Founding mothers of the Indian Republic: gender Politics of the Framing of the Constitution Founding mothers of the Indian Republic: gender Politics of the Framing of the Constitution , by Achyut Chetan, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2022, GBP 90 (hardback)

Abstract

ABSTRACTIn this review, I argue that Achyut Chetan’s book makes two contributions: Firstly, it sets the record of Indian constitutional history straight by relocating the authorship of women constitution-makers, who have hitherto been forgotten in the memory of the Indian republic. Secondly, the book creates potential for reshaping our current constitutional and feminist discourse on multiple issues by rereading the position of women constitution-makers. I then argue that the book should have engaged more critically with the challenges posed to the claim of radicality of the 15 women constitution-makers by two factors: the nationalist discourse and the elite-ness of the All India Women’s Conference. I thus pose a question—Can there be a project of reviving “founding mothers” without the necessary precondition of “radicality”?KEYWORDS: Constitution-makingfounding-mothersConstituent Assembly DebatesfeministconstitutionalismgenderAchyut Chetanfeminism AcknowledgmentsI thank Dr Shreya Atrey, Dr Dinesha Samararatne, Akbar Zaheer, and the anonymous reviewers of the journal for their valuable comments on a draft of this review. I am also thankful to Dr Aparna Chandra for multiple conversations on the topic at hand over the last four years. I have benefited immensely from those discussions. All mistakes remain mine.Notes1 Achyut ChetanFounding Mothers of the Indian Republic: Gender Politics of the Framing of the Constitution (CUP 2022) 21.2 This is a dialogue from the documentary “Sisters with Transistors”, written and directed by Lisa Rovener. The documentary tells the story of electronic music’s unsung heroines, its women pioneers. Lisa Rovener, “Sisters with Transistors” (17 October 2020) accessed 19 January 2023.3 Chetan (n 1) 4 (emphasis added).4 See Charu Gupta, ‘Hindu Women, Muslim Men: Love Jihad and Conversions’ (2009) 44(51) EPW 13. See also Tanika Sarkar, “Is Love without Borders Possible” (2018) 119 Feminist Review 7; South Asia Human Rights Documentation Centre, “Anti Conversion Laws: Challenge to Secularism and Fundamental Rights” (2008) 43(2) EPW 63.5 B Shiva Rao (ed), The Framing of India’s Constitution (Indian Institute of Public Affairs 1967) vol 2, 177–178.6 Madhav Khosla, for instance, similarly relies on pre-ICA documents. See also Madhav Khosla, India’s Founding Moment: The Constitution of a Most Surprising Democracy (Harvard UP 2020); Gautam Bhatia, The Transformative Constitution: A Radical Biography in Nine Acts (Harper Collins India 2019) 20–33.7 Chetan (n 1) 22.8 Sandipto Dasgupta, ‘Conflict, Not Consensus: Towards a Political Economy of the Making of the Indian Constitution’ in Udit Bhatia (ed), The Indian Constituent Assembly: Deliberations on Democracy (Routledge 2017) 38–57; Udit Bhatia, “Introduction” in Udit Bhatia (ed), The Indian Constituent Assembly: Deliberations on Democracy (Routledge 2017) 2–3. The consensus framework is visible in the scholarship of: Granville Austin, The Indian Constitution: Cornerstone of a Nation (OUP 1966); Sarbani Sen, The Constitution of India: Popular Sovereignty and Democratic Transformations: The Constitution of India (OUP 2007); Rajeev Bhargava, “Introduction: Outline of a Political Theory of the Indian Constitution” in Rajeev Bhargava (ed), Politics and Ethics of the Indian Constitution (OUP 2008). The conflict-oriented framework is visible in the scholarship of: Arvind Elangovan, “The Making of the Indian Constitution: A Case for a Non-Nationalist Approach” (2014) 12(1) History Compass 1.9 Austin (n 8).10 ibid 22.11 ibid 425.12 ibid 444–461.13 Khosla (n 6) 10–12.14 See also Anupama Roy, Gendered Citizenship: Historical and Conceptual Explorations (Orient BlackSwan 2013) 126–180.15 Article 3, Indian Women’s Charter of Rights and Duties 1946, submitted by Mrs