FROM MILLIONS TO FRACTIONS 239
Statutory Commission, that these classes are not a pressing problem in the Punjab and will get some representation as tenants.” [1]
Opinion of the Punjab Provincial Franchise Committee.
“K. B. Din Mahomed and Mr. Hansraj (who represented the Untouchables on the Committee) held that, while there are no depressed classes among the Musalmans, there exist depressed classes among the Hindus and Sikhs Their total number being 1,310,709.
Mr. Hansraj considers this list incomplete.”
“They held that provision should be made for separate representation by treating the depressed classes as a separate community. Mr. Nazir Husain, Rai Bahadur Chaudhri Chhotu Ram, Mr. Own Roberts, K. B. Muhammad Hayat, Mr. Qureshi, Mr. Chatterji, Sardar Bhuta Singh and Pandit Nanak Chand held that it is impossible to say that there are depressed classes in the Punjab in the sense that any person by reason of his religion suffers any diminution of civic rights......The Chairman, Pandit Nanak Chand and Sardar Bhuta Singh are of opinion that the depressed classes do not exist in the sense in which they exist in Southern India, and that, while there are in the villages certain classes who occupy a very definitely inferior economic and social position, it is not possible to differentiate the Hindu leather worker or Chamar who is claimed as a depressed class from the Musalman leather worker or Mochi who no one alleges belongs to a separate class.” [2]
It will thus be seen that the Punjab Provincial Government avoided to answer the question. The Punjab Provincial Committee by a majority denied that there existed a class such as depressed or untouchable.
UNITED PROVINCES
Opinion of the Provincial Franchise Committee.
“The United Provinces Franchise Committee is of opinion that only those classes should be called “depressed” which are untouchable. Judged by this test, the problem of untouchability is non-existent in these provinces except in the case of Bhangis, Doms and Dhanuks, whose total population, including those sections which are touchable is only 582,000.” [3]
Babu Ram Sahai, a member of the United Provinces Pronvincial Franchise Committee representing the untouchable classes, in his minute of dissent gave the numbers [4] of the Untouchables in U. P. as
1 Supplementary Memorandum by the Punjab Government, I.F.C., Vol. III, p. 29.
2 Memorandum by the Punjab Provincial Franchise Committee, I.F.C., Vol. III, p. 35.
3 I.F.C. Vol. III, p. 398.
4 Ibid., p. 440.