Constituent Assembly of India


The Constituent Assembly of India was elected to write the Constitution of India. Following India's independence from British Government in 1947, its members served as the nation's first Parliament.
An idea for a Constituent Assembly was proposed in 1934 by M. N. Roy, a pioneer of the Communist movement in India and an advocate of radical democracy. It became an official demand of the Indian National Congress in 1935, C. Rajagopalachari voiced the demand for a Constituent Assembly on 15 November 1939 based on adult franchise, and was accepted by the British in August 1940.
On 8 August 1940, a statement was made by Viceroy Lord Linlithgow about the expansion of the Governor-General's Executive Council and the establishment of a War Advisory Council. This offer, known as the August Offer, included giving full weight to minority opinions and allowing Indians to draft their own constitution. Under the Cabinet Mission Plan of 1946, elections were held for the first time for the Constituent Assembly. The Constitution of India was drafted by the Constituent Assembly, and it was implemented under the Cabinet Mission Plan on 16 May 1946. The members of the Constituent Assembly were elected by the provincial assemblies by a single, transferable-vote system of proportional representation. The total membership of the Constituent Assembly was 389 of which 292 were representatives of the states, 93 represented the princely states and four were from the chief commissioner provinces of Delhi, Ajmer-Merwara, Coorg and British Baluchistan.
The elections for the 296 seats assigned to the British Indian provinces were completed by August 1946. Congress won 208 seats, and the Muslim League 73. After this election, the Muslim League refused to cooperate with the Congress, and the political situation deteriorated. Hindu-Muslim riots began, and the Muslim League demanded a separate constituent assembly for Muslims in India. On 3 June 1947 Lord Mountbatten, the last British Governor-General of India, announced his intention to scrap the Cabinet Mission Plan; this culminated in the Indian Independence Act 1947 and the separate nations of India and Pakistan. The Indian Independence Act was passed on 18 July 1947 and, although it was earlier declared that India would become independent in June 1948, this event led to independence on 15 August 1947. The Constituent Assembly met for the first time on 9 December 1946, reassembling on 14 August 1947 as a sovereign body and successor to the British parliament's authority in India. As a result of the partition, under the Mountbatten plan, a separate Constituent Assembly of Pakistan was established on 3 June 1947. The representatives of the areas incorporated into Pakistan ceased to be members of the Constituent Assembly of India. New elections were held for the West Punjab and East Bengal ; the membership of the Constituent Assembly was 299 after the reorganization, and it met on 31 December 1947.
The constitution was drafted by 299 delegates from different caste,region religion,gender etc. These delegates sat over 114 days spread over 3 years and discussed what the constitution should contain and what laws should be included. The Drafting Committee of the Constitution was chaired by Dr. B.R Ambedkar.
B. R. Ambedkar was a wise constitutional expert, he had studied the constitutions of about 60 countries. Ambedkar is recognised as the "Father of the Constitution of India".
The constitution of India is the biggest constitution in the world as it includes laws from other countries' constitutions also.

''Description of the constituent assembly''

The Constituent Assembly of India, consisting of indirectly elected representatives, was established to draft a constitution for India. It existed for approx. three years, the first parliament of India after independence in 1947. The Assembly was not elected on the basis of universal adult suffrage, and Muslims and Sikhs received special representation as minorities. The Muslim League boycotted the Assembly after failing to prevent its creation. Although a large part of the Constituent Assembly was drawn from the Congress Party in a one-party environment, the Congress Party included a wide diversity of opinions—from conservative industrialists to radical Marxists, to Hindu revivalists.
The Assembly met for the first time in New Delhi on 9 December 1946, and its last session was held on 24 January 1950. The hope of the Assembly was expressed by Jawaharlal Nehru:

