Bentinck, Rammohun and Sati

THIS refers to Sudesh Vaid's review of rny book on Sati (July 2). Your reviewer is quite right in suggesting that I should have discussed Macaulay's amendment of Ben- tinck's legislation of 1829 in his draft of the Indian Penel Code which reintroduced the category of 'voluntary suttee'. However, I don't think that this amendment was "an accommodation to liberal (the British Orientalists] opinion of non-interference in the religious affairs" of the people of India. Macaulay was more hostile to the British Orientalists. We know how harshly he treated them and their views on education in his Minute on Education (1835) which Gandhi called 'notorious'.