Long overdue ban
THE Central Government has been trying to get ready from the beginning of this year to make a law which can ban all forms of lottery effectively.

Kosovo: what next?
IT is NATO’s moment of truth. One week of bombing has not persuaded President Slobodan Milosevic to give up his tough stand and seek peace.

Salute to Suu Kyi
AUNG Sang Suu Kyi is perhaps the tallest leader at the global level fighting the forces of tyranny and repression.

WORLD'S RIVER DISPUTES
by Sunanda K. Datta-Ray
INDIA’s treaties with Pakistan and Bangladesh on sharing the Indus and Ganga rivers are increasingly being looked at as models for a world in which future wars might be over water, instead of oil, unless it can bring itself to face up to the reality that rivers and rainfall belong to no one country.

Restating national priorities
by A. K. Nair
POLITICAL power grows out of the barrel of the gun. Mao had made the statement when conquest used to be in terms of battlefield victories, and annexation of territory. Since then the perception of “conquest” has changed, and another source of power has emerged.

Lapses in children’s education
by Reeta Sharma
SUCH are the times that one is left with little confidence in any government organisation. Today, the working of a majority of government-run or aided organisations is marked by lethargy, tardiness, distorted and exaggerated objectives, corrupt practices, and inefficiency at each step.

Design your happiness
by Shriniwas Joshi
SUMMERS are when Shimla-houses have number of guests. I also had quite a few this summer but two of them need special mention because they helped me in unlearning that they had taught me about planning a house. Biren is Vaastu Shastra savvy and Lalit is Feng Shui (pronounced Fung Shway) enthusiast.

75 Years Ago

Boycott of British Goods
THE Liberal Party is by no means united on the subject of the boycott of imperial, including British, goods, even as a protest against the Kenya decision. We have seen that subject to one important reservation Mr Jamna Das Dwarka Das is emphatically in favour of it.

Long overdue ban

THE Central Government has been trying to get ready from the beginning of this year to make a law which can ban all forms of lottery effectively. In February, Union Home Minister L. K. Advani informed Parliament that the Finance and Law Ministries had given their clearance to a Bill in this regard. Lottery has an element of gambling in it and more often than not the motive behind this “game” is not charitable. In several languages, the equivalents of this word are close in connotation to luck, chance or even defeatist attitudes. Trade has flourished around it as a nucleus and people have found in it a lucrative business. However, it has ruined many homes, institutions and lives. Over the years, this practice of financial speculation, with a strong futuristic element, has impoverished overambitious people while enriching a few overnight. The Union Government has an umbrella jurisdiction over its own draw of lots. For the provincial units, it is a state subject and the Centre’s jurisdiction cannot work there. The Central lotteries fall in List I in the Seventh Schedule of the Constitution. In the case of the states, the practice is regulated by Entry 34 of List II. Single-digit lotteries have proved disastrous and the Lottery Regulation Act, 1998, has not yet been implemented, thanks to a stay order passed by the Guwahati High Court. Now, most of the states and major political parties have mustered the requisite political will and a formal ban on all lotteries seems to be a distinct possibility. One of the chief opponents of such a ban is the North-East. The governments there earn crores of rupees from lotteries. The Centre appears to be inclined to compensate the “Seven Sisters” by giving them an amount of Rs 50 crore. A genuine problem is that of redeployment of the personnel working in the lottery departments. But this fallout is not uncontainable. States like Kerala think that thousands of people would become unemployed if lotteries are banned in areas falling within their jurisdiction. The Centre has rightly described lotteries as a social evil. Many lucrative provisions have been outlawed on moral grounds.

Why can’t lotteries be treated as one of these? Such logic can be extended to money-making activities like horse-racing, but it is good to begin with a ban on lotteries. It is necessary to quicken the pace of the legislation. Too much money is being lost. Illegal lotteries abound. There will be a loss of revenue to the Centre and the states if lotteries are banned. But since society needs a healthy and moral base more than a financial plinth, radical steps have to be taken and enforced ruthlessly. There are many ways of effecting economy in the social system. The losses emanating from a complete ban on lotteries will be more than compensated by the social gains made on account of it. The passage of the Bill should be smooth and unobstructed. The states should give their voluntary consent as early as possible and abolish the ruinous business in their territories. Their cooperation is vital. The Seventh Schedule encouraged the law-makers to go the whole hog to finish this scourge. Those who cite the example of prohibition in this regard do not act with fairness. Come to think of it, science and human necessities will one day—some day—hasten the process of banning the consumption of tobacco and liquor and we all will move a step forwards towards achieving total health. Jawaharlal Nehru understood life well and once said in the context of social welfare: “Life is like a game of cards. The hand that is dealt you represents determinism; the way you play it is free will.” Lotteries should be outlawed also by free will.

