"I am confident that the praise and gratitude which are their due for these manifold services will flow forth in an abundant measure from our hearts. But let us look to another aspect of the question. What was England before her advent to India? What was her position in the hierarchy of world powers? Can it be denied that the sovereignty of India increased the power and prestige of England a hundred-fold and more? If then India has reason to be grateful to England, is not England also under a corresponding debt of immense gratitude to India? Of the gratitude of India, proofs have been forth-coming again and again. Of the gratitude of England, the proof is now to come; and if you refuse to grant our legitimate prayer, we shall take it that your gratitude is an empty and meaningless phrase." To a patriot when he goes to take a survey of the present condition of India, the first thing that presents itself is the deplorable state of the agriculturists; and that at once reminds us of our poverty. We all know that in the absence of trade and commerce agriculture is the chief means of our subsistence. In his address at the Bengal Provincial Conference Chitta Ranjan has presented before us a pitiable picture of our peasantry. The annual income of a peasant of our country ranges from sixteen to twenty rupees. This amount is certainly insufficient for a peasant even to keep his body and soul together. A prisoner in a Government Jail in India gets Rs. 48 annually for his subsistence. The comparison clearly shows that for bare subsistence the peasants have to incur debts. There is not one single village in Bengal where at least 75% of the inhabitants are not in debt; and there are villages where this frightful indebtedness extends to the whole of the population. Thus it appears, first, that the peasant by tilling his land does not earn enough to give him an adequate livelihood; and secondly, that out of the little that he earns a portion finds its way into the pocket of the "Mahajan". And poverty is the source of all corruption, in the case of the peasants poverty grinds them in two ways. In the first place, it makes them weak, feeble, spiritless, and in the second place it has become a frightful source of theft and robbery. Thus from whatever point of view we consider the matter, the removal of poverty seems to be one of our chief and foremost problems.