Page:Speeches And Writings MKGandhi.djvu/135

 narumarrou mo Loan Enom 45 Ordinance was amended so as to take females out of its operation. But it applies to all adult males and even to children, in that the parents or guardians have to take out registration certidcates for their children or wards, as the case may be. It is a fundamental maxim of the British law that everyone is presumed to he innocent until he is found guilty, but the Ordinance reverses the process, brands every Indian as guilty, and leaves no room for him to prove his innocence. There is absolutely nothing proved against us, and yet every British Indian. no matter what his status is, is to be condemned as guilty, and not treated as an innocent man. My Lord, an Ordinance of this nature it is not possible for British Indians to re- concile themselves to. I do not know that such an Ordinance is applicable to free British subjects in any part of His Majesty’s Dominions. Moreover, what the Transvaalthinksl to·day, the other Colonies thinks to-morrow. When Lord Milner sprang his Bazaar Notice on British Indians, the whole of South Africa rang with the idea. The term "bazaar" is a misnomer; it has been really applied to locations where trade is utterly impossible. However, a proposal was seriously made, after a Bazaar Notice by the then Mayor of Durban, Mr. Ellis Brown, that Indians should be relegated to bazaars. There is not the slightest reason why this Ordinance also, if it ever becomes law, should not be copied by the other parts of South Africa. The position to·day in Natal is that even indentured Indians are not required to carry passes as contemplated by the Asiastic Law Amendment Ordinance; nor are there any penalties attached to the ncn·carryi¤g of