1092 DR. BABASAHEB AMBEDKAR : WRITINGS AND SPEECHES
the 31st October 1948 and those appointed thereafter. Thus, those in category one will get an additional pay as personal pay which will be equivalent to the difference between the salary fixed by the Constitution and the salary which they are drawing, and those who are in category two will get the salary as fixed by the Constitution.
Perhaps, it might be necessary to explain why we have adopted the 31st October 1948 as the dividing line. The answer is that the Government of India had notified to the various High Courts and the Federal Court that any judge who is appointed before the 31st October 1948 will continue to get the salaries which he was getting now but that the same assurance could not be given with respect to judges appointed after the 31st October 1948. It is in order to guarantee this assurance, so to say, that this dividing line has been introduced.
I would like to say a word or two with regard to the scale of salary fixed in Schedule II and the scale of salary obtaining in other countries, for instance, in the United States the Chief Justice gets Rs. 7,084 per month while the puisne judges get Rs. 6,958. In Canada the Chief Justice gets Rs. 4,584 and the puisne judges get Rs. 3,662. In Australia the Chief Justice of the High Court gets Rs. 3,750 and the puisne judge gets Rs. 3,333. And in South Africa the Chief Justice gets Rs. 3,892 and the puisne judges get Rs. 3,611. Anyone who compares the standard salary that we have fixed in Schedule II with the figures which I have given I think, will realise that our salaries if at all, compare much better with the salaries that are fixed for similar functionaries in other countries except the U.S.A.
In fixing these salaries we have been as fair as we could be. For instance, it would have been perfectly open for the Drafting Committee to say, following the rule that those who have been appointed before the 31st October 1948, if their salary is in excess of what is the normal salary fixed by the Constitution, we could have also made a provision that the judges of the High Court of Nagpur shall get less than the normal salary, because their salary is less than the normal salary as at present existing. But we do not propose to perpetuate any such grievance and therefore we have not introduced a countervailing provision which in strict justice to the case, the Drafting Committee would have been justified in doing. I therefore submit that so far as the salary of the judiciary is concerned there can hardly be any ground for complaint.
I come to the question of the president. The president of the Union is obviously a functionary who would replace the present Governor-General