Vol. 15 · pages 171–175

154 DR. BABASAHEB AMBEDKAR : WRITINGS AND SPEECHES Dr. Ambedkar : It will be initiated long before so that the final order of Parliament shall be passed not after twenty days ; twenty days is the period that has been given. Government will no doubt initiate whatever changes are necessary. Mr. Speaker : I do not know. I thought that it would be a rather difficult matter. It is just possible that the House may be engaged with important business and it may not pass the necessary order before twenty days. Dr. Ambedkar : The House will then have to give precedence to this. Mr. Speaker : What I was considering about this was that we might say “and shall be subject to such modifications as Parliament may make on a motion made within twenty days from the date on which the Order is so laid.” Dr. Ambedkar : I am prepared to accept it. An. hon. Member : Parliament may not be in session. Mr. Speaker : Therefore, what I was suggesting to the Law Minister was that twenty days will be counted from the time of laying it when the House is in session and the only condition should be that a motion is made within twenty days. * Shri Ramalingam Chettiar (Madras) : I have a little doubt as between clauses 12 and 13. Clause 12 says that the President may alter the order he has passed already. Clause 13 says that it may be modified by the Parliament. In the interval what is going to happen ? Is the order passed by the President to be effective or is it to be only provisional. Dr. Ambedkar : It is provisional because the final authoirty is with Parliament. Shri Ramalingam Chettiar : You do not say so. The section as it stands says that it is a final order subject to modification and not that it is a provisional order. The order becomes effective immediately it is passed. It may be modified by the Parliament afterwards. * P. D., Vol. 4, Part II, 20th April 1950, pp. 3074-75.

155PARLIAMENTARY DEBATES Dr. Ambedkar : It is a provisional order in the sense that if Parliament does not afterwards modify, it takes effect. But the ultimate power of enactment so to say is left to Parliament. Pandit Thakur Das Bhargava : The point raised by my hon. friend Mr. Kamath was that as a matter of fact according to the Constitution the Election Commissioner is invested with certain powers and these powers do not deal with the delimiting of constituencies. It is the privilege of the Parliament alone to delimit constituencies. Now the Election Commissioner is put in a much better situation than even the Committee. He will only consult it and he has the right to formulate the proposals. Mr. Speaker : This is the same thing which was raised previously. When we discussed clause 6 the same point was raised and the position has been clarified already by the Hon. the Law Minister. Ultimately it is Parliament which is going to exercise this power. Dr. Ambedkar : All these are preliminary stages. Even the President’s order is a preliminary stage. Mr. Speaker : The hon. Member will see in the amendment the words “formulate proposals as to the delimitation of constituencies”. He is not given the power of determining. Another thing to remember is that, it is this Parliament that will deliberate and examine the proposals in respect of the delimitation. * Dr. Deshmukh : ………You might lay down any procedure by which the committees will be elected. But there should be some element of election in so far as these persons are concerned. The Chair should not be saddled with the responsibility of creating a body which is going to determine the constituencies. *P.D.. Vol. 4, Part II, 20th April 1950, pp. 3076-77.

156 DR. BABASAHEB AMBEDKAR : WRITINGS AND SPEECHES Mr. Speaker : May I know the reactions of the Hon. the Law Minister? Dr. Ambedkar : I cannot accept any of these amendments. Sardar B. S. Mann : What about my amendment Sir ? What is the Hon’ble Minister’s reaction ? Dr. Ambedkar : I cannot accept it. Sardar B. S. Mann : Then I do not move it. Clause 20 (Meaning of ‘Ordinary resident’) * Dr. Ambedkar : I beg to move: After sub-clause (3), insert : “(4) Any person holding any office in India declared by the President in consultation with the Election Commission to be an office to which the provisions of this sub-section apply, or any person who is employed under the Government of India in a post outside India, shall be deemed to be ordinarily resident during any period or on any date in the constituency in which, but for the holding of any such office or employment, he would have been ordinarily resident during that period or on that date.” and renumber the subsequent sub-clauses. In sub-clause (4), renumbered as sub-clause (5),— (i)after “sub-section (3)”, insert “or sub-section (4)” ; and (ii)after “Armed Forces” insert “or but for his holding any such office or being employed in any such post as is referred to in sub-section (4).” In sub-clause (5), renumbered as sub-clause (6),— (i) after “sub-section (3)”, insert “or sub-section (4)”; and (ii) for “sub-section (4)”, substitute “sub-section (5)”; This amendment is made for the purpose of removing some doubts that were expressed with regard to the application of the term “ordinarily resident” which occurs in clause 20, in * P. D., Vol. 4, Part II, 20th April 1950, pp. 3081-82.

