THE MINORITY................TO 381
been admitted merely for reasons for convenience. But for God’s sake do not ride that principle too much. You will create a great deal of difficulties. In a certain sense the rule of majority is the wrong rule. I am prepared to argue that case. Let me illustrate. We are engaged in framing a Constitution. I have been placed at the head of it as its Chairman. We have to guard the fundamental right of the minorities. Do not forget that the fundamental right means that the majority has no right to do a certain thing. That is the meaning of the fundamental right. The fundamental right in a constitution puts absolute limitation upon the power of the majority to do a certain thing. As a matter of fact, the majority rule has come but by what I call a fluke.
If you examine the procedure of the House of Commons and the History of it, you will find that about the year fourteen fifteen hundreds of (what happened was this that) a motion was moved in the House of Commons: those in favour went and sat in one lobby, those who were against it sat in the other lobby. The Speaker asked the clerk how many were in Ayes’ lobby and how many in Noes’ lobby. He was told that there were 20 in the Noes’ lobby and 50 in the Ayes’ lobby. The Speaker did not declare the result of the motion. What he did was to tell the Ayes lobby to go into the Noes lobby and to persuade them to come and sit in the House and then only he declared the result. What does that mean, something very significant, that the majority cannot have a decision in its favour unless the speaker was confident that the minority, if not actively, at least passively was prepared to give consent. That was the original procedure. Later on for some reason this practice or this obligation upon the majority to go out and persuade their brethren in the opposite side to come back and to listen was dropped. However, although Parliamentary Democracy for the purpose accepted the principle of a majority rule do not think that you can by any way you like ill-treat or put to a disadvantage a minority. You will create a great deal of trouble for youself in this very House. The minority must always be won over. It must never be dictated to.