Hansa-Mehta for Information of Sub-Commission (UN, 1 May 1946) accessed 19 January 2023.16 Khosla (n 6) 14.17 Bhargava (n 8) 33.18 Elangovan (n 8) 5.19 Vatsal Naresh, “Pride and Prejudice in Austin’s Cornerstone: Passions in the Constituent Assembly of India” in Bhatia (n 8) 58–82.20 Kalyani Ramnath, ’We, the People’: Seamless Webs and Social Revolution in India’s Constituent Assembly Debates’ in Bhatia (n 8) 181–195.21 Arvind Elangovan, ‘We, the People?’: Politics and the Conundrum of Framing a Constitution on the Eve of Decolonization’ in Bhatia (n 8) 10–37.22 Elangovan (n 8) 4.23 See also Partha Chatterjee, The Nation and Its Fragments: Colonial and Postcolonial Histories (Princeton University Press 1993) 116–157.24 Chetan (n 1) 14.25 Catharine A MacKinnon, “Foreword” in Beverley Baines, Daphne Barak-Erez and Tsvi Kahana (eds), Feminist Constitutionalism: Global Perspectives (CUP 2012) ix. Emphasis added.26 For instance, Sucheta Kriplani’s voice was only heard when she sang the national anthem twice. Ammu Swaminathan and Vijaylakshmi Pandits each spoke only once. Surprisingly, Amrit Kaur never spoke in the Assembly. See Surbhi Karwa, ‘Constitution Itself Is a Feminist Document’- Is It?’ (LLM thesis, National Law University Delhi 2019) 30–31.27 Chetan (n 1) 59; Referring to the vacating of seats by Chaudhury and two other women, Purnima Banerji demanded in the assembly that seats vacated by women members should be filled by women members. Constitutional Assembly Debates (Proceedings), vol X (11 October 1949) accessed 19 January 2023.28 A member lamented that the Drafting Committee has sent “a lady to fight their cause” referring to Durgabai Deshmukh who often presented the proposals of the Rule Making Committee to the house. See Constitutional Assembly Debates (Proceedings), vol X (15 October 1949) accessed 19 January 2023.29 Durgabai Deshmukh was targeted on multiple occasions. See Constitutional Assembly Debates (Proceedings), vol X (15 October 1949) accessed 19 January 2023. Similarly, on another occasion during the Constituent Assembly Debates (Legislative), Durgabai had to seek intervention from the Chair for being allowed to speak amidst interruptions and an off handed comment by Rohini Kumar Chaudhuri. This happened when she was arguing against the male members during a debate on the Abducted Persons (Recovery and Restoration) Bill. In a deeply troubling development, some male members had demanded that women on the Indian side of the border should not be returned unless Pakistan returns an equal number of women. See Constituent Assembly Debates (Legislative) (15 December 1949) 662 accessed 19 January 2023. For a discussion on the bill, see generally Urvashi Butalia, The Other Side of Silence: Voices from the Partition of India (Duke UP 1998) 172–245.30 On two occasions, first, when RV Dhulekar compared a man’s “right to protect cows” to that of his right to protect “his women”––RV Dhulekar, Constitutional Assembly Debates (Proceedings), vol VII (24 November 1948) accessed 19 January 2023; second, when Rohini Kumar Chaudhari asserted the need of protection “against women” just like the need of protection ‘against cows’––Constitutional Assembly Debates (Proceedings), vol XI (21 November 1949) accessed 19 January 2023.31 Naziruddin Ahmad, while commenting on the difference between accession and integration of territory, compares wives to property, see Constitutional Assembly Debates (Proceedings), vol VII (5 January 1949) accessed 19 January 2023.32 Purnima Banerji, Constitutional Assembly Debates (Proceedings), vol X (11 October 1949) accessed 19 January 2023.33 Chetan (n 1) 110. See also Article 8, Indian Women’s Charter of Rights and Duties, 1946, Submitted by Mrs Hansa-Mehta for Information of Sub-Commission (UN, 1 May 1946) accessed 19 January 2023.34 Chetan (n 1) 28. See also Flavia Agnes, Family Law: Family Laws and Constitutional Claims (OUP 201) 149–150.35 ibid 28.36 ibid 259.37 Nivedita Menon, ‘A Uniform Civil Code in India: The State of the Debate in 2014’ (2014) 40 Feminist Studies 480, 