Constituent assembly demand
Topic: Framing the Indian Constitution · NCERT: Beyond NCERT
Meaning
This was the demand that Indians themselves, not the British Parliament, should write India's constitution through their own assembly. M.N. Roy first put the idea forward in 1934. The Congress officially took it up in 1935. It was a clear break from the colonial Acts of 1909, 1919 and 1935, which the British had made for India. The British first accepted the idea in principle in the August Offer of 1940.
Example
In the August Offer of 1940, Viceroy Linlithgow promised that after the Second World War, Indians would mainly be responsible for framing their own constitution. The Constituent Assembly finally met on 9 December 1946.
Don't confuse with
- Government of India Act, 1935: it was a constitution the British Parliament made for India. Only about 10-15 per cent of adults could vote under it. The constituent assembly demand rejected this kind of law made from outside.
Related concepts
- Provincial elections of 1946
- Constituent Assembly of India
- Sachchidananda Sinha
- H.C. Mookerjee
- Committees of the Constituent Assembly
- Advisory Committee on Fundamental Rights and Minorities
- Flag Committee
- National Flag of India
- Constituent Assembly as legislature