MAHATMA GANDHI AND

THE INDIAN CONSTITUTION

Why did the Constituent Assembly of India discard Mahatma Gandhi’s

concept of constitutional structure that gave prominence to villages, and
prefer parliamentary democracy instead? Why did the self-sufficient and
self-governing village of his dream not find a place in India’s political edifice?
This book explores these and other important questions that are intrin-
sically linked to the making of modern India. It traces the events during
the freedom struggle, leading up to independence, and the forming of the
Constituent Assembly. The volume looks at the underlying foundations
of the Indian nation state and the role of leaders like Jawaharlal Nehru,
Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel and B. R. Ambedkar. It further explores the link-
ages and the dissonances between Gandhi’s ideas and principles and the
Indian Constitution.
Engaging and accessible, this book will be an interesting read for research-
ers and scholars of modern India, South Asian politics and history.

Narendra Chapalgaonker is former Judge, High Court of Bombay, Mumbai,

Maharashtra, India. He taught law and Marathi literature before joining
the Bar. He was Professor Emeritus in the Social Sciences at Yeshwantrao
Chavan Maharashtra Open University, Nashik, and Ford Professor in
Public Law at the Indian Law Society’s (ILS) Law College, Pune. He is
also Associate Fellow at the Indian School of Political Economy, Pune,
Maharashtra.
This page intentionally left blank
 MAHATMA GANDHI
AND THE INDIAN
CONSTITUTION

Narendra Chapalgaonker
Translated by Subhashchandra Wagholikar
First published 2016
by Routledge
2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN
and by Routledge
711 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017
Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business
© 2016 Narendra Chapalgaonker
The right of Narendra Chapalgaonker to be identified as author of this work has
been asserted by him in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright,
Designs and Patents Act 1988.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised
in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or
hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information
storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers.
Trademark notice: Product or corporate names may be trademarks or registered
trademarks, and are used only for identification and explanation without intent to
infringe.
British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
A catalog record has been requested for this book.
ISBN: 978-1-138-99941-1 (hbk)
ISBN: 978-1-315-65833-9 (ebk)
Typeset in Goudy
by Apex CoVantage, LLC
To the memory of MAHATMA GANDHI
This page intentionally left blank
 CONTENTS

Preface ix
Acknowledgements xiv

1 The setting 1

2 The evolution of Gandhiji’s leadership 14

3 The struggle for independence and constitution 28

4 Preparing for the Constituent Assembly 48

5 The Gandhian conception of the constitution 67

6 The Constituent Assembly decides 84

Epilogue 99
Appendices 122
Index 128

vii
This page intentionally left blank
 PREFACE

It is not so that a leader of a nation scores success in each and every struggle
he launches on behalf of his nation. History puts down tally of his achieve-
ments and failures at the end of his life. Gandhiji has been subjected to
such bookkeeping many times. Last three years of his life proved critical for
setting direction of future of independent India. Those were the days when
die was cast for liberation of India from British fetters. Mahatma Gandhi
had provided leadership to the independence movement. At the advent
of independence, framing of constitution that determined direction of the
future course of the nation was already under way. Gandhiji saw the pro-
cess of constitution framing as another freedom struggle, and it is generally
held that Gandhiji could not win this battle. But this will be not only a
superfluous view, but also a half truth.
The first battle was against alien empire. The second battle he would
have to fight against his own men, colleagues and followers, whom he held
like his sons. He would have to accept even defeat without a word of pro-
test; and bury deep the sting of setback before offering them his blessings.
Personal glee or grief of victory and defeat, he did not harbour; but he could
foresee fair or adverse consequences for future of the nation. And this made
him sad.
People view the freedom struggle and the movement of national recon-
struction discretely; but for Gandhiji, both battles were intertwined. He
had never drawn a strict dividing line between the political and the con-
structive work. He would not think of any part of life in a compartmental-
ized way. The mission of giving moral content to politics was born out
of his comprehensive way of thinking. He did not want different sets of
people, some to work in politics and others to do constructive work. The
constructive work was not a leisure time activity, to be undertaken for
the period when the freedom movement had to be suspended. For him, the
constructive work was part and parcel of the freedom movement. The spin-
ning wheel and the khadi were icons of not only self-reliance or of financial

ix
 PREFACE

uplifting of the poor, but these were also the symbols of resolve to fight for
the freedom. Some of his followers used to prefer one and defer another in
their mind, but even they did not disown the bond between the political
and the constructive work.
For many of the congressmen, constructive work was only one of the
means adopted to build strength towards winning political freedom, and
Gandhiji was well aware of this view. As freedom was won and Congress
adorned power, most of them lost interest in the constructive work. It
was not a result of intoxication of freedom or of power; but because of
the grave hurdles nation faced at dawn of independence did not brook
easy solutions. Whole energy of the leadership was consumed by these
issues. There was influx of refugees. Inferno of violence flared. Food grains
became scare. Some princes dreamt of retaining independent states. Tribal
bands had launched invasion in Kashmir. A group of communists, sensing
opportune time, had commenced preparation for armed rebellion. All such
problems were staring at rulers who had just taken the charge. Naturally,
various options did not receive the attention as would have been given if
the constitution was framed in a period of total tranquility. Similarly, no
moments could be spared to pay attention to constructive work. And some
of the leaders began to believe the power itself to be the instrument, the
only instrument, of social transformation. Proximity to power is, no doubt,
agreeable.
Gandhiji spent last three years of his life in unease, afflicted with pains.
The partition of the nation he could not prevent, the collective cruelty
the occasion spurred, neglect of constructive work by the leaders who were
bogged down in transient issues of politics and crumbling base of moral val-
ues essential for pro-people politics – all these anguished him. The upheav-
als in his mind is reflected in contemporary political correspondence, as
well as in notes maintained by the British officers.
What was the origin of this disquiet in his mind? He had never given
importance to personal credit for successes. He had transcended beyond
such material desires. Then why this anguish? The nation was being par-
titioned despite his resistance. He had tried all means to avoid it, to the
extent of even offering seemingly outlandish and impractical proposals to
the rival party, and yet the partition could not be avoided. The anguish
over failure to avoid the partition was but natural, but the affliction of mere
geographical divide could not have made so deep a wound in his heart.
A correspondent had posed a quandary to the effect that people were
kicking away the ladder of Gandhi’s ideals over which the nation had
climbed so high. Hindu-Muslim unity, Hindustani, khadi and the village
industries were completely forgotten, and those still talked about them
were either deceiving themselves or deceiving others.

x
 PREFACE

To this, Gandhiji responded in an article in the Harijan of 17 August

1947, titled ‘Is He Buried Alive?’. He wrote, ‘I cling to the hope that I am
not yet buried alive. The hope rests on the belief that the masses have not
lost faith in his idols. When it is proved that they have, they will be lost
and then I can be said to have been buried alive. But so long as my faith
burns bright, as I hope it will, even if I stand alone, I shall be alive in the
grave and, what is more, speaking from it.’ In the same article, Gandhiji
worried that people’s mind was changing and if the trend continued, it will
be impossible to protect them from the gathering storm.
Many of the leaders who had spent their lives in constructive work and
propagation of Gandhian thought shared his anxieties. Two important gath-
erings in December 1947 gave expression to these concerns and called for
guidance by the Mahatma. Workers practicing Gandhiji’s ideas on educa-
tion under the banner of ‘Hindustani Talimi Sangh’ met in Delhi. Dr Zakir
Hussain, who was to become president of India in later days, opined that
they would be able to shun power politics if the many informally formed
groups handling different programmes of constructive work were brought
together in a single organization. In his reply, Gandhiji said,

If the united constructive workers sangh tries to go into power

politics, then it would spell its ruin. Had it been so, I would myself
had entered politics and tried to run the government my way.
Those who are holding the reins of power today, would have easily
stepped aside to make room for me, but whilst they are in charge,
they can carry on only according to their own lights. But I do
not want to take power into my hands. By abjuring power and by
devoting ourselves to pure and selfless service of the voters, we
can guide and influence them. It would give us far more real power
than we shall have by going into the government. But a stage
may come, when the people themselves may feel and say that they
want us, and no one else, to wield the power; the question could
then be considered. I shall not probably be alive then. . . . By that
time, India would have become an ideal state.

On this, Dr Zakir Husain remarked, ‘Ideal government would need ideal

persons to run it.’ To this Gandhiji replied: ‘We can send men of our choice,
without going into the Government ourselves. Today, everybody in the
Congress is running after power. That presages grave danger. Let us not be
in the same power-thirsty mob.’
After few days, Gandhiji attended a meeting of constructive work-
ers organized by the Constructive Work Committee of the Congress
party, where Acharya Kripalani, Shankarrao Deo and Rang Rao Diwakar

xi
 PREFACE

expressed concern about future of the constructive work. They complained,

pointing to specific instances, that provincial Congress governments were
making decisions and policies against those very articles of self-reliance
and village industries, which the Congress had backed in pre-independence
days. Though jaggary was still praised to be better, in practice, licenses were
being issued to open sugar factories. Government spoke of promoting khadi,
and focused on growth of textile mills. If the Congress does not approve of
the constructive work, why it was paying lip service to it, they wondered.
And what should the constructive workers do in these circumstances, they
wanted to know. Would it not be better for all constructive workers to form
themselves into a separate body for vigorous prosecution of the constructive
work, it was suggested.
Gandhiji responded to both issues extensively. He said,

The objective of the constructive work organization is to gener-

ate political power. But if we may say that political power having
come, it must be ours as a prize for our labours, it would degrade us
and spell our ruin. Take the case of the Charkha Sangh. It has the
largest membership of all the sanghs. But we have never endeav-
ored to get its members enrolled on the (party’s) voters’ list. It was
suggested at one time that we should get their names enrolled on
the Congress register. I opposed it. ‘Do we want to capture the
Congress?’ I asked. That would be tantamount to killing it.
Today, politics has become corrupt. Whoever enters into it get
contaminated. Let us keep out of it altogether. Our influence will
grow thereby. The greater our inner purity, the greater shall be our
hold on the people, without any effort on our part.
Can you really appreciate whatever I am doing today? Then you
should have the strength to eradicate corruption, where-so-ever
it may be . . . for that you need not go into any committee. Your
work is among the masses. I am told that the draft constitution
does not mention gram panchayats. Do not bother about it. We
will have to help the villages to breathe again, help them to revive
themselves. We should give them education and more power and
make them prosperous.

Gandhiji would not have become so disturbed and sad if the political free-
dom and reconstruction of the nation would have been two totally different
things in his mind. If it would have been a question of choosing between a
presidential system and a parliamentary one, and in case Gandhiji’s choice
was not favoured, it would not have so much pricked his heart. Reconstruc-
tion was integral in his meaning of freedom; without it, he felt, freedom

xii
 PREFACE

would be incomplete. Villages should be self-reliant, keeping their needs to

minimum, and be autonomous from exterior influences; these conditions
he thought essential to protect individual freedoms of every person. In his
premise, political freedom of the nation will be complete if, and only if, the
individual becomes free and remains so. He had put forward again and again
this inseparable relation between the individual’s freedom and the nation’s
freedom. Even at the Karachi Congress, where he moved the Resolution
on Fundamental Rights, he had maintained that these freedoms were soul
of a nation’s freedom. The juggernaut of the centralized state will crush
freedom of common man, he feared. Empowering of villages was an essen-
tial counterforce against centralization of power, he believed. Gandhiji had
advised constructive workers to strive to create an open environment in
which the villages will be able to breathe without restraints. But this was
not to happen. He saw centralized power leading humanity to violence, in
broad sense of the word.
Gandhiji was insistent on one more point, and that was communal har-
mony. He had made sincere efforts to avoid partition, inviting criticism
for going to the extent of offering Jinnah the authorization to form united
India’s entire cabinet. Those who could not gather the gesture misunder-
stood Gandhiji being pro-Muslim. This misunderstanding cost him his life.
Even if an entirely Muslim League ministry was formed, it had to be respon-
sible to the legislature in which the Congress enjoyed large majority. The
ministry could not have functioned disregarding the majority: Gandhiji
knew it and even Jinnah was aware of it. That is why Jinnah did not accept
this proposal. ‘Now, rivers of blood will flow,’ Gandhiji’s anguished heart
cried on the final decision of the partition. He wished he could prevent the
fires of violence. He was agonized by the violence, and his greatest despair
was the fact that he could not stop it.
If we try to weigh Gandhiji’s triumphs and failures in the perspective of
his thoughts, it becomes an account of not only Gandhiji’s performance;
it measures up deeds of all of us, of the nation itself. It is not a matter of
credit or discredit; it is for the nation to ponder if a thing was beneficent
and if so, how it came about, and if it was not beneficent, still why it did
happen. Details of the system become secondary when the history tallies
accounts in this way. It remains measure of triumph of divinity over bestial-
ity in human minds, or alternately, its failure. Ultimately, political systems
are not shaped by theories of political science; although they appear to be
so on paper, their attainments and disappointments are defined by mind of
the operating society.

xiii
 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

I am grateful to Librarians and staff of Dr. Babasaheb Ambedkar Marathwada

University, Aurangabad, Saraswati Bhuvan College, Aurangabad; Aundh Pub-
lic Library, Aundh; Gandhi Seva Sangh Library, Wardha. I am also grateful
Dileep Majgaonkar of Rajhans Prakashan, Pune (publishers of original Marathi
book) for consenting to publish the English translation; Anand Hardikar,
Sharadchandra Panse, Prof. Siby Joseph and Niranjan Rajadhyaksha for their
valuable suggestions. I am grateful to Subhashchandra Wagholikar for translat-
ing the book in English, Rajat Narayan Agrawal for permitting the inclusion of
photograph of his father with Mahatma Gandhi in this book.
I am also grateful to Routledge and all its editorial staff for publishing this
book in such a fine form.

xiv
 1
THE SETTING

The victory at Plassey in 1757 is believed to mark British ascendancy in

India. Ensuing fifty or sixty years saw the British regime stabilized in most
parts of the country. British rule in India was not like earlier power shifts the
country had witnessed many times. It was not limited to ouster of an indi-
vidual king or a ruling family, and their replacement by another. Certainly,
these new rulers were aliens who had alighted from lands beyond oceans; but
more importantly, their English nation was not, unlike India, wholly under
feudal rule. Parliamentary democracy had come to stay in their country.
Although the actual administration in India, till the year 1858, was car-
ried by the East India Company, a trading company established in England,
still its governance was debated, and its failures were challenged in the Brit-
ish Parliament. This had given Indian populace reason to believe that they
could appeal to the King against tyranny of company officials stationed in
India. The first political organization called ‘Bombay Association’ was formed
on 26th August 1852. In successive years of 1852 and 1853, the Bombay
Association submitted two petitions to the British Parliament which were
penned by Dr Bhau Daji Laad, a reformer in Maharashtra who was secretary
of the Association.1 Following the rising of 1857, the Queen of England took
over reins of Indian administration in next year. Still the British Parliament
continued to debate the governance of India and to criticize its omissions.
A branch of the East India Association, established by Dadabhai Naoroji
in England, was launched in Bombay in 1869. The Pune Sarvajanik Sabha
(or The Pune Public Forum) took one more step in these endeavours
towards demanding political rights when it submitted a petition to British
Parliament, drafted by Mahadeo Govind Rande, demanding the inclusion
of eleven Indian representatives in the House of Commons, to be elected
by Indian voters.2 This was a nascent plea for a representative political
body. Already, a legislature of advisory nature with limited powers had
come into existence on which two or three Indian persons were used to be
nominated. Before the general elections of 1885 in Britain, organizations

1
 THE SETTING

like Sarvajanik Sabha of Pune and Mahajan Sabha of Madras had sent
their representatives to England to canvass with the contestants on issues
concerning India. Even in the absence of voting rights, Indians felt need
to strive to get their problems projected in the British Parliament. In 1885,
Indian National Congress was launched; it was the first India-wide political
organization that later came to lead the freedom movement.

New education
The new rulers introduced new system of instructions in India. Indians
were introduced to social and physical sciences as developed in Europe.
The new curriculum allowed Indians to study history of struggles fought all
over world to secure fundamental rights to every human being, including
right to dignified life and other rights of political nature. The rulers had
diverse expectations about effects of the new instructions being imparted
to Indian people. They knew, on one hand, that new education will awaken
Indians to their political rights, leading to possible demands of freedom;
on the other hand, some of them hoped that the teaching will see decline
of Hindu religion, and the newly educated people will turn to the new,
Christian faith. Thomas Babington Macaulay, one of the key officers who
decided education policy for India, pointed out to both anticipated effects,
one publicly, in his speech in House of Commons on 10th July 1833,3 and
other in a private letter, written to his father on 12th October 1836.4 In
fact, the expectations of large-scale collective conversions were belied; but
the liberal education unsurprisingly tended to blossom aspirations of free-
dom in minds of Indians. Although, imperialist arrogance marked some of
higher officers sent to India, some were tempered with liberalism, then in
vogue in educated elites in Britain. The philosophy of liberalism was on
way to become a significant moral basis of the British system, that granted
highest value to individual, to his civic freedoms and to minimalist interfer-
ence by the state in his freedoms, and it included right of people to elect
their government, respect to dissenters, fullest opportunity of development
to every person, and the belief that only nonviolent evolutions bring last-
ing reforms. The Indian political organizations and their political demands
could get opportunity of expression only due to liberalism in British regime;
under any other regime devoid of parliamentary democracy and liberalism
these things would have come to naught.

Double standards of proponents of liberalism

Indians had come to acquire theoretical knowledge of the liberalism being
propagated by European thinkers. Books of authors like Adam Smith, John

2
 THE SETTING

Stuart Mill, Jeremy Bentham, Jean-Jacques Rousseau and Thomas Paine

had reached India. Mill and Bentham had found place in the curriculum
itself. Educated among Indians had started to understand general philoso-
phy of liberalism. But they could not stomach some contradictions in for-
mulations of these liberal philosophers. Mill was not prepared to say that
all nations and people had right to self-rule. Such presentation would have
gone against British imperialism. If all were entitled to self-rule, there could
be no imperialism and no subject nations. Persons like Mill had worked out
through such dilemma: he wrote that right to self-rule was only for those
societies that had matured their decision-making capabilities, and not for
others. For those still in primitive life, or who were not civilized, there was
no need of democracy; they will benefit more under rule of an Akbar-like
absolute despot, he claimed.5
If all nations have right to self-rule, if Mill and friends accept that Aus-
tralia and New Zealand had right to independence, then why India cannot
have the same right? Newly educated Indians could not find proper and sat-
isfactory response to this question in Mill’s works. If all men are equal, and
if all have equal rights, then why did the European government in South
Africa exercise racist policies? In India, why was unequal treatment given
to Indian people and to those from ruling race? Why did they have unequal
rights? Why is there difference in their pays for same work? Such questions
exercised minds of educated people.

Logical demand of authority

Response of the educated Indians in two main regions of Bengal and Maha-
rashtra, where the new education system was initiated first, was significant.
They were little confused in the face of new rulers, their new procedures,
and material changes they had introduced; but not before long, discerning
leaders of the society moved out of perplexity and began critique of their
circumstances. And they dreamt of future too. Even Lokahitwadi (literally
‘a proponent of people’s interests’) Gopal Hari Deshmukh, who confessed
that ‘Britishers were gurus who were sent by Gods from distant lands’, did
not desire perpetuation of the alien’s rule. He wrote in one of his Shatpatras
(‘The Hundred Letters’, a reformist treatise):

Once the (Indian) people become knowledgeable, they will quietly

urge the Britons to grant them parliament on pattern of the one in
their own country. After our people begin sitting in it, they will qui-
etly ask, why, they being equally wise, were not bestowed authority.
When majority of Hindu people will hold such view, the govern-
ment will be obliged to act on it. . . . And then the Britons will stay

3
 THE SETTING

here only for trading; that means they will be back to the original
state of their arrival in India, and our people will enjoy the parlia-
ment and self rule. . . . If the Britons will make any trouble or will try
to force some strange piece of legislation, then they will see replay of
happenings in America, and our people will make themselves inde-
pendent, and they will ask the Britons to go back to their country.6

Had India befallen to be conquered by some utterly feudal power, she

would have yearned for only self-rule and could have won it only by resort
to arms. But these rulers were singular, and the times too were unusual. The
American and the French Revolutions had proclaimed all over the world,
at least in principle, the fundamental rights of individual as well as right of
freedom to every nation. As these developments influenced formation of
mind of newly educated Indians, their struggle against the British imperial-
ism did not remain confined to self-rule; their idea of independence encom-
passed constitutional institutions like parliament, and democratic bodies
like a representative government elected by people. Indians demanded of
Britain a constitutional democracy. They yearned for a constitution writ-
ten by Indian people without any imperialist control. The idea of freedom
comprising a constitutional democracy was endorsed not only by the elite
leadership but also mass leaders like Mahatma Gandhi who drew common-
ers in the freedom movement too backed it. Dadabhai Naoroji who used
to argue, like a practiced lawyer, that being British subjects made us British
citizens, and that we demand only those rights bestowed to British citizens
residing in England, and nothing more, realized later the need to speak
explicitly. Delivering presidential address to the twenty second national
session of the Congress at Calcutta in 1906, he demanded in categori-
cal words, ‘self government or swaraj like that of the United Kingdom or
the Colonies’.7 Dadabhai used the term swaraj intentionally. He wanted
to underscore that he was in agreement with leaders like Lokmanya Tilak
who had been demanding swaraj. Starting with pleas to consider their prob-
lems or to grant Indian representations in the British Parliament, political
opinion in India had evolved to make unequivocal declaration that ‘swaraj
is the only remedy for our all ills and that is our only demand’. Gandhiji
who led the Indian freedom struggle expanded the term to mean not the
administration of dominion status but an independent state governed by a
constitution that is written and accepted by the people of India.

Independence and the constitution

At the very time the British rule was gaining stability in India, the educa-
tion it initiated had begun to germinate in people’s minds aspirations for

4
 THE SETTING

freedom, for deliverance from the British Empire. Indians did not visual-
ize a sequence of first waging war or armed rebellion to free the country,
and then of working out political arrangements for independent India, not
at least on the national scale. Some local rebellions took place, but their
leaders also had no idea about future constitutional arrangements. Even
the armed struggle raised by Subhas Chandra Bose had the singular aim of
freedom. They had no time to reflect on future arrangements. Barring such
exceptions, both the direction of political transformations and the ways to
achieve those were, naturally, influenced by political traditions of the rul-
ers. Generally speaking, demands for freedom of India were raised by law-
ful ways only, and parallel to freedom movement, Indian intellectual and
political leadership had started thinking about shape of India’s future con-
stitution. It is noted that first private bill indicating the outline of Indian
Constitution was drafted and circulated for consideration hardly ten years
after the launch of Indian National Congress, the organization that later
fought for freedom, in 1885. Indians imagined that the British government
will not only grant their demand of freedom, but will also help in the forma-
tion of independent India’s Constitution too. Indian leadership hoped that
knowing significance of the liberal political philosophy and of universally
developing values of freedom and equality, as well as fundamental human
rights, the British government will not remain indifferent to these, and that
the push of public opinion will compel the empire to create an independent
constitutional state in India.

The meaning of a constitution

The constitution is nothing but a well-defined roadmap for administration
of an emerging or already independent country. What will be the rights of
the citizens? Who will be responsible to protect their rights? Which rights
are allowed to be regulated by the state? How will the institutions which
are part of the state, like the executive, the judiciary and the legislature,
relate with the citizenry, and with each other? What will be limits of their
powers? The document that answers these questions is the constitution. It
is only a law, a law more important than other laws, as it is believed to be
the basic law. The validity of other laws is tested against the constitution.
If a law is held contrary to the constitution, it is void to that point. The
constitution cannot be changed or amended as easily as other laws. Gov-
ernments of different parties and of different opinions can come to power
through the route of ballot. New governments are entitled to implement
their new policies, but the nation needs to be set on some definite course.
Some values have to be set as basis of the nation’s governance, and the
government is expected to run the country in light of those values and in

5
 THE SETTING

the direction charted by the constitution. In this way, the constitution is a

frame set up for the future.
James Bryce, political scientist and author of the well-known treatise,
Studies in History and Jurisprudence, had defined the constitution as ‘the
framework to delineate functions, limitations, and powers of permanent
institutions established by law in the country’.8 Bolinbroke’s definition
of the constitution, proffered in his treatise On the Parties’ and quoted by
K. C. Wheare in the Modern Constitution described it as ‘that assemblage
of laws, institutions, and customs . . . according to which the community
hath agreed to be governed’.9 A constitutional government cannot func-
tion if the constitution does not affirm powers and limitations of constitu-
tional institutions like the legislature and the judiciary. The legislature is
expected to enact laws fulfilling aspirations of the people; the executive is
there to implement these laws, and the judiciary checks whether the laws
were constitutionally valid and if the executive discharged its responsibility
properly. The judiciary not only adjudicates usual cases of disputes between
citizens but the constitutional courts (high courts and the Supreme Court)
are entrusted with responsibility to review enactments of the legislature and
their implementation by the executive.

Authority to frame the constitution

If the law of constitution is believed to contain more legal sanctity than
other laws, then who is authorized to make it? Who will first enact the
constitution as the legislature comes into existence only after the ratifi-
cation of the constitution? The constitutions of Australia, Trinidad, New
Zealand, Sri Lanka and Canada were enacted by the British Parliament.
The bills of these constitutions were presented and passed in the British
Parliament in the same manner the other laws are passed. The constitu-
tions of these countries in original form were not approved by citizens of
these countries, or their representatives. The British Parliament, in its own
authority, awarded constitutions to these countries; only the later amend-
ments were made by the respective countries. Britain was no more sov-
ereign power then. The constitution of Ireland, another British colony,
was created by slightly different procedure. A House of Representative of
Ireland was established by law enacted by the British Parliament and its
members independently created their country’s constitution. The British
government disapproved their authority to create the constitution, but the
British Parliament again gave its approval to the very constitution prepared
by the Irish representatives, and ratified it.10
However, in case of India’s Constitution, Mahatma Gandhi and Indian
National Congress were insistent that it will be authored by Indians and

6
 THE SETTING

not by the British Parliament. Accordingly, it was to be written by represen-

tatives of Indian people. Indian independence was to be authorized by the
British Parliament. In a sense, it was to be a peaceful transition. When sub-
jugated country gains independence as result of a revolution, or a republic is
born after the overthrow of a tyranny, the leaders accepted by people to lead
them prepare the constitution. Many a country’s constitution was born at
the dawn of independence as the very part of the process of freedom struggle
itself. Peoples’ representatives assembled and prepared constitution; they
had not acquired this authority through the ballot, but the charged times
had conferred the authority to them. People’s consent was assumed, and
the whole country had given approval to their leadership. In India, the
Congress wanted the constitution-making to be entrusted to a constituent
assembly elected under adult franchise by all Indians. But independence
arrived in so unforeseen speed that there was no time to hold fresh elections
for the constituent assembly. The British tri-ministerial delegation sent to
India to work out procedure of transfer of power had declared its scheme on
16th May 1946. As spelt in the 18th and 19th sections of the ministerial
scheme, it was decided that ‘though it would have been proper to elect the
constituent assembly by adult franchise, the time needed for it is absolutely
unacceptable. Hence representatives elected to the regional legislatures on
the basis of limited franchise will elect the constituent assembly’.11 The
assembly was elected accordingly.

Why constitution?
Why we need a constitution? C. F. Strong in his Modern Political Constitu-
tions has given a pertinent and concise reply to the question. ‘The consti-
tution seeks to curb arbitrary actions of the government, to protect rights
of the ruled, and to delimit the sovereign’s sphere of powers’, he said.12 In
common man’s parlance, the term ‘government’ is used in wider sense. In
his mind, the government includes the legislature, the judiciary, the cabinet
or the executive and other officers. The constitution is the document that
explains character, powers and duties of this government.
The origin of the concepts of the constitution and of the constitutional
state can be traced to expositions of Greek philosophers and the systems
prevalent at their time. In India also, in later period, republics existed in
some areas; and experiments of this type were carried here too. The gov-
ernments in such republics, compared to those of today, were not so com-
plex, and the issues the state faced also, again in comparison, were much
straight and simpler. Those issues could be resolved through discussions and
by accepting majority opinion. Distinct constitutional institutions like the
legislature, independent judiciary and the executives are recent inventions;

7
 THE SETTING

when it was recognized that it will obstruct march of the nation if every new
government sought to change policies of the state; and hence the nation
has to go by certain direction. This led to concept of constitutional democ-
racy which sought to curb tyranny of majority which may arise in future.
Most of the constitutions of democracies in contemporary world have
evolved from eighteenth-century philosophies and the effects of two resul-
tant revolutions. The philosophies of Thomas Hobbs and John Locke
propagated in seventeenth century set forth the doctrine that, broadly,
the citizens had some inherent rights, and the institution of state had
come into existence by sanction of the citizens to protect those rights. If
the state became negligent in its duty to protect those rights, and turned
tyrannical, then the citizens have right to overthrow that state. Removal
of James Second from the throne was justified on grounds that he had
wrecked the unwritten agreement of protecting citizens’ rights between the
King and the citizenry. In later half of eighteenth century, Jean- Jacques
Rousseau asserted in his Social Contract that sovereignty rests in people.
Views of these philosophers inspired the American Revolution in 1776,
and 13 years later, the French Revolution in 1789. The democratic sys-
tem did not remain dependent on pleasure of the King or the government.
The Declaration of Independence of America proclaimed that ‘all men are
created equal’ and are endowed with ‘certain inalienable rights’. Thomas
Paine’s Common Sense that asserted doctrine of peoples’ sovereignty and
their inherent rights was published in the same year (1776) with rousing
reception. Half million copies of the book were sold within a year. Paine’s
second book, Rights of Man was brought out in 1791, and it too had similar
response. The Constitution of America materialized from the American
Revolution and became stable. The French Constitution had embodied the
Declaration of French Revolution (Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the
Citizen); but unfortunately, in few days, the constitutional state fell casualty
to violence that followed the revolution. Events in these two countries,
and those in England in later part of seventeenth century, have shaped the
essence of the modern world constitutions. Most of the later constitutions
endorsed the principle that people had fundamental rights and the state
was created to protect those rights. Although devoid of a written constitu-
tion, England had acknowledged these principles in conduct of her govern-
ment. Evidently, this philosophy and consequent political transformations
aroused by it were reflected in the English education the rulers had intro-
duced in India. It naturally followed that the makers of Indian Constitution
too were influenced by these views. Patently, constitution of every nation
is expected to be consistent to its traditions, history and values evolved in
her freedom struggle; that constitution is enjoined to eternally protect its
‘national constitutional democracy’.

8
 THE SETTING

It is well known that Indian Constitution was debated and finalized by

members of the Constituent Assembly during the 34 months’ period from
December 1946 to November 1949. The duration spent in constitution-
making should not be measured only as the time spent in actual drafting,
or in discussing and finalizing it. One more factor of significance had con-
tributed in the process of constitution-making in case of India and many
other countries freed from imperial yoke in twentieth century. Wherever
the imperial government had tried to involve the natives by introduction of
phased reforms in administration, the citizens of the subject country gained
opportunity to work various political and constitutional institutes and
learn their character. Even if the imperial government retained ultimate
vital power in their own hands, and gave only limited authority to political
institution of the colony, people came to understand advantages and dis-
advantages of those institutions. These experiences guided their decisions
of whether to include those institutions in postindependence constitutions
and what shape should be given to them.

Constitutional institutions
It was in nineteenth century when few members of public began to be
nominated to the legislatures in India. The legislature did not wield much
power, but they came to discover that it was a good platform to air some
grievances of the people. In later times, although the electorate remained
limited, some elected representatives entered the legislatures. Slowly, their
number increased, and powers of the legislature too grew. The concept that
the cabinet should be responsible to the legislature was introduced many
years later, when the Act of 1935 was implemented on provincial level.
Elections in 1936–37 saw ascendency of Congress ministries in six prov-
inces and coalition ministries in remaining provinces. The people’s repre-
sentatives, even if for a short period, had opportunity to enjoy the power.
Three High Courts were established, by a decree of the Queen in 1862,
at Calcutta, Bombay and Madras. Although a constitution granting funda-
mental rights to citizens was not in existence, these courts came to acquire
the traditional powers of courts in Britain to issue writs to mitigate injustices
to the citizens as well as to review decisions of lower courts. Initially, all
judges in the High Courts were Europeans only, but slowly, as years passed,
one or two of Indians could rise to the post. Janardan Vasudeo was first to be
appointed to the Bombay High Court, and later Nanabhai Haridas was made
an ad hoc judge. Nanabhai was appointed as permanent judge of the Bombay
High Court in 1884. Then followed appointments of Kashinath Trimbak
Telang, Mahadeo Govind Ranade and Badruddin Tayyabji, in that order. At
the district level also, where earlier all judges were British, gradually Indians

9
 THE SETTING

also found place. On lower courts, almost all faces one saw were Indians. This
judicial system in pre-British period helped to imbibe in Indian minds the
secular principle that with laws being written and equally applicable, a judge
of any faith can do justice, irrespective of the litigant’s religion.
The government introduced the Indian Civil Service, a specialist service
of covenanted servants, to run the administration in India. Initially, Indi-
ans could not enter it, but in later years doors of civil services were opened
to Indians. Lower-level appointments up to deputy collectors were made
mostly from Indians. A high-quality machinery for administration devel-
oped from this service. Independent India later christened it as the Indian
Administrative Service. Indians could experience at the dominion stage
itself a modest demonstration of how a disciplined administrative service
committed to rules can be built and its efficiency can be utilized in interests
of the people.
After introduction of the British rule, some provinces were demarcated
for administrative convenience; and a governor was appointed to every
province with an advisory council to help him. Later on legislatures were
formed and expanded. The Act of 1935 distributed powers between the
Union and the provincial governments, and delineated spheres of their
authority. This was the beginning of the federal system. The federal system
is considered ideal for a vast, multilingual country like India with distinct
cultural traits.

Basic principles of the constitution

Independence does not mean only the departure of alien rulers and their
replacement by the natives. Why do we desire independence and what will
the common citizen gain from it? Such questions have to be addressed.
The constitution documents not only the frame of government. Undoubt-
edly, the appearance of the state machinery is of certain import, but more
significant are value-preferences behind it. The constitution settles which
values will get credence in future direction of the nation. We had before us
examples of other nations, of their freedom movements, but the main inspi-
ration was expected to come from our own struggle. Every nation’s political
and cultural traditions and its freedom movement influence the preference
of values in the constitutional state.
Many movements and events, including the demands of complete inde-
pendence in the Congress sessions, Vaikom temple satyagraha to secure
right to use the road leading to the shrine, or the chavadar tale satyagraha at
Mahad for the right to draw water from public water sources, were instru-
mental in shaping character of the Indian Constitution. These events and
movements underscored the values of the constitution.

