REPORT OF THE UNION CONSTITUTION COMMITTEE 23
Clause 24
*The Honourable Sir N. Gopalaswami Ayyangar : Sir, I move Clause 24:
“24. The superintendence, direction and control of all elections, whether Federal or Provincial, held under this constitution including the appointment of election tribunals for decision of doubts and disputes arising out of or in connection with such elections shall be vested in a Commission to be appointed by the President.”
The object of this clause, Sir, is to ensure as far as possible that elections in the country, Federal or Provincial, are conducted in an impartial manner. The idea is to set up a Commission appointed by the President under whose auspices all these various aspects of election activities and post-election activities will be regulated and controlled.
†Dr. B. R. Ambedkar (Bombay : General) : Mr. Vice-Chairman, I think it is desirable that I should state to the House the origin of this clause.
Although this clause appears in the Constitution which deals with the Union, as a matter of fact this matter was dealt with by the Fundamental Rights Committee. The Fundamental rights Committee came to the conclusion that no guarantee regarding minorities or regarding elections could be given if the elections were left in the hands of the Executive of the day. Many people felt that if the elections were conducted under the auspices of the Executive authority and if the Executive authority did have power, as it must have, of transferring officers from one area to another with the object of gaining support for a particular candidate who was a favourite with the party in office or with the Government of the day, that will certainly vitiate the free election which we all wanted. It was therefore unanimously resolved by the members of the Fundamental Rights Committee that the greatest safeguard for purity of election, for fairness in election, was to take away the matter from the hands of the Executive authority and to hand it over to some independent authority. Although Clause 23 does not specifically refer to the details of the scheme that was considered in the Fundamental Rights Committee, I should like to state to the House that the Scheme that was in the minds of the members of the Fundamental Rights Committee was that there would be a Central Commission appointed by the President in order to deal with the elections throughout India. Although that was the scheme contemplated
*CAD. Vol. IV, 29th July 1947, p. 915.
† Ibid., pp. 917-18.