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EVIDENCE TAKEN BEFORE THE JOINT COMMITTEE ON INDIAN CONSTITUTIONAL REFORM
Witnesses examined by Dr. B. R. Ambedkar
(1)
Sir Patrick James Fagan, K.C.I.E., C.S.I., F.R.A.S.. Mr. E. B. Loveluck, Mr. Wilfred Harold Shoobert, Mr. Eustace Arthur Cecil King, Mr. Henry Robert Harrop, Mr. Frederick Wynne Robertson, Sir Evans Cottan, Mr. Harold Lancelot Newman and Mr. Sale, on behalf of European Government Servants, Indian Police Association and Civil Engineers’ Association.
*382. Dr. B. R. Ambedkar : You stated a little while ago that there is a great deal of hostility shown to the Indian Public Service by the Indian Press and by the politicians in India ?
Sir P. J. Fagan : Yes.
*383. Dr. B. R. Ambedkar : I would like to read to you a small extract from the Minute written by Sir Reginald Craddock, which is appended to the Lee Commission Report, on page 132, paragraph 10, a few lines from the bottom. This is the paragraph to which I want to draw your attention : “Several of those who have given evidence before us believe that the hostility from time to time shown by the new legislatures is entirely occasioned by the fact that the members of the All-India Services are imposed on them from outside, and that fresh recruitment for those Services will indefinitely prolong these vested interests ; but that, once control passes from the Secretary of State to the Government of India or to the Local Government in the transferred field as the case may be, all bias and animus will disappear.” I want to know whether you agree with that statement ?
Sir P. J. Fagan : No ; I do not think we have sufficient grounds for agreeing with that statement. Of course, if it should turn out so, it would be good, but I am afraid the Associations have not sufficient grounds for agreeing with the statement that there would be a sudden change of attitude.
- Dr. B. R. Ambedkar : Do not you think the very fact that you want to remain outside the control of the Indian Legislature, and the new
*Minutes of Evidence, Vol. II-A, 13th June 1933, pp. 69-70.