Vol. 2 · pages 101–105

82 DR. BABASAHEB AMBEDKAR : WRITINGS AND SPEECHES bound to come, one-third of the present number will be sufficient and the land revenue and the baluta will constitute a sufficient remuneration without any additional burden on the treasury. I ask in all seriousness why should not the Government undertake to bear that burden ? Why should not the Government pay the cost of the services ? In the case of every other Government employee, Government has made itself bold to come before this Council to ask for additional money. Sir, in the year 1921 Government agreed to increase the salaries of village teachers. In the same year Government brought forward proposals to increase the salaries of the subordinate services. Apart from this, Government brought forward proposals to increase the salaries of the talatis. If, Sir, the Government have got the nerve, the courage and the sympathy for these classes to bring forward financial measures to remunerate other services, why should not Government have the same nerve, the same courage and the same sympathy in the case of these Mahars ? I do not understand, Sir, why for instance Government should continue or be a party to a system which enthrals and enslaves a class of His Majesty’s subjects. I submit, Sir, that either on the legal ground or the moral ground, and I say on financial ground, the principle I have enunciated in section 4 of my bill is just and equitable. I now come, Sir, to the other class of watandar Mahars, those who care to carry on with the watan, those who are prepared to render services provided their grievances are remedied. These Mahars I have provided for in clause 6 of my bill. The provision in this section which is sought to be enacted in the interests of that part of the Mahar population, which cares to carry on the village duties, mainly consists in the re-organization. I use the word advisedly—mainly consist in the re-organization of the baluta system. If honourable members will go through the clauses which are enacted therein, they will find that there is, first of all, a provision made for the conversion of the baluta into a money cess. Secondly, provision is made for the recovery of the money cess along with the land revenue. Thirdly provision is made for the division of that cess into two parts, one for services rendered to the ryot and another for services rendered to the Government; so that that part of the cess which will be apportioned for services to the Government will be obligatory, while that part of the cess which will be apportioned for private services to the ryot will be optional. Those ryots who care to employ the services of the Mahar for their private service will be obliged to pay only that part of the cess which will have been assigned for private service. The Mahars, on the other hand, if, they do not want to render service to the ryot but want to render service only to the Government shall forfeit that part of the money cess which will have been assigned for private services. Now, Sir, the House is likely to think that I am making some novel proposals; I wish however to emphasise that none of these provisions are new. They already exist in the Watan Act. There is only a change in the existing system and a re-organization. The first provision that baluta shall

83ON THE HEREDITARY OFFICES ACT AMENDMENT BILL be converted into a money cess will be found already existing in section 19 of the Watan Act. That is not, therefore, a new thing. Under the existing Watan Act the Collector is given the power to convert, whenever he thinks fit, the baluta into a money cess. The second provision that the collection of the money cess shall be made along with the land revenue, I submit again is not a new proposal. It already exists in the Watan Act. Reference to section 81 of the Watan Act will show that the Collector has, under the existing Act, the power to collect all haks, all remunerations, all emoluments, as if they were arrears of land revenue. Therefore, what I submit, Sir, is that there is nothing that is new in section 6 of the bill. All that is new in section 6 of my bill is that the discretion instead of being given to the Collector is given to the parties themselves. The existing law recognizes that circumstances will arise when provisions such as those contemplated by section 6 of my bill will be necessary. Otherwise those provisions would not have found any place in the existing law. What I feel is that although the Collector may have the discretion, he may not know, he may not be aware, and may not be cognisant of the fact that circumstances have arisen which require that his discretion should be exercised. All I say is that the Collector should be guided by the parties themselves in the matter of the exercise of the discretion, so that, if the parties desire that the baluta should be collected along with the land revenue, the Collector will know that the occasion has arisen for him to use his discretion. There is nothing new in this, except the transfer of the discretionary power from the Collector to the ryots and to the Mahars. Then, Sir, the third provision as regards the partition of the baluta between two specific shares, one for private service and the other for Government service, is no doubt new. But I submit that circumstances have rendered it very necessary. According to the view of Government the baluta is a joint payment for services to the ryots and for services to Government. The Government on the 3rd of May 1899 passed a resolution No. 3074 wherein they have expressly laid down that baluta is a joint remuneration for services both to the ryots and to the Government. I need not go so fai back in order to give support to this view. Even as late as 1919, the Government in the papers that they laid before this House, in reply to a question on this point relied upon the order passed by the Assistant Secretary to Government in which the proposition has been expressly emphasized, that the baluta is not paid for merely private services, but is also paid for services to Government Now, Sir, what I submit is that the Mahars, some of them, are willing to render services to the Government, but they are not willing to render services to the ryots. There are also certain ryots, I know of, who do not want to employ an agency which is forced upon them as the Mahars are by the present law. They would like to employ on their own initiative at their own will, any one whom they would care to employ. In the same way there are some Mahars who do not want to render services to the ryot. They would like to have their freedom

