Petitions
S.A. Wahid - 'Why India should leave British Empire'
17 May 1949In collaboration with
This petition was submitted by S.A. Wahid from Hotel Windsor, Bombay. The petition suggested that India refrain from joining the ‘Anglo-American Imperialist block’, so that the country’s resources would no longer be used for the benefit of ‘Anglo-American Imperialists’.
To
The chairman “Indian Constituent Assembly” New Delhi
Dear Sir,
[unclear] Why India should leave British Empire”
By staying within the British Empire, India will remain a source of raw material and market of their manifactured goods, as the leadership of Asia is not competent enough to chekmate the intrigues of Anglo-American Imperialism. There is a clear evidence of weakness of Indian leadership, regarding the huge waste of Sterling balances of about Rs I750 Crorers or about $5000 millions, for importing the food, manifactured goods, buying naval ships, armaments and huge military waste. The imports of food, manifactured goods and armaments is still kept up and through foreign loans, India will become a debtor nation as ususual, however at the end of the second world war India was a creditor nation. If these sterling balances[unclear] were used for the ecnomic developments of the nation through the planned national economy, nationalization of means of production and distribution, India by this time would have become ecnomically self sufficient, gainfully employing all of her peoples.
I would advise India not to join Anglo-American Imperialist block for one main reason. Anglo-American Imperialists fought the last 2 world wars, to dominate the whole world both ecnomically and politically, that is maintaining themselves as industrial nations, and keeping the rest of the world as their market of manifactured goods, we notice even European industries being eliminated through the Marshall plan, how India would be encouraged to be industrialised by them. Through mass unemployment, India will be made a military base of Anglo-American Imperialism and make the peoples of this country as their cannon fodder..
The best course for India and whole of Asia is to join, Eastern European Democracies, Communist China and Soviet Union, for the immediate development of their industries and agriculture and thus gainfully employing all the peoples of this nation and so providing living security to them all.
Truly Yours
S.A.Wahid Hotel Windsor Bombay May I7-49
(Notes:
1.Certain content in the document was unclear or incompletely written. The same has been marked as [unclear].
2.Typographical errors in the original document have been retained to ensure authentic reproduction of the original document.)