Mr. President the Advisory Committee which has to be formed under the provisions of the Statement of May 16 is a very important Committee from many points of view. All of us know that it is the minorities problem in India that has held up the progress of this country for a number of years and a satisfactory solution of this problem, I believe, will lead to the prosperity of the country. We have laid down, in the Objectives Resolution that in the future Constitution of India, an adequate provision for the protection of all minorities has to be provided for. As far as the Congress is concerned, beginning with 1922 when the demand was made for a Constituent Assembly of India, several resolutions have been passed in which it has been laid down by the Congress that provisions for the protection of minorities have to be made to the satisfaction of the minorities concerned. Therefore, I am glad that the Congress Party in this House has agreed to the constitution of this body which has commended itself to all members in the Constituent Assembly of India. As to what the ultimate solution of the communal problem proposed by this Advisory Committee may be nobody can say at this stage. But we all know that the whole of the communal problem is before this Minority Committee. The clauses for the protection of minorities which have to be framed by this Advisory Committee, have some relation to existing facts. The clauses for the protection of minorities pertain to the religious, cultural, economic, administrative and political spheres. Communities in India have heretofore laid stress on certain provisions in the Government of India Act, as provisions which may be retained for the proper protection of minorities. Whether the Advisory Committee would make its report on those lines it is not for me to say at this stage. Those provisions all of us know. We know that Anglo-Indians have got section 242 of the Government of India Act. Certain other communities have laid stress on the weightage provided to them. Other communities have insisted on the retention of separate electorates. Some of these provisions may have done mischief in years past, but I do believe that this Advisory Committee will consider the question of the protection of minorities from all their various points of view and, whatever is good in the larger interests of the country and also in the interests of the minorities, that will find a place in the report of this Advisory Committee.
