It is clear from this statement that the investigation of the committee was neither judicial nor even semi-judicial; it was a purely administrative inquiry conducted behind the backs of the individuals concerned, without the latter having any opportunity of cross-examining the witnesses or giving their explanations of the evidence against them. While the different Governments in India were fully represented in each case by the ablest of their servants, the individuals investigated were not. We do not want to insinuate that either the Governments or the officers deputed by them were unfair in their evidence. All that we want to point out is that the other side had no opportunity of putting their case before the committee. Consequently, it is no wonder that one comes across many traces of political and racial bias both in the introduction and the Report. The very first paragraph of the introduction betrays either ignorance on the part of the committee about the ancient history of India, or a deliberate misrepresentation of the nature of the Hindu State. The committee says: "Republican or Parliamentary forms of governments as at present understood were neither desired nor known in India until after the establishment of British rule. In the Hindu State the form of government was an absolute monarchy, though the monarch was by the Hindu Shastras hedged round by elaborate rules for securing the welfare of his subjects and was assisted by a body of councillors, the chief of whom were Brahmin members of the priestly class which derived authority from a time when the priests were the sole repositories of knowledge and therefore the natural instruments of administration." The statements made in this paragraph do not represent the whole truth. The committee ignores the fact that Republican or Parliamentary forms of Government "_as at present understood_" were neither desired nor known in any part of the world, except perhaps England itself until _after_ the establishment of British rule in India.[1] Then the committee has altogether ignored that, in the Hindu State, the form of government was not an absolute monarchy _always and in all parts of India_. There is ample historical evidence to prove that India had many Republican States, along with oligarchies and monarchies at one and the same period of her history. The second part of the second sentence is also not correct, because the priestly class derived its authority from a time when the priests were not the sole repositories of knowledge. The several Hindu political treatises belong to a period when the whole populace was highly educated and could take substantial part in the determination of the affairs of their country.