Young India: An interpretation and a history of the nationalist movement from withinLajpat Rai, Lala
History
Young India: An interpretation and a history of the nationalist movement from within
Lajpat Rai, Lala
India -- Politics and government -- 1765-1947
“This is emphatically a book to be read by the Secretary of State for
India himself, as well as by the members of the Council and the clerks
in the India Office. It ought to be pondered over by every Indian
civilian. It is not that it brings any new indictment against British
rule in India, though much that Mr. Lajpat Rai says is very
uncomfortable reading; but it reveals, alike to the Indian bureaucracy
and to the British public, how unexpectedly acute and well-informed is
the criticism to which our somewhat slow and stupid Administration is
subjected, how completely it is out of touch with the thought of
educated ‘Young India;’ how far we are from getting into sympathetic
accord with the feelings and aspirations of the educated classes,
Mussulman as well as Hindoo.... Those who read Mr. Lajpat Rai’s very
significant volume (Will the Indian Government even allow it to enter
India?) will not agree with all his statements or proposals. But they
deserve to be widely read and carefully weighed. Every Briton would be
the better for reading them. And they deserve an answer--not merely a
reasoned refutation by the India Office of that which it thinks
erroneous or perverse, but, what is much more important, a prompt reform
of all that the India Office does not venture to defend.”
REEDY’S MIRROR (St. Louis):
“The book is profoundly interesting as showing what the native thinks of
British rule in India. Heretofore we have seen almost wholly through
Caucasian eyes--mostly the eyes, of Englishmen, members of the
government bureaucracy or missionaries, who have represented England as
the great benefactor of India. Through the eyes of Mr. Rai we see an
entirely different India--an India under a perfect despotism, in the
main a benevolent despotism, but which does not hesitate to use the
mailed hand when opposed.”
THE NATION (London):
“The whole book is a definite and we believe an accurate statement of
the present feeling among a rapidly increasing body of young and
educated Indians who have learnt the value of political freedom and the
difficulty of winning or retaining it.”
* * * * *
_WORKS BY THE SAME AUTHOR (IN ENGLISH)_
THE ARYA SAMAJ
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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