The Liberal disillusionment

THE concluding speech of Dr Tej Bahadur Sapru at the Liberal Conference is chiefly notable as a proof of the fact that the disillusionment of the Liberal party is nearing completion. Dr Sapru, in fact, was one of the not many great Liberal leaders who retained their faith in the Reforms to the very last, and the fact that even he has now realised the necessity for an immediate radical revision of the Government of India Act shows conclusively that the Reforms, as now interpreted, have no friends left in India and among prominent Indians. The whole speech was an unqualified condemnation of the speech of Sir Malcolm Hailey in the Assembly, which differed from similar condemnations in the Congress press and by Congress leaders only in its avoidance of strong language. It must have been a delight to hear the learned doctor take one by one all the main contentions of the Home Member and literally tear them to pieces. Of the distinction drawn by the Home Member between a responsible government and Dominion status, Dr Sapru said he hoped for the good name and the reputation of the Government here and in England that there was no seriousness behind a definition of that character. As regards the plea that the Reforms must under the Act be worked for 10 years before the question of revising them could arise, he said he was certain that the provisions of the Act did not exclude the appointment of a Royal Commission earlier, and challenged any other legal interpretation. He quoted Mr Montagu’s reply to Colonel Wedgwood in the House of Commons that there was nothing to prevent the appointment of a Commission before the expiry of the 10-year period if it was justified by the existing conditions.