38 DR. BABASAHEB AMBEDKAR : WRITINGS AND SPEECHES
of self-governing India, I will now turn to the recommendations of the Simon Commission in our behalf. The Simon Commission has no doubt sympathetically considered the case of the Depressed Classes for constitutional safeguards. The Commission has attempted to give a true picture of the conditions of the Depressed Classes, although that picture is by no means complete. They have only referred to the difficulties of the school and the well. They form but a very small part of the long list of the grievances of these-unfortunate classes. All the same it must be conceded that the necessity to the Depressed Classes of constitutional safeguards is more truly realized by the Simon Commission than it was by the Montford Report. But I am sorry to say that both as regards the manner of our representation and the strength of our representation the recommendations of the Simon Commission are very disappointing.
- At present the Depressed Classes, as you are aware, are represented by nomination. Those of us who have had the misfortune of representing you in the councils will tell you of the evil effects of the system of representation by nomination. And I am glad to say that in the evidence given before the Simon Commission by our people all over India, the system was universally condemned. It deprives our people of their liberty to choose their best men to represent them and it leaves our nominated representatives no freedom of action. It is regretable that the Simon Commission does not discard that vicious system. It still clings to it and recommends that the Governor may nominate representatives of the Depressed Classes if suitable candidates are not available for election. Not only this, the Simon Commission makes a most undesirable proposal by recommending that the Governor may authorise persons who are themselves not members of the Depressed Classes to represent them in the legislatures. These are however reserve measures the consideration of which need not detain us much. But the main proposal of the Simon Commission is in my opinion equally unacceptable. According to it the Depressed Classes are to be represented by election in a system of joint electorates with reserved seats. This, no doubt, would make great advance in our present position if the recommendation had nothing more