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having any reference to such considerations as numbers, education, and the material progress of the community referred to, but upon a fantastic theory of " of "—an artificial and arbitrary arrangement which must in practical appli- "balancing power cation result in injustice to one section of the people or another. The truth of this assertion is well proved by the scheme of representation given in the Joint Memo- randum. Its obvious inconsistencies can be defended on no rational grounds. It simply means that the majority section of the population of any country have no inherent right to adequate representation, but must be contented with what the minority communities in their wisdom and goodness of heart agree to allow them. Even from a communal point of view it is obvious that no such right of dictation can be claimed by, or granted to, any group of communities. It is scarcely necessary to add that in any scheme of reform adequate constitutional safeguards may be provided against any such danger as is apprehended by the authors of the Memorandum, instead of allowing their imaginary fear to stand as an insuperable barrier athwart the part of political progress in this country.
8. In reply to the criticisms levelled at the Congress in regard to its repre- sentative character, the memorialists beg to submit herewith a copy of an interview granted by the President of the Congress to the Ceylon Daily News, which they venture to submit establishes by indisputable facts and figures the position which the Congress occupies in Ceylon. (Vide Appendix H.)
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9. In conclusion the memorialists beg to submit that any alteration of the reform scheme on the lines suggested in the Joint Memorandum will be keenly resented as a retrograde step which cannot but be disastrous to the welfare and political progress of Ceylon. It will engender in the minds of the people a sense of distrust which it would be difficult, if not impossible, to eradicate, and will create in this country a feeling of discontent the result of which it is not easy to foresee. In submitting these observations on the Joint Memorandum your Memorialists earnestly invite your careful and impartial consideration of the Congress claims in the sincere hope that you will judge them on their own merits and grant to the law- abiding and progressive people of this country a constitution which will set them forth in the path of ordered progress towards self-government.
And your Memorialists as in duty bound will ever pray.
H. J. CHAS. PEREIRA,
President.
M. A. ARUL Anandan, M. T. DE S. AMERASEKERA,
Honorary Secretaries.
On behalf of the Executive Committee of the Ceylon National Congress. Ceylon National Congress Chambers.
Colombo, 20th September, 1922.
APPENDIX B.
EXTRACTS from interview granted to the Ceylon Daily News by Honourable Mr. E. R. Tambimuttu, 23rd August, 1922: —
The Hon. Mr. E. R. Tambimuttu, interviewed yesterday, said :----
The statement in the mischievous memorandum that the Tamils favour the scheme of reform propounded there is quite unfounded. The Tamil provinces are represented in Council by Mr. Duraiswamy and myself. As for me from the very beginning I was opposed to the Tamils casting their lot with the other minorities in opposition to the Singhalese. I refused to take part in the deputation that awaited on His Excellency with that Memorial.
"But the Memorialists maintain that Mr. Duraiswamy favoured their scheme," remarked our representative.
Mr. Tambimuttu replied: I have Mr. Duraiswamy's assurance that he did not see the memorial, and it is evident from the memorial itself that he has not signed it. In fact the telegram that was published as an appendix to the memorial, Mr. Duraiswamy says, was a private reply to a telegram from Sir P. Ramanathan, and its publication was quite unauthorized. Sir P. Ramanathan, as everybody knows, is one of the nominated members, and to quote the same document that is used by the Memorialista, a nominated member is called to Council because of his experience or because his voice will be listened to in Council, not because he is a Tamil. Sir P. Ramanathan cannot be said to represent the Tamils Therefore I fail to see
So
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I am
how these minorities could boast that the Tamils are in agreement with them. very sorry that this Memorandum has created some bad blood between the Tamils and the Singhalese, but I am sure every true Singhalese who understands the situation will realize that the Tamils and the Singhalese should stand together in order to face the crisis that is looming ahead of us. and I am sure he will dissociate himself from all connexion with the Memorial.
Mr. Duraiswamy will be here on Thursday,
APPENDIX C.
Extracts from the Ceylon Daily News, 26th August, 1922. AN EMPHATIC REPUDIATION..
The Hon. Mr. Duraiswamy's Signature.
THE Hon. Mr. E. R. Tambimuttu, M. L. C. for the Eastern Province, has already mentioned in the interview he granted a Daily News representative that Mr. Duraiswamy did not sign the Memorial in question and that the authors of the Memorial had made an abuse of his private telegram to Sir Ponnambalam by annexing it to their Memorial.
