BY M. VENKATARANGAIYA. M.A.

I

In his learned paper on "The evolution of the Legislature in Hyderabad," read at the last session of the Indian Political Science Conference¹, Professor H. K. Sherwani of the Osmania University put forward the view that the reforms introduced into the State in 1939 formed "a bold, unique and definite departure from the principles which were supposed to have been the last word in the application of democracy to India," that they obviated the short-comings of the graft of a purely European democracy to Indian conditions, that they constituted a great step forward in the matter of representation, composition and powers of the legislative assembly, ² and that in certain respects they could even serve as a pointer to British India³. The implications of this view are that the reforms are democratic in their nature, that there is a type of democracy specifically European in character and therefore unsuited to Indian conditions, that the type devised for Hyderabad possesses certain novel features to which there is no parallel in the democracies of the West, and that this is the type of democracy that deserves to be extended to the rest of India. As it appears that the term ‘democracy’ has been used by the learned professor in a rather loose sense, it is proposed to examine his view, and incidentally to describe the real nature of the reforms.

It may be noted at the outset that according to him there are three remarkable features which give a uniqueness to the reforms under consideration. The first is the division of the State into a series of economic rather than geographical constituencies; and in bringing this about Hyderabad has, in his view, made history. The second is the establishment of a unicameral instead of a bicameral legislature. The third is the tremendous increase in the number of the elected members of the legislature from four to forty-two, on which he remarks that it is doubtful if in any other recent constitution such an advance is to be seen.

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The documents bearing on the subject make it clear that the object of the reforms is not the introduction of democracy, either of the European or the non-European type, into the State. It is on the other hand the more humble one of creating some institutions for helping the government in obtaining ‘a knowledge of the needs and desires of the people.’ In the message conveyed by the Nizam to his Legislative Council, announcing the appointment of the Reforms Committee, he stated that the problem for which he wanted the Committee to discover a solution was that of increasing the association between his people and his government by the creation of a body or bodies representing the main interests in his State, from which his government could derive adequate and constant knowledge of the needs and desires of his people⁴. The terms of reference to the Committee were defined as follows: "Keeping in view the conditions in and the requirements and circumstances of the State, to investigate and report on all suitable alternatives for the more effective association of the different interests in the State with the government whereby the latter may be placed in continuous possession of their needs and desires." ⁵ The Committee strictly adhered to these terms and the chairman gave a ruling that the subject of responsible government did not come within the terms of their enquiry.⁶ The changes which the Committee recommended and which were subsequently approved by the Executive Council and the Nizam have only brought into existence a few bodies like an enlarged Legislative Assembly containing forty-two elected members out of a total strength of eighty five; a number of advisory committees attached to departments of administration like Agriculture, Education, Finance, Industrial Development Public Health, Hindu Religious Endowments, Muslim Re1igious Endowments, and Religious Affairs consisting of an equal number of officials and nominated non-officials; District Boards and Municipal Committees with an elected majority, and a provision for annual district conferences in which the inhabitants of an area can make representation on matters of local interest to the Subedar.⁷ It is on the strength of changes like these that Professor Sherwani refers to the reforms as democratic in their character.

The mere existence of representative bodies does not make a constitution democratic. What is fundamental to it is the amount and nature of power transferred to them. It is only in the degree in which political power is exercised by them that the state acquires a democratic character. The Legislative Assembly established in Hyderabad is not endowed with a final power in respect of any matters whatever. In the first place important items like the administration of Sarf–i–Khas, the relations with the Paigahs, the Executive Council, grants of land or cash by the Nizam, salaries, allowances, pensions, and gratuities, and the military and other armed forces are excluded entirely from the jurisdiction of the Legislative Assembly.⁸ Even in regard to items which are within its purview it has no final authority to legislate or withhold legislation. The Head of the State has the right of vetoing the bills passed in the Assembly, and also of enacting laws not approved by it. Its sanction is not necessary either for the levy of taxes or for the appropriation of revenues. It can only discuss the budget in a general way and move resolutions of a recommendatory nature in respect of expenditure on items included within its jurisdiction.⁹

