Vol. 13 · pages 636–640

603DRAFT CONSTITUTION Mr. President: I will now put the amendments to vote. [Following amendments were adopted.] 1 “That with reference to amendment No. 1975 of the List of Amendments, in Chapter V, of Part V for the word ‘Auditor-General’ wherever it occurs, (including the heading) the words ‘Comptroller and Auditor-General’ be substituted.” 2 “That in clause (1) of article 124 after the word ‘President’ the words ‘by warrant under his hand and seal’ be inserted.” 3 “That with reference to amendment No. 1975 of the List of amendments, after clause (1) of article 124, the following new clause be inserted :— ‘(1-a) Every person appointed to be the comptroller and Auditor-General of India shall, before he enters upon his office, make and subscribe before the President or some person appointed in that behalf by him an affirmation or oath according to the form set out for the purpose in the Third Schedule.’” 4 “That for amendment No. 25-A of List-I (Third Week) of amendments to Amendments, dated the 2Sth May 1949, the following be substituted :— “that with reference to amendment No. 1980 of the List of amendments, for clause (4) of article 124, the following clause be substituted :— ‘(4) Subject to the provisions of any law made by Parliament; the conditions of service of members of the staff of the Comptroller and Auditor-General shall be such as may be prescribed by rules made by the Comptroller and AuditorGeneral : Provided that the rules made under this clause shall, so far as they relate to salaries, allowances, leave or pensions, require the approval of the President.’” 5 “That with reference to amendment No. 1981 of the List of amendments, for clause (5) of article 124, the following clause be substituted :— “(5) The administrative expenses of the office of the Comptroller and Auditor-General, including all salaries, allowances and pensions payable to or in respect of the Comptroller and Auditor-General and members of his staff, shall be charged upon the revenues of India.’” Article 124, as amended was added to the constitution. ARTICLE 125 *Mr. President: Amendment No. 1986, by Dr. Ambedkar. The Honourable Dr. B. R. Ambedkar : Mr. President, Sir, I move : “That for the Explanation to article 125, the following Explanation be’ substituted :— “Explanation.— In this article, the expression ‘law made by Parliament’ includes any law ordinance, order, bye-law, rule or regulation passed or made before the commencement of this Constitution and for the time being in force in the territory of India’.” The House probably will remember that the functions of the AuditorGeneral are regulated not by law made by Parliament, but by Ordinance, order, bye-law, rule or regulation, etc., made by the Governor-General, under the powers conferred upon him by the Government of India Act, *CAD, Vol. VIII, 30th May 1949, p. 412.

604 DR. BABASAHEB AMBEDKAR : WRITINGS AND SPEECHES 1935. Consequently, in order to keep alive the ordinances, orders, bye-laws, rules and regulations made by the Governor-General, it is necessary to amplify the explanation so as to include these orders also. ***** *The Honourable Dr. B. R. Ambedkar : Sir, with regard to the amendment of my Friend Mr. Kunzru I am prepared to accept it provided he is prepared to drop the words “or any local”……† Pandit Hirday Nath Kunzru : I have dropped them. The Honourable Dr. B. R. Ambedkar: Because local audit is a matter which is within the control of the Provincial Governments. But the addition of the words “other authority” I think may be necessary or even useful. As he has himself said, the policy of the Government of India today is to create a great many corporations to manage undertakings which it is not possible to manage departmentally and consequently it is necessary that the Government of India should make some provision for the audit of these corporations. That being so I think it is desirable to vest the Central Government with power to allow the Auditor-General to audit even the accounts of all such authorities. Subject to the modification I have suggested, I am prepared to accept the amendment. With regard to the point made by my Friend Mr. Sidhva that many of these rules with regard to the duties of the Auditor-General are made by the executive, and, therefore, since by the amendment which I have suggested we are continuing to give these powers the same operation which they had before, we are practically investing the Executive with the authority to prescribe the duties of the Auditor-General. Obviously, there is an incongruity in this position, in that an officer who is supposed to control the Executive Government with regard to the administration of the finance should have his duties prescribed by rules laid by the Executive. Now the only reply that I can give to my honourable Friend, Mr. Sidhva, is this that these provisions have been taken bodily to a large extent from the provisions contained in section 151 of the present Government of India Act, 1935, which deal with the custody of public money, and section 166 which deals with the rules made by the Governor-General with regard to the duties of the Auditor-General. *CAD, Vol. VIII, 30th May 1949, pp. 414-15. †Dots indicate interruption.

605DRAFT CONSTITUTION Under the scheme of that Act the rules were required to be made by the Governor-General in the exercise of what is called his individual judgment, that is to say, he would not be required to take the advice of his Ministry in making these rules. To that extent the rules made by the Governor-General prescribing the duties of the AuditorGeneral would undoubtedly be independent of the Executive. Today we are not vesting the President with any such power of independent judgment so that if any modification in these rules were to be made by the President he would undoubtedly be acting on the advice of the Ministry of the day, that is to say, the Executive. I admit that to that extent there is a certain amount of anomaly, but I do hope that my honourable friend, Mr. Sidhva, who, I hope, will continue to function as a Member when the new Parliament is constituted, will take on himself the earliest opportunity of urging Parliament to change the position and to convert the rules into laws made by Parliament. [Following amendment of Pandit Kunzru in addition to that of Dr. Ambedkar mentioned before was accepted.] “That in clause (1) of article 130, after the word ‘may’ the words ‘on behalf of the people of the State’ be inserted.” (Article 125, as amended, was added to the Constitution.) ARTICLE 127 *The Honourable Dr. B. R. Ambedkar : Sir I move : “That in article 127, for the word ‘Parliament’ the words ‘each House of Parliament’ be substituted.” It is only a formal amendment. The amendment was adopted. ***** ARTICLE 130 †The Honourable Dr. B. R. Ambedkar : Sir, this article is an exact reproduction of article 42 which deals with the executive power of the Union. There is no change made at all. Word for word this article is a reproduction of article 42. I find from the book of amendments that exactly similar amendments were tabled to article 42 and they were debated at great length. I do not think I can usefully add anything to what I said in the course of the debate on article 42 and the amendments * CAD, Vol. VIII, 30th May 1949, p. 415. † Ibid., p. 423.

606 DR. BABASAHEB AMBEDKAR : WRITINGS AND SPEECHES thereon. Therefore, I submit that I am not prepared to accept any of the amendments that have been moved here. [All the three amendments moved by Prof. K. T. Shah, Mr. Mod. Tahi and Mr. Naziruddin Ahmad were rejected by the House.] ***** ARTICLE 131 *Mr. President : It is only a question of the order in which the amendments are taken. I want to dispose of the question of election first. Shri T. T. Krishnamachari : The choice of the alternative may be left to the mover. Dr. Ambedkar may say which he proposes to move. Normally the procedure will be to move a particular article. The Chairman of the Drafting Committee will be the person to make the choice, if you allow it to him, that will solve the problem. He might move one of the alternatives. This procedure is going to come in the way of normal procedure later on. So, I think the best thing is to leave the discretion to the mover. If you recognise Dr. Ambedkar as mover, then he may be asked to move one or other of the alternatives. Mr. President : Is Dr. Ambedkar prepared to accept one of the other alternatives ? The Honourable Dr. B. R. Ambedkar : Sir, I want to say a word regarding procedure to be followed. Taking the article 131, as it is, no doubt it is put in an alternative form. The two alternatives have one tiling in common viz., that they propose the Governor to be elected. The form of election is for the moment a subsidiary question. As against that, there are three or four amendments here which set out a principle which is completely opposed to the two alternative drafts of 131 and they suggest that the Governor should be nominated. If the amendment which proposes that the Governor should be nominated were to be accepted by the House, then both the alternatives would drop out and it will be unnecessary for the House to consider them. Therefore my suggestion would be that it would be desirable to take up No. 2010 of Mr. Gupte, and then Mr. Kamath and then No. 2015. If this matter was taken up first and the House came to the conclusion on whether the principle of appointment by the President should be accepted, then obviously there * CAD, Vol. VIII, 30th May 1949, p. 425.

607DRAFT CONSTITUTION would be no purpose served in discussing article 131 in either of its alternative forms. That would be my suggestion subject to your ruling in the matter. Mr. President: There are several amendments which support the idea of election or appointment by President. The other amendments are regarding the method of election. First I want to get rid of the question of election so that all amendments relating to method of election will go. Then we can take up the question of appointment and the appointment in that case will be by the President. Shri Alladi Krishnaswami Ayyar (Madras : General): If the question of appointment or not is taken up first, that will automatically eliminate the election question. I agree with Dr. Ambedkar’s views in the matter. ***** *The Honourable Dr. B. R. Ambedkar (Bombay : General) : Mr. President, Sir after such a prolonged debate on the amendment I think it is quite unnecessary for me to take the time of the House in making any prolonged speech. I have risen only to make two things clear; one is to state to the House the exact co-relation between the two alternatives that have been placed by the Drafting Committee before the House and amendment No. 2015 which has been debated since yesterday. My second purpose is to state the exact issue before the House, so that the House may be able to know what it is that it is called upon to bear in mind in deciding between the alternatives presented by the Drafting Committee and the new amendment. Sir, the first alternative that has been put by the Drafting Committee is an alternative which is exactly in terms of the decision made by this House some time ago in accordance with the recommendations of a Committee appointed to decide upon the principles governing the Provincial Constitution. The Drafting Committee had no choice in the matter at all, because according to the directions given to the Drafting Committee it was bound to accept the principle which had been sanctioned by the House itself. The question, therefore, arises : why is it that the Drafting Committee thought it tit to present an alternative ? Now, the reason why the Drafting Committee presented an alternative * CAD, Vol. VIII, 31st May 1949, pp. 467-69