Mr. Duraiswamy's Version,
A representative of the Ceylon Daily News was able yesterday to hea. from Mr. Duraiswamy his version of the affair.
At first Mr. Duraiswamy was not disposed to grant an interview because he said that he had been misrepresented in the Daily News.
"How?" asked our representative.
-
Your paper said that I have signed the Memorial, which I never did,” replied the Member for the Northern Province.
you say I signed it.
"In fact I refused to sign the Memorial. political advancement into the minority camp.'
You spoil your own cause by throwing the supporters of
But
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"Then you disagreed with the proposals in the Memorial!
"
"I disagree," emphasized Mr. Duraiswamy, with many of the principles enunciated in the Memorial, especially that no two communities should be in a majority in Council. This, I consider, directly calculated to ignore the interests of the majority of the population, Singhalese and Tamils, in the Island."
"From the very first," added Mr. Duraiswamy, "both Mr. Tambimuttu and I have been trying our best to bring about a settlement even at the risk of sacrificing our personal friendship with some prominent figures on the other side. May I say that it is not in vain that I hope we will be able to get on in harmony."
Mr. Duraiswamy mentioned that his telegram would have made it clear that he did not support the scheme in the Memorial in question. The scheme he supported was for a Council of ten official members, ten minority members, no nominated members, and twenty-five territorially elected members. expressed only that he was in favour of maintaining the proportion (7 to 13) between In that telegram he Tamils and Singhalese.
Extracts from an interview published in The Citizen of the 17th September. 1922. The Hon. Mr. W. Duraiswamy.
"I had no hand whatever in the Minorities Scheme. Ramanthan shows that I was opposed to the very essentials of that absurd scheme. If we have to hand the guidance of our political matters to the Minorities what is My telegram to Sir our political worth? I cannot understand how age and experience could have been guilty of such egregious blunders. I will never support any scheme of that kind that commits the Tamils to the hack-waters of political uselessness. No sane Tamil unobsessed by personal magnificence could have been guilty of such a woeful exhibition of political absurdity. This is all the work of our old men. cannot lead in the right way they lead in the wrong, but they always lead; that is their one and only ambition."
If they
APPENDIX D.
Dr. E. V. Ratnam.
Dr. E. V. Ratnam, M.M.C., interviewed, said that he entirely dissociated him- self from what is stated in the Memorial.
Page 390Page 391
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He said that a Committee Meeting of the Tamil Association of Colombo, of which he was the president, will be held this evening to consider the present political situation and the contents of the Memorial-Extracts from the Ceylon Daily News, 23rd August. 1922.
Tamil Association Telegram.
The Colombo Tamil Association has despatched the following cable to the Secretary of State for the Colonies:-
The Colombo Tamil Association representing all Tamil sections, entirely disapprove scheme in memorandum forwarded by minorities, beg inform that elected Council Members for Tamil Provinces have publicly repudiated Minorities' Memo- randum. This Association forwarding Memorial.
DR. RUTNAM,
President.
Colombo Tamil Association.
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issue, I wish here to endorse his views as a sincere Moslem of self-respect and national honour and deeply deplore Mr. Muhammed Kamer Cassim's hasty and ill-considered action towards Reform.
He is a member of the Executive Committee of the Ceylon National Congress. I do not know what made this young Reformer to change his views so suddenly without the least consideration.
Mr. Cassim could not have participated in this Memorial without the consent of the Ceylon Muslim Association. Could it be then Sir Ramanathan's charming words or tactful diplomacy that won Mr. Cassim to his side! Cassim as a lawyer should not have signed on behalf of the Ceylon Muslim Associa- Even then Mr. tion while Mr. T. B. Jayah holds the Presidentship for this year. Moslem repudiate all that is said in the Secret Memorial as the lately nominated I as a true Tamil Knight's political invention against the Ceylon National Congress.
I am, &c.,
A MEMBER, Ceylon Muslim ASSOCIATION.
17th August, 1922.
Mr. Kamer Cassim's Repudiation.
SIR,
Arpendix E.
Extracts from the Ceylon Daily News.
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Letters to the Editor.
Secret Minority Memorial and Ceylon Muslim Association.
