Making of the Indian Constitution

A constitution is the rulebook a country writes for itself: who governs, how they are chosen, what powers they hold, and what they may never do to their citizens. Every other law flows from it.

For nearly two hundred years, India had no such rulebook of its own. The British governed India through laws passed by their own Parliament in London. Every few decades they issued a new one — the Government of India Act of 1919, then a bigger one in 1935 — each giving Indians slightly more say in running their own affairs, but always on British terms and always revocable. Indians could advise. They could not decide.

So the demand grew: Indians must write India's rulebook themselves.

But who writes it? You cannot have one leader sit down and draft it — that would be one man's opinion imposed on 300 million people. The accepted answer worldwide was a Constituent Assembly: a large body of representatives from every region, religion and community, who meet, argue, and agree on the rules together. Constituent means the body that constitutes — that brings the country's rulebook into being. It has one job, and once the constitution is written, its work is done.

The thinker M.N. Roy first suggested this for India in 1934. The Congress made it an official demand in 1935. The British ignored it for years — until the Second World War, when Britain suddenly needed India's cooperation in soldiers, money and factories. That gave Indian leaders leverage, and Britain began making offers.

This is where most people go wrong, so take it slowly. The people of India did not vote for these members. That surprises everyone — here is why.

In 1946, India had no universal adult franchise. The British allowed voting only to people who owned property, paid taxes above a certain level, or held certain educational qualifications — roughly 15% of adults. Universal adult franchise did not exist in India until the Constitution itself created it in 1950. So a direct national election was impossible. The workaround was indirect election, in two steps:

The numbers. Total strength was fixed at 389 — and Partition later cut it to 299.

Of British India's 296, the four chief-commissioner seats were Delhi, Ajmer-Merwara, Coorg and British Baluchistan. Seats were shared by population — roughly one per million — then divided among three communities, Muslim, Sikh and General, each electing its own. When Pakistan was created in August 1947, the Muslim League members from those areas left, dropping the Assembly from 389 to 299.

The first meeting was on 9 December 1946 in the Constitution Hall, New Delhi. The Muslim League boycotted it entirely. Dr. Sachchidananda Sinha, the oldest member, was made temporary chairman — a convention borrowed from France. Two days later, on 11 December 1946, the Assembly elected Dr. Rajendra Prasad permanent President, with H.C. Mukherjee as Vice-President.

Before drafting any articles, the Assembly had to agree on what kind of country it was building — republic or monarchy, rights for all or privileges for some, power at the Centre or in the provinces. So on 13 December 1946, four days into the Assembly's life, Jawaharlal Nehru moved the Objectives Resolution: not a law, but a statement of the principles the Constitution should rest on.

It declared India an independent sovereign republic where all power flows from the people; guaranteed every citizen justice, equality of status and opportunity, and freedom of thought, expression, belief, faith, worship, vocation and association; promised minorities, backward classes and tribal areas adequate safeguards; and committed India to world peace. The Assembly debated it for over a month and adopted it on 22 January 1947.

Nearly 300 people cannot draft a document line by line in open session, so the Assembly split into committees — small groups that each took one part of the problem and brought recommendations back to the full house. There were 22 committees: 8 major and 14 minor. The ones worth knowing:

The Drafting Committee was set up on 29 August 1947 — the most important of the lot, converting every committee's recommendations into numbered articles. Its seven members:

The Assembly sat for 2 years, 11 months and 18 days, across 11 sessions totalling 165 days. Members proposed roughly 7,635 amendments, of which about 2,473 were debated.

The Assembly did not disband — it carried on as India's provisional Parliament until the first general elections of 1951–52.

The original document was handwritten, not printed — calligraphed by Prem Behari Narain Raizada and decorated by Nandalal Bose and his artists at Santiniketan. It ran to 395 Articles, 22 Parts and 8 Schedules.

The framers borrowed deliberately and openly. Ambedkar defended this — the aim was a workable constitution, not an original one.