Sir, the absence of my provision for financial help to the poorer and needy provinces brings me to the question of the province from which I come namely Assam. Honourable friends will remember that early this year, I had taken seventy minutes of your time to explain to you the position of financial collapse to which the province has been subjected to unless timely aid comes from the Centre she cannot exist as a unit of the federation. Assam’s position is that of a sentinel on the east and north east boundaries of the vast continent of India where dark and menacing clouds of communism are rising and collecting to the panic and charging of all the civilised world. It is very well said that the strength of a unit is the measure of the strength of the federation and, no doubt we have tried to make the Centre strong in the draft of the Federal Constitution for India. Just as the strength of a chain ties in the strength of its weakest link, Assam must be kept up to the standard of a civilized Government; her people must be kept happy and contented as otherwise there is a fear of Assam becoming the favorite hunting-ground of Communism.
