in Ireland are under the spiritual control of their priests. The result will be that they and other races and religions will be unrepresented, as they have been under the Minto- Morley reforms, for they cannot stand against Brahmin intrigue. Communal representation was rejected in deference to the objections of the Indian National Congress, as represented by the late Mr. Gokhle, a Brahmin Congress leader. It has rejected them for the same reasons as it is now rejected, at the request of the Congress-League, who know very well that communal repre- sentation would give the true voice of India. And this voice is not their voice, so they would be relegated to their natural obscurity. It is a grave injustice to all, especially to non-Brahmin Hindus, Christians, Pariahs and many other communities in the rural districts not to grant communal representation. Certain castes in the towns such as Parsis, Jains and Banias will not feel the deprivation so much, but they will be constrained to join the Congress-League if they wish for any voice in politics. That body will accept them willingly, because they are very rich communi THE MONTAGU-CHELMSFORD REPORT 309 ties, whose subscriptions to the Congress-League Political Fund will greatly increase the power of agitators. This fund is kept secret, after the manner of party funds in England. It is proposed to remedy the injustice done to some castes by nomination, but Indian nominees of Government cannot be in- dependent, and they will enjoy no one's confidence. Notwithstanding the fact, which is well known to all having even a rudimentary knowledge of India, that there is no sense of common interest between the various Indian peoples, who differ in race, religion and language, the Authors of the Report insist that they all form an Indian nation. They insist that the various nations, races and languages shall be moulded into one people, regardless of justice or injustice, by the new institutions they intend to enforce, and they forget that forms of government are the result of national temperament long acting on public affairs ; the administration of public affairs are not the means of producing any durable alteration in the disposition of the peoples subjected to their influence. No calamities have been found so enduring or have created such misery as those arising from the forcible transference to the people of one race of the institutions of another. CHAPTER XVII THE MONTAGU-CHELMSFORD REPORT (continued). / TT V HE Minto-Morley reforms introduced in 1910 are severely. 1 and unjustly criticized in the Report. The Authors say that there is friction between official and elected members of the reformed Legislative Councils and that the proceedings of these bodies are unreal ? If this friction existed I certainly never saw it. During the time I was a member of the Legislative Council the best relations existed between official and unofficial members. I knew most of the elected members, with -whose views I frequently disagreed and as frequently told them I did so, but this made no difference whatever in our personal relations, nor did it cause the slightest friction between us. It was much the same with other official members. It is politicians out of a job who are against the Government, not those who have got one. Far from being unreal the advice tendered by the elected members of the Legislative Council of the Governor General admit- tedly greatly influenced the policy of the Government of India. The Legislative Councils are purely advisory, and in no sense Parliaments, so that to give advice and make suggestions was the purpose for which they were created. Lord Morley* in his speech made on introducing his reforms in Parliament in Decem- ber, 1908, clearly explained that he had no intention of setting up a parliamentary system. He said : " If I were attempting to set up a parliamentary system in India, or if it could be said that this chapter of reforms led directly or necessarily up to the establishment of a parliamentary system in India, I, for one, would have nothing at all to do with it. I do not believe it is not of very great consequence what I believe, because the fulfilment of my vaticinations could not come off very soon in spite of the attempt in Oriental countries at this moment, * Vide Indian speeches, 1907-1909, Viscount Morley. 310 THE MONTAGU-CHELMSFORD REPORT 311 interesting attempts to which we all wish well, to set up some form of parliamentary system it is no ambition of mine, at all events, to have any share in beginning that operation in India. If my existence, either officially or corporeally, were prolonged twenty times longer than either of them is likely to be, a parliamentary system in India is not at all the goal to which I would for one moment aspire." Lord Morley's reforms as is usual when concessions are made to the Congress-League were " gratefully accepted " by the " moderates," but the " extremists " soon proceeded to reject them with contumely, demanding that they should receive something very much larger. The action of the " extremists " doesn't interfere with the concessions which are granted to the " moderates," but they change places immediately the con- cessions come into effect, and other demands are made by the future moderates in due course. There will be no end to the game till the voracious appetite of the Congress-League is satiated. This is just what they are doing as regards the concessions now proposed. Few who know India will to-day disagree with Lord Morley's views as expressed in 1908 regarding the introduction of a parliamentary system into India, certainly so long as existing conditions prevail there. The Minto-Morley reforms consisted of two sections, the one relating to executive, the other to legislative councils. Under them the following innovations were introduced : (i.) An Indian