142 DR. BABASAHEB AMBEDKAR : WRITINGS AND SPEECHES
such honour to heathen is generally as was best calculated to maintain it in a high state or exultant obesity.”
It was not till 1841 that Government dissociated itself from actual participation in the Hindu and Mahomedan religions ceremonies and that too after a great deal of agitation by the Missionaries.
“In a circular letter signed by the Military Secretary to the Government of Fort St. George, and addressed to the Commanderin-Chief, under date of July 6, 1841, it is intimated, “under instructions from the Court of Directors, conveyed through the Government of India”, that “the attendance of troops or of military bands at native festivals or ceremonies, and the firing of salutes on occasions of that nature,” were “in future to be discontinued, with the object of separating the Government and its officers, as far as possible, from all connexion with the ceremonies of the Hindoo and Mahomedan religions.” The ordinary marks of respect paid to native princes on the occasions of their going forth or returning from such festivals or religious observances were, however, to be paid; and the change was to be effected “in a manner calculated not to alarm the minds of the natives or to offend their feelings. “These orders were circulated by the Commander in-Chief to the Generals commanding divisions, and by them to the regiments under their several commands.”
What reform could be expected from a Government which had become so steeped in native prejudices and which wasted such official resources to tend them and keep them up ?
It was stricken and paralyzed by sympathy. When it ceased to sympathise with the prejudices it was overtaken by fear. This fear arose out of two considerations.
The first consideration related to the promises it had made to the people of India. On assuming the Government of any new territory, previously under native rule, it was the practice of the British Government to announce to the people that they would be protected in the free exercise of their religions and that neither their institutions nor their usages would be assailed. Thus in 1801 a solemn declaration was made, in the following terms to the people of the Carnatic :—
“Although the Right Honourable the Governor in Council trusts that the experience which the inhabitants of the Carnatic have already had, will have rendered it unnecessary for His Lordship to explain the general principles of moderation, justice, protection, and security, which form the characteristic features of the British Government, yet His Lordship in