Vol. 15 · pages 216–220

199PARLIAMENTARY DEBATES a very important power. It is really the one and only power which Parliament possesses to control the Government and to order the Government; and if Parliament were to give its permanent power of raising revenue to the Executive, the Executive would not care two hoots for Parliament. It is, therefore, very desirable that Parliament should keep within its own hands this power. The British Parliament keeps the Executive under control, if I have understood it correctly, in two ways. They have certain important Acts which are only Annual Acts, for which they never have permanent Acts. For instance the Army Act in England is an Annual Act. Every year, the Executive has to come before Parliament in order to get that Act renewed; and if they do not renew it, the whole army will have to be disbanded, because there will be no law governing it. The other measure by which the British Parliament controls the Executive is by reserving for annual levy, certain taxes, for instance, income-tax which forms a very large part of the resources of the British Government, and also of our Government. Therefore, there can be no quarrel on the question that Parliament should be very chary, very tardy, of handing over powers of taxation to the executive. It is perfectly open to Mr. Tyagi to say that in this matter delegation should not be made, or some other view may be taken. But so far as competency is concerned, I am afraid, he is out of court. After this matter was brought to our notice, I also came to the conclusion that, probably, from the point of view of financial propriety, from the point of view of maintaining the supremacy of Parliament, it was desirable to make some amendments in the clauses as they stood in the original Bill. I do not know whether I have got the thing with me now; but I am satisfied that there are two new provisions in the new amendments. One is this that the power to levy customs duty on articles not specified is only for a short period, up to the Budget Session, not indefinitely, for all times. Whenever the Budget Session comes, any customs duty levied by the Executive under this Bill will automatically lapse, and the matter will then be dealt with by Parliament, as Parliament deals with any other financial measure. I should have thought that that was a great improvement in

200 DR. BABASAHEB AMBEDKAR : WRITINGS AND SPEECHES the Bill as it stands, and Parliament should not have any quarrel about proposing a legislation of this sort. *Pandit Thakur Das Bhargava : ..........After all this we must revert to our own Constitution to decide the point. As far as our Constitution is concerned this House is not competent to delegate any such authority to the Ministers. Dr. Ambedkar : There is no bar; we have plenary powers. Shri Santhanam : Will the hon. Member read article 286? Mr. Speaker : Matters would be shortened if the hon. Member is allowed to proceed with his argument in his own way. Let us hear him first. Pandit Thakur Das Bhargava : At this moment we need not be wedded to any theory. I am not wedded to any theory. I only place these facts for your consideration, so that you may consider them before coming to a final decision..... * P.D., Vol. 6, Part II, 4th December 1950, p. 1178.

201PARLIAMENTARY DEBATES (23) SOCIETIES REGISTRATION (AMENDMENT) BILL *Shri Sidhva (Madhya Pradesh) : My Bill refers to amendment of the Societies Registration Act, 1860. This is a very simple Bill. The Minister of Law (Dr. Ambedkar) : May I, with your permission, make a statement on the Bill, so that my friend Mr. Sidhva may be in a position to determine the course that he should follow? Last time when the Bill was before the House I promised that I would enquire from the various States as to what they thought about Mr. Sidhva’s measure and that I would communicate to Mr. Sidhva as well as to the House the replies received from the various States. Now the position is this. So far as Part A States are concerned, they are desirous that the improvement suggested by Mr. Sidhva should be made, but they have made this reservation that they would like to initiate legislation themselves. The Government of India, on a further consideration, do not think that, in view of the wishes expressed by the Governments of the Part A States, they should themselves undertake all-India legislation. They do not think that this is a matter of such character as to require common uniform legislation throughout India. They are prepared to, leave the matter to the different States. So far as Governments are concerned, Part A States must be excluded from this Bill. In regard to Part B States, they have no such law and consequently the Government of India did not consult them. The standing rule which the Government of India observe in the matter of initiating legislation falling within the Concurrent List is of a very longstanding character, namely, that they shall not undertake legislation without the consent * P. D., Vol. 7, Part II, 12th December 1950, pp. 1560-65.

202 DR. BABASAHEB AMBEDKAR : WRITINGS AND SPEECHES of those States. Therefore, what remains for us to operate upon is States in Part C. Therefore, if Mr. Sidhva wishes to proceed with this Bill he must agree to confine this particular measure to Part C States. That is one limitation which I am afraid we shall have to insist upon. Then, the other thing that I find is this, that Mr. Sidhva’s Bill will require considerable amendment—almost every clause of the Bill requires amendment. As I said last time, I am myself in favour of the legislation and I do not wish to obstruct it in any way. In fact, I have here before me drafted such amendments as I think are necessary to make in this Bill. I am quite prepared to pass on those amendments to Mr. Sidhva so that he may himself move them and take the credit for initiating this legislation. Therefore, my suggestion to Mr. Sidhva was this that he might move for the postponement of the consideration of the Bill to the next session, have these amendments from me, give notice of the amendments himself, and, next time when the Bill comes up, move them. And I promise that I shall accept the amendments that I myself am suggesting, if that course is agreeable to him. Shri Tyagi (Uttar Pradesh) : It is not a very great promise. Dr. Ambedkar : As I said, I am committing myself to the acceptance of these amendments, so that the Bill may not have the defects which we certainly find it is full of now. It is for Mr. Sidhva to decide what course he would follow. I thought I might help him by this statement. Shri Sidhva : I was glad to hear the statement of my Hon. friend the Law Minister. What I was suggesting was that my Bill was a very simple Bill, namely, an addition to Section 4 of the Societies Registration Act. As the Law Minister has rightly stated, the Part A States have sent their opinions favouring the adoption of my Bill, but they said that they would themselves like to initiate in making the legislation. ..... I hope that Dr. Ambedkar would be good enough to accept my suggestion. We do not want to wait any longer to

203PARLIAMENTARY DEBATES see that the fraudulent procedure that is being practised by various societies is continued. Now that the Hon. Law Minister has accepted the provisions of the Bill, there is no difficulty. The question is only of time and I hope the Law Minister will accept my suggestion. I therefore beg to move : “ That the Bill further to amend the Societies Registration Act, 1860, be taken into consideration.” Dr. Ambedkar : I am sorry. I think my hon. friend Mr. Sidhva has misunderstood me. He is probably under the impression that while accepting his Bill as it stands, I am seeking to amend some other provisions of the original Act. That is not so. I am amending his amendments because I find it impossible to accept the Bill as drafted by him without the amendments that I am suggesting. Therefore, as I said, I have not the least objection for the Bill going through provided the amendments I am suggesting are made in the Bill of Mr. Sidhva. Here are the amendments I am prepared to hand over the papers to Mr. Sidhva, but of course, there has been no notice of these amendments and I do not know what view the House will take, but as I said, he can take the amendments, give notice of them and have the matter discussed. Mr. Speaker : I was just thinking as to whether—I am not clear yet—whether we could get a priority in respect of this Bill on the assumption that the consideration motion is moved and then have the further consideration postponed. Dr. Ambedkar : That may be done. Mr. Speaker : Perhaps he will be coming in ballot. The only difficulty is that he loses the priority. Dr. Ambedkar : If I may say so, the Bill is very small and I am speaking without the authority from Government, but I do not think it would be difficult for me to persuade Government to give, for instance, whole day to Mr. Sidhva from one of the Government days in the next Budget Session. Mr. Speaker : There is another alternative to it also; supposing instead of taking it now, we postpone the consideration of this Bill say, at five minutes to five, and we