CONCLUSION OF FEDERATION VERSUS FREEDOM: SPEECH BY DR AMBEDKAR

CONCLUSION OF FEDERATION VERSUS FREEDOM: SPEECH BY DR AMBEDKAR

I have perhaps detained you longer than I should have done. You will allow that it is not altogether my fault. The vastness of the subject is one reason for the length of this address.

I must, however, confess that there is also another reason which has persuaded me not to cut too short. We are standing today at the point of time where the old age ends and the new begins. The old age was the age of Ranade, Agarkar, Tilak, Gokhale, Wachha, Sir Pherozeshah Mehta, Surendranath Bannerjee. The new age is the age of Mr. Gandhi and this generation is said to beGandhi generation. As one who knows something of the old age and also something of the new I see some very definite marks of difference between the two. The type of leadership has undergone a profound change. In the age of Ranade the leaders struggled to modernize India. In the age of Gandhi the leaders are making her a living specimen of antiquity. In the age of Ranade leaders depended upon experience as a corrective method ot their thoughts and their deeds. The leaders of the present age depend upon their inner voice as their guide. Not only is there a difference in their mental make up there is a difference even in their viewpoint regarding external appearance. The leaders of the old age took care to be well clad while the leaders of the present age take pride in being half clad. The leaders of the Gandhi age are of course aware of these differences. But far from blushing for their views and. their appearance they claim that the India of Gandhi is superior to India of Ranade. They say that the age of Mr. Gandhi is an agitated and an expectant age, which the age of Mr. Ranade was not.

Those who have lived both in the age of Ranade and the age of Gandhi will admit that there is this difference between the two. At the same time they will be able to insist that if the India of Ranade was less agitated it was more honest and that if it was less expectant it was more enlightened. The age of Ranade was an age in which men and women did engage themselves seriously in studying and examining the facts of their life, and what is more important is that in the face of the opposition of the orthodox mass they tried to mould their lives and their character in accordance with the lightthey found as a result of their research. In the age of Ranade there was not the same divorcebetween a politician and a student which one sees in the Gandhi age. In the age of Ranade a politician, who was not a student, was treated as an intolerable nuisance, if not a danger. In the age of Mr. Gandhi learning, if it is not despised, is certainly not deemed to be a necessary qualification of a politician.

To my mind there is no doubt that this Gandhi age is the dark age of India. It is an age in which people instead of looking for their ideals in the future are returning to antiquity. It is an age in which people have ceased to think for themselves and as they have ceased to think they have ceased to read and examine the facts of their lives. The fate of an ignorant democracy which refuses to follow the way shown by learning and experience and chooses to grope in the dark paths of the mystics and the megalomaniacs is a sad thing to contemplate. Such an age I thought needed something more than a mere descriptive sketch of the Federal Scheme. It needed a treatment which was complete though not. exhaustive and pointed without being dogmatic in order to make it alive to thedangers arising from the inauguration of the Federal Scheme. This is the task I had set before myself in preparing this address. Whether I have failed or succeeded.  it is for you to say. If this address has length which is not compensated by depth, all I can say is that I have tried to do my duty according to my lights.

I am not opposed to a Federal Form of Government. I confess I have a partiality for a Unitary form of Govsernment. I think India needs it. But I also realize that a Federal Form of Government is inevitable if there is to be Provincial Autonomy. But I am in dead horror the Federal Scheme contained in the Government of India Act. I think I hive justified my antipathy by giving adequate reasons. I want all to examine them and come to their own conclusions. Let us however realize thatthe case of Provincial Autonomy is very different from that of the Federal Scheme. To those whothink that the Federation should become acceptable, if the Governor-General gave an assurancealong the same lines as was supposed to be done by the Governors that he will not exercise his powers under his special responsibilities. I want to say two things. First I am sure the Governor-General cannot give such an assurance because he is exercising these powers not merely in the interest of the Crown but also in the interest of the States. Secondly, even if he did, that cannot alter the nature of the Federal Scheme. To those who think that a change in the system of State representation from nomination to election will make the Federation less objectionable, I want to say that they are treating a matter of detail as though it was a matter of fundamental. Let us note what is fundamental and what is not Let there be no mistake, let there be no fooling as to this. We have had enough of both. The real question is the extension and the growth of responsibility. Is that possible ?That is the crux. Let us also realize that there is no use bugging to Provincial Autonomy and leaving responsibility in the Centre hanging in the air. i am convinced that without real responsibility at the Centre, Provincial Autonomy is an empty shell.

What we should do to force our point of view, this is no place to discuss. It is enough if I have succeeded in giving you an adequate idea of what are the dangers of this Federal Scheme.