10
 THE SETTING

A review of pre-independence agitations, or mass movements, and issues

and demands shows how the basic principles of constitution were evolved.
The foremost demand was for education: it should be open to all, and every-
body should be free to decide what to study. From Raja Ram Mohan Roy
to social leaders in Maharashtra, many tried to convince people about the
importance of education, and made efforts to make it available to them.
No individual can be discriminated on the grounds of caste or gender and
denied right to education, these philosophers contended. Freedom of edu-
cation was an important element of individual freedom, and the demand
that everybody should have equal right to it edified the value of equal-
ity. Christian missionaries who came to India established schools which
were open to all castes, and even for the so-called untouchables. Patriotic/
devoted rulers like Sayajirao Gaikwad strived for it in their states. Mahatma
Jotirao Phule and others like him tried to convince the masses about the
importance of getting education. Gopal Ganesh Agarkar affirmed that girls
should be given same education which was imparted to boys, as they too
have right to participate in various fields of social life. Dhondo Keshav
Karve had launched residential schools needed for adult girls. Workers like
Ramchandra Kalaskar had started school for the dalits.
Practice of untouchability was the most barbarous feature of caste dis-
crimination. Thrust of our struggle for equality was mobilization of pub-
lic opinion against untouchability and later attempts to abolish it by law.
Innumerable workers like Vithal Ramji Shinde took stand against inhuman
custom of untouchability. The Congress party had included in its national
programmes the abolition of untouchability. Leaders like Dr Bhimrao
Ramaji alias Babasaheb Ambedkar rose from the Dalit community itself
and developed unprecedented awakening against this social injustice.
Widows were discriminated in many ways, with denial of right to remarry,
and right to education too. They had to suffer humiliations, with second-
ary role in social life, and were forced to observe gosha or veil. In Bengal,
widows were forced to perform sati (the practice of a widow joining her dead
husband on his funeral pyre) so that they would not be there to stake claim
to property of their deceased husband. Widows in Maharashtrian Brahmin
society lived in pathetic conditions. Movements against defacing of widows
by forced shaving and their humiliation were launched. (Many had to face
immense hardships to obtain society’s consent to remarriage even after a
law validating remarriages was enacted; Vishnushastri Pandit and others
had to struggle for it.) All these struggles were part of the wider movements
for equality. It was need of the time to speak out against tyranny of the Brit-
ish raj; this resulted into the evolution of right to expression. Other rights
followed. Once individual freedom is accepted, it follows that the person
would have rights of expression, of travel, of association, of faith and of

11
 THE SETTING

reverence. Many journalists fought for freedom of expression. The press

was born and it started criticizing performance of the government. Govern-
ment replied by passing a law for compulsory registration of newspapers in
1867. A post of ‘Reporter on the Native Press’ was created to screen con-
tents of native press. The section 124A specifying punishment for crime of
treason was inserted in Indian Penal Code in 1870. The Vernacular Press
Act was promulgated in 1878; but it had to be withdrawn in face of strong
opposition. Bal Gangadhar Tilak and Keshav Mahadeo Bal, the editor and
manager of Kesari, respectively, faced the first trial of treason in Maharash-
tra. Many more newspapers like Gurakhi, Pratod, Bhala, Rashtramat were
slapped with cases and their editors sentenced. They had criticized func-
tioning of the government and highlighted injustices people suffered; this
was their only major crime.
Satyagrahas were offered even for the demand of right to enter the temple
one worshipped. These agitations developed in people’s mind the compo-
nent of the fundamental rights. India shelters many faiths like Hinduism,
Islam, Christianity, Sikhism, Jainism and Buddhism. All these faiths gener-
ally preach lessons of fraternity. All human beings, and in some faiths all
beings, were to be seen as kith and kin, they instructed. They gave primacy
to burgeon values of pity, compassion and love in people’s mind. The Indian
freedom movement was led by men who identified with these Indian tradi-
tions; and attempts to widen the value of fraternity were made in course of
the movement itself. Hindus and Muslims were two major faiths in India.
The imperialists calculated that it will be easy for them to rule if the two
faiths were not allowed to unite politically. Pakistan was carved out by
partition at the dawn of independence and the theory of Muslims being
separate nation succeeded for the moment. But the party in forefront of
the freedom movement – the Congress –, and its leadership rejected theo-
cratic basis of nationhood and sought to take along followers of all faiths
and to forge understanding and affection among them. Hundreds of thou-
sands of Muslims have continued to live with equal rights in independent
India. Secular governance was to be agreeably one more direction for the
constitution.
Considering this background, it is imperative in study of the constitution
to explore how much Gandhi contributed in the process of the constitution-
making, how much influence he had on it and how many concepts in his
mind found place in the constitution. Exploring Gandhi’s contribution in
constitution-making does not mean denying others’ valuable contribu-
tions; constitutions of great nations are created with contributions by many
persons, and citizens are indebted to all of them. In research, one needs to
select a portion of the subject for investigation; and here we have just fol-
lowed this.

12
 THE SETTING

Notes
1 A. K. Priyolkar, Dr. Bhau Daji: vyakti, kaal and kartrutva, Mumbai Marathi
Sahitya Sangh, Mumbai, 1971, pp. 68–88. (An exhaustive Marathi biography
of Dr Bhau Daji, the social reformer of Mumbai.)
2 Narendra Chapalgaonkar, Teen nyayamurti aani tyancha kaal, Mauj Prakashan,
Mumbai, 2010, p. 48 (Sketches in Marathi, of three judicial luminaries who
led socio-legal reforms in nineteenth-century India. An English edition of the
study will be issued shortly.)
3 John Clive, Thomas Babington Macaulay, Secker and Warburg, London, 1973,
p. 232.
4 Ibid, p. 376.
5 John Stuart Mill, Considerations on Representative Government, Forum Books,
New York, 1958, Chaps. 4–18; and On Liberty, Bantom Dell, New York, 2008,
pp. 14–15.
6 A. K. Priyolkar (Ed.), Lokhitwadikrut Nibandhsangrah, letter 54, English rajyaapa-
sun fal, pp. 137–8. (A reformist treatise by Lokhitwadi Gopal Hari Deshmukh,
in the form of hundred letters.)
7 T. K. Tope, Bombay and Congress Presidents, Maharashtra State Board for Lit-
erature & Culture, Mumbai, 1985, p. 69.
8 As quoted in C. F. Strong, Modern Political Constitutions, Rupa & Co., Calcutta,
1963, p. 11.
9 As quoted in K. C. Wheare, Modern Constitutions, Oxford, London, 1958, p. 2.
10 Ibid., pp. 53–4.
11 Maurice Guyer and Appadorai, Speeches and Documents on the Indian Constitu-
tion, Oxford, London, 1957, pp. 581–3.
12 Strong, Modern Political Constitutions, pp. 11, 12.

13
 2
THE EVOLUTION OF
GANDHIJI’S LEADERSHIP

Mahatma Gandhi (Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi, 1869–1948) was the

esteemed and highest leader of the Congress Party, but he was not a mem-
ber of the Constituent Assembly. He had never contested provincial or
central legislative elections. However, Gandhiji was frequently consulted
on structure and functioning of the Constituent Assembly. Whoever were
office bearers of the Congress Party, they, as well as members of the interim
government formed in 1946, regarded Gandhiji as their mentor. Although
he had remained aloof from government functioning, persons who regarded
him rashtrapita, or father of the nation, and who had fought the freedom
struggle under his leadership were going to be rulers of the independent
India. Gandhiji had been repeatedly warning the British raj that authority
to determine future of India could not rest with the British government,
or with the British Parliament or even with Indians chosen by the British,
but only with a constituent assembly elected by Indians could have the
right to decide it. Hence he had been constantly demanding formation of
such constituent assembly. Notably, attempts to draft the constitution had
been going on in India since 1885 and numerous drafts were worked out.
This was the background before the members of the Constituent Assembly
met; and even though the constitution is generally said to have been writ-
ten in meetings of the Constituent Assembly held from December 1946
to end of November 1949, it is acknowledged that oblique process of the
constitution-making had been going on since long.
Gandhiji did not attend even the meetings of the Congress parliamen-
tary party, used to be held every day before sittings of the Constituent
Assembly when it was in session. Although he was not present physically,
obviously he remained there in minds of the participants who had fought
in the freedom struggle under his leadership. Moving the resolution on aims
of the constitution on 13th December 1946, Jawaharlal Nehru noted in his
speech Gandhiji’s debt on the nation. ‘He is the author of the Constituent
Assembly,’ Nehru declared with gratitude. He said,

14
 THE EVOLUTION OF GANDHIJI’S LEADERSHIP

There is another person who is absent here and who must be in the
minds of many of us today the great leader of our people, the father
of our Nation who has been the architect of this Assembly and all
that has gone before it and possibly of much that will follow. He is
not here because, in pursuit of his ideals, he is ceaselessly working
in a far corner of India. But I have no doubt that his spirit hovers
over this place and blesses our undertaking.1

Even before this speech of Nehru, at the very start of functioning of

the Constituent Assembly, the provisional chairman Satchidanand Sinha
had noted in his speech how Mahatma Gandhi had demanded setting of
the Constituent Assembly way back in 1922.2 In ensuing proceedings too,
many members had occasion to express their feelings similar to Nehru’s;
they respectfully acknowledged leadership of Gandhi. It must be a rare
occasion if in any of other constituent assemblies, a non-member national
leader had received such reverent mention.

The greatest leader of the nation

The struggle India fought under the leadership of Gandhi was not only
a political struggle for transfer of power. The movement cherished val-
ues of equality and fraternity as equally important with that of freedom.
The Indians who were divided between number of religions, castes, faiths
and languages were brought together by the freedom struggle and by
the leadership of Gandhi. Gandhi’s recipe of wisdom based on gender
equality, abolition of barbarous practice of untouchability, economy of
self-reliance and autonomy rooted in mutual cooperation had given a
wider perspective to the freedom movement. That is why he is called the
father of the nation. Most of the members of the Constituent Assembly
had opportunity to participate in the freedom struggle under the leader-
ship of Gandhi; now they faced the challenge of making of the Indian
Constitution.
The Indian civilization esteemed some values as foundation of the soci-
ety. A nation was sought to be built on the foundation of these received
values supplemented by values evolved in our freedom struggle as well as
those pledged in freedom struggles all over the world as basis of the new
society at the time of overthrowing tyrannies of foreign or native pow-
ers. Indian political leadership had been treated with one more value-
nourishment. Under the British rule, the Indian leaders had learnt the
political system in Britain, and the English education had introduced
them to liberal philosophies. Most of them viewed the liberal parlia-
mentary democracy as model political system. The constitution makers

15
 THE EVOLUTION OF GANDHIJI’S LEADERSHIP

faced a daunting challenge of fusing the Western ideals of parliamentary

democracy with the Indian society as it was.
The title of rashtrapita given to Gandhi was not just an honorific. People
tended to identify him as the symbol of integrity of the vast country con-
sisting of various religions, castes and languages. His leadership had made
many wonders. His leadership had proved beneficial to freedom struggle in
course of which he transformed the procedures and practices of struggles
earlier followed all over the world. He had raised the political fight to level
of morality. It was for the members of Constituent Assembly to ponder if
and how his leadership and his guidance can be useful in making of the
constitution.
The value base of Indian freedom struggle arose from the civilization of
the country as well as from lives of leaders like Gandhi who led from the
front. Gandhi had unmatched gift of giving a new meaning to the political
fight by lifting it to moral plane. In the history of world, nobody had given a
completely new character to a political struggle as he could do. His political
philosophy was born out of his life experiences and his experiments.
Mohandas was born in a family of courtiers who had served as divan or
naib divan to princely states like Porbandar, Rajkot or Junagad in Saurash-
tra. Although not super rich, the family was respected for their honesty and
as holders of high office. He was married in childhood. Some incidents in
his life had aroused in him loathing against excessive sex drive. ‘Instead of
wasting time in studying for B.A., send him to England. He will be qualified
to become divan once he returns after becoming Barrister,’ it was advised.
But there was an unexpected hindrance. Nobody from his modha wania
caste had till date travelled abroad. Crossing of ocean was forbidden. The
caste council ordered Gandhi not to go to foreign land. He defied it, and
was declared outcaste.
Gandhi travelled to England in 1888 and returned in 1891 after becom-
ing a barrister. In hardly three years stay ashore, he had learnt many lessons.
His mind was averse to accept the notion of superiority of Western lifestyle
and greatness of the Western culture. Still he had tried to imitate them in
some ways and himself found those attempts ridiculous. On return from
England, for some days, he tried to pursue practice at Saurashtra, and then
at Bombay. At the initial stage itself, he had occasion to encounter some
malpractices in the profession, like canvassing briefs through middlemen.
He could find no content in practice here. Providentially, a Memon family
engaged in trade in South Africa was scouting for a barrister to advise and
help them in legal matters; they had made queries with brother of Gandhi.
Mohandas saw a good opportunity in the offer, and decided to shift his prac-
tice to South Africa. The series of experiences he encountered in South
Africa reshaped his personality. Instead of becoming a lawyer arguing in

16
 THE EVOLUTION OF GANDHIJI’S LEADERSHIP

the law courts, he was molded as a leader fighting to secure human rights
in wider sphere of life.

Encounter with racism

European planters who had settled in South Africa after establishment of
British power there brought in bonded labours from India to toil their farms.
They were forced to work there on fixed wages without a place to complain.
Some of them had settled in South Africa after completion of their bonds,
trying their hand at farming. Some followers of different faiths in Guja-
rat too had migrated to South Africa for trading. The formerly indentured
labours who were freed persons after completion of their bonds and had
settled there as well as the traders migrated from Gujarat had to resort to
courts to settle their business as well as family disputes. Dada Abdullah, one
of the wealthy merchants, had especially invited Mohandas to South Africa
to provide him (and others like him) legal help. The young barrister was
prepared to face any difficulty in the legal profession; but he had to fight
different forces, and mainly out of the courts. He had to fight even to win
treatment worthy of a human being.
The circumstances in South Africa altered priorities of Gandhi’s life. The
Europeans’ society engrossed with complexes of racial supremacy was sup-
ported by crude imperialist power. The original black inhabitants and the
migrated Indians both suffered life full of humiliations. There was another
reason too for the opposition to settling Indians in Africa by the Europeans.
The Indian labours had acquired good farming skills during and even before
the indenture period. Some of them, freed at the end of their labour bonds,
had obtained small plots of lands and had started farming on their own. The
Europeans were weary of letting the number of the labours swell lest they
bring in tough competition to them in the agricultural business; moreover
most of them harboured racist feelings with approval of the government.
When Gandhiji visited the court accompanied by Dada Abdullah after
reaching Durban in South Africa in 1893, he wore the Kathiawadi pagree or
headgear, which the judge ordered him to remove. Gandhiji refused to fol-
low and moved out of the court. Series of such incidents followed. In those
days, there was no direct train from Durban to Johannesburg. One had to
take a train up to Charlestown and then travel by horse-drawn buggy. There
was a combined ticket both for the train and for the buggy travel. Gandhi’s
client had purchased a first-class ticket for him. The train had halted at
Maritzburg, after leaving Durban when a European traveller entered the
compartment and asked Gandhi to disembark. On Gandhi’s refusal to do
so, the European called railway officers and police. Gandhi’s luggage was
thrown out and he was forcibly removed from the train. He spent the night

17
 THE EVOLUTION OF GANDHIJI’S LEADERSHIP

of biting cold shivering on the railway station, asking himself if he should

go back go India, or stay to fight for his own rights and that of his fellow
black people? And his mind resolved to fight.3
Many more such incidents followed. He had to face insults in the buggy
too. He was refused a hotel room. He was not allowed to dine with white
men in public eateries. Not even the footpath was for him to walk. Gandhi
had firsthand experiences of the humiliating treatment given to blacks and
Indians by the racist Europeans in South Africa. The Africans and Indians
suffered mutely; Gandhi understood the need to organize them for struggle,
and to channelize discontent burning in their minds. While representing his
client in court, he started combating for the populace suffering racist raze.

Battle against unfair laws

The imperialist government had incorporated the arrogant racist concepts
into law. It was decided that permission was required to trade in South
Africa, and for farming too. The permission could not be easily obtained by
non-Europeans. One more rule demanded certain educational qualification
to enter the Natal region. This disqualified most of the Indian labours for
a legal stay in South Africa. A third rule was for registration. The Asian
people had to pay prohibitive fees to register themselves. They were not
allowed to stay without a registration. A number of unfair enactments
followed.
Gandhi organized people to fight against these laws. The people had
mutely suffered since long time and first task was to change their mind.
The fight was against a government with brute powers, which could not
be obviously fought with arms. People were unarmed; how will they fight
and oppose the government? We will have to defy the law to register our
protests, and will have to suffer imprisonment and other inconveniences
for breach of law, Gandhiji used to explain. If our demand is just, and we
are prepared to suffer for its insistence, then there is certain possibility of
success, he asserted. He crafted the word satyagraha in course of this struggle
in South Africa, and formed its philosophy as a weapon of the movement. If
one shuns violence completely, and gathers strength of his morality behind
his demands, he will certainly succeed, even if in small measure, against
all odds; and the very act of fighting against injustice instead of suffering it
brings moral and mental transformation within oneself; Gandhiji himself
experienced and made hundreds of his colleagues to experience this. The
barrister who had gone to South Africa seeking professional avenues had
been transformed at his return into a leader of nonviolent mass struggle.
Justice Ranade read a paper on ‘Indian foreign migration’ in the Industrial
Conference held at Pune on 3rd September 1893, exposing conditions of

18
 THE EVOLUTION OF GANDHIJI’S LEADERSHIP

Indian labour who had migrated to South Africa and other parts of world.4
It was later published in tri-monthly of the Sarvajanik Sabha that was edited
by Gopal Krishna Gokhale. Gandhiji travelled to Pune in 1896 to meet
Gokhale, when he discussed with him the injustices suffered by Indians in
South Africa. They had detailed discussions when they again met in Cal-
cutta Congress held in December 1901. Before returning to South Africa,
Gandhiji requested Gokhale to look into the problems of Indians in South
Africa. After Gokhale had raised the issue in India for many days, Gandhiji
requested him to personally visit South Africa, which he did in October
1912. Gokhale returned to India after two months stay, but the band of
affection formed with him on the occasion lasted to the end. Gokhale
respected Gandhiji in his mind as a leader fighting for self-esteem, and who
was a votary of nonviolence, and a true patriot. Gandhiji looked up to him
for guidance in future days. He saw his political guru in him. He was deeply
influenced by Gokhale’s commitment to truth as well as his liberal politi-
cal mind. Gandhiji decided to return to India after he was inflicted with
pleurisy, and when a partial settlement was achieved in the struggle. When
Gandhiji informed Gokhale of his intentions, he advised him that as he was
returning after a long period, he should travel throughout India at least for
a year and observe people and their problems ‘and then only think of what
could be done for them’.

First struggles in India

After uninterrupted stay of over 21 years in South Africa, Barrister Mohan-
das Karamchand Gandhi disembarked from the passenger boat Arabia in
Bombay harbours on 9th January 1915. Gokhale wanted him to become
member of Bharat Sevak Samaj after his return to India. But in view of
Gandhiji’s inclination to follow his separate programmes, other members
were doubtful if he will be of much use as a member of the Samaj. Finally
he dropped the idea and decided to establish an Africa-styled ashram in
India, preferably in Gujarat. The Satyagrah Ashram was founded on 29th
May 1915 on the banks of the River Sabarmati. Gokhale, who had helped
in the formation of the ashram, had left for heavenly abode few days before
it. Gandhi had become known all over India as the leader who had won
justice for blacks in South Africa through nonviolent struggle. He began
getting invitations from many places to guide struggles against injustices.
Pandit Madan Mohan Malaviya had moved a bill in the Central Assembly
in 1916 prohibiting emigration of indentured labours from India to South
Africa. The government had given a vague promise to impose the ban at an
appropriate time. Gandhiji began a journey to awaken public opinion for
immediate ban on indentured labour, and to gain understanding of peoples’

19
 THE EVOLUTION OF GANDHIJI’S LEADERSHIP

mind too. Most of the time, he travelled by what was then called the third
class of railway; for him that was the best way to know India. Gandhiji
addressed many public meetings and offered to undertake satyagraha to
ban sending of indentured labour to South Africa. Finally, the government
made announcement of the ban. Gandhiji had been conducting a move-
ment for it since 1894 which bore fruits now.

Fighting injustices
Gandhiji had gone to attend Congress at Lucknow where a gentleman
named Rajkumar Shukla came to see him. He narrated sufferings faced by
farmers in Bihar’s Champaran region and requested Gandhiji to visit the
area to see the situation there. Gandhiji came to know the extent of the
wrong when he travelled there. Gandhiji learnt injustices and deceptions
suffered by labourers toiling in indigo farms owned by European estate hold-
ers. Every farmer was forced to produce indigo in certain part (teen kathiya)
of his farm. The rule was intended to ensure supply of raw materials to
factories of indigo, and it was obviously unfair. It was a unilateral fight
between European factories and estate owners on one hand, and the sup-
pressed farmers on the other. Gandhiji taught the farmers to stand against
the injustice in a peaceful way. Gandhiji was served with notice of expul-
sion when he was trying to understand people’s grievances. He was charge
sheeted for defying the order, but later the charges were withdrawn. Finally
government appointed an inquiry committee under chairmanship of Sir
Frank Sly; Gandhiji was made one of its members. The unfair law on the
issue was repealed at the end.
In 1917, the mill owners of Ahmedabad withdrew the 75 per cent bonus
usually given to mill workers on account of recurrent plague. An agitation
against the decision was launched, and Gandhi assumed the role of mentor
of the movement. Gandhiji drew weapon of fasting when attempts were
made to break the strike. Finally the strike was settled. Meanwhile the
Kheda district faced severe famine, and this led to demands for suspension
of land revenue charge.
In initial three or four years of his stay in India, Gandhi did attempt to
mitigate many cases of injustice by trying to talk directly with opponents
to present people’s viewpoint, but at the same time he used to indicate his
inclination to offer satyagraha too. He had to actually resort to satyagraha
in Champaran. In Ahmedabad mill workers’ agitation, he resorted to strike
and non-cooperation. He had colleagues like Acharya Kripalani and Rajen-
dra Prasad in Champaran; others like Vallabhbhai Patel, Shankarlal Banker
joined in non-payment of revenue agitation in Bardoli, Kheda district. These
gentlemen became key colleagues of Gandhi in his future movement.

20
 THE EVOLUTION OF GANDHIJI’S LEADERSHIP

A committee led by Justice Sir Sydney Roulette in 1919 proposed a new

act giving expanded powers to the police, on pretext of suppressing so-called
revolutionary movement in India. A peaceful satyagraha was launched
against this oppressive act. Peoples observed hartal, a general strike protest-
ing against this act and oppressive measures. The agitation was generally
nonviolent and peaceful; but violent incidents happened at some places.
Gandhiji condemned the violence and even offered help to affected Brit-
ish citizens. At the height of the agitations, hundreds of unarmed citizens
were ruthlessly fired on at Jallianwala Bagh; the whole nation was stunned
by the brutality.

Weapon of non-cooperation
The whole nation protested against atrocities by police and military in Pun-
jab. Gandhiji decided to channelize the protest in an organized movement.
The Allied nations had abolished the Ottoman Empire in Turkey at the
end of the First World War. The emperor of Turkastan (Turkey) was seen
as highest religious head – the Khalifa – of Islamic world. With abolition of
the empire, Khilafat too was put to end by the Allied nations. Muslims all
over the world were agitated against this action; Gandhiji combined protest
against atrocities in Punjab with the denunciation of Khilafat abolition.
Gandhiji’s call to Indian people on 1st August 1920 to resort to non-
cooperation with the British regime opened a new chapter in Indian poli-
tics. People and even the rulers were not fully aware of the new weapons
like non-cooperation with the government, unarmed resistance to unfair
act of the government and civil disobedience or the satyagraha. Gandhiji
had used these weapons in his fight against racial supremacy and its dis-
criminating laws in South Africa. Now he wanted to employ these on a
wider battleground of India, in struggle of Indian people for their rights and
freedom. Before that, following his transparent style of working, he wrote a
letter to Viceroy Lord Chelmsford informing him of his decision to protest
against the atrocities in Punjab and against the imperial government’s stand
on the Khilafat that was revered by the Muslims; he took pain to explain
the nature of the agitation in the letter too.
Gandhiji wrote an article titled ‘The Doctrine of Sword’ in the Young
India issue of 11th August. He wrote:

In this age of rule of brute force, it is almost impossible for any-

one to believe that anyone else could possibly reject the law of the
final supremacy of brute force. . . . But I believe that non-violence
is infinitely superior to violence. Forgiveness is more manly than
punishment. . . . Non-violence in its dynamic condition means

21
 THE EVOLUTION OF GANDHIJI’S LEADERSHIP

conscious suffering. It does not mean meek submission to the will

of the evil-doer, but it means putting of one’s whole soul against the
will of the tyrant.

He further wrote:

My religion has no geographical limits. If I have a living faith in

it, it will transcend my love for India herself. My life is dedicated
to the service of India through the religion of non-violence which
I believe to be the root of Hinduism.

Gandhiji wanted nonviolence that was embraced as an expression of

soul force.
This time, a visible feature of nonviolence was non-cooperation. All India
Congress Committee was scheduled to meet in Calcutta in the first week of
September. Gandhiji himself drafted the resolution on non-cooperation to
be presented in the session. It mentioned the Punjab atrocities and Khilafat
as two issues behind the agitation. Vijayraghavachari and Motilal Nehru sug-
gested supplanting these two issues with demand for swaraj, to which Gandhiji
readily agreed. A programme of non-cooperation was presented to the people
in the resolution. It appealed to people to return all honours granted by the
British government, to boycott all government functions, not to participate
in working of legislatures and not to contest any elections, boycott of courts,
boycott of foreign goods and lastly, not to take part in recruitments for the
ongoing war in Mesopotamia. Everybody knew that armed struggle could
be one of the ways to fight against a foreign power. A practice of making
demands through representations and memorandums had come to prevail in
British rule. Gandhiji proposed for unarmed people a novel way of fighting by
non-cooperation to the government. It was new for the people and the gov-
ernment also had no experience of it. The non-cooperation resolution moved
by Mahatma Gandhi was adopted by Congress session with 1855 against 873
votes on 5th September 1920. By this time, Mahatma Gandhi had become
supreme leader of the Indian National Congress, and the moderate leader-
ship, hitherto supported by majority, was on decline now.

Anxieties of the moderates

Doubts in minds of common people about the non-cooperation movement
were slowly diffused and the agitation came to crest. The government was
surprised by this unexpected response to the movement, so were some mod-
erate leaders. People were still to get used to the idea of completely peace-
ful protests and non-cooperation. Although the people generally followed

22
 THE EVOLUTION OF GANDHIJI’S LEADERSHIP

ahimsa, at some places some enthusiasts had resorted to small incidents of

violence. The moderate leadership, which was cooperating with the gov-
ernment, became more anxious by such stray incidents. They claimed that
movements like non-cooperation will not bring swaraj but only chaos to
the country. Gandhiji had written in the letter to the Viceroy that

I have ventured to suggest the remedy of non-cooperation which

enables those who wish to disassociate themselves from the gov-
ernment and which, if it is unattended by violence and undertaken
in an ordered manner, must compel it (government) to retrace its
steps and undo the wrong committed.5

But the moderates wanted to continue with the way of memorandums.

Some moderate leaders in Bombay including Sir Narayanrao Chandavarkar,
Gokuldas Parekh, Jamanadas Dwarkadas, K. Natrajan, H. P. Modi, N. M. Joshi,
Kanaji Dwarkadas issued a statement opposing Gandhi’s non-cooperation
movement.6 Chandavarkar wrote in one of his articles that ‘non-cooperation
is deprecated by the religious tenets and traditions of our motherland of all
the religions that have saved and elevated the human race’. In one of his
articles Chandavarkar even charged that Gandhi did not believe in peaceful
means. However, he expressed great respect for Gandhiji.
Sir Sankaran Nair, a former judge of Madras High Court and a member of
Viceroy’s Council, had published a book titled Gandhi and Anarchy, main-
taining that Gandhi’s non-cooperation movement had unlocked anarchy in
India. He gave a long list of violent incidents during the agitation. The Khila-
fat issue had been appended to the non-cooperation movement. The Muslim
Mopallahs living in Malbar area of Kerala had almost turned rebel, and they
had declared the establishment of a state of Khilafat. In reality, it was largely
a goonda raj and the Hindus were at its receiving end. Nair has explained the
incidents in detail in his book. Gandhi’s movement had led to discontent and
it was an invitation to anarchy, Nair contented. He claimed that although
the Punjab incidents were made an excuse for the movement, violent ele-
ments among Gandhi’s followers found justification in the agitation to resort
to violence on their own. Gandhi’s path of nonviolence and self-sacrifice will
not lead to any beneficence but only bloodshed, he claimed.7
Nonviolent satyagraha is disobedience of law done generally by selected
persons after due notice. They are prepared to accept punishment for the
offence. But non-cooperation being a mass movement will not remain
disciplined and such agitation risks breakout of violence. This was anxi-
ety of moderate leaders like Chandavarkar and Nair. Gandhiji was resort-
ing to this new method of agitation and ignoring the risks in it as he did
not believe in constitutional ways; it was alleged at the opening stage of

23
 THE EVOLUTION OF GANDHIJI’S LEADERSHIP

non-cooperation movement. In later period, observers made the allegation

of same kind but different in manner. They alleged that Gandhi’s politics
nailed liberalism in India. It appears that politics of petitioning was end of
their liberalism. In their view, methods of satyagraha or fasting coerce oppo-
nents, and this they thought, was contrary to liberalism. These objections
need to be deliberated here.
Gandhi had taken all possible steps to eschew any violence in the non-
cooperation movement. He himself rushed to some of the places where
violence had erupted and made efforts to restore peace. In Bombay, boy-
cott of Prince of Wales’s reception led to confrontation and violent clashes
broke out between non-cooperators and cooperators. Gandhji appealed for
peace and resorted to fast for it. The Chaurichaura incident, where some
policemen were burnt to death by agitators, pained Gandhi to an extent of
suspending the movement. A general agitation like non-cooperation car-
ries the risk of rupture of discipline and break-out of violence. The leader of
movement has to account for this aspect in his plan of action. Gandhiji was
alert to it. He did not want his agitation being used as a pretext to violence;
moreover he did not approve of violence itself.

Liberal, not moderate

Review of Gandhiji’s political thoughts entails first to clear some concep-
tual confusion. The liberal thought is a value-based school of perception.
All men are equal, all have equal rights, everybody has right to express
his opinion and others need to understand his opinion. The government
should function with the sanction of people’s opinion. Every person has
the right to make progress without encroaching on others’ rights and the
other person should have equal opportunity to do so. This is the general
position of liberals. It is true that many of the moderates during the Brit-
ish regime in India were liberals; but it will be wrong to assume that only
those who believed to gain rights from the British through representations,
prayers and petitions were counted as liberals. This misconception has
gained deeper roots among students of political history. It cannot be said
that making of applications and supplication to the government and work-
ing through the British-granted legislatures of limited authority for rights of
natives could have been the only liberal way of politics. Why those persons,
who preferred some other way, different but devoid of violence, and who
were receptive to others opinions, amenable to dialogue with deference
to others, cannot be counted among liberals? The point is open to debate.

Gandhi, who, after Tilak made vocal the Indian demand for inde-
pendence and gave momentum to the process of converting the

24
 THE EVOLUTION OF GANDHIJI’S LEADERSHIP

Congress into a mass movement formally determined to win com-

plete freedom, may be said to have closed the chapter of Indian
liberalism,8

thus commented A. D. Pant, a scholar of social history.

It will not be reasonable to term Gandhi an opponent of liberalism just
because he did not approve supplicant attitude of moderates. Gandhiji’s
methods of non-cooperation or satyagraha were wholly nonviolent. Even if
it is assumed that he used these methods to bring moral pressure on oppo-
nents, one cannot overlook his insistence on harmony in all sections of
society, respect for faiths and thought of each other, appreciation of others
views and creation of a society free of exploitation and injustices. It was a
mass scale movement and it need not be assumed that everybody partici-
pating in the movement had comprehended moral position of Gandhiji.
Some such persons did indulge in violent acts; but Gandhiji never endorsed
violence. On the contrary, he unambiguously protested against such acts.
Both Justice Mahadeo Govind Ranade and Hon. Gopal Krishna Gokhale
were liberals, but they need not be counted among other moderates. Poli-
tics of Lokmanya Tilak was said to be radical, but he also aspired for the
rule of law. He only insisted that laws should be consistent to people’s views
and free of bias. Why should not Lokmanya be appreciated as satyagrahi
who risked breach of law in raising his voice against injustice, and accepted
imprisonment for it? Lokmanya Tilak’s critique of Gandhiji’s methods,
made after scrutinizing its distinctiveness, is highly significant:

If constraints delineated by the law are not based on creed or

justice. . .votaries of truth and justice plead to disobey those con-
straints in such circumstances. It needs mental vigor, genuine con-
viction and righteous character to materialize the thought in action.
This quality is not gained only by scholarship; this makes what is
called moral force.9

Tilak expressed this view in his foreword to a biography of Mahatma

Gandhi that was penned by Mrs Avantikabai Gokhale. The foreword was
written in 1918. He attests that Gandhiji’s path of nonviolent satyagraha
may be followed by persons with high moral strength. Gandhiji held that
methods of civil disobedience or non-cooperation cannot be used to spread
anarchy in society. His disobedience aimed to set up a fair system of redressal
of injustice. His movement aspired to replace rule of unjust laws imposed
by a foreign power without sanction of the people with the rule of just
laws enacted by an elected government. Tilak’s statement in court in 1908,
when he was sentenced to six years imprisonment for treason, explains his

25
 THE EVOLUTION OF GANDHIJI’S LEADERSHIP

views on means and methods to be applied in regulation of social system.

‘There are higher powers that rule the destiny of men and nations; and, it
may be will of Providence that the cause I represent may prosper more by
my suffering than my remaining free.’ These are his famous words, nowhere
decrying rule of law but only pointing out a divine power superior to the
alien regime! Gandhi never showed discourtesy to judiciary whenever he
was tried in courts. He used to express respect to the judiciary and the law,
and then explain compulsions to disobey the law while agreeing to undergo
prescribed punishments readily. The constitutional methods as practiced
then meant to submit prayers of demands to the imperial power while con-
tinuing to meekly suffer the unjust laws. There was only one point of major
difference between views of Gandhiji and Tilak; Gandhiji did not approve
the use of violence as a means in any circumstances, and Tilak could not
hide his sympathies for revolutionaries applying violent methods. But he
himself followed methods of only lawful agitation in his life.
Representations of few Indian intellectuals to the British government
did not fully reflect discontent among common people. Gandhiji’s non-
cooperation movement provided channel to express the discontent in a
more effective way. Gandhiji’s leadership was completely different from
other leadership. His philosophy was not born of any prevalent political
stream. Moreover, it was not made of immutable principles. It was evolving
through experiments of understanding and redressing grievances of peo-
ple. These were based on some of Gandhiji’s vision of life. He believed in
basic human goodness. Anybody can be convinced of one’s true position,
and make him discard his natural interests to awaken his conscience, he
thought. Others’ mind can be changed not by force but by self-sufferings,
he felt. He believed in equality and fraternity among men. His experiments
of self-regulation of various avarices from excessive libido to foods were not
some kind of rituals but were part of his moral position.
Gandhiji’s political guru Gopal Krishna Gokhale too was initially not
certain of gaining independence by Gandhiji’s nonviolent movement. In
an article written in 1909, reminding that no nation had achieved freedom
without a war, Gokhale observed that Britain was bound to spend its last
pence and even last man to preserve the colonial power. Ghokhale had
earlier travelled to South Africa to study problems of Indians there and
to support their nonviolent struggle under Gandhiji’s leadership. He had
also guided Gandhiji in it. Gokhale died within six year after it. Swaraj had
not reached in sight by then. But it appears that Gokhale had approved
methods of collective boycott and nonviolent satyagraha. After Gandhiji’s
non-cooperation movement was over, M. N. Roy, the supreme leader of
Communist Party at that time, remarked that there cannot be a nonviolent
revolution. It should be remembered that Roy was a communist but in his

26
 THE EVOLUTION OF GANDHIJI’S LEADERSHIP

political memoirs (1964) Roy agreed that ‘more than the moderates’ ways,
Gandhi’s non-violent collective boycott proved more effective medium of
tremendous expression of people’s discontent’ (p. 543).
Concept of rule of law has to be expanded to mean rule of the constitu-
tion. A law should be just and the constitutional scrutiny is one test to find
if it is just or not. A freed nation creates constitution through its represen-
tatives to define to frame a just system of governance. The constitution
demarcates rights of citizen and relations between the citizenry and the gov-
ernment. The independent India was committed to write laws according to
expectation of Indians, and before that, the constitution had to be written
to show how such laws would be written. Hence, without showing disre-
spect to British courts and legal system, Gandhi demanded a constitution
written by Indians for themselves. The Congress had accepted Gandhiji’s
leadership since the Special Session of 1920 at Calcutta. He would not have
pursued the demand for constitution if he would have been an anarchist.
He disapproved centralized and totalitarian power and wanted a decentral-
ized system which will maintain peoples’ decision-making capacity largely
unaffected. He was not an anarchist to hope for negation of the state or for
license of abandoned behaviour to people, without any restrain even by
institutions created by them.
In the next chapters, we will consider his views and that of Indian
National Congress, the political organization he led, on the subject of mak-
ing of Indian Constitution, their insistence on constitutional democracy
and features of the constitution, as were articulated since 1920, whence
Gandhiji was accepted as supreme political leader of India.

Notes
1 Constituent Assembly Debates, Official Report, reprint, Lok Sabha Secretariat,
New Delhi,1985, p. 60.
2 Ibid., pp. 5–6.
3 Pyarelal, Mahatma Gandhi: The Early Phase, Vol. 1, Navajivan, Ahmedabad,
1986, p. 298.
4 M. G. Ranade, Essays on Indian Economics, G. A. Natesan & Co., Madras, 1920,
pp. 114–49.
5 M. K. Gandhi, CWMG, Vol.18, Publication Division, Delhi, 1994, pp. 131–8.
6 As quoted in Tendulkar: Mahatma Vol. 2, Publications Division, Delhi, 1969,
p. 3.
7 Sir C. Sankaran Nayar, Gandhi and Anarchy, 1922; photographically reproduced
reprint, Mittal Publications, New Delhi, 1995.
8 A. D. Pant , ‘Rammohan Roy and Indian Liberalism’, in Raja Rammohan and the
New Learning. Ed. B.P. Barua. Orient Longmans, Hyderabad, 1988, p. 111.
9 B. G. Tilak, Introduction to Mahatma Gandhi by Avantikabai Gokhale, Mumbai
(Marathi) Granth Sangrahalaya, Mumbai, 1970, pp. 15–16.

