NOTES 71 For our information on this and on political developments in Sikkim till the advent of British colonialism, we have mainly relied on the account provided in The Himalayan Kingdoms: Bhutan, Sikkim and Nepal by Pradyumna P Karan and William M Jenkins Jr, D Van Nostrand Company, Prmceton 1963. This book, viciously biased against People's China and absurdly flattering to the Government of India, is itself an indication of the US imperialist interest in Sikkim. 8 Maxwell, op. cit., p 37, emphasis added. 9 For our information on this, and the general British colonial policy in the area, we have relied upon Britain and Chinese Central Asia : The Road to Lhasa 1767 to 1905 by Alastair Lamb, Routledge and Kegan Paul. London 1960; and also on the books by Charles Bell and Maxwell cited above. Lamb's is a useful study, but can by no means be considered anti-imperialist, or sympathetic to the subject peoples of the area. Maxwell's penetrating and, indeed, startlingly original study suffers nevertheless from his inability or unwillingness to indict British imperialism in relation to its policy in the area. 1 ° Maxwell, op. cit., p 67. 11 Quoted by Gunnar Myrdal, Asian Drama : An Enquby into the Poverty of Nations, Vol I, Pantheon, New York 1968, p 181. 12 See H E Richardson, Tibet and Its History, OUP, London 1962, p 173. 18 Ibid., p 173. 14 Ibid., p 178. 15 Published in Shanghai, September 9, 1949, quoted by Girilal Jain, Panchsheela and After : A Reappraisal of Sino-Indian Relations in the Context of the Tibetan Insurrection, Asia Publishing House, Bombay 1960, p 7. 1 6 New China News Agency (NONA), March 28, 1959, quoted in Jain, op. cit., p 87. 1 7 Brahmanand Mishra, "Nepal : Who Armed the Khampas, ?", Economic and Political Weekly, September 7, 1974, pp 1531 and 1533. 18 Charles Bell, Political Officer in Gangtok, drove home this lesson thus in 1924 : In Tibet also we had an ideal barrier against Bolshevist influence... Chinese soldiers, stationed in Mongolia, had been found to be infected with Bolshevism. If China reoccupied Tibet, their troops... might well form a focus of Bolshevist intrigue against India." (Bell, op. cit., p 191). Writing 35 years later, but from the other side, Anna Loiuse Strong makes the same point: "...when songs of jubilee spread across Tibet, 'nothing remained (for India) but to slam that door shut by a physical and emotional storm." (China Reconstructs, March 1960 quoted injain, op. cit., p 224). 1 9 Maxwell op- cit., p 70. 20 See the CPI (M) Central Committee statement "On Sikkim", and the report, "The Unequal Treaty—and Now the Absorption," in People's Democracy, Calcutta, September 15, 1974. 21 Rajya Sabha Proceedings, New Delhi, September 7, 1974; Speech by Mathew Kurian of the CPI (M). 22 See Swaran Singh's statement in the Rajya Sabha, The Mail, September 7, 1974. 28 See the report in People's Democracy, op. cit., 24 Speech by Samar Mukherjee of the GPI (M) in the Lok Sabha, reported in the Indian Express, September 5, 1974. 25 This story has been convincingly and most readably told by Maxwell in his book cited above, especially pp 173-288 and Postscript, pp 447-466. 26 Speech by Bhogendra Jha of the CPI in the Lok Sabha, reported in the Indian Express, September 5, 1974.