পাতা:বাংলাদেশের স্বাধীনতা যুদ্ধ দলিলপত্র (প্রথম খণ্ড).pdf/৩৮৮

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বাংলাদেশের স্বাধীনতা যুদ্ধ দলিলপত্রঃ প্রথম খণ্ড
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(9th October, 1953)

 Sir, next I take up the question whether the Constitution is a federal one. It is federal in name only. Like the Unitary System of Government the Centre has usurped many of the powers of the Units and the Provinces. It is neither Federal nor Unitary but it is a hotchpotch. It is a curious amalgam. Scrutinize the three lists given in the report and you will find that even under the bureaucratic British administrations, Provinces had many powers which have been taken away from them under the proposed Constitution. Situated far away as East Bengal is, the autonomy of that Province and the autonomy of other provinces also, except in certain important matters like the Defense, Foreign Affairs, and Currency should have been conceded and granted. This question of the autonomy for the provinces has been the claim of the Muslim League Parliamentary Party of East Bengal. They passed a resolution in 1949 in which this was included. It is supported by the Lahore Resolution of Muslim League passed in 1940. It is in the objectives Resolution which the late Qaid-i-Millat moved. It is the scheme that was placed before the Cabinet Mission by the late Qaid-i-Azam in 1946. What we have got, Sir, today, is a truncated provincial autonomy. It is a negation of federalism and we cannot touch it even with a pair of tongue.

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(14th October, 1953)

 The Honourable Mr. Nurul Amin: (East Bengal: Muslim).......Sir. there are people who thinks in terms of confederation. They think that the Lahore Resolution which gave a sort of an inkling of the two zonal independent States, should be given effect to. One has got to take into consideration the time factor between the Lahore Resolution and the achievement of Pakistan. The idea behind that resolution was to include the whole of Bengal in the eastern zone with Assam and the whole of Punjab and the rest which now comprises Western Pakistan, including Kashmir State, in the Western Zone. That was the idea when the Lahore Resolution was passed, but what did we get? In the words of the late Quaid-i-Azam, we got a truncated Pakistan, not the Pakistan which was envisaged in the Lahore Resolution, but a truncated Pakistan, and this very fact alone is sufficient to abandon the idea of two independent States. East Bengal with a load of 4Vi crores of population, has no area to expand. I do not see how it is possible for those, who think in terms of two independent States, to think of East Bengal existing as an independent State, unless they in their heart of hearts feel that by doing so they shall make East Bengal a satellite of India. Of course, then that is possible. The less we think in terms of a confederation the better it is for all of us in Pakistan.

 Now, Sir, we have got to frame a constitution which should inspire confidence among the people of both the zones and for that purpose certain figures have been prepared, as this can be achieved only by figures. That is not the main consideration. The main consideration is that we must all work for the consolidation of Pakistan. We must have the same idea which imbibed us at the time of Lahore Resolution, that we must have a Pakistan of our own, so that the people irrespective of their place of birth or place of residence must have a common ideal, we must have a common State of their own and