27
 3
THE STRUGGLE FOR
INDEPENDENCE AND
CONSTITUTION

One of the natural outcomes of new education introduced by British regime

was awareness of rights. The rulers were alien and participation of Indians
in decision-making process of administration was almost nil. Existence of
autonomous political organizations of people was imperative before politi-
cal rights could be demanded. Indian National Congress, the first pan India
political organization of Indian people was formed in 1885. Representa-
tives from different parts of India assembled and deliberated political future
of the country in the annual Congress sessions; Congress began demand-
ing changes in the British administration to make it people oriented; the
demands were raised in speeches and motions that were passed in the
Congress sessions. Seeds of future Indian Constitution can be found in
these calls and resolutions. Although many times immediate aim of these
demands and resolutions was to suggest minor changes in the prevalent
British regime, these implicitly expressed feelings that governance of our
country should be run according to our aspirations.
British civil servants and political leaders in Britain too attended sessions of
the Congress. Charles Bradlaugh, a member of lower house of British Parlia-
ment (the House of Commons), attended the Congress session held in Bom-
bay in 1889. William Wedderburn who chaired this session told the delegates
in his opening remarks that Charles Bradlaugh had prepared a draft bill to be
tabled in the British Parliament and it outlined expected political reforms in
India. He assured that the bill takes care of demands of reforms raised earlier
on the platform of Congress. A demand for introduction of political institu-
tions in India was made in the session through a resolution moved by a British
delegate Eardley Norton. One more resolution asked the subjects committee
to frame rules defining qualifications and disqualification for members and
voters for such political institutions. Bradlaugh moved the ‘Indian Councils
Amendment Bill’ in British Parliament on 12th February 1890.1
The bill stipulated that at least half of the members of Central Assem-
bly and provincial assemblies would be peoples’ representatives; number of

28
 THE STRUGGLE FOR INDEPENDENCE AND CONSTITUTION

officers who sat as members in the house should not exceed one-fourth of
its strength, and remaining one-fourth members will be nominated by the
government. All persons completing 21years of age and fulfilling some min-
imum conditions were to be offered voting rights. One representative for
every five million of population was to be elected to the Central Assembly
and one for every one million to the provincial assembly. In every region,
people of minority faith were offered seats proportionate to their numbers.
The Indian legislatures, till then usually filled by government nominees,
were to be opened under the provisions of bill to some of the peoples’
elected representatives. Acts titled ‘Government of India Act’ were made
in the British Parliament from time to time, and accordingly, changes were
introduced in administration in India. Bradlaugh’s private bill of 1890 was
unlike the government bills on the subject as views expressed in the Con-
gress sessions were taken into consideration in it. This was the first bill
moved in the British Parliament which took sincere cognizance of public
opinion expressed in India. But it never came up for discussion in the house.
The first bill on the lines of the general character of a constitution was
apparently drafted in 1895. The Preamble of this bill was written on 8th
May 1895, records show.2 The author of the bill cannot be ascertained; it
was inferred by some that the draft was inspired by Lokmanya Bal Ganga-
dhar Tilak, but this could not be authenticated. The act proposed by this
bill was titled ‘Act of Indian Constitution’. The proposed act laid down
four wings of the state, namely, the sovereign power, legislative power, the
judicial power and the executive power. The judiciary and the executive
were regarded secondary to the legislature. It was acknowledged that the
sovereign power rested with the British monarch. The authority to appoint
viceroy was to remain with the sovereign power. The parliament was to
have two houses; powers were to be divided between the central and the
provincial governments. Right to expression and right to free education
were awarded to every citizen. This bill too was never introduced in the
British Parliament. Considering its features, this constitution apparently
asked to award dominion independence to India. It included the principle
of provincial autonomy.
One more document should be noted in history of efforts at drafting
of the Indian Constitution. It is not an attempted draft, but some sugges-
tions towards it. Lord Willingdon, then governor of Bombay, had privately
requested Gopal Krishna Gokhale to send a note giving concrete sugges-
tions about expected constitutional reforms in Indian system. Gokhale,
who was seriously ill at that point of time, ignoring own health, penciled
a note from his sickbed on 17th February 1915, just two days before he
breathed last. He had communicated his wish that the note may be shown
to his two friends, Pherozeshah Mehta and Aga Khan. This indicates that

29
 THE STRUGGLE FOR INDEPENDENCE AND CONSTITUTION

he was aware of having suggested something more significant than routine

reforms.
Following were some of suggestions made by Gokhale in the note:

1 Centre’s powers should be curtailed to give maximum autonomy to

provinces. The Government of India and the Minister for India in the
British cabinet will have minimum controls on the provinces.
2 Every province will have a cabinet made of six ministers including
three Indians and three British members.
3 Provincial legislature will have 75 to 100 members; but except the
expert members, no non-official member will be nominated by the
government.
4 Taxation in provinces will be subject to sanction by the legislature.3

Gokhale knew that changes will be slow and rulers will have to be con-
vinced of any of our suggestions. But he was clear in his mind on future
course of India’s political arrangement being responsible governance. The
provincial autonomy mentioned in his proposal found place after 20 years
in the Act of 1935.
It was in 1906 in Calcutta session of the National Congress that Dadabhai
Naoroji raised in clear terms the demand of self-rule in India. The Muslim
League was launched in the same year, but it did not demand swarajya or
self-rule for Indians. Mohammed Ali Jinnah entered the League in 1913,
and impelled it to amend its constitution to accept self-rule as one of its aim.
The League too joined all Indians in demanding Indian independence. This
was an important change in hitherto policy of the League. Mohammed Ali
Jinnah, who had so far remained aloof from the communalist League, took
initiative to organize, in 1915, sessions of both Congress and the League in
Bombay, where exercises were opened to form, in unison, a scheme of con-
stitutional arrangements for free India. The scheme was adopted, in 1916,
in separate sessions of both organizations. The scheme envisaged separate
constituencies for Muslims, with specified proportion of representation. It
was to be 50 per cent in Punjab, 30 per cent in the United Provinces, 40 per
cent in Bengal, 25 per cent in Bihar, 15 per cent each in Central Provinces
and Madras and one-third in Bombay. The then Bombay Province included
Sindh. The scheme had made broad distribution of powers between the cen-
tre and the provinces. It presumed dominion status for India. Indians were to
get all rights enjoyed by the British citizens. Later on, the Congress and the
League slowly drifted away and the joint scheme approved by both organiza-
tions in their Lucknow sessions was buried in annals of history.
Around those days, the Home Rule movement was launched in
the country under the initiative of Annie Besant, one of the leaders of

30
 THE STRUGGLE FOR INDEPENDENCE AND CONSTITUTION

Theosophy movement. Many of the congressmen had joined this move-

ment. Lokmanya Tilak was in the forefront of the movement. Home rule
meant self-rule. All India Congress session held in Delhi in 1918 asked the
British Parliament to grant India right of self-rule. The session demanded,
among other things, that all laws and rules which bar or obstruct political
debates should be repelled and Indians be allowed to freely express their
opinions and aspirations; administrative officers should not prevent it; and
the British Parliament should expeditiously pass an act establishing fully
responsible government in India.

Broader meaning of swaraj

After his return from South Africa, the movements in Champaran, Ahmed-
abad, and Kheda (Bardoli) had helped to build Gandhiji’s image as a leader
who could help and guide people in struggles against injustice. Surely his suc-
cess in South Africa, and the weapon of nonviolent satyagraha he had used
to achieve it, had become well known. After the demise of Lokmanya Tilak
and after acceptance of non-cooperation by the Congress, Gandhiji came
to be recognized as the greatest political leader of the country. Till the day,
churning among the intellectual leadership of India used to throw up consti-
tutional demands which were projected from the podiums like the Congress
sessions. Mahatma Gandhi’s leadership backed these demands with mass
power of common people. His constitutional demand drew strength from
respect he carried in minds of Indians and from the response to his move-
ments. The meaning of swaraj – a state run on the basis of the constitution
designed by Indians – started to pervade in minds of sensible people.
Some major experiments at constitution-making and representations
to the government made before the advent of Gandhiji’s leadership were
mentioned earlier. Gandhiji presented his philosophy in simplest terms.
Instead of using the intricate terminology of law, he preferred phrases that
a commoner can grasp instantly. Indians were aware of the word swaraj and
the concept behind it as Lokmanya Tilak and other leaders had successfully
seeded the word in the minds of people. Gandhiji, while explaining his idea
of how swaraj would be or should be achieved, had initiated the concept of
constitutional state for India. In an article in Young India published on 5th
of January 1922, he elaborated his belief on how the swaraj will be achieved,
declaring that ‘swaraj will not arrive as a gift by the British parliament; the
British parliament was to only endorse by its Act the solemnly declared
will of the Indian people’. The will declared by Indians certainly meant the
constitution made by Indians for themselves; Gandhiji indicated that only
role the British Parliament could play was to give up its claim on India and
to agree to India’s independence. Leaders of the Swaraj Party sitting in the

31
 THE STRUGGLE FOR INDEPENDENCE AND CONSTITUTION

Central Assembly followed steps consistent with ideas being propagated by

Gandhiji in his periodicals like Young India.
The Swaraj Party, made of none but congressmen, followed broad policy
of not opposing Gandhiji’s non-cooperation, but not boycotting the elec-
tions; they entered the legislatures to obstruct the government. The party
had 42 members elected to central legislature. They had good presence in
many provincial assemblies too. The party viewed itself as a part of the
Congress. Divan Bahadur T. Rangachariyar and Pandit Motilal Nehru of
the Swaraj Party moved in February 1924 two separate but broadly similar
resolutions that advised to take steps to establish in India a government
wholly responsible to people and suggested to call a round table conference
to decide features of the Indian Constitution. Motilal Nehru’s resolution,
which made the demand more explicitly, was carried by 78 against 48 votes.
This was a highly significant development. The legislature established by
the British had officially demanded a responsible government; now they
could not claim that it was not authoritative view of Indian people.
Differences appeared in the committee under the chairmanship of Sir Alex-
ander Muddiman, the secretary of home in government of India, appointed
by the government in 1924 to report on implementation of reforms act. Four
members of the committee, namely, Tej Bahadur Sapru, Shivaswami Iyer,
Mohammed Ali Jinnah, and Raghunath Purushottam Paranjapye, annexed
a note of dissent to report of the committee, submitting some proposals, one
of which called to initiate steps towards a responsible system. When the
Muddiman report came up for discussions in the Central Assembly, Moti-
lal Nehru moved an amendment to the official resolution, proposing that
administration in India be given widest possible autonomy and it should be
made responsible to the Indian legislature. The amendment included the key
demand of calling a round table conference to frame the Indian Constitution.
‘The future Indian set up we envisage will remain within the Empire but with
complete autonomous dominion status,’ he clarified in his speech.
There were many moderate and liberal leaders in India who followed
constitutional ways to raise problems of Indians and present public opin-
ion on them. They had an actively working organization named ‘National
Liberal Federation’. They passed a resolution in one of their conferences in
1925, rejecting the majority report of the Muddiman committee and sup-
porting the dissent note. The resolution demanded, among other things,
that the provincial governments and the central government should be
made responsible to the provincial assemblies and the Central Assem-
bly, respectively, Indians should be admitted in the Civil Service and the
defence forces without any discrimination, number of seats in the legisla-
ture should be increased, and women should be given equal status, in the
legislatures as well as in the government employment.

32
 THE STRUGGLE FOR INDEPENDENCE AND CONSTITUTION

The first bill in British Parliament

The first bill aiming to give India an independent constitution and fully
autonomous dominion status within the empire was actually tabled in Brit-
ish Parliament in 1925. Mrs Annie Besant took initiative to call an infor-
mal meeting of members of both houses of the central legislature at Simla,
where draft of this bill was discussed. The draft was presented for discussions
in an all-party conference assembled at Delhi in 1925 under the chairman-
ship of Mahatma Gandhi. The all-party conference formed a committee to
deliberate over the draft in depth. It was presented, along with recommen-
dations of the committee, in the conference held at Kanpur in April 1925.
A drafting committee of C. P. Ramswami Iyer, B. Shiva Rao, Yadunandan
Prashad and Mrs Annie Besant published it as the final document. George
Lansbury moved the draft in British Parliament on 17th December 1925.4
After a formal presentation, orders to print the bill for circulation to the
members were issued; but meanwhile, the Labour Party was defeated in the
parliamentary elections and the bill lapsed.
There are remarkable similarities between some of the provisions in that
bill and our present-day constitution. Most of the provisions in the existing
Indian Constitution relating to fundamental rights, like freedom of expres-
sion, freedom of faith and belief, right to assemble peacefully and with-
out arms, equality before law, restrain against gender discrimination, were
there in that bill. It also sought to distribute powers between the provinces
and the centre. There were no differences between Gandhiji, Congress
and intellectual moderate leaders on such basic issues such as the need to
have an independent constitution for India; or constitutional protection to
fundamental rights of the citizens, a federal system, protection of rights of
minorities and need to make special efforts for advancement of backward
classes. Such a constitution will have to be framed only by elected repre-
sentatives of the Indian people; on this point too, there was unanimity
among them.
As the demand for a government responsible to elected legislature or
people in India began to be raised from the podiums of political organi-
zations and even in the legislatures, the British government had to take
cognizance of it. A commission under chairmanship of Sir John Simon was
appointed in 1927 to report on to what extent it was practical to have a
responsible political administration in India, and if India was competent
enough to implement such a system in prevailing circumstances. The com-
mission was told to explore public opinion on the issue of political reforms.
Not a single Indian member was included in the commission. Naturally,
Indian National Congress boycotted visit and hearings of the Simon Com-
mission. Indian leadership was also not agreeable to the pace of political

33
 THE STRUGGLE FOR INDEPENDENCE AND CONSTITUTION

reforms and dillydallying tactics of the government. The national confer-

ence of Congress meeting in May 1927 at Bombay, by a resolution, asked
its working committee to form a committee to draft the constitution. The
demand was reiterated in Madras session held same year in December. The
resolution specifically directed to include clear proclamation of citizen’s
rights (fundamental rights in today’s parlance) in the proposed constitution.
Although the Congress had undisputable support of the nation, it felt
that views of representatives of all political parties and opinions should
be taken into consideration as, in its view, national constitution was not
a party affair and it will become a manual for ages and for generations to
come. They had already set the practice of taking all parties in confidence
while making drafts and deliberating them in all-party conferences. Follow-
ing the directive of the Madras session, the Congress Working Committee
called a meeting of representatives of all parties in February 1928 at Delhi.
The meeting was attended by representatives of All India Muslim League,
All India Hindu Mahasabha, All India Christian Conference, the States
Peoples Conference or Samsthani Praja Parishad, All India Liberal Federa-
tion and Congress. A small drafting committee was formed in the meeting
held in May 1928 at Bombay; it included Ali Imam, Tej Bahadur Sapru,
Madhav Shrihari Aney, Sardar Mangal Singh, Shoaib Quereshi, Subhas
Chandra Bose and G. R. Pradhan. Motilal Nehru headed the committee.
The committee’s report, which included a rough draft of the constitution,
was presented to all-party conference held on 10th August 1928.5 The
report came to be known as ‘Nehru Report’ in India’s constitutional history.
The report was accepted, in principle, by the conference held at Lucknow
in late August, and the committee was re-appointed and instructed to sub-
mit a more detailed report, with permission to co-opt some more members
if required. The all-party conference held in the final week of December
at Calcutta adopted the final report which was nothing but draft of the
constitution. This constitution proposed for India the status of independent
constitutional state within the British Commonwealth. The princely states
were to stay, but will be under control of the central government of India.
The Supreme Court was to solve any dispute between the provinces and
the Union on their relations with each other or about jurisdiction of their
powers. The report offered extensive list of rights of citizens. This draft can
be called, in broad way, precursor of the present constitution.
Congress was trying to carry along other political parties and nonpo-
litical leaders in creating draft of the constitution as it wanted the draft
to be genuine reflection of Indian opinion; it expected the British govern-
ment to table the bill in parliament with regard to the unanimous view.
Meanwhile, the British government was also taking some steps regarding
political reforms in India. Evidently, their views differed immensely. Even

34
 THE STRUGGLE FOR INDEPENDENCE AND CONSTITUTION

dominion status was not accepted by the Simon Report. However, Lord
Irwin, releasing the report on 31st October 1929, had proclaimed on behalf
of the government that ‘ultimate aim of self-ruling dominion was accepted
since 1917’ (this was reference to the announcement made on 20th August
1917 in the Commons, by the Secretary of State for India, Montague),
and ‘advance continues in that direction’, he stated. However, bureaucratic
speed of this advancement was not appreciated at all by Indian people.
Both parties did not see eye to eye even on what they meant by ‘dominion
status’. British statesmen were not ready to accept that dominion entails
full autonomy. But according to Gandhiji, self-rule for the colonies meant
full autonomy and freedom to opt out of the British Empire any time at
will. During the discussions Gandhiji and Motilal Nehru had with Irwin in
December 1929, Gandhiji told Irwin in clear words this meaning he had in
his mind. However, Irwin clarified that he was not in a position to prom-
ise colonial self-rule in Gandhiji’s perception at this point. In his speech
to Central Assembly on 25th January 1930, Viceroy Irwin declared that
‘dominion status was the ultimate aim, and government did not intend to
implement it immediately’.
After this clear explanation by the government, Gandhiji and Congress
did not have much interest in the round table conference called to discuss
reforms proposed in Simon Report. Gandhiji raised some demands with the
government, including issue of release of political prisoners, withdrawal of
tax on salt and cuts in salaries of top civil servants and in defence expendi-
ture. He further declared that Congress will participate in the round table
conference once these demands were met. The conference would not have
much meaning if the Congress, which commanded largest support of Indi-
ans, was to stay away from it. British government was trying hard to rope
in Congress; Gandhiji eyed to take advantage of this to make some gains.

Unambiguous demand for full freedom

The years 1930 and 1931 gave decisive direction to political movement
in India. Within few days following Viceroy Irwin’s proclamation of 31st
October 1929, national session of Congress met at Lahore, presided by
Jawaharlal Nehru. The Congress Working Committee, in its meeting on
2nd January 1930, had passed a resolution to observe 26th January as ‘com-
plete independence demand day’ all over India. Earlier, in his concluding
remarks at Lahore session, Jawaharlal Nehru declared from the presidential
chair, ‘complete independence is our motto’. Gandhiji wrote in an article
published on 26th January, ‘Today is the day to proclaim that we will not be
satisfied with dominion status; we want purna swaraj, or complete indepen-
dence.’ He had explained meaning of purna swaraj. Since then, Congress

35
 THE STRUGGLE FOR INDEPENDENCE AND CONSTITUTION

had abandoned limited aim of dominion status and embraced the goal of a
complete independent nation with its own, distinct constitution.
The Congress Working Committee meeting in February 1930 resolved
to launch civil disobedience movement to attain the objective of purna
swaraj. The Working Committee requested Gandhiji to lead the movement.
Gandhiji embarked on a march from Sabarmati to Dandi on 12th March
1930 along with select workers. The salt satyagraha commenced on 6th April
and Gandhiji was arrested on 5th May. The Simon Report was released on
27th May 1930. By then, not much interest persisted about the report in
Indian people. Both Congress and Muslim League disapproved of the Simon
Report for different reasons. The first round table conference to consider rec-
ommendations in the Simon Report and political reforms in India was held
on 12th November 1930 at London. As Congress had rejected the Simon
Report, it was excluded from Indian representatives invited by the viceroy to
the conference. The representation included Jinnah and moderate leaders.
The first round table conference concluded on 19th January 1931.
As the proceeding of the first round table conference without Congress
participation came to conclusion, some moderate leaders started efforts to
bring about compromise between Gandhiji and government to ensure par-
ticipation of the Congress in the round table. Talks were opened between
Viceroy Lord Irwin and Gandhiji on 17th February 1931. Hundreds of
people were jailed in course of the movement; lands of many had been
confiscated in agitations like no-tax campaigns. In addition to demands of
release of political prisoners and return of their properties, Gandhiji wanted
reduction in salt tax. He wished that some concrete steps towards indepen-
dent constitutional state will be taken at the next round table conference.
During the parleys with Viceroy, Gandhiji stayed at Dr Ansari’s home.
Every time, he walked the distance of five kilometres to the Viceroy’s resi-
dence from Dr Ansari’s home and back. Nobody accompanied him most of
the times. On 2nd of March, Gandhiji returned past midnight – at 1.00 a.m.,
and immediately called members of Working Committee to inform them of
details of talks. Congress was to participate in the round table conference
only if the terms Gandhiji had set for the government were fulfilled. Some
of the conditions were accepted and Congress agreed to suspend agitation
and to participate in the round table conference. The pact ensured release
of political prisoners. Lands of farmers in Kheda district had been confis-
cated and auctioned to others; Viceroy agreed to handover a letter to the
Governor of Bombay for returning those lands to original holders. Some
reduction in salt tax was accepted. It was accepted that the round table
conference, scheduled shortly, will aim to plan a scheme of constitutional
government in India. The non-cooperation movement was to be suspended
only, and not totally withdrawn.

36
 THE STRUGGLE FOR INDEPENDENCE AND CONSTITUTION

Many objections were raised about the Gandhi-Irwin pact. Some Con-
gress leaders felt that it was Gandhiji’s surrender. Vallabhbhai Patel wanted
explicit assurance to return lands confiscated in no-tax agitation. To
Jawaharlal Nehru, singular agenda of the round table conference should
have been purna swaraj. He saw no need to go to the round table unless the
demand for complete independence was accepted. As the absence of refer-
ence to purna swaraj in the resolution drew criticism, Gandhiji replied that
complete independence was India’s born right and it was obvious that ‘noth-
ing less than that will satisfy us’. In a written statement released to Indian
and American journalists in Delhi on 5th March 1931, Gandhiji asserted
that purna swaraj was the aim of Congress, and for them, success of round
table conference depended on how much advance was made towards this
goal. On the very next day, addressing a press meet, he talked of ‘indepen-
dent nation within the commonwealth’ instead of term ‘autonomy within
the empire’. Replying to questions of journalists, he stated that, ‘presently,
empire will not exist and “I see only commonwealth now” ’.6 The concept
of ‘an independent nation within the British Commonwealth’ was vastly
different from ‘an autonomous nation within British Empire’.

Demand for fundamental rights

Session of Congress was held at Karachi in March 1931; this was presided
over by Vallabhbhai Patel. This session took an important step towards
framing of the constitution for India. A resolution on fundamental rights
and economic restructuring was passed in the session. The resolution gave
idea of constitution that will be acceptable to Congress. It maintained that
any constitution without including points stated in the resolution will not
be accepted by the Congress.7
Vital points in the resolution had their origin in long discussions Jawa-
harlal Nehru and Mahatma Gandhi had during the period between the
final week of February 1931 and first week of March 1931. It was essential
to hold discussions with colleagues like Jawaharlal Nehru as they were to
implement the constitution. Gandhiji was too busy in those days. Visitors
continued for whole day. Only time available and suitable was before day-
break. Jawaharlal Nehru used to arrive at dawn for discussions. Issues mostly
discussed were the constituent assembly, features of the constitution, and
utility of Congress as a party after independence. The fundamental rights,
apart from being valuable to all citizens, will give minorities guarantee of
protection to their language, religion and culture. Hence debate on funda-
mental rights was politically significant also. Post-independence restructur-
ing of Indian economy was to be another important issue. Huge population
lived in destitution. For Gandhiji, consideration of economic advancement

37
 THE STRUGGLE FOR INDEPENDENCE AND CONSTITUTION

of rural people too was significant. It was settled that following sunrise dis-
cussions with Gandhiji, Nehru was to draft the resolution and show it to
Gandhiji, whose corrections were to be carried out before submitting it to
the Congress Working Committee, and with its concurrence, finally pre-
sented to the subjects committee of the Karachi Congress session.
Most of the important points in two chapters on fundamental rights and
directive principles of state policy in prevalent constitution can be traced
to this resolution. It lists those points which the Congress expected to be
part of any acceptable constitution. The resolution mentioned fundamen-
tal rights including freedom of organization, freedom of expression and of
press, freedom of faith and trust, freedom to minorities to preserve their
culture, language and script, equality unqualified by religion and gender,
unrestricted admission to all to public places like roads and schools and
no interference of state in individual liberties and right to property, except
by procedure established by law. Other things mentioned in the resolution
were the eradication of bonded labour, protection to women, right to form a
labour union, reductions in armed levies, ceiling on salaries of government
employees with some exceptions, ban on child labour and adult franchise.
Gandhiji himself moved the resolution in the session and elaborated on it.
The government had invited to the round table conference a number of
representatives who were opposed to Congress policies. It was policy of the
British to delay decisions on main demands on excuse of differences among
Indian representatives. In this situation Gandhiji did not hold hope of any
immediate decision in the round table conference. ‘Don’t harbor hopes of
gaining something certainly in the round table conference and don’t blame
us if we return empty handed,’ he warned the delegates in his speech at the
Karachi Congress.

Sole Congress representative

Congress, which had rejected the Simon Report, had not participated in the
first round table conference. Following the Gandhi-Irwin pact, it decided
to take part in second round table conference. It was decided that Gandhiji
will be sole representative, and the Working Committee may select other
delegates if required. A meeting of representatives of princes and other
Indians who were invited by the viceroy to travel to London for the round
table conference was held in Delhi on 21st March. Gandhiji and Madan
Mohan Malaviya attended the meeting. In the discussions, Gandhiji sug-
gested to hold meetings of round table conference, like those in London, in
India also, in which representatives of the British government too should
join. Such meetings in India will help in removing mutual distrust, he sub-
mitted. This was not only a procedural point; he wanted to imply that,

38
 THE STRUGGLE FOR INDEPENDENCE AND CONSTITUTION

instead of travelling to London to fetch gift of swaraj, decisions were being

made through negotiations between the two countries on equal footing.
The second round table conference had already opened on 7th September
when he reached London on 12th.
Many reasons can be guessed as to why Congress Working Committee
chose Gandhiji to be their sole representative to the round table confer-
ence. One of the reasons was, except Gandhiji, most of the Congress lead-
ers were not so sympathetic to Gandhi-Irwin pact. The pact may lead to
misapprehension of Congress having abandoned demand of complete inde-
pendence, they feared. No other leaders like Jawaharlal Nehru or Sardar
Patel fancied going to the conference. Congress Working Committee, in
its resolution authorizing Gandhiji to represent it, affirmed that ‘poorna
swaraj was the goal of Congress, and there was no change in it’. Towards
this goal, it instructed to see that portfolios of defence, foreign relations
and finance were entrusted to the (Indian) nation. This would not allow
Gandhiji to accept anything lesser. Gandhiji was fully aware of it. In course
of his address in the Congress session, after quoting the policy resolution
it had adopted, Gandhiji stated that ‘this was limitation to his delegation’.
As only the policy agreed in the resolution was to be presented there in the
conference, they might have thought it better to be done by a sole delegate.
‘We have reposed faith on this leader, let us persist in it,’ said Khan Abdul
Ghaffar Khan on proposal to send Gandhiji as delegate. Furthermore, the
solo representation would better underline the position that Congress was
an all-inclusive organization consisting of different castes and religions and
it spoke in one voice.
The second round table conference was the first attempt by the Brit-
ish government to work out shape of India’s prospective constitution with
deliberations with Indians. The rulers visualized a popular government in
India, but with the sovereign powers in hands of the imperial government.
Both the British statesmen and Indian leaders talked of ‘dominion free-
dom’, with diverse meaning in their minds. The British envisaged swaraj
which will run unto the day they wished, and will remain under their lash.
Congress leaders’ idea of swaraj was to have authority to secede any time
from British Commonwealth, with no power to imperial agents for any
interference.
Evidently, round table conference was not a direct dialogue between the
Congress or some other organization representing Indians and the British
government. As the British saw them, they had called representatives of
different interests in India. These included not only the princes but many
moderate leaders who commanded little support of public opinion. Gandhi-
ji’s very first speech in the conference revealed his maturity and political
vision. He did not forget to indicate, obliquely, that although he was sole

39
 THE STRUGGLE FOR INDEPENDENCE AND CONSTITUTION

delegate of Congress, it was an all-inclusive organization, and implicitly,

he represented the whole of India. Naming leaders of various castes and
communities, including Muslims, he explained how Congress was a com-
prehensive organization. Congress had even tried to protect interests of the
princes, he reminded. He declared that free India and free Britain, cooper-
ating in equal relationship, will be able to work for welfare of the world, to
fight together if required and to share joys and agonies of each other.
In his second address to the conference, Gandhiji affirmed in no uncer-
tain terms that ‘all delegates invited to the conference were delegates of
government’s preference, and not representatives of Indians’. He requested
representatives of the princely states to realize that people of the states
and those in British India were one and the same, and their interests were
intertwined with each other. On question of voting rights, he said that
wealth or education could not be basis of right to vote, and all adult Indi-
ans should be entitled to the right. Gandhiji did not agree in his heart that
Muslims, Sikhs and backward classes had separate interests, but along with
Dr Ambedkar, Congress too sought to represent interests of the scheduled
castes, he reminded. Replying to a question raised by Sir Akbar Hyderi
during the discussions, he suggested that the central legislature should be
elected directly by the voters and not by members of provincial assemblies.
This will entitle every voter to two votes, one for the central legislature and
another for the provincial house.
Before the committee set to consider issues relating to minorities,
Gandhiji read out the Congress Working Committee’s resolution itself
which explained the protections Congress offered to the minorities. ‘The
chapter on Fundamental Rights in the constitution will guarantee protec-
tion to culture, language and script of minorities, to their personal law, and
to their right to practice their religion,’ he explained. In cabinet formation,
a convention of considering minority representation will be set, he assured.
On the Supreme Court, he said that it should have widest possible powers
and it should function as a protector of fundamental rights of citizens for
whole India. ‘Congress is determined to wipe out the blot of untouchabil-
ity,’ he reiterated. He will never agree that Congress could not represent
the Dalits and that their interests were separate, he emphasized. Congress
will accept any solution preferred by minorities, but they should not be
given separate constituencies, particularly not the scheduled castes, ‘as it
will be beginning of splitting up of Hindu community and severing from
each other’, he felt.
In the discussions on Indian economy, Gandhiji mentioned the ‘home
charges’ levied for governing India, and the drain of wealth on India. An
independent Indian government will pursue economic policies aimed at
India’s interests, he emphasized. ‘The Indian farmer remains idle without

40
 THE STRUGGLE FOR INDEPENDENCE AND CONSTITUTION

work for six months of the year. Think of how much wealth will be cre-
ated if government provides him with additional employment during this
period,’ he reminded and asserted that India would not need to depend
on foreign capital. On nature of provincial autonomy, he said that both
provincial autonomy and centre’s responsibility should walk hand in hand.
Work of the conference continued until 1st of December 1931. For
convenience of working, the conference had established two committees,
one to draft the constitution of federation, and another to consider issue
of minorities. Mahatma Gandhi was member of both committees. Along
with Hindu majority, other minority communities like Muslims, Christians,
Dalits and Sikhs lived in India. How these minorities be given representa-
tions in the legislative council was one of the important issues before the
round table conference. Gandhiji, in his address, refuted the government’s
allegation that lack of unanimity among Indian leaders on the communal
question was responsible for the delay in constitutional reforms. Passing
over all other issues related to independence, the government was deliber-
ately stressing minority issue, he warned. It was old policy of British gov-
ernment to divide Indians on the basis of religion and caste; they were
merely following the same. Gandhiji reiterated, insistently, that the Con-
gress will accept any solution agreeable to Indian minorities which include
thousands of Muslims, Harijans and others. Congress will certainly consider
their rights; but no separate electorates should be allowed for Harijans, he
demanded. At the conclusion of the conference, Prime Minister Ramsay
MacDonald stated that until Confederation could not be formed due to
differences among Hindi delegates on protective rights of minorities, pro-
vincial constitution could be prepared. He requested delegates to authorize
him to arbitrate on representations of minorities in the provincial assem-
blies. Gandhiji agreed to MacDonald arbitrating on representation of Mus-
lims and Sikhs but he opposed to give him such authorization in the case of
Dalits as both of them held vastly different views on the subject.
In his last address to the conference, Gandhiji assured that he and his
colleagues in Congress were prepared for maximum sacrifice in the interest
of a just and fair solution. ‘You have before you life of myself and of my col-
leagues in Congress working committee; we are prepared to sacrifice, but we
cannot abandon interests of mute millions of Indian people,’ said Gandhiji.
And he declared, ‘We do not possess arms to rebuff those unfair things, but
thirty five crore peoples’ willpower have right to say “no”, have right to
refute injustice, and our nation has now learned to refuse.’8
Gandhiji returned from the round table conference on 28th of December
1931, by which day discarding understanding shown in Gandhi-Irwin pact,
the nation was again reeling under oppression. Gandhiji was arrested on
4th January and was taken to Yerawada Jail. Jawaharlal, who was on way

41
 THE STRUGGLE FOR INDEPENDENCE AND CONSTITUTION

to meet Gandhiji, was arrested midway. A number of Congress leaders met

Gandhiji in the jail and held discussions. Ramsay MacDonald announced
his award on 17th August 1932, specifying representations of various
minorities in Assemblies. They were to be offered reserved constituencies.
The decision is known as ‘communal award’ in India’s political history. On
20th September, Gandhiji launched fast against the decision of giving sepa-
rate constituencies to Dalits. He had declared earlier that he would oppose
if separate constituencies were given to Dalits.
Veil of anxiety spread over country after Gandhiji began fast. Under ini-
tiative by Madan Mohan Malaviya, a pact was effected between Gandhiji
and Dr Babasaheb Ambedkar, offering to reserve total of 148 seats in vari-
ous provincial assemblies. Similarly, in the Central Assembly too, seats
were to be reserved; but the constituencies were to remain joint on both
levels. The pact gave more number of seats to Dalits than those the com-
munal award would have given; but the demand of separate constituencies
was not accepted. The compromise, known as ‘Pune Pact’, was hammered
out on 26th September, ending Gandhiji’s fast.
The third round table conference was held by the end of 1932, but
neither Gandhiji nor any other delegate of Congress attended it. Natu-
rally, nothing notable was achieved there. A joint committee of select
members of both houses of British Parliament was formed in April 1933
and Lord Linlithgow was appointed to chair it. The committee was told
to report on proposed political reforms in India after mulling over the dis-
cussions in round table conference and the report of Simon Commission.
The committee’s report did not suggest any major political reforms which
could be immediately implemented. On the contrary, it listed a number
of difficulties. Its two important recommendations included distribution
of powers between provincial and central governments, and options for
the princely states of joining or not joining the federation. The Govern-
ment of India Act of 1935 was tailored on the basis of the committee’s
recommendations. As the term of Irwin ended, Lord Linlithgow himself
was appointed viceroy in his place and was charged with responsibility to
implement the Act of 1935.
The Act of 1935 provided the frame of administrative system in forth-
coming constitution of India. It made provisions essential for a federation,
like autonomy of limited powers to provinces, and distribution of powers
between provincial and central governments. The governors in the prov-
inces and the viceroy in the centre were given right to veto, and they
enjoyed significant privileges over and above the powers of elected rep-
resentatives. The act did not give Indian people sampoorn swaraj, and this
was not acceptable to the Congress. But after getting an assurance that
British governor will not use his privileges to obstruct working of popular

42
 THE STRUGGLE FOR INDEPENDENCE AND CONSTITUTION

government, Congress decided to work the act. Accordingly, Congress gov-

ernments came to power in six of the provinces.
Meanwhile, a new resolution declaring that the Congress desired real
democratic regime and such regime could be possible only under a state
with independent constitution was passed in the Congress session held in
December 1936 at Faizpur in Maharashtra. Another resolution in the ses-
sion decided to hold a conference of Congress members in provincial and
Central Assemblies to demand framing of constitution and to discuss steps
to achieve it.
Following this resolution in Faizpur Congress, a conference of Congress
legislators was held on 19–20 of March 1937, at Delhi, presided over by
Jawaharlal Nehru. In his extensive address, Jawaharlal commended a com-
pletely independent constitutional state but endorsed the idea of Com-
monwealth of equivalent relationship with Britain. India’s continuance in
such Commonwealth will not compromise its independence, he explained.
One of the resolutions in the Conference demanded repel of Act of 1935
terming it as law to extend slavery and exploitation of India. The resolution
called for formation of the Constituent Assembly to frame independent
constitution for India. Resolutions endorsing it were passed by provincial
assemblies of Bihar, Bombay, Central Provinces, Orissa, United Provinces,
Madras and NW Frontier Province. In the Central Assembly, a resolution
demanding framing of constitution by the Constituent Assembly elected
through adult franchise was moved by S. Satyamurti, a senior Congress
leader from Madras, in September 1937; it said that the constitution will
replace the Act of 1935. The resolution was carried on 17th September,
1937. ‘So long as Gandhiji is alive, relations between Britain and India
may continue to be harmonious, and chances of reformation of political
relations on that basis will be there; the government should remember this
and accept Gandhiji’s hand of affection,’ urged Satyamurti in his address
on that occasion.
Meanwhile, the Second World War broke out; Germany attacked Poland
on 2nd September 1939 and England declared war against Germany very
next day. Simultaneously, the Viceroy declared that India too was joining
the war. No Indian political leader or members of the legislature were taken
into confidence before taking the step. The Viceroy called Indian leaders
for discussions at Simla, after making the declaration of war on behalf of
India. Gandhiji reached Simla on 5th of September. In a statement released
there, he disclosed that he had written a letter to Hitler requesting to avoid
war. ‘As a citizen of a nation that had lost independence, I express sympa-
thies with Polish people’, he stated. In an article written three days later,
Gandhiji explained why he sympathized with England and France. How-
ever, he did not fail to point out discrepancy in Britain’s policy. ‘England

43
 THE STRUGGLE FOR INDEPENDENCE AND CONSTITUTION

claimed that the war was being fought in defence of democratic freedom
and for ushering a world founded on democracy, while she was not prepared
to give that freedom to its possessions like India expeditiously,’ he main-
tained. Congress and Gandhiji condemned viceroy’s act of declaring war
without consent of Indian people.
Lord Linlithgow issued a statement on 17th of October 1939. While
presenting aims of the war, he mentioned, obliquely, the possibility of India
getting freedom after end of the war. However, he maintained in the same
statement that Muslim League will be consulted as representative of Mus-
lims in India. The British government was not speaking in definite terms of
granting freedom to India after the end of war. Categorical assurance was
being postponed by resorting to false jumbling on whether Indians were
competent for freedom. Gandhiji was asserting his demand in interviews
to various newspapers and press releases. He wrote in an article titled ‘The
Only Way’, carried by his weekly Harijan on 25th November:

Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru has compelled me to study, among other

things, the implications of a Constituent Assembly. When he first
introduced it in the Congress resolutions, I reconciled myself to
it because of my belief in his superior knowledge of the techni-
calities of democracy. But I was not free of scepticism. Hard fact,
however, made me a convert and, for that reason perhaps, more
enthusiastic than Jawaharlal himself. For I seem to see in it a
remedy, which Jawaharlal may not, for our communal and other
distempers, besides being a vehicle for mass political and other
education. . . . Again the Constituent Assembly alone can produce
a constitution indigenous to the country and truly and fully repre-
senting the will of the people. Undoubtedly, such a constitution
will not be ideal, but it will be real, however imperfect it may be in
the estimation of theorists or legal luminaries. Self-government to
be self-government has merely to reflect the will of the people. . . .
I cannot conceive a people governing themselves rightly through
a government imposed from without, even as fabled jackdaw could
not walk like a peacock with feather borrowed from his elegant
companion.9

Referring to Hindu-Muslim problem in India, he maintained in the

article that there was no other solution to it other than a Constituent
Assembly.
Some more significant things were happening in India. Jinnah had
demanded separate Pakistan for Muslims. Lahore session of League held
on 23rd and 24th March 1940 passed the resolution demanding Pakistan.

