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DR. BABASAHEB AMBEDKAR : WRITINGS AND SPEECHES
recognition that the Scheduled Castes are a separate and important element in the national life of the country and that their consent is necessary are in no way new proposals. Both the statements have been made by responsible representatives of His Majesty’s Government, viz., the Secretary of State and the Viceroy long before the Cripps’s proposals came into being. Particular attention is drawn to Mr. Amery’s statement on 14th August 1940 and Lord Linlithgow’s statement on 10th January 1940. It is hoped that a perusal of these declarations will enable those who are trying to negative the claim of the Scheduled Castes for political rights to realise that their propaganda is both foolish and malicious.
(1)
Extract from the Montagu-Chelmsford Report on Indian Constitutional Reform — 1917.
155 … … We have shown that the political education of the ryot cannot be a very rapid, and may be a very difficult process. Till it is complete, he must be exposed to the risk of oppression by people who are stronger and cleverer than he is : and until it is clear that his interests can safely be left in his own hands or that the legislative councils represent and consider his interest, we must retain power to protect him. So with the depressed classes. We intend to make the best arrangements that we can for their representation, in order that they too may ultimately learn the lesson of self-protection. But if it is found that their interests suffer and that they do not share in the general progress, we must retain the means in our own hands of helping them.
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(2)
Extract from the Fifth Despatch of the Government of India dated 23rd April 1919 on the Report of the Southborough Committee on Franchise.
- We have analysed in the statement (printed at the top of the next page) the interests which in the committee’s opinion should be represented by non-official nomination.
We accept these proposals generally. But there is one community whose case appears to us to require more consideration than the committee gave it. The Report on Indian Constitutional Reforms clearly recognizes the problem of the depressed classes and gave a pledge respecting them. “We intend to make the best arrangements that we can for their representation.” The castes described as “Hindus—others” in the committee’s report, though they are defined in varying terms, are broadly speaking all the same kind of people. Except for differences in the rigidity of their ex