z:\ ambedkar\vol-02\vol2-05.indd MK SJ+YS 21-9-2013/YS-8-11-2013 386
386 DR. BABASAHEB AMBEDKAR : WRITINGS AND SPEECHES
CHAPTER 2
PROVINCIAL GOVERNMENT IN RELATION TO THE CROWN
For the purpose of securing Provincial autonomy it is not sufficient merely to lay down proper relations between the Provincial Government and the Central Government. It is also necessary to define the status of the Provincial Government. This is of practical importance principally in respect to their external relations. That the Provinces cannot have any international status goes without saying. But the question of their relationship with the Home Government stands on a different footing and cannot be easily disposed of. It is clear that whatever the nature of the relationship between the Provincial and Home Government it must be in keeping with the constitutional law of the country. The degree of independent political existence of a Province must determine the angle from which the problem is to be looked at. Are the Provinces to be treated so very devoid of independent political existence that they are to be treated as mere internal divisions comparable with the areas of local Government, unknown and unrecognised beyond India itself ? If so, that Imperial Government would know but one Indian authority, the Central Government, and would in all matters affecting India address itself to that Government and receive communications from or through it alone. On the other hand, have the Provincial Governments an independent political existence in the eye of the law ? If they can be said to have it, then the Imperial Government must recognise them and must in all provincial matters address them and must receive communication from them. Of these two possible bases of relationship there is no doubt that the latter is the more proper one. An independent political existence for the Provinces is now an accomplished fact. They have a sphere of activity in which they have an authority of their own. The whole scheme of reforms is opposed to the subordination of the Provincial Governments to the Central. The chief executive of the Province is not a nominee of the head of the Central Government. He is the representative of the Crown in the Province and not of the Governor-General. The constitution is a pluralistic constitution and there is nothing to suggest the view that while within India the constitution is to be treated as plural, conferring distinct powers on each, it is to be treated by the Imperial Government as a unitary constitution with a single responsible Government.
What are the matters in which the right of Provincial Governments to deal directly with the Home Government can be recognised ? Following the role prevalent in the case of the Australian Commonwealth that in matters in which the Crown is concerned solely in its capacity as part of the constitution of a Government, communications proceed directly between the State Governor and the Colonial Office without the intervention of the Governor-General, it must be claimed on behalf of the Provincial Governments that they shall have the right to deal with the Home Government directly without the intervention of the Central Government. The