Introduction
The Constituent Assembly of India was constituted in November 1946 under the framework formulated by the Cabinet Mission Plan. It was entrusted with the historic dual mandate of framing a sovereign Constitution for independent India and functioning as the country's first interim Provisional Parliament, presided over by G.V. Mavalankar for legislative business.
Mandate of the Constituent Assembly
The Constituent Assembly operated with a twofold constitutional and legislative responsibility:
- Constitution-Making Body: Chaired by Dr. Rajendra Prasad, it was tasked with drafting, debating, and adopting a comprehensive, sovereign Constitution reflecting the aspirations of independent India.
- Provisional Parliament: Functioning under the speakership of G.V. Mavalankar, it enacted ordinary laws and oversaw executive administration during the transitional period from 1947 until the first general elections in 1951–52.
Composition and Mode of Election
The Assembly was designed to balance demographic weight and regional diversity through a semi-representative structure:
- Numerical Strength: Originally fixed at 389 members (292 representing British Indian provinces, 93 representing princely states, and 4 from Chief Commissioner provinces), its total strength was reduced to 299 following the partition of India under the Mountbatten Plan.
- Mode of Selection: Members from British provinces were elected indirectly by provincial legislative assemblies using proportional representation by single transferable vote, while princely state delegates were nominated through consultation with their rulers.
- Regional Representation (Central India/MP Region): Eminent representatives included delegates from Central Provinces & Berar (Pt. Ravishankar Shukla, Seth Govind Das, and H.V. Kamath), Madhya Bharat (Gopikrishna Vijayvargiya), and Vindhya Pradesh (Capt. Awadhesh Pratap Singh).
Major Criticisms of the Constituent Assembly
Despite its historic achievements, several contemporaries and scholars criticized the Assembly's character and process:
- Not a Representative Body: Critics pointed out that it was not elected on the basis of universal adult franchise; members were indirectly chosen by provincial legislatures elected under the restricted property and tax qualifications of the Government of India Act, 1935 (covering only 10–15% of the population).
- Congress and Single-Community Dominance: Constitutional scholar Granville Austin observed that the Assembly was virtually a "one-party body" dominated by the Congress party. British politician Winston Churchill critically remarking that it represented "only one major community in India".
- Lawyers' and Politicians' Paradise: British jurist Sir Ivor Jennings termed it a "lawyers' paradise", pointing out that the predominance of legal luminaries contributed to an excessively bulky, complex, and litigious constitutional document.
- Time-Consuming Drafting Process: The Assembly took 2 years, 11 months, and 18 days to complete its task, leading member Naziruddin Ahmad to satirically rebrand the Drafting Committee as the "Drifting Committee" in contrast to the rapid drafting of the American Constitution.
Conclusion
Notwithstanding these compositional limitations and procedural critiques, the Constituent Assembly functioned with unprecedented ideological openness. By relying on consensus and accommodation rather than majoritarianism, it successfully crafted an enduring democratic framework that safeguarded fundamental freedoms, social justice, and pluralistic unity.