Vol. 10 · pages 546–550

525CRITIQUE OF THE PROPOSALS........ and other parties at a disadvantage. If the Indian National Army trial had not been staged at the time of the election the Congress would have lost completely, so low was its stock. Apart from these two reasons why the election results should not have been as a test, there is a special reason why it should not have been taken to determine whether the Congress did or did not represent the Scheduled Castes. That reason is that the final elevation for the Scheduled Castes seats is by a system of joint electorate in which the Hindus also vote. The Hindus vote being preponderent it is easy for the Congress to elect a candidate belonging to the Scheduled Castes standing for the Scheduled Caste seats entirely by Hindu votes. That the Scheduled Castes representatives in the Provincial Legislatures who stood on the Congress ticket were elected solely by Hindu votes and not by the votes of the Scheduled Castes is a fact which even the Cabinet Mission will not be able to deny. The real test by which to determine whether the Congress represents the Scheduled Castes is to examine the results of the Primary Elections which preceded the Final Elections, for in the Primary Election the Scheduled Castes have a separate electorate in which the Hindus have no right to vote. The Primary Election therefore reflects the real sentiments of the Scheduled Castes. What does the result of the Primary Election show ? Does it show that the Scheduled Castes are with the Congress ? The Scheduled Castes have been allotted 151 seats in the Provincial Legislatures. They are distributed among the different Provinces except Sindh and the North-west Frontier Province. Primary Election is not obligatory. It becomes obligatory only if there are more than four candidates contesting for a seat. In the last Primary Election which preceded the Final Election, Primary Election became obligatory in 40 constituencies out of 151. They were distributed as follows :— Madras … … 10 Bombay … … 3 Bengal … … 12 United Provinces … 3 Central Provinces … 5 Punjab … … 7

526 DR. BABASAHEB AMBEDKAR : WRITINGS AND SPEECHES There were no Primary Elections in the Provinces of Bihar and Orissa. The results of the Primary Elections in the 40 constituencies are tabulated in the Appendix which accompanies this note. The results prove:— (I) That out of 283 candidates the Congress put up only 46 candidates on its ticket ( See Table I) and out of 168 successful candidates had only 38 to its credit ( See Table V). (II) The object of a Party in entering into a Primary Election is to drive out all rival parties from the Final Election by putting up at least four candidates on its party ticket. Whether a party can put up four candidates on its ticket depends upon how much confidence it has in the voters to vote for its party ticket. The Congress has not ventured to put up more than one candidate in each constituency. This shows that the Congress had no confidence that the Scheduled Caste voters would vote for the Congress ticket. If there is any party which has ventured to put up four candidates for each seat it has contested, it is the Scheduled Castes Federation. ( See Table II, Parts I, V, Columns 3 and 4). (III) Measured in terms of votes cast in favour of the Congress it is proved beyond dispute that the Congress obtained only 28 per cent of the total votes polled in the Primary Election (See Table IV). (IV) If there was not the temptation to get oneself elected in the final election with the help of the Hindu votes the Independents would all be members of the Scheduled Castes Federation. On that assumption the Scheduled Castes Federation is the only party which represents the Scheduled Castes and the 72 per cent voting in favour of the Non-Congress Parties should be set out to its credit (See Table IV). The members of the Cabinet Mission argued that Dr. Ambedkar’s following was confined to the Scheduled Castes in the Bombay Presidency and the Central Provinces only.

527CRITIQUE OF THE PROPOSALS........ There is no foundation for this statement. The Scheduled Castes Federation is functioning in other Provinces as well and it has won notable electoral success as great as in Bombay and the Central Provinces. In making this statement the Mission has failed to take account of the signal victory Dr. Ambedkar secured in the election to the Constituent Assembly. He stood as a candidate from the Bengal Provincial Legislature Assembly. He secured 7 first preference votes and topped the poll so far as the general seats were concerned beating even Mr. Sarat Chandra Bose, the Leader of the Congress party. If Dr. Ambedkar has no influence outside Bombay and Central Provinces how did he get elected from Bengal ? It must be further remembered that there are 30 seats for the Scheduled Castes in the Bengal Provincial Assembly. Out of the 30 as many as 28 were elected on the Congress ticket. Of the two who belonged to his party one fell ill on the day of election. This means that 6 Scheduled Caste members elected on the Congress ticket broke the Congress Mandate and voted for Dr. Ambedkar. This shows that even these Scheduled Caste members who belong to the Congress regard him as the leader of the Scheduled Castes. This is complete disproof of the statement made by the Mission. The Congress has been so much encouraged by the surrender of the Mission that a letter addressed to the Mission the Congress has gone to the length of denying that the Scheduled Castes are a minority. This means that the Congress is not prepared to give the Scheduled Castes the same safeguards as they would to other minorities. The Mission has not repudiated this suggestion of the Congress. Herein lurks a great danger and it is necessary to pin down the Mission in the course of the debate and compel them to say if they do or do not regard the Scheduled Castes as a minority. The Cabinet Mission have said in their proposals that before sovereignty is transferred Parliament will have to satisfy itself that the safeguards for Minorities are adequate. The Mission has nowhere defined the machinery for examining the safeguards. Whether there would be a Joint Committee of the two Houses of Parliament to

528 DR. BABASAHEB AMBEDKAR : WRITINGS AND SPEECHES examine the minority safeguards has not been made clear. The Mission has not even stated that His Majesty’s Government will exercise its independent judgment in coming to its conclusion on the adequacy of the safeguards. It is necessary to have these matters defined because this provision was an afterthought with the Mission and did not form part of its original proposals which gives the impression that this was intended merely to act as a sop to the minorities. zz

529CRITIQUE OF THE PROPOSALS........ Analysis of the Results of Primary Elections Held in December, 1945 (Preliminary to the General Election in India Held in February 1946) for Choosing Candidates from the Scheduled Castes (Untouchables) for the Seats Reserved for the Scheduled Castes in the Provincial Legislatures of India Note.—The Tables in this Analysis are prepared from official figures.