The Indian Independence Act was passed on 18th July 1947. The act created two new independent dominions; India and Pakistan on 15th August 1947. The Act repealed the use of ‘Emperor of India' as a title for the British Crown and ended all existing treaties with the princely states. It also made the existing Constituent Assemblies, the dominion legislatures. These Assemblies were allowed to exercise all the powers that were formerly exercised by the Central Legislature, in addition to the powers regarding the framing of a new Constitution, before which all territories were to be governed by the Government of India Act, 1935.
As per the notification of the Gazette of India, published on 26th July 1947, the first Constituent Assembly of Pakistan was given shape with 69 Members (later on the membership was increased to 79), including one female Member.
In addition to acting as a legislature until the new Constitution was enacted, it was to frame the Constitution of Pakistan, The primary constitutional mandate of the First Constituent Assembly of Pakistan. Amongst others, it elected Mr. Mohammad Ali Jinnah as its first President and approved National Flag of the Federation of Pakistan on 11th August 1947; it appointed a Committee on Fundamental Rights of Citizen and Minorities of Pakistan and also approved a resolution regarding officially addressing Mr. Mohammad Ali Jinnah as ‘Quaid-i-Azam or the great leader on 12th August 1947; it adopted Objective Resolution which established the concept and guiding principles for the future constitution on 12th March 1949, and on the same day, a Basic Principles Committee comprising of 24 Members was formed to prepare a draft Constitution based on the Objectives Resolution.
It is claimed that the First Constituent Assembly managed to prepare a final draft of the Constitution in 1954; however, before the draft could be placed in the House for approval, the Assembly was dissolved by the then Governor General Ghulam Muhammad on Sunday, 24th October 1954. Maulvi Tamizuddin, the then President of the Assembly, challenged the dissolution in the Sindh Chief Court and won the case. The Government in return, went to the Federal Court that validated the Governor General’s act of dissolving the Assembly.
During its troubled eight years of life, the First Constituent Assembly debated varied aspects of the new Constitution and, for that matter, appointed several sub-committees, however, what it could not complete was its fundamental task of framing the constitution of Pakistan. The subject matter of this piece does not spotlight the differences that existed amongst the members of the Assembly on the basic structure of the new Constitution; it however, highlights the principles of ‘liberty, equality and fraternity’, on which, except for a few Muslim nationalist and religious zealots, were, at least conceptually, agreed upon on the floor of the First Constituent Assembly. What follows are excerpts from the verbatim three speeches of the founding father of Pakistan who deliberated upon the liberty and equality of all citizens of Pakistan irrespective of their faith, ethnicity, and gender.
Mr. Jinnah’s contemporaries and claimants to be his successors in present-day Pakistan have failed to translate into action the assurances given to all citizens of Pakistan, especially to religious minorities
1. As they have been assured repeatedly
The first meeting of the Constituent Assembly of Pakistan took place in the historic Assembly Chamber, Karachi, on Sunday, the 10th of August, 1947, at Ten the Clock. Mr. Liaquat Ali Khan (East Bengal: Muslim) proposed that Mr. Jogendra Nath Mandal be elected as temporary Chairman was seconded by Khwaja Nazimuuddin (East Bengal: Muslim) and Honourable Mr. Jogendra Nath Mandal then took the Chair. His Excellency’s inaugural address as the Chairman of the Assembly:
“I thank you all ladies and gentlemen, most cordially for the great honour you have done me by electing me as the Chairman of the historical, first, inaugural meeting of the Constituent Assembly of Pakistan. Today, gentlemen, it gives me much pleasure to declare that the election as Chairman of a member from a minority community augurs very well with the creation of Pakistan, because Pakistan today is the result of persistent and legitimate demand of the minority community, namely, Muslims of India. I would like to point out that not only will the people of Pakistan and India but the people of the whole world look to the Pakistan Constituent Assembly and find for themselves that the Muslim community which was determined to acquire their legitimate rights and privileges and determined to have a separate State of Pakistan will never lack in the quality of doing not only justice and fairness but acts of generosity towards the people of minority communities inhabiting Pakistan, and that is my greatest satisfaction. People of minority communities in Pakistan may be assured, as they have been assured repeatedly by the Muslim League leaders, and particularly Quaid-i-Azam Mr. Mohammad Ali Jinnah, that the people of minority communities would not only be treated justly and fairly but generously too...”
