Simon Commission
The Indian Statutory Commission was a group of seven British MPs of the lower house , which in 1927 by British India , had been sent to a constitutional reform for this colony to design. Because of its chairman, Sir John Simon , it was commonly referred to as the Simon Commission . Ironically, one of its members was Clement Attlee , the British Prime Minister who gave India and Pakistan independence in 1947 .
The Government of India Act of 1919 established a system of dyarchy over the provinces of British India. The Indian public called for a revision of the difficult dual rule and the law of 1919 required a commission, which should be appointed after 10 years, to examine the functioning of the system of government in constitutional practice and, if necessary, to draft reform steps. Towards the end of the 1920s, the British Conservative government feared enormous electoral defeats for the Labor Party in Great Britain and feared the consequences of a transfer of power to such an "inexperienced" body in India. Prime Minister Stanley Baldwin therefore appointed seven MPs, including Chairman Simon, in November 1927, who formed the commission promised in 1919 to deal with the constitutional problems of the Indian state.
The people of the Indian subcontinent, even the moderates, were furious and found it a national insult that not a single Indian belonged to the Simon Commission, which was to determine the future of India, and that Indian matters should be investigated and judged exclusively by the British . The Indian National Congress decided at its congress in December 1927 in Madras to boycott the Commission and demanded that Lord Birkenhead , the Secretary of State for India , the submission of a draft constitution that is acceptable for the Indian population. A faction of the Muslim League led by Ali Jinnah also decided to boycott the commission.
Almost simultaneously with their arrival in Bombay on February 3, 1928 , the Simon Commission was confronted with a crowd of protests. The commission was accompanied by chants like "Simon, go back" . The whole country went on a hartal (strike that also closed the shops) and many people greeted the commission with black flags . Similar protests occurred in every major Indian city the seven British MPs visited. Nevertheless, one protest against the Simon Commission scandalously surpassed all others:
On October 30, 1928, the Simon Commission arrived in Lahore , where, as in the rest of the country, massive protests awaited. The protest in Lahore was led by the Indian nationalist Lala Lajpat Rai , who in February 1928 introduced a resolution against the Simon Commission in the Central Legislative Assembly of the Punjab . To pave a way for the commission through the crowd, the police began beating the demonstrators with their lathis , iron-studded batons . The police were particularly brutal against 63-year-old Lajpat Rai, who later that day declared: "Every blow that hits me is a nail in the coffin of British imperialism." Seventeen days later, on November 17, 1928, died his serious injuries.
No Indian politician was ready to meet with the commission. However, in order to make a constructive contribution, a non-partisan conference appointed a committee chaired by Motilal Nehru to draft an Indian constitution. This draft constitution, commonly known as the Nehru Report , provided for Dominion status along the lines of Canada , Australia and New Zealand . The Muslims rejected the Nehru Report, however, because they did not see their minority rights sufficiently taken into account due to the unified electorate. The radical wing of the Congress Party around Jawaharlal Nehru and Subhash Chandra Bose then demanded complete independence from the British Empire , Swaraj . The fierce controversy within the Congress party was ended by a compromise proposal by Mahatma Gandhi , which provided for an ultimatum to the British side, according to which the Congress party would be content with Dominion status if it were passed within a year by December 31, 1929. If Dominion status were not granted by then, the Congress party would campaign for full independence with a non-violent campaign. The British government responded to the ultimatum that one had to wait for the Simon Commission report and the drafting of a constitution from the round table in London . The Congress Party was not satisfied with this rejection at its congress at the end of 1929, when Jawaharlal Nehru served as president for the first time: it commissioned Gandhi to develop a strategy for a new campaign of civil disobedience that took place between 1930 and 1934.
The Simon Commission published its 17-volume report in 1930. She proposed the abolition of the dyarchy and the establishment of representative provincial governments. The report recommended holding on to separate municipal electorates until the tension between Hindus and Muslims subsided. Faced with opposition to the commission from educated Indians and mounting rather than shrinking local tensions, the UK government opted for a different method of dealing with India's constitutional issue: before publishing the report, it stated that going forward it would take Indian views into account and the natural way out of the constitutional process of Dominion status for India. The result of the Simon Commission was the Government of India Act of 1935 , which established a representative government at the provincial level in India and forms the basis for many parts of the Indian constitution. The first provincial elections were held in 1937, which the Congress Party won in nine of the eleven provinces.