Kosovo: what next?

IT is NATO’s moment of truth. One week of bombing has not persuaded President Slobodan Milosevic to give up his tough stand and seek peace. Kosovars are fleeing to nearby Albania (and until Tuesday to Macedonia which has since sealed its border).The Yugoslav army continues to separate men and boys from their family members for selective killing. Some leaders have also been liquidated, to go by western sources. In fact the punitive air raids, ostensibly started to relieve pressure on the people of Albanian origin, have only accentuated their indescribable plight. Countries like Italy and Greece which had well-founded reservations about the need and effectiveness of the raids, have openly started demanding an early end to them. Political parties and pacifist groups are mounting protest. On the other extreme, hawks are stepping up their campaign to commit troops as the only way to stop the killings.

In Russia, the strongest ally of Yugoslavia, the powerful Communist Party wants the country to rush weapons and raise a voluntary force to fight NATO alongside the Serbs. One extremist faction prefers deploying short-range nuclear-tipped missiles in Belarus, close to Yugoslavia. President Yeltsin has taken a very moderate view, condemning the air raids but refusing to get involved in the fighting. He has despatched Prime Minister Primakov to talk to Mr Milosevic and work for a ceasefire. Seemingly the Moscow developments should reduce pressure on NATO, but actually it will be the other way round. With no threat of intervention by Russia and with the misery of Kosovars intensifying, and the air strikes — as many as 1700 sorties and the firing of 100 cruise missiles — producing no dramatic result, the call for inducting ground troops will also intensify. And that would be a call to cross the Rubicon.

In its existence of 50 years, NATO has not fought a war. Now it has to fight one in Europe itself. It will result in Europeans killing Europeans. That is a horrendous thought and socialist parties in power in most countries will find it morally objectionable and politically risky. In the USA, the Senate has voted against sending troops and any suggestion to this effect will revive Vietnam memories. The certain backlash of public opinion has shifted the focus on the possible strategy to get out of Kosovo and at present there is no such strategy. NATO has 12,000 troops in Macedonia but they are lightly armed and are expected to be part of a peace-keeping force wedging themselves between the regular Serb army and the civilian population. There is another problem for NATO. The fierce air attacks have revived the debate about the “Black Tigers” of the Kosovo Liberation Army. They are heavily armed and have a reputation of being ruthless killers. In this respect they are a carbon copy of the Serb army which produced such heartless characters as Radovan Karadzic and General Ratko Mladic of the Srebrenica genocide infame, Yugoslavia has its crop of trigger-happy men but it sorely lacks sober men to save innocent civilians from uniformed men.

Salute to Suu Kyi

AUNG Sang Suu Kyi is perhaps the tallest leader at the global level fighting the forces of tyranny and repression. Before the apartheid structure was knocked down in South Africa Mr Nelson Mandela commanded the same respect from the international community which the pro-democracy leader of Myanmar enjoys today. The South African President’s domestic life was destroyed during his struggle against white dictatorial rule over the black majority. Suu Kyi too has known little domestic bliss although her marriage to Michael Aris, a respected British scholar on Tibetan history, was the stuff love stories are made of. Last week the last chapter of the forced separation of Suu Kyi and Michael Aris by the military junta in Yangon was written in England where he died of prostate cancer. He died a heart-broken man because his request for a visa to visit Yangon was refused by the Myanmarese dictatorship. It turned down humanitarian appeals from the global community for letting Aris visit his wife in Myanmar. Unfortunately India was not among the countries which pleaded Suu Kyi’s cause, although according to reports Defence Minister George Fernandes has allowed a pro-democracy outfit of Myanmarese activists to operate from his official residence. Perhaps in response to the universal condemnation for not granting Aris his last wish the tyrants have reportedly sent a formal letter of condolence to the pro-democracy leader.