84 DR. BABASAHEB AMBEDKAR : WRITINGS AND SPEECHES to serve or not to serve. But under the existing law this freedom is denied to them. They are forced to serve whether they wish it or not. This is due to the fact that the baluta is a joint remuneration and there is no way of finding out how much of the remuneration in the form of baluta is due for Government services and how much of it is due for private services. In these days of rivalry in social advancement the tension between the ryots and the Mahar has become great and will continue to grow in intensity unless freedom to employ and freedom to serve is provided for. To achieve this purpose it is necessary to define the quota of baluta due from the ryot on account of private services to the ryots and that due for the services rendered to Government. What happens under the present circumstances is this, that if a Mahar does not render service to the ryot, all the same, there being no partition of the baluta, the ryot is obliged to pay the whole and the Mahar gets an advantage over the ryot. On the other hand it happens that if the Mahar did not render service to the ryot but rendered services only to Government, he loses the whole of the baluta, for the reason that the ryot has no idea how much of the baluta is due from him for Government services. Not knowing this he withholds the whole and thereby causes a wrongful loss to the Mahars. It is therefore very essential, I think, in the interest of better administration and in the interests of peace in the villages that this partition of the baluta should take place. I submit it is absolutely contrary to the principle of law that the services of one class of people should be forced upon other classes of people. It would be atrocious to uphold a system under which a particular barber should alone shave us to the exclusion of any other barber. But the watan system is such an atrocious and barbarous system. I am sure the lawyer members of this House are aware that we had in the High Court a case in which one of the barbars had brought a suit that the Yajmans (the ryots) in a particular village were not entitled to employ the services of an outside barber, that whether or not that particular barber was efficient or not, whether he knew how to crop the hair or to pare the beard, he was entitled to render service to the ryots all the same. The same thing happens in the case of Mahars. What my bill aims at is freedom of contract; if the ryots do not want to employ the Mahars, they ought to have perfect liberty not to employ them, and if the Mahars do not want to serve, the Mahars should have perfect liberty not to serve. But under the present system, under the system of joint remuneration, this liberty of contract is negatived and is not obtainable. My scheme provides for that freedom of contract, and I think at least in this century when every society has advanced from status to contract we ought not for instance to block the progress of Indian society by refusing the Mahars and the ryots the liberty of contract. One thing I would like to say is that the system which I have outlined here in this bill is not altogether my own. It is a system which I have copied from the Berars. In the Central Provinces and the Berars, similar feuds and troubles were going on between ryots and the Mahars. A great agitation

