Governors of States

Article 129, Draft Constitution of India 1948

There shall be a Governor for each State.

Article 153, Constitution of India 1950

There shall be a Governor for each State.

Draft Article 129 (Article 153) was debated on 30th May 1949. It stipulated that each State would have a Governor.

One member proposed an amendment to mandate that there would be at least one Governor ‘from each of the States in Part I of the First Schedule’. He argued that this was necessary to ensure that all states were adequately represented in government services. Although the principle of adequate representation received support, a member believed that the question should be addressed while discussing the appointment of Governors.

Another member argued that it was unnecessary to have Governors in the first place, and that the Centre should instead have administrative control over the states. He contended that provincial autonomy was only necessary during colonial rule, and symbolized distrust of national government. He received the support of a member who argued that the basis of the semi-federal structure of the Draft Constitution was the Government of India Act, 1935 and was therefore not an indigenous idea. This member further argued that although the Assembly had already adopted this system of governance, the state administrations had proven too unstable and therefore a unitary constitution was the need of the hour. The other members of the Assembly disagreed with these comments as being ‘out of order’ because the broad principles of the Constitution had already been previously decided.

The proposed amendment was negatived. The Draft Article was adopted on 30th May 1949. It was later amended by the Constitution (7th Amendment) Act, 1956.