The fact of the matter is that democratic government is inconsistent with the basic conception of the Hyderabad polity as envisaged by the Reforms Committee and as accepted by the Executive Council. This conception has been expressed in the following terms: "The Head of the State represents the people directly in his own person, and his connection with them, therefore, is more natural and abiding than that of any passing elected representatives. He is both the supreme head of the State and the embodiment of his people’s sovereignty. Hence it is that, in such a polity, the Head of the State not merely retains the power to confirm or veto any piece of legislation, but also enjoys a special prerogative to make and unmake his executive, or change the machinery of government through which he meets the growing needs of his people. Such a sovereignty forms the basis on which our constitution rests, and has to be preserved."¹⁰ So long as this principle is taken as the basic foundation of the constitution it is not possible to raise any democratic superstructure–European or non-European–on it. The view that the hereditary ruler of the State is a more direct, natural and permanent representative of the people than those specifically elected by them is in entire conflict with the elementary notions of democracy. It is more in consonance with the theory of Divine Right upheld by the European monarchs of the seventeenth and the eighteenth centuries, with the theory of virtual representation and the Whig trusteeship put forward by Edmund Burke, and with the metaphysical theory of Hegel that the State is a self-conscious ethical substance of which the monarch is the external symbol.

Democracy is government by consultation, conference and discussion, and it works only where there is freedom for the organisation of political associations and parties and for criticising the actions of Government on the platform and in the press. As one eminent writer¹¹ has put it, "the emergence of constitutional Government, and in particular the crystallization of the systems of popular representation as we know them, are inextricably interwoven with the growth of the modern press. Without it constitutional Government is unimaginable". The truth of all this is recongnised by the Reforms Committee which described¹² the press and the platform as "safety valves of public life, the closure of which often develops the canker of discontent in the body politic". But the recommendations which it has made for guaranteeing freedom in these matters are of a halting and inconclusive character. The Executive Council has also not gone very much beyond these recommendations. Conveners of public meetings have still to give previous intimation to the competent authority which is empowered to prohibit them. A new press regulation more or less on the same lines as the legislation in British India and. suitably adopted to local conditions has been promised. ¹³

One should also hesitate to speak of the reforms as democratic when one finds the representation of specific economic and industrial interests (the one unique feature of the new constitution) advocated and defended by the Reforms Committee¹⁴ on the ground that, "this is the trend of the modern progressive thought on which rests the theory of the Corporative State. Economically, Hyderabad is not highly advanced. There has not as yet been any effort of a voluntary and spontaneous character on the part of the different economic groups–peasants, agricultural workers, industrial labour, etc.,–to organise themselves into associations to safeguard their interests through collective action. In such a situation the introduction of the principles of the Corporative State will certainly result in economic organisations being started under Governmental auspices and completely bureaucratized.¹⁵ This is of the essence of Corporativism as it has manifested itself in Italy, the land of its birth. It is the economic basis of the Fascist State. And any one with the least acquaintance with Fascism can easily understand how wide a gulf separates it from democracy. One really has to ask oneself whether in the reformed constitution of Hyderabad one does not find the germs of the Fascist State.

The assumption made by many students of politics in India–and Professor Sherwani is typical of them–that there is a type of democracy specially European in character and therefore unsuited to Indian conditions is an entirely mistaken one. The mistake is the outcome of the failure to distinguish between democracy as an ideal and democracy as a group of institutions, which are the instruments for achieving the ideal.¹⁶ As an ideal, democracy stands for responsible government and for an equal right of all men and women in a community to a share in the benefits of civilised life. It is opposed to the view that the rulers have an inherent or a divine right to rule, that in what they do or fail to do they are only responsible to their conscience or to God and not to their people. It is also opposed to the view that the blessings of a civilized life, like security from external and internal violence, adequate wealth and leisure, health and education, should be the monopoly of only a few privileged classes, and that the rest should only toil for the advantage and the happiness of these classes. It declares that it is not enough that rulers have good intentions but that they should by their work produce results in terms of the welfare of each and every individual, irrespective of his race, language or religion. There is nothing specially European about democracy as an ideal. It is of universal validity and deserves to be realised as effectively in one country as in another. If the reformed constitution of Hyderabad is to be considered democratic it should be only with reference to this ideal. Judged by this test it has no claim to be so considered. It has not recognised the principle of responsible government and it has not conceived the need for a new social order based on the abolition of the privileged classes like the nobles, the Jagirdars and the Maashdars.