(Constituent Assembly Debates; Sunday, 10 August 1947, p. 1-3).
2. No matter to what community you belong, no matter
The Constituent Assembly of Pakistan met at the Assembly Chamber, Karachi, on Monday, the 11th of August, 1947, at Ten the Clock, the temporary Chairman (The Honorable Mr. Jodendra Nath Mandal) in the Chair. In compliance with the provisions of the procedure for the election of the President, passed by the Assembly on the 10th August 1947, Mr. Jogendra Nath MandaI announced to Honourable Members that 7 nomination papers duly filled in had been received by the Secretary on behalf of Quaid-i-Azam Mohammad Ali Jinnah, The names of the proposers and seconders were as follows: the proposers included Mr. Ghyasuddin Pathan, Mr. Hamidul Huq Chowdhury, Mr. Abul Kasem Khan, Mr. Liaquat Ali Khan, Khwaja Nazimuddin, Mr.M. A.Khuro, Maularra Shabbir Ahmad Osmani whereas the seconders of the proposal were Mr. Abdulla-al Mahmood, Mr. Muhammad Habibullah Bahar, Mr. Nul' Ahmed, Sardar Abdul' Rab Khan Nishtar, Khan Iftikhar Husain Khan, Sardar Bahadur Khan, Mr. Ghazanfar Ali Khan.
All nomination papers were declared valid, and, as there was no other candidate, Honourable Jogendra Nath Mandal, the temporary Chairman of the Assembly declared Quaid-i-Azam Mohammad Ali Jinnah as the duly elected President of the Constituent Assembly. Mr. Mandal then requested the newly elected President to take the Chair. (Quaid-i-Azam Mohammad Ali Jinnah accompanied by Mr. Liaquat Ali Khan and Sardar Abdur Rab Khan Nishtar went up to the dais and occupied the Chair amidst loud applause.
In response to felicitations by the honorable members, Mr. Jinnah addressed the Assembly as its first President. One fact to be spotlighted here is that Mr. Jinnah made his historic speech on 11th August as the first elected President of the Constituent Assembly not as the first Governor General of Pakistan as it is sometimes misquoted by the students of history and politics. Mr. Jinnah maintains:
“Ladies and Gentlemen, I cordially thank you, with the utmost sincerity, for the honour you have conferred upon me the greatest honour that it is possible for this Sovereign Assembly to confer by electing me as your first President…after the division of India, it was impossible to avoid the questions of minorities being in one Dominion or the other. Now that was unavoidable. There is no other solution. Now what shall we do? Now, if we want to make this great State of Pakistan happy and prosperous…work together in a spirit that every, one of you, no matter to what community he belongs, no matter what relations he had with you in the past, no matter what is his colour, caste or creed, is first, second and last a citizen of this State with equal rights: privileges and obligations…no power can hold another nation, and especially a nation of 400 million, souls in subjection; nobody could have conquered you, and even if it had happened, nobody could have continued its hold on you for any length of time but for this… Therefore, we must learn a lesson from this. You are free; you are free to go to your temples, you are free to go to your mosques or to any other places of worship in this State of Pakistan. You may belong to any religion or caste or creed that has nothing to do with the business of the State…we are starting with this fundamental principle that we are all citizens and equal citizens of one Stale…Now, I think we should keep the fact in front of us as our ideal and you will find that in the course of time, Hindus would cease to be Hindus and Muslims would cease to be Muslims, not in the religious sense, because that is the personal faith of each individual but in the political sense as a citizen of the state…”
(Constituent Assembly Debates; Monday, 11 August 1947, p. 18-20).
