Coming now to the provisions of the Constitution, I regard the provision of adult suffrage to be its greatest merit. The common man in India will now be the maker of his own destiny. I cannot understand the apprehensions of those who fear adult suffrage. We must have confidence in the common man. Adult suffrage has been one of the main demands of the Congress throughout the period of its struggle. We must, therefore, be proud at the dawn of this day when that dream has been realised. After adult suffrage I give importance to the Fundamental Rights. In the Fundamental Rights, equality between man and man has certainly been ensured in our Constitution. There shall now be no untouchability recognised by law. The abolition of untouchability has been compared to the abolition of slavery in America, but I think untouchability is a greater curse than slavery. Equality before the law of every man has also been guaranteed. But liberty has been a casualty in our Constitution. I think Sections 21 and 22 are the darkest blot on this Constitution. I could never have conceived that in the Constitution of free India, detention without trial will be permitted under the fundamental rights of the people. Having been convicted to total penal servitude for some 31 years in six trials on six different occasions during the Freedom struggle and having passed 10 years of my young life in prison dungeons and condemned cells in the days of our slavery under the British rule, both as a detenue and as a convict, I know the tortures which detention without trial means and I can never reconcile myself to it. An equally great blot on the Constitution are sections 358 and 359 which provide for the suspension of the Fundamental Rights and the methods of their enforcement during an emergency. This is, I think, a mockery of Fundamental Rights. I also regard Article 31 about property as the charter of capitalism in this country. I am sure, the representatives of the people elected on the basis of adult suffrage will change this Article which makes all socialisation of the means of production for the community impossible. The Directive Principles of State policy which have been so beautifully described in Part IV cannot be realised so long as Article 31 forms part of this Constitution. I would have wished that these Directive Principles had been incorporated as Fundamental Rights in the Constitution. I know it was not possible to give effect to them from today but we could have said that at the end of 10 years the Directive Principles would automatically become Fundamental Rights. I had sought to achieve this by my amendment No. 559 in Volume I of the List of Amendments, with regard to the four rights of Economic freedom which are guaranteed to citizens in the Soviet Union. I wish within 10 years India should be in a position to guarantee these same fundamental rights to its citizens. By my amendment no.773, I had wished to provide for obligations of citizens. These obligations are contained in the Soviet Constitution. At present our constitution does not provide any such obligation and I think,this is one of its weaknesses.