You deserve the thanks of all right-minded Ceylonese for bringing to light the Secret Memorial submitted to the Secretary of State for the Colonies by members of the Minorities in the Legislative Council.
I do not desire to offer any criticism on the Memorial. but I will only add that Mr. M. K. Cassim, who signs on behalf of the Ceylon Muslim Association, had no authority to sign on its behalf. The views expressed by him are his own and in no way do they bind the Association.
If the Memorial had been submitted to the Executive Committee of our Association for approval, I, as a member of that Committee, would have known its contents. On reading the Mohammedan assent attached to the Memorial, I find it begins as follows: "We hereby agree to the Scheme of Representation which, we understand, had been adopted by the members of the Legislative Council, who represent the European, Burgher, Tamil, Mohammedan and Indian Communities." The use of the words, "
we understand" makes it clear that the assent given by Mr. Cassim on behalf of the Association cannot be accepted as an assent of the Association.
Colombo, 16th August.
Yours, &c.,
M. L. M. Reyal..
SIR,
I TAKE the task of thanking you for enlightening the Ceylon public on that 'Secret Minority Memorial" presented to the Secretary of State for the Colonies by some unauthorized "Diehards" who acted on their individual capacity pretend- ing that they really and sincerely represented the interests of their respective constituents. As a member of the Ceylon Muslim Association and a sympathiser of the Ceylon National Congress and other political bodies who demand and agitate for a Liberal and a Constitutional Government. "A Government by the people," and
A Government of the people," most of the signatories to the said secret policy are the members of the class who Government for the people," I believe that were nominated by His Excellency to represent their communities in disguise.
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Particularly speaking for the Moslems, I may venture to say that the Hon. the Moslem Member ought to have not committed such a suicidal blunder joining the Honourable Sir P. Ramanathan (Mr. Cader's new philosopher, guide and friend in the Reform question). Sir Ramanathan is well known to us by his past attitudes towards the Moslems. The Mohammedan member has, by his present actions, made the Congress men, who have extended their liberal support to our demand to condemn our actions and suspect our future activities for the nation's need. Referring to the statermanlike protest of Mr. M. I.. M. Reyal which appeared in your yesterday's
DEAR SIR,
I JUST returned to town having spent a few weeks' holiday in the country. Certain letters and comments in the Press criticizing my action have been brought to my notice, and I hasten to offer my explanation in respect of the Secret Minority Memorial.
In the first place I must say that I did not subscribe to the Memorial, but only agreed to the scheme of representation which, I was assured, had been adopted by the representations of many communities in the Legislative Council, and this is made clear by the wording of the Memorandum I signed. I did not see the Memorial itself. I asked for a copy of it, which was promised me. copy. Had I seen it I would have been the first to repudiate many of the statements I did not as yet get the contained therein,
I agreed to the scheme on behalf of the Association after consulting some of the responsible office-bearers and members of the Committee of the Association, though personally I was against giving a Tamil Member for the City of Colombo. instance we were only concerned with the scheme as affecting the Mohammedan In this community.
I must confess that I believed in the sincerity of the prime movers of that Memorial and I took it for granted that nothing improper would have been said in the Memorial, though I had nothing to do with that Memorial itself because I did not sign it.
Thanking you for the space granted me in your valuable journal.
Fort Galle, 26th August.
APPENDIX F.
Yours, &c..
M. KAMER CASSIM.
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Extracts from the Low Country Products Association Members' Memorial. 14. Your Memorialists therefore humbly beg that Your Lordship will be pleased to take such measures as may be necessary to place the Legislative Council of Ceylon on an elective basis, and to include in the Executive Council at least two Unofficial Members, to be selected by the elected members of the Legislative Council. In May, 1903, as a result of a unanimous vote of the Legislative Council, the then Governor, Sir West Ridgeway, recommended to Your Lordship's predecessor, Mr. Chamberlain, the addition of two Unofficial Members to the Executive Council, tending to satisfy the public opinion, which is in favour of more effective repre- sentation in the Government of the Colony," and as "it would formally place at the disposal of the Government advice and information which it is not always possible to obtain from official sources." Mr. Chamberlain was unable to accept the proposal, as the Unofficial Members were not elected members but nominees of Government, and mentioned that in other Crown Colonies where unofficials were placed in the Executive Council, this change followed as a corollary of the admission to the Council of Government of elected representatives of the people.”
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