85ON THE HEREDITARY OFFICES ACT AMENDMENT BILL was carried on, on the part of both the sides and Government there appointed a committee to investigate into the matter and to make their proposals. In 1920, the committee made its proposals and the Government introduced the system which I have essentially reproduced in the provisions of this bill. I submit that if the provisions of this bill, which are the result of the recommendations of the Berar Committee, are good for the Berars, I think they cannot be bad for the Bombay Presidency, because the Berar system was a replica of the Bombay system ; so much so that the whole of the Berar Committee’s report is based upon the resolutions of the Bombay Government. These are the main provisions of the bill. There is a provision in the bill, however, which probably requires a little explanation and that provision is the provision which introduces certain changes in section 9 of the Watan Act. I mean clauses 2 and 3 of my bill. Under the provisions of the Watan Act, it is laid down that watan lands shall not be alienated to any one outside the watan family. There is also a provision under section 9, which empowers the Collector to resume the land of a watandar which has been transferred to a non-watandar. But under section 9 whether or not to declare the alienation null and void and to resume such alienated land is left entirely to the discretion of the Collector. The Collector does not always choose to exercise the discretion vested in him under section 9 in favour of the watandar. This may cause no particular hardship when the land so alienated although it is watan land is not assigned as remuneration to an officiating watandar. But I submit, Sir, that if an officiator is required to render services to Government on the express understanding that his watan land has been assigned to him in remuneration for his work shall always remain in his possession, I think Government ought to resume those watan lands which have gone out of the hands of the officiator. The sections which I have introduced make the declaration of alienation as null and void obligatory upon the Collector in the case of such watan lands as are assigned as remuneration of an officiator. In introducing these sections I adopt as my basis the well-known division of watan lands into two classes, those assigned as remuneration and those not assigned as remuneration. In the case of lands not assigned as remuneration the Collector may well not exercise his discretion because of the fact that the land is not necessary immediately for the purpose of the remuneration of the officiator. In that case if the Collector does not exercise his discretion in favour of the watandar and declare the alienation null and void there is not much case for complaint. But when the land is expressly reserved and assigned as remuneration. I think the Collector ought to have no discretion whatever in the matter but in every such case, the declaration should be given that the alienation is null and void. I admit, Sir, that there are two defects in the bill as I have drafted it, and I like to make this admission because I want to be very, very just. I do not want to throw any additional burden on the ryot in the interests of the Mahars. The simple reason is that I am an enemy of the watan system.

86 DR. BABASAHEB AMBEDKAR : WRITINGS AND SPEECHES I have striven all along to destroy the Maharaki watan system, although I know that in the immediate future the Mahars will suffer a great loss. But I am convinced that these shackles of the watan system are the principal causes which are keeping them backward. I am taking a long view of the matter and it is this that leads me to be indifferent to the immediate benefits to the Mahars from their watans. I cannot therefore be particularly striving to steel an advantage over the ryots, not particularly striving for benefitting the Mahars at the cost of the ryot. Honourable members of this House will see that the baluta system is, as I have organised it in my bill, not going to impose any additional burden upon the ryot. I use expressly the word “equivalent”. That means no additional burden shall be levied upon the ryots for the remuneration of the Mahars. That will show how just I mean to be,. That leads me to admit that there are two defects in the bill. One is that in altering section 9 (alongwith clauses 2 and 3 of the bill) so as to make it obligatory upon the collector to resume the land, there ought to be a provision allowing the Collector to pay compensation to the dispossessed non-watandar. I readily admit that the lands may have been transferred to any one in faith and for full consideration. It stands to reason that when such a transferee is deprived of it, he ought to be paid compensation. When I had first drafted this bill, I had provided that the Collector should have power to compensate the non-watandar, but on the advice of certain official members, I withdrew that, but I am prepared to make that amendment in the select committee. Secondly, I ought to have provided that just as the Mahars should have option not to serve the ryot, the ryot ought to have the option not to employ the Mahars. I am prepared also to make that amendment in the bill in the select committee to which it may be referred. These are all the things, I think, in the bill which call for explanation. Before I bring my remarks to a close I think I ought to make it very clear to the Honourable the Revenue Member that this bill has the support of the entire Mahar population. There is no division of opinion on that point at all. In fact there cannot be a division of opinion on this bill and for very good reason. The bill is not an obligatory bill. It is purely a discretionary bill. Unless the watandar Mahars desire that the provisions of this bill should be brought into operation, they will not be brought into operation. Things will continue as they are now. A change will come only when the Mahars will feel the necessity for it. It will not be forced upon them against their will. Mr. P. R. Chikodi: This is an unilateral arrangement. It ought to be bilateral. Dr. B. R. Ambedkar: I know I ought to make that amendment which has been omitted but which will be made in the select committee. I say there cannot be any opposition to this bill on the part of the Mahars themselves because the bill is not an obligatory one and it does not compel them to take advantage of it. It only makes certain provisions in their interest if they want to avail themselves of them. The Mahars have not