HT podcast: The years of constitutionalism

Why did the Congress have an ambivalent attitude to the Round Table Conferences? What was the idea of provincial autonomy embedded in the 1935 Act and what were its long term implications?

As the civil disobedience movement faded, the British embarked on a political exercise to defuse nationalist aspirations — in a way that would help the Empire retain absolute political control. This manifested itself in three Round Table Conferences, the Government of India Act 1935, and the 1937 provincial elections, in which the Congress participated and performed exceedingly well.

The signing of the Government of India Act 1935. (ANI)

But each of these measures had both intended and unintended consequences.

Why did the Congress have an ambivalent attitude to the Round Table Conferences? What was the idea of provincial autonomy embedded in the 1935 Act and what were its long term implications? And did being in power help Indian nationalists prepare for the future, or did it deepen the Hindu-Muslim fault line within Indian nationalist movement?

In this episode, scholar Arvind Elangovan reconstructs the years of British Indian constitutionalism, brings alive the Mahatma Gandhi-BR Ambedkar debate on caste and electoral system and explains the impact of the 1935 Act on independent India’s Constitution.

He also takes us back to the 1937 elections which saw the Congress both work with the colonial power it had promised to oust, while pushing for incremental reforms from within.

Link to podcast: https://www.htsmartcast.com/history-podcasts/1947-road-to-indian-independence/ep-9-the-years-of-constitutionalism/