44
 THE STRUGGLE FOR INDEPENDENCE AND CONSTITUTION

Earlier Congress session held at Ramgarh had resolved not to participate in

imperialist war (ongoing Second World War) and passed a resolution giving
sole authority to Gandhiji to launch a struggle. Linlithgow reiterated on
8th August 1940 that the government policies aimed at dominion swaraj.
That the government will, after the war, try to form a committee of rep-
resentative Indians to frame a constitution, was only clear promise in the
Viceroy’s statement. The scheme proposed in Linlithgow’s statement made
no definite mention of formation of a national government and granting
postwar freedom to India.
Exercising authority given by Congress, Gandhiji launched individ-
ual satyagraha on 17th October 1940. Provincial ministries had already
resigned. Necessary preparations for mass satyagraha were not complete and
this might had been one of the possible reasons of keeping the satyagraha
on individual level; but another reason was anxieties sensed by Gandhiji
of many opportunist elements infiltrating the Congress at first inkling of
freedom and grabbing emergent power. He had expressed his concerns
in his Ramgarh address. Gandhiji wanted that the workers committed to
Congress cause should be allowed to offer individual satyagraha only after
undergoing rigorous test. In a sense, it was a sort of screening for selection
of personnel to manage administration of independent India.
Hitler attacked Russia in June 1941, drawing it into war from which she
had remained aloof so far. Japan seized Singapore on 15th February 1942,
and followed to grab Brahmadesh too, pushing the war to gates of India.
‘The war has now become worldwide. Congress sympathies certainly lie
with those who are fighting for freedom; but due to atmosphere of dis-
trust about the British government, it is impossible to cooperate with
the government,’ stated Congress Working Committee in its resolution.
Realizing that more empty declarations will not beget any advantage in
India, Sir Crawford Cripps was dispatched to India to suggest concrete
proposals about independence and subsequent political reforms. On the
very day Sir Cripps landed in India, a ‘Pakistan Day’ was observed; warn-
ings were issued in gatherings that there will be no compromise on the
demand. Cripps issued a statement on 29th March, presenting some defi-
nite proposals. It said

1 Steps to grant dominion status (including right to leave the common-

wealth) should be taken.
2 A Constituent Assembly should be formed immediately after end of
the war. Members of the Constituent Assembly to be elected from new
members of the provincial assemblies on basis of proportionate repre-
sentation. Princely states to be asked to send their representatives to
the Constituent Assembly.

45
 THE STRUGGLE FOR INDEPENDENCE AND CONSTITUTION

3 The British government will ensure immediate implementation of the

constitution framed by this Assembly; but if any of the provinces or
princely state does not wish to join the Constituent Assembly, it will
have independent status like India, and it will be free to frame its own
constitution.10

Except the third clause, remaining part of the scheme was executed. The
Constituent Assembly was elected as stipulated in the scheme. Various
political parties in India began expressing their reactions to the schemes,
but there was no unanimity among them. The scheme did not provide for
forming a national government in transition period. Discretion offered to
provinces was designed to balkanize India. Furthermore, it would be curtain
raiser to Pakistan. That is why Congress rejected the scheme. After failure
of Cripps mission, Congress had no alternative but to resort to agitation
once again.
The meeting of All India Congress Committee opened at Bombay from
7th August 1942. The resolution on struggle accepted by the Working Com-
mittee was adopted by overwhelming support. It was in discussions on this
resolution that Gandhiji delivered his famous speech to direct ‘Quit India’
of Chale Jao. The whole working committee was arrested in the midnight
of 8th August. Hundreds of other workers were jailed. Taking Gandhiji’s
directive to ‘Do or Die’ as final, satygrahas, processions, arrests and inci-
dence of sabotage took place at many places all over country. As agitation
broke out and all Congress leaders were jailed, negotiations on formation
of the Constituent Assembly came to end.
All members of Congress Working Committee were lodged in the fort of
Ahmednagar, while Gandhiji was detained in Aga Khan Palace in Pune.
Kasturbaa too was brought to stay there.
Gandhiji continued correspondence with the government from the
detention, and viceroy used to send replies to him. No hopes for way out
by compromise was in sight. Meanwhile, Chakravarti Rajagopalachari
expressed his opinion that Congress ministries erred in resigning and Cripps
proposal should have been accepted. This was poles apart from the official
position of Congress. It created much excitement, but the moment had
lapsed. Possibility of the government and the Congress coming together
on the basis of that scheme had faded out. As term of Linlithgow came
to end, Lord Wavell, who headed British army in India, was appointed
to the post of viceroy; he took over on 20th August 1943. He used to be
ex-officio member of Viceroy’s council during term of Linlithgow; hence
he was well versed with British administration in India and the political
issue. Gandhiji requested permission to meet Congress Working Commit-
tee’s members, which the government declined; consequently Congress was

46
 THE STRUGGLE FOR INDEPENDENCE AND CONSTITUTION

not in a position to make fresh assessment. By middle of April, Gandhiji’s

health had deteriorated; it became critical in month of May.
In these circumstances, government released Gandhiji on 6th May
1944. As soon as his health showed little recovery, he commenced political
activities. From 28th March 1945, members of Congress Working Com-
mittee, who were detained in Ahmednagar fort, began to be sent to prisons
in various places from where they had been arrested. After cessation of
world war in Europe, all members of Congress Working Committee were
released on 15th June 1945. Now Gandhiji had his colleagues available for
consultation.

Notes
1 B. Shiva Rao, The Framing of India’s Constitution, Vol. 1. Select documents,
Universal Law Publishing Co., Delhi, 2005, p. 3.
2 Ibid., p. 5.
3 D. B. Mathur, Gokhale – A Political Biography, P. C. Manaklal & Sons, Mumbai,
pp. 428–32.
4 Shiva Rao, The Framing of India’s Constitution, p. 44.
5 Ibid., p. 58.
6 Collected Works: Mahatma Gandhi, Vol. 45, p. 250.
7 B. Shiva Rao, The Framing of India’s Constitution, p. 370.
8 C. Rajgopalachari and J. C. Kumarappa (Ed.), The Nation’s Voice, Navjeevan,
Ahmadabad, 1947, p. 82.
9 Quoted in D. G. Tendulkar, Mahatma, Vol. 5, Publications Division, New
Delhi, 1969, p. 203.
10 Ibid., Vol. 6, pp. 71–2.

47
 4
PREPARING FOR THE
CONSTITUENT ASSEMBLY

Gandhiji was released from detention in Aga Khan Palace at Pune. He had
become too weak. After taking complete rest, first few days at Pune, and
then at Juhu in Bombay, he started meeting and corresponding with people.
The British government too was keen to reopen dialogue with Indian lead-
ers. The foremost question troubling the government’s mind was the reso-
lution of Congress session of 42, calling people not to cooperate with the
government. The question was whether the Congress Party and its leaders,
if released from restrictions, will resort to fresh agitations as directed by
that resolution, or they will reciprocate the government’s positive think-
ing by extending cooperation. When this question was put to Gandhiji,
he too replied that the resolution was approved by the Congress Working
Committee, and ‘not a single comma and dot can be changed without its
authority’.1 Although Gandhiji was freed, other members of the Congress
Working Committee were still in jail. Gandhiji had obliquely reminded
the government that if it desired a dialogue, it had to release the members
of the Congress Working Committee. Presently the Working Committee
members were released from jail and political activities gained momentum.
Gandhiji wrote a letter to Wavell on 27th July 1944; he was more than
willing to advise the Congress Working Committee to pass a resolution
offering complete cooperation to government in war efforts if announce-
ment of Indian independence was made straight away, and a national gov-
ernment responsible to the central legislature was constituted immediately.
The Viceroy conveyed in his response that government wanted to grant
complete independence to India, as soon as the war comes to an end, pro-
vided that constitution acceptable to all major national parties was ready
before it.2 Indications of an end to war were on horizon. Independence
also looked at hand. It had been insistence of Gandhiji and Congress
leaders that the constitution should be prepared by Indian people. Now
the British government too publicly expressed the same desire. Both the

48
 PREPARING FOR THE CONSTITUENT ASSEMBLY

imperial government and Congress had come to unanimous view that the
Indian independence should be built on the foundation of constitutional
democracy.

Efforts to avoid partition

The most serious and urgent political issue was of Pakistan. Pitch of Mus-
lim League demand since 1940 for creation of a separate nation for Mus-
lims in India had been becoming shriller. Jinnah and Muslim League had
pushed the theory of Hindus and Muslims being two nations, India should
be partitioned at the time of granting independence and Muslim-majority
provinces carved out to form a separate nation of Pakistan, he demanded.
No partition at all, least on basis of religion, Gandhiji insisted. He felt that
the partition will strike at roots of religious harmony. He was prepared for
all kinds of sacrifices to forestall partition. Muslims may be provided all
amenities and protections to their satisfaction, but carving out of Pakistan
should be averted, Gandhiji thought. He strived to that end.
‘At one hand, there is demand for Constituent Assembly; on the other, for
creation of Pakistan. How these two things can go hand in hand? Unless the
Muslims are given clear promise of protective measure they pine for, how the
Constituent Assembly will come into existence?’ asked one of the readers to
Gandhiji. Replying to the query, Gandhiji wrote in Harijan dated 29th June
1940,

When all of us will be able to think objectively, then we will stop

championing for separate constituencies and two nations. To your
question (about what provisions should be there for the minori-
ties), only the Constituent Assembly will be in position to give
reply.

First of all, the Constituent Assembly should be formed for the whole of
India, the Muslim League too should be part of it, and if the Constituent
Assembly will not make satisfactory provisions for Muslims, then only they
may decide about going separate way; but most probably, that occasion will
not arrive, he believed.
While he was detained in Aga Khan Palace at Pune, Gandhiji came across
a statement by Jinnah that he was prepared for discussions if Gandhiji gave
an invitation. Gandhiji wrote to Jinnah on 4th May 1944 expressing his
readiness for discussions. Next four months saw spate of correspondence and
meetings between the two leaders. Long meetings took place between them
from 9th to 27th September 1944. Points of differences between Gandhiji

49
 PREPARING FOR THE CONSTITUENT ASSEMBLY

and Jinnah were not reconcilable. Fundamental divergence between the

two positions was not such which could be sorted out by discussions, and
Jinnah was determined not to give up demand for Pakistan regardless of any
promise offered. Jinnah raised more primary point: on whose behalf you are
talking with me, he asked. Gandhiji did not take the position that he was
negotiating officially on behalf of Congress organization. He was talking
in his personal capacity, he used to tell, and this further fortified Jinnah’s
resolution of not agreeing to anything at all.
The dialogue conducted through their correspondence and in personal
meetings in September 1944 was unsuccessful. Gandhiji told journalists
that the talks failed as he could not agree to Jinnah’s two nation theory and
hence they could not settle the Hindu-Muslim issue. Forthcoming Con-
stituent Assembly will consider any protection the Muslims wanted, and
there was no need to form a separate nation; this was Gandhiji’s stand. It
was impossible to gratify Jinnah.

Rajagopalachari plan
Around this time, Chakravarti Rajagopalachari, one of the prominent
leaders of freedom movements and a colleague of Gandhiji, published a
plan for consideration by Jinnah and Muslim League. Rajagopalachari
had discussed the plan with Gandhiji and he had given word that if
Rajaji succeeded to get approval of Jinnah, Gandhiji too would consent
to it. Rajagopalachari communicated the plan to Jinnah in April 1944.
He received no definite response from Jinnah. Finally, Rajagopalachari
sought by telegram Jinnah’s permission to publish it, to which Jinnah
replied that he was willing to put his plan before the executive committee
of the Muslim League, but ‘as you would not allow making any changes
in the plan, I could not do anything’. Rajagopalachari informed Jinnah
that the plan still had consent of Gandhiji and although Congress had not
given explicit authorization, obviously his views carried influence with
Congress. To which, Jinnah responded that he did not mean to do any-
thing more than already conveyed.
The plan proposed by Rajagopalachari was generally on the following
lines:

1 The Muslim League was to endorse the demand for independence and
will join the interim government.
2 At the end of war a commission would demarcate those contiguous
areas in North-West and North-East India in which the Muslims were
in an absolute majority, and in those areas a plebiscite of all inhabitants
would decide whether or not they should be separated from Hindustan.

50
 PREPARING FOR THE CONSTITUENT ASSEMBLY

3 In the event of separation, agreements would be made for defence,

commerce, communications and other essential purposes.
4 The terms would be binding only if Britain transfers full power and
responsibility for the governance of India.

If partition and creation of Pakistan becomes inevitable, that should

be executed in a peaceful way; that was the intention of both Rajaji and
Gandhiji. Emotion of people ran high; Indian political leaders making any
statement approving of Pakistan demand came under tremendous pres-
sure. (Today, leaders of India and Pakistan while holding talks on Kashmir
must have experienced similar pressures.) Rajaji too faced flak for his now-
realized-to-be-impractical scheme. Rajaji and Gandhiji had perceived in
1944 what Congress accepted in 1947; but at that time (in 1944) they did
not have support of party.
Germany surrendered in May 1945; Japan followed in August, but end
of the Second World War was already evident. Viceroy Wavell was called
to London for discussions in March 1945. Post war, Britain had decided to
shed its imperial responsibilities. Naturally, granting independence to India
was a part of the decision. Presently, Wavell faced two major tasks; one was
to make preparation for Indian independence, and second, to hold elections
to provincial legislatures at earliest which had been delayed because of the
Second World War. Earlier elections were held in 1936 and although term
of the legislatures was over, election could not be held because of the war.
Returning to India on 14th June 1945, Lord Wavell made a speech on
All India Radio to announce that he had called a conference at Simla to
find out views of different political leaders, and to that end, he had ordered
the release of members of Congress Working Committee. All members of
the Working Committee detained in different jails were freed. Gandhiji
and the released members met on 21st June and they decided to accept
viceroy’s invitation to the Simla conference.
The Simla conference was slated to open on 25th June. Gandhiji had
clarified that he would not be Congress representative. One of the rea-
sons was Jinnah’s stand that Congress leaders like Maulana Azad were
not representatives of Muslims. Gandhiji and Congress claimed that it
included people of all religions and it represented all. Maulana Azad was
Congress president at the time, and that was one more reason he should
be invited to talks as main representative of Congress, Gandhiji rightly
maintained. Along with Azad, other Congress leaders like Nehru, Patel,
Rajagopalachari and Govind Ballabh Pant had joined the conference.
Mahatma Gandhi reached Simla as he was given a separate personal invi-
tation to participate in the conference. Although no concrete decisions
were made in the conference, extensive discussions were held on India’s

51
 PREPARING FOR THE CONSTITUENT ASSEMBLY

post-independence political arrangements, including the Pakistan plan. As

views of various political leaders found expression in the discussions, posi-
tions of the British government and Indian leaders became more evident
to each other.
The day before opening of the conference, Wavell held long separate
meetings with Gandhiji and Jinnah. Gandhiji told the viceroy that release
of Congress Working Committee members was not sufficient; all con-
gressmen should be released. Gandhiji wanted to discuss what will be the
status of princely states in independent India; but Wavell replied that the
conference was only about those areas which were directly under British
control, and subject of the states was not on agenda presently. Agenda of
the conference was set broadly; but Wavell had already declared the deci-
sion to complete Indianization of Viceroy’s Council (or cabinet in today’s
language) in which, except the viceroy himself and the army chief, only
Indians will be appointed to all posts of members. Indian members would
have opportunity to handle important portfolios like home, finance,
defence that were out of bound for them until then.
A key point of discussion in the Simla conference was proportion of
Hindu and Muslim members in the Viceroy’s Council. Although popula-
tion of caste Hindus and Muslims varied, the British government wanted
them to share equal posts. Gandhiji took objection to the term ‘Caste
Hindu’ itself. Congress wanted Dalits to be counted in the term ‘Hindu’;
it demanded that representations of the Dalits be taken into consider-
ation while finalizing Hindus’ seats. Who will get the seats of Muslims;
only Muslim League representatives, or Muslims in Congress too will be
eligible to share those seats? This was another point of contention. Jin-
nah was not ready to compromise on both these points. The ship of Simla
conference broke up on rock of Jinnah’s adamancy. It was wound up in
middle of July.
The issue of forming Constituent Assembly for India was viewed by the
government to be ‘urgent and important’, declared the Minister for India
in a statement to British Parliament on 4th December 1945. Meanwhile,
some efforts at preparations for the Constituent Assembly by carrying all
political parties continued in India. A 30-member subcommittee headed
by Sir Tej Bahadur Sapru that included Mukundrao Jaykar, Radhakrishnan,
Gopalaswami Ayyangar, Frank Anthony, Mohamed Yunus was deliberat-
ing on features of the constitution. The committee published its report in
December 1945. The committee was agreeable to that part of Cripps mis-
sion relating to Constituent Assembly; but it recorded its opposition to the
idea of partition of India to create two independent nations.
Wavell sent a note to the cabinet on 27th December 1945, setting for
himself three targets to be achieved in 1946:

52
 PREPARING FOR THE CONSTITUENT ASSEMBLY

1 to secure a reasonably efficient Executive Council with Representa-

tives of the principal parties on a proportional basis, which will carry
on the government of India during the interim period;
2 to form a Constitution Making Body which will produce a workable
and acceptable constitution;
3 to bring about Governments in the Provinces, on a Coalition basis as
far as possible.3

It was even contemplated in those days whether the Cripps plan will be
acceptable to Indians if offered again; but later the idea was given up, and
a new mission of three ministers including Cripps was dispatched to India.
The tri-ministerial delegation of Lord Pethick Lawrence, Sir Stafford
Cripps and A. V. Alexander reached India in March 1946. Addressing the
Commons House, Prime Minister Attlee had said that his colleagues were
visiting India to see that India gets complete freedom at earliest; it was
for India to decide what sort of government should be there. After ini-
tial discussions with Indian leaders, the three ministers and the viceroy
announced a scheme on 16th May 1946. Broadly, the scheme was to cre-
ate a federation of all provinces and princely states in which subjects of
defence, foreign affairs and communication were to be in hands of the cen-
tral government and all other subjects in the jurisdiction of the provinces.
The scheme envisaged formation of groups of provinces, and those groups
were to be given constitutional status. Although the tri-ministerial scheme
had dubbed Pakistan as impracticable, the formation of groups would have
led to the creation of Muslim majority in some of them. League favoured
the provinces of Punjab, Bengal and Assam to be included, wholly and
without division, in the groups (the Punjab in Western Group and the
Bengal and Assam in Eastern Group) but at the same time claimed that
there was no need of the central government at all. It wanted the groups
should be entrusted with all authority in matters of foreign affairs, defence
and communication; thus the League would have pocketed two Greater
Pakistans instead of one.4 Congress was dead set against the inclusion of
Hindu majority areas of Punjab, Bengal and Assam in Pakistan. And a
central government was imperative for it. The tri-minister scheme could
muster approval of neither the Congress, nor the Muslim League, nor even
the Sikh leadership.
At the far end of the tri-ministerial mission, a revised version of the
scheme was put on the table; a ‘Three tier plan’, as Viceroy Wavell dubbed
it. The scheme envisaged:

• Formation of one Pakistan consisting of Sindh, Baluchistan, North-

West Frontier Province, Muslim majority districts of Punjab (exclud-

53
 PREPARING FOR THE CONSTITUENT ASSEMBLY

ing Gurdaspur), Muslim majority districts of Bengal and Sylhet district

of Assam.
• Remaining areas will become Bharat (India).
• If these two nations agree to form a federation, they will be given full
freedom except in minimal subjects of defence, foreign affairs and com-
munication.

As this scheme gave consent to the demand of Pakistan and wanted

establishment of a Federation of India and Pakistan, the three ministers
obviously presumed its acceptance by all parties. Wavell wrote letters to
Congress president Maulana Azad and Muslim League’s leader Mohammed
Ali Jinnah asking to send four representatives each to Simla for further dis-
cussions. Accordingly, the second Simla conference was held but unanimity
evaded this scheme too.
The 16th May declaration had stipulated in paragraph 19 the forma-
tion of a Constituent Assembly. Meanwhile the three ministers declared
on 16th June that a provisional government will be formed in the centre.
It was to include two major parties of Congress and Muslim League, as well
as representatives of minorities like Christians, Parsees and Dalits. Prepara-
tions for forming the provisional government were made by Viceroy Lord
Wavell and Congress decided to participate in the Constituent Assembly
despite its aversion to being counted as representative of Hindus. Muslim
League which had declared that it will not join the Constituent Assembly
until the formation of the provisional government later boycotted it. The
interim government established on 2nd September 1946 included seven
members, namely, Jawaharlal Nehru, Vallabhbhai Patel, Rajendra Prasad,
Sarat Chandra Bose, Jagjivan Ram, Asaf Ali and Syed Ali Zaheer, all of
them Congressmen.
Muslim League had set two key conditions for joining the provisional
government. The first condition was that Congress should not nominate
on its behalf any Muslim to the ministry; Muslim representatives will be
chosen only by the Muslim League. And at least one of the three important
departments of defence, foreign affairs and communication should be allot-
ted to a Muslim League representative; that was their second condition.
Congress rejected both conditions. Finally a compromise was struck after
Congress offered departments like finance and health, and Muslim League
joined the provisional government on 15th October 1946.
Gandhiji was keen that the provisional government should enjoy full
de facto autonomy; if not de jure. He met Viceroy Wavell on 27th August
1946 when, during the discussions, the Viceroy indicated that responsibil-
ity of peace keeping was to be entrusted to him and the British army. The
very next day, Gandhiji wrote a strongly worded letter to Wavell to rebuke

54
 PREPARING FOR THE CONSTITUENT ASSEMBLY

him that if such responsibilities and authorities were to rest with the British
government itself, the provisional government will turn out to be nothing
but a farce.5
Will the Constituent Assembly for framing of Indian Constitution,
although elected by Indian people, have statutory status? A doubt cropped
up in Gandhiji’s mind. Gandhiji and Vallabhbhai Patel met the three min-
isters and viceroy on 24th of June 1946 to seek clarification on this point.
Cripps reminded them of the political principle that the peoples’ mandate
and not a resolution of a legislature was the basis of validity of a constituent
assembly; and the statutory status given to the constituent assembly makes
not much difference.6 The Independence of India Act was yet to come; the
question would not have cropped up if the constituent assembly had fol-
lowed the passing of the independence act. While the Constituent Assem-
bly’s work was under way, India achieved freedom on 15th August 1947
under the ‘Indian Independence Act’ passed by the British Parliament; this
ended speculation on validity of the Constituent Assembly.
The declaration of 16th May had granted both the demands of Indian
independence and the Constituent Assembly, according to the British gov-
ernment. It was agreed in principle that the Constituent Assembly will be
elected on the basis of adult franchise. But as holding of such elections would
have been time consuming, a middle way was worked out to elect members
of the Constituent Assembly by recently elected members of provincial leg-
islatures. Elections to the Central Assembly were held in December 1945;
out of its 102 seats, Congress had won 57, and the League had 30 seats. In
the provincial elections, Congress had won 925 out of total 1,585 seats.
Number of total seats in the Constituent Assembly was fixed at 389; out
of which 296 were to be elected by the provincial assemblies and 93 seats
were earmarked for representatives of populace of princely states. In the
elections to the Constituent Assembly held in July 1946, Congress bagged
203 of 212 general seats. Of the seats reserved for the Muslims, all except
seven were won by the Muslim League. Being aware that the Constituent
Assembly was the forum which will mark the direction of destiny of the
nation, the Congress and others too had sent their key leaders to it. Lead-
ers like Jawaharlal Nehru, then president of the Congress, Mohammed Ali
Jinnah of Muslim League, Syama Prasad Mookerjee of Hindu Mahasabha,
Dr Ambedkar of Scheduled Castes Federation were elected to the Constitu-
ent Assembly. Others included chief ministers of eight provinces, many
former chief ministers and sitting ministers. Strength of Hindus, including
those from Dalit communities, was more than 200, and Muslims numbered
80, most of them, 73 to be precise, elected on the Muslim League ticket.
Even as the elections to the Constituent Assembly were under way,
it was evident that the Congress was going to win a thumping majority.

55
 PREPARING FOR THE CONSTITUENT ASSEMBLY

But the Congress Working Committee desired that representatives of all

faiths and communities should be there in the Constituent Assembly to
make the constitution and it should reflect political opinions of all hues.
The Congress saw that small communities like the Christians, the Parsees
and the Anglo-Indians were ensured representations in the Constituent
Assembly. Furthermore, it was endeavour of the Congress that the Constit-
uent Assembly should include representatives of scholars of constitutional
issues with administrative experience and those of intellectuals; accord-
ingly, Alladi Krishnaswami Aiyar, Hridaynath Kunzru, N. Gopalaswami
Ayyangar, K. Santhanam, Mukundrao Jaykar, Satchitanand Sinha were
elected to the Constituent Assembly. Erstwhile opponents of Congress
like Shewtchalpatirao of the Justice Party and Syama Prasad Mookerjee
of Hindu Mahasabha, and philosophers like Dr Sarvpalli Radhakrishnan
were elected on support of the Congress. Dr Babasaheb Ambedkar, elected
from the East Bengal, was unseated following the partition of the country.
He had made mark of his studiousness in functioning of subcommittees by
then. Dr Ambedkar also understood the importance of participating in the
constitution-making for future of the country. He had mollified his posi-
tion to cooperate with the majoritarian Congress Party. As his membership
ended, Congress wanted him to return to Assembly as early as possible. Fol-
lowing resignation of Dr Mukundrao Jayakar, a seat of a delegate of Bombay
legislature fell vacant. The Congress high command wanted Dr Ambedkar
to be elected on that seat, and Dr Rajendra Prasad conveyed this to leader
of Congress Legislative Party Bal Gangadhar Kher in a letter written on
30th June 1947. Accordingly, Babasaheb was unanimously elected on the
seat.7 Congress had attempted to accommodate a number of persons who
can be called constitutional experts or whose learning of law could be help-
ful in framing of the constitution. Apart from Dr Ambedkar as mentioned
earlier, these included many persons like Sir Alladi Krishnaswami Aiyar, N.
Gopalaswami Ayyangar, B. Shiva Rao, K. Santhanam, and Prof K. T. Shah.
Question of participation of Muslims and the Sikhs came to fore as elec-
tions to the Constituent Assembly were completed. The Panthic Pratinidhi
Sabha of Sikhs resolved to participate in the Constituent Assembly on 14th
August 1946; but the Muslim League could not be persuaded despite many
efforts. On 21st November 1946, Mohammed Ali Jinnah declared that the
League will not join the Constituent Assembly. Later in 1947, by-elections
to the seats boycotted by the League were held; the seats being reserved
for Muslims, some members of the Muslim League who had opted to stay
in India, as well as some other Muslims were elected to the Constituent
Assembly. In such an atmosphere, first meeting of the Constituent Assem-
bly was called on 9th December 1946.

56
 PREPARING FOR THE CONSTITUENT ASSEMBLY

Groundwork for the constitution

Preparations for functioning of the Constituent Assembly began on lev-
els of both the Congress Party and the government. Congress had formed
an experts committee for the groundwork, consisting of Jawaharlal Nehru,
N. Gopalaswami Ayyangar, Prof K. T. Shah, Dhananjayrao Gadgil, K. San-
thanam, Barrister Asaf Ali and Prof Humayun Kabir. The committee’s
meetings had commenced since July 1946.
There was a Reforms Department in the Secretariat of Government of
India; a studious officer named Benegal Narsingh Rao worked there. He
had served earlier as a judge of the Calcutta High Court and although he
had prospects of being elevated to the Federal Court – the central court –
he declined the prestigious option to join in laying of the constitutional
foundation of the nation. Rao had earlier participated in preparations of
constitution framing of Burma (now Myanmar). He had surveyed views of
various political leaders through a detailed questionnaire. Particularly, he
had extensive discussions with Jawaharlal Nehru on prospective shape of
the constitution on 21st November 1945. Rao was appointed as constitu-
tional advisor after office of the Constituent Assembly was opened on 1st
July 1946. Keeping in view various political probabilities, Rao had already
prepared rough drafts of various types of constitutions; and in view of the
political uncertainty about whether the partition will take place or not, he
seems to have considered both possibilities in these notes.
Peoples’ mandate reflected in elections of 1946 was completely polarized
in geographical areas of Hindu majority and Muslim majority except the
Muslim majority area of North-West Frontier Province where the Con-
gress captured more seats than the Muslim League. Rao had studied some
major constitutions, and though he wanted to try to keep the country
united, bearing in mind the circumstances, he was thinking of some tran-
sient arrangement under which the Hindu and Muslim regions will be
allowed to part ways in case they found it impossible to live together. The
Muslim majority regions may be granted autonomy in the shape of Paki-
stan, but the country should remain one independent nation for matters
of defence; this seems to be the intent of his initial proposals. After the
decision of partition was confirmed, he presented a newly prepared rough
outline to the Constituent Assembly on 30th April 1947. This was taken
into consideration when the Assembly made the draft of the constitution.
Discussions on make-up of the constitution had started on Congress
Party level too. Mahatma Gandhi and Jawaharlal Nehru were two leaders
who could make major contribution in finalizing basic principles of the
constitution. Although the freedom struggle was fought under leadership of
Gandhiji, it was somewhat presumed that leadership of the constitutional

57
 PREPARING FOR THE CONSTITUENT ASSEMBLY

government of the nation will go to Jawaharlal Nehru. The two leaders

enjoyed, apart from political associations, very affectionate relations in
personal life too. Both appear to have held discussions on basic principles
of the constitution holding respect to each other’s positions. They did not
discuss different articles of constitution and it was not possible also. How-
ever, they did discuss what should be the basic principles. The discussions
between these two leaders had begun from the resolution on fundamental
rights passed by the Karachi Congress in 1931. The resolution on funda-
mental rights adopted by the open session of the Congress on 31st March
1931 was drafted after discussions between Nehru and Gandhiji. It was
Gandhiji who touched up the resolution written by Nehru and then it was
presented to the session. Gandhiji moved the resolution and made a speech
to justify it. In later period also, it seems that discussions between the two
had continued. It took speed after the independence came in sight and it
became imperative to actually think of nature of the constitution.
The Congress Working Committee met at Pune from 12th to 18th Sep-
tember 1945; Gandhiji was present during most of the sittings. This meeting
of the Congress Working Committee was very crucial as it was expected to
decide the direction of independent India’s future pathway. The resolution
passed by the Working Committee held that the constitution of India was
to be framed by a constituent assembly of democratically elected representa-
tives; it will be federal constitution and residue rights (not specifically indi-
cated by the constitution) will remain with the provinces; fundamental rights
approved by the Karachi Congress and later added to the list will be included
in the constitution, and every province will enjoy maximum autonomy
consistent to a strong central authority. In a sense, character of the Indian
Constitution was finalized in this resolution of CWC. Following this CWC
meeting, session of All India Congress Committee was held at Bombay on
21st and 22nd September. Gandhiji did not attend this session; he had stayed
back to get naturopathy treatment at Uruli Kanchan near Pune.