was appointed for the first time to be a member of the Governor General's Executive Council, and it was ruled that there should always be an Indian member in future. (2.) An Indian was also for the first time appointed a member of the Executive Councils of the Governors of Madras and Bombay respectively, and it was decided that each of these Councils should in future have an Indian member. Provision was made for the subsequent establishment of Executive Councils on the same lines to be associated, in due course, with other provincial rulers. (3.) Two Indian members a number since increased were appointed to the Executive Council of the Secretary of State, which previously never had an Indian member. These changes admitted the right of Indians to the highest executive appointments in the Government service, from which they had been previously excluded, so that they are on exactly the same footing as regards eligibility as British. They have for 312 INDIAN STUDIES long held a large proportion of higher and practically all those of lower grade in the civil administration. The Report says from which one might infer that Indians had little or nothing to do with the Government of their own country that the Indian element in the administration should be largely increased. The fact is that Indians have a very large share, in some respects the largest, in the administration, and that without any further changes in the principles of government there is nothing what- ever to prevent their rulers from giving them even a much larger one, should they deem it expedient to do so. The mistake that has been made, and is continued with some few exceptions, is that all the higher appointments given to Indians and most of the subordinate appointments are conferred on those of the scribe castes, instead of being divided among qualified men of all races. The result of this favouritism has been that while race distinctions between British and Indians have been removed as far as employment in the Government service is concerned, those between Indians of different races have been aggravated, and have increased racial animosity. (4.) The existing Legislative Councils were increased in numbers and the Government majority retained in the Imperial Legisla- tive Council has been abolished in those of the local govern- ments. The right of veto, without which, under the circum- stances, efficient government would be impaired, was left to the Governor General and Governors in their capacity of President of the Imperial and provincial Legislative Councils respectively. The privileges of non-official members were greatly enlarged ; the rules of procedure were modified in their favour so as to allow them to exercise a much greater influence in the earlier stages of the annual budget ; their right of interpellation was greatly strengthened ; facilities were afforded them for the full and free discussion of public policy, and they were allowed, under sanction, to introduce bills and resolutions. [ The mistakes made in the Minto-Morley reforms were that constituencies were too contracted and communal representation was rejected. It was foreseen at the time that the result would be to place all political power in the hands of the Congress-League. Experience has proved that this has been so. The electorate must be greatly enlarged and constituencies created on communal lines ; otherwise the evils of allowing this THE MONTAGU-CHELMSFORD REPORT 313 small clique to monopolize the political power will be further exaggerated. with these defects remedied the real views of the Indian peoples only can be obtained, in the usual democratic way, by an election. What direction these views may take cannot be predicted with any certainty by Mr. Montagu, Lord Chelmsford or any one else. It is futile to attempt to do so, either by " the faith that is in us " or by " the views of the corps of earnest men who believe sincerely and strive for political progress," who only consist of a coterie, the members of which desire to get as many Government appointments for themselves as they can and to rule over the rest of the population. The Authors of the Report leave the electorate, which is the base of the structure they intend to create, to be decided by a committee composed of a president with no Indian experience, and four members, two of whom shall be British officials and two Indians. In the composition of this committee I see clearly the inspiration of the Congress-League. It is a characteristic scribe caste intrigue which only those who know India well can fully appreciate. Their reason for asking for a President of no Indian experience is the same which made them ask for provincial governors to be appointed from England. They hope, from previous experience, that the two Indian members will either belong to or be subservient to their clique, and the British members will be officials who favour their preposterous claims. Apart from the question of the unsuitability of a committee so composed for advising as to an electorate, the conditions to be inquired into are so varied in the different parts of India, and the amount of work entailed is so enormous and complicated, and requires such great local knowledge, that no five men could cope with it properly in a life-time. This most difficult question can only be efficiently and justly dealt with, within a reasonable time, by local governments, who have the necessary information at their disposal and who are well acquainted with the conditions existing in their provinces. The creation of an electorate is the essential preliminary to the introduction of a system of self-government, and is the base oh which that government must rest. Until the electorate is satis- factory, or at any rate reasonably so, the structure to be raised on it, presuming it will be in accordance with the wishes