No elaborate argument is required to show that there is no uniform or standardized type of political institutions in all the democratic countries of the west deserving to be labeled as European: There is a large variety in the machinery of democratic government. In respect of systems of representation, the status and powers of the second chambers, the relation of the executive and the legislature, the place of the judiciary, the organisation of the Civil Service, the degree of decentralisation and local self-government and the extent to which representative advisory and consultative bodies are used–in these and in various other matters which go to determine the real nature of the political and administrative machinery employed in a state, no two democratic countries are exactly similar, and there is nothing therefore which should be styled as European democracy. More-over the forms of democratic government have been undergoing change from time to time in accordance with the changing needs and circumstances of each State. The position of the Cabinet in England today, or of the President in the United States, is quite different from what it was a quarter of century ago. The Civil Service also occupies a quite different position. The relations between central and local authorities have also undergone a great transformation in all democracies. The fact is that there is no rigidity in democratic machinery. Like life itself it is experimental in its outlook and character. Whatever success it has so far achieved or it might achieve in future is due to its flexibility and adjustability. It is not wedded to unicameralism or bicameralism; it does not ignore the utility of functional representation for certain purposes. It is therefore unscientific to speak of a standardised form of European democracy and of the shortcomings of its graft to Indian conditions.

It is in the light of these considerations that one has to form an estimate of the significance of what Professor Sherwani calls the remarkable achievements of the Hyderabad reforms–their unicameralism and the economic basis of representation. Bicameralism is not now regarded as an essential part of democratic machinery in the sense in which it was advocated in the eighteenth and the nineteenth centuries. There has been a complete change from the view as represented by the Federalist¹⁷ to that as represented by Professor Laski,¹⁸ an ardent advocate of unicameralism. In the majority of democratic states, second chambers have gradually been losing their power and influence–the only important exception being the Senate of the United States. Moreover those who still support the institution of a second chamber do so on the ground that the large power usually vested in the lower house should be checked by an upper house. This ground is not applicable to Hyderabad. In the first place the unicameral legislature does not possess any real authority which requires to be checked by a second chamber. In the second place it is so constituted that the elements and interests which serve as a check against the rashness of a lower house in the democratic states are effectively and more than adequately represented on it. The holders of Samsthans, the Jagirdars, the Maashdars, the agents of the Ilaquas, and the large members of nominated officials and non-officials, together with the members of the Executive Council constitute a formidable block to check the power of the elected element, so much that there is very little left for a second chamber to accomplish. Under these circumstances the unicameralism of the constitution is of no significance.