Background and election

India was still under British rule when the Constituent Assembly was established following negotiations between Indian leaders and members of the 1946 Cabinet Mission to India from the United Kingdom. Provincial assembly elections were held in mid 1946. Constituent Assembly members were elected indirectly by members of the newly elected provincial assemblies, and initially included representatives for those provinces that formed part of Pakistan. The Constituent Assembly had 299 representatives, including fifteen women.
The Interim Government of India was formed on 2 September 1946 from the newly elected Constituent Assembly. The Congress Party held a large majority in the Assembly, and the Muslim League held nearly all the seats reserved in the Assembly for Muslims. There were also members of smaller parties, such as the Scheduled Caste Federation, the Communist Party of India and the Unionist Party.
In June 1947 delegations from Sindh, East Bengal, Baluchistan, West Punjab and the North West Frontier Province withdrew to form the Constituent Assembly of Pakistan, meeting in Karachi. On 15 August 1947 the Dominion of India and Dominion of Pakistan became independent nations, and members of the Constituent Assembly who had not withdrawn to Karachi became India's Parliament. Twenty-eight members of the Muslim League joined the Indian Assembly, and 93 members were later nominated from the princely states; the Congress Party secured a majority of 82 percent.

Constitution and elections

At 11 am on 9 December 1946 the Assembly began its first session, with 207 members attending. By early 1947, representatives of the Muslim League and princely states joined, and the Assembly approved the draft constitution on 26 November 1949. On 26 January 1950 the constitution took effect, and the Constituent Assembly became the Provisional Parliament of India.

Organization

Dr. Rajendra Prasad was elected as the president and Its vice-president was Harendra Coomar Mookerjee, a Christian from Bengal and former vice-chancellor of Calcutta University. Also chairing the assembly's Minorities Committee, Mookerjee was appointed governor of West Bengal after India became a republic. Jurist B. N. Rau was appointed constitutional adviser to the assembly; Rau prepared the original draft of the constitution, and was later appointed a judge in the Permanent Court of International Justice in The Hague.
The assembly's work had five stages:
The Constituent Assembly appointed a total of 22 committees to deal with different tasks of constitution-making. Out of these, eight were major committees and the others were minor committees.
Major Committees
  1. Drafting Committee – B. R. Ambedkar
  2. Union Power Committee – Jawaharlal Nehru
  3. Union Constitution Committee – Jawaharlal Nehru
  4. Provincial Constitution Committee – Vallabhbhai Patel
  5. Advisory Committee on Fundamental Rights, Minorities and Tribal and Excluded Areas – Vallabhbhai Patel. This committee had the following subcommittees:
  6. # Fundamental Rights Sub-Committee – J. B. Kripalani
  7. # Minorities Sub-Committee – Harendra Coomar Mookerjee,
  8. # North-East Frontier Tribal Areas and Assam Excluded & Partially Excluded Areas Sub-Committee – Gopinath Bordoloi
  9. # Excluded and Partially Excluded Areas Sub-Committee – A V Thakkar
  10. Rules of Procedure Committee – Rajendra Prasad
  11. States Committee – Jawaharlal Nehru
  12. Steering Committee – Rajendra Prasad
  13. National flag ad hoc committee – Rajendra Prasad
  14. Committee for the function of the consistution assembley - G V Mavlankar
  15. House committee - B Pattabhi Sitaramayya
  16. Language committee - Moturi Satyanarayana
  17. Order of business committee - K M Munshi

    Criticism

The constitution has been, in more recent times, critiqued on the basis of the fact that the members of the Constituent Assembly were chosen not by universal suffrage, but rather, they were predominantly members of the Congress party. It has been argued that the Congress party aimed not to overthrow British power, but rather transfer its power into Indian hands. In his book The Constitution of India: Miracle, Surrender, Hope, Rajeev Dhavan has argued that the Indian people did not have much say in the making of the Constitution which was they had no choice but to accept. It has also been argued that the members of the Constituent Assembly were mostly Hindu men from dominant castes, which in the end embedded certain Hindu, dominant-caste and patriarchal prejudices in the Constitution.

