Provisions as to provisional Parliament and the Speaker and Deputy Speaker thereof

Article 311, Draft Constitution of India 1948

(1) Until both Houses of Parliament have been duly constituted and summoned to meet for the first session under this Constitution, the Constituent Assembly of the Dominion of India shall itself exercise all the powers and perform all the duties conferred on Parliament and may in particular make law for securing the due constitution of the two Houses of Parliament and for providing for all matters relating to or connected with elections to either House of Parliament including the delimitation of constituencies and for such other ancillary and consequential matters as may be deemed necessary for the purpose of giving effect to the provisions of this Constitution.

Explanation:-For the purposes of this clause, the Constituent Assembly of the Dominion of India includes members chosen to fill casual vacancies in that Assembly in accordance with rules made in that behalf by the Assembly, but shall not include any members representing any territory not included in the First Schedule.

(2) The Speaker of the Constituent Assembly when functioning as the Dominion Legislature under the Government of India Act, 1935, shall continue to be the Speaker of such Assembly functioning under clause (1) of this article.

(3) Such person as the Constituent Assembly of the Dominion of India shall have elected in this behalf shall be the provisional President of India until a President has been elected in accordance with the provisions contained in Chapter I of Part V of this Constitution and has entered upon his office.

(4) All persons holding office as ministers for the Dominion of India immediately before the commencement of this Constitution shall after such commencement become members of the Council of ministers of the provisional President under this Constitution.

Article 379, Constitution of India 1950

(1) Until both Houses of Parliament have been duly constituted and summoned to meet for the first session under the provisions of this Constitution, the body functioning as the Constituent Assembly of the Dominion of India immediately before the commencement of this Constitution shall be the provisional Parliament and shall exercise all the powers and perform all the duties conferred by the provisions of this Constitution on Parliament.

⁠Explanation.—For the purposes of this clause, the Constituent Assembly of the Dominion of India includes—

(i) the members chosen to represent any State or other territory for which representation is provided under clause (2), and

(ii) the members chosen to fill casual vacancies in the said Assembly.

⁠(2) The President may by rules provide for—

(a) the representation in the provisional Parliament functioning under clause (1) of any State or other territory which was not represented in the Constituent Assembly of the Dominion of India immediately before the commencement of this Constitution,

(b) the manner in which the representatives of such States or other territories in the provisional Parliament shall be chosen, and

(c) the qualifications to be possessed by such representatives.

⁠(3) If a member of the Constituent Assembly of the Dominion of India was, on the sixth day of October, 1949, or thereafter at any time before the commencement of this Constitution, a member of a House of the Legislature of a Governor’s Province or of an Indian State corresponding to any State specified in Part B of the First Schedule or a Minister for any such State, then, as from the commencement of this Constitution the seat of such member in the Constituent Assembly shall, unless he has ceased to be a member of that Assembly earlier, become vacant and every such vacancy shall be deemed to be a casual vacancy.

⁠(4) Notwithstanding that any such vacancy in the Constituent Assembly of the Dominion of India as is mentioned in clause (3) has not occurred under that clause, steps may be taken before the commencement of this Constitution for the filling of such vacancy, but any person chosen before such commencement to fill the vacancy shall not be entitled to take his seat in the said Assembly until after the vacancy has so occurred.

⁠(5) Any person holding office immediately before the commencement of this Constitution as Speaker or Deputy Speaker of the Constituent Assembly when functioning as the Dominion Legislature under the Government of India Act, 1935, shall on such commencement be the Speaker or, as the case may be, the Deputy Speaker of the provisional Parliament functioning under clause (1).