Resolution
State's People's Conference,
Ludhiana Session, 1939 on the
Treaties of Indian Princes with the Paramount
Power
Legal Document No
63
Whereas great stress has been laid on old treaties
between the British power and the States and attempts
have been made to use these treaties to perpetuate
autocracy and the semi-feudal order which so long
prevailed in the States and obstruct the progress of
the people, it is necessary to point out the real
character of these treaties, the manner and
circumstances under which they were made, the person
who made them, and the interpretations placed on them
in later years. Out of 552 States in India only forty
have such treaties and, these were usually made after
a conflict between the officers and agents of the East
India Company and persons who had no status of
independence, but who had come to exercise authority
over part of the country, after the collapse of the
central authority in India, which resulted from the
fall of the Mughal empire. The treaties were made
without any reference to or regard for the people and
applied to then existing circumstances. Gradually, as
these circumstances changed they ceased to have any
importance, and many of them were ignored or even
completely abrogated long ago by the practice of the
Political Department of the Government of India, which
varied and developed with the changing policy of the
Paramount Power. In any event the treaties made over a
century ago cannot be considered binding on the people
of the States at a time when conditions have entirely
changed. The treaties are now used by the Paramount
Power to intervene in the struggle for freedom in the
States in favour of the Rulers, and the obligations of
this power to protect the people from misrule and
oppression is ignored.
This conference strongly of opinion that these
treaties should be forthwith ended as being completely
out of date and inapplicable to present conditions,
and it calls upon the Paramount Power to refuse help
to misrule and who attempt to crush the movement for
freedom in these States.
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