Bande Mataram

Soldiers and Assaults

08-May-1907

The Englishman has after much deliberation decided to open a fund in aid of the soldiers who the other day attacked an Indian and assaulted him and was fined Rs. 150 by the Magistrate. The appeal for help is made at the fag end of a long article which opens thus:—

"The private soldier in a large Indian town such as Calcutta has many disabilities and not less temptations. The nature of his occupation leaves him a certain amount of leisure, and it is not to be expected that he should be a man of sufficient culture to spend this leisure in literary pursuits. He sallies forth for a walk, during the course of which he is only too frequently the object of undesirable attention of both a quasi-friendly and an openly hostile kind. Our experience of the excellent Mr. Atkins goes to show that he is as a rule an extremely well-behaved man, chivalrous and kindly in his way, and certainly by no means a swaggering, hectoring bully. Yet he inevitably on occasion comes into unpleasant contact with the natives of the country."

Then the Hare Street journal says that petty dealers and hucksters take advantage of the soldier's ignorance of the language and other disabilities and attempt to cheat him, an "attempt which if discovered leads to the most natural resentment on the part of the victim. This resentment may be, in default of the power of vernacular expression, translated into action, but is the soldier to blame?" Certainly not. And as a white man, he has every right to assault the Indian who is, in the words of Kipling, the Banjo Bard of the Empire, no more than "half-devil, half-child". Belonging to a race that makes laws the soldier has

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the power to take the law into his own hand when dealing with "natives". And the Englishman is sure that "his behaviour is as a rule admirable and reflects credit on the man and the service." The man, of course, is worthy of the service. If attempts to cheat are to be punished with blows by the victim, why, Clive should have been the first Englishman to suffer at the hand of Omichand. We are sorry the wisdom of the Englishman was not shared by Justice Norris who tried the O'Hara case, nor by Lord Curzon who was constrained to punish an entire regiment for misconduct, nor by the Bengal Government in the matter of the Barrackpur shooting case. But we do not quarrel with the Englishman for supporting the soldiers. We are convinced misconduct on their part will not cease till we learn to retaliate. Our duty lies clear before us—to organize measures of self-defence and determine to have tooth for tooth and eye for eye.

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