of the people, must, in the main, remain a matter for future decision, 3 14 INDIAN STUDIES I predict very confidently that an electorate created on communal lines will not share the views of the Congress-League, which bodies will be relegated by it to their natural position of a small and comparatively unimportant minority. It is for this reason that the League and Congress oppose communal electorates with all the undue influence they have acquired. It would be, to say the least of it, premature to rend the Govern- ment of India in twain at their behest till the views of the intended electorate are known. What we do know for certain is that, under the aegis of the Congress-League, towns have been provided with municipalities which are more or less corrupt, and that the railways and the subordinate posts under Govern- ment are largely staffed by their followers, who are notoriously corrupt and oppressive. Yet the elected members of the League and Congress in the Legislative Councils or elsewhere have never once used their influence to even discourage the evil practices of their followers ; they have never mentioned them in the councils, which is one of the reasons why the masses of the people are so inimical to them. Besides municipalities, the only other institutions in the direction of self-government are the local and district boards in the rural districts, the members of which are nominally elected, but really appointed by subordinate Indian officials. These boards are allowed no real responsi- bilities, and they therefore form no precedent by which we may judge of the future. There is, however, considerable evidence, especially as regards the Mahratta country, that village self- government, where it existed in the shape of village councils, before it was upset by the British, was quite satisfactory and fairly efficient to meet the requirements of the peoples. There is little doubt that the great mass of India's population ardently desire that future self-government should be based on the village council ; this is well, because complying with the desire will not be open to the objections or difficulties surrounding an exotic Western system transplanted on Eastern peoples. The members of both village councils and municipalities should be elected periodically, and should be responsible to those who elect them. The qualification of electors of both might be based on the payment of land revenue, income tax, or road cess. The qualification will, of course, vary greatly in different provinces, and even in different districts. The village councils should be entrusted with definite duties, which would vary, similarly, THE MONTAGU-CHELMSFORD REPORT 315 in different parts of the country. I believe the Government of India has quite recently done something in the direction of erecting them. In the most advanced villages the duties of councils would as nearly as possible follow ancient practice, and would include the provision of primary education (in the vernacular), the maintenance of village roads, the excavation and control of tanks for water-supply, sanitation, dispensaries, and the administration of justice in petty cases in accordance with their feeling of justice and equity. Lawyers, court forms and stamps should not be required in village council cases. To insist on a knowledge of British law would be to make the work of village councils impossible. They should be granted an assured income, which they should themselves collect, as they should also collect all other village taxes. Above the village council would be the district board, the members of which should also be elected and responsible to the electorate. It should deal with education, beyond that which is controlled by village councils or municipalities, collegiate education excepted ; with roads, beyond those controlled by the village council ; with the question of provision of medical practitioners and veterinary services, agricultural demonstration farms and such-like. Dis- trict boards should be under the guidance of competent controlling officials, who should be their advisers, but not members ; with progress their controlling powers could be gradually reduced till they disappeared. The district boards should inspect and control the \vork of the village councils. Their duties should be arranged with a view to their eventually taking over that control of the district which is now exercised by the magistrate. They should be given denned powers of taxation, and should be entrusted with the collection of the taxes which they are allowed to impose. The magistrate of the district should be responsible for the maintenance of law and order in the district, and should be its head, as he is now, until the time when his duties can be safely entrusted to the district board. When this time will arrive depends upon the administrative progress made. Municipalities should be put in the same position. The district magistrate should be the sole channel through which the district council communicates with the local govern- ment. Commissioners of districts are a fifth wheel in the coach, and other work should be found for them, such as that of revenue boards or financial commissionerships. 