The Growth of Political Science in India

Dr. G. N. SARMA

Marathwada University

PROFESSOR M. VENKATARANGAIYA may be looked upon as representing the growth of political science in our country during a period of about half a century. Among the senior-most teachers of the subject, he can be regarded as summarizing the history of political science in India. Not only is he the teacher and inspirer of students, he is in a very real sense the maker of the subject, having taught political science from its stage of undifferentiated formlessness to its present stage of development and specialization.

Political science in India as an independent discipline is comparatively recent. When Venkatarangaiya began his career as a lecturer in the P. R. College, Kakinada, he started as a teacher of history. There are many students of his who have vivid recollections of how he could make history live and convey the message of the past in such a way that it could form a living memory, a “Living Past.” When we characterize political science of those days as undifferentiated and formless it should be understood that it was still in its initial stages when its connections with History and the Humanities were emphasized more than its claims to an autonomous status. It may be necessary to remind ourselves that in those days a course in the social sciences was invariably comprehensive and extensive, rather than precisely defined and intensive as it is at present. It may indeed be said that the trend towards definition and specialization now so pronounced that in many instances the point of indivisibility has well nigh been reached and that the larger implications and affiliations of these courses are slowly asserting themselves once again. The earlier teachers were thus “all-rounders” who could teach History, Politics and Economics with equal facility and competence.

After passing the M. A. examination in 1910, Venkatarangaiya joined as a lecturer in the P. R. College, Kakinada, and served in that capacity for three years and then for fourteen years (1913-1927) he worked as a lecturer in the Maharajah’s College, Vizianagaram. It was during this period that he secured in 1925 a research fellowship in the Madras University. He worked on the subject of Local Self-Government for one year from 1925 to 1926. In 1928 his book entitled The Beginnings of Local Taxation in the Madras Presidency was published by the Andhra University. Then followed in 1933, his book The Development of Local Boards in the Madras Presidency. These are rightly acclaimed as the earliest systematic and thorough studies of a subject still in its infancy–Lord Ripon’s Resolution on Local Government was dated just 1882. Students of history know how in the translation of the Resolution into institutional forms much of the vision of Lord Ripon was sacrificed, with the result that Local Government ultimately became an instrument for securing the efficient performance of functions dearer to provincial governments. The spirit that inspired the resolution was largely obscured by the needs of administrative efficiency. Local Government, unfortunately, became the field of the “Local politician,” interested in securing immediate gains and petty triumphs unrelieved by any sense of the large purpose which it was intended to serve. It was for this reason, perhaps, that Local Government could not evoke academic interest either. It is a distinctive feature of Prof. M. Venkatarangaiya’s interests that they were not “academic” in the narrow sense of the term, confined to the abstract study of theoretical problems and treating problems of the community, with the lofty disdain of the scholastic. Prof. Venkatarangaiya’s interests were realