Hedges

So grave have been the world's other troubles in recent weeks that the third successive Indian Round Table Conference has dragged out its deliberations in almost complete obscurity. Last week its Hindus, Moslems, Parsees and British politicians seized the spotlight for a brief instant by marching into the King's Robing Room of the House of Lords for their final session. India Office immediately issued handfuls of optimistic propaganda hailing the Conference as "largely successful." Sir Samuel Hoare, Secretary of State for India, sent the delegates home with the following pat on the back:

"I would venture to sum up the results of the conference in two sentences. First, we have clearly delimited the field upon which the future constitution is going to be built. . . . Secondly, we have created an esprit de corps among all of us. . . ."

It was hard to find much more that the Conference did accomplish. In the name of His Majesty's Government, Sir Samuel, a stalwart Tory, refused to fix a date for the establishment of an Indian Federation (first step toward "dominion status") in 1935 or any other definite year. He rejected even the concept of an Indian-born Minister of Defense for India. He refused to pledge that Indian troops shall never be sent beyond India's frontier except with the special consent of the Indian Legislature. He stuck firmly by all the British "safeguards" that have stranded previous round table conferences, but he did think of a more polite way of talking about them.

"I think of these safeguards," said Sir Samuel, "not as a stone wall that blocks the road, but as hedges on either side that no good driver ever touches, but that prevent people on a dark night falling into a ditch."

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