3i6 INDIAN STUDIES To enable the peoples of the district to represent their griev- ances and aspirations to the magistrate of the district, and by him to the local government, he should have an advisory council, composed of members of the district board, elected by the board itself. The members of the advisory council should at all times have free access to the district magistrate they should be appointed for a limited time and re-elected periodically. Such a system should be introduced without delay ; it would satisfy all loyal people, and would be a sound foundation to build further progress on. Enormous progress will have to be made in this rudimentary self-government before India is fit for any parliament ary system. In the meantime what is required is to develop the Minto-Morley reforms by legislative councils, estab- lishing an enlarged electorate on communal lines, and enlarging the legislative councils. Further progress must be delayed until the views of the electorate are known. In considering the question of self-government, that of language cannot be excluded. The official language of local legislative councils, district boards and village councils should be the prevailing vernacular. The official language of the Imperial Legislative Council must be English. This is a hardship on Indians literate in vernaculars, amongst whom are men of the highest position, socially and intellectually, for which there is no remedy. To fix a common language generally understood by all its members is impossible. But the hardship must be minimized by allowing much greater facilities than at present exist for those members only literate in vernaculars to express their views, handicapped as they must of course be by not understanding English. The President of the Imperial and local legislative councils should be specially appointed officials. Governor Generals and Governors should not preside, both because these appointments are largely made from England, and those so appointed will know no vernacular, and also because Indian etiquette prevents cultured men from expressing their views freely before such high officials, because they represent the King-Emperor in their eyes. Presuming that the decentralization recommended by the Government of India in 1911, and elaborated in the Montagu- Chelmsford Report, is carried out, and real autonomy granted to the provincial Governments to enable them to deal with local affairs, while the Government of India is allowed autonomy in all Indian affairs, it will be necessary to re-allot the work of the THE MONTAGU-CHELMSFORD REPORT 317 executive councils of both Governors of provinces and the Governor General. Provincial executive councils should have a department to deal solely with self-government. Greater changes are required in the executive council of the Governor General ; in the first place, its members should be really, not nominally, in charge of, and fully responsible for, the work of departments. The position of secretaries to the Government of India in a department should be changed to that of secretaries of the department in which they serve. They should not be allowed access to the Governor General except when acting for the member in charge during his absence or when doing so under his orders. It should be enlarged, and its business re-allotted to separate members in charge of departments dealing with self-government, foreign affairs, feudatory States, railways and agriculture, all of which are of such importance that the business of each would amply occupy the time of a separate department. The Governor General and governors and members of executive councils would, if decentralization were fully carried out, be relieved from all official trivialities, and would have sufficient leisure, not only to attend to important business, but also to tour much more frequently, and so get into touch with the peoples, especially with the chiefs, nobles and gentry. It is most important that all high officials should no longer continue isolated. The system proposed in Paragraph 316 of the Report for " Opening Recruitment for the Public Services to Candidates selected in India " will do more towards improving the relations between men of position among the rural classes and the Government than anything else recom- mended in it. It would also do more than anything else to induce men of position to interest themselves in self-government, always supposing that the electorate will be so arranged that they can come forward as candidates without loss of dignity. Nothing will avail to destroy the existing despotism if the members of the executive council are not placed in an indepen- dent position, one which they have long ceased to occupy, and if the legal quorum constituting a meeting of council be not altered so as to preclude the Governor-General, if so inclined, from ignoring his council, and transacting business only with the member of the department to which it belongs. Definite orders are necessary which would make council meetings obligatory at stated periods. INDIAN STUDIES To keep touch between the Government of India and local governments it is necessary that governors of provinces should be extraordinary members of the Governor General's Executive Council meetings of which they should attend at least once in six months. The rules for the conduct of business in the Executive Council should be passed by that body itself, and should be subject to the approval of the Secretary of State, and not, as is now the case, passed arbitrarily by the Governor General. This would necessi- tate a revision of Paragraph 9 of the Indian Councils Act of 1861. Under existing conditions the creation of a Council of Chiefs is not practicable, for reasons which I have explained in the chapter on " Feudatory States " ; but this does not prevent the Government of India from consulting chiefs officially regarding matters of importance, which it should certainly do. The proposals in the Report suggest far too many committees ; what is really required is that the Government of India should present to Parliament a simple form of annual administration report, giving useful information regarding the administration of each department, the condition of the country, its finances, resources and possibilities. It should be available to all, and should be translated into the principal vernaculars, so that the people of England and India would be in a position to judge of the activities of the Government of India