The prejudice against Indian settlers outside India is showing itself in
a variety of ways: Under the impudent suggestion of sedition the Fiji
Government has deported Mr. Manilal Doctor who with his brave and
cultured wife has been rendering assistance to the poor indentured
Indians of Fiji in a variety of ways. The whole trouble has arisen over
the strike of the labourers in Fiji. Indentures have been canceled, but
the spirit of slavery is by no means dead. We do not know the genesis of
the strike; we do not know that the strikers have done no wrong. But we
do know what is behind when a charge of sedition is brought against the
strikers and their friends. The readers must remember that the
Government that has scented sedition in the recent upheaval in Fiji is
the Government that had the hardihood to libel Mr. Andrew's character.
What can be the meaning of sedition in connection with the Fiji strikers
and Mr. Manilal Doctor? Did they and he want to seize the reins of
Government? Did they want any power in that country? They struck for
elementary freedom. And it is a prostitution of terms to use the word
sedition in such connection. The strikers may have been overhasty. Mr.
Manilal Doctor may have misled them. If his advice bordered on the
criminal he should have been tried. The information in our possession
goes to show that he has been strictly constitutional. Our point,
however, is that it is an abuse of power for the Fiji Government to have
deported Mr. Manilal Doctor without a trial. It is wrong in principle to
deprive a person of his liberty on mere suspicion and without giving him
an opportunity of clearing his character. Mr. Manilal Doctor, be it
remembered, has for years past made Fiji his home. He has, we believe,
bought property there. He has children born in Fiji. Have the children
no rights? Has the wife none? May a promising career be ruined at the
bidding of a lawless Government? Has Mr. Manilal Doctor been compensated
for the losses he must sustain? We trust that the Government of India
which has endeavoured to protect the rights of Indian settlers abroad
will take up the question of Mr. Doctor's deportation.
Nor is Fiji the only place where the spirit of lawlessness among the
powerful has come to the surface. Indians of (the late) German East
Africa find themselves in a worse position than heretofore. They state
that even their property is not safe. They have to pay all kinds of dues
on passports. They are hampered in their trade. They are not able even
to send money orders.
In British East Africa the cloud is perhaps the thickest. The European
settlers there are doing their utmost to deprive the Indian settlers of
practically every right they have hitherto possessed. An attempt is
being made to compass their ruin both by legislative enactment and
administrative action.
In South Africa every Indian who has anything to do with that part of
the British Dominions is watching with bated breath the progress of
commission that is now sitting.
The Government of India have no easy job in protecting the interests of
Indian settlers in these various parts of His Majesty's dominions. They
will be able to do so only by following the firmest and the most
consistent policy. Justice is admittedly on the side of the Indian
settlers. But they are the weak party. A strong agitation in India
followed by strong action by the Government of India can alone save the
situation.