Basic differences between Gandhiji and Nehru

Prolonged discussions appear to have been held two or three times between
Mahatma Gandhiji and Jawaharlal Nehru. Their views did not meet on
some points. These disagreements had been there since 1928, when Nehru
had returned from his stay in Europe and, true to his character, had con-
veyed to Gandhiji, respectfully but firmly, his variances. In a letter dated
11th January 1928, Nehru wrote,

Reading many of your articles in Young India – your Autobiog-

raphy etc, – I have often felt how different my ideals were from

58
 PREPARING FOR THE CONSTITUENT ASSEMBLY

yours. And I have felt that you were very hasty in your judgments,
or rather having arrived at certain conclusions you were over-
eager to justify them by any scrap of evidence you might get. I
remember how in an article . . . you gave some newspaper cutting
from America about crime and immorality and contrasted Ameri-
can civilization with India. I felt it was something like Catharine
Mayo. . . .8
I think you misjudge greatly. The civilization of the West attach
too great an importance to its many failings. You have stated some-
where that India has nothing to learn from the West and that she
has reached a pinnacle of wisdom in the past. I entirely disagree
with this view and I neither think that the so called Ramarajya was
very good in the past nor do I want it back. I think the western
or rather industrial civilization is bound to conquer India, may be
with many changes and adaptations.9

He has conceded in the letter that he was aware of faults in the Western
culture and these will have to be removed.
Gandhiji’s reply to this letter took somewhat extreme position. Gandhiji
was pained by Nehru’s letter, particularly his blunt observations in it. He
wrote:

I see quite clearly that you must carry on open warfare against me
and my views. For, if I am wrong I am evidently doing irreparable
harm to the country and it is your duty after having known it to
rise in revolt against me. . . . The differences between you and me
appear to be so vast and radical that there seems to be no meeting
ground between us. I can’t conceal from you my grief that I should
lose a comrade so valiant, so faithful, so able and as honest as you
have always been. But this dissolution of comradeship – if dissolu-
tion must come in no way affects our personal intimacy.10

Even with such disagreements, Gandhiji chose Jawaharlal Nehru to be

his chief lieutenant in the freedom struggle and later as his successor to lead
the nation after independence.
Gandhiji had a clear vision of independent India and its expected
restructuring. The village was the basic element in his vision; political
and economic autonomy of the village and such things had priority in it.
Both agreed on protection to fundamental rights of citizens, on provid-
ing employment to them and improving their standard of life. Gandhiji’s
idea of Indian Constitution appears to have found direct and elaborate

59
 PREPARING FOR THE CONSTITUENT ASSEMBLY

expression on two occasions. First, when the pantpratinidhi’s small

princely state of Aundh in Maharashtra embarked on an experiment
of Swaraj and democratic governance; and later when the Constituent
Assembly was about to begin its work, Sriman Narayan Agrawal wrote the
book A Gandhian Constitution for Free India to publicly disclose the nature
of the constitution Gandhiji had in his mind. Jawaharlal did not wholly
approve of Gandhiji’s views on the constitution. It was for Nehru to lead
the nation in future, and only the constitution that was in minds of Nehru
and his colleagues will come about; this much Gandhiji knew, and he
had accepted this reality. Both respected each other, beyond formalities,
and they had very warm relations. In spite of extreme disagreements on
some issue, there was no possibility of any rupture in their relations. The
Congress Working Committee finalized key principles of the constitution
in its resolution of September 1945. It was followed by another round of
interaction between Gandhiji and Nehru.
Gandhiji wrote in a letter to Nehru on 5th October 1945 on difference
of outlook between them. ‘If the difference is fundamental, then I feel that
the public should also be made aware of it,’ he said. According to him,
that was good for the democratic process. This was in reference to discus-
sions in Working Committee about social and economic aims. Till then,
Gandhiji and some members of Working Committee like Nehru had dif-
fered on economic structure of independent India; but these were mostly
points of discussions on academic level. Now it was time for the Congress
to come to a decision on a definite policy and execute it. In the Pune meet
of the Congress Working Committee, when the subject of economic policy
was discussed, it was decided to hold a separate three-day deliberations on
the issue.
Gandhiji also wrote to Nehru to convey unmistakably the gravity of the
subject and his contentions in following words:

Whether the working committee sits or not I want our position

vis-à-vis each other to be clearly understood by us for two reasons.
Firstly, the bond that unites us is not only political work. It is
immeasurably deeper and quite unbreakable. Therefore it is that
I earnestly desire that in the political field also we should under-
stand each other clearly. We both live for the cause of India’s
freedom and we would both gladly die for it. We are not in need of
the world’s praise. Whether we get praise or blame is immaterial to
us. . . . I must admit that I am now an old man. . . . I have therefore
named you as my heir. I must, however, understand my heir and
my heir should understand me. Then alone shall I be content.

60
 PREPARING FOR THE CONSTITUENT ASSEMBLY

Gandhiji asserted in the very letter,

If India is to attain true freedom and through India the world also,
then sooner or later the fact must be recognized that people will
have to live in villages not in towns, in huts not in palaces. Crores
of people will never be able to live at peace with one another in
towns and palaces. They will then have no recourse but to resort
to both violence and untruth. I hold that without truth and non-
violence there can be nothing but destruction for humanity. I must
not fear if the world today is going the wrong way. It may be that
India too will go that way and like the proverbial moth, burn itself
eventually in the flame round which it dances more and more furi-
ously. But it is my burden to protect India and through India the
entire world from such a doom.

At the end of the letter, Gandhiji again clarified his ideal of village. He
wrote,

The village of my dreams is still in my mind. After all every man

lives in the world of his dreams. My ideal village will contain intel-
ligent human beings. They will not live in dirt and darkness as
animals. Men and women will be free and able to hold their own
against anyone in the world. There will be neither plague nor chol-
era nor small pox; no one will be idle, no one will wallow in luxury.
Everyone will have to contribute his quota of manual labour. It is
possible to envisage railways, post and telegraph offices etc.11

The Congress Working Committee had met few days before Gandhiji
wrote this letter. As mentioned in the letter, the CWC had agreed to hold
two-three days long deliberations to develop over these village-centric
ideas of Gandhiji. After four days, on 9th October 1945, Nehru wrote from
Allahabad to make some points quite clear.

The question before us is not one of truth versus untruth or non-

violence versus violence. One assumes as one must that true co-
operation and peaceful methods must be aimed at and a society
which encourages these must be our objective. The whole ques-
tion is how to achieve this society and what its content should be.

He stated his views on the village in very frank words. He said, ‘A vil-
lage, normally speaking, is backward intellectually and culturally and no

61
 PREPARING FOR THE CONSTITUENT ASSEMBLY

progress can be made from a backward environment. Narrow-minded peo-

ple are much more likely to be untruthful and violent.’ This opinion of
Nehru went along with the views expressed by Dr Ambedkar in his speech
before the Constituent Assembly. In view of Jawaharlal, the emergent India
needed to put down:

certain objectives like sufficiency of food, clothing, housing, edu-

cation, sanitation etc. which should be the minimum requirement
for the country and for everyone. It is with these objectives in
view that we must find out specifically how to attain them speed-
ily. Modern means of transport as well as other modern develop-
ments must be continued and be developed. There is no way out of
it except to have them. If that is so, inevitably a measure of heavy
industry exists. How far that will fit in with a purely village soci-
ety? Personally I hope that heavy and light industries should all be
decentralized as far as possible and this is feasible now because of the
development of electric power. If two types of economy exist in the
country, there should be either conflict between the two or one will
overwhelm the other. . . . I do not think it is possible for India to
be really independent unless she is a technically advanced country.
In the present context of the world we cannot even advance cul-
turally without a strong background of scientific research in every
department. There is today in the world a tremendous acquisitive
tendency both in individuals and groups and nations, which leads
to conflicts and wars. Our entire society is based on this more or
less. That basis must go and be transformed into one of cooperation,
not of isolation which is impossible. If this is admitted and is found
feasible then attempts should be made to realize it not in terms of
an economy which is cut off from the rest of the world but rather
one which cooperates. From the economic or political point of view
an isolated India may well be a kind of vacuum which increases the
acquisitive tendencies of others and thus creates conflicts.

Gandhiji had mentioned in the letter his perceptions of future India as

presented in the Hind Swaraj written in 1909. Nehru wrote candidly with
respect in his reply,

It is many years ago since I read Hind Swaraj and I have only a vague
picture in my mind. But even when I read it 20 or more years ago it
seemed to me completely unreal. Your writings and speeches since
then I have found much that seemed to me an advance on that
old position and an appreciation of modern trends. I was therefore

62
 PREPARING FOR THE CONSTITUENT ASSEMBLY

surprised when you told us that the old picture still remains intact
in your mind. As you know, the Congress has never considered
that picture much less adopted it! You yourself have never asked
it to adopt it except for certain relatively minor aspects of it. How
far it is desirable for the Congress to consider these fundamental
questions, involving varying philosophies of life, it is for you to
judge. . . . A body like the Congress should not lose itself in argu-
ments over such matters which can only produce great confusion
in people’s minds resulting in inability to act in the present. This
may also result in creating barriers between the Congress and oth-
ers in the country. . . . It is 38 years since Hind Swaraj was written.
The world has completely changed since then, possibly in a wrong
direction. In any event any consideration of these questions must
keep present facts, forces and the human material we have today
in view, otherwise it will be divorced from reality.12

The letter was followed by discussions between the two leaders in Pune at
the end of which Gandhi decided in his mind to put full stop to the dispute.
In a letter written to Nehru on 13th November 1945, Gandhiji made a note
of important points discussed between them. He expressed hope saying, ‘It
would not matter if ultimately we might have to agree to differ so long as
we remained one at heart as we are today.’ Four points listed by Gandhiji in
the letter can be taken as substance of the discussions but not as a note of
unanimity. Gandhiji writes:

1 The real question, according to you, is how to bring about man’s high-
est intellectual, economic, political and moral development. I agree
entirely.
2 In this there should be an equal right and opportunity for all.
3 In other words, there should be equality between the town dwellers
and the villagers in the standard of food and drink, clothing and other
living conditions. In order to achieve this equality today people should
be able to produce for themselves the necessaries of life i.e. clothing,
foodstuffs, dwellings and lighting and water.
4 Man is not born to live in isolation but is essentially a social ani-
mal independent and interdependent. No one can or should ride
on another’s back. If we try to work out the necessary conditions
for such a life, we are forced to the conclusion that the unit of the
society should be a village, or call it a small and manageable group of
people who would, in the ideal, be self-sufficient (in matter of their
vital requirements) as a unit and bound together in bonds of mutual
cooperation and inter-dependence.13

63
 PREPARING FOR THE CONSTITUENT ASSEMBLY

Gandhiji expressed hope in the letter that Jawaharlal will endorse these
points.
There was no disagreement between Gandhiji and Nehru on need for
comprehensive efforts for economic, political, moral and intellectual devel-
opment of mankind. The real point of difference was how to achieve this.
Gandhiji in his letter had tried to find a common ground; but the method
part in it was absolutely unacceptable to Jawaharlal. Gandhiji wanted
all workers to know their different approaches about future course of the
nation and about formation of constitution accordingly. But Jawaharlal was
against doing such things. Common workers will be confused if they came
to know of differences on basic issues between two top leaders of nation, he
felt. In one of his responses, he writes,

How far it is desirable for the Congress to consider these funda-

mental questions, involving varying philosophies of life, it is for
you to judge. I should imagine that a body like the Congress should
not loose itself in arguments over such matter which can only pro-
duce great confusion in peoples’ minds resulting in inability to act
in the present. This may also result in creating barriers between
the Congress and others in the country.14

The village should be the primary unit of economic and political sys-
tem of the nation; this only will ensure its autonomy, thought Gandhiji.
If industries were felt necessary to uplift standard of living of people, these
should not be concentrated as far as possible. It was Gandhiji’s belief that
micro unit like the village will have to be strengthened if humanity was to
progress on the basis of cooperation. He had stuck to this political thought
right from the days of Hind Swaraj (1909). Preferences of common people
will gain proper expression if the panchayat was given central role and the
provincial and central governments were elected through them in indirect
elections, he felt.
Evidently, Nehru preferred parliamentary democracy, and simultane-
ously, he wanted speedy growth of industries for improving standard of liv-
ing of people as early as possible; this was the basic difference in approach.
While these discussions between Gandhiji and Nehru on the basic charac-
ter of the constitution was going on, the expert committee Congress had
appointed on 8th of July 1946 took into consideration both these alterna-
tives during its deliberations on the constitution. There was no point of
disagreements about the fundamental rights. On economic and political
formation, the committee was not inclined towards the constitutional fea-
tures Gandhiji had in his mind, and it gave green signal to parliamentary

64
 PREPARING FOR THE CONSTITUENT ASSEMBLY

democracy and a political system based on the Government of India Act

of 1935.
Although holding fundamental disagreements on the character of the
constitution, and having given clear expression to them, both Gandhiji
and Nehru did not want the differences to be carried to extremes which
may defeat their very purpose. Apparently, the divergence between stands
of Gandhiji and Nehru continued to end, and it found reflection in some
measure in the deliberations in the Constituent Assembly also. In later
period, Gandhiji decided to keep himself aloof from the discussions on the
constitutional features. In a letter written to Ghanashymdas Birla on 26th
November 1946, Gandhiji wrote, ‘I am not going into the Constituent
Assembly; it is not quite necessary either. Jawaharlal, Sardar, Rajen Babu,
Rajaji, Maulana – any one or all five can go there – or Kripalani. Send this
message to them.’15 In his address to the prayer meeting on 1st April 1947,
Gandhiji said, ‘(Now) that will be done what Congress decides. Nothing
will happen on my words. My command will not run henceforth. If it was
not so, what happened in Punjab, Bihar and Noakhali, that would not have
happened. But now, nobody listens to me.’16

Notes
1 Tendulkar, Mahatma, p. 232.
2 Pyarelal (Ed.), Mahatma Gandhi, Correspondence with the Government 1944–47,
Navjeevan, Ahmedabad, 1959, pp. 6–9.
3 Penderal Moon (Ed.), Wavell Viceroy’s Journal. Oxford, 1973, p. 196.
4 Ibid., pp. 471–80.
5 Pyarelal, Mahatma Gandhi: Correspondence with the Government, 1944–47,
pp. 221–2.
6 Transfer of Power: 1942–47, Nicholas Mansergh (Ed.), Vol. VII, Her Majesty’s
Stationery Office, London, 1979, p. 1028.
7 Quoted in Granville Austin, The Indian Constitution, Cornerstone of a Nation,
Oxford, New Delhi, 2006, p. 13.
8 Catharine Mayo (1867–1940), the American author. Her book Mother India
became infamous for denigrating the nation with misinformation.
9 Dev Arjun (Ed.), Gandhi-Nehru Correspondence – A Selection, National Book
Trust, India, New Delhi, 2011, p. 11.
10 Ibid., pp. 24–6.
11 Ibid., pp. 201–3.
12 Ibid., pp. 204–8.
13 Ibid., pp. 209–10.
14 Ibid., pp. 206–7.
15 Ghanshyamdas Birla, In the Shadow of the Mahatma, p. 288, Vakils, Feffer and
Simons, Bombay, 1968.
16 Quoted in Rajmohan Gandi, Mohandas, A True Story of a Man, His People, and
an Empire, Viking, New Delhi, 2006, p. 605.

65
Mahatma Gandhi and Sriman Narayan who articulated Gandhiji’s concepts of
constitution.
 5
THE GANDHIAN CONCEPTION
OF THE CONSTITUTION

Mahatma Gandhi not only led the Indian freedom movement, but had
deliberated on and guided in various fields of life. He was proponent of
none of the prevalent political philosophies, neither a follower nor even
a critic to any of them. He did not get bogged down in such theoretical
debates of political or sociological nature. He used to observe and ponder
over life and societal reality around and form his opinions. That is why he
is difficult to fit in any of known political philosophies. His words sought
to diagnose social life and prescribe therapy on its ailments. One can see
this method adopted by him caused some variations in his thinking. He
himself had advised that there was no certain philosophy named Gandhism
or Gandhivaad, and that he had been making series of experiments in pur-
suit of truth. He had taken up role of a social scientist. Varied subjects like
political science, sociology, religion, economics, health science, nutrition
science formed his field of research and experiments. ‘Gandhi thoughts’
were born out of practical experiences.
Gandhiji has not recorded his views on the Indian Constitution in a
single exclusive document. The picture of India’s future constitution he
had in his mind is found scattered here and there; one has to collect and
reconstruct his idea. One should also remember that Gandhiji was not a
scholar of political science. He came to think of post-independent India’s
political, economic and social structure while agitating for the indepen-
dence. He had come to conclusion beforehand about the picture of future
society, and then began advocating for a constitution that will shape the
society accordingly.
No doubt, the idea of constitution in Gandhiji’s mind was different from
constitutions of many countries framed in nineteenth or twentieth cen-
tury; but while pleading for a constitution of different priorities suitable to
our circumstances, his insistence for there being a proper constitution was
significant. Gandhiji too approved the idea of constitutional democracy.
Freedom, according to his definition, was ‘self-rule founded on self-made

67
 THE GANDHIAN CONCEPTION OF THE CONSTITUTION

constitution’; this meaning of freedom he had uttered in the midst of free-

dom movement. The parliamentary democracy was introduced to Indian
people by various ways during the British rule, and they had, during the
days of provincial autonomy, a short but direct experience of some of the
institutions also. Many of the Indian leaders were influenced by the sys-
tem of parliamentary democracy. However, Gandhiji had accepted only the
constitutional democracy; he did not approve the parliamentary and federal
system. The constitutional democracy is a broad concept, and the parlia-
mentary democracy is one of the forms of that concept. Gandhiji wanted to
have a document that will guide the nation in certain direction, and in this
sense, he was for a constitution. He would not approve an unhinged system
likely to take new directions after every election or after every generation.
Among the political leaders of the nation, he was the visionary who raised
the demand of a constitution, and linked it to the idea of freedom. That
entitles him for at least partial credit for the creation of the constitutional
system in India.

Hind Swaraj
We encounter Gandhiji’s ideas on social, economic and political structuring
first time combined in the pamphlet he wrote in 1909, titled Hind Swaraj.1
The pamphlet appeared first in the Indian Opinion, the weekly published in
South Africa, and was translated in many languages including Gujrati and
English. Then government of Bombay Province had proscribed it. India
celebrated centenary of this booklet in 2009, and it is viewed as an impor-
tant stage in Gandhiji’s thinking. He has expressed his ideas in the form of
question and answer, his questioner being the imagined readers.
He did not see emergence of freedom in acquisition of own army, own
flag and own parliament only. Carlyle had called the parliament ‘a talk-
ing shop of the world’. The parliamentary leaders care only for success of
their party and not for interests of the country, he pointed out. He also
reminded that people’s opinions, formed on basis of the newspapers, are
not necessarily right. Gandhiji’s views on the newly emergent culture in
Europe were not favourable. Thousands of people die in violence in wars,
and thousands sweat in factories suffering wretched life. Gandhiji identi-
fied superior wares and superior weapons as signs of this Western culture.
Britons could hold in bondage India not with their armed strength but
because Indians tolerated the foreign yoke, he stated, in mild but firm
words. Unity of Hindus and Muslims was imperative, he advocated, and
pleaded that disputes need not be taken to Britons and should be set-
tled by ourselves. Lawyers and doctors employ their professional know-
ledge more to serve their own interests than those of the society, he

68
 THE GANDHIAN CONCEPTION OF THE CONSTITUTION

complained. He wished the lawyers to counsel for eschewing litigation

and doctors to advise style of living that will not require prescriptions.
The method of armed struggle employed by Mazzini and Garibaldi to
free Italy was not suitable to India, according to Gandhiji, and he held that
Indian people would never take up arms because it was not an appropriate
way for India. As the British rule on India was unfair, the way to our free-
dom was to dissuade them from the vice, he argued, with support of many
illustrations, and followed it with his exposition of the Satyagrah and the
moral it needs.
Generally, education is taken as literal knowledge, but many things like
how to till farm, how to behave with seniors at home, how to conduct
oneself with people in the village, etc. should be included in education. For
education, may it be primary or higher education, important thing is what
you intend to do with it. Its utility depends on how much it helps one to
become a human being and to perform his or her duties. We yearn to learn
English out of false ideas of eminence and elegance, but in interactions
with others, English educated persons also leave imprint not of dignity but
of hypocrisy, hatred and unfairness. And so it is not true that mere Eng-
lish education makes a man civilized. On language instructions, Gandhiji
advises us to give preference to Indian language and learn each other’s lan-
guage. All and at least some people should learn, apart from their custom-
ary tongue, languages of other provinces; thus they will get rid of English
in their communication with each other. Humans can live comfortably
without machine-made goods. So why should we have machines which are
not essential? he asked.
Gandhiji has some specific counsel for Indians. He wanted the people
to resort to English only when they have no option; lawyers and judges
should not work in the court, instead they should use their knowledge to
ensure that people settle disputes between themselves out of court; doctors
should not experiment on animals to invent medicines, and not prescribe
those medicines which are useless; those who are well-off should not heed
the rulers and invest their money in swadeshi cottage industries; all should
vow to use swadeshi goods; such self-reliance will certainly lead to freedom,
he believed.
The picture of emergent India as visualized and painted by Gandhiji can
be viewed at both moral and material levels. That a lawyer should be well
prepared to present his clients brief in the court, but first both parties should
try to settle the issue amicably. Doctor should advise his patient to change
his life style and prescribe medicine in minimal measure and only when
inevitable. Even today, a good physician follows this restrain. Gandhiji’s
sensible expectation that instead of wantonly using English, Indian lan-
guages should become medium of communication is wholly ignored by us

69
 THE GANDHIAN CONCEPTION OF THE CONSTITUTION

today. Gandhiji had made in later period some amendment to his views on
machines as stated in 1909 in the Hind Swaraj and had signaled approval
to those machines which will not trim down employment. It should not be
forgotten that Hind Swaraj is a broad vision of prospective society and not
a draft of the constitution.

Aundh experiment
Aundh was a small princely state of some 70 or 72 villages, now in the
Satara district of south Maharashtra. The princely family was conferred
the title of Pratinidhi and the small estate for services rendered to Maratha
Kingdom in the troubled period of seventeenth century. Bhagvanrao
Pantpratinidhi, who ascended to throne of this state in 1923, believed
in the principle of power to people, whose representative would run the
administration and decide whatever assignment payable to the king.
Gandhiji blessed the idea of the king. A charter of democratic relations
between the king and the rayat was drawn up in 1938.2 Some days earlier,
young prince of the state, Appasaheb Pant, who was an activist in the free-
dom movement, had been on visit to Bangalore (now Bengaluru) when
he had a chance to meeting with Morris Freedman, a Polish by birth who
was employed as an electrical engineer in services of the Mysore State
and was interested in social radicalism. They had a discussion about the
prospective experiment of Swaraj in Aundh state and Freedman expressed
desire to visit Aundh. Freedman requested the then divan of Mysore, Sir
Mirza Ismail to allow him to go to Aundh as an advisor for some days,
but on denial of permission, resigned the job and shifted to Aundh. He
travelled to villages accompanying Appasaheb, observed peoples’ life and
joined in the democratic experiment the king had visualized. Squatting
with Appa on the floor of temple hall in Aundh, Freedman penned the
Charter granting freedom to people of Aundh, and it was proclaimed with
the approval of the king.
Very next month, the king visited Wardha to see Gandhiji and told him
his decision to hand over power to the people. Gandhiji was obviously
pleased on the proposal of the king who saw himself as servant of his peo-
ple. Gandhi personally dictated constitution of the state, which was taken
down verbatim, and the king carried it back to his state. Gandhiji wrote
after this meeting:

The king of Aundh appreciated people’s needs and wished their

social progress. The ruler of Aundh has but anticipated the wants
of his people and has even been in advance of them in social mat-
ters. The declaration of full responsibility was the natural result of

70
 THE GANDHIAN CONCEPTION OF THE CONSTITUTION

the past acts of the ruler. I hope that the rights conferred by the
proclamation will not in any way be whittled down in drawing up
the constitution. I would suggest that the privy purse should on
no account exceed rupees thirty-six thousand. There should be a
definition of fundamental rights, i.e., and equality of all in the eye
of the law, abolition of untouchability and liberty of speech. . . .
It is to be hoped that the noble example of Aundh will be copied
by the other States and that its people will by their conduct prove
themselves in every way worthy of the responsibility that is to
devolve on them.3

The constitution of Aundh

A constitution bill prepared in Aundh on the lines indicated by Gandhiji,
under its Article 2, gave every citizen, subject to regard to public moral-
ity and nonviolence, right to life, freedom of expression, right to assemble
peacefully, right to worship, equality before law, right to free basic educa-
tion, right to employment and right to minimum sustenance wages for it.
The legislature was to decide powers of the king. Every village or a group
of villages was to have a village council or the gram panchayat, and the
sarpanch was to be elected by the panchayat. Most of the functions like
arrangements for education, social welfare, water supply, sanitation and
sewage, roads, maintenance of public places, village pastures, bazaar were to
be handed over to the panchayat. The state was divided in four talukas, and
heads of all gram panchayats were ex officio members of the taluka panchayat.
The legislative assembly of the state was the body authorized to enact
laws. The assembly was to consist of all members of taluka panchayats and
two more members elected by each taluka. The whole legislature cannot be
dissolved, but every year, one-third of its members would retire. The speaker
and deputy speaker of the legislature were to be elected by the house. An
act passed by the legislature, after receiving consent of the king, was to be
proclaimed to come into effect. The king was to appoint, from members
of the legislature, a three-member cabinet of two ministers and one prime
minister. The legislature could adopt a no-confidence motion against the
cabinet. Disputes of small causes were to be settled by the panchayats; and
other cases by the chief justice appointed by the king. The chief justice
could hear original applications as well as appeals against decisions of the
panchayats. People’s delegates would hold key to public treasury and they
would decide the allowances for the king. ‘The king was the first servant
and the bearer of conscience of the people of Aundh,’ the draft constitution
declared. The constitution bill was adopted by the Aundh legislature and

71
 THE GANDHIAN CONCEPTION OF THE CONSTITUTION

was proclaimed on 21st January 1939, launching the experiment of consti-

tutional democracy in a small Indian state; this was tailored on Gandhiji’s
vision of constitution in which the village panchayat was the basic unit of
the state.
It was so that the affairs of village panchayat gained prominence and the
pantpratinidhi started handing over power to people’s representatives only
after the enactment of this constitution. A legislative council to give advice
to the king had come into existence in 1923 itself; one of its members was
appointed minister in 1935, and he was assigned some departments like
primary education, health, agricultural reform and cooperation. A three-
member ministry consisting of this minister, the divan of the state and the
king himself was running the administration. An act of compulsory primary
education was enacted by the Aundh state in 1916 and by 1930, every vil-
lage in the state boasted of at least one primary school. The state supported
education in two ways; it provided free education to all and scholarships to
needy students.4
Aundh administration used to be run according to this constitution for
some nine or ten years until the state merged with the Indian Union in
1948. Although Aundh was a small state, consisting of hardly 72 villages,
the experiment conducted there was noteworthy. The British rulers did not
like the pantpratinidhi’s action of preparing a new constitution and hand-
ing over powers to people, and they recorded their protest on it.
The Aundh state was formed with 19 islands landlocked by British-ruled
areas on all sides and spread in different districts. The village councils, apart
from being responsible for revenue collections and education, looked after
policing their areas, and still the state was comparatively much peaceful.
The state had tried to make the justice-delivery system prompt and eco-
nomical. Persons like Nanasaheb Chaphekar from Badalapur, Appasaheb
Bakhale from Satara used to sit in chairs of judges. Shankarrao Kirloskar,
the founder of Kirloskar industries, was a minister for some time. Son of the
king, Appasaheb Pant, who later went on to become ambassador of India,
was the chief minister of the state, and after his term, Ramappa Bidri Vakil
followed on the post. Aundh became debt-free state during the administra-
tion of swaraj. Many experts have certified that they found it to be an ideal
administration.
History has noted the administration for two more reasons. First was
encouragement given to industrialization: Kirloskars were given land to
open their factory near Kundal. The Ogale glass industry also received simi-
lar grant for their factory. A nephew of the king was encouraged to estab-
lish a soap factory in the state. Vedmahrashi Pandit Satvalekar, an eminent
Sanskrit scholar, had established a large printing press in Aundh. Another
progressive aspect of the Aundh administration included laws enacted for

72
 THE GANDHIAN CONCEPTION OF THE CONSTITUTION

eradication of untouchability, giving full inheritance rights to women and

easing of conditions for adoption. Although after granting of swaraj to
people the king remained only a constitutional head, the state continued
to receive guidance by him. Freedom fighters from British India were not
stifled in Aundh as happened in some other princely states. At zenith of the
movement, numerous freedom fighters found refuge in the friendly environ-
ment in Aundh.
Following promulgation of the new constitution, a panchayat act was
enacted to implement the scheme of panchayat raj in Aundh. The village
councils and town councils were authorized to look after education, health,
sanitation, bazaar and jatras, and other initiatives of public utilities. These
councils were authorized to hear minor cases of civil and criminal nature.
A book on this act, written by Appa Pant and printed in the government
printing press of Aundh, was published in 1940.5

Solitary experiment in Gandhian philosophy

The constitution of Aundh was in operation for around nine years. It had
followed Gandhiji’s philosophy in accepting the village as the basic unit.
The heads of village panchayats formed the taluka panchayat, and chiefs of
the taluka panchayats and delegates elected by them sat in the legislative
council. The authority to allocate funds from public treasury was vested
in people. Autonomy of decision making had percolated to ground level.
The geographical coverage of the experiment was not large, but it aimed to
assure efficacy of a constitution inspired by Gandhian philosophy. This was
the first and only experiment of a Gandhian constitution.
Writing in the Harijan on 26th July 1942, Gandhiji elaborated his idea of
prospective constitutional scheme of villages in free India.

My idea of a village swaraj is that it is a complete republic, inde-

pendent of its neighbours for its wants. Government of the village
will be conducted by a panchayat of five persons annually elected
by the adult villagers, male and female. . . . The panchayat will be
the legislature, judiciary and executive combined to operate . . . .
Any village can become such a republic today without much inter-
ference even from the present government whose sole effective
connection with the villages is the exaction of the village revenue.

Earlier, many years back on 6th August 1925, Gandhiji had written in
Young India, ‘If the village people will keep expecting that government
should regulate everything in their life even after the country gains inde-
pendence, then it cannot be thought to be true independence.’

73
 THE GANDHIAN CONCEPTION OF THE CONSTITUTION

Sriman Narayan’s exposition of Gandhian constitution

The Aundh constitution Gandhiji ordained was planned for a small princely
state. In drawing constitution for the country, one had to take into consid-
eration the whole of India, and its administrative units of provinces, dis-
tricts and talukas, and relations between them. Some national imperatives
had to be taken into account. One can trace from Gandhiji’s writings and
speeches the idea of Indian Constitution he had in his mind, and major pro-
visions he desired. The Gandhian Constitution of Free India, a book penned
by Sriman Narayan, helps us to view a general plan of the constitution from
his perspective.6 Sriman Narayan, who was principal of Sacceria College of
Commerce of Wardha, had participated in the freedom movement, and he
was a close follower of Gandhiji’s thinking. In post-independence period,
he had been India’s ambassador to Nepal for some time. Sriman Narayan
lived in Wardha and naturally could get many opportunities to interact with
Gandhiji. His book, that included a brief foreword by Gandhiji, was pub-
lished in 1946, when the Constituent Assembly was about to be launched,
and obviously, it carries significance. Gandhiji notes in the foreword that
Agrawal had been interpreting his (Gandhiji’s) writing for many years and
the manuscript had been shown to him before its publication. Agrawal had
made some alterations too on Gandhiji’s suggestion. ‘He has done what for
want of time I have failed to do,’ in these words Gandhiji has recommended
the book; hence there could be no reservations to regard the book as the
truthful presentation of Gandhiji’s thinking on constitution of India.
Mahatma Gandhi was that leader of India who took particular inter-
est in the evolution of Indian culture and civilization, observes Agrawal,
quite accurately. Gandhi viewed making of the constitution not only in
terms of political science or only in frame of constitutions as developed in
Western countries. While leading the freedom movement, he was thinking
and expressing his views on character of free India. In his thinking, basis
of ground circumstances as existed in India received weightage. Reforms in
India should be planned taking into consideration existent social and eco-
nomic structure; this was the direction of his thinking. He did not believe
in complete demolition of prevailing social and economic structure and
building anew in its place. And he was not willing to throw away whatever
good was there in India’s earlier social and economic structure.
When experts inspired by the Congress began preparations for framing
of the Indian Constitution, most of them had, unfortunately, never given
attention to the prevalent ancient institutions in India. These experts came
from English-educated elites, and were influenced by Western political the-
ories and values. Some of them had no relation at all to the independence
movement, and those who had participated in the movement had accepted

74
 THE GANDHIAN CONCEPTION OF THE CONSTITUTION

leadership of Gandhi in the agitation, but not necessarily his economics and
his beliefs about new social system. Many of the liberal intellectuals, who
were patriots but had kept distance from the movement, were impressed by
mainly the British type of parliamentary system. These circumstances were
bound to influence the process of constitution drafting.

Scientific examination of Gandhian philosophy

Significance of Agrawal’s exposition lies in that he examined Gandhian
thought in light of theories of Western philosophers and showed its efficacy
in contemporary period. ‘The constitution is not thing that can be imported;
every nation has its own civilization and culture, that we call soul of the
nation, and the constitution should be tailored to protect this uniqueness’;
quoting this observation by John Marriot in Dictatorship and Democracy,
Agrawal goes on to explain distinctiveness of Gandhian thought. Most of
the constitutions born in eighteenth and nineteenth centuries had adopted
system of Western democracy with political institutes of a broadly similar
method. It was but natural that those constitutions and political experi-
ments had influenced minds of Indian leadership. But Gandhiji viewed
constitution-making in light of Indian tradition and realities; while approv-
ing sound elements in Western education and administration, he had not
forgotten social and traditional political realities of India. His views were
shaped by long observation of public life in the country.
It fell to Sriman Narayan to examine Gandhiji’s concept of constitution
in light of established theoretical principles and to clarify if it was relevant
to time or not. Even if one would not accept all of his views and reasoning,
it should be agreed that Agrawal did his job neatly.
Why is ‘rule of or by majority’, which is the basic operative principle
of democratic working, deemed inadequate by many philosophers? And
why do they fear that democracy may fail? Raising these questions, Sriman
Narayan tells us that Gandhism is the only solution to this problem.
Gandhiji had said that if democracy is founded on violence, it will be inca-
pable to protect weak. He felt that democracy in Western countries was
nothing but a milder form of fascism or Nazism. In exercising democracy,
decentralization was the only way to steer clear of violence and coercion,
he reasoned. He has stated that despite many faults in the ancient village
system, it had carried seeds of ideal economic and political system. Agrawal
reminds us that political scientists like Adams and Laski had commended
decentralized system of governance. He says that the Indian villages had
implemented a balanced economic system which shunned both laissez faire
and absolute control, and Gandhiji saw it useful to continue.

75
 THE GANDHIAN CONCEPTION OF THE CONSTITUTION

New definition of Ramrajya

Explaining his idea of post-independence India, Gandhiji talked of
‘Ramrajya’, a well-understood term for Indian people. The classical epics
and folk tales have impressed in popular imagination the concept of Ram-
rajya as the state which gives joy to all, the state which is just and fair to
all and that was what Gandhi meant. Agrawal has quoted Gandhi’s words
from The Hindu dated 22nd June 1945:

It can be religiously translated as Kingdom of God on earth. Politi-

cally translated, it is perfect democracy in which, inequalities base
of possession and non-possession, colour, race or creed or sex van-
ish. In it, land and the state belong to the people. Justice is prompt,
perfect and cheap and, therefore, there is freedom of worship, and
of speech and the Press – all this because of the reign of the self-
imposed law of moral restraint. Such a state must be based on
truth and non-violence and must consist of prosperous, happy and
self-contained villages and village communities.

Gandhiji knew that if the villages were to decide to meet their wants
themselves with aim to become self-sufficient, people will have to limit
their needs; hence his commendation of simple living. Gandhiji’s urge
for simple living was born not out of compulsion of immediate reality of
poverty; he was aware how growing and excessive needs lead to chain of
misfortunes.
The constitution should ensure protection of fundamental rights,
Gandhiji insisted. The resolution of fundamental rights and economic
reconstruction he moved in the Karachi Congress was witness to his posi-
tion. Gandhiji and Nehru and some other leaders differed on the nature
of economic reconstruction, but all agreed on fundamental rights, which
they felt were essential. In Part II of the book, where he outlines Gandhiji’s
concept of constitution, Agrawal devotes the very first chapter to funda-
mental rights and duties of citizens. Following points were included in the
fundamental rights:

1 All citizens shall be equal before the law irrespective of caste, colour,
creed, sex, religion or material wealth.
2 No citizen shall suffer any disability on account of his or her religion,
caste or creed in regard to public employment, public honour, trade
and commerce.
3 Subject to principle of nonviolence and public morality, every citizen
will enjoy freedom of person, freedom of speech, freedom of assembly,
combination and discussion.

76
 THE GANDHIAN CONCEPTION OF THE CONSTITUTION

4 Every citizen will enjoy freedom of conscience and the right to follow
personal and social customs, subject to public order and morality.
5 All citizens shall be free to preserve and develop their script, language,
and culture.
6 All citizens shall have an equal right to the use of wells, tanks, roads,
schools and places of public resort, maintained out of state or local
funds, or dedicated by private person for the use of general public.
7 Every citizen shall be entitled to free basic education, otherwise known
as Nai Talim.
8 Every citizen shall have the right to obtain legal and police protection
from violence, compulsion or intimidation in regard to his or her per-
son and personal property.
9 Every citizen shall have the right to obtain a minimum living wage
through honest work or employment.
10 Every citizen will have the right to rest, by not being compelled to work
for more than eight hours a day.
11 Every citizen shall have the right to medical freedom. (Existing rules
and regulation regarding compulsory vaccination or inoculation shall
be suitably amended).
12 Every citizen shall have right to take part in public administration
through his or her vote on the basis of adult franchise.
13 Every citizen shall have the right to keep and bear arms in accordance
with rules and regulation made in this behalf.

Agrawal mentions following points as duties of the citizen:

1 All citizens shall be faithful to the state especially in time of national

emergencies and foreign aggression.
2 Every citizen shall promote public welfare by contributing to state
funds in cash, kind or labour as required by law.
3 Every citizen shall avoid, check and if necessary resist exploitation of
man by man.

