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412 DR. BABASAHEB AMBEDKAR : WRITINGS AND SPEECHES
executed its promise to help the Congress to win independence. But the promise of the Congress to bring about Pakistan would remain executory. Mr. Jinnah who insists, and quite rightly, that the promises should be concurrent could never be expected to agree to place himself in such a position. The second difficulty which Mr. Rajagopalachariar has overlooked is what would happen if the Provisional Government failed to give effect to the Congress part of the agreement. Who is to enforce it ? The Provisional Government is to be a sovereign government, not subject to superior authority. If it was unwilling to give effect to the agreement, the only sanction open to the Muslims would be rebellion. To make the Provisional Government the agency for forging a new Constitution, for bringing about Pakistan, nobody will accept. It is a snare and not a solution. The only way of bringing about the constitutional changes will be through an Act of Parliament embodying provisions agreed upon by the important elements in the national life of British India. There is no other way.
There is a third fault in the C. R. Formula. It relates to the provision for a treaty between Pakistan and Hindustan to safeguard what are called matters of common interests such as Defence, Foreign Affairs, Customs, etc. Here again Mr. Rajagopalachariar does not seem to be aware of obvious difficulties. How are matters of common interest to be safeguarded ? I see only two ways. One is to have a Central Government vested with Executive and Legislative authority in respect of these matters. This means Pakistan and Hindustan will not be sovereign States. Will Mr. Jinnah agree to this ? Obviously he does not. The other way is to make Pakistan and Hindustan sovereign States and to bind them by a treaty relating to matters of common interests. But what is there to ensure that the terms of the treaty will be observed ? As a sovereign State Pakistan can always repudiate it even if it was a Dominion. Mr. Rajagopalachariar obviously drew his inspiration in drafting this clause from the Anglo-Irish Treaty of 1922. But he forgot the fact that the treaty lasted so long as Ireland was not a Dominion and that as soon as it became a Dominion it repudiated the treaty and the British Parliament stood silent and grinned, for it knew that it could do nothing.