They even offered to help with the Buddhist rites for her deceased husband. But Suu Kyi has rightly turned down their offer of help. It has come a little too late and from the wrong people. Technically Suu Kyi should have been at the head of the government in Myanmar after her party swept the elections arranged by the military junta. She was instead placed under house arrest by the same set of rulers who had promised a democratically elected government for the people of Myanmar. Suu Kyi, who has strong ties with India because of the fact that she did her graduation from Delhi University, is without doubt a brave person — to call her a brave woman would amount to doing injustice to her stature as the inspiration for similar movements in other parts of the globe. She turned down the junta’s offer to let her visit her ailing husband in England because she knew that the dictators would not let her return to Myanmar. Hers is a rare story of a wife having to make the difficult choice at being by the bedside of her terminally ill husband or remain with the people who need her to continue the fight against repression. It is easy to give lectures on patriotism and nationalism from the pulpit. But Aung Sang Suu Kyi is a living embodiment of a leader’s unqualified commitment to the cause of freedom and democracy for her people. She should draw strength from the example of Mr Mandela who never gave up hope and finally led his people to liberation from white rule.

WORLD'S RIVER DISPUTES
Future wars may be over water
by Sunanda K. Datta-Ray

INDIA’s treaties with Pakistan and Bangladesh on sharing the Indus and Ganga rivers are increasingly being looked at as models for a world in which future wars might be over water, instead of oil, unless it can bring itself to face up to the reality that rivers and rainfall belong to no one country. As a recent international conference stressed again, they are global assets and should be subject to an international regimen.

Dr Peter Gleick of the Pacific Institute for Studies in Development, Environment and Security is one of those to warn of the grim shape of things to come. The danger, he said, is “symptomatic of our inability in general to manage limited supplies of fresh water on a sustainable basis”. It is precisely because of such fears, and because drought threatens the entire global community, that the solution must also be global, not piecemeal and ad hoc. Just as the Green Revolution transformed agriculture in the 1960s, argue the experts, only a Blue Revolution can now conserve and manage fresh water supplies, organise the development and expansion of resources, and ensure that riparian, rain and groundwater reserves are shared equitably.

The problem calls for a binding legal framework as crisis after crisis demonstrates that a world that is starved of water is inherently unstable.

Iraq, Syria, Lebanon, Egypt, Yemen, Saudi Arabia and the Gulf sheikhdoms, all desert lands, are “heading for a period of increased serious demand on water during the next 20 to 25 years”, says Mr Omar Touqan at the energy and resources section of the United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Western Asia. “Water reservoirs will not meet requirements and it will be necessary to find new water resources. The issue has raised concerns all over the region,” according to Mr Touqan.

Israel used its military might in the early 1960s to stop a Syrian-Jordanian scheme for irrigation from the Jordan river, later occupying the river’s headwaters so as to be able to command most of the flow. Not surprisingly, the Palestinians are bitter about water being diverted from them to the West Bank’s Jewish settler colonies. Turkey and Syria nearly came to blows recently over the Tigris-Euphrates basin where the huge Ataturk Dam will be ready in five or six years. Egypt had earlier threatened war if Ethiopia drew any more water for its agriculture from the blue Nile. In fact, this is a major irritant in a volatile region whose economic grievances usually find sizzling political and military expression, holding the prospect of an even more fierce backlash from countries like Israel and Turkey.

West Asia is not, however, the only part of the world to teeter on the brink of collapse.

Farmers in northern Thailand have been clamouring for an agreement with Myanmar to draw on the Salween and Moei rivers in order to avoid water rationing which, they complain, will devastate their crops. Mexico complains that American over-use has reduced the Colorado river, which used to flow in a broad sweep into the Gulf of California, to a thin and often vanishing trickle. All five Central Asian republics are embroiled in disputes over the Aral Sea basin and the Amu and Syr rivers.

Dependent on Malaysia for water, Singapore is another case in point. Bickering between the two countries is constant: while Singapore would like a water treaty in perpetuity, Malaysia seems to threaten from time to time to cut off supplies altogether. As a result, Singapore has turned to Indonesia for additional water and is also investing heavily in desalination plants. But according to the Johns Hopkins School of Public Health, five countries (Bahrain, Kuwait, Libya, Malta and Qatar) have an even lower per capita availability than Singapore’s 180 cubic metres. Four other “developed water-short countries” (Britain, the USA, Belgium and Poland) also face political tensions, external or internal, as a consequence of shortages.

What all this reflects is that population is growing while water supplies are not. By 2025, three billion people, or 40 per cent of the global population, might have to struggle in conditions of chronic water shortage.

