Finds England's "Law and Order" a Cloak For Exploitation in India

"With the exception of modern science, India has little to learn from the West," declared Syud Hossain, Indian lecturer, publicist, and diplomat, in a recent interview with a CRIMSON reporter. Mr. Hossain, who is in this country on his second American lecture tour, is one of India's most distinguished authorities on international relations.

"India is the very cradle of civilization," he declared. "It is the fountainhead of much that is most precious among all peoples. Mathematics was invented there; poetry, literature, sculpture, painting, and philosophy have there been brought to their highest peaks."

Mr. Hossain protested against the idea that British control is needed in India, either for the good of the people, or to preserve law and order. "Law and order"--he exclaimed, "that is merely a cloak for exploitation! Why should a country which has existed independently for thirty-eight centuries be unable to do without foreign interference?

"Government is either carried on for the good of the people, or for the good of the rulers. There is no half-way mark. England his impoverished the Indian people. Suppose some foreign country controlled all your resources, manipulated your tariffs, made your budgets, and levied your taxes! That is what England is doing in India. She has appropriated all movable wealth, and now uses India as a source of raw materials, and a market for manufactured goods."

Blames Censorship for Misconceptions

The control of public opinion by England through propaganda and censorship, coupled with Western ignorance and indifference, has resulted in the common misconceptions about India, and usual failure to appreciate true values in Indian affairs, according to Mr. Hossain. "The average American's idea of India is a place where elephants roam about and fortune-tellers line the streets; just as his idea of a Turk is a person who is constantly either wallowing in polygamy, or cutting the throats of Christians.

"The Separatist movement in India will go on; it may ebb or flow as the heavy hand of oppression comes down, but a movement of 300,000,000 people can never be extinguished." Mr. Hossain pointed to what has happened in Ireland. "There was a time when England might have quieted Ireland easily," he continued, "when a rational settlement would have been accepted. But a nation, irritated and embittered by centuries of misery and oppression, is not in a frame of mind to agree to a compromise, whether rational or not."

Denounces War

Mr. Hossain is an earnest opponent of war, and denounces the psychology that makes war possible--the ignorant national egotism which expresses itself in "cants of national superiority." "I was in England when the war broke out," he said, "and it was amazing to see educated men and women, cultured people supposedly with intellectual poise, almost instantaneously convinced that every one of the 60,000,000 Germans were Huns. The same thing would happen if the United States declared war on Japan.

"What an astonishing commentary on education this is! A century or more ago we might have said that the people were ignorant, and knew no better, yet there is no change today." Mr. Hossain said that cooperation must replace competition, among both individuals and nations, and that universal principles must be established instead of the ignorant egotism and narrow patriotism of today. He made a plea for a more sympathetic understanding among all nations, and particularly between the East and the West, as a necessary preliminary to world peace.