LORD ZETLAND’S SPEECH May 6, 1937

[Prof. Dr. Yogendra Yadav]

Prof. Dr. Yogendra Yadav

Gandhian Scholar

Gandhi Research Foundation, Jalgaon, Maharashtra, India

Contact No. – 09415777229, 094055338

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LORD ZETLAND’S SPEECH May 6, 1937

 

 

If a quasi-legal formula could be devised to regulate the varied and changing relationships between the Governor and his Ministry, it would have been embodied in the Act. It was just because there was no such formula that it was emphasized again and again in the course of the discussions preceding the Bill that it would be the spirit in which the Constitution was worked that would be of the first importance for its success. It is here that such unfortunate misunderstandings have arisen. In some quarters a great deal more has been read into that part of the Act which imposes certain obligations upon a Governor that it actually contains. In its most recent pronouncement, the Congress declared that the past record and the present attitude of the British Government showed that without the assurances demanded a popular Ministry would be exposed to constant irritating interference. This differs so profoundly from the picture of a popular Ministry functioning under the Act as I have always seen it that it is perhaps desirable that I should describe the working of the Constitution in Indian Provinces as I always contemplated it. Since I was a member not only of the Select Committee, but the Round Table Conference, I may claim to know something of the intentions of those who framed the measure and the spirit in which it was conceived. First let it not be supposed that the field of Government may be divided into two parts in which the Governor and Ministry operate separately at the risk of clashes between them. The essence of the new Constitution is that the initiative and responsibility for the whole Government of the Province, though in form vested in the Governor, passes to the Ministry as soon as it takes office. It will be the Governor’s duty to help Ministers in their task in every way, particularly by his political experience or administrative knowledge. The reserved powers of which so much has been made by the Congress will not normally be in operation; indeed they only come into the picture if he considers that the carefully limited special responsibilities laid upon him by the Act and impressed upon him by the Instrument of Instructions are involved, but even if the question of their use does arise here is emphasized the spirit in which it was intended that the Constitution should be worked it would be altogether wrong to assume that a Governor would immediately set himself in open opposition to his Ministry. That is the last thing in the world that I should either expect or desire. A Governor whose advice and support has been valuable to a Ministry in the conduct of its own affairs will surely be able to lay his own difficulties before them the moment he sees a risk that he and his Ministers may not see eye to eye in a matter for which special responsibility has been laid upon him by parliament. Just as Ministers can count upon the assistance of the Governor in their difficulties, so could he in his turn rely upon receiving the sympathetic consideration of his Ministers for a difficulty in his own position which, maybe, could be met by some modification of their proposals that would not materially affect the Ministry’s programme? In any case a discussion of the matter between men working together for a common purpose is likely at least to secure that points of difference between them are narrowed. It will then be for each having regard to the interests of the Province as a whole to consider whether the points of difference so narrowed and defined justify a break in a fruitful relationship. It would doubtless be too much to hope that occasions will never arise in which neither side can with good conscience give way. But if my picture of the working of Government under the Act is true and if the relations between the Governor and his Ministry are those of partners in a common enterprise, there can be no possible question of the Governors interfering constantly and embarrassingly in the responsibilities and work of the Ministries. It is certainly not the intention that Governors by a narrow or legalistic interpretation of their own responsibilities should trench upon the wide power which it was the purpose of parliament to place in the hands of Ministries and which it is our desire they should use in the furtherance of the programmes which they advocated. In the working of the Constitution as far as it at present is possible to judge, I find happy confirmation of the picture as I have always seen it. Both in the Provinces in which Ministries are working with majorities in the Legislatures and those in which minority Ministries are functioning, a bold programme has been drawn up as far as I know without the smallest attempt on the part of any Governor to interfere. Is it too much to hope that those who have so far hesitated to accept responsibilities of office from a mistaken sense of fear lest they should be unduly hampered in their tasks will derive reassurance and encouragement from the objectless on provided by the actual working of the Constitution in their midst? I need hardly say that I hope devoutly and in all sincerity that it may be so.