China already illustrates this imbalance in acute form. With 22 per cent of the world’s people but only 7 per cent of the world’s fresh water, China practises what the experts call “zero sum game of water management”. Which means denying one competing area to supply another, depriving agriculture, when needed, to favour industry. That is possible only within a single totalitarian jurisdiction, not in democratic dispensations or multinational regions. Certainly not when 100 countries share 13 major rivers and lakes, and at least 214 river systems straddle international borders.

The free-for-all that this predicates can be avoided, as the Worldwatch Institute has reiterated, through enforceable international laws to govern the allocation and use of international rivers and inland seas. It is not just sharing of existing water that must be regulated. Conservation, regeneration, pollution control and afforestation are of crucial importance. So is population control. The need, in fact, is for a comprehensive multi-pronged economic strategy.

The World Bank reckons that it may cost up to $800 billion over the next decade only to meet the total demand for fresh water for drinking, sanitation, irrigation power generation and other purposes. But in spite of a series of United Nations conferences since the first was held in Argentina in 1977, and a host of reports and recommendations that culminated in a set of guidelines, there is still no overall enforceable strategy.

If such multilateral agreements can be attempted for trade, for various environmental causes, missile control and nuclear weapons, it can be attempted for water too — only on a more equitable basis, taking into account a country’s needs and not only its status in terms of power politics. True, an international regimen will not automatically wipe out tension. But the absence of the discipline that such a system could impose adds greatly to the potential for global conflict.

Formerly Editor of The Statesman, the writer is editorial consultant to The Straits Times in Singapore.

Restating national priorities
by A. K. Nair

POLITICAL power grows out of the barrel of the gun. Mao had made the statement when conquest used to be in terms of battlefield victories, and annexation of territory. Since then the perception of “conquest” has changed, and another source of power has emerged.

Even before Mao died, his successor Deng had sensed the qualitative change in the definition of power. He realised that economic competition would become the modern equivalent of the old politico-military struggle for supremacy. Adversarial goals would be pursued by commercial means. Having come to terms with the changed reality, Deng decided that power would henceforth flow out of the barrel of the economic gun. During the next 15 years he managed to lift as many as 200 million Chinese above the poverty line — a feat never before achieved. In the process he took human rights, Tiananmen Square, reduced defence expenditure and the attendant opprobrium in its stride. Deng had restated China’s priorities.

India being a democratic country cannot follow Deng’s route in its entirety, but we certainly need to do some hard thinking. Economic progress has to be at the top of the national agenda. The seeming disadvantage of being a democracy has to be overcome by establishing greater contact with the people to convert economic resurgence into a movement.

We have to make the best use of our limited resources, always keeping in mind that once the economic goal is achieved, progress in other fields will follow. Instead of tinkering with inconsequential matters, we need to restate our national priorities. Economic development must be numero uno.

For a change, instead of trying to raise revenues through borrowing or taxation, an easier way can be the release of resources through cost rationalisation. Initially, two major areas of expenditure need to be streamlined — defence and government expenditure.

The political plan should be to keep talking to Pakistan over Kashmir, Siachen and other matters. To release resources for economic development a soft-handed approach will have to be developed. We must also try to convince Pakistan that their own economic development must take precedence over everything else. As it is, they are on the verge of defaulting on their foreign debts. This approach will at least help stem the increase in defence expenditure. Further, it is high time an in-depth review of the cost effectiveness of the defence services was undertaken. A serious exercise would both reduce expenditure and increase efficiency.

The other factor holding up rapid economic advance is the inability of the government to balance its books. With an unacceptable fiscal deficit, the government borrowing is crowding out the private sector and keeping the interest rates at a high level. To reduce the fiscal deficit the government must look at the tremendous scope for improving the efficiency and productivity of its administrative set-up and public sector units. The size of the bureaucracy is such that it can derail the economic effort of the country. Similarly, the loss-making public sector units are resulting in annual dissaving of thousands of crores.

Our constant endeavour should be to link remuneration with productivity. Once the productivity principle is accepted, the size of the civil services and the number of persons in the unionised sectors can be reduced — by attrition — to avoid hardships. This would release enormous resources every year. The prerequisite to all this is, of course, the political will to make major changes. The party leading the coalition can only seize the initiative by correcting the basic anomalies and creating public opinion in favour of the corrective measures.

Such goals as involve a change in priorities have been set and achieved both in China and the United Kingdom. China with foreign exchange reserves exceeding $150 billion tells its own story and the success of the bold policies of Mrs Margaret Thatcher is more than evident in the growth in productivity in the UK.

