Lord Winterton's motion in the House of Commons regarding the intrigues of Communist agents in the Northwest of India hus again drawn attention to the persistence of Bolshevik tactics in Central Asia, So far back as 1921 the Bolsheviks established at Tashkent a school for ithe training of propagandists; it is believed that not less than a thousand Indians of various communities, but especially Hindus from Delhi and Benares, were attending this school. Recent events in Afghanistan have some extent facilitated Bolshevik intrigue, but it is more probable that, whenever trouble has broken out on the Northwest Frontier of India, it has been due to the Tashkent-trained Indians working up to the north from the interior of India, and not by Pathans from over the frontier. It is exceedingly difficult for anyone to get into British India from Afghanistan and independent tribal territory without being detected, The reasons are fully appreciated by anyone who knows the frontier and the methods of administration there. In the year 1920 the Khilafat agitation in India led to the Hejirat—or holy exodus—from the Punjab and Sind of a large number of misguided Mohammedans, many of whom lost their lives' in the disastrous trek through Afghanistan, Some of these men found their way to Tashkent, but few were infected by Bolshevik Propaganda because they were bitterly disillusioned by the horrible experiences through which they went that, if anything, they became hardened anti-Bolsheviks, The real danger in India lies in the activities of the Bolshevik agents among the young Hindus of the intellectual class, who find it exceedingly difficult to secure work and are therefore disgruntled.
Lord Winterton, who has had a very long experience at. th India Office, where his work Under-Secretary brought him into close touch with this problem, has probably very good ground for suggesting that information be obtained on the subject. The recent Treaty igned between the British Government and Moscow involved a pledge on both sides that propaganda should cease. Tha British Government obviously are not going to move unless they have what in popular language is called a cast-iron case. The position is complicated by the fact that at the moment there is proceeding at Meerut the trial of thirty-one men (English and Indian), who are accus+ ed of treason on the ground that, acting under instructions from Moscow, they attempted to sti up revolution in India. Unti that trial is over it might be undesirable and difficult for the British Government to dilate at Jength on this aspect of their Indian troubles, Still Lord Winterton has done a service in reminding the Labour Government that this is a matter which cannot be overlooked. Pro paganda of the Red type may po perfectly harmless in England and mercifully killed by ridicule, but in a country like India if. may often be, and has been, the direct cause of the loss of innocent lives.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.