Editor’s Note:
Regular readers may have noticed a new addition to our collection of primary documents: constitutions drafted in princely states. These texts represent an important—though often overlooked—strand in the development of India’s constitutional heritage. While only a handful are currently available on the site, we are committed to expanding this collection in the coming weeks and months—so stay tuned.
To accompany this effort, we are launching a new series titled Crowns & Constitutions, which will explore the people, ideas, and events that shaped princely state constitutions in India. The series will closely examine the various provisions of these constitutions,, compare and contrast them, and situate them within the broader landscape of India’s constitutional history and law.
The first article in the series below focuses on law-making powers in princely states. Were these constitutions truly the vehicles of reform they claimed to be—especially in granting representative assemblies greater legislative authority? In this piece, Saumya examines three such constitutions and offers a close reading of their legal provisions.
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Who Could Make Laws Under the Constitutions of Princely States?
In this article, I evaluate the concentration of legislative power in three princely states. To this end, I examine the scope of subject-matter jurisdiction granted to legislative bodies, and the degree of control exercised by the ruler over their composition and functioning.
At one end of the spectrum lies the Government of Mysore Act, 1940. The Act created a Representative Assembly and a Legislative Council but vested near-absolute authority in the ruler, referred to as ‘His Highness the Maharaja’. The Act explicitly preserved the Maharaja’s right to enact laws, proclamations, and orders without reference to either chamber, notwithstanding anything in the Act: thus effectively subordinating both institutions to the Maharaja’s will. This prerogative was further reinforced by an open-ended and expandable list of excluded subjects over which legislative power rested entirely with the ‘Government’, meaning the Maharaja acting with the aid and advice of his Council of ministers. Even this Council was firmly under the Maharaja’s control, as he held discretion over appointments, removals, and allocation of business. Together, these provisions granted the Maharaja wide latitude to bypass the chambers or nullify laws, whether by shrinking the chambers’ subject-matter jurisdiction or negating enactments.
While both chambers under the Mysore Act, especially the Representative Assembly, had elected elements, the government retained control over election processes and procedural rules. This enabled indirect influence over the chambers’ functioning, even before the question of royal assent arose. And crucially, no enactment could become law without the Maharaja’s approval— an approval the Maharaja was under no obligation to give. Thus, despite the formal existence of legislative institutions, real power remained concentrated in the ruler’s hands.
In contrast, the Aundh State Constitution Act I of 1939 conferred comparatively greater autonomy on its legislature. It limited the ruler’s (Shrimant Rajasaheb’s) exclusive law-making authority to a defined set of ‘special powers’, primarily related to foreign affairs. This narrower exclusion allowed the legislative body to operate over a broader domain than its Mysore counterpart. Furthermore, unlike in Mysore, the Aundh Legislative Assembly consisted solely of indirectly elected members, with no scope for royal nominations. This insulated the Assembly to a significant extent from the Rajasaheb’s influence.
Although the ruler’s assent was still required for legislation to take effect, the Aundh Act provided a formal override mechanism: the Assembly could re-promulgate the bill across up to three sessions to ensure its enactment. This safeguard, though procedurally demanding, introduced a potential check on the Rajasaheb’s veto. This marked a step towards functional autonomy, while executive authority remained vested in the ruler, the Government, Taluka Councils, and Panchayats.
The Manipur State Constitution Act, 1947 extended this trajectory of legislative independence further. It sharply restricted the Maharajah’s personal prerogatives, and subjected even those powers to the framework of the Act and the laws of the State. Thus, unlike Mysore, no subject was left completely immune from legislative scrutiny. Institutional autonomy was further entrenched through the structure of governance: legislative powers resided with a Council of Ministers, accountable to a fully elected State Assembly. The Assembly elected and could remove all ministers except the Chief Minister, who was appointed by the Maharajah only in consultation with the elected members. This design placed legislative initiative and control firmly in elected hands, limiting the ruler’s influence over both the composition and operation of the governing bodies.
The Manipur Act, like its counterparts, required royal assent for legislation to become law. However, it allowed the Assembly and Council to override a veto by employing a less onerous process than that prescribed in Aundh. This, combined with the Assembly’s full electoral basis and its control over ministerial appointments, marked the highest degree of legislative autonomy among the three states.
Taken together, these Acts trace a clear arc—from the near-total authority of the ruler in Mysore, through a partially autonomous legislature in Aundh, to the comparatively empowered institutions of Manipur. Legislative power in princely states was not monolithic, but varied based on how each constitutional framework defined jurisdictional boundaries, structured representation, and balanced assent with institutional override. The result was a spectrum of governance—from symbolic assemblies to substantive legislatures with meaningful checks on monarchical power.