constituent assembly of india debates (proceedings)- volume vii

question; we shall have only to see that the amendments as they were accepted by the House have been
incorporated in the final form in which the draft is placed before the House.
This is the proposal which I place before the House and I think this ought to meet with the approval
of the members of this House.
Seth Govind Das (C. P. & Berar: General): *[Mr. President, I would like to know whether after
adoption of the article relating to the national language, clauses which might have been passed by then
in English would be placed before this House for adoption in Hindi.]*
Mr. President : *[Yes, of course, all the clauses would be reconsidered in that language which may
have been adopted as the national language. There would be no discussion at that time on the clauses as
such. The only point for consideration would be whether the clause has been correctly translated or not.
I, therefore, think that our discussions should be based on the English draft at present, for all those who
have given thought to the draft and those who have prepared it, have done so in that language only. And
when clause relating to the national language is finally adopted we would put up the translation of the
Constitution in that language before you for adoption.]*
Pandit BalKrishna Sharma (United Provinces: General): Sir, I wish to draw your attention to this
very important question which my honourable friend Seth Govind Das has raised before the House.
Shri Mahavir Tyagi (United Provinces: General): *[Mr. President, I would like to submit that before
we proceed to discuss fundamental questions, it appears desirable that you should decide what the
procedure would be for tabling amendments. Shall the old procedure be followed or the one which you
have stated now? It is necessary so that we may have some idea of the order in which debate would
proceed, and the time we would be allowed for sending in amendments.]*
Mr. President: *[Both will be decided simultaneously.]*
Pandit Balkrishna Sharma : Sir, I fail to see where the point of order lies. As a matter of fact, I
only wanted to draw your attention to one thing. Before you call upon the Honourable Dr. Ambedkar to
move that the Draft Constitution be taken into consideration, I should like to draw your attention to the
question which has been raised by my friend Seth Govind Das. After the motion which the Honourable
Dr. Ambedkar is to move has been carried, we shall certainly consider the Constitution clause by clause.
As you know, Sir, I am one of those who had given notice that the National language of India be Hindi
and the script the Devnagari script. Naturally, the question will arise when we take into consideration one
clause after the other of our Constitution, as to which language will it be in which the Constitution shall
be deemed to have been passed. My suggestion, therefore, before you will be that when we consider the
clauses of the Constitution, after finishing one Chapter of it, we must revert in Hindi and pass every
clause as has been amended by this House and as has been translated in that language by a Sub-
Committee of this House. I would therefore request you, Sir, that before you take up the consideration of
the Constitution clause by clause, you may be pleased to appoint a Sub-Committee of this House which
will keep itself in touch with the clauses and the amendments that the House wishes to make therein and
as they are passed, and that Committee should get these clauses translated and these clauses, after
finishing one Chapter, may again be brought before the House in Hindi and it could be deemed to have
been passed in Hindi also. So that, after some time, when we have ultimately done away with the
English language, the original must be considered to have been passed in Hindi, and it should be the
ultimate authority, the authentic constitution. If we do not adopt any such course, I think we shall be
greatly handicapped at the time when I think article 99 of the Constitution comes before us and we
declare our language as Hindi and the script the Devnagari script. I think there is some difficulty before
my South Indian friends. They can easily say that "this Constitution at present is in the English language
which we all understand, you call upon us to pass every clause in Hindi, and we do not know the