12 Dec 1946

The Constituent Assembly of India met in the Constitution Hall, New Delhi, at Eleven of the Clock, Mr. Chairman (The Hon’ble Dr. Rajendra Prasad) in the Chair.

If there are any Members who have not yet signed the Register, they may do so now.

(Nobody came forward.)

It seems there is nobody who has not yet signed. We now proceed to the next item. The first item that we have is a Resolution by Pandit Jawahar Lal Nehru. I understand that there are some Members who feel that they have not had sufficient time to consider this important Resolution. There is no doubt that the Resolution is a very important one and I would not like any Member to feel that he has not had sufficient time to consider it fully. If the House so desires, I am prepared to adjourn this discussion till tomorrow.

Yes.

Then there is another matter in this connection in regard to which I should like the advice of the House. We have got a Rules Committee and its members should meet to prepare the Rules which they will place before us. They should have time separate from the general session of the Assembly. If you agree, they will meet after this House is adjourned and we shall do as much as we can do. But if it cannot complete the work, the Rules Committee will have to meet tomorrow, and I would like to know whether the House would like to sit in the morning from 11 or in the afternoon because I would suggest that we should have one session only, either in the morning or afternoon, so that the Rules Committee may get the other half of the day for its work. If the House want the morning session, then we can meet in the morning.

We want morning sessions.

Afternoon sessions.

I am afraid in this matter it is difficult for me to come to a decision. I have to trouble the members to raise their hands-those who would like the morning sessions may please raise their hands.

(More members raised their hands in favour of the morning session.)

It seems the morning session is preferred by a large number of people. We shall have the session at 11 tomorrow morning concerning this Resolution and in the afternoon we may have, if necessary a meeting of the Rules Committee. If any Members have got any amendment to the Resolution to move, I would request them to hand over the amendments to the Secretary in the course of the day and we shall take up the discussion tomorrow. The Secretary will take care, if possible, to circulate the amendments also to Members.

Are we sitting on Saturday ?

I think we should be sitting on Saturday. That is my view but that is entirely in the hands of the House. I think we will be sitting on Saturday too.

I think we should not meet on Saturday. Let us have a day off for quiet discussions of the problems between ourselves.

I think we should not meet on Sundays and that should be sufficient for quiet discussions for Pandit Hirday Nath Kunzru.

We shall consider that tomorrow. So far as the House is concerned, I think we have to adjourn now till 11 A.M. tomorrow and I would like the Members of the Rules Committee to meet say half-an-hour later. In the meantime we shall fix up some room where they shall meet.

The House stands adjourned till 11 A.M. tomorrow.

It seems to me that it will serve a useful purpose if the Hon’ble Mover of the Resolution formally moves and expresses his views to enable the Members here to understand the full import of the Resolution, so that we can frame amendments accordingly and these can be taken up tomorrow or the day after.

The House has, already been adjourned.

Sir Hari Singh Gour has suggested that the Resolution might be moved by the Mover today who in his speech could explain his own point of view so that the other Members may be in possession of that and the discussion might take place tomorrow. I had myself at first thought of that but then I felt that the members would like to consider the whole thing tomorrow.

Tomorrow.

There seems to be a difference of opinion and I do not like to take a vote on this question especially as I have already declared the House adjourned. So we shall now adjourn. The House stands adjourned till tomorrow, 11 O’Clock.

The Assembly then adjourned till Eleven of the Clock, on Friday, the 13th December, 1946.