The proposals regarding the Government of India called the Central
Government may be thus summed up:
(_a_) _General_: "We have already made our opinion clear that
pending the development of responsible government in the provinces
the Government of India must remain responsible only to
Parliament. In other words, in all matters which it judges to be
essential to the discharge of its responsibilities for peace,
order, and good government it must, saving only for its
accountability to Parliament, retain indisputable power."
(_b_) _The Governor General's Executive Council_: "We would
therefore abolish such statutory restrictions as now exist in
respect of the appointment of Members of the Governor General's
Council, so as to give greater elasticity both in respect to the
size of the Government and the distribution of work."
At present there is one Indian member in the Viceroy's Executive Council
consisting of six ordinary members and one extraordinary besides the
Viceroy. This scheme recommends the appointment of another Indian.
(_c_) _The Indian Legislative Council_.
I. Legislative Assembly: "We recommend therefore that the strength
of the legislative council, to be known in future as the
Legislative Assembly of India, should be raised to a total
strength of about 100 members, so as to be far more truly
representative of British India. We propose that two-thirds of
this total should be returned by election; and that one-third
should be nominated by the Governor General, of which third not
less than a third again should be non-officials selected with the
object of representing minority or special interests.... Some
special representation, we think, there must be, as for European
and Indian commerce, and also for the large landlords. There
should be also communal representation for Muhammadans in most
provinces and also for Sikhs in the Punjab."
II. The Council of State: "We do not propose to institute a
complete bi-cameral system, but to create a second chamber, known
as the Council of State, which shall take its part in ordinary
legislative business and shall be the final legislative authority
in matters which the government regards as essential. The Council
of State will be composed of 50 members, exclusive of the Governor
General, who would be President, with power to appoint a
Vice-President who would normally take his place: not more than 25
will be officials, including the members of the executive council,
and 4 would be non-officials nominated by the Governor General.
Official members would be eligible for nomination to both the
Legislative Assembly and the Council of State. There would be 21
elected members of whom 15 will be returned by the non-official
members of the provincial legislative councils, each council
returning two members, other than those of Burma, the Central
Provinces and Assam which will return one member each....
"Inasmuch as the Council of State will be the supreme legislative
authority for India on all crucial questions and also the revising
authority upon all Indian legislation, we desire to attract to it
the services of the best men available in the country. We desire
that the Council of State should develop something of the
experience and dignity of a body of Elder Statesmen; and we
suggest therefore that the Governor General in Council should make
regulations as to the qualification of candidates for election to
that body which will ensure that their status and position and
record of services will give to the Council a senatorial
character, and the qualities usually regarded as appropriate to a
revising chamber."
III. Legislative procedure: "Let us now explain how this
legislative machinery will work. It will make for clearness to
deal separately with Government Bills and Bills introduced by
non-official members. A Government Bill will ordinarily be
introduced and carried through all the usual stages in the
Legislative Assembly. It will then go in the ordinary course to
the Council of State, and if there amended in any way which the
Assembly is not willing to accept, it will be submitted to a joint
session of both Houses, by whose decision its ultimate fate will
be decided. This will be the ordinary course of legislation. But
it might well happen that amendments made by the Council of State
were such as to be essential in the view of the Government if the
purpose with which the Bill was originally introduced was to be
achieved, and in this case the Governor General in Council would
certify that the amendments were essential to the interests of
peace, order, or good government. The assembly would then not have
power to reject or modify these amendments, nor would they be open
to revision in a joint session.
"We have to provide for two other possibilities. Cases may occur
in which the Legislative Assembly refuses leave to the
introduction of a Bill or throws out a Bill which the Government
regarded as necessary. For such a contingency we would provide
that if leave to introduce a Government Bill is refused, or if the
Bill is thrown out at any stage, the Government should have the
power, on the certificate of the Governor General in Council that
the Bill is essential to the interests of peace, order, or good
government, to refer it _de novo_ to the Council of State; and if
the Bill, after being taken in all its stages through the Council
of State, was passed by that body, it would become law without
further reference to the Assembly. Further, there may be cases
when the consideration of a measure by both chambers would take
too long if the emergency which called for the measure is to be
met. Such a contingency should rarely arise; but we advise that in
cases of emergency, so certified by the Governor General in
Council, it should be open to the Government to introduce a Bill
in the Council of State, and upon its being passed there merely to
report it to the Assembly."
IV. Powers of dissolution, etc.: "The Governor General should in
our opinion have power at any time to dissolve either the
Legislative Assembly or the Council of State or both these bodies.
It is perhaps unnecessary to add that the Governor General and
the Secretary of State should retain their existing powers of
assent, reservation, and disallowance to all Acts of the Indian
legislature. The present powers of the Governor General in Council
under section 71 of the Government of India Act. 1915, to make
regulations proposed by local Governments for the peace and good
government of backward tracts of territory should also be
preserved; with the modification that it will in future rest with
the Head of the province concerned to propose such regulations to
the Government of India."
V. Fiscal legislation: "Fiscal legislation will, of course, be
subject to the procedure which we have recommended in respect of
Government Bills. The budget will be introduced in the Legislative
Assembly but the Assembly will not vote it. Resolutions upon
budget matters and upon all other questions, whether moved in the
Assembly or in the Council of State, will continue to be advisory
in character."
(d) Privy Council: "We have a further recommendation to make. We
would ask that His Majesty may be graciously pleased to approve
the institution of a Privy Council for India.... The Privy
Council's office would be to advise the Governor General when he
saw fit to consult it on questions of policy and administration."
(e) Periodic commissions: "At the end of the last chapter we
recommended that ten years after the institution of our reforms,
and again at intervals of twelve years thereafter, a commission
approved by Parliament should investigate the working of the
changes introduced into the provinces, and recommend as to their
further progress. It should be equally the duty of the commission
to examine and report upon the new constitution of the Government
of India, with particular reference to the working of the
machinery for representation, the procedure by certificate, and
the results of joint sessions."