One is forced to draw a similar conclusion regarding the claim that, by constituting the legislature on the basis of economic rather than territorial interests, Hyderabad has made history. In the first place the Assembly is not constituted wholly on that basis. It is not known exactly what economic interests are represented by the four holders of Samsthans and Jagirdars, the two Maashdars, the two graduates and the six members representing the District Boards, the District Municipalities and the Hyderabad Municipal Corporation. Thus out of the forty-two elected members fourteen may be said to represent no economic interest–if by an economic interest one is to understand a group of producers of economic goods. In the second place there is large nominated element which does not represent any economic interests as such. And it follows from these two features that it is not likely that legislation undertaken by the Assembly, the resolutions discussed in it and the other kinds of business transacted by it, will be based on a consideration of the interests of the main economic groups in the State. In the third place there is no support for the view that in introducing an element of functional representation Hyderabad has done something that is novel or unprecedented. The Executive Council has taken a saner view of the matter and expressed itself as follows:^{19 "}Outside India the experiment is not new; in India itself, the constitutions of British India and of some States provide partly and in the case of certain interests for a similar basis." In the legislatures in British India as they evolved during the last fifty years, provision has always been made for the representation of interests like Chambers of Commerce, Landholders, Planters etc; and Hyderabad has only enlarged on this precedent. In all the democratic states of Europe, Councils and Chambers constituted on a functional and economic basis have in recent times formed an integral part of their governmental machinery.²⁰ The German Economic Council under the Weimar Republic, the French Economic Council, the British Economic Advisory Council, and similar Councils in Czechoslovakia and other States of Europe demonstrate quite clearly that the need for functional representation has been realised. And when one keeps in mind that much of the legislation today is undertaken not by parliaments but by administrative departments, and that bodies representative of the concerned interests are invariably attached to these departments–there are ninety-seven such Permanent Advisory Committees in England today–²¹ one should hesitate a great deal before ascribing any novelty to the system inaugurated in Hyderabad. After a survey of the part played by Interest Groups in the modern State, Professor C. F. Friedrich has rightly come to the conclusion that, wherever we turn, functional representative devices are forging ahead as decisive elements in any representative scheme under modern industrial conditions.²²

Professor Sherwani has not made clear anywhere what those conditions and circumstances peculiar to Hyderabad are, which necessitate a departure from what he calls European democracy and the setting up of a democratic legislature on a functional basis. It is true that the Reforms Committee went into this subject in accordance with the first portion of the terms of reference. But it has not succeeded in establishing any kind of connection between its analysis of "The conditions in and the requirements and circumstances of the State" in Part I of its Report and the functional representation which it recommended in the Second Part. The only features characteristic of Hyderabad to-day²³–according to the Report–are the comparative illiteracy of the people in spite of the increasing expenditure on education; a general awakening throughout the Dominions manifesting itself in the convening of conferences, the formation of societies and journalistic activities; an awakening among women, an increase of expenditure on the construction of roads, railways, bus service, telephone, radio and electricity; and the impact of the outside world on the people of the State. These are features which are characteristic of almost every part of India, and no inference can be drawn from them as to what type of popular participation in the government of the State is desirable under these circumstances. One or two other points also deserve consideration in this connection. It is one thing to have councils and parliaments organised on a functional basis if they are mainly to be advisory and consultative; it is quite a different thing to have legislative bodies with final authority to make laws constructed on the same pattern²⁴. Pure functional representation for legislative purposes is found today in the U. S. S. R. and Italy. These legislatures are able to function in spite of the diversity of interests of the different economic groups represented on them, primarily because the power of ultimate decision is not in their hands but in those of the dictatorial parties–the Communists and the Fascists–which control and co-ordinate all activities in the State. But for this kind of party dictatorship, functional representation would have created such a large amount of friction making community-living wholly impossible. Similarly in Hyderabad a functionally organised legislature will not create disturbance so long as it continues to be an advisory body–as is the case with it at present–the real authority being wielded by the hereditary Head of the State and his executive council. But the moment it is contemplated to transfer real powers to it and to introduce democracy into the State, a breakdown will have to be faced. The common interest whose furtherance alone is the object of the State cannot be promoted by a body constructed to represent the diversity of interests in sociey. As Professor Finer puts it,²⁵ the real difficulty in the management of the State, which integrates thousands of different personal, local and syndical interests, is not soluble by disintegration and the consequent encouragement of guild conceit and selfishness, but by integration first, and then devolution, legislative and administrative, and always consultation of the associations and localities.

