PARLIAMENTARY DEBATES 17
(4)
*EXTRA PROVINCIAL JURISDICTION BILL
The Honourable Dr. B. R. Ambedkar (Minister for Law) : Mr. Speaker, I stand to make just a few observations in order to clear some of the doubts and suspicious which have been expressed by Members of the Assembly who have so far taken part in the debate.
Sir, the one point which was made by the Honourable Mover of the amendment was that this Bill was reviving the jurisdiction of paramountcy which was abolished by the Indian Independence Act. Now, it is quite true that the Indian Independence Act releases the Indian States from all the obligatious that were imposed upon them by virtue of paramountcy. But, I think, what that means is this, that the Dominion Government cannot as a succession State inherit the jurisdiction which arose out of paramountcy. It means nothing more than that ; it does not mean that any Indian State could not confer by an agreement upon the Dominion Government the rights and jurisdictions which were exercised by the British Government as against that Indian State. I think that point has been clearly lost sight of and I should like to repeat it again that what the Independence Act means is this; that the Dominion Government cannot be regarded as a succession State to the British Government in so far as Paramountcy is concerned. It certainly does not mean that if an Indian State chooses, for reasons which it thinks are imperative, to confer jurisdiction of the analogous type that arose out of Paramountcy upon the Dominion Government, there is anything either in the Government of India Act or in the Indian Independence Act to prevent that Indian State from doing so. I think that point has to be clearly borne in mind. When the question is raised as to which are the Indian States to which this particular Bill and its provisions would
- C. A. (Leg.) D., Vol. II, 9th December 1947, pp. 1559-61.