Vol. 17, Part I · pages 146–150

121ROLE OF ......................... INDIAN DEMOCRACY RESERVATIONS We have fixed this proportion of representation in the Legislatures on the following assumptions:— (1) We have assumed that the figures for the population of the Depressed Classes given by the Simon Commission (Vol. I. P.40) and the Indian Central Committee (Report, P. 44) will be acceptable as suffciently correct to form a basis for distributing seats. (2) We have assumed that the Federal Legislature will comprise the whole of India, in which case the population of the Depressed Classes in Indian States, in Centraly Administered Areas, and in Excluded Territories, besides their population in Govrnor’s Provinces, will form very properly an additional item in calculating the extent of representation of the Depressed Classes in the Federal Legislature. (3) We have assumed that the administrative area of the Provinces of British India will contiune to be what they are at present. But if these assumptions regarding figures of population are challenged as some interested parties threaten to do, and if under a new census over which the Depressed Classes can have no control, the population of the Depressed Classes shows a lower proportion, or if the administrative areas of the Provinces are altered, resulting in disturbing the existing balance of population, the Depressed Classes reserve their right to revise their proportion of representation and even to claim weightage. In the same way, if the All-India Federation does not come into being, they will be willing to submit to readjustment in their proportion of representation calculated on that basis in the Federal Legislature. II. METHOD OF R EPRESENTATION 1. The Depressed Classes shall have the right to elect their representatives to the Provincial and Central Legislatures through Separate Electorates of their voters. For their representation in the upper House of the Federal or Central Legislature, if it is decided to have indirect election by

122 DR. BABASAHEB AMBEDKAR : WRITINGS AND SPEECHES members of the Provincial Legislatures, the Depressed Classes will agree to abandon their right to Separate Electorates so far as their representation to the Upper House is concerned subject to this: that in any system of proportional representation arrangement shall be made to guarantee to them their quota of seats. 2. Separate Electorates for the Depressed Classes shall not be liable to be replaced by a System of Joint Electorates and reserved seats, except when the following conditions are fulfilled:— (a) A referendum of the voters held at the demand of majority of their representatives in the Legislatures concerned and resulting in an absolute majority of the members of the Depressed Classes having the franchise. (b) No such referendum shall be resorted to until after twenty years and until universal adult suffrage has been established. III. NECESSITY OF D EFINING THE D EPRESSED CLASSES The representation of the Depressed Classes has been grossly abused in the past inasmuch as persons other than the Depressed Classes were nominated to represent them in the Provincial Legislatures, and cases are not wanting in which persons not belonging to the Depressed Classes got themselves nominated as representative of the Depressed Classes. This abuse was due to the fact that while the Governor was given the power to nominate persons to represent the Depressed Classes, he was not required to confine his nomination to persons belonging to the Depressed Classes, since nomination is to be substituted by election under the new constitution, there will be no room for this abuse. But in order to leave no loophole for defeating the purpose of their Special Representation we claim— (i) That the Depressed Classes shall not only have the right to their own Separate Electorates, but they shall also have the right to be represented by their own men. (ii) That in each Province the Depresed Classes shall be strictly defined as meaning persons belonging to communities which are subjected to the system of Untouchability of the sort

123ROLE OF ......................... INDIAN DEMOCRACY prevalent therein and which are enumerated by name in a schedule prepared for electoral purposes. IV. NOMENCLATURE In dealing with this part of the question we would like to point out that the existing nomenclature of Depressed Classes is objected to by members of the Depressed Classes who have given thought to it and also by outsiders who take interest in them. It is degrading and contemptuous, and advantage may be taken of this occasion for drafting the new constitution to alter for official purposes the existing nomenclature. We think that they should be called “Non-Caste Hindus”, “Protestant Hindus”, or “Non-Conformist Hindus” or some such designation, instead of “Depressed Classes”. We have no authority to press for any particular nomenclature. We can only suggest them, and we believe that if properly explained the Depressed Classes will not hesitate to accept the one most suitable for them. We have received a large number of telegrams from the Depressed Classes all over India supporting the demands contained in this Memorandum.”* “While the session was going on, His Majesty the KingEmperor gave a reception to the Indian Delegates on November 5. It was arranged that a few Members should speak at the party. Gandhi was present bareheaded. He was clad in his customary loin-cloth and wore sandals. The king-Emperor asked Dr. Ambedkar about the condition of the Untouchables in India, and when he heard the harrowing tales from Dr. Ambedkar who narrated them with his flowing heart, eloquent eyes and scintillating face, he shuddered. The kingEmperor then inquired of Dr. Ambedkar cordially about his father and the place of his education, and how he had achieved academic eminence.” 1 * : For previous memorandum see. Appendix to Proceedings of the Minorities Sub-Committee of the First Session of the Conference. This Supplementary Memorandum dated 4th November 1931 is printed as Appendix VII in the original proceedings at Pp. 1409-11. 1 : Keer, p. 181.

