The following is the debate wherein Babasaheb B.R. Ambedkar spoke on The Andhra State Bill, 1953 as the Rajya Sabha Member of the Parliament:
Continuing from the previous issue…
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Now, Sir, we have inherited a tradition. People always keep on saying to me, “Oh, you are the maker of the Constitution.” My answer is I was a hack. What I was asked to do, I did much against my will.
Shri P. Sundarayya: Why did you serve your masters then like that?
Mr. Chairman: Order, order
Dr. B.R. Ambedkar: But, Sir, we have inherited, on account of our hatred of the British, certain ideas about democracy which, it seems to me, are not universally accepted. We inherited the idea that the Governor must have no power at all, that he must only be a rubber stamp. If a Minister, however scoundrelly he may be, however corrupt he may be, if he puts up a proposal before the Governor, he has to ditto it. That is the kind of conception about democracy which we have developed in this country.
Shri M.S. Ranawat (Rajasthan): But you defended it.
Dr. B.R. Ambedkar: We lawyers defend many things. (Interruptions.) You should listen seriously to what I am saying, because this is an important problem.
Sir, as I said, we happened to develop a theory of democracy, simply because of our opposition to the British. The British must go and the British must have no power. A Governor must have no power. Let me cite two cases.
One case which I propose to cite is about the Constitution of Canada and I refer to section 93 of that Constitution. As everyone in this House knows, Canada, like ourselves, is a bilingual place. A part of it speaks English, a part of it speaks French. And what is worse still is that the English speaking people are Protestants; the French are Roman Catholics. In 1864, when the Constitution of Canada was made, the Catholics were very much afraid as to what might happen to them under the English Protestant majority and they were not prepared to come into the Constitution of a united Canada. Therefore the Parliament enacted section 93 in the Canadian Constitution. That section does two things. It says that if any province – naturally the reference was to provinces in Protestant areas – where Roman Catholics lived passed any law with regard to certain matters which the Roman Catholics regarded as their special privilege based upon religion, they had the right to appel to the Governor General that a wrong was done to them, and the Governor General by section 93 had the right to look into their complaint.
It was a statutory right of complaint. Not only did section 93 give the Catholics a statutory right of appeal against the decision of the majority to have a certain measured annulled, but it goes much further and says that the Governor General shall have the right to enact a positive measure in protection of the Catholic minority. I would like to ask my friend, the Home Member, whether, with the inclusion of section 93 in the Canadian Constitution, he regards the Canadian Constitution to be democratic or undemocratic. What is his answer?
Dr. K.N. Katju: My answer is that you had drafted this Constitution.
Dr. B.R. Ambedkar: You want to accuse me for your blemishes?
Mr. Chairman: He has said that he defended the present Constitution because it was the majority decision. Get along.
Dr. B.R. Ambedkar: Sir, therefore, my submission is this that no harm can be done to democracy and to democratic Constitution if our Constitution was amended and powers similar to those given to the Governor General under section 93 were given to the Governor. At any rate, that would be some kind of a safeguard to certain small linguistic areas or linguistic groups who find that the majority in the State are not doing justice to them.
The second suggestion that I would like to make is from the English Constitution. My hon. friend must be aware of the position of Scotland in the British Constitution and therefore I would not go into greater details. But he will remember two things. One is this that although Scotland and England are one – nobody can say that they are two separate countries – still there is a special Secretary of State for Scotland under the British Constitution to look after the interests of the Scottish people. He must have gone to London, I think, various times. (The Hon.
Minister indicated by signs – three) three times. Surely, he must have passed by the Parliament Street and just by the side of 10, Downing Street, there is a big brass board ‘Scottish Office; which is the place where the Secretary of State for Scotland sits. That is the one provision which the British have made. They have not argued, as my friends have argued, that this is a recognition of communalism. Have they? Scotland came and joined England some hundreds of years ago and yet the British people, in order to recognise the sentiments of the Scots, in order to respect their feelings, have created statutorily an office called the Secretary of State for Scotland.
The second thing to which I would like to refer is this that in the British Parliament there are two Committees. One is a Committee for Wales and Monmouthshire and there is another Committee for Scotland consisting of Scottish members. All Bills referring to Scotland have to be sent to the Scottish Committee so that the Scottish members may have their full say in the matter. In the same way the members of Wales and Monmouthshire are also brought on committees connected with their affairs. It is by placating the sentiments of smaller communities and smaller people who are afraid that the majority may do wrong, that the British Parliament works. Sir, my friends tell me that I have made the Constitution. But I am quite prepared to say that I shall be the first person to burn it out. I do not want it. It does not suit anybody. But whatever that may be, if our people want to carry on, they must not forget that there are majorities and there are minorities, and they simply cannot ignore the minorities by saying, “Oh, no. To recognise you is to harm democracy.” I should say that the greatest harm will come by injuring the minorities. I fear sometimes that if the minorities are treated in the way in which they are being treated in our Bombay State – I do not want to be parochial, but my friends have been telling me, as I am not there and I do not take any interest in my State, as you know, and I do not even like to call myself a Maharashtrian – I do not know what will ultimately happen. I am fond of Hindi, but the only trouble is that the Hindi-speaking people are the greatest enemies of Hindi.
Mr. Chairman: Dr. Ambedkar, is an aside.
Dr. B.R. Ambedkar: It is an aside. Now, Sir, I am told that the Ministers are drawn from the two provinces. The clever members of the Ministry draw all the funds for developing the resources in that particular area, and the other area gets nothing. The same is being said about the Rayalaseema area, that the coastal people are generally able to get larger funds for their area and the Rayalaseema people get nothing. If my friend could make a provision in the Constitution that there shall be constituted lawfully under this very Bill a committee consisting of the members belonging to Rayalaseema, who will have the right to represent to the Governor and to the members of the Ministry that their part is to be included, I think a large part of the grievance would disappear. Similarly, Sir, I find that our Bengali Members are considerably agitated over the fact that part of Bihar – they say – is Bengal. I do not know; it may be, because originally Bengal spread over everywhere. The Governor General had a very large area, and wherever the Governor General went, the Bengalis also went with him.
Mr. Chairman: Go on with the Andhra Bill
Dr. B.R. Ambedkar: Yes, I am only giving an illustration. My illustration is this, that supposing such was the case that the Biharis were not treating the Bengalis well. Well, the only way open for solving this problem would be that there should be a committee of the Legislature consisting of the Members who are Bengalis and who would have the right to represent their grievances to the Ministry as well as to the Governor or to the President. When all these things fail, then I suppose we shall have to go to the naked proposition that we shall be linguists first and linguists last, and that we shall not recognise India.
If that is to be or ultimate aim, well, may God save us! But, Sir, my submission to my hon. friend is this that he should examine carefully some of the points I have made, particularly in the last part of my speech, and see whether he can find any solution to the problem of linguistic provinces, based on the suggestions that I have made, in the new measure that he may have to bring – he may not be very willing to bring a new measure, but he may have to bring it.
Source: Speeches of Dr. B.R. Ambedkar
in the Rajya Sabha