Prominent members

Madras:
Annie Mascarene, O. V. Alagesan,
Mrs. Ammu Swaminathan,
M. Ananthasayanam Ayyangar,
Moturi Satyanarayana,
Mrs. Dakshayani Velayudhan,
Mrs. G. Durgabai,
Kala Venkatarao,
N. Gopalaswamy Ayyangar,
D. Govinda Das,
Revd. Jerome D'Souza,
P. Kakkan,
T.M. Kaliyannan Gounder,
K. Kamaraj,
V. C. Kesava Rao,
T. T. Krishnamachari,
Alladi Krishnaswamy Iyer
L. Krishnaswami Bharathi,
P. Kunhiraman,
Mosalikanti Thirumala Rao,
V. I. Munuswamy Pillai,
M. A. Muthiah Chettiar,
V. Nadimuthu Pillai,
S. Nagappa,
P. L. Narasimha Raju,
B. Pattabhi Sitaramayya,
C. Perumalswamy Reddy,
T. Prakasam,
S. H. Prater,
Raja Swetachalapati Ramakrishna Renga Roa of Bobbili,
R. K. Shanmukham Chetty,
T. A. Ramalingam Chettiar,
Ramnath Goenka,
O. P. Ramaswamy Reddiar,
N. G. Ranga,
Neelam Sanjeeva Reddy,
Sheik Galib Sahib,
K. Santhanam,
B. Shiva Rao,
Kallur Subba Rao,
U. Srinivasa Mallya,
P. Subbarayan,
C. Subramaniam,
V Subramaniam,
M. C. Veerabahu Pillai,
P. M. Velayudapani,
A. K. Menon,
T. J. M. Wilson,
Qaede Millath Mohamed Ismail Sahib,
K. T. M. Ahmed Ibrahim,
Mahboob Ali Baig Sahib Bahadur,
B. Pocker Sahib Bahadur,
Pattam Tanupillai
Bombay:
Balchandra Maheshwar Gupte,
Hansa Mehta,
Hari Vinayak Pataskar,
Dr. B. R. Ambedkar,
Joseph Alban D'Souza,
Kanayalal Nanabhai Desai,
Keshavrao Marutirao Jedhe,
Khandubhai Kasanji Desai,
Bal Gangadhar Kher,
M.R. Masani,
K.M. Munshi,
Narahar Vishnu Gadgil,
S. Nijalingappa,
S. K. Patil,
Ramchandra Manohar Nalavade,
R. R. Diwakar,
Shankarrao Deo,
G. V. Mavalankar,
Vallabhbhai Patel,
Abdul Kadar Mohammad Shaikh,
A. A. Khan
West Bengal:
Mono Mohan Das,
Arun Chandra Guha,
Lakshmi Kanta Maitra,
Mihir Lal Chattopadhyay,
Satis Chandra Samanta,
Suresh Chandra Majumdar,
Upendranath Barman,
Prabhudayal Himatsingka,
Basanta Kumar Das,
Renuka Ray,
H. C. Mookerjee,
Surendra Mohan Ghose,
Syama Prasad Mookerjee,
Ari Bahadur Gurung,
R. E. Platel,
K. C. Neogy,
Raghib Ahsan,
Somnath Lahiri,
Jasimuddin Ahmad,
Naziruddin Ahmad,
Abdul Hamid,
Abdul Halim Ghuznavi
United Provinces:
Maulana Hifzur Rahman Seoharwi,
Ajit Prasad Jain,
Algu Rai Shastri,
Balkrishna Sharma,
Banshi Dhar Misra,
Bhagwan Din,
Damodar Swarup Seth,
Dayal Das Bhagat,
Dharam Prakash,
A. Dharam Dass,
R. V. Dhulekar,
Feroz Gandhi,
Gopal Narain,
Krishna Chandra Sharma,
Govind Ballabh Pant,
Govind Malviya,
Har Govind Pant,
Harihar Nath Shastri,
Hriday Nath Kunzru,
Jaspat Roy Kapoor,
Jagannath Baksh Singh,
Jawaharlal Nehru,
Jogendra Singh,
Jugal Kishore,
Jwala Prasad Srivastava,
B. V. Keskar,
Kamala Chaudhry,
Kamalapati Tripathi,
J. B. Kripalani,
Mahavir Tyagi,
Khurshed Lal,
Masurya Din,
Mohan Lal Saksena,
Padampat Singhania,
Phool Singh,
Paragi Lal,
Purnima Banerjee,
Purushottam Das Tandon,
Hira Vallabha Tripathi,
Ram Chandra Gupta,
Shibban Lal Saxena,
Satish Chandra,
John Matthai,
Sucheta Kripalani,
Sunder Lall,
Venkatesh Narayan Tiwari,
Mohanlal Gautam,
Vishwambhar Dayal Tripathi,
Vishnu Sharan Dublish,
Begum Aizaz Rasul,
Hyder Hussain,
Hasrat Mohani,
Abul Kalam Azad,
Muhammad Ismail Khan,
Rafi Ahmad Kidwai,
Z H Lari
East Punjab:
Bakshi Tek Chand,
Jairamdas Daulatram,
Thakurdas Bhargava,
Bikramlal Sondhi,
Yashwant Rai,
Ranbir Singh Hooda,
Lala Achint Ram,
Nand Lal,
Baldev Singh,
Giani Gurmukh Singh Musafir,
Sardar Hukam Singh,
Sardar Bhopinder Singh Mann,
Sardar Rattan Singh Lohgarh
Chaudhry Suraj Mal
Bihar:
