1124 DR. BABASAHEB AMBEDKAR : WRITINGS AND SPEECHES
The Honourable Shri K. Santhanam : The article does not limit it only to those laws; it can also extend further.
The Honourable Dr. B. R. Ambedkar : No, it cannot extend further. The necessity for bringing an amendment in sub-clause (b) is this; that the executive power of the centre extends not only to matters enumerated in List I, but may also extend to matters enumerated in List III, and the position of the Drafting Committee is this, that whenever a law is made by Parliament, in respect of any matter contained in List III if the law confers executive power on the Centre, the power of the President to grant reprieve must extend to that law. Therefore, these words are necessary. Mr. Santhanam’s amendment is absolutely unnecessary and out of place because article 60 covers the point.
(Amendment of Mr. Santhanam was negatived.)
*The Honourable Dr. B. R. Ambedkar : The clause moved by my Friend Mr. Krishnamachari is of old standing. It occurs in the Instrument of Instructions issued to the Governor of the provinces under the Government of India Act, 1935.
Paragraph 17 of the Instrument of Instructions says :
“Without prejudice to the generality of his powers as to reservation of Bills, our Government shall not assent in our name to, but shall reserve for the consideration of our Governor-General any Bill or any of the clauses herein specified, i.e.
(b) any Bill which in his opinion would, if it became law so derogate from the powers of the High Court as to endanger the position that that Court is, by the Act, designed to fulfil.”
This clause is the old Instrument of Instructions the Drafting Committee had bodily copied in the Fourth Schedule which they had proposed to introduce and it will be found in Vol. II of the amendments at pages
368-369. In view of the fact that the House on my recommendation came to the conclusion that for the reasons which I then stated it was unneccessary to have any such schedule containing instructions to the Governors of the States in Part I, it is felt by the Drafting Committee that, at any rate, that particular part of the proposed Instrument of Instructions, paragraph 17, should be incorporated in the Constitution itself. Now, Sir, the reasons for doing this are these :
The High Courts are placed under the Centre as well as the Provinces. So far as the organisation and the territorial jurisdiction of the High Court are concerned, they are undoubtedly under the Centre and the Provinces have no power either to alter the organization of the High Court or the
*CAD, Vol. X, 17th October 1949, pp. 393-394.