484.38 Minutes of Dissent of MR Masani, Hansa Mehta, Amrit Kaur to the Draft Report of the Sub-Committee on Fundamental Right in Rao (n 5) 162.39 ibid. See also Hansa Mehta, Constitutional Assembly Debates (Proceedings), vol XI (22 November 1949) accessed 19 January 2023.40 Flavia Agnes, Family Laws and Constitutional Claims (OUP 2011) 148–176; see also Janaki Nair, Women and Law in Colonial India (Kali for Women 1996) 180–203.41 As seen in Shayara Bano v Union of India AIR 2017 9 SCC 1 (SC) (more commonly known as “the Triple Talaq case”). See also Flavia Agnes, “The Politics Behind Criminalizing Triple Talaq” (2018) 53 EPW 12–14; Flavia Agnes, “Women’s Movement within a Secular Framework – Redefining the Agenda” (1994) 29 EPW 1123.42 Shreya Atrey, ‘Feminist Constitutionalism: Mapping a Discourse in Contestation’ (2022) 20 International Journal of Constitutional Law 611, 618.43 ibid 615.44 Chetan (n 1) 243.45 See also Nira Yuval-Davis, Gender and Nation (Sage 1997).46 Chetan (n 1) 79.47 ibid 78.48 See generally Geraldine Forbes, Women in Modern India (CUP 1999). See also Maitrayee Chaudhuri, The Indian Women’s Movement: Reform and Revival (Palm Leaf Publications 2011).49 Roy (n 14) 44.50 Chatterjee (n 23) 117.51 Chetan (n 1) 214.52 ibid 215.53 On limits of outcome-oriented feminist inquiries, see Atrey (n 42).54 B Pattabhi Sitaramayya, Constitutional Assembly Debates (Proceedings), vol XI (25 November 1949) accessed 19 January 2023; see generally Constitutional Assembly Debates (Proceedings), vol IV (18 July 1947) accessed 19 January 2023; see also Roy (n 14) 167.55 Annual Report, AIWC 10th Session 1935 as cited in Forbes (n 48) 113. In the assembly Renuka Ray similarly asserts that there has not been “strife between men and women”. See Constitutional Assembly Debates (Proceedings), vol IV (18 July 1947), accessed 19 January 2023.56 Article IV, Indian Women’s Charter on Rights and Duties, 1946, Submitted by Mrs Hansa-Mehta for Information of Sub-Commission (UN, 1 May 1946) accessed 19 January 2023.57 Article XII, Indian Women’s Charter on Rights and Duties, 1946 Submitted by Mrs. Hansa-Mehta for Information of Sub-Commission (UN, 1 May 1946) accessed 19 January 2023.58 Rohit De, A People’s Constitution: The Everyday Life of Law in the Indian Republic (Princeton UP 2018) 170.59 Forbes (n 48) 189.60 Nair (n 40) 197–199.61 Chetan (n 1) 97.62 On history of the All India Depressed Women’s Conference, see Urmila A Pawar and Meenakshi Moon, We Also Made History: Women in the Ambedkarite Movement (Zubaan 2004) 135–156.63 Austin (n 8) 2.64 Ruth Houghton and Aoife O’Donoghue, ‘Ourworld’: A Feminist Approach to Global Constitutionalism’ (2020) 9 Global Constitutionalism 38.65 There has been growth in scholarship on “people” and the constitution. See De (n 58); Ornit Shani, “The People and the Making of India’s Constitution” (2022) 65 The Historical Journal 1102.66 Beverley Baines, Daphne Barak-Erez and Tsvi Kahana, “Introduction: The Idea and Practice of Feminist Constitutionalism” in Baines, Barak-Erez and Kahana (n 25).67 Elizabeth Katz, ‘Women’s Involvement in International Constitution-Making’ in Baines, Barak-Erez and Kahana (n 25) 204.68 Helen Irving, Gender and the Constitution: Equity and Agency in Comparative Constitutional Design (CUP 2008) 16.69 Women’s Caucus, Nepal Law Society, ‘Women Members of the Constituent Assembly: A Study on Contribution of Women in Constitution Making of Nepal’ (2012) accessed 19 January 2023.70 International Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance, ‘Constitution Assessment For Women’s Equality’ 2016 accessed 6 January 2023.71 Irving (n 68) 1.72 Tom Ginsburg, ‘Does the Process of Constitution-Making Matter’ (2009) 5 Annual Review of Law and Social Sciences 201.73 Recent work has begun to focus on constitution-making in Asia. See Kevin YL Tan and Ridwanul Hoque (eds), Constitutional Foundings in South Asia (Hart Publishing 2021).74 For collection of all speeches by women members, see Selected Speeches of Women Members of the Assembly (2012) accessed 19 January 2023.