157PARLIAMENTARY DEBATES its application to certain persons who may have temporarily left their places of ordinary residence and gone to stay somewhere else. It is felt necessary that such a provision ought to be inserted in this clause. This refers to persons who are sent outside India temporarily on official duty and in whose case it may be presumed that they have ceased to reside in the place of their ordinary residence. It is to prevent that kind of presumption being drawn in their case and to retain their right to be registered in the constituency in which they have been ordinarily residing that this provision is made. Similarly, this provision is also intended to apply to the case of Ministers, for instance, at the Centre who, having regard to the fact that they have accepted certain offices under the State, presumably intend to stay here during the term of their office which might be co-terminus with the term of Parliament itself, namely five years. There again, it might be presumed that they have ceased to reside in the place where they have been ordinarily residing. It is to cover that case also that it is felt that some such provision is necessary. It was also suggested to me that Members of Parliament as distinguished from office-holders, such as Ministers and so on, may be affected by the other presumption, namely that as they come here often they may also be deemed not to reside in the place where they are ordinarily resident. But on advice I feel that that presumption cannot be applied to them, for the reason that when a man temporarily for some specific reason leaves his ordinary place of residence and goes somewhere else, it cannot be presumed in law that he has abandoned his intention to revert to his original place of residence. Consequently, I don’t think that that provision is necessary in the case of Members of Parliament. In the other two cases it seems that it may be necessary and as a measure of precaution I propose to introduce this amendment. The motion was adopted: Clause, as amended, was added to the Bill.

158 DR. BABASAHEB AMBEDKAR : WRITINGS AND SPEECHES Clause 21 (Meaning of ‘qualifying date ’ and ‘qualifying period’) * Dr. Ambedkar : I beg to move : For sub-clause (a), substitute : “(a) in the case of electoral rolls first prepared under this Act, shall be the first day of March 1950, and the period beginning on the first day of April 1947 and ending on the thirty-first day of December 1949, respectively; and” This is the result of the agreement that was reached this morning as regards the preparation of the electoral rolls and the qualifying period. Clause 27 ** Dr. Ambedkar : Sir, I thought that I had this morning explained to the hon. Member who initiated this debate why clause 17 was not applied, but evidently he was very keen that his objections should be heard by the whole House. I do not deny him that privilege. Shri Ethirajulu Naidu : On a point of order, Sir, is it in order to refer to what transpired at the meeting in the morning ? Dr. Ambedkar : Certainly ; there is nothing secret about it. The committee was constituted by the Speaker himself. Mr. Deputy Speaker : There is nothing secret about it. It is in order. Dr. Ambedkar : Now, Sir, the point is this. No doubt we have initiated in clause 17 of the Bill a very important principle, namely, that one man shall be registered in one constituency and that he shall have one vote, but it must always be understood that the prinicple can be made applicable only in the case of constituencies of the same class, that is to say, territorial constituencies. Now, the constituencies which we propose to form under clause 27 of this Bill are different classes of constituencies. They are not constituencies of the same class. A graduate constituency is a *P. D., Vol. 4, Part II, 20th April 1950, pp. 3082. **Ibid., pp. 3084-87.