To-day we seem to be seeing*the results of the stronger rule in India which has been in evidence since the late summer. A telegram published yesterday announced that the authorities had found possible to release from gaol Sikhs over 50 years of age who had been concerned in the Akali disturbances, and this will no doubt prove to be the forerunner of other measures of clemency. The story of these disturbances, or rather the religious feud out of which they arose, is a long one, going back to the early days of the Shih religion and the initial split into different sects. After the lapse of generations the temples and shrines were found to be in possession of a corrupt and dissolute priesthood, and that they might be purified the opponents of that priesthood resorted to violent methods of ejection and set about increasing the number of Akalis—Sikhs sworn on the sword in their infancy. The result was bloodshed, as for instance the massacre at Nankana and other wild doings as late as last summer.. Worst of all gandhi entered into the counsels of the dissatisfied Sikhs, used their religious grievances for the fostering of his own particular politics, and only a few months ago had brought the Punjab into a state of unrest and danger. The disappearance of Gandhi from India gave the authorities the chance to check the outrages which had become almost a commonplace, and as his followers lacked any of the hypnotic influence which he seems to have exercised upon his countrymen, the task of pacification was simplified. The result in these few months seems to have been to restore a great stretch of territory to its normal condition of peace, and the moral is obvious, that never again can the flabby hand of the sentimentalist be allowed to tamper with its government.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.