Except the provision to carry arms, Agrawal had proposed, in slightly

different terms, almost all provisions in the present-day constitution. The
right to bear arms might have been inspired from the provision in Ameri-
can Constitution, a result of circumstances then prevailing in that country.
In India, only the Sikhs were needed to be given the right out of regard to
their religious belief. The phrase ‘in accordance with rules and regulations’
makes it clear that carrying of arms will not be allowed without a license;
and that is the position even today. In India, the right to bear arms with a
license is a legal right, and not a fundamental right.

77
 THE GANDHIAN CONCEPTION OF THE CONSTITUTION

Gandhi was firm to make village the basic unit; the Part II of the
Gandhian constitution as presented by Agrawal makes it clear. He pro-
posed a five-member village council (panchayat) elected by all adult persons
in the village, with a sarpanch unanimously chosen by the council. If the
council failed to make unanimity, the sarpanch will be elected not by the
majority of the panchayat but by fresh vote of the whole village. The elected
panchas (council members) could be removed by a resolution supported by
75 per cent of voters. The constitution expected that, so far as possible, the
panchayats will be elected by unanimity.

Function of the panchayats

Sriman Narayanji has listed powers and duties of the village panchayat
extensively. Since village was to be principal unit of administration, he
must have felt it necessary. It gives a fair idea about the kind of village
Gandhiji had in his mind. Village panchayats were to run and maintain
primary and lower basic school, a library and also a night school for adults.
It was to provide for akharas gymnasium and play grounds. Panchayats
were to arrange arts and crafts exhibitions and seasonal fairs and celebrate
festivals of all communities and bhajan and kirtan mandals and encour-
age folk dance and theatre. It was expected to provide village guards and
protect villagers from dacoits and wild animals. Gram panchayat was also
to look after fixing and collection of the land revenue, encourage coop-
erative farming, make proper arrangement for irrigation, provide seeds
and agricultural equipment through cooperative shops. As far as possible,
food grains necessary for the consumption of villagers were to be produced
in that village only. Efforts for the soil conservation were also expected
from them. Sanitation and proper drainage system, prevention of epidem-
ics, provisions of healthy drinking water also were included in the village
panchayat’s job. Villages were to organize the production of khadi and
other cottage industries, including a dairy on cooperative line. A tannery
using the hides of dead animals was also one of the expected functions.
Agricultural and industrial products were to be marketed by cooperative
societies and the godowns were also to be provided. Taxes were to be fixed
and collected by the village panchayats themselves and panchayats were
to have wide legal powers to impose criminal and civil cases to provide
cheap and speedy justice.
Talukas after the reorganization were to be smaller in size consisting of
about 20 villages. The term of village and taluka panchayats was to be
three years. Functions of the taluka panchayat were to guide, supervise and
coordinate the activities of the village panchayat, arrange for secondary
and upper basic education, maintain bigger hospitals and maternity homes.

78
 THE GANDHIAN CONCEPTION OF THE CONSTITUTION

They were to run taluka cooperative banks and marketing societies, main-
tain intervillage roads and arrange for intervillage sports. The district pan-
chayats were to run colleges, institutions for imparting post-basic education
and well-equipped hospital for special diseases; and they were also to run
the district cooperative bank and marketing societies and make arrange-
ments for irrigation.
The constitution envisaged a nagar panchayat or the town council, con-
sisting of panchayats of every ward, which will be responsible for traffic,
lighting and water supply in the town. Similarly, there will be a prant pan-
chayat or a provincial council consisting of all district panchayat heads,
and in case of smaller provinces, additional elected delegates one each by
the district panchayats. The provincial panchayat will look after university
education, higher technical education and research. Its functions included
transportation in the province, large irrigation projects, famine relief, pro-
vincial bank to finance the district panchayats, protection and planning of
natural resources and founding of basic industries. The constitution divided
prospective India into 19 provinces; with a separate province of Bombay
where both Marathi and Gujrati languages were to be spoken. Maharashtra
and Vidarbha including Nagpur were two more wholly Marathi-speaking
provinces as envisaged in the constitution. Hindustani was shown as the
language of present-day Hindi-speaking provinces. The provincial pan-
chayats were authorized to make laws, and the ministers of the provincial
governments were expected to be appointed on criterion of efficiency only
without regards to their party or caste.
An All India Panchayat consisting of all provincial panchayats was
planned, that would include all chairmen of provincial panchayats and in
case of large provinces one more elected delegate. Gandhiji was opposed
to the idea of bi-cameral legislature; he did not foresee an elected legisla-
ture making hasty decisions requiring a second chamber to correct it. The
princely states too were authorized to send their delegates to the All India
Panchayat. Responsibilities of the All India Panchayat included defence of
the country from aggressions, to raise a national defense force, to maintain
internal order, to coordinate various schemes prepared by the provinces, to
establish and run nationally important industries, to make arrangements
about currency, customs and international trade, to establish nationally
important research and technological institutes, to guide states to maintain
a common standard of education and to conduct foreign policy. The chair-
man of the panchayat will be the president of India. The panchayat will
appoint a cabinet and the ministers will be responsible to the panchayat.
As in provinces, ministers of All India Panchayat too were expected to
be selected strictly on merit. Hindustani was the national language and
it could be written both in devanagari and in Urdu scripts. The All India

79
 THE GANDHIAN CONCEPTION OF THE CONSTITUTION

Panchayat was a federation formed by the provinces and princely states

by their free will, and they were ensured autonomy, granting such units of
provinces or states right to secede from the federation.

Judiciary and election system

The constitution conferred the primary judicial authority on the village
councils. In cases involving complex points of law, the subjudge of the
taluka will visit the village to help and guide the panchayats to make a
decision. There would be no courts on the taluka level; there would be
district courts, appointed by the district panchayat; and appeals on their
decisions will be heard by the high courts and the Supreme Court as is
done presently. The Supreme Court had power to hear disputes between
provinces. A judge of the Supreme Court could not be removed before his
retirement age, except in the case of complaint of serious nature against
him. Although the judiciary was stated to be independent, the judges were
to be appointed by the panchayats on respective levels. The Supreme Court
was instructed to give particular attention to protection of fundamental
rights of minorities. As the prevalent laws were written in intricate and
complex language, the constitution asked to appoint an experts panel to
streamline and rewrite them.
The constitution had recognized adult franchise without regard to caste,
faith, race, gender or wealth or education. But a number of criteria were sug-
gested for contestants in an election like literacy, general education, experi-
ence of civic life, record of selfless service and self-sufficiency that will curb
lure of corruption. In a primary election, no propaganda was allowed as the
contestants were expected to be known to everyone in the village. Sepa-
rate constituencies were barred and there were only joint constituencies. In
addition to the system of election by open or secret polling by the voters,
Sriman Narayan has also written about the ancient Indian method of selec-
tion of representatives by drawing lots – even in the absence of a tie between
two candidates. The prevalence of such a method at that time is attested
by the inscriptions at Uttiramerur (or Uttaramerur) – which are quoted by
Dr Radha Kumud Mukharjee in his book Local Government in Ancient India.
If the candidates are equally qualified, what is the difference if any of them
was elected; this was the thinking behind acceptance of this mode.

The princely states and the minority question

The princely states were a big obstacle in way of Indian independence. The
British had retained the states to safeguard their rule; how can a dwarf claim
his so-called powers before a giant? Gandhiji asked. The princely regimes

80
 THE GANDHIAN CONCEPTION OF THE CONSTITUTION

were dual slavery, he observed, and predicted that these will come to end
one day. Gandhiji was not against raising of armed forces and police for
defence of the nation. Because of the typical geographical position, foreign
powers know that an assault on India risks a world war and they will not
gamble on it; and self-reliant India will not become a cause for an inter-
national conflict; nobody will crave to conquer it to capture its market, he
believed.
The minority (Muslim) question will not be solved with creation of Paki-
stan; on the contrary, it will become acute, he reasoned. He felt that the
autonomous units of the federation will ensure fair treatment to minori-
ties and protection of their fundamental rights. According to him, minor-
ity problem will find its own solution if we could raise standard of life of
all people leading to eradication of poverty. There should be co-operation
between nations and all should be treated equal. India should help those
who are under foreign yoke to regain their freedom. In international rela-
tions, there should be no discrimination on basis of race; and one nation
could never have power to rule other nation. This was the general thrust of
foreign policy stated in this constitution.

Taxation and national wealth

The constitution gave a brief but precise system for economy and taxa-
tion. Half of the revenue collected by the village will be given to the gram
panchayat or the village council and other half will be distributed between
the district, provincial and All India Panchayats; their share will be decided
by a finance commission to be appointed by the constituent assembly.
The agricultural income will be taxed in progressive ways; a bequest tax
on transfer of property beyond certain ceiling; and the income tax will be
assigned to the provincial government. There will be no tax on salt, and
total ban on alcohol will divest the government of any income from tax on
it. In rural areas, people will be encouraged to pay the tax in kind and in
labour instead of cash payment. Money earned from major industries and
public services will be assigned to the All India Panchayat.
All land in the country will be owned by the government and there will
be no jamindari. Land will be assigned to actual tiller; major basic industries
will be owned by the government; this will set resources of the nation in ser-
vice to the nation. Mines, rivers, forests, roads, airways, post and telegraph,
shipping and other sources of communication will be national wealth. Any
of these, if presently in private hand, will be taken over by the government,
of course with fair compensation.
All boys and girls up to 14 years of age will receive free and compulsory
education. The aim of education will be to make them self-reliant. Schools

81
 THE GANDHIAN CONCEPTION OF THE CONSTITUTION

will not give any physical punishment. Medium of instructions on all lev-
els will be mother tongue. Use of English medium is the major reason of
nation’s misfortune; and we will lose our soul if it is continued further,
Gandhiji felt. In his scheme, university education will focus on mainly
technological training and research. A graduate will be conferred his or her
degree only after he or she renders social service for one year.

The open jail

It will be futile to expect that with advent of swaraj, all crimes in country
will come to immediate end. But the jails in swaraj will be a kind of reform
homes. Agrawal has noted an example of an open jail established in Mos-
cow in Soviet Union. Gandhiji’s concept of open jail had been put into
practice by the king of Aundh.7 The constitution had asked to open special
homes for juvenile children. As the complexities of criminal laws contrib-
ute to swell criminal tendencies, Agrawal wanted to simplify these laws.
The panchayat had option to continue with services. They were authorized
to make additional appointments. The tri-colour flag with a charkha at the
centre, taken up by the people during the independence movement, was to
become the national banner under the constitution.
One should remember that the concept of constitution in Gandhiji’s
mind, as expounded in the book by Agrawal, was only an outline of the
constitution; an expert committee with keen eye to technical terminol-
ogy would be needed to frame the constitution. The sketch outlined in
the book seems rather disorderly, but it gives fair reflection of basic ideas
in Gandhiji’s mind, and Gandhiji himself has vouched for it. The book by
Agrawal was published in January 1946, few days before the Constituent
Assembly was formed and began its efforts. The reforms department and
the expert committee appointed by All India Congress Committee too had
just begun mapping features of the constitution. Gandhiji was the greatest
leader of the independence struggle of India and was called father of nation.
Did they critically examine views of the father of nation on constitution-
making, and to what extent accepted them, or preferred to ignore them?
We will take this question presently.

Notes
1 M. K. Gandhi, Hind Swaraj or Indian Home Rule, Navjivan, Ahmadabad, 1938.
2 Appa Pant, A Moment in Time, Bharatiya Vidya Bhavan, Mumbai, 1988,
pp. 26–8.
3 Harijan (Ed. Mahatma Gandhi): 12 November 1938.
4 Indira Rothermund, The Aundh Experiment, A Gandhian Grass Root Democracy,
Somaiya Publications Pvt Ltd, Mumbai, 1983, pp. 24–5.

82
 THE GANDHIAN CONCEPTION OF THE CONSTITUTION

5 Appa Pant, Administration of Gram Panchayats, Aundh Library, Typescript, 1945.

6 Sriman Narayan Agrawal, Gandhian Constitution for Free India, Kitabistan, Alla-
habad, 1946.
7 An act was enacted in 1944 on the Swatantrapur settlement of open jail. The
well-known Hindi film Do Ankheh Barah Hath was inspired by this settlement.

83
 6
THE CONSTITUENT ASSEMBLY
DECIDES

The Provisional Government was formed on 2nd November 1946; actually

it being the Executive Council of the Viceroy, Jawaharlal Nehru was desig-
nated as the vice president of the Executive Council. Virtually, he used to
do all tasks a prime minister performs today. Preparations for functioning
of the Constituent Assembly began very next week after he took oath of
office. Sir Benegal Rao met him to discuss the date of first seating of the
Assembly, procedure of its working and the nomination of the senior most
member as the provisional chairman, till a regular one was elected. Doubts
were raised if the meetings of the Constituent Assembly will be valid as
the Muslim League had boycotted it. B. N. Rao and Kanaiyalal Munshi
had expressed their opinions on this point. Majority of total members of
the Constituent Assembly were certain to attend the meetings, but from
certain provinces, very few delegates would be there. In Munshi’s opinion,
the meetings would be valid even if the League members remained absent;
but Rao observed that the League may take the issue of validity of the
meetings to the Federal Court. Finally it was decided to call the meeting
of the Assembly even as the boycott by League continued. The Constitu-
ent Assembly met on 9th December 1946, presided over by Satchidanand
Sinha. After his opening remarks, newly elected members presented their
credentials and took oath of membership.
The Congress had decided certain procedure about the Assembly’s func-
tioning; its members used to meet before the official seating commenced
and decide party’s line about the day’s agenda. Along with congressmen,
these meetings were open to those who were not members of the party but
were elected on its support. Non-Congress members of the ministry too
were welcome in these meetings. Many delegates like Alladi Krishnaswami
Aiyar, N. Gopalaswami Ayyangar, and Pt Hridaynath Kunzru had been
elected with support of the Congress but were not members of the party;
they also used to participate in these meetings. Dr Ambedkar also began to
attend these meetings after his re-election to the Assembly. Decisions taken

84
 THE CONSTITUENT ASSEMBLY DECIDES

in this meeting were later formally ratified in next seating of the Constitu-
ent Assembly.
The experts’ panel appointed by the Congress Party under chairmanship
of Nehru had taken some policy decisions after deliberations. Two members
of this panel, Prof Humayun Kabir and Prof Dhananjayrao Gadgil, were
not on the Constituent Assembly, but participated in deliberations of the
panel. Sardar Patel also attended sometimes. The panel met continuously
for four days in July 1946, and again four days in August. These meet-
ings discussed a number of important issues like powers of the provincial
and central governments, procedure for amending the constitution and the
issue of princely states. The panel prepared a draft of resolution on aims of
the constitution. It can be said that broad outline of the constitution was
set by this panel.
The decisions to adopt British model of parliamentary democracy and
the federal structure as laid down by the 1935 Act were seemingly taken
in this panel. The scheme in Gandhiji’s mind, based on the autonomous
village as the principal unit and formation of provincial and central govern-
ment through indirect elections, was not approved by this panel. Appar-
ently, this important and policy-laying panel did not give much thought to
the idea of constitution as conceived by Gandhiji.

Resolution on aims and objects

Jawaharlal Nehru moved the resolution on the Aims and Objects of the
Constitution in the Constituent Assembly on 13th December, which
declared that India would be an independent, sovereign republic; all per-
sons in India would enjoy social, economic and political justice, equal-
ity of status and opportunity, equality before law; freedom of thought,
expression, faith, worship, profession and organization; it would take
special protective steps for minorities and backward classes; and it would
strive to regain for this ancient land its appropriate place in the world
community.
The resolution asserted that the sovereign power rests with the people.
The real issue was what will be the institutional medium through which
the sovereignty flows to the people. Participating in the discussions on this
resolution, Minoo Masani made a mention of different streams of thought
living in India, and referred to insistence of Mahatma Gandhiji on this
score, quoting him from an interview given to Louis Fischer. Gandhiji had
said, ‘I want the center of power which now rests in big cities of New Delhi,
Calcutta and Bombay to be dispersed in seven lakh villages of India.’1
Minoo Masani was a socialist and close friend of Nehru. He was lone
member who mentioned Gandhiji’s wish. None of the Gandhians elected

85
 THE CONSTITUENT ASSEMBLY DECIDES

to the Constituent Assembly mentioned during the discussions on this

resolution any thought of passing on the sovereignty to villages. In the
discussions on aims of the constitution, there was little debate about distri-
bution of powers. Most of the speeches were devoted to support that part
of Nehru’s resolution, now contained in the Preamble of the Constitution,
assuring justice and protection of fundamental rights; another point of dis-
cussions was the suggestion by Jaykar to await for Muslim League to join
the Assembly. After passing the Resolution on Aims, the session of the
Assembly was adjourned on 21st of January 1947, and it was decided to
meet in April 1947 again; this span of four months was expected to resolve
the fate of partition after which further course of action could be chalked
accordingly, they surmised.
When the Constituent Assembly reconvened on 28th April 1947,
India’s partition was confirmed. Delegates elected to the Constituent
Assembly from provinces of Bengal and Punjab that were going to be
partitioned, and Sindh, North Western Frontier Province, Baluchistan
slated to go to Pakistan, lost their membership. Some members of Muslim
League who were elected from the provinces remaining with India also
lost their membership since they had migrated. These seats were to be
filled in by by-elections.
The first session in December-January was shadowed by the uncertainty
of Muslim League joining the Assembly, and not much business could be
transacted except the passing of the Resolution on Aims. Now the Assem-
bly got up with task swiftly. Before adjourning for a long break on 24th
January 1947, a committee to deliberate and recommend on issues of funda-
mental rights of the citizens and rights of minorities was formed under the
leadership of Vallabhbhai Patel. Another committee, appointed on 25th
January under the leadership of Jawaharlal Nehru, was told to delineate
powers of the Union government. In April 1947, these committees pre-
sented their reports to the Constituent Assembly; and on 30th April, a
committee under the leadership of Vallabhbhai to suggest constitutional
provisions relating to the provinces and other one led by Jawaharlal Nehru
to recommend basic principles of the central constitution were formed.
Both these committees presented their reports in months of June and July.
No mention of any panchayat system could be found in reports of these
committees, not even in their deliberations.
This primary but vital task over, by-elections to the vacant seats were
held. Most of the vacated seats in India being reserved seats for Mus-
lims went to members of the League, former and present. Dr Babasaheb
Ambedkar was elected unopposed on 14th July 1947 on a seat vacated by
Mukundrao Jaykar who had resigned following differences of opinion dur-
ing the debate on Resolution on Aims.

86
 THE CONSTITUENT ASSEMBLY DECIDES

Formation of Drafting Committee

At that time, a number of reports and drafts were available to the Con-
stituent Assembly, including a draft of constitution prepared by Sir
Benegal Narsing Rao after studying constitutions of various countries, a
framework of the constitution outlining powers of central government as
recommended by Jawaharlal Nehru-led committee, and another report
of Vallabhbhai Patel committee recommending fundamental nature of
the constitution of the states. A draft drawing essence of these docu-
ments would be needed to ensure a smooth debate in the Constituent
Assembly; it required elaborate phrasing, taking into consideration their
meanings followed in different constitutions. Powers and limitations of
the central and state governments and different wings of the state were
to be delineated. It was not only tedious job; it called for balanced and
studied approach. By a resolution on 29th August 1947, a seven-member
committee to prepare the draft constitution which would serve the basis
for discussion was constituted. It included Alladi Krishnaswami Aiyar,
N. Gopalaswami Ayyangar, Dr B. R. Ambedkar, Kanaiyalal Munshi, Syed
Mohammed Sadullah, B. N. Mittal and D. P. Khaitan. Dr Ambedkar, who
had joined the government as minister only 14 days earlier, was elected
chairman of the drafting committee. The committee wrote the draft of
the constitution in less than six months and presented it to the Constitu-
ent Assembly on 21st February 1948.
Several members of the drafting committee used to remain absent to
many meetings and Dr Ambedkar had to shoulder considerable burden of
the responsibility. His work did not end with preparing the lengthy draft;
he had to reply to debates in the Constituent Assembly. He had to decide
whether to accept or reject amendments suggested during the article-wise
discussions; many times, new phrases were put forward which had to be
taken into consideration. The Constituent Assembly was a legislative body;
and to pilot such a huge piece of legislation through the extensive debates,
responding to various points and winning approval, was perhaps a record
performance.
The chairman of the Constituent Assembly Dr Rajendra Prasad on 10th
May1948 wrote a letter to the constitutional advisor Benegal Narsing Rao.
He would like the constitution to begin from the village and go up to the
centre, he suggested. In his view, the adult franchise be exercised to elect
the village panchayat, after which all higher panchayats and the provincial
and central legislatures should be elected by indirect elections, not by direct
polls. Rao replied that they had already adopted the principle that the leg-
islatures on both provincial and central levels will be elected by directs
elections and adult franchise; and this cannot be reversed now.2

87
 THE CONSTITUENT ASSEMBLY DECIDES

Gandhiji also took note of the fact that the village was not accepted as
the basic administrative unit in the draft constitution. In December 1947,
during a conference of constructive workers organized by the Constructive
Work Committee of the Congress, Acharya Kripalani, Shankarrao Deo and
Rang Rao Diwakar posed a question to Gandhiji:

As the Congress, after having captured power, failed to give to the

constructive work sufficient importance or attention; would it not
be better for all the constructive workers to form themselves into
a separate body for the vigorous prosecution of the constructive
work?

Gandhiji responded at length in his address; he said,

Today, politics has become corrupt. Anybody who goes into poli-
tics is contaminated. . . . Has what I am doing today penetrated
your hearts? (If yes) Then you should have strength to remove
corruption, wheresoever it may be. For that you need not go into
Committee. Your work is among the masses. The Constituent
Assembly is today forging the constitution. Do not bother about
affecting changes in it. Shriman Narayan Agrawal has written to
me that in the Constitution that is being framed now, there is no
mention of grampanchayat, whereas the Congressman have always
said that the grampanchayat must be the foundation of our future
polity. We have to resuscitate the village, make it prosperous and
give it more education and more power. What good will the Con-
stitution be if the village does not find its due place in it? But we
must recognize the fact that the social order of our dreams cannot
come through the Congress of today. Nobody knows what shape
the Constitution will ultimately take. I say, leave it to those who
are labouring at it. . . . And supposing you get a Constitution after
your heart, but it does not work. Think of the root and take care of
it as much as you can and make self-purification the sole criterion.
Even a handful imbued with this spirit will be able to transform
the atmosphere. The people will soon perceive the change and
they will not be slow to respond it. Yours is a uphill and difficult
task but it is full of rich promise.3

This speech is very clear; Gandhiji seems to have abandoned hope of

realizing his dream of new India through the Constituent Assembly and
the constitution it was preparing. He was disappointed about both the Con-
stituent Assembly and the Congress Party.

88
 THE CONSTITUENT ASSEMBLY DECIDES

The draft prepared by the drafting committee was sent to all mem-
bers of the Constituent Assembly for their perusal and suggestions; the
committee took into consideration all suggestions and amendments, and
the revised draft was formally tabled in the Constituent Assembly by
Dr Babasaheb Ambedkar on 4th November 1948. In the first reading,
following parliamentary practice, the discussion was devoted to general
nature of the Bill of Constitution, which continued for a week and ended
on 9th November. One of the reservations raised in the discussions of very
first reading was it did not reflect Gandhiji’s thought.

Debate on village primacy

Dr Ambedkar had, in his address on 4th November while presenting the
draft, had mentioned that the village and district panchayats were not
taken as basis because members, in their written submissions, had recorded
adverse opinions in this regard. Quoting Metcalfe’s observation of the vil-
lages looking only for themselves without caring who ruled the country,
Dr Ambedkar said that village republics cannot be justified only because of
their longevity; ‘the village is a sink of localism, a den of ignorance, narrow
mindedness and communalism,’ he observed.4
Damodarswarup Seth, moving an amendment to the draft constitution
on 5th November, referred to Gandhiji’s thought and significance of vil-
lages in our system.

I want to ask whether there is any mention of villages and any

place for them in the structure of this great Constitution. No,
nowhere. The constitution of a free country should be based on
‘local self-government’. We see nothing of local self-government
anywhere in this Constitution. This Constitution as a whole,
instead of being evolved from our life and reared from the bottom
upwards is being imported from outside and built above down-
wards. . . . Mahatma Gandhi emphasized the fact that too much
centralization of power makes that power totalitarian and takes it
towards fascist ideals.5

Participating in the debate, Prof Shibbanlal Saxena referred to Sriman

Narayan’s book explaining the constitution of Gandhiji’s dreams and
pleaded to ponder over it seriously.6 Shibbanlal thought that even if the
draft was finalized, they could change it as they wished and incorporate
Gandhiji’s concepts in it.
Participating in the debate, Hari Vishnu Kamath challenged Dr Ambed-
kar’s opinion that Indian villages were ‘dens of narrow mindedness,

89
 THE CONSTITUENT ASSEMBLY DECIDES

communalism and exploitation’. Buttressing his point with writings of

Dr Kashiprasad Jaiswal and Sri Aurobindo, he emphasized that national
character of India was founded on villages. Raising the question why there
should be a state, Kamath reminded that Gandhiji had tried all his life to
end the conflict between the citizen and the state, or at least bring balance
between them. Kamath pointed towards a possible reason he sensed for
non-inclusion of the Gandhian thought in the draft constitution prepared
by the drafting committee, ‘among the members of which no one, with
the sole exception of Munshi, had taken any active part in the struggle
for our country’s freedom’ and perhaps that is why they did not remember
Gandhiji.7 This conjecture of Kamath was wrong and unfair to the drafting
committee, because it was tasked to prepare the draft in light of whatever
decisions and recommendations on the nature of the constitution that were
already made; the committee was not authorized to take any different policy
decision. The earlier experts committee appointed by the Congress Work-
ing Committee had, in deciding the principles of the constitution, rejected
the option of making the village basic autonomous unit and electing the
provincial and central panchayats by indirect elections. That committee
included some leaders like Jawaharlal Nehru, Barrister Asaf Ali, Kanaiya-
lal Munshi who had participated in the freedom struggle. Granville Aus-
tin had, before he wrote his book on Indian Constitution, interviewed Dr
Dhananjayrao Gadgil, one of the expert members, who candidly agreed
that Gandhiji’s concept of constitution was rejected by their committee. Dr
Gadgil had published in 1948 a booklet titled ‘Some Reflections on Indian
Constitution’ which makes no mention of Gandhiji’s suggestion of making
the village basic unit and any reaction on it.
Neither the committee on central constitution (which outlined powers
of the centre) led by Jawaharlal Nehru nor another on principles of the pro-
vincial constitution that was led by Vallabhbhai Patel has in their reports
appraised Gandhiji’s thought on villages. The Congress leadership which
decided the basic character of the constitution did not insist on Gandhiji’s
concept; they were determined on introducing British-style parliamentary
democracy in India.
The two committees led by Nehru and Patel that were tasked to draw
rough outline of part of the constitution that related to the powers of centre
and provinces and relevant principles ended in finalizing character of the
constitution. That it will be the British-style parliamentary democracy and
that the Government of India Act of 1935 will be followed for the distri-
bution of powers between the centre and the provinces; these two points
had been firmly settled in these two reports. Furthermore, leadership of
these two had such a wide support that most the members of the majority
Congress Party in the Constituent Assembly would have, in case of any

90
 THE CONSTITUENT ASSEMBLY DECIDES

discord, accepted word of these two leaders; such was their mental state.
In difficult situations and disagreements, people used to turn to Nehru and
Patel for guidance. Even during Vallabhbhai’s illness, people used to go to
his home seeking advice. T. T. Krishnamachari, a member of the drafting
committee, lauded contributions of Nehru and Patel in his speech on 25th
November 1949. Mentioning inspiration and guidance by these two lead-
ers, Krishnamachari said, ‘After all, they are the true makers of the Indian
constitution.’8
Some more speakers in the discussions on first reading of the Constitu-
tion Bill expressed dissatisfaction for discounting Gandhiji’s concept in the
draft. ‘This constitution will only indicate to the outside world that we have
no originality and only borrow from the constitutions of other countries. I
say emphatically that the constitution is not what is wanted by the country,’
lamented Ramnarayan Singh representing Bihar.9 Shibbanlal Saxena, the
aforementioned member, told the members that Metcalfe’s description of
the villages was not correct.

As one who has done work in villages and has experience of the
working of Congress Village Panchayats for the last 25 years, I can
say that this picture is purely imaginary. . . . I personally feel, if we
bring to these villages panchayats all the light and all the knowl-
edge which the country and the world have gathered, they will
become the most potent forces for holding the country together
and for its progress towards the ideal of Ramrajya.10

Sir Alladi Krishnaswami Aiyar, a jurist who was a member of the draft-
ing committee, offered an explanation for not giving separate status to the
villages.

With the large powers vested in the provincial or State legisla-

tures in regard to local self-Government and other matters, there
is nothing to prevent the provincial legislatures, from constitut-
ing the village as administrative units for the discharge of various
functions vested in the State Government.11

This, in legal sense, was a correct statement, but actual experience is

adverse; in some provinces, elections to the village panchayat were not held
for more than 40 years, and even where the elections were held, in the absence
of constitutional status to the village councils, large irregularities continued.
Finally the parliament had to rectify its mistake by amendment to the consti-
tution. The 73rd Constitutional Amendment added Part IX and Part IX A to
the constitution giving constitutional status to village panchayats, municipal

91
 THE CONSTITUENT ASSEMBLY DECIDES

councils and the district panchayats. This made regularly holding elections
to the local self-government obligatory on the state governments. Now the
elections are held on schedule, but still there is vacillation in transferring
powers in many subjects which the states can hand over to the village pan-
chayat. The schedule attached by the aforementioned 73rd Constitutional
Amendment lists many powers which are not entrusted to the village pan-
chayats; perhaps the people’s representatives elected from the constituencies
no more trust the village leadership.
Senior Congress leader Prof N. G. Ranga, who was a known Gandhian,
addressed the Constituent Assembly on 9th November. Stating at the very
beginning that he was most unhappy on observations of Dr Ambedkar on
villages, Prof Ranga regretted the draft did not reflect Gandhiji’s concept of
constitution.

Mahatma Gandhi has pleaded over a period of thirty years for

decentralization. We as Congressmen are committed to decentral-
ization. . . . In the Objectives Resolution that we passed in the
beginning we wanted provinces to have the residual powers, but
within a short period of two years public opinion rather has been
interpreted by those drafters to have swung to the other extreme,
to complete centralization at the Centre and strengthening the
Centre over much.12

Mahaveer Tyagi spoke bluntly. He said,

The circumstances have changed from what they were when this
work was entrusted to the Drafting Committee. It is very unfortu-
nate that, in the history of India, the lamp which lit our hearts with
pleasures of freedom was put out suddenly and we were steeped in
sorrow. . . . The ideology also has changed to a great extent. Now
to give that old picture on the canvas will be making the picture
a back number. We must examine the picture from the point of
view of Gandhiji, through his eyes. His eyes are not with us, but
still there are persons in this House who have the glimpse of his
eyes. It must not be forgotten that this Constituent Assembly is
the fruit of the labour of those who worked day and night for about
thirty years in their attempt to win freedom. It is their achieve-
ment. It is they who should have given us the Constitution. They
alone are competent to draw up the Constitution. The Constitu-
tion should have been the work of revolutionaries alone. But since
this Assembly has been constituted by the British we cannot think
of the other possibilities and it could not be purely a Gandhian

92
 THE CONSTITUENT ASSEMBLY DECIDES

Constitution altogether. . . . In this Constitution, I must confess, I

am very much disappointed. I see nothing Gandhian in this Con-
stitution. It is not the fault of the Drafting Committee. It is our
own fault. When we decided upon the principles of this Consti-
tution we gave them certain basic principles to work upon. . . .
Gandhiji had always been keen on total prohibition in the coun-
try, but the Constitution does not say a word about it. To say in
the Draft Constitution that people shall not be deprived of their
property without adequate compensation means that India will
ever belong to the vested interests. . . . Gandhiji had said that the
wealthy should consider themselves only as custodians of wealth.
He never went to the extent to which we are going in this Draft
Constitution (giving protection to right to property). Only if revo-
lution is meant to be avoided we should let the door remain open
for coming generations, if they ever so desire, to socialize all vested
interests and all means of production in the country. If we shut the
door as we have done against future socialization, by our Article
24(2), I submit, the youth of India will rise and knock at the doors
and smash it and the result would be a bloody revolution.13

The first reading of the revised draft was completed on 9th Novem-
ber 1948 and the Assembly passed a resolution to take up the draft for
article-wise consideration. It was opened with discussion on the Pre-
amble; but shortly it was postponed to later stage and was taken up only
at the end of discussion on the draft. Prof Shibbanlal Saxena moved an
amendment to the Preamble seeking to add at the beginning, before
current phrasing of ‘we, the people of India, having solemnly resolved to
constitute India into a sovereign, secular, democratic socialist republic
etc’. following words: ‘In the name of God the almighty under whose
inspiration and guidance, the father of the nation Mahatma Gandhi who
led the nation from slavery into freedom, etc.’ Immediately after speech
of Saxena, Brijeshwar Prasad rose to object, saying,

I do not want that the name of Mahatma Gandhi should be incor-

porated in this constitution because it is not a Gandhian constitu-
tion. The foundation stone of this constitution is the decisions
of the American Supreme Court. It is the Government of India
Act, 1935 repeated again.

Brijeshwar Prasad had been so annoyed that he termed the constitution

as ‘rotten’. It was Acharya Kripalani on whose request Saxena withdrew his
amendment.14

93
 THE CONSTITUENT ASSEMBLY DECIDES

Following criticism that the constitution did not grant any powers to the
village panchayats, and even did not mention them, the Congress Party
decided to bring them in the Directive Principles. This was the compro-
mise solution; accordingly K. Santhanam moved on 22nd November 1948
an amendment to add a new Article 31 A (now Article 40) to the con-
stitution. The Article says: ‘The State shall take steps to organize village
panchayats and endow them with such powers and authority as may be
necessary to enable them to function as units of self-government.’15
On 23rd November 1948, in continuing debate on the Directive Prin-
ciples, Mahavir Tyagi proposed an amendment to the Article 34 of the
draft, adding a subclause that ‘the State shall encourage use of swadeshi
items to promote cottage industries and endeavor to make the rural areas
self-sufficient’.16 Sensing mood of members following some discussion on
this amendment, Dr Ambedkar agreed to partially accept it. The direc-
tive to the state to promote cottage industries appears in Article 43 of
the final text of the constitution. Some members had insisted to provide
for total prohibition; as the Article 47 enjoins the state to raise level of
public health, it has also directed ‘to endeavour to bring about prohibi-
tion of the consumption, except for medicinal purposes, of intoxicating
drinks and of drugs which are injurious to health’.
Proponent of Gandhian thought could only partly succeed to include
some of the points for which Gandhiji was insistent, in the advisory part
of the constitution. Points not included in the draft in Part IV, that is in
Articles 36 to 40, but added later are:

1 To establish village panchayat and grant them and other panchayats

(like town or district panchayats) necessary powers;
2 To promote cottage industries to make the villages self-sufficient;
3 To try to bring prohibition of alcohol and other intoxicating drugs.

This must have been the result of intraparty discussions; no voting was
taken on these amendments as Dr Ambedkar, mover of the bill, himself
accepted them. Gandhiji’s demand of total prohibition on cow slaughter
was not included in constitution; it did not get place in the directive prin-
ciples also; only in the Article 48 laws to ban slaughter of cows and milch
animals were mentioned. The overall shape of the constitution could not
be carved according to Gandhiji’s concept. Gandhians could win only small
battles to include these three points in the directive principles.
In Gandhiji’s concept, the highest legislature or the parliament of India
would have been a single chamber body, formed by indirect elections. As
the village panchayats themselves were denied the constitutional status,
there remained no question of holding indirect elections by them to the

94
 THE CONSTITUENT ASSEMBLY DECIDES

district panchayats and through those to the state and central panchay-
ats. Nobody talked about indirect election when the draft Article 67, sub-
clause 6, that provided for electing members of the Loksabha on the basis
of franchise granted to all Indians above age of 21 years, came up for discus-
sion. The Assembly ratified the proposal; now the age is reduced to 18 years.
The article-wise discussion was completed on 16th November, and on
the very next day, a resolution was moved that the constitution as amended
be approved. Now it was the third reading of the constitution and the
members were expected to give their comments on overall structure of
the constitution as it was shaped. In this discussion too, many members
expressed dissatisfaction that Gandhiji’s concepts were excluded from the
constitution; but none of them thought in terms of rejecting the document.
R. K. Sidhwa referring in his speech to adult franchise, one of the basic
tenets of Congress now enshrined in the constitution, said that even the
illiterate persons many times give their opinions and vote quite thought-
fully; but he lamented that the gramswaraj and autonomy of villages in
Gandhiji’s dream could not be included in the constitution. Prof Ranga
regretted that the central authority was made too strong but expressed hope
that people who had fought for freedom under the leadership of Gandhiji
would follow their intellect and conscience in the implementation of the
constitution and preserve the democracy.
Damodarswroop Seth was blunt in his expression. He reminded that
members of the Constituent Assembly are elected by legislators, who them-
selves were elected by a limited franchise. Then he proceeded to remark

we, who are here in this House as the representatives of the public
have failed to fulfil our duty for which we had assembled here due
to various reasons and causes such as party politics. It is for this
reason that the people of India are particularly faced with disap-
pointment again as they had seen after the change of Govern-
ment. Then, we have to consider, what is in store for us? . . . This
Constitution cannot work permanently in this country.17

A balanced comment
Towards the fag end of third reading in the last week, one of the significant
speeches was made by Shankarrao Deo, the well-known Gandhian leader
who had been member of the Congress Working Committee for long time.
At the onset, he appreciated the efforts of drafting committee, saying,

While appointing the draftsman of our constitution, we were

eager to have the knowledge of the constitutional pandits, and

95
 THE CONSTITUENT ASSEMBLY DECIDES

the precision of the constitutional lawyers and we have got them

in full measure. Dr. Ambedkar and his associates or his colleagues
of the Drafting Committee deserve our gratitude.