Unicametalism and functional representation are not the essential features of the scheme of reforms in Hyderabad. Its basic characteristic is the attempt made in it to solve what is generally known as the communal problem; and it solves it by giving equality of representation to the Muslims and the Hindus not merely on the Legislative Assembly but also on all other deliberative bodies like the District Boards, the Municipal Committees and the Village Panchayats. The Muslims form about eleven percent, and the Hindus about eighty-six percent of the population in the State. In spite of this, the number of Hindu representatives is to be exactly the same as that of the Muslim representatives. There are districts, towns and villages where the Muslim population is not even seven or eight percent; but even there they are to share equal representation with the Hindus on local bodies. And when account is taken of the need to set apart a few seats at least to Christians and Zoroastrians, there is the possibility of the Hindus who constitute a large majority of the population becoming a minority on the legislature. There is no precedent for the grant of such heavy weightage to a minority community as has been given to the Muslims in Hyderabad. There is also another anomaly. While Muslims are treated as a homogeneous community in spite of the existence of acute differences between the Sunnis and the Shias–differences which were recognised²⁶ in some of the previous proposals for constitutional reform–the distinction between caste Hindus, Harijans, Depressed Classes and Lingayats is raised to the status of a political principle and this distinction is bound to reduce still further the influence of the Hindus on the legislature. A still further anomaly is that the principle of equality between the two communities is not extended to the Executive Council and the Civil Services where the Muslims enjoy an extraordinarily preponderant share. The Firman of the Nizam²⁷ issued in connection with the reformed constitution refers to Hyderabad as a Muslim State, and the scheme of representation it provides for results in the perpetuation of the ascendancy of the Muslim inhabitants who form a sort of privileged community in the State. This is the central feature of the new constitution.

In Support of this position the only argument that has been put forward is: "The importance of the Muslim community in the State, by virtue of its historical position and its status in the body politic, is so obvious (?) that it cannot be reduced to the status of a minority in the Assembly." ²⁸ This only means to say that because the community has for so long been in enjoyment of a privileged position it should continue to do so for all time. Here is a claim which is not based on justice or fairness.

Long ago, Hamilton, that master of political wisdom, with his deep insight into realities of government, expressed himself thus in respect of the claim for equality made by the individual States of the American Confederation even though they differed from each other in point of population: ²⁹ "Every idea of proportion and every rule of fair representation conspire to condemn a principle which gives to Rhode Island an equal weight in the scale of power with Massachusetts, or Connecticut, or New York; and to Delaware an equal voice in the national deliberations with Pennsylvania, or Virginia, or North Carolina. Its operation contradicts the fundamental maxim of republican government, which requires that the sense of the majority should prevail. Sophistry may reply, that sovereigns are equal, and that a majority of the votes of the States will be a majority of confederated America. But this kind of logical legerdemain will never counteract the plain suggestions of justice and common sense. It may happen that this majority of States is a small minority of the people of America; and two-thirds of the people of America could not long be persuaded upon the credit of artificial distinctions and syllogistic subtilities, to submit their interests to the management and disposal of one-third." It is this false doctrine of group equality that lay at the basis of the theory of concurrent majority put forward by Calhoun³⁰ with its advocacy of nullification and secession and that drove the American States to a civil war among themselves. And it was also the doctrine which was responsible for that equal representation of the English Upper Canada and the French Lower Canada on the Canadian Legislature before 1867, which led to the ultimate breakdown of constitutional government in that country.³¹ One should not commit the mistake of the kind that the problem as to how different religious and linguistic groups inhabiting the same State should be enabled to learn the habits of peaceful living is peculiar to India and that other countries have not been faced by a similar situation, or that we are capable of suggesting novel solutions for it. Both as a warning and as a guide, the history of other countries has great lessons to teach us in this connection.

In our habit of talking in terms of groups and communities, we are apt to forget that what we have to be really interested in is in the welfare and happiness of individual men and women. There are no interests of communities apart from those of the members constituting them. Viewed in this perspective communal equality and weightage imply undue advantages to certain individuals and undue suffering to others. An individual is denied opportunities of serving the State as a legislator, an administrator or as a civil servant or as a member of the fighting forces, not because he is not qualified for it but because of his following a particular faith. Persons with greater skill and capacity are relegated to inferior positions because of the community to which they belong, thus creating in the minds of a large number a sense of frustration and disappointment, leading to violent popular outbreaks and revolutions.³² Similarly the goods which can only be provided through the instrumentality of the State are distributed among individuals not according to their needs but to the accident of their membership in this or that community. The hunger of a Muslim or his ignorance is considered to deserve relief more than that of a Hindu or Christian. It is this fact, that weightage in the excercise of power leads to weightage in the enjoyment of the benefits arising from State action, that constitutes the injustice of all systems of communal representation, like that of Hyderabad.

