* Does the Indian National Congress Represent the Scheduled Castes (Untouchables) of India ?
The Cabinet Mission sent out to India by the Labour Government early this year to resolve the political deadlock in India set out a Scheme for the framing of the constitution by a Constituent Assembly. This Constituent Assembly is to be composed of representatives chosen by the members of the Provincial Legislatures by a single transferable vote. For the purposes of the composition of the Constituent Assembly the Cabinet Mission’s Scheme has divided the members of the provincial legislatures into three categories (1) Muslems, (2) Sikhs and (3) General, each with a fixed quota of seats. Each category has a separate electorate whereby the Muslem representatives of the Constituent Assembly will be elected by the Muslem members of the Provincial Legislature, the Sikhs by the Sikh members and the General by all the rest. The ‘general’ includes
(1) Hindus, (2) Scheduled Castes, (3) Indian Christians, and (4) Anglo-Indians.
- The Scheduled Castes of India were greatly surprised to find that they were lumped together with the Hindus. It has been declared time and again by His Majesty’s Government that His Majesty’s Government recognizes that the Scheduled Castes are separate element in the national life of India and that His Majesty’s Government will not impose any constitution to which the Scheduled Castes are not a willing party. The question is asked why the Cabinet Mission recognized the Muslems and the Sikhs as separate elements and why they refused to give the Scheduled Castes the same status ?
In the debate that took place in Parliament on the 18th of July, on the proposals of the Cabinet Mission, Sir Stafford Cripps, Mr. Alexander and Lord Pethick-Lawrence tried to defend themselves against this criticism, Their argument was two-fold :—
(1) That in the elections to the Provincial Legislature which took
- Source : Printed booklet. —Ed.