DR. AMBEDKAR AND THE HINDU CODE BILL 431
monarch of Bihar, but he is one of the undisputed leaders of India. Dr. Rajendra Prasad has given the clearest possible indication. He knows not only the people of Bihar but Bengal as well and also other provinces. He sat up his practice in Calcutta and upto the middle of his life he lived in Calcutta. It is not for nothing that he gave the warning that the Constituent Assembly constituted as it is to-day, ought not to discuss a legislative measure of this nature. I can speak for myself. I cannot speak for others. I honestly feel that I have absolutely no right, legal or moral to be a party to any measure, any legislation, which is not absolutely necessary for the day to day administration. I was returned to the Constituent Assembly with four votes only. I can honestly declare here and now that when I sought all those four votes from the Members of the West Bengal Legislative Assembly, I never promised them that I would give them the right of divorce. Neither did they ask for it. I declare that I never promised them that I was going to scrap up the law of inheritance. I never told them that I was going to the Constituent Assembly to create a fresh Portfolio and a Ministry of Marriage, because I feel that such an institution will be necessary here in the Central Government, if this Bill goes through. Look at the formalities that have been provided here. So, personally speaking, I feel that I have no right to give my assent or dissent to this. I can only tell the House that I am not competent, because I had no specific mandate from my Constituency to do it. When I came in through the General Elections there were clear issues before the Country such as the attainment of the freedom of the country and all the rest of it; and the last time we came here, we were enjoined only to draw the Constitution of India. Therefore, it might gratify our vanity that we as members of the sovereign legislature of the land are competent to enact such a legislation but the claim is shorn of all moral content whatever. Nothing would have been lost if we had deferred the consideration of this Bill to some future dale after the next General Elections. I emphatically maintain, Mr. Chairman, that the time chosen for its passage through this House has been most importune. After the attainment of independence, problems after problems have been confronting the National Government. Have we been able to solve them ? We have not. Are we in the country very popular ? By ‘we’ I mean ‘all’ including that side. No. Frankly, because we raised expectations which we have not been able to fulfil. That may be due to a variety of causes over which we have had no control; that may be due to an interplay of forces, which took us unawares, absolutely unprepared. But throughout the country you find