124 DR. BABASAHEB AMBEDKAR : WRITINGS AND SPEECHES “When the British Premier saw that there was no unanimous solution to the Minorities problem, he asked all the Members of the Minorities Committee to sign a requisition authorising him to settle the communal problem and to pledge themselves to accept his decision. Gandhi singned this pledge alongwith other Members. Dr. Ambedkar did not sign this requisition as he believed in the justice of his demands. The Prime Minister then adjourned the Conference on December 1. Just before this requisition Dr. Ambedkar had a talk with Gandhi at the residence of Sir Mirza Ismail. Gandhi suggested a novel method to win the support of Dr. Ambedkar. He said that if the Untouchable candidates failed in the general election held on the basis of joint electorates without reservation of seats, the Depressed Classes should prove their bona fides in a Court of Law.” 1 After the adjournment of the 2nd Round Table Conference, various Comments were made by the different people and the press. The Comments are as follows : “Mr. T. A. Raman a well known Journalist from India was travelling back to India. One of the fellow passenger told Mr. T. A. Raman that if he even murdered anybody it would be Dr. Ambedkar”2 ‘Subodha Patrika’ weekly in its issue dated 15th November 1931 said : “We fail to understand Mahatma Gandhi’s stand with respect to the demands of the Depressed Classes. To say the least, it is unreasonable and extremely irritating. If there is any community that needs the fullest protection it is that of the Untouchable classes. The Muslims and the Sikhs are well protected and ‘Their avowed fears as a contemporary puts it’ are but a mask for winning a privileged position in the commonwealth. Now we ask, is it right for Mahatmaji to yield to the false claims of the stronger communities and turn down the Untouchable ? It is no use quibbling ; if Mahatma Gandhi’s attempts to solve the communal problem have been futile so far, he is to blame also. Unpalatable though Dr. Ambedkar’s outbursts may be, they are intelligible, if not well-grounded. It is no use taking shelter behind the so-called Congress mandate which is to all practical purposes, as elastic as Gandhiji would like to have it. We feel that the Congress has been 1 : Keer, Pp. 190-191. 2 : Ibid. P. 183.

125ROLE OF ......................... INDIAN DEMOCRACY tinkering with the removal of Untouchability, Why, otherwise, we ask that the Nehru Committee was not made to include as much as a representative of the Depressed Classes ?” “If any firm decision on the problem of minorities is going to take time and therefore freedom is also being delayed, then initially provincial autonomy would be acceptable. This was how Gandhiji without consultation of his friends conveyed his acceptance to the British Prime Minister. The disclosure of this private conversation raised a storm among Indian delegates. Dr. Sapru, Jaykar representing Progressive Hindus and Dr. Munje, Malviya etc. representnting Hindu Mahasabha were also terror-striken. They tried to verify Gandhiji’s statements. Induial Yagnik, who was a Brahmin and had long association with Gandhiji, had gone to London as special reporter of Sunday Advocate’. He wrote in the ‘Sunday Advocate’ dated 6th December 1931 thus : ‘Gandhi Accepts provincial Autonomy. But I venture to state that Gandhi has already delivered himself bound hand and foot into the kindly arms of the British rulers. I referred somewhat casually last week to Gandhi’s secret pact with Lord Lothian to agree to provincial autonomy as a first instalment of the new scheme of self-government for India. Of course, Gandhi had shrewdly hedged this agreement with the condition that representative of the self-governing Provinces and States should eventually be invited to form a Constituent Assembly which would be authorised to draft the new Federal Constitution for India. I understand that Government naturally did not agree to this condition. But they shrewdly seized on this agreement of Gandhis’, and gave it as wide a currency as possible of course, in an unofficial manner. Of course moderate politicians like Tej Bahadur Sapru and Mr. Jaykar were awfully enraged on hearing of these conversations and engaged in a very hot tussle with Gandhi. Mr. Jaykar, I am told, was particularly wild with the Congress plenipotentiary, and Gandhi is reported to have hotly replied that he was quite free to do what he liked, and he was perfectly sure of getting the Congress to agree to what ever he pleased. When the matter leaked out, however into the press, Gandhi naturally did his best to wriggle out of this secret understanding as Government had of course not agreed to the condition which formed an integral part of his agreement. But if you read between the lines of the special interview that Gandhi