India After Independence: 1947-2000 (6 page)

The highest norms of politics and political behaviour were set up by the movement. Its major leaders for example, Dadabhai Naoroji, Gopal Krishna Gokhale, Lokamanya Tilak, Gandhiji, Bhagat Singh, Jawaharlal Nehru, Subhas Bose, Sardar Patel, Rajendra Prasad, C. Rajagopalachari, Acharya Narendra Dev, Jayaprakash Narayan, possessed moral integrity of the highest order. It was because of this moral authority and high moral standards of the leadership that the movement could mobilize millions. This was also true of the cadres, most of whom gave up their careers, their studies and their jobs, abandoned family life and devoted their entire lives to the movement. Also, judged in its totality, the movement was able to maintain harmony between means and ends. The movement was able to develop the capacity to evolve, renovate and change with the times. Its programme and policies, underwent continuous change and moved in a radical direction in response to the urges of the masses as they were awakened to political activity and to the changing policies of the colonial rulers. The movement was, therefore, in many ways highly original and innovative, keeping abreast with contemporary world thought, processes and movements.

The legacy of the national movement could be summarized as: a commitment to political and economic independence, modern economic development, the ending of inequality, oppression and domination in all forms, representative democracy and civil liberties, internationalism and independent foreign policy, promotion of the process of nation-in-the-making on the basis of the joyous acceptance of the diversity, and achievement of all these objectives through accommodative politics and with the support of a large majority of the people.

Independent India has as a whole remained loyal to the basics of the legacy of the national movement, a large part of which is enshrined in the Constitution and incorporated in the programmes and manifestos of most of the political parties. The Indian people have tended to use this legacy as the yardstick to judge the performance of governments, political parties and institutions.

A legacy, especially of a prolonged movement, tends to endure for a long time. But no legacy, however strong and sound, can last forever. It tends to erode and become irrelevant unless it is constantly reinforced and developed and sometimes transcended in a creative manner to suit the changing circumstances.

The Constitution of India came into force on 26 January 1950. Since then the day is celebrated as Republic Day. But before 1950, 26 January was called Independence Day. Since 26 January 1930, it was the day on which thousands of people, in villages, in mohallas, in towns, in small and big groups would take the independence pledge, committing themselves to the complete independence of India from British rule. It was only fitting that the new republic should come into being on that day, marking from its very inception the continuity between the struggle for independence and the adoption of the Constitution that made India a Republic.

The process of the evolution of the Constitution began many decades before 26 January 1950 and has continued unabated since. Its origins lie deeply embedded in the struggle for independence from Britain and in the movements for responsible and constitutional government in the princely states.

More than passing resolutions on the need for, or framing proposals for constitutional reform the heart of the national movement’s contribution lay in its concrete political practice. This popularized among the people the notions of parliamentary democracy, republicanism, civil liberties, social and economic justice, which were among the essential principles of the Constitution. For example, the idea of a parliamentary form of government was introduced into the Indian political consciousness by the inclusion of the term ‘Congress’ (the Lower House in USA), in the name of the Indian National Congress. The actual functioning of the Congress organization, especially from 1920 onwards, after Gandhiji modified the Congress constitution, was based on the elective principle. All office-bearers were chosen through election, be it the president of the All-India Congress Committee (AICC) or the secretary of the village-level Congress Committee. The AICC, which consisted of delegates elected by the Provincial Congress Committees (PCCs), was the equivalent of the Lok Sabha or the parliament, and the Working Committee was the equivalent of the Cabinet. The Congress president was the counterpart of the prime minister. Thus, when the Constitution in 1950 adopted a parliamentary form of government, with a Cabinet led by a prime minister, it was not,
as is commonly supposed, the British parliament that it was emulating. It was formalizing nationalist practices, which the people were already familiar with.

Even more than the form, it was the spirit of democracy, on which in the last and first resort the foundations of the Constitution rest, that was inculcated among the people by the national movement. This found expression in widespread mass participation. It ensured a place for adult franchise after independence. Could women have been denied the vote in 1950 after Gandhiji as early as 1930 had entrusted crucial parts of the Civil Disobedience movement to their care? Could a property or income qualification co-exist with the concepts of
daridranarayan
and
antodya
? Could the literacy or educational qualification be smuggled into the Constitution once Gandhiji had based his entire struggle on the ‘dumb millions’?