and of the motives by which it is actuated. The debates in the legislative councils provide almost the only opportunity the Government of India and local governments have of vindicating their actions before their critics in England and India, so that these, too, should be published in a form convenient and easily procurable by those interested. The " statement exhibiting the moral and material progress and condition of India," which is presented to Parliament annually, does not show clearly the condition of India in any one year, nor does it elucidate the facts or general principles which have governed the administration during the year. It is an obsolete and useless work. With decentralization, both administrative and financial, carried out to the extent intended in the Report, troops of highly- paid appointments and whole brigades of clerical appointments can be abolished by which immense sums can be saved in the cost of administration. THE MONTAGU-CHELMSFORD REPORT 319 The initiation of self-government, on the lines indicated, will further conduce to economy, and will be a substantial step, which can be taken at once, in the direction of self-government, and one which can be easily and gradually developed, as experience dictates. The great cost of administration and the haphazard policy on which it has hitherto been carried on, have grievously hampered the economic development of India. Much of what the Authors of the Report say in regard to India's economic position, both military and commercial, is based on a misapprehension of the situation, to discuss which in detail is outside my object. Although commercial and military economics are close allies, more so in India than elsewhere, their respective lack of develop- ment has been due to different causes, which have, however, reacted on one another. Commercial development, as I have said in the chapter on the land, has been hindered by the heavy tax on agricultural incomes ; by the caste system, which prevents initiative and precludes the best educated peoples from taking work requiring manual labour or physical exertion ; by the unwillingness of the classes who possess capital to invest it in commercial enterprises, as they obtain higher interest by usury ; by foreign bounty-fed competition, and by lack of technical education, to give which no efficient steps have ever been taken. The best technical schools in the country when the war broke out were the following : A gun-carriage factory, a cordite factory, a lyddite factory, a rifle and gun factory, and rolling mills. They were established some sixteen years ago, under Lord Curzon's Governor General- ship, on the recommendation of his military advisers, who then saw clearly the necessity of making India militarily self- contained. In 1905, when the Liberal Government came into power, a cry was started for the reduction of military expendi- ture, one way of complying with which was found in the reduction of the work in these factories to the lowest possible, so that their value was greatly reduced as technical schools. While I was in command of the Army very strong pressure was brought to bear on me to induce me to abolish the gun and rifle factory, on the grounds that it would be cheaper to import guns and rifles from England. This I strenuously resisted, but in spite of my opposition, both these and the other factories were 320 INDIAN STUDIES financially starved and only allowed a bare existence. The consequence was that the large number of mechanics who would otherwise have been trained in them were not forthcoming, to the no small detriment of engineering and other projects through- out the land requiring such men. The Authors of the Report convey an unjust reflection on the military authorities in India in saying that " the war has thrown a strong light on the military importance of economic development." Its importance was quite evident to the military authorities many years before the war began, but the politicians, who held the purse, refused to listen to them. Latent animosities between Indians have been raised by the proposal made in the Report to confine communal representation to Musalmans and Sikhs only, and by considering Musalmans as if they were all of one sect. Racial animosities have been, as I have said, for long further reinforced by the practice of allowing a few scribe castes of one or two provinces to monopolize nearly all Government appointments throughout India. I feel convinced that as the outcry in India against establishing an electorate on non-communal lines is so great, and to do so would be so unjust, the proposed limiting communal representation to two peoples cannot be enforced. The difficulty of creating an electorate on communal lines is doubtless greater than treating India as one nation in this respect ; but it can be dealt with by local governments. By adopting communal representation, and by allowing local governments to draw up a scheme for it to be approved by the Government of India, much future evil will be avoided. When provincial autonomy becomes a reality, it should be ruled that all Government appointments in each province shall be given to its inhabitants, otherwise racial animosities will be further increased. No changes in the direction of self-government, important though they be, are anything like so important as a revision of the Land Revenue policy on the lines I have indicated in the chapter on that subject, the prohibition of forced labour, putting a stop to the corruption and oppression of the petty Indian officials, whose nefarious practices are bringing British rule more and more into disrepute. It is a great mistake to defer dealing with these grave evils for a single day. Printed at The Chapel River Press, Kingston, Surrey. UNIVERSITY OF OVERDUE- jERUWAiJ^l_ JUN ^ ^ __ ^-s re UNIVERSITY OF CAUFORNIA LIBRARY