z:\ ambedkar\vol-02\vol2-06.indd MK SJ+YS 21-9-2013/YS-8-11-2013 443
SAFEGUARDS FOR DEPRESSED CLASSES 443
the case. The people who exercise the power are not always the same people with those over whom it is exercised; and the self-government spoken of is not the government of each by himself, but of each by all the rest. The will of the people, moreover, practically means the will of the most numerous or the most active part of the people, the majority of those who succeed in making themselves accepted as the majority ; the people, consequently, may desire to oppress a part of their number; and precautions are as much needed against this, as against any other abuse of power. The limitation, therefore, of the power of Government over individuals loses none of its importance when the holders of power are regularly accountable to the community, that is to the “strongest party therein. This view of things, recommending itself equally to the intelligence of thinkers and to the inclination of those important classes in European Society to whose real or supposed interests democracy is adverse, has had no difficulty in establishing itself; and in political speculations the tyranny of the majority is now generally included amongst the evils against which the Society requires to be on its guard.”
From this it is obvious that representative Government cannot altogether do away with the necessity of such guarantees for the protection of the interests of the minorities in a nation. Indeed it may safely be asserted that a representative form of Government far from being a means of affording protection to the minorities must be deemed to be so very inadequate for that purpose that its introduction without a system of guarantees being made a part thereof was looked upon as a most dangerous experiment. The postwar history of Europe abounds in such cases. The peace treaties between the allied powers and Zechoslovakia, Austria, Hungary, Rumania and the Polish German Convention relating to Upper Silesia with their guarantee clauses for the benefit of the minorities bear eloquent testimony to the fact that the minorities cannot depend upon the representative form of Government but must seek protection in the form of guarantees of their rights.
If representative Government is so weak when operating among European peoples, where the secularisation of politics has gone far further, how much weaker must it be in India where politics is nothing but theology in action. It is this theology against which the Depressed classes must seek to be protected. How destructive is this theology of true citizenship has nowhere been described so well as in the Note by the Hon’ble Sir Alexander Cardew, K.C.S.I., I.C.S., to the Government of India contained in the letter No. 1146 (Reforms) dated the 31st December 1918. The following extracts are made from that Note :
“2. It may first be asked whether the democratic idea is in accordance with the prevailing philosophy of the people of India. The fundamental principle of the modern democratic State is the recognition of the value of the individual and the belief that as each individual has but one life, full opportunity should be accorded to each to attain his maximum development in that life. Neither of these propositions is accepted in the current philo