The struggle for the freedom of the Press under British rule was vigorously fought by many leaders, and especially by Lokamanya Tilak who paid a very heavy price for the combative tone of his newspapers. Many other newspapers too like the
Leader, Amrita Bazar Patrika, Bombay Chronicle, The Hindustan Times, The Hindu
, the
Tribune, Searchlight, Andhra Patrika, Aaj, Ananda Bazar Patrika
, among others functioned as unpaid organs of the national movement. This history ensured that freedom of expression became a fundamental right in the Constitution.

Swaraj . . . will not be a free gift of the British Parliament. It will be a declaration of India’s full self-expression. That it will be expressed through an Act of Parliament is true. But it will be merely a courteous ratification of the declared wish of the people of India even as it was in the case of the Union of South Africa . . . . The British Parliament, when the settlement comes, will ratify the wishes of the people of India as expressed not through the bureaucracy but through her freely chosen representatives. Sivaraj can never be a free gift by one nation to another. It is a treasure to be purchased with a nation’s best blood. It will cease to be a gift when we have paid dearly for it.

This statement, made by Gandhiji in 1922
¹
, makes clear the British did not introduce any constitutional reforms or organs on their own initiative but always in belated and grudging response to sustained Indian nationalist pressure. There is a myth which has been carefully and often successfully purveyed by British administrators and later neo-imperialist scholars that the British initiated modern responsible and constitutional government in India and that the Constitution was merely the culmination of the series of constitutional initiatives made by them in 1861, 1892, 1909, 1919 and 1935. This can be disproved given the fact that their concessions, at every stage, fell far short of what Indians were demanding.

For example, the elective principle was first introduced by the British
in the Indian Councils Act of 1892. The Congress and its nationalist precursors, and the Indian Press, had been demanding elections to the councils, elected majorities in them, and greater powers to the non-official members of councils for many years before that. Nationalist demands had already far exceeded what was granted in 1892.

It is also necessary to realize that nationalist demands were not just a little more advanced than British practice: they were far ahead. When the Congress demanded that at least half the members of the councils he elected, and that there should be male adult franchise, vote by ballot, power to the legislative councils to vote on the finance bills, etc., the actual British practice in India was that the Imperial or Central Legislative Council was a totally nominated body of a maximum of seventeen members with an official majority and a few token Indian members. The 1892 Act introduced elected members but they were still in a minority, and had very few powers. On the other hand, the nationalists’ conception of the nature of India’s constitutional, framework was advancing rapidly. In 1895, there appeared the Constitution of India Bill, also known as the Home Rule Bill, about whose authorship there is no conclusive evidence, but which ‘Annie Besant . . . thought . . . was probably issued under Lokamanya Bal Gangadhar Tilak’s inspiration’
²
, which conceived of basic human rights such as freedom of expression, equality before the law, right to the inviolability of one’s home, right to property, etc., for all citizens of India. Even the Government of India Act, 1935, the last British enactment, failed to satisfy the repeated Indian demand, first made in 1895, for a declaration of the rights of the people of India.

The Indian leaders felt no necessity to abandon the constitutional legacy of the pre-independence period at the time of the writing of the Constitution and to start on a clean state—this was their own legacy for which they had fought hard and made many sacrifices. The Constitution could thus borrow heavily from the Government of India Act of 1935 because those who drafted the Constitution had no need to prove their independent credentials. They also believed that the advantages of familiarity which existing institutions had should not be rejected. Since they also freely rejected what was unsuitable in the old and added much that was new, they did not hesitate to retain what was of value.

Beginning in the 1880s and 1890s with the notion that Britain must grant responsible government to India, the national movement, by the end of the second decade of the twentieth century begun to espouse the doctrine of self-determination or the right of Indians to frame their own constitution. Tilak and Annie Besant, during the First World War, had launched a Home Rule agitation (the name being inspired by the Irish Home Rule Movement). The Congress-Muslim League Scheme for constitutional reforms which emerged out of the Congress-League Pact of 1916
demanded that four-fifths of the members of the provincial legislatures be elected ‘by the people on as broad a franchise as possible.’
³
In 1918, the Congress session at Delhi resolved that: ‘In view of the pronouncement of President Wilson, Mr Lloyd George, and other British statesmen, that to ensure the future peace of the world, the principle of Self-determination should be applied to all progressive nations, . . . this Congress claims recognition of India . . . as one of the progressive nations to whom the principle of Self-determination should be applied.’
⁴
The arguments did not impress the British rulers, and the new instalment of reforms in 1919 was introduced with the assertion that the ‘timing and pace’ of constitutional reform would be decided by the British alone. The Indian answer to this was the Non-cooperation Movement led by Gandhiji. After this movement ended in 1922, and sections of Congressmen now constituted as the Swaraj party fought elections to the legislative councils, the constitutional battle was joined with a renewed vigour.

