This is an amendment of a fundamental character. We have provided in the Constitution for nomination of twelve members to the Council of States. There will be twelve members who are nominated in that Council and in the Lower House Anglo-Indians will also be nominated. According to this clause (5) as it stands, members who have not been returned by the electorate shall be able to be permanent Ministers of the Government. This is altogether against all democratic methods. Formerly, I had desired that only members of the Lower House who were elected by the General Electorate should be eligible to be appointed as Ministers but after seeing the opinion of many Members I thought that my amendment should not be so extreme, but I do feel that unless everybody who is a Minister has got the confidence of the electorate, he should not be appointed as one. I therefore want that instead of “is not a member” it should be “is not an elected member”. You may remember, formerly, when we were discussing the election of the President, we provided that only elected members should be entitled to vote. Now, if members nominated are not fit to vote at the Presidential election, if we do not credit them with that much responsibility, surely to be a Minister of the Government of India is a far more responsible office. The same will be the case about any Cabinet in any province. Therefore, if nominated members are not fit to vote for the President’s election they are also not fit to be appointed Ministers of any Government. Every Minister who is a member of a Cabinet must seek open election and if he is returned, only then he should be appointed a Minister. Otherwise, what will happen is this. In many provinces we shall have Upper Chambers, and there too there will be nominated members and if these nominated members may become Ministers I am sure an occasion might arise when the whole Council of Ministers is composed of nominated members excepting perhaps the Prime Minister. That will be a very extraordinary situation indeed. It would be a complete negation of democracy. Therefore I want this question to be properly understood. Probably, this was the purpose of my honourable Friend Dr. Ambedkar and what he meant was that if a Minister does not become a member of either House within six months, he ceases to be a Minister. By this, he surely meant that he should be elected and I would very much welcome it from him if that is his purpose, and I expect he will accept my amendment. I hope in this way he will see that Government is absolved from the charge that in our Constitution there could be Cabinets where except the Prime Minister all the Ministers are nominated. Especially in the State legislatures, as at present provided about two-thirds of the members in the Upper Chamber shall be nominated and if any Prime Minister thinks of nominating only those members, then the whole Cabinet will become a sort of nominated Cabinet and that surely is utterly against democratic principles. Similarly, in the Central Parliament also, the twelve members whom the President may nominate may be persons the majority of whom may be appointed to the Cabinet. It may be that such a thing may not arise, but it is quite possible and we should see that no Prime Minister is able to allow his power to be so misused. I therefore think that the addition of the word “elected member” would make the whole thing perfectly right. I hope Dr. Ambedkar will accept this amendment. Sir, I move.
(Amendments Nos. 1330 and 1331 were not moved.)