To translate the idea of ‘freedom, liberty, and equality, into practice, it is to be realised by those who hold the responsibility to administer the state affairs that Pakistan came into being not as the result of any conquest. It was the result of accommodation. The accommodation of minorities
3. Mr. President, it is not really a piece of cloth
Mr. Liaquat Ali Khan moved a resolution in the Assembly to adopt the National Flag of the Federation of Pakistan. The resolution reads: “That this Assembly resolves that the National Flag of the Federation of Pakistan be of the following description:- A dark green rectangular flag in the proportion of length to width 3: 2 with a white vertical bar at the mast, the green portion bearing a white crescent in the center and a five-pointed white heraldic star. The size of the white portion being one-fourth the size of the flag, nearest the mast, the remainder three-fourths being dark green.” (Constituent Assembly Debates; Monday, 11 August 1947, p. 21-22)
The resolution to adopt the National Flag, though with reservations from the minority members especially the Pakistan National Congress, a party that mainly was comprised of East Bengalis, who championed the idea of a secular and progressive state led by Kiran Shanker Roy (died 20 February 1949) the Congress party leader in the East Bengal Legislative Assembly and Parliamentary Leader in the Pakistan Constituent Assembly Pakistan, in the Muslim-dominated First Constituent Assembly, was adopted on Monday, 11 August 1947. On the occasion, Mr. Liaquat Ali Khan elaborated upon the essence of freedom, liberty, and equality as embedded in the National Flag of Pakistan, as a member of the Assembly in the following words:
“Now, Mr. President, the Flag, it will be noticed, is not the flag of any political party or anyone community. The flag is the Flag of Pakistan Nation, of the Pakistan State which has to come into existence on the 15th of August. Sir, the Flag of every nation is not merely a piece of cloth. It is not really the cloth that matters, but it is what it stands for, and I can say without any fear of contradiction that this Flag which I had the honour to present to this House, will stand for freedom, liberty, and equality to those who owe allegiance to this Flag of Pakistan. This flag will protect the legitimate rights of every citizen…We know what are the consequences of exploitation. We have been exploited for the last 200 years and we would be the last people to use our flag for the purpose of exploiting other nations. Therefore, Mr. President, this Flag will be a flag of freedom not only for the people of Pakistan; this Flag will be an emblem of peace to help in maintaining, peace throughout the world…
Therefore, Mr. President, as I said, it is not really the piece of cloth of the Flag that matters. It is not it's colouring that matters. But it is what the Flag stands for, and I assure the Honourable House that as constituted, as I visualise the future constitution of Pakistan, it will stand for Freedom, Liberty, and Equality of all the citizens of the Pakistan State and for the integrity and independence of the Pakistan Federation.
(Constituent Assembly Debates; Monday, 11 August 1947, p. 22-23)
4. Alas! Mr. President, it has proved merely a piece of cloth
The founding fathers of the state, to a fair extent, gave greater assurance for state-building on the principles of freedom, liberty, and equality. Nonetheless, in the words of Mr. Bhim Sen Sachar, a minority member of the Assembly, “It is one thing to lay down a certain policy but it is completely different to give effect to that policy in practice.” The assurances that had been given by Mr. Jinnah as a President of the Assembly threw a tremendous responsibility on his lieutenants on whom it would have been left to administer the affairs of the State. Mr. Jinnah’s contemporaries and claimants to be his successors in present-day Pakistan have failed to translate into action the assurances given to all citizens of Pakistan, especially to religious minorities,
To translate the idea of ‘freedom, liberty, and equality, into practice, it is to be realised by those who hold the responsibility to administer the state affairs that Pakistan came into being not as the result of any conquest. It was the result of accommodation. The accommodation of minorities, the Muslims in united India before the 15th of August, 1947, and accommodating the religious minorities after the 15th of August as manifested in the assurances of the founding fathers. Thus, in the words of Mr. Sacher, ‘my submission is that one thing which is essential to have to run Pakistan State on a joint basis so that in no case should the minorities think that there is a majority; which conscious of the strength of its members, can march alone merrily without even bothering to consult the wishes of a minority.’