Title: The Will of the People

1. The Constituent Assembly was formed in 1946-47 while the British were still in India. An interim government led by Jawaharlal Nehru was in place but could only operate under the directions of the Viceroy and the British Government in London.

2. Communist member Somnath Lahiri believed British imperialism was influencing the Constituent Assembly's deliberations and urged members to free themselves from imperial rulers.

3. Nehru admitted that nationalist leaders had wanted a different kind of Constituent Assembly, and there was a hand of colonial government in the making of the assembly, but the Assembly derived its strength from the will of the people, who were the source of the government's power.

4. The Constituent Assembly was expected to express the aspirations of those who had participated in the movement for independence, which included ideals of democracy, equality, and justice.

5. When Raja Ram Mohan Rai and Ishwar Chand Vidyasagar launched a campaign against Sati , for Girls education and Widow remarriage they meant for Equality and Justice, When Swami Vivekananda invoked us for reforms in Hinduism to become more just and when mahatma jyotiba phule pointed out the sufferings of depressed classes, They were asking for social justice and when thousands of countrymen joined hands with mahatma Gandhi , they wanted liberty and citizen’s rights.

6. The demand for representation in government led the British to introduce a series of constitutional reforms, including the acts of 1909 (Minto – Morley reforms), 1919(Montague – Chelmsford) and the Government of India Act of 1935, which made the executive partly responsible to the provincial legislature and expanded the electorate.

7. However, these earlier constitutional developments were not directly debated and formulated by Indians, and the legislatures elected under the 1935 Act operated within the framework of colonial rule.

8. Nehru's vision for the Constitution was of an independent, sovereign Republic of India.