One initiative in which Annie Besant, Tej Bahadur Sapru, V.S. Srinivasa Sastri played a leading role, was the Commonwealth of India Bill which was drafted in India, revised by Labour Party leaders, accepted unanimously by the Executive Committee of the Parliamentary Labour Party, and had its first reading in the House of Commons in December 1925. It could not, however, survive the defeat of the Labour government. It is significant that the Bill, which had the support of very wide sections of Indian opinion, specified in clear terms that ‘India shall be placed on an equal footing with the Self-Governing Dominions.’
⁵
The Memorandum accompanying the Bill reminded the British of their history:
⁶

We seek an honourable agreement, such as Britain refused to her American Colonies and created a Republic, but made with her other Colonies and created peace and amity.

At this juncture, a very prominent role was also played by Motilal Nehru, who introduced a resolution on 8 February 1924 in the Central Legislative Assembly which asked the government ‘to summon, at an early date, a representative Round Table Conference to recommend, with due regard to the protection of the rights and interests of important minorities, the scheme of a constitution for India.’
⁷
This scheme would be ratified by a newly-elected Indian legislature and then sent to the British parliament to be embodied in a statute. This was the first time that the demand for a Constitution and the procedure for its adoption were spelt out in such clear terms. This resolution, which came to be known as the ‘National Demand’, was passed by a large majority in the Central Legislative Assembly—76 for and 48 against.

The British, showing their contempt for the ‘National Demand’, appointed the all-White Simon Commission in November 1927 to recommend further constitutional changes. The move was roundly condemned by all sections of political opinion in India. Lord Birkenhead, the Secretary of State, while announcing the Commission in the House of
Lords on 24 November 1927, also repeated his challenge to Indians, first delivered on 7 July 1925: ‘Let them produce a constitution which carries behind it a fair measure of general agreement among the great peoples of India.’
⁸

The challenge was accepted and, at the initiative of the Congress, an All Parties Conference was called in May 1928 which appointed a committee chaired by Motilal Nehru ‘to determine the principles of the Constitution for India.’
⁹
The Nehru Report, submitted on 10 August 1928, was in effect an outline of a draft Constitution for India. Most of its features were later included in the Constitution of India. It visualized a parliamentary system with full responsible government and joint electorates with time-bound reservation of seats for minorities. The Nehru Report laid special emphasis on securing fundamental human rights for the people of India. These included the right to ‘the freedom of conscience and the free profession and practice of religion,’ ‘the right of free expression of opinion, as well as the right to assemble peaceably and without arms, and to form associations or unions,’ equal rights for men and women, the right to form unions, and the right to free elementary education. Interestingly, the secular character of the State was listed as a fundamental right. Of the nineteen rights listed in the Nehru Report, ten were incorporated into the Constitution. The Nehru Report also recommended that ‘the redistribution of provinces should take place on a linguistic basis.’
¹⁰

The Nehru Report was followed by a boycott of the Simon Commission and mass demonstrations wherever its members went. In December 1929, the Congress declared complete independence as its goal and followed this up with the launching of the mass Civil Disobedience Movement in April 1930 which brought hundreds of thousands into the streets and saw around one hundred thousand in jail. It was becoming increasingly clear that Indians were unlikely to be satisfied with anything less than the right to frame their own Constitution. The idea that this should be done not through the conference method, as was the case with the Nehru Report, but via a Constituent Assembly elected for this specific purpose, on the basis of the widest possible franchise, began to gain ground. Jawaharlal Nehru was the first national leader to articulate the idea in 1933 though M.N. Roy, the Marxist leader, had made the suggestion earlier. In June 1934, the Congress Working Committee, while rejecting the White Paper presented by the British government on further constitutional reform, resolved that the ‘only satisfactory alternative to the White Paper is a constitution drawn up by a Constituent Assembly elected on the basis of adult suffrage or as near it as possible.’
¹¹

The demand for a Constituent Assembly was repeated frequently after 1934 and included in the Congress manifesto for the 1936-37 elections. The Congress won majorities in seven out of eleven provinces and decided to form ministries. However, it made sure that this was not construed as acceptance of the existing constitutional framework. The meeting of the Congress Working Committee at Wardha on 27-28 February 1937 which decided in favour of accepting office also reminded the legislators that a
resolution of the Faizpur Congress had bound them to articulate the demand for a Constituent Assembly as soon as possible in the new legislatures.