512 DR. BABASAHEB AMBEDKAR : WRITINGS AND SPEECHES
of what might he called collective responsibility. Obviously, there cannot be a legal sanction for collective responsibility. The only sanction through which collective responsibility can be enforced is through the Prime Minister. In my judgment collective responsibility is enforced by the enforcement of two principles. One principle is that no person shall be nominated to the Cabinet except on the advice of the Prime Minister. Secondly, no person shall be retained as a member of the cabinet if the Prime Minister says that he shall be dismissed. It is only when Members of the Cabinet both in the matter of their appointment as well as in the matter of their dismissal are placed under the Prime Minister, that it would be possible to realise our ideal of collective responsibility. I do not see any other means or any other way of giving effect to that principle.
Supposing you have no Prime Minister, what would really happen ? What would happen is this, that every Minister will be subject to the control or influence of the President. It would be perfectly possible for the President who is not ad idem with a particular Cabinet, to deal with each Minister separately, singly, influence them and thereby cause disruption in the Cabinet. Such a thing is not impossible to imagine. Before collective responsibility was introduced in the British Parliament you remember how the English King used to disrupt the British Cabinet. He had what was called a Party of King’s Friends both in the cabinet as well as in Parliament. That sort of thing was put a stop to by collective responsibility. As I said, collective responsibility can be achieved only through the instrumentality of the Prime Minister. Therefore, the Prime Minister is really the keystone of the arch of the Cabinet and unless and until we create that office and endow that office with statutory authority to nominate and dismiss Ministers there can be no collective responsibility.
Now, Sir, with regard to the second proposition of my friend Prof. K. T. Shah that a Minister on appointment should seek a vote of confidence. I am sure that Prof. K. T. Shah will realise that there is no necessity for any such provision at all. It is true that in the early history of the British Cabinet every person who, notwithstanding the fact that he was a Member of Parliament, if he was appointed a Minister, was required to resign his seat in Parliament and to seek re-election because it was fell that a person if he is appointed a Minister will likely