Page:A Nation in Making.djvu/341

A discussion followed my speech. There were comments in the newspapers. But the Extremist organs showed little or no signs of co-operation.

In the same spirit and with the same object in view, namely, the co-operation of public opinion, I had convened earlier in the year (in March, 1921), only two months after I had assumed office, a conference of leading representatives to discuss some of the more important provisions of a Bill to amend the Calcutta Munici- pal Act. An amendment of the Calcutta Municipal Act had long been overdue. The idea had been present to the mind of the Government ever since Lord Carmichael's time; a Bill was actually introduced into the Council in 1917, but was withdrawn. I decided to take the matter up and place the municipal system of Calcutta, and, if the opportunity occurred, that of the whole province, on a line with the newly inaugurated Reforms. In pursuance of this policy, after I had amended the Calcutta Municipal Act and had placed it on the statute book, I started framing a Bill to amend the Bengal municipal system, which was as old as the year 1884, and had been allowed to remain for forty years without any substantial amendment; and here again I followed the practice, which I had inaugurated, of convening a conference of some of the leading representatives of the mofussil municipalities, and I consulted them with regard to the important features of the pro- posed amendment. This is a procedure, I may add, that I uniformly followed during my tenure of office in connexion with all legislative projects.

Throughout I felt that in the new order of things popular co- operation was essential. I tried to secure it, so far as lay in my power; and, but for the unhappy atmosphere that had been created and to which I have referred, a more satisfactory measure of suc- cess would probably have attended my efforts. In pursuance of this policy I visited several towns in East, West and North Bengal, and held conferences with members of District Boards and with other leading inhabitants, and discussed with them their sanitary problems. In some places the Non-Co-operators tried to create difficulties, but the local officials were able to overcome them. Mr. Emerson, Commissioner of the Dacca Division, came all the way from Dacca to Barisal to prevent any trouble, and there was none in that stronghold of Non-Co-operation. It was the youthful section of the community that was most affected by its teachings and demonstrative in its condemnation of the Government.