But following his temperament of frank and free speech, he assailed that
in framing of the constitution they had not shown regard to leadership that
had emerged from the freedom movement. He said,

We did not choose to have the wisdom of the statesmen whose

main asset is mother wit and commonsense, nor did we choose to
fashion our Constitution in the spirit of our Revolution, because
none of the makers of this present Constitution can claim to have
passed the test of revolutionary struggle which preceded the year
1946 when the Constituent Assembly met. In fact, the Constitu-
tion can hardly be called the ‘child’ of the Indian Revolution.
Look at the Constitutions of the world which are the products
of revolutions. . . . Though we have that come to power on the
crest of a non-violent Revolution led by Mahatma Gandhi, still
we must admit that the principles on which that Revolution was
based have not gone deep into the body politic or in the Indian
society. We must admit that, though we followed him, we did
not accept his entire conception of life. It was a political Revolu-
tion which has given us power-political – which we have tried
to embody in this Constitution. But as far as social or economic
conceptions of Mahatma Gandhi’s ideology of life are concerned,
we must admit that we have to travel for before we can say that we
are anything near to them.

Towards end of his speech, Shankarrao Deo agreed that some of the
principles for which Mahatma Gandhi and the organization had asserted
were included in the constitution and for which we should feel proud. He
remarked,

Our Constitution, we can assert, has given political freedom and

democracy in full measure, because it is based on the principle of
adult franchise. . . . If we have imbibed the teachings of Mahatma
Gandhi, then we can go ahead with full faith in our people, and
if today there is any guarantee against the fissiparous or disruptive
forces and tendencies in this country, then in my humble opinion,
it is this principle of adult franchise. This guarantees us as far as
possible for a Constitution to guarantee, that the progress of this
country will be on peaceful and democratic lines.18

96
 THE CONSTITUENT ASSEMBLY DECIDES

We have seen points of basic difference between the course adopted in

the draft constitution and path in minds of Gandhians; but in some of the
parts, there were no differences between the Congress leaders who deter-
mined the principles of constitution and the framers who modelled it. For
inclusion of this part in the Constitution, some credit will have to go to
Mahatma Gandhi, his leadership and the Congress organization, and to
the freedom struggle they fought. Starting from Article 9 to Article 24 in
Part III of the draft, various fundamental rights of the citizen are listed;
this part is a revised version of the resolution on fundamental rights that
was passed in Karachi Congress in 1931. This resolution was moved by
Mahatma Gandhi and seconded by Jawaharlal Nehru; and its terminol-
ogy was finalized after discussions between these two leaders. The Resolu-
tion on the Aims and Objectives of the Constitution moved by Jawaharlal
Nehru at the commencement of the Constituent Assembly also stated that
the Constitution will ensure political, social and economic justice to all
citizens and protection to their fundamental rights. There were discussions
in the Assembly on the phraseology, but no digression of any basic nature.
Doubts were expressed on the propriety of inclusion of right to property,
which later proved true and step-by-step amendments have removed this
right from the list of fundamental rights.
Article 11 in Part of Fundamental Rights (now Article 17) abolished
untouchability and declared it a punishable offence. Eradication of
untouchability was made part of Congress programme right from 1924.
Gandhiji and the Congress Party had persistently tried to pull Hindu soci-
ety from this inhuman practice. The leadership that had emerged from
the Dalit community itself had begun to resist injustices they faced. Many
social struggles from Vaikom temple satyagraha to Chavadaar Taale move-
ment at Mahad in Maharashtra had created awakening in both high castes
and Dalits elements of the society. Leaders like Dr Babasaheb Ambedkar
rose from the Dalit community and it was providential that the honour to
table the constitution containing declaration of abolition of untouchability
fell on Dr Ambedkar.
Mahatma Gandhi had left this world as the Constituent Assembly went
with its task; the constitution was framed and approved by members who
held him in high regards. This constitution had rejected many notions
Gandhiji had in his minds. It had refused to regard the villages as the basic
unit. It accepted the British Parliamentary system and federalism with a
strong centre. There were many reasons for doing so.
The country had been partitioned as the constituent assembly embarked
on the exercise. Pakistan was born and thousands of people lost lives. Lakhs
became homeless; massive deluge of refugees created huge problem of their
rehabilitation. Pakistan invaded Kashmir through tribal bands. Although

97
 THE CONSTITUENT ASSEMBLY DECIDES

most of the princely states had merged into the Union, Hyderabad and
Kashmir issues remained unresolved. In both cases, the government of
India had to resort to force for different reasons. The communist leadership,
meeting in Calcutta in 1948, had seen it as most opportune time for armed
uprising. Their directive fuelled armed rebellion in Telangana. Widespread
scarcity of food grains was experienced; many essential commodities had
become out of reach. The circumstances were such that anybody would
prefer a strong central government. The central government was led by
leaders like Jawaharlal Nehru and Vallabhbhai Patel, both revered by entire
India. The result was little assertion for decentralization of political power.
The circumstances had finalized shape of the constitution.
A contradictory scene was reflected constantly in the discussions in
Constituent Assembly. On the one hand, immense respect was shown to
Mahatma Gandhi; the house saluted him whenever an article like aboli-
tion of untouchbility was passed. But a constitution of his dreams giving
preference to rural India and making it autonomous was disowned by the
Congress leadership. His concepts were not helpful for India’s defence and
development in prevailing circumstances, they believed.

Notes
1 Constituent Assembly Debates, Official Report, Book 1. Reprint, Lok Sabha
Secretariat, New Delhi, p. 63.
2 Austin, The Indian Constitution, p. 35.
3 Quoted in D. G. Tendulkar’s: Mahatma, Vol. VIII, p. 229.
4 C.A.D. Book 3, p. 39.
5 C.A.D. Book 3, p. 212.
6 C.A.D. Book 3, p. 216.
7 C.A.D. Book 3, p. 219.
8 C.A.D. Book 6, p. 961.
9 C.A.D. Book 3, p. 249.
10 C.A.D. Book 3, p. 285.
11 C.A.D. Book 3, p. 336.
12 C.A.D. Book 3, p. 350.
13 C.A.D. Book 3, pp. 360–1.
14 C.A.D. Book 6, pp. 444–5.
15 C.A.D. Book 3, p. 520.
16 C.A.D. Book 3, p. 530.
17 C.A.D. Book 6, p. 694.
18 C.A.D. Book 6, pp. 729–31.

98
 EPILOGUE

Gandhian ideology in the Constitution

The Indian Constitution could not be shaped according to Mahatma
Gandhi’s views; this is the general perception, and it is substantially true.
But it will be wrong to say that there is nothing Gandhian in it. The inde-
pendence of India should arrive in the form of a constitutional state, and
the constitution would have to be framed by the Indian people themselves;
this was the contention of the Congress, and Gandhiji himself was propo-
nent of this line. The Congress organization and Gandhiji both were insis-
tent for fundamental rights of the citizens, and even 16–17 years before the
Constituent Assembly came into being, in course of the freedom struggle,
a resolution specifically demanding fundamental rights and elaborating
those rights had been adopted on forum of the Indian National Congress.
Jawaharlal Nehru and Gandhiji were the two authors of that resolution.
That India would be a secular nation and the minorities would have rights
to protect their culture and religion; this also was proclaimed by the Con-
gress and Gandhiji on many occasions. Congress was on record that all
citizens should have right to progress and equal opportunity of progress.
The Congress and Gandhiji were firm on adult franchise; it meant that
every adult in country would have right to vote and could choose represen-
tatives through his vote. The Congress policy inherently presumed direct
elections to the legislatures. This policy was revealed through many of its
resolutions, memorandums and other ways, and certainly, Gandhiji was a
partner in this process.
Credit goes to Gandhiji for two more significant points in the Constitu-
tion. His was immense contribution in awakening public opinion against
inhuman practices like untouchability. It was on his insistence that eradi-
cation of untouchability found place in Congress programme. From among
those who suffered this inhuman custom rose leaders like Dr Ambedkar and
he also launched a struggle by resorting to agitations. All these things in

99
 EPILOGUE

totality resulted in creating public opinion for abolition of untouchability

in the independent India. Article 17 included in the constitution has abol-
ished untouchability and declared it a punishable offence. The Preamble
of the Constitution has assured political, social and economic justice to
all citizens; and liberty, equality and fraternity are deemed to be basis of
the system. The freedom movement had valued these things and Mahatma
Gandhi and the Congress had insisted for it. Overall awakening in the
world and circumstances of history were certainly responsible for inclusion
of these values in the constitution; but Gandhiji’s leadership also deserves
credit for the achievements.
Although such significant parts of the constitution were result of poli-
cies of Congress, the freedom movement and leadership of Gandhiji, it
did not acknowledge the village as the basic unit with constitutional
authority and powers of planning and taxation that was the main thrust
of Gandhiji’s discourse. The Congress Party had accepted his leader-
ship during the freedom struggle, regarded him the guiding spirit of the
movement; even in times of strong differences, his advice was generally
respected. But the Constituent Assembly did not accept all of his opin-
ions on the shape of the constitution that chalked path for country to
travel after the independence; not only that, the Assembly failed to hold
any serious or separate debate on his views.
Why was Gandhiji, hailed as the highest leader of the nation, was dis-
regarded in this manner when chalking future political set-up of indepen-
dent India? Why was Gandhiji’s concept of national structure founded on
the gramswarajya (self-rule of the village) could not be integrated in the
constitution? While mulling on such issues, one is struck by uniqueness of
Gandhiji. First, he was not an academic theorist trained in modern politi-
cal science. He was a path seeker, a social thinker who subjected various
aspects of life to his independent genius. It is very difficult to place Gandhiji
in the ranks of established school of political science that derived from
Hobbes-Locke-Rousseau. Second, Gandhiji deliberated in his innovative
way such concepts as rights, privileges, duties, state power and democracy
in relation to the individual and the society of which he is an element, as
against the approach of modern political science that treats these concepts
only relative to the state and the individual, and their association with each
other. Modern political science articulates principle behind each of these
concepts that define relations between the state and the citizen; Gandhiji
offers not much on individual’s relation with the state, but examines these
concepts anew in reference to relations between the individual and the
society of which he himself is a part. Third, and this is significant, that in
his scheme of thought these concepts shed aridity of theorizing, and acquire

100
 EPILOGUE

a moral import. He did not want to reduce relations between individuals,

as well as between the individual and the society to grass material level;
these relations should be bound by much superior thread of social morality,
he thought.

Democracy
The way he enlarged the idea of democracy was notable. In his mind,
democracy was not the rule of the majority. Functioning according to
majority decision is an element of democracy that could be easily applied;
and recourse to it is inevitable. But Gandhiji wanted opinions of all peo-
ple to be taken in consideration and the decision to be made with concur-
rence of all; that is the true spirit of democracy, he thought. Suppression
of minority by majority is nothing but a kind of violence, he felt. Efforts
for unanimity should be continued to the last, he seems to indicate. In
an article published in the Young India on 8th December 1931, Gandhiji
wrote:

Let us not push the mandate theory to ridiculous extremes and

become slaves to resolutions of majorities. That would be a revival
of brute force in a more virulent form. If rights of minorities are
to be respected. it will be the duty of majority to see to it that the
minorities receive a proper hearing and are not otherwise exposed
to insults.

This interpretation of democracy led him to one more position: that

democracy cannot be created through violent ways. He pointed out the
example of the French Revolution to buttress this position. A change of
regime brought about through violent means will not uphold freedom of
individual, he felt. He wrote in the Harijan on 27th March 1939,

True democracy or the Swaraj of the masses can never come through
untruthful and violent means, for the simple reason that the natu-
ral corollary to their use would be to remove all opposition through
suppression or extermination of the antagonist. That does not
make for individual freedom. The individual freedom can have
the fullest play only under regime of unadulterated ahimsa.

The word ahimsa was not limited to shunning of arms and avoidance
of physical harm but disregarding a minority opinion was also a kind of
violence, he felt.

101
 EPILOGUE

Swaraj
In Gandhiji’s vision, freedom or swaraj did not connote the limited sense
of geographical freedom of the nation. Mere replacement of alien rulers by
indigenous representatives will not bring about the complete freedom or
poorna swaraj; he had deeper and wider meaning of swaraj in his mind. And
congressmen did not fathom the meaning of freedom although it was knock-
ing on the door, he stated. Political freedom of the nation was one element of
the swaraj; but swaraj will require Indians to free themselves from influences
of alien culture and thought and become competent to think independently,
he implied. This he has clarified in Hind Swaraj. He stated that swaraj will
not be complete if people retained language and thought of earlier rulers.
Fetters of thought too, like fetters of authority, make a man slave, he felt. He
wanted the freedom to grow from the bottom, with every village becoming
like a republic wielding full powers. How can the village swaraj survive under
the shadow of a powerful central regime? Its decision-making potency itself
will be clipped, he feared. The village should be free because it is more likely
to keep the individual free. Free individuals living in the free village will be
competent to interact on equal level with each other as well as with outer
world, he maintained. ‘Independence must begin at the bottom,’ he insisted;
the bottom was the village and every individual living in it.
Man suffers servitude not only from an alien power; many times he
relinquishes on his own independent decision-making capacity, or hands
over it to some dominant ideology. Gandhiji exhorts to free oneself from
this self-inflicted mental servitude. In a sense, it is a struggle with oneself.
For him, one more implication of freedom was economic freedom. How
could the individual gain economic freedom? First, he should have the right
to toil and right to get compensation for it and that should be adequate to
take care of his minimum needs. If he is able to live a human existence, then
only he will be in a position to enjoy other freedoms. Second, he should
be able to identify his true needs, so that he would not jump in competi-
tion that leads to violence. The economic freedom should go together with
social freedom. Hence Gandhiji spent major part of his life in the eradication
of untouchability. He strove for equal rights of women for the same reason.
Gandhiji talks not of privileges but speaks in language of morality that it was
sin to deny natural rights of others.

State power
The individual is at the centre of Gandhiji’s idea of power. He opposed
giant machines partly because it will shrink employment, but also because it
will gain more importance than the man who will be relegated to secondary

102
 EPILOGUE

status. A machine that will not reduce employment and will be supportive
to human labour is acceptable to him as such a machine will be subservient
to command and need of the worker; human discretion will remain intact.
Under the state that became powerful, the individual finds himself helpless,
forgetting that the state was created by his authority in first place. It is not
true that the legislature was source of state power; it rests in the individuals
and they hand over it to legislature, he asserted. He wrote,

We have long been accustomed to think that power comes only

through Legislative Assemblies. I have regarded this belief as a
grave error brought about by inertia or hypnotism. . . . The truth
is that power resides in the people and it is entrusted to the time
being to those whom they may choose as their representatives.
Parliaments have no power or even existences independent of the
people. It has been my effort for the last twenty one years to con-
vince the people of this simple truth. (Constructive Programme:
Its Meaning and Place. CWMG, Vol. lxxv, pp. 146–6)

Gandhi and Nehru: two distinct pass

Mahatma Gandhi and Jawaharlal Nehru had basic differences on model-
ling political and economic society of independent India. Ultimately, it
was Nehru’s concept of society that largely prevailed in the constitution.
The British-style parliamentary system, heavy industries for industrial
progress of the nation, infrastructure development like power and irriga-
tion, democratic socialism and affirmative action for the weaker sections
of the country all these were hallmarks of Nehruvian political philosophy.
Gandhiji wanted a village-dominated society that will, he thought, con-
tinue cooperative relations between men. He pleaded for simple living and
a production mode that will support values of human labour. Surplus of
human labour becomes vehicle of exploitation in the capitalist economy,
and this, in Gandhiji’s view, was a kind of violence. Increasing the human
needs cannot be called progress; hence these should be kept in limit, he
insisted. This picture of prospective society in Gandhiji’s mind was totally
different from the picture Nehru had in his mind. Both had, right from 1928
to the formation of the Constituent Assembly, expressed their differences
candidly to each other. (We have discussed in detail these differences in the
fourth chapter.) Gandhiji always kept in mind that he himself had chosen
Nehru as his political successor who would be the leader of tomorrow’s
independent India and he least desired political conflict with his heir. In
these circumstances he had only one option; and that was to move away
from the debates on the character of the constitution, which he did.

103
 EPILOGUE

Future arrangements
Gandhiji used to express, from time to time, his views on future edifice of
the society that reflected concept of constitution he had in his mind. This
began from the Hind Swaraj he wrote in 1909, and although Congress Party
and its leadership evidently respected his views, they did not accept these
in entirety. Congress had never agreed that the village would be the basic
and autonomous unit, that only the village panchayat election would be by
direct voting and that elections on all other levels including the legislature
would be by indirect vote. The principle of autonomy of village too never
appears to be part of Congress policy. Many Congress leaders had adopted
simple living under the influence of Gandhiji and began wearing khadi and
even spinning yarn. The charkha had become a symbol of war on poverty,
of self-reliance and, to some extent, of freedom struggle; but most of the
congressmen believed that all problems would not get solved only with
the charkha or constructive work. Gandhiji used to give constructive pro-
gramme to keep workers engaged whenever the satyagraha movement was
suspended or the movement waned for some reasons. In these constructive
programmes, literally thousands of people took part; but the charkha and vil-
lage autonomy were not imagined in political canvass of independent India.
Congress did not say that the Government of India Act of 1935 should
have given, along with the distribution of powers between the centre and
the provinces, separate powers to the villages too; Congress participated in
elections held according to that act and formed ministries for some time.
It is true that under an alien rule, the law made by the sovereign can be
worked or broken, but cannot be easily changed. And at that point of time,
even Gandhiji’s views on constitution had not taken definite shape. Those
were evolving, slowly. We have before us some models of Gandhian consti-
tution evolved according to requirement, like the constitution framed for
Aundh state under the guidance of Gandhiji, and another one authored by
Sriman Narayan for independent India after sounding mind of Gandhiji.
Gandhiji was not a constitutional expert and he himself had acknowledged
it. His views on the expected core content of the constitution came as
tenets, expressed by a philosopher from time to time.

The autonomous and self-reliant village

The status of village that Gandhji imagined in political, social and eco-
nomic structure of independent India was multi-faceted. In his scheme, the
basic unit of governance would be the village, with adequate powers to con-
duct their administration; the panchayat would be elected by direct adult
franchise and village panchayat members would in turn elect the taluka

104
 EPILOGUE

panchayat, its members would vote for the district panchayat elections,
and in that order, up to the election of national panchayat by indirect vote.
He was firm that the village should have all tri-categories of powers, to
make its own rules, enforce those rules and try cases of crimes and disputes
in the villages. The village panchayat would decide measure and mode of
levies in the village and collect them; it would look after arrangements of
sanitation, health and education in the village, he thought. The village in
his concept would have authority to draw its own development plan and
implement it. In place of present centralized planning he sought decentral-
ized one. In his view, problems of villages could be better grasped by the
village dwellers only.
Gandhiji wanted every village to be economically self-sufficient. He
felt that daily needs of the villagers could be satisfied with produces of the
village. Only a self-sufficient village could be autonomous; if it became
dependent, it would come under the influence of others. There was one
more assumption behind his defense of village autonomy: people depen-
dent on each other will sustain each other and live in harmony. The
oilman, the weaver, the ironsmith and the carpenter of the village were
required by everybody to satisfy their needs; hence all others will treat
them well and will supply their wants, it was believed.
It does not follow that his idea of village self-sufficiency was so tight
that no exception was allowed. Even in such times when peoples’ needs
were taken care of with produce from the village and from nearby villages,
some articles had to be brought from away; for example, salt and coconuts
were being imported from Konkan to satisfy needs of the people of Desh
or the area known as Deccan. Many more examples can be added.
Gandhiji’s concept of village swaraj demanded, along with self-
sufficiency and self-reliance, political autonomy also. In an article pub-
lished in Harijan dated 26th July 1942, he wrote,

My idea of village swaraj is that it is a complete republic, indepen-

dent of its neighbor for its own vita wants. . . . The government
of the village will be conducted by the Panchayat of five persons,
annually elected by the adult villagers. . . . Panchayat will be leg-
islature, judiciary and executive combined to operate. . . . Here is
perfect democracy based upon individual freedom.

Many Indians believe that the village in Gandhiji’s dream actually

existed in Indian social system sometime in history. The villages faraway
from the developments in the political centre of the country sustained
their existence by making their own independent arrangements. Gandhiji

105
 EPILOGUE

imagined that every village should, as far as possible, satisfy its wants
and should not depend on others, so that it will safeguard its autonomy.
When such autonomy was real, it was so only because of geographical
reasons and for lack of material resources. A different version of auton-
omy is isolation. Until the beginning of nineteenth century, not even
bullock cart tracks existed in the Western Maharashtra; cargo brought to
Maharashtra across Sahyadri ranges had to be hauled over heads by men.
Similar conditions prevailed in nearly every part of the country until the
colonial government introduced railways and undertook the construction
of roads and bridges. The bullock carts did not have spokes wheels but
those were of made of solid wood. This made transport by bullock cart
difficult. Spokes wheels came later; and transportation done on camels
and donkeys slowly shifted to bullock carts. Till these developments took
place, communication between two villages was extremely demanding.1
In those days, items produced in a place could be supplied in the same
or at the most in one or two neighbouring villages. People had to use oil
squeezed by the village oilman (teli) and wear fabric woven by the village
weaver. This had continued not out of some ethical notions; it was a kind
of necessity created by the existing conditions. Because of close familiar-
ity between the producer and the consumer, the trade could be conducted
by barter system and this was a certain advantage.
Onerous communication was one reason of the isolation of villages;
another problem was little scope for selection from goods of different vari-
eties and qualities for satisfying a particular need. Not much variation
can be discerned between cloth woven in one village and that woven in
another village, or oil tilled by the teli in one’s village and that produced
in another village. Nowadays the consumer has so many options to choose
from; that was not so in bygone days. And notions of living standard,
false or true, have led to unbound inflation of needs that was not there
in old days.
Means of transport were meagre and also expensive; and therefore
luxury goods meant only for kings and the affluent classes were trans-
ported, generally to the capital city, or to some large town. In days of
uncertain political conditions, even consignments of such items had to
be suspended. The villages were so autonomous that they were oblivious
of what happened in the capitals. (This is recorded by many economic
historians.) Their only concern was how to save themselves from loot and
plunder by marauders. The rulers in medieval period were feudal; rarely
was a king concerned about the material well-being of his subjects. Others
cared only for loot and plunder and accumulation of wealth for them-
selves and for their feudal buddies. If a Sher Shah built roads and planted
trees on either side, history took particular note of it. Nobody thought of

106
 EPILOGUE

any public amenities for villages. Hence the villages were left undisturbed
as they remained; this kept their autonomy intact. This autonomy was, in
a way, compulsion and the state was not inclined to meddle in affairs of
the village because it had no gain in it.

Metcalfe’s opinion and rejoinder

Sir Charles Metcalfe’s observations on Indian village, recorded in his min-
utes of 1830, are widely known. He wrote:

The village communities are little republics, having nearly every-

thing they want within themselves, and almost independent of
any foreign relations. They seem to last where nothing else does.
Dynasty after dynasty tumbles down. Revolution succeeds to revo-
lution, but the village communities remain the same. This union
of the village communities, each one forming a separate state in
itself, has contributed more than any other cause to the preserva-
tion of people of India . . . and is in a high degree of conducive to
their happiness and to the enjoyment of a great portion of freedom
and independence. I wish, therefore, that the village constitution
should never be disturbed.

In considering this opinion of Charles Metcalfe on autonomy and inde-

pendence of Indian villages, one thing should be remembered. He was an
officer in the administration of ruling East India Company, concerned
more with land revenue. The governments in pre-British India did not
enter into revenue settlement with each farmer independently; the vil-
lage used to pay a combined levy on the whole village to the government.
This way, it should have been easier for the government to collect the
dues. Second, the government need not dabble in the affairs of the auton-
omous village. Still we should note the positive part about autonomy in
the observations of Metcalfe.
Dr Ambedkar and many others have severely criticized the minutes of
Metcalfe. Dr Ambedkar, in his address to the Constituent Assembly on
4th November 1948, described the villages as ‘den of ignorance, mean-
mindedness and communalism’.2 Karl Marx saw life in Indian village as
‘uncivilized, barbarian’ and wanted to destroy the ‘regressive village sys-
tem if humanity was to make any advance’. He asserted,

We must not forget that these idyllic village communities, inoffen-

sive though they may appear, had always been the solid foundation
of Oriental despotism, that they restrained human mind within

107
 EPILOGUE

the smallest possible compass, making it the unresisting tool of

superstition enslaving it beneath the traditional rules.3

Metcalfe had noted one upshot of isolation of the village. Having no

contact with outside world, the villages were cut off from new knowl-
edge, changes in the world and new thinking. Second, those who were
dominant in the village had opportunity to exploit others, and according
to some commentators, social formation was so strong that it became dif-
ficult to seek redress against the exploitation.
Today the village scene has totally transformed. Communication has
eased. Nearby towns or cities offer a number of options of consumer goods.
Efforts to boost human wants through artificial ways (like advertising,
new standards of prestige, improvement in quality of goods, etc.) have
gained greatly. This exercise of pumping up human wants is not confined
to turf of market or economics, but it has begun affecting the Indian social
and political system too. Gandhiji’s teaching of simple living with his own
example was easier to follow in his days than today; allurements were few
and far between. Not so anymore. Human nature of passion for gratifica-
tion has been made the foundation of our economic life. In Gandhiji’s
days, simple living and wearing of khadi was associated with struggle for
independence and equality, giving both an ethical footing. Nowadays, no
such idealism is positively linked to simple living as in past. The swadeshi
or swagrami (vow to patronize goods produced in own village) can main-
tain such ethical bonding only in exceptional times, not for all times.
Day by day, as means of communication expanded, that self-sufficiency,
consequential autonomy and the resultant isolation melted away. The
process had begun in Gandhiji’s lifetime itself; now it has spread, barring
some remote, tribal belts, all over. Today not even a country can remain
completely self-sufficient, economically autonomous and isolated from
others; obviously that is impossible for a village. In his times also, there
were not many committed persons who, in face of finer and cheaper for-
eign goods available in the market, had pledged to use goods made only
in his country or in his village; today there is hardly any.

Proliferating wants
Now, standard of living, including that of the village dweller, has changed a
good deal. List of his essential needs has expanded to add many new things,
like the writing pen or the bath soap, which cannot be seen, as wasteful. As
income rises, standard of living is bound to improve, and with it, the need
to purchase goods that are more useful or of better quality; these expenses
need not be seen as extravagant. It will not be fair to ask villagers to deny

108
 EPILOGUE

themselves things like the cooking gas or stainless steel vessels and evi-
dently, all such goods cannot be manufactured and marketed at remunera-
tive prices in the village. If the market offers better and affordable goods,
and communication to the market from home is easy, the consumer natu-
rally shifts his or her choices.
Supporters of Gandhian thought, like Satish Kumar, a multifaceted
Indian activist, pacifist and thinker who now lives in England, believe
that the village could remain self-sufficient even in these days. They
imagine that every village should have its own carpenter, a cobbler, a pot-
ter, a mason, a weaver, a teacher, a technician, a banker, a trader, an artist
and a preacher too. They take such scheme of swadeshi to be practicable
even today. Gandhiji wanted the village to be not only self-sufficient but
autonomous also, and he imagined India as the confederation of such
village republics; Satish Kumar says he agrees with this.4 Academician
Sudheendra Kulkarni, who studied Gandhian thought in the perspec-
tive of modern science and technology, sees no possibility of the village
republics imagined by Satish Kumar materializing in reality. According
to Kulkarni, the village community cannot become self-sufficient now
as it has not remained aloof from the urban society. If we do not revisit
the concept of swadeshi in frame of present reality, Gandhiji’s model will
become only a relic of history, he thinks.5 Urbanization growing apace
currently is accepted as inevitable. In 1971, 20.22 per cent of the total
population lived in the cities; in 2001, the proportion had grown to 27.78 per
cent. In states like Tamil Nadu, Maharashtra, Gujarat, the pace of urban-
ization is still faster; in these states, 43.86, 42.40 and 37.35 per cent of
people, respectively, live in the cities.6
In the process of raising standard of living, there are one or two dilem-
mas discordant with the principle of equitable development. Standard of
living did not rise equally for all sections of village community. Benefits of
development schemes do not reach many sections of the society who are
politically fragile. They do not possess purchasing power to buy new goods
from the city, and articles that used to be available in the village and even
the balutedar artisans who made them, are fast disappearing. One more
process is going on. A science of marketing has emerged which, seeking
to vend certain goods, invents new wants with the help of advertising.
Shops are filled up with these goods of seeming necessity but needless in
actuality. Mobile phone is a need, but not as significant as a toilet; how-
ever, there are more mobile phones than toilets in rural India, a survey has
revealed. The artificially raised standard of living is becoming a model in
modern society. It is not only difficult but impossible to stop it. In such
a situation, prerequisite to make available to the people who really need
goods, like grains, sugar, edible oil and common cloth, continues. This

109
 EPILOGUE

remains a challenge facing the public distribution system and cooperative

stores in the country.

Gandhi: revolutionary philosopher and leader

Gandhij was trying to make most of Indian social system founded on reli-
gion and tradition. This does not mean he was a traditionalist leader, cling-
ing to fossils. His attempts at revolution in all three fields of religion, social
modes and politics were simply unprecedented. Although he called himself
an orthodox, he sought to change at least some of the customs which put
the society in the clasp of religion. Untouchability was one such deep-
rooted custom, and it was not easy to awaken public mind against it which
Gandhiji tried to do. He sought the help of Hindu shastris to establish that
untouchability was not part of fundamentals of the Hindu philosophy.
Since religion had primacy in the society he thought it crucial to show
that the religion disapproved customs like untouchability. He also made
efforts to win equal and respectable status for women with male. ‘I will not
address a public meeting if minimum of five ladies are not present’, this was
the rule he had set some time. Women began to attend political meetings,
and even offered satyagraha and went to jails; they became part of political
life; a major part of the credit for this change goes to Gandhiji. His was
significant contribution in efforts to end the common notion of women not
being equal of men. He proved, in both South Africa and India, that one
can fight for one’s demands in nonviolent way. It is to only his credit that
the Indian freedom struggle, while remaining nonviolent, became ardent.
Instead of demolishing the religion or social structure, he thought of how
it could be utilized, or what changes could be brought in it. It is agreed that
he was the man who blended ethical values to Indian politics. He aimed
that along with the religion, social life and politics, a man’s personal life
also should remain free of violence, and that means agreeing to non-exploi-
tation of others. The village-centred society was a practical manifestation
of his philosophy.

The dream and the reality

There were many who held that the village in Gandhiji’s imagination did
not exist in reality and they saw no possibility of it materializing in future
also. They thought that the village based on harmony and cooperation can
be pictured only in dreams. As they saw it, the sense of cooperation was
lost and social and economic exploitation took its place. Only the well-to-
do sections came to dominate and the villages being isolated from outside

110
 EPILOGUE

world, there was none to challenge their despotism. The autonomy had
turned into isolation that in turn helped in exploitation. The example of
lesser artisans, workers or the balutedars is suffice to explain this change.
The balute system was born out of need to satisfy wants of the village
through cooperation with each other. Later on, in recent days, the land
owners stopped treating the balutedars with respect as earlier, who were now
reduced to obtain the rightful annual compensation for their labours as if
they were beggars. The dalits, who were employed in the common manual
works of the village, were relegated to worst conditions. Leave alone get-
ting their wages regularly, they came to suffer humiliation. Nowadays, the
balutedars like carpenter, ironsmith, cobbler and barber have left the vil-
lage, migrating to bigger towns or cities, and they offer their services on
cash term; the system of balute has ended. This transformation of village was
taking shape in days when the constitution was being written, and Jawa-
harlal Nehru as well as Ambedkar were quite aware of it. We have already
seen the views of Nehru as expressed in his letter to Gandhiji and also those
of Ambedkar. Socialist leader and thinker Ashok Mehta too had candidly
observed, ‘Village community has generally broken down; the villages pres-
ent a picture of economic debris and social decay.’7
Jaiprakash Narayan has noted both positive and negative aspects of the
Indian village. Talk of welfare of the whole nation is beyond the compre-
hension of common man; he cannot grasp the interest of 37 crores Indi-
ans (as the population stood at the time); but if we tell him something
beneficial to his village, he can easily appreciate it, Jaiprakash observed.
At the time the British left India, there could not have remained a sin-
gle village that could claim some affiliation to the village republics of
bygone age, noted Jaiprakash. According to him, most of the traditions
we inherited were detrimental to democracy, and the schemes of local
self-government or cooperative principle we are trying to introduce in
the villages are not rooted in the past. Aim of these schemes is to teach
the villagers to think logically and motivate them for change and devel-
opment, he affirmed.8
There lives a community in southern France that has preserved, in
actual practice, the idea of autonomous village akin to a religious belief.
This experiment was launched by Joseph Jean Lanza del Vasto (1901–81)
who, after a meeting with Gandhiji in 1937, had assumed the name Shan-
tidas as conferred by Gandhiji. During the days of bhoodan movement he
had visited India to see Vinoba Bhave. This community, known as the
‘Ark’, is settled in some one thousand acres of land in the vicinity of the
Languedoc hills. Around 50 persons live collective life based on truth,
love and tolerance to each other. They fulfil all of their wants themselves,

111
 EPILOGUE

and bring in no outside articles and assistance. They have tried to main-
tain their autonomy and independence by means of simple living. Every
year, more than 3,000 people visit their settlement.9
The question is whether the experiment in the settlement would be
preserved as an exhibition of a relic or people around the world would
take inspiration from it. Until today, no replication of completely autono-
mous village like ‘Ark’ is found anywhere in the world. However, one
should appreciate the people who, upholding commitment against uni-
versal trends, carry on the experiment.
Noted economist Dr Dhananjayrao Gadgil, who was vice chairman
of the planning commission for some time, has observed that a village
cannot be taken as a viable unit in planning. As in planning for even a
primary and small unit, several aspects including supply and demand sides
have to be taken into account, the basic unit for planning will have to be
no less than the area under an Agricultural Market Committee, Dr Gadgil
suggested.10 It is a moot question if a village can be deemed the unit for
planning, but there is no dispute that planning should develop from bot-
tom to top; in the absence of participation of village dwellers, schemes
initiated or imposed from top do not get much success.
Cooperative institutions could play a constructive role in India’s rural
rebuilding; on this point there was unanimity between Mahatma Gandhi
and Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru. The draft of Gandhian constitution pre-
sented by Sriman Narayan Agrawal suggests that there will be coopera-
tive establishments for village industries, dairy, marketing of produce from
agriculture and village industries and warehouses for grains. ‘In small vil-
lages where people knew each other since long times, and affinity akin to
familial relations prevailed, cooperative institutions will be successful; in
such atmosphere, it is easier to work in cooperation,’ observed Nehru.11
Everybody felt, even the planning commission felt, that traditional har-
mony and community feeling inherited by the Indian villages from his-
torical times would help in success of cooperative movement; but none
of them except Gandhiji thought that this harmony would be useful to
make the panchayats autonomous to function as basic constitutional units
with political authority. If the village harboured evils of domination, hun-
ger for power and communalism, these are bound to harm the cooperative
economy also, and that includes even its politics; this can be seen reflected
in the disaster of cooperative movement today. Under the government’s
lead, the cooperative moment grew numerically but lost its soul, as a spirit
of cooperation evaporated. The only purpose remained was to get benefits
of government subsidies, and moreover, to corner those benefits for oneself
by misusing offices of authority.

