632 DR. BABASAHEB AMBEDKAR : WRITINGS AND SPEECHES
and if my friend, Mr. Tyagi has got Volume II of the printed List of amendments, he will see what the proposed amendment is. The proposed amendment gives power to the President to declare what are not foreign countries, and that declaration would govern whether a particular country is or is not a foreign country. For the benefit of my Friend, Mr. Tyagi, I would also like to add one word of explanation. Many people seem to be rather worried that when a country is declared not to be a foreign country under the proposed amendment, or the Commonwealth Agreement, all such people who are inhabitants of those countries would ipso facto acquire all the rights of citizenship which are being conferred by this Constitution upon the people of this country. I want to tell my friends that no such consequence need follow. The position under commmonwealth relationship would be this; In all the dominion countries, the residents would be divided into three categories, citizens, aliens and a third category of what may be called Dominion residents residing in a particular country. All that would mean is this, that the citizens of the dominions residing in India would not be treated as aliens, they would have some rights which aliens would not have, but they would certainly not be entitled, in my judgment, to get the full rights of citizenship which we would be giving to the people of our country. I hope my friend, Mr. Tyagi, has got something which will remove the doubts which he has in his mind.
Shri Mahavir Tyagi : I heartily thank you for the interesting speech that you have made.
[The amendments moved by Dr. Ambedkar and that of Shri T. T. Krishnamachari were carried. Article 167, was accordingly added to the Constitution]
ARTICLE 169
*The Honourable Dr. B. R. Ambedkar : (Bombay : General) : Sir, not very long ago this very matter was debated in this House, when we were discussing the privileges of Parliament and I thought that as the House had accepted the article dealing with the privileges and immunities of Parliament, no further debate would follow when we were really reproducing the very same provision with regard to the State legislature. But as the debate has been raised and as my Friend Mr. Kamath said that even the press is agitated, I think it is desirable that I should state what exactly is the reason for the course adopted by the Drafting Committee, especially as when the debate took place last time I did not intervene in order to make the position clear.
*CAD, Vol. VIII, 3rd June 1949, pp. 582-84.