Lapses in children’s education

by Reeta Sharma

SUCH are the times that one is left with little confidence in any government organisation. Today, the working of a majority of government-run or aided organisations is marked by lethargy, tardiness, distorted and exaggerated objectives, corrupt practices, and inefficiency at each step.

The formation of the Punjab Human Rights Commission (PHRC) in March 1997 made many people dismiss it as yet another gimmick which governments often indulge in. However, two years later a fresh look at the PHRC turns out to be a rather revealing experience.

Mr Parkash Singh Badal had declared in his party’s election manifesto that the Akalis would form the state’s own human rights commission. The Akali Dal promptly fulfilled the promise on being voted to power. The government allocated Rs 2 crore as first annual grant to run the commission. The government appointed Justice V.K. Khanna, a retired Chief Justice as Chairman, besides four members.

In the very first year, 1997-98, the PHRC took suo motu notice of 124 cases of human rights violations. It set a remarkable record by disposing of 85 cases within a year. Besides, the PHRC took an overall view of human rights in a wider perspective.

Recalling the progress during the two-year period, Justice Khanna says: “From the very beginning I personally felt that handling of human rights violation cases should go hand in hand with spreading awareness about it. People should be able to respond and react when such violations take place in society. They should also know about the forum where to refer to in such cases.”

No wonder then that the PHRC initiated two-way action. On the one hand, it began receiving complaints while on the other, it organised a series of seminars and workshops on core issues about such violations. The first one in the series was on “Human Rights Education”, conducted at Panjab University, in March, 1997, involving teachers, students and jurists. Next, the PHRC organised a week-long workshop on “Victimology” at the Police Academy, Phillaur, in which police of all ranks participated.

“We organised the third workshop on “child protection” in December, 1997, in collaboration with the British High Commission, once again at Phillaur. The purpose was to sensitise the police on how to protect a child if its rights were violated. We involved, besides the police, the departments of education, health, social services and all the NGOs working for children’s welfare”, he stated. Similarly, on January 5, 1998, another seminar on “Prison Reforms” was held in collaboration with the National Human Rights Commission.

This exercise is continuing in a rather systematic and sustained manner with more seminars and workshops to come. Meanwhile, the type of cases that have been taken cognisance of by the PHRC will certainly go a long way in establishing the credibility of this commission. For example, the commission took suo motu notice of a Dalit woman and her adult son being stripped naked in the presence of each other by the Bathinda police. The PHRC ordered a full-fledged inquiry into the case by the Additional DGP, Mr A.P. Bhatnagar, and found the incident to be true. The victims were granted interim compensation by the commission.

In yet another case, the PHRC acted on a news paper report which said education of children was getting adversely affected due to teachers posts remaining unfilled in various schools at Mansa. Out of 22 principals posts, only two were filled. Another pathetic picture was that of the 48 posts of headmaster as many as 37 were vacant.

The PHRC further discovered that science education was badly affected. None of the four colleges in Mansa was holding classes for pre-engineering and pre-medical students. The commission issued a notice to the state in this regard, which resulted in an improvement in the situation. The state has now filled 164 posts of headmaster out of the 184 posts lying vacant, which include those in Mansa district as well.

What is interesting to note is that the PHRC has certainly sent signals that its range is quite wide in interpreting human rights violations. Mostly one hears of violations pertaining to social and economic oppression or those which are criminal in nature. However, there are other types of violations which have wider repercussions. For instance, neglect of children’s education.

The PHRC took notice of another news report in The Tribune of May 4, 1998, which stated that drugs were being sold freely in chemists’ shops in police district of Batala. When asked by the commission, the state Drug Controller explained that his department was handicapped due to a shortage of drug inspectors who are supposed to check this menace. The PHRC’s active role and consistent follow up forced the state Drug Controlling and Licensing Authority to act. It promptly organised raids on shops of chemists in Batala, Gurdaspur and other districts in Punjab and has assured the PHRC of continuing pressure “so as to eradicate the reprehensible addiction among the people.”

Justice Khanna is full of praise for the commission members — Mr M.S. Chahal, Justice J.S. Sekhon, District Judge T.S. Cheema and Mrs Maninder Mattewal — besides the Secretary Mr A.P. Bhatnagar, who is Additional Director-General of Police.

He said: “All members and other personnel at the PHRC displayed laudable team work. The fact that we could dispose of such a large number of cases in such a short span of time (despite being in the process of establishing the commission from the scratch) speaks volumes of the commitment of all my members and staff and of their heart-felt conviction to end violations from around us.”

