The Advisory Committee on Minorities in their report dated the 8th August, 1947, clearly stated that there will be reservation of seats for the scheduled castes and the scheduled Tribes for a period of ten years. At the end of ten years this position was to be reconsidered. This formula was accepted by the Constituent Assembly during its session of August 1947. But in their subsequent meeting on 11th May 1949 the Advisory Committee on Minorities abolished reservation of all other minorities except the Scheduled Castes and the scheduled Tribes. The reservation of seats for Scheduled Castes and scheduled Tribes was retained for ten years as originally decided, but nothing was said about the reconsideration of the problem at the end of ten years. I beg to lay emphasis upon these words that nothing was said about the reconsideration of the question at the end of ten years. This silence on the part of the Advisory Committee on Minorities about the question of reconsideration of this problem has been construed to mean that the Advisory Committee is against reconsideration at the end of ten years. In their report the Minorities Committee say that they have given this political concession to the scheduled castes and the scheduled Tribes because “the standards of education and material well-being of the Scheduled Castes, even on Indian standards, are extremely low and moreover they (the Scheduled Castes) suffer from previous social disabilities”. Therefore it is evident from the Report of the Minorities Committee that it is on account of the extremely low educational and economic conditions of the scheduled castes and the grievous social disabilities from which they suffer that the political safeguard of reservation of seats had been granted to them.
