My first criticism against the present Report is that it is, like some other reports, exceptionally perfunctory. The framers of the Report will pardon me if I use somewhat strong words. The attitude of the Members of the Committee is, I think, very correctly reflected in one of the sentences to be found in a book that has been provided by the office to us. I will read that one sentence: “Great difficulty has been experienced in selecting provisions for inclusion” of course in the draft of Fundamental Rights in the Indian Constitution-as “there is no absolute standard as to what constitutes ‘Fundamental Rights’, and the basis of classification varies from country to country.” This, it is clear has been the sole sheet-anchor of the Committee. They have delved into various books on Constitution of the world to select a section here and an item there so as to suit the Indian conditions and conform to their ideals. I submit to you and to the House, Sir, that this is not the correct attitude to take when dealing with fundamental rights. India, our country, is totally incomparable with Ireland. What is there in Ireland, that we should bodily adopt its fundamental rights for our country? What may be useful for them may not be worthy of consideration by us. The total population of Ireland is only 29 lakhs which is the same as, if not less than the population of the State of Baroda. And what is the character of this particular Constitution which has been considered worthy of imitation? I have not seen any important book on Constitutional History or Constitutional Law bestowing any special praise on the Irish Constitution and I fail to see what there is that makes it fit to be adopted whole-sale. In my opinion the Committee viewed the whole question from an utterly wrong stand-point. Our Constitution framers appear as if they merely studied the existing Constitutions and chose what they thought would probably serve as a sop to the socialists and communists. This I think summarises and properly expresses in a nutshell what has been presented to us. They did not want in any case to go very far; but none the less they were not in a position to leave out the social and economic aspects of the Constitution altogether untouched. In this half-hearted manner they have dealt with it. Therefore it is that we have something that cannot be accepted by a very large section of people either here or outside.