Meanwhile, the controversy over the issue whether the PHRC can take up cases not more than a year old has subsided. Justice Khanna clarified: “The National Human Rights Commission was formed in 1993 and it could take up cases only from 1992. This means that there was a platform to reach all these six or seven years. And many people approached the PHRC when they felt that human rights were violated. Hence this one-year stipulation has no relevance now”, he pointed out.

Design your happiness
by Shriniwas Joshi

SUMMERS are when Shimla-houses have number of guests. I also had quite a few this summer but two of them need special mention because they helped me in unlearning that they had taught me about planning a house. Biren is Vaastu Shastra savvy and Lalit is Feng Shui (pronounced Fung Shway) enthusiast.

Biren advised me to remove all the windows from the South and the South-West of my house because South is Yama’s direction and South-West the Demon’s. He suggested that these sides of the house be shut off by building high opaque walls there. When I told him that it would mar the beauty of the house and the panoramic view of the hills and valleys would be lost to us forever, he cautioned: “Well, don’t do it but then remain prepared for the attack of Yama and Demon on you and your family.” I told him that it was not unknown to him that I could manage to cross the average age of today’s Indian by living in this very house and my family was also not sorrily placed. He replied that that was because the entrance to the house was from the North. “The entrance should be from the North or North-East which ensures long life of the occupants”, he made me wiser.

He also asked me to remove quite a few walls inside the house because “greater the number of walls, greater the block to energy flow”. I would have happily acted upon my friend’s advice had I not been afraid of the energy with which the roof would fall on my head. His last piece of advice was “sleep with the head pointing East or South, never North. Since in the human body, the head is the North pole, it will repel the earth’s North pole and cause disturbed sleep.” I cheerfully agreed with him that my head with whiteness spreading over it was like North pole but everybody’s head, say, my son’s head with jet-black hair on it was not a bit North pole. Biren knew me from my youth and so did not mind my imprudence.

His departure coincided with Lalit’s welcome. I knew that he had fingers in many pies but it was knowledge to me that one of his fingers was in Feng Shui pie too. Immediately on his arrival, he asked me to remove the bottle-brush tree which was directly outside the front door of my house. He said, “A tree outside the front door would block, in Feng Shui terms, prosperity from entering the home.” He was, however, happy to see the trees planted on the North-West side of the house. “Trees planted on this side of the house bring happiness for the inhabitants”, he told me. He also advised me to keep a tank of fish in the home because fish symbolised money and success. His last piece of advice like that of his predecessor was concerned with “how should I sleep”. It was, “the foot of the bed should never face the door. The genesis for this is the Chinese practice of laying out the dead with feet to the door and carrying the body out feet first.” I told him that if I followed his advice then my head would fall on the North which was forbidden by Vaastu. He gave me a friendly “do or die” look.

Both Biren and Lalit have gone back to the polluted Delhi. My bottle-brush tree is where it was and the South and the South-West of my house are still open and grand. I have devised my own “Shangri-La” living principle, the first and the last rule of which is, “Be happy with the design of the house where you are living and if you are building a house then design your happiness. House takes care of itself.”

75 YEARS AGO

Boycott of British Goods

THE Liberal Party is by no means united on the subject of the boycott of imperial, including British, goods, even as a protest against the Kenya decision. We have seen that subject to one important reservation Mr Jamna Das Dwarka Das is emphatically in favour of it. On the other hand, Mr Srinivas Sastri, while strongly advocating the boycott of the British Empire Exhibition and other imperial functions, and also a general policy of retaliation, has so far said nothing about the desirability or otherwise of this particular measure, while the “Leader” of Allahabad, which is in general accord with Mr Sastri, expresses its serious misgivings as to the feasibility and desirability of the boycott.

It writes: “The bocyott of British goods has been one of the principal weapons of political warfare in the armoury of the Das-Tilak school of politics”.

To say this is to forget that the whole of political Bengal, led by Sir, then Mr Surenderanath Banerjea, adopted this weapon in its fight against the dismemberment of the Province, and that the entire Indian National Congress, irrespective of party differences, supported Bengal in the adoption of this method. Who can say that the attainment of Swaraj or even the undoing of the Kenya wrong is a less important object than the rescinding of the partition of Bengal? Undoubtedly the question of feasibility has to be seriously considered, and it has to be seen that we do not cut off our nose to spite our face. But it is exactly for this reason that the Bombay meeting suggested that the Congress should appoint a Committee of Experts to formulate a practical scheme.