112
 EPILOGUE

Village in danger of extinction

Although the self-sufficient and autonomous villages in Gandhiji’s dream
have become unfeasible today, the crucial question the planners face now
is whether the Indian villages will continue to be there, and whether a
large section of population should continue to live in the villages. Leaving
such decisions to market will entail the only option, somewhat cruel one,
of allowing the collapse of the social structure, ignoring collateral human
issues. Nowadays, we see several abandoned houses in every village. The
Tenancy Laws were enacted with an aim to give ownership of the land to
the tillers; according to a survey ordered for the Planning Commission,
powerful tenants became beneficiaries and weak landowners were losers
in the implementation of the Tenancy Laws, but not only that; dominant
landowners escaped from net of the act and their tenants were robbed of
any benefit of the law. Now the money power triumphs on everything and
most of the land is being offered for sale. Fascinated by escalating prices, the
tiller-owner surrenders his land, many times for non-farming purposes, and
moves out of the village, acquiring short-lived riches and perpetual misery.
Irrigated lands under dams, which were built with money paid by the public
through taxes, are being released for non-farming purposes on vast scale.
This is a national crime; and it should be made penal. With the country
being short of resources, why is this misuse of irrigated land allowed? One
does not intend to oppose industrialization; certainly factories should be
built, but only on waste lands or one with low productivity. And roads from
that place to the cities should be reckoned as a part of the expenses on that
industry.
While standard of living rose and purchasing power of the village
dwellers also increased, no sustained efforts were made to provide essen-
tial modern amenities in the village itself. For either lack of funds or
absence of proper priority in planning, the village saw not much of mate-
rial improvement. Mere availability of material facilities is not enough to
raise the standard of living; there will have to be available in the village
employment that allows one to maintain that standard. Only in such
conditions, a village can be made one’s permanent domicile. Two types
of people are migrating from villages today. First, those who are rich or
fancy to become rich; they feel necessity to shift for the children’s educa-
tion and the parents’ political activities. These families have moved to
nearby cities.
The second class consists of labourers who could not get sustenance
wages in the village and consequently seek alternate work. This class
would not move to nearby city but would prefer to shift directly to big
cities like Bombay, or at least to smaller cities like Kolhapur, Aurangabad,

113
 EPILOGUE

or Nasik which have seen some industrialization. Fifty year ago, the saa-
lkari or annual contract tiller was paid Rs 400 a year; now the yearly
wages have risen to Rs 50,000. These wages are not affordable, complain
the land owners; but the saalkari also calls it to be quite inadequate. The
annual remuneration of Rs 50,000 comes to around Rs 4,000 per month,
but if he worked in a factory, he could earn at least Rs 8,000 monthly.
Of course, not everyone bags such a factory job and earns Rs 8,000 per
month, but he would certainly get more than the farm wages. Earlier, the
farm work used to begin at crack of dawn; now the labourers arrive at the
farm not earlier than ten o’clock. No doubt the rural employment scheme
is necessary, but it has led to annihilation of the work culture. If the vil-
lages are to be saved from destruction, some harsh decisions will have to
be made. Government should think of starting some small industry for
every group of four or five adjoining villages. Moreover, there would have
to be planning for agriculture; today it is left to the market. Seeing the
cotton getting good prices in the market, villages in Marathwada region
of Maharashtra discontinued sowing of Jowar and took up farming of cot-
ton; consequently Jowar ceased to be staple food for poor and became
dearer than wheat.
Gandhiji was not averse at all to introducing new amenities in the
villages. He certainly wanted the villages, like the cities, to have such
amenities and the villages to be made a place to live with dignity. In past
60 years of planning, India has not been able to provide clean drink-
ing water to all villages. The villages will become suitable for cottage
industries if all villages get adequate power supply, good quality roads and
homes with health amenities. Not much planned development in such a
manner took place in the villages. The cities, kept encircled by industries,
went on swelling, suffocating themselves. Extinction of employment
forced migration of people from villages to cities that continues endless.
Now no space remains for industries to grow in the cities. Today’s indus-
trial management science tells us that manufacturing parts of a machine
at different places reduces cost of production and encourages research
for improvement in it. Towards this end, development centres could be
set up, although not in insignificant villages but little away from big cit-
ies like Bombay, Pune and Delhi where people from villages could find
employment. Distance remains no problem in these days if those centres
are connected to cities by excellent roads. The insistence that all goods
should be produced in a village and village dwellers should manage only
on the locally produced goods was not reasonable in past and will not be
accepted today; but this does not mean that all unemployed persons have
to rush to only Bombay-like cities in their region. Although rejuvenation
of villages dreamt by Gandhiji could not happen, one can see that the

114
 EPILOGUE

villages are not ravaged, deserted and the people are forced to throng to
ever-growing slums in the cities.
At the stage of constitution-making, the top leadership was not in a
mood to make some special provisions for the villages or to give them
some power. Later in 1992, the 73rd Constitution Amendment stated
that some powers and subjects could be entrusted to the panchayats. It
gave a list of those subjects also; but control of the state government
continued undisturbed. The constitution does not speak of handing over
powers about the subjects listed in the XIth schedule, including agricul-
ture, minor irrigation, water conservation, fisheries, rural housing, roads,
bridges, libraries to all panchayats; the Article 243 G mentions endow-
ing the powers to panchayats at appropriate level. Usually, this means that
the powers would be given to Zilla Parishads which are also assumed to
be panchayats. Most state governments did not make enactments and
proclamations giving these powers to even them. The gram panchayats
or village councils could be handed over some subjects or part thereof,
but legislators do not appear to be prepared for this. Political scientists
like the late M. N. Srinivasan are not sympathetic to these suggestions.
They fear that the majority castes in the village will be tempted to use
the enlarged powers of the gram panchayats to promote interests of their
own castes, in detriment to other smaller communities.12 It is not proper
to say that because of conflicts between the power centres, old and new,
in the villages, they should not be given powers. It is not true that every-
thing is fine in the state and central governments. The defects plausible
in the democracy have crept in everywhere; certainly, democracy cannot
be abolished for these faults.

Why no machines?
Gandhiji has explained many times why he was opposed to machines.
Machines are more useful where working hands are fewer; here in India,
the question is how to provide work for idle hands, as farm worker has no
work for almost six months in a year. ‘I want no machines that take away
work of hands,’ Gandhiji reasoned. He has indicated at a place that he was
not opposed to machines that would not reduce jobs of men and would pro-
duce finer goods. He had very clear notion of what should be intended with
use of the machine. E. F. Schumacher, the author of Small Is Beautiful who
developed the unique human-centred economics, had stated that primary
goal of technology should be to make human labour easy and tolerable that
is necessary for one’s survival or for improvement in one’s competence.13
That is what Gandhiji wanted. He opposed machines of mass production as
these snatched human jobs; but he was not against machines that simplified

115
 EPILOGUE

and eased human labour and retained the jobs. From farm implements to
the charkha, he wanted to employ lesser technologies to make improve-
ments; that is what Schumacher calls ‘intermediate technology’, useful for
small-scale productions. It is but natural to expect the technologies that
develop smaller machines or implements useful for large number of work-
ers will be more valuable for countries like India and its villages with their
large labour force. The nanotechnology, which has recently become a topic
of discussions in the fields of science and technology, enables us to create
machines of smaller size with greater capacity by using minimum space to
achieve small-scale productions or technical work in effortless and high-
quality ways. This technology can be successfully utilized in operations of
the Indian village, claim its proponents. Sudheendra Kulkarni feels that if
Gandhiji would have been alive, he would have certainly welcomed the
computer and internet.
Cottage industries can provide complementary employment to farmers
and farm labourers who are dependent on agriculture in rural India, Gand-
hji suggested. This idea of Gandhiji was actually brought to life, limited to
his followers, even in pre-independence days. Small units manufacturing
leather articles, soap and similar goods were run in Wardha and its neigh-
bourhood, and at some other places also. Gandhiji encouraged such enter-
prises to underline the importance of bread labour. People from all castes
had joined these industries. Gandhiji defied, of course in a very limited way,
the traditional rule binding particular caste to particular vocation.
When the cottage industries, artisans’ trades and crafts decline or end,
people engaged in those activities are reduced to farm labourers who
become available to the land owners in larger numbers and on lower
wages. Gandhji made the charkha a symbol of common man’s self-reliance
and of his determination to fight against the foreign power. Remuner-
ations earned with physical labour will enhance one’s dignity, he felt.
When Gandhiji talked of encouraging handicrafts, he did not mean items
of ornamentation for collections of affluent; he recommended manufac-
ture of goods which were in actual use and could be used. But the plan-
ning in India, even in the first and second five year plans, assumed that
the small-scale industries will grow mainly in the cities. The charkha and
yarn spinning has lost long back its status of supplementary vocation for
farm labourers in the villages, and nowadays the khadi and yarn is pro-
duced mainly in the production centres of the Khadi Gramodyog Board.
Gandhiji and the Gandhians wished that the constitution will intro-
duce provision for total prohibition. Since the British regime, opium and
alcohol has become major sources of government revenue; and even the
post-independence governments did not seem to be much enthusiastic to
lose that income. The experiment of prohibition introduced in the Bom-

116
 EPILOGUE

bay province led to mushrooming industry of illicit distillation. Today,

such prohibition continues in Gujarat, but no political party is sure of its
success or even of its necessity. In 1964, the Tekchand Committee recom-
mended measures to regulate and restrain drinking, and state governments
declared some procedures but did not care for their strict enforcement:
some regimes do not have faith in effectiveness of their own measures.
In the Gandhian constitution, jails and police did not have much sig-
nificant place; it was assumed that crimes would become rare, and these
need not be punished in the conventional way. Today the circumstances
do not allow making such assumption. Life has become so complicated
that large number of laws are required to regulate it. Tangle of law has
grown boundless. How can the gram panchayats will be able to cope with
it? Need of recourse to courts is increasing day by day and we see no pos-
sibility of escape from this system. The gram panchayat taxes and collec-
tion of land revenues turn out to be insufficient for development of the
village, and the central and state governments have to give grants to meet
expenses on development works. The villages are wholly dependent on
the state and central governments for their progress and advancement.
Gandhiji held self-sufficiency to be basis of freedom and autonomy; pres-
ently a development-oriented village cannot remain self-sufficient in eco-
nomic sense. Developing nations too cannot become totally self-sufficient
and be free from debt or donation by other nations.

Away from the process

Gandhji who had attended the Second Simla Conference of political lead-
ers held in May 1946 and also helped in the establishment of the Con-
stituent Assembly became completely detached from functioning of the
Constituent Assembly. After deciding to remain aloof from the process of
constitution-making, he gave priority to other tasks. The Congress Party’s
twelve point manifesto for legislative elections of 1946 had, while promis-
ing equal rights and opportunity of advancement to all citizens, special pro-
visions for victims of social injustice and fundamental rights to all citizens,
declared that Congress supported federal constitution and was committed
to give enough autonomy to its units, that is provinces. One more point the
manifesto made was the Congress intended to undertake modernization of
industries and agriculture. It further affirmed that Congress policy aimed
to have social control on sources of production. It should be noted that
Constituent Assembly was created through these legislatures which were
elected on strength of this manifesto.
In his tour of many parts of the country in 1946, Gandhiji gave par-
ticular preference to constructive works. Political freedom was inevitable,

117
 EPILOGUE

but true freedom of the individual and the nation will depend on their
self-reliance, he believed. The Congress Working Committee met at Cal-
cutta, between 7th and 11th December 1945, when most Congress work-
ers awaiting independence were thinking of how the prospective power
could be exercised. In such circumstances, Gandhiji made the Working
Committee pass a resolution stating,

Constructive activities of the Congress, beginning with the spin-

ning wheel and khadi as the center, are emblematic of the policy
of non-violence and that every other Congress activity, including
what is known as the parliamentary programme, is subservient to
and designed to promote the constructive activities as explained
by Gandhiji. . . . that civil disobedience, mass or any other, meant
for the attainment of freedom is inconceivable without the adop-
tion of the constructive programme on the widest scale possible by
the masses of India.14

Even after the passage of this resolution, there were little prospects of
its impact. The political workers were busy with problems of food scarcity
in the country and the possibility of partition and many other consequen-
tial issues. It was natural that they were anxious for the advent of power.
A Mahatma like Gandhiji was exception; for others it was predictable
behaviour. Gandhji wished that at least some Congress workers should,
through the party, devote themselves to the constructive work, and the
resolution had reflected this desire.
Leaving aside for the time the supposition that the village could not
be self-sufficient and autonomous, it is essential for us to take some other
questions for consideration. Why was the village not accepted as the
administrative unit? In distribution of powers, why was the village not
given some of the powers as was done between the states and the centre?
The framers of constitution did not believe in decentralization; that is
the clear answer to such questions. When the question why the panchay-
ats were not offered powers was raised, it was stated that the states could
do so. This meant that the states could offer some of their powers to the
panchayats and, in the same way, could withdraw also. The panchayats
were not recognized as constitutionally protected units while writing the
constitution. The municipal councils and the panchayats were granted
the constitutional status later, after nearly 50 years, through a constitution
amendment. But this status is confined to regularly holding their elections
without granting them any powers; the amendment only allows endowing
powers to them if so desired. Dr Dhananjayrao Gadgil’s conclusion that

118
 EPILOGUE

the village could not be taken as the unit for planning seems to have been
endorsed by all.
Gandhiji wanted all ensuing election except at the village-level pan-
chayat would be held indirectly. Experience of indirect elections in past
60 years shows that it contributed to horse trading; price of vote has gone
on inflating in all elections including the Rajya Sabha, Vidhan Parishads,
market committees and municipal councils. Many times, voters are seen
openly demanding money. In such circumstances, how would the state
governments and the central government have been shaped if the system
of indirect elections would have prevailed? It is not that no irregularities
take place in elections by direct voting; but still many times people vote
wisely, and equating between brick and boulder, make better of choices
from whatever is on offer, or at least try to do so. Indirect elections would
not allow even this.
The police force, equipped with several ways and weapons, are proving
inefficient to curb crime and maintain peace; in these circumstances, no
ruler will think of maintaining peace with minimum of force, assuming
there would be no occasion of handing out punishments. As Gandhiji’s
ideas of autonomous and self-sufficient village as the basic unit, elections
by indirect voting, economic transactions in villages through cooperatives
remained stillborn, offices of power in the village panchayats, cooperatives
and others, instead of being means of serving society, became source of
privileges and false dignity, and consequently causes of conflicts and hatred.
There remains little difference between the village and city regarding crim-
inality, violent acts and bitterness between different sections of the society.
Politics, that is power politics, has become all important today. Although
we see some youths coming forward to devote to constructive work, politi-
cians who mainly wield power look at such programmes as a propaganda
opportunity. In these circumstances, Mahatma Gandhji remains not much
useful as the source of intellectual inspiration, at least not in the political
life. On the other hand, we see significant number of people in many politi-
cal and social revolutions all over the world who were inspired by Mahatma
Gandhi and his ideology. Martin Luther King (Jr) who was martyred in
struggle for equal rights to black Americans, Nelson Mandela who freed
South Africa from colonial yoke, Lech Walesa who liberated Poland from
communist dictatorship, Vaclav Havel who gave Czechoslovakia not only
the political revolution but a new theory of humanism, and Dalai Lama
who fought lifelong battle for autonomy of Tibet all of them have acknowl-
edged debt of Gandhian philosophy.
Gandhiji’s philosophy inspired all over the world struggles for freedom
from foreign rules and for human rights, and awakened confidence in

119
 EPILOGUE

nonviolent ways; and in few gatherings like the developing nation’s con-
ference in Johannesburg, they mentioned Gandhiji and the principle of
‘equal rights and equal development’ was endorsed by all. But one thing
should be noted; that none of them, even who wielded power in their
country, tried to introduce back in their own land a political system that
gave preference to simple living, limiting personal needs, living life of
cooperation at primary level of the village and operating a production
system that gives full scope to human labour.
The whole world is terrorized by violence in the name of religion and
its perpetrator terrorists. Philosophers had hoped that factors like religion,
governance, education and cooperation will enlarge understanding; that
people will accept each other, and eschewing exploitation of resources
will find ways for their fair distribution and augmentation. Actually these
factors too appear to strengthen violence and barbarity. The world recalls
Gandhiji only at such times. A nation’s freedom will remain intact only if
individual’s freedom is not compromised, Gandhiji had said. He suggested
the path of self-sufficiency to become free of outer shackles. Although his
draft of constitution was not found practical, the Indian Constitution has
not completely divorced from his ideology. The Preamble of the Consti-
tution itself proclaims ideals which were dear to him. The fundamental
rights cited in the constitution remind us of Gandhiji’s persistence about
them. Even after partition on the basis of religion, India was born as a sec-
ular nation; credit for this also goes to Gandhiji. Several provisions in the
Directive Principles section direct us to tread path of Gandhiji. Whether
to step on the road shown by Gandhiji is for the political majority in the
country to choose. It was Gandhiji who was instrumental in founding
the democracy that tells us to accept whatever was the majority decision.

Notes
1 H. Fukazawa, in The Cambridge Economic History of India, Vol. 2–1757 to 2003
(Ed. Dharma Kumar), Orient Longman, 2004, p. 339.
2 Constituent Assembly Debates, Book 3, Reprint, Lok Sabha Secretariat, New
Delhi, 1985, p. 39.
3 Karl Marx, ‘British Rule in India’, Article, New York Herald Tribune, 25 June
1853. Quoted in Music of Spinning Wheel, p. 7.
4 Satish Kumar, Gandhi’s Swadeshi: The Economics of Permanence, http:// Carvan.
squat. net.
5 Sudheendra Kulkarni, Music of the Spinning Wheel, Amaryllis, New Deli, 2012,
p. 479.
6 K.C. Sivaramakrishnan, Amitabh Kundu and B. N. Singh, Oxford Handbook of
Urbanisation in India, Oxford University Press, New Delhi, 2007, p. 5.
7 Ashok Mehta, Studies in Asian Socialism, Bharatiya Vidya Bhavan, Mumbai,
1959, p. 215.

120
 EPILOGUE

8 Jayprakash Narayan, Towards a New Society, Asian Affairs Congress for Cul-
tural Freedom, New Delhi, 1958, pp. 73–4, 92.
9 Siby K. Joseph, Community of Ark; Hind Swaraj Perspectives in Practice, Gandhi
Marg, Vol. 31, No. 2, July-September 2009.
10 D. R. Gadgil, Planning for Agricultural Development in India: Address at 13th
Annual Conference of Indian Society of Agricultural Statistics, Sangam Press,
Poona 1960.
11 M. N. Srinivas, Quoted in Gunnar Myrdal, Asian Drama, Vol. 1, Penguin
Books, London, 1968, p. 299.
12 E. F. Schumacher, Small Is Beautiful, Study of Economics as if People Mattered,
Radhakrishna, New Delhi, 1977, p. 138.
13 Sudheendra Kulkarni, Music of the Spinning Wheel, pp. 363–7.
14 Tendulkar, Mahatma, Vol. 7, p. 22.

121
 Appendices
[1] FUNDAMENTAL RIGHTS
AND ECONOMIC PROGRAMME

A Resolution passed by the Indian National Congress

in its open session at Karachi – March 29–31, 1931
This Congress is of opinion that to enable the masses to appreciate what
‘Swaraj’, as conceived by the Congress, will mean to them, it is desirable to
state the position of the Congress in a manner easily understood by them. In
order to end the exploitation of the masses, political freedom must include
real economic freedom of the starving millions. The Congress, therefore,
declares that any constitution which may be agreed to on its behalf should
provide, or enable the Swaraj Government to provide, for the following:

1. Fundamental rights of the people, including:

(i) freedom of association and combination;
(ii) freedom of speech and of the press;
(iii) freedom of conscience and the free profession and practice of
religion, subject to public order and morality;
(iv) protection of the culture, language and scripts of the minori-
ties;
(v) equal rights and obligations of all citizens, without any bar on
account of sex;
(vi) no disability to attach to any citizen by reason of his or her
religion, caste or creed or sex in regard to public employment,
office of power or honour and in the exercise of any trade or
calling;
(vii) equal rights to all citizens in regard to public roads, wells,
schools and other places of public resort;
(viii) right to keep and bear arms in accordance with regulations and
reservations made in that behalf;
(ix) no person shall be deprived of his liberty nor shall his dwell-
ing or property be entered, sequestered or confiscated, save in
accordance with law.

122
 APPENDICES

2. Religious neutrality on the part of the state.

3. Adult suffrage.
4. Free primary education.
5. A living wage for industrial workers, limited hours of labour, healthy
conditions of work, protection against the economic consequences of
old age, sickness and unemployment.
6. Labour to be freed from serfdom or conditions bordering or serfdom.
7. Protection of woman workers, and specially adequate provisions for
leave during maternity period.
8. Prohibition against employment of children of school going age in fac-
tories.
9. Right of labour to form unions to protect their interests with suitable
machinery for settlement of disputes by arbitration.
10. Substantial reduction in agricultural rent or revenue paid by the peas-
antry and in case of uneconomic holdings exemption from rent for
such period as many be necessary, relief being given to small Zamindars
wherever necessary by reason of such reduction.
11. Imposition of a progressive income tax on agricultural incomes above
a fixed minimum.
12. A graduated inheritance tax.
13. Military expenditure to be reduced by at least one half of the present
scale.
14. Expenditure and salaries in civil departments to be largely reduced. No
servant of the state, other than specially employed experts and the like,
to be paid above a certain fixed figures which should not ordinarily
exceed Rs. 500 per month.
15. Protection of indigenous cloth by exclusion of foreign cloth and for-
eign yarn from the country.
16. Total prohibition of intoxicating drinks and drugs.
17. No duty on salt manufactured in India.
18. Control over exchange and currency policy so as to help Indian indus-
tries and bring relief to the masses.
19. Control by the state of key industries and ownership of mineral
resources.
20. Control of usury – direct or indirect.

It shall be open to the AICC to revise, amend or add to the foregoing

so far as such revision, amendment or addition is not inconsistent with the
policy and principles thereof.

123
 APPENDICES

B The speech Mahatma Gandhi made while

moving the above resolution
This resolution is meant for those who are no legislators, who are not inter-
ested in intricate questions of constitution, who will not take an active
part in the administration of the country. It is meant to indicate to the
poor inarticulate Indian the broad features of Swaraj or Ramaraj. Before my
march to Dandi I had included some of these features in my eleven points.
Those have been made more comprehensive. They are now presented to
you in a separate resolution. They were advisedly omitted from the main
resolution because that would have made that mandate for the delegation
burdensome.
But by passing this resolution we make it clear to the world and to our
own people what we propose to do as soon as we come into power. Let
Government also take note of it. Let those who may have to deal with us
at the Round Table Conference also take note of the fact that the Viceroy,
under Swaraj, should not get more than Rs.500 per month. The position
has been made as clear as possible, in order that we may not be accused of
having sprung sudden surprises on those who have to deal with us. They
are also meant to forewarm all concerned. Let them prepare themselves for
the coming legislation by modelling their lives in the light of the coming
changes.
I shall take a few instances. Clause IV of the fundamental rights protects
the culture, language and scripts of the minority. Now though I am sure that
Islamic and Aryan cultures are not mutually exclusive and fundamentally
different, I must recognise that Musalmans took upon Islamic culture as
distinctive from Aryan. Let us therefore cultivate tolerance. Let us try to
learn the Urdu language and Urdu script and understand the Musalmans’
insistence on it.
Then there is abolition of all disabilities attaching to women, in regard
to public employment, office of power or honour, etc. The moment this is
done, many of the disabilities to which the women are subjected, will cease.
So far as the Congress is concerned, we have admitted no such disability.
We have had Dr Besant and Shrimati Sarojini Devi as our Presidents and in
the future free state it will be open to us to have women presidents.
Religious neutrality is another important provision. Swaraj will favour
Hinduism no more than Islam, nor Islam more than Hinduism. But in order
that we may have a state based or religious neutrality, let us from now adopt
the principle in our daily affairs. Let not a Hindu merchant hesitate to have
deserving Muslims as his employees, and let every Congressman make reli-
gious neutrality his creed in every walk of life.

124
 APPENDICES

Item number five deserves the immediate attention of all mill and factory
owners who should anticipate human legislation foreshowed in the clause.
The last item relates to the control of usuary. Islam strictly prohibits the
charging of interests as criminal by a Hindu. The Pathans have forgotten
the Islamic injunction, have followed our bad example and are known to
charge from 200 to 300 per cent interest. I wish I could persuade Khan
Abdul Gafar Khan to go to our parts to wean his co-religionists from usuary.
Let also our bankers and money-lenders betimes make drastic reductions in
their rates of interest, lest drastic legislation should find them unprepared.
The farmers are being crushed to extinction. So let the money lenders
adopt 8 per cent as the maximum rate to afford the same relief.
Let the zamindars and the Maharajas be assured that the Congress does
not seek to destroy them, but is determined to destroy them, but is deter-
mined to destroy all wrong and injustice. Let them make an earnest endeav-
our to understand the grievances of their tenants and introduce adequate
measures of relief before legislation overtakes them.
Let it be understood that this resolution by no means has any finality. It
is open to the AICC to revise, amend or add to the twenty points and so
let no one oppose the resolution for mere difference on matters of details.
Those however, who are opposed to the policy and principle must reject it,
but they must bear in mind that the poor man’s Swaraj is soon coming and
let them not be found unprepared when it actually comes.
A. M. Zaidi and Shaheda Zaidi The Encyclopaedia of the Indian National Congress. Vol. 10.
1930–1935. The Battle for Swaraj. S. Chand & Co. Ltd., New Delhi, 1980. Resolution,
pp. 149–51 and Gandhiji’s Speech, pp. 113–4.

125
 [2] GANDHI’S EXPECTATION
FROM CONSTITUENT
ASSEMBLY

Excerpts from article ‘Independence’ published in Harijan, 28 July

1946, few days after Congress had appointed a committee of experts
for preparing the Principles of the Constitution.

Independence of India should mean independence of the whole of India,

including what is called India of the States and the other foreign powers,
French and Portuguese, who are there, I presume, by British sufferance.
Independence must mean that of the people of India, nor of those who are
today ruling over them. The rulers should depend on the will of those who
are under their heels. Thus, they have to be servants of the people, ready
to do their will.
Independence must begin at the bottom. Thus, every village will be a
republic or panchayat having full powers. It follows, therefore, that every
village has to be self-sustained and capable of managing its affairs even to
the extent of defending itself against the whole world. It will be trained
and prepared to perish in the attempt to defend itself against any onslaught
from without. Thus, ultimately, it is the individual who is the unit. This
does not exclude dependence on and willing help from neighbours or from
the world. It will be free and voluntary play of mutual forces. Such a society
is necessarily highly cultured in which every man and woman knows what
he or she wants and what is more, knows that no one should want anything
that others cannot have with equal labour.
This society must naturally be based on truth and non-violence which, in
my opinion, are not possible without a living belief in God, meaning a self-
existent, all-knowing living Force which inheres every other force known
to the world and which depends on none and which will live when all other
forces may conceivably perish or cease to act. I am unable to account for my
life without belief in this all-embracing living light.
In this structure composed of innumerable villages, there will be ever-
widening, never-ascending circles. Life will not be a pyramid with the apex

126
 APPENDICES

sustained by the bottom. But it will be an oceanic circle whose centre will
be the individual always ready to perish for the village, the latter ready to
perish for the circle of villages, till at last the whole becomes one life com-
posed of individuals, never aggressive in their arrogance but ever humble,
sharing the majesty of the oceanic circle of which they are integral units.
Therefore, the outermost circumference will not wield power to crush
the inner circle but will give strength to all within and derive its own
strength from it. I may be taunted with the retort that this is all Utopian
and, therefore, not worth a single thought. If Euclid’s point, though incapa-
ble of being drawn by human agency, has an imperishable value, my picture
has its own for mankind to live. Let India live for this true picture, though
never realizable in its completeness. We must have a proper picture of what
we want, before we can have something approaching it. If there ever is to
be a republic of every village in India, then I claim verity for my picture in
which the last is equal to the first or, in other words, no one is to be the first
and none the last.
In this picture every religion has its full and equal place. We are all leaves
of a majestic tree whose trunk cannot be shaken off its roots which are deep
down in the bowels of the earth. The mightiest wind cannot move it.
In this there is no room for machines that would displace human labour
and that would concentrate power in a few hands. Labour has its unique
place in a cultured human family. Every machine that helps every indi-
vidual has a place. But I must confess that I have never sat down to think
out what that machine can be. I have thought of Singer’s sewing machine.
But even that is perfunctory. I do not need it to fill in my picture.
QUESTION. Do you believe that the proposed Constituent Assembly could
be used for the realization of your picture?
ANSWER. The Constituent Assembly has all the possibilities for the
realization of my picture. Yet I cannot hope for much, not because the State
Paper holds no such possibilities but because the document, being wholly of
a voluntary nature, requires the common consent of the many parties to it.
These have no common goal. Congressmen themselves are not of one mind
even on the contents of Independence. I do not know how many swear by
nonviolence or the charkha or, believing in decentralization, regard the vil-
lages as the nucleus. I know on the contrary that many would have wanted
India to become a first-class military power and wish for India to have a
strong centre and build the whole structure around it. In the medley of
these conflicts I know that if India is to be leader in clean action based on
clean thought, God will confound the wisdom of these big men and will
provide the villages with the power to express themselves as they should.

127
 INDEX
Act of Indian Constitution 29
agitation 12, 20–4, 36, 46, 75, 99
ahimsa 101
all-party conference 33–4
Aundh state 60, 72, 104; constitution
of 71–3; experiment 70–1
authority, logical demand of 3–4
autonomous village 104–7
autonomy, provincial 29–30, 41, 68
barrister 16, 18
Besant, Annie 30–1
Bombay Association 1
British government 5–6, 14, 22, 26,
33–5, 38–9, 41, 44–6, 48, 52, 55; and
Indian leaders 52
British Parliament 1–2, 4, 6–7, 14,
28–9, 31, 33, 42, 52, 55; first bill in
33–5
Central Assembly 19, 28–9, 32, 35,
42–3, 55
Congress and Muslim League 36, 54
Congress leadership 90, 98
Congress organization 50, 97, 99
Congress Party 11, 14, 48, 57, 85, 88,
94, 97, 100, 104, 117
Congress Village Panchayats 91
Congress Working Committee 34–6,
38–40, 45–8, 51–2, 56, 58, 60–1, 90,
95, 118
constituent assembly 48–65; aims
and objects, resolution on 85–6;
balanced comment 95–8; drafting
committee, formation of 87–9;
village primacy, debate 89–95
128
constitution: authority to frame 6–7;
central 86, 90; and independence
4–5, 28–47; meaning of 5–6;
national 34; principles of 10–12;
provincial 41, 90
constitutional democracy 4, 8, 27, 49,
67–8, 72; national 8
constitutional institutions 9–10
constitution amendment 115, 118
constitution bill 71, 89, 91
Cripps, Crawford 45
Dalits 40–2, 52, 54
democracy 3, 8, 44, 65, 75, 95–6,
100–2, 111, 115, 120
drafting committee 33–4, 87, 89–93,
95–6
economic freedom 102
economic programme 122–5
education system 2, 3
elections: indirect 64, 85, 87, 90, 94–5,
119; system 80; village panchayat 104
foreign policy 81–2
freedom movement 2, 4–5, 10, 12, 15,
50, 68, 70, 74, 96, 100
freedom struggle 7–8, 14–16, 57, 59,
90, 97, 99–100, 104
fundamental rights 2, 4, 8–9, 12, 33–4,
37–8, 40, 58–9, 76, 80–1, 86, 97, 99,
117, 120, 122–5; demand for 37–8;
resolution on 37, 58, 97
Gandhi, Mohandas Karamchand:
anxieties, of moderates 22–4;
 INDEX
constituent assembly, expectation
from 126–7; constitution-making
process, away from 117–20;
constitution, thoughts 67–82;
dream and reality 110–12;
first struggles, in India 19–20;
ideology in constitution 99–101;
independence, struggle for 28–47;
injustices, fighting against 20–1;
leadership of 14–27, 75; machines,
opposing to 115–17; Narayan and
74–5; and Nehru 58, 60, 64–5, 76;
non-cooperation, weapon of 21–2;
philosophy, scientific examination of
75; philosophy, solitary experiment
in 73; proliferating wants 108–10;
racism, encounter with 17–18;
revolutionary philosopher and leader
110; unfair laws, struggle against
18–19; villages, extinction danger
113–15
Gandhi-Irwin pact 37–9, 41
government: constitutional 6, 36;
imperial 9, 21, 39, 49; independent
Indian 40; provincial 10, 29, 32, 79,
81; responsible 31–2
Government of India Act 29, 42, 65,
90, 93, 104
gram panchayats 71, 78, 81, 115, 117
Hind Swaraj 62–4, 68–70, 102, 104
Hobbs, Thomas 8
Home Rule movement 30
independence: complete 10, 35, 37, 39,
48; and constitution 4–5, 28–47
India Congress Committee 22, 46, 58,
82
India Muslim League 34
Indian Constitution 5, 8–10, 15, 27–9,
32–3, 55, 58–9, 67, 74, 90–1, 99, 120
Indian freedom movement 12, 67
Indian freedom struggle 4, 16, 110
Indian independence 7, 30, 48–9, 51,
55, 80
Indian Independence Act 55
Indian leaders 15, 39, 41, 43, 48, 52–3,
68
Indian National Congress 2, 5–6, 22,
27–8, 33, 99
129
Indian villages 75, 89, 107, 111–13,
116
India panchayats 79, 81
injustices 18–20, 25, 31
Jinnah, Mohammad Ali 30
judiciary 5–7, 26, 29, 73, 80, 105
Karachi Congress 38, 58, 76, 97
Khilafat 21
labour, indentured 17, 19–20
liberalism 2–3, 24–5
local self-government 89, 91, 111
Locke, John 8
Macaulay, Thomas Babington 2
Malaviya, Madan Mohan 19, 42
Metcalfe, Charles 107–8
Modern Political Constitutions 7
Moodiman, Alexander 32
Muslims 12, 21, 30, 40–1, 44, 49–52,
54–6, 68, 81, 86
national wealth 81–2
Nehru, Jawaharlal 14, 35, 37, 39, 43,
54–5, 57–9, 84–6, 90, 97–9, 103, 111
non-cooperation movement 22–4, 26,
36
open jail 82
organizations, political 1–2, 27–8, 33
panchayats 64, 71, 73, 78–80, 82, 87, 94,
104–5, 112, 115, 118; district 79–80,
89, 92, 94–5; function of 78–80;
provincial 79; taluka 71, 73, 78
Pant, A. D. 25
partition 12, 49, 51–2, 56–7, 86, 118,
120
political freedom 102, 117
political reforms 33–4, 36, 42, 45
poorna swaraj 39, 102
provincial assemblies 28–9, 32, 40–3,
45, 55
Pune Pact 42
purna swaraj 35–7
Rajagopalachari, Chakravarti 50–6
Rajagopalachari plan 50–6
 INDEX
Ramrajya 76–8
Ranade, Mahadeo Govind 25
rashtrapita see Gandhi, Mohandas
Karamchand
revolutionary movement 21
round table conference 32, 35–9,
41–2
Roulette, Sydney 21
salt satyagraha 36
satyagraha 10, 12, 18, 20, 21, 23,
25, 31
Satyagrah Ashram 19
Schumacher, E. F. 115
Second World War 43, 45, 51
self-government 44, 94
self-reliant village 104–7
self-rule 3–4, 30–1, 35, 67, 100
Simla Conference 51–2
Simon Report 35–6, 38
state governments 87, 91–2, 115, 117,
119
state power 100, 102–3
130
Strong, C. F. 7
swaraj 4, 22–3, 26, 31, 39, 60, 70, 72–3,
82, 101–2
Swaraj Party 31–2
taxation 81–2
Tilak, Bal Gangadhar 4, 12, 25, 26,
29, 31
untouchability 11, 15, 40, 99, 110
villages: autonomy 85, 104–5, 107,
111–13; communities 76, 107, 109,
111; councils 71–3, 80–1, 91, 115;
dwellers 105, 108, 112–14; industries
112; panchayats 72–3, 78, 87, 91–2,
94, 105, 119; republics 89, 109, 111;
swaraj 73, 102, 105
workers, constructive 88
Working Committee 36, 38, 46, 48, 51,
58, 60; members of 36, 60; members
of Congress 46–7, 51