The injustice is not very much mitigated by the provision that representatives should be elected in joint and not separate electorates as is the case in British India. The reality of representation depends on the freedom of the electorate to choose the candidate considered best fitted in its opinion; and such freedom is absent when the voters are called on to elect only Hindus or Muslims. Much also of the virtue of functional representation which has been considered as the cardinal feature of the reformed constitution is lost when each interest has to distribute its choice equally between Muslims and Hindus. A candidate who can better represent the interests will have to be ignored if his choice results in the election of more Hindus or more Muslims than what is permitted in the constitution. This restriction of choice leads to another anomaly. In no case is it open to an economic interest like Commerce, Industries, Banking, etc., to elect a Christian or a Zoroastrian or any one else who is not a Hindu or Muslim even though he happens to occupy the leading position in the particular economic group. One is reminded in this connection of the observation made by an eminent scholar that the wisest way of abolishing a Parliament is to let it stand, but to fill it with your own trusted nominees.³³

No real change or reform in the constitution of a State is possible unless a new constituent power comes into existence. By a constituent power is meant that body or group of people within the State which possess the effective power to make a constitution for it and operate it against all opposition. It is upon the character and the views of that body that the nature of the constitution depends. History shows that it is only when, owing to changes in the economic or the social structure of a people, new groups emerge with sufficient strength to bring pressure to bear on existing governments, dictate to them, and thus become the constituent power in the State, new constitutions come into effect, reflecting the views of the emerging groups. Every constitution embodies the principles according to which political power is organised and used in a given State; and a reform of the constitution means a change in these principles. It therefore involves a new alignment of power in the community. No change which does not involve a fresh arrangement or distribution of power deserves to be called a constitutional change. This is the reason why charters and reforms voluntarily granted by rulers and governments do not really result in constitutional changes. No one will voluntarily agree to a reduction in one’s authority. The case is different when owing to the emergence of a new politically conscious group governments are compelled to grant new constitutions. It is in this way that dynastic States of Europe became transformed into middle-class democracies; and it is the rise of the proletariat that is transforming the latter into mass democracies.

This explains why the Hyderabad reforms have not brought about any changes of a constitutional character. Power is now located in the same persons in whom it was located before the introduction of reforms. No new constituent power has as yet arisen in the State. While the Nizam has the formal constituent power in his hands the real constituent power is the British Crown. It alone has the authority to determine what should be the character of the constitutions governing the Indian States. It is one of the incidents of paramountcy. It sets a limit to the kind of reforms that the Head of an Indian State might introduce. This is the conclusion–and no other conclusion is possible–arrived at by the Mysore Committee³⁴ on Constitutional Reform (1939). There is no ground for thinking that the position of Hyderabad in relation to the paramount power is in this respect different from that of Mysore or any other Indian State. All doubts in this regard were set at rest by the letter of Lord Reading as Viceroy³⁴ to the Nizam in 1926. The constituent power therefore in respect of Indian States now rests with the British Crown. It does not favour the introduction of a real democratic Government into British India, and it will not look with favour at such a step being taken in Hyderabad. The conclusion to be drawn from this is that any real constitutional development in the Indian States is intimately connected with the progress or events in British India. Nothing is more unrealistic than the attempt to frame constitutions for individual States irrespective of what is happening in the rest of the country. The fortunes of democracy in Hyderabad are closely bound with its fortunes in British India; and one has to wait for the rise of a new constituent power different from the British Crown if there is to be a reformed constitution anywhere in the country.