DRAFT CONSTITUTION 633
I do not know how many Members really have a conception of what is meant by privilege. Now the privileges, which we think of, fall into two different classes. There are first of all, the privileges belonging to individual members, such as for instance freedom of speech, immunity from arrest while discharging their duty. But that is not the whole thing covered by privilege.
Dr. P. S. Deshmukh : We do not want any enumeration of the privileges nor any lecture on how they are exercised. What we want to know is whether it is not possible to embody them into the Constitution. That is the real question.
Mr. President : He is dealing with the matter.
The Honourable Dr. B. R. Ambedkar : I am mentioning the difficulty. If we were only concerned with these two things, namely freedom of speech and immunity from arrest, these matters could have been very easily mentioned in the article itself and we would have had no occasion to refer to the House of Commons. But the privileges which we speak of in relation to Parliament are much wider than the two privileges mentioned and which relate to individual members. The privileges of Parliament extends, for instance, to the rights of Parliament as against the public. Secondly, they also extend to right as against the individual members. For instance, under the House of Commons’ powers and privileges it is open to Parliament to convict any citizen for contempt of Parliament and when such privilege is exercised the jurisdiction of the court is ousted. That is an important privilege. Then again, it is open to Parliament to take action against any individual member of Parliament for anything that has been done by him which brings Parliament into disgrace. These are very grave matters—e.g., to commit to prison. The right to lock up a citizen for what Parliament regards as contempt of itself is not an easy matter to define. Nor is it easy to say what are the acts and deeds of individual members which bring Parliament into disrepute.
Pandit Thakur Das Bhargava : We are only concerned with the privileges of members and not with the privileges of Parliament.
The Honourable Dr. B. R. Ambedkar : Let me proceed. It is not easy, as I said, to define what are the acts and deeds which may be deemed to bring Parliament into disgrace. That would require a considerable amount of discussion and examination. That is one reason why we did not think of enumerating these privileges and immunities.