PARLIAMENTARY DEBATES 837
Sir, the real point for our consideration on this question is whether the Constitution and the rules that have been framed for the procedure of this House permit of giving effect to the suggestion that has been made by my hon. Friend.
Dr. B. R. Ambedkar (Bombay) : I had originally thought not to participate in this debate, because I felt that it was right and proper that the new Members of this House who are sitting on the front Opposite Bench ought to be given the fullest chance to express their views on these important matters dealt with in the speech of the President. But some of my friends said that it would be useful if I said what I felt about the two important matters which undoubtedly loom large before the minds of some Members of the House at any rate and a large majority of the public. The first matter which looms large is obviously the matter of food. There can be no doubt that this country has found itself in the grip of one of the biggest problems that it has ever been called upon to face. Sir, as a younger boy, I had witnessed famines myself because my father was engaged as some kind of a cashier to pay the wages of many people who were engaged in famine relief work. I was living with him as a young boy and I could see the condition of the famine-striken people. As a student of economics I had the opportunity of reading those magnificent. books by one of the greatest Indian civil servants namely, Romesh Chandra Dutt, who had given a complete picture of the periodical famines that had taken place in this country, right from the beginning when the British came to occupy. But, Sir, remembering all this past history, my imagination cannot recall anything that I have seen or anything that I have read in any way comparable to the condition that we see today. I think it would not be an exaggeration to say that there was a time when there were famines but they occurred sometime at an interval of 10, 15 or 20 years. Today we have reached a stage when there is a famine almost every month in this country. This month there is a famine in Bihar, another month there is a famine in Rayalaseema, a third month there
P. D. (Council of States) Vol. I, 21st May 1952, pp. 266-69.