What is an executive officer ? Supposing an executive officer has to decide my fate; he is the person who is interested in getting my property and giving me a very small compensation. That is not fair. He should not be a person who should represent the Government’s interest in all the stages. The courts will also be appointed by the Government. Let those courts decide our civil rights so that people may have confidence; and moreover, Sir, in regard to ordinary properties excepting the Zamindari, etc., I am not fully satisfied as to how the principle of superiority of the rights of the community has precedence over the rights of the individual. After all where is the law that you should usurp the rights of the individual with a view to benefit the rest of the society excepting that individual ? The salutary rule which we have accepted for the last sixty years and more is that the present market value is the proper basis for fixing the amount of compensation and this should not be departed from, unless for scheme of agrarian reforms involving millions of people and multiplicity of litigious suits. I understand that my socialist friends come, here. Some of them are very rich themselves and do not practise what they preach and are engaged in amassing as much property as they can lay their hands upon. I just want to submit for the consideration of the House the views of the common man. The common man does not recognize your doctrines of “Property is theft”. He believes in the sanctity of property. Supposing any land or house is taken away for the purpose of a railway line or some undertaking of the Government, no doubt for a public purpose, will any one be satisfied if he is not given full compensation, and is there any valid reason why he should not be fully compensated ? As a matter of fact no one will feel confident if you enact laws as you propose to enact that not the courts. but the executive officers should be the final arbiters of the civil rights of the people, and it is not politic to undermine the confidence of the people.
