Separate Electorate System

Separate Electorate System was introduced by the morley-minto reforms of 1909, recognized by the montagu-chelmsford report of 1919 and further extended by the Government of India Act of 1935. All the elections to local bodies and Legislative Council from 1909 to 1946 were held on the basis of the separate electorate system. The elections of 1954 in East Bengal were also held under the separate electorate system. The Constitution of Pakistan (1956) abolished this system and introduced, instead, universal joint electorate system maintaining some minority safeguards for the Hindus.

The system of separate electorate gained ground from a specific socio-political situation created by the relations between the two largest communities of India, Hindus and Muslims. The development of the two communities had been moving very unequally ever since the British conquest. Since the Hindus received modern education and this had access to the opportunities created by the colonial state, they established an absolute dominance over the political, social and economic fields.

Since the mid-nineteenth century, the Hindu middle class had been developing political aspirations including sharing power with the colonial government. Politically, this aspiration was reflected in the formation of the All India National Congress in 1885 and other associations. It had a deep political significance. The Congress, which was led by the Hindus by and large, tried to bring all Indians under its nationalist banner. Sir Syed Ahmed Khan, a north Indian Muslim leader, was of the opinion that joining the Congress, on the part of the Muslims, was no solution to the backwardness of the Indian Muslims. He maintained that the Indian Muslims should take to English education, become loyal to the British and stay away from the nationalist politics of the Congress. This is what his followers called the Aligarh Movement.

While the Viceroy lord minto announced his eagerness to introduce responsible government in India, a deputation of Muslim leaders headed by Aga Khan met him at Simla and ventilated their demand for safeguarding the Muslim interests by arranging community representation based on separate electorate until the Muslims were sufficiently advanced for participating in politics with the Hindus on equal footing. To the viceroy, the demand sounded reasonable, and thus he assured them his support to the proposal. Eventually, the Morley-Minto Reforms (1909) provided for the separate electorate system for the Muslims.

The introduction of separate electorate system was interpreted by the Congress as a colonial device to constrict the normal growth of Indian nationalism. The Congress agitation to revoke this system did not yield any positive result. In the mean time, the political scenario began to take a new shift from 1912. The annulment of the partition of Bengal (1912) alienated the Muslims and forced them to join the agitation politics of the Congress. To bring the Muslims to the nationalist fold, the Congress changed its strategy and finally recognized the separate electorate system by signing a covenant with the Muslim League at Lucknow in 1916. The incorporation of the separate electorate into the India Act of 1919 was thus not opposed by the Congress though it rejected the Constitution on some other grounds.

The simon commission (1927), which was appointed to inquire into the working of the Constitution of 1919 and suggest ways and means for further constitutional reforms, recommended not only to preserve the separate electorate system but also to extend it to other depressed communities and castes. The Constitution of 1935 thus introduced separate electorate for the Muslims and Scheduled Castes. Of the total 250 seats of Bengal Legislative Assembly, 117 seats were kept reserved for the Muslims, and 20% of the rest of the seats were reserved for the Scheduled Castes. Accordingly, the general elections of 1937 were held on the basis of the extended separate electorates. The Muslim League and the Krishak Praja Party could form the coalition government in 1937 because of the separate electorate system. This system undoubtedly further widened the process of separatism between the two communities, and outcome was the lahore resolution (1940) which enunciated a separate homeland for the Muslims on the basis of two-nation theory, a doctrine which paved the way to Pakistan in 1947. The separate electorate system was abolished under the Pakistan Constitution of 1956. [Sirajul Islam]