Amiyo Kumar Ghosh,
Anugrah Narayan Sinha,
Banarsi Prasad Jhunjhunwala,
Bhagwat Prasad,
Boniface Lakra,
Brajeshwar Prasad,
Chandika Ram,
K. T. Shah,
Devendra Nath Samanta,
Dip Narain Sinha,
Guptanath Singh,
Jadubans Sahay,
Jagat Narain Lal,
Jagjivan Ram,
Jaipal Singh Munda,
Kameshwar Singh of Darbhanga,
Kamaleshwari Prasad Yadav,
Mahesh Prasad Sinha,
Krishna Ballabh Sahay,
Raghunandan Prasad,
Rajendra Prasad,
Rameshwar Prasad Sinha,
Ramnarayan Singh,
Sachchidananda Sinha,
Sarangdhar Sinha,
Satyanarayan Sinha,
Binodanand Jha,
P. K. Sen,
Sri Krishna Sinha,
Sri Narayan Mahtha,
Syamanandan Mishra,
Hussain Imam,
Syed Jafar Imam,
Latifur Rahman,
Mohammad Tahir,
Tajamul Hussain,
Choudhry Abid Hussain.
Hargovind Mishra
Central Provinces and Berar:
Ambica Charan Shukla,
Raghu Vira,
Rajkumari Amrit Kaur,
Bhagwantrao Mandloi,
Brijlal Biyani,
Thakur Cheedilal,
Seth Govind Das,
Hari Singh Gour,
Hari Vishnu Kamath,
Hemchandra Jagobaji Khandekar,
Ratanlal Kishorilal Malviya,
Ghanshyam Singh Gupta,
Lakshman Shrawan Bhatkar,
Panjabrao Deshmukh,
Ravi Shankar Shukla,
R. K. Sidhva,
Dada Dharmadhikari,
Frank Anthony,
Kazi Syed Karimuddin,
Ganpatrao Dani
Assam:
Nibaran Chandra Laskar,
Dharanidhar Basu-Matari,
Gopinath Bardoloi,
J. J. M. Nichols-Roy,
Kuladhar Chaliha,
Rohini Kumar Chaudhury,
Muhammad Saadulla,
Abdur Rouf
Orissa:
Biswanath Das,
Krishna Chandra Gajapati Narayana Dev,
Harekrushna Mahatab,
Laxminarayan Sahu
Lokanath Mishra,
Nandkishore Das,
Rajkrishna Bose,
Santanu Kumar Das,
Yudhishir Mishra
Delhi:
Deshbandhu Gupta
Ajmer-Merwara:
Mukut Bihari Lal Bhargava
Coorg:
C. M. Poonacha
Mysore:
K.C. Reddy,
T. Siddalingaiya,
H. R. Guruv Reddy,
S. V. Krishnamoorthy Rao,
K. Hanumanthaiya,
H. Siddaveerappa,
T. Channiah
Jammu and Kashmir:
Sheikh Muhammad Abdullah,
Motiram Baigra,
Mirza Mohammad Afzal Beg,
Maulana Mohammad Sayeed Masoodi
Travancore-Cochin:
Pattom A. Thanu Pillai,
R. Sankar,
P. T. Chacko,
Panampilly Govinda Menon,
Annie Mascarene,
P.S. Nataraja Pillai,
K.A. Mohamed,
P.K.Lekshmanan
Madhya Bharat:
Vinayak Sitaram Sarwate,
Brijraj Narain,
Gopikrishna Vijayavargiya,
Ram Sahai,
Kusum Kant Jain,
Radhavallabh Vijayavargiya,
Sitaram S. Jajoo
Saurashtra:
Balwant Rai Gopalji Mehta,
Jaisukhlal Hathi,
Amritlal Vithaldas Thakkar,
Chimanlal Chakubhai Shah,
Samaldas Laxmidas Gandhi
Rajasthan:
V. T. Krishnamachari,
Hiralal Shastri,
Sardar Singhjhi of Khetri,
Jaswant Singhji,
Raj Bhadur,
Manikya Lal Varma,
Gokul Lal Asava,
Ramchandra Upadhyaya,
Balwant Sinha Mehta,
Dalel Singh,
Jainarain Vyas
Patiala and East Punjab States Union:
Ranjit Singh,
Sochet Singh,
Bhagwant Roy
Bombay States:
Vinayakrao Balshankar Vaidya,
B. N. Munavalli,
Gokulbhai Daulatram Bhatt,
Jivraj Narayan Mehta,
Gopaldas A. Desai,
Paranlal Thakurlal Munshi,
B. H. Khardekar,
Ratnappa Bharamappa Kumbhar B.N Datar
Orissa States:
Lal Mohan Pati,
N. Madhava Rau,
Raj Kunwar,
Sarangadhar Das,
Yudhishthir Mishra
Central Provinces States:
R. L. Malaviya,
Kishorimohan Tripathi,
Ramprasad Potai
United Provinces States:
B. H. Zaidi,
Krishna Singh
Madras States:
V. Ramaiah,
Ramakrishna Ranga Rao
Vindhya Pradesh:
Avdesh Pratap Singh,
Shambu Nath Shukla,
Ram Sahai Tiwari,
Mannulalji Dwidedi
Cooch Behar:
Himmat Singh K. Maheshwari
Tripura and Manipur:
Girja Shankar Guha
Bhopal:
Lal Singh
Kutch:
Bhawani Arjun Khimji
Himachal Pradesh:
Yashwant Singh Parmar

Members who later withdrew after partition

East Bengal:
Abdullah al Mahmood,
Maulana Mohd Abdullah el Baqui,
Abdul Hamid,
Abdul Kasem Khan,
Mohammad Akram Khan,
A. Hamid,
Azizuddin Ahmad,
Muhammad Habibullah Bahar,
Prem Hari Barma,
Raj Kumar Chakraverty,
Sris Chandra Chattopadhyaya,
Abdul Matin Chaudhary,
Murtaza Raza Choudhry,
Hamidul Haq Chowdhury,
Akhay Kumar Das,
Dhirendra Nath Datta,
Bhupendra Kumar Datta,
Ebrahim Khan,
Fazlul Huq,
Fazlur Rahman,
Ghayasuddin Pathan,
Begum Shaista Suhrawardy Ikramullah,
Liaquat Ali Khan,
Mafizuddin Ahmad,
Mahmud Hussain,
Jnanendra Chandra Majumdar,
A. M. Malik,
Birat Chandra Mandal,
Jogendra Nath Mandal,
Mohammed Ali,
Khwaja Nazimuddin,
M.A.B.L. Nur Ahmed,
Nurul Amin,
Ishtiaq Hussain Qureshi,
Sri Dhananjoy M.A. B.L. Roy,
Maudi Bhakesh Chanda,
B.L. Serajul Islam,
Maulana Shabbir Ahmad Osmani,
Shahabudin Khwaja,
H.S. Suhrawardy,
Harendra Kumar Sur,
Tamizuddin Khan,
Kawivi Kerwar Datta, Ghulam Mohammed
West Punjab:
Mian Mumtaz Mohammad Khan Daultana,
Ganga Saran,
Zafarullah Khan,
Iftikhar Hussain Khan,
Mian Muhammad Iftikharuddin,
Muhammad Ali Jinnah,
Sheikh Karamat Ali,
Nazir Ahmad Khan,
Sardar Abdur Rab Nistar,
Feroz Khan Noon,
Omar Hayat Malik,
Shah Nawaz Begum Jahan Ara,
Sardar Shaukat Hyat Khan,
Northwest Frontier Province:
Khan Abdul Ghaffar Khan,
Sardar Bahadur Khan,
Sardar Asad Ullah Jan Khan
Sindh:
Abdus Sattar Abdur Rahman,
Alhajj Muhammad Hashim Gazder,
M.A. Khuhro
Balochistan:
S. B. Nawab Mohammad Khan Jogezai

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