INDIA’S CONSTITUTION

Otago Daily Times, Issue 21197, 1 December 1930, Page 9

INDIA’S CONSTITUTION

THE FEDERATION PROPOSAL BASIS FOR DISCUSSION. LORD SANKEY’S DOCUMENT. (British Official. Wireless.) - (United Press Association.) (By Electric Telegraph—Copyright.) RUGBY, November 28. (Received Nov. 30, at 5.5 p.m.) At the first full meeting of the enlarged Federal Relations Committee of the Indian Conference, the Prime Minister, who presided, explained that it was proposed to have a general discussion on the heads of the subjects prepared by Lord Sankey - and- then- remit them to special sub-committees for investigation and for. the suggestion of methods for overcoming difficulties. The sub-com-mittees’ reports would be considered by a committee of the whole conference. Mr MacDonald said he hoped that the conference, .would succeed in embodying its conclusions in a series of resolutions. It was agreed • that Lord Sankey’s heads of subjects should be adopted as the provisional agenda. Lord Sankey’s document was prefaced by what , was described as a .preamble. After some discussion on a proposal to amend the wording of this to include the word “ dominion,” it was agreed to regard it simply as an introduction to, the heads of subjects and not a preamble defining the character of the contemplated constitution.

Lord Sankey gave an exposition of the scope ol head No., I—namely, the component elements of a., federation, and after discussion it was' agreed that a sub-committee should be appointed by the chairman, after consultation with the Business Committee, to report on types of federal structure and their’component elements. It was later announced that the sub-committee, which will be known as the Federal Structure Subcommittee, comprises the chairman, Lord Sankey, and from the British delegation Professor Lees-Smith, Lord Lothian, and a Conservative delegate to be nominated, while from the Indian States delegation the representatives will be the Nawab of Bhopal, the Maharajah of Bikaner, Sir Akbar Hydari, Sir Mahommed Mirza . Ismail, and Colonel Haksar, .and from * the British India delegation Mr Srinivasa Sastri, Sir Tej Bahadur Sapru, Mr Dirvan Bahadur Ramai&wami Mudaliyar, Sardar Sahib Sardar Ujjalsingh, Mr M. A. Jinnah, Sir Muhammad Shafi, Mr ; Tracey French Gavin Jones, Sir C. P. , Bamaswami Aiyar, and Sir Syed Sultan Ahmed. The full committee will meet in the afternoon to consider the remainder of the 12 -heads. . Addressing the committee, Lord’ Sankey said that the first heading might seem to invite discussion, as, for example, whether Burma should be a component unit, or. whether Sind should be separated from Bombay, or what should be ■ the position of the north-west frontier i province. That was not : the intention, and .it was hoped to exclude all such matters of detail until a later period, possibly after these questions, have been examined by the. sub-committee. What was to be .discussed now was the theory of what should be the component ele- ' ments of federation. Theoretically there were several possibilities as follows: (d) A union of all the States on one hand and British India on the other, combining to make a federation; (2) a federation of British India on the one side and on the other the States, entering .singly; . (3) a, federation, of which the a 1 component 'elements were,; each province' a and ea'ch State. Three things must .be borne in mind, first, that British India was at present a unitary State divided for the purposes of convenience into provinces, and not a number of provinces federated to form a State; secondly, 1 there was hardily any organic connection between the States or any two or more , -of them; thirdly, there was no organic connection between the States, or any one of them, and British India. The ties between the Government of India and the States were treaties and powers resulting from a doctrine of paramountcy* hut the subjects of, the States were not British subjects.