Vol. 14, Part I · pages 261–265

DR. AMBEDKAR AND THE HINDU CODE BILL 243 quote that rule so that I may consult it and see for myself whether the point of order raised by the honourable member is not out of order. Mr. Speaker : These are obvious matters which need not be argued. If we differ on the substance of the matter, let us devote time to that substance rather than take up the time in the technicalities of the matter. If people are against the Code then it is a matter of substance. If they are in favour of it, even then it is a matter of substance. But let us not take the time of the House in technicalities. Subsequently, the point of order mentioned was that the Bill which was referred to the Select Committee was, on facts, not the Bill which the Select Committee considered and that therefore the report is based on something else. That is the point of order, put in short, and on that point of order arguments were addressed. If the honourable member Pandit Bhargava has to address or speak on facts, matters would stand differently; the matter is, I believe, covered amply by what Mr. Naziruddin Ahmad has stated. Has he to invite my attention to any other facts ? Shri Jaspat Roy Kapoor : May I respectfully request you, Sir to permit me to place my point of order before, you ? It relates to the competency of this House, in the present session, to deal with this question at all; also, whether the point of order raised by my friend Mr. Naziruddin should be discussed in this session at all ? For, if my point of order is accepted it will shut out all discussion on the subject in the present session. Mr. Speaker: I think I will go step by step. Let the first point of order be disposed of. Assumsing that the first point of order goes in favour of the Bill, then the second point of order which the honourable member has raised is competent and therefore he may raise the point later on. Shri Jaspat Roy Kapoor : My submission is that even the discussion of the point of order raised by Mr. Naziruddin Ahmad is a point which should be considered by this house and the question is whether it is competent to discuss the subject at all. Mr. Speaker: I do not agree that I should take that point first. It will be for the Chair to decide whether the Select Committee considered the Bill that was referred to it or something else, and whether, therefore, its report should or should not be taken into

DR. BABASAHEB AMBEDKAR : WRITINGS AND SPEECHES244 consideration. After that is decided, it is perfectly competent for the honourable member to point out to me any points or any law or any practice by which this House is not competent to take into consideration the present Bill. That is the better way. Let us save time. Shri Jaspat Roy Kapoor : May I say one word, Sir ? Mr. Speaker : No, no Pandit Bhargava. Pandit Thakur Das Bhargava : Sir, I only propose to lay before you some facts and some law as it would apply to those facts. For instance, I beg to point out that the proceedings before the Select Committee was an abuse of the rules of this House. The privilege of this House has been violated by the Select Committee and by the procedure of the Law Department. Secondly, if my facts are correct, another Bill was considered and not the Bill which was referred to it by the House. The question which arises then would be a question of law, whether such a procedure was justified and whether this House should consider this report as a report on this Bill which was referred to the Select Committee or whether it is a document which is not valid in law and is not a legal document. I will therefore confine myself to the two types of questions which I submit are quite related. In regard to the substance also, with your permission, I will subsequently have something to say provided your ruling is that this question is also relevant. In my humble opinion, the question divide itself into two parts. Number one, whether the report which has been presented to the House is a good report from the procedural point of view. Number two, whether the report has gone beyond the scope of the Bill. I propose to address the House on the second question subsequently. First of all, with your permission, I will address the House on the first question before laying certain facts before the House. My humble submission is that according to what we have got in the Select Committee’s report and from the papers which have been circulated to us and which are found in the Library, I have come to the conclusion that after the Bill was referred to the Select Committee, the Law department just substituted another Bill for this Bill, and this Bill was considered by the Select Committee. I do not know whether these facts are absolutely correct, but I have consulted some members who were in the Select Committee and they have informed me about it and at the same time from the report of the Select Committee also it appears that as a matter of fact . . . . .

DR. AMBEDKAR AND THE HINDU CODE BILL 245 Mr. Speaker : I am afraid the honourable member is practically repeating what the honourable member Mr. Naziruddin Ahmad has said. It is the same thing. I have gone through the report myself bearing in mind the points raised and while I would like to give the honourable member the fullest liberty to place any other facts not included in Mr. Naziruddin Ahmad’s speech, I do not think we should go into the same repetition Pandit Thakur Das Bhargav a: I do not like to repeat. I only want to know if these facts are taken to be correct. If ultimately another honourable member gets up and says these facts are wrong, then the whole argument would fall down. Therefore, I want to place before you how I have come to the conclusion that these facts are correct. If you take them as correct, I do not want to trouble the House and your goodself. I submit that as a matter of fact it appears from the report of the Select Committee itself that the substituted Bill was alone considered, because from the majority committee’s report as well as the dissentient’s report it appears that no other Bill was considered and the Bill which was referred to the Committee was not at all considered. Now, Sir, Dr. Ambedkar has kindly placed before us a comparative statement. If you will kindly see these tables, there are two parts, one shows how from this Bill the original Bill was different. He has given another table showing the difference between the Draft Bill and the Select Committee report. This also shows that only the re-drafted Bill was considered and not the original Bill. Any way, taking this to be the right tiling, if it is accepted that the re-drafted Bill was only considered, the question arises before you whether the re-drafted Bill could be considered by the Select Committee or not, and if this action of theirs is not tantamount to the breach of privileges of this House as well as abuse of the powers that this House granted to the Select Committee. Now, Sir, I may not be taken to say that there was any wrong motive behind it; such a course may have been intentional or nonintentional; it may have been done with the best of motives or with the worst of motives; I am not concerned with that. I am concerned with one central fact that the original Bill which this House referred to the Select Committee was never considered by the Select Committee. The Honourable Shri K. Santhanam (Minister of State for Railways and Transport): On a point of order, I wish to know whether this House can go into the manner in which a Select Committee has

DR. BABASAHEB AMBEDKAR : WRITINGS AND SPEECHES246 dealt with a Bill. In that case, it would require verbatim reports of all proceedings in a Select Committee. We can reject the report or accept the report or do anything with the report but how the Select Committee dealt with it is a matter which, I think is not relevant and it is not the practice of the House either to go into it. Otherwise, every future Select Committee will have to give us a verbatim record of its proceedings, so that we can judge of the propriety. . . . Mr. Speaker : I am afraid various points of order are being raised and stated too widely. As regards the present point, if the position is that the Bill which was sent by this House was not considered at all by the Select Committee, I think it would be perfectly competent to go into the question as to whether the Select Committee did or did not consider. Then the question will arise as to how far it would be permissible to go into the proceedings of the Select Committee and to that my present reaction is that this House or myself will not be sitting as a fact-finding committee or court, but we shall take into consideration—we are entitled to take into consideration—what the Select Committee itself has stated in its report, and therefore, the matter will be more or less one for inference—coming inferentially to some conclusion as to what the Select Committee did and not by taking evidence of every member of the Select Committee and taking extra evidence. Now, I may point out to my friend Pandit Bhargava, that in spite of all that he has said the argument is not being advanced any further. Whether you call it a breach of the privileges of the House or abuse of procedure, the argument, in short, comes to this—that the Select Committee considered a substitute Bill; that it did not consider the original Bill sent by this House, and that this conclusion is based on certain remarks or observations in the Select Committee report— majority as well as the minority report—and therefore he infers—to state more correctly—from these documents that the original Bill was never considered. That, in short, is the point of order. The question of breach of privilege or abuse of procedure will arise, if we come to the conclusion that the Select Committee did as he infers, but if we come to the conclusion that the Select Committee was not guilty in the manner in which he infers it to be, then the question of breach of privilege or abuse of procedure does not arise at all. I can assure honourable members that I have carefully gone through every point that the honourable member is going to read from the report of the Select Committee and, perhaps, something more also,

DR. AMBEDKAR AND THE HINDU CODE BILL 247 and I have my own conclusions about it. I think I can make the whole thing short by stating what I have felt about the Bill and decide the matter rather than take up the time of the House. That is my feeling in the matter. ( Some Honourable Members: “Quite so, Sir.”) Anyway, we are not going to finish this Bill today. We can just clear the ground and I think without further going into arguments, I may perhaps . . . . Pandit Thakur Das Bhargava: I do not want to go further into arguments after having heard from you how things have taken place, but I do wish to place before you some of the ruling which I have got which go to show that this Bill as emerging out of Select Committee is abosultely unwarranted, illegal and vitiates the entire report of the Committee and before the House there is no report at all. This is my submission. If you will permit, I will place some rulings before you. Mr. Speaker: However, the rulings follow certain facts. In this case, it is alleged that, as a matter of fact, the Select Committee have failed to consider the original Bill. If that is established, then we shall have ample time to consider the rulings. Pandit Thakur Das Bhargava: Nobody is denying this fact. Mr. Speaker : That is just the point, as the honourable member will see. When I give my ruling which I have carefully prepared after reading all the papers. If any further points arise after the facts as stated by me are accepted, then those points of order may be considered. Shri M. Tirumala Rao (Madras : General): Before you give your ruling, is there no other method of knowing the truth except by inference ? The Honourable Dr. B. R. Ambedkar (Minister for Law): May I, with your permission, intervene for a minute to correct an impression which my friend Pandit Bhargava has sought to create in this House that the original Bill which was referred by this House to the Select Committee was never before the Select Committee ? I mink it is a gross mis-representation. If my honourable frined were to refer. . . . . Mr. Speaker : I have myself studied the position in great details. I shall clarify it by reading out my decision. Pandit Mukut Bihari Lal Bhargava (Ajmer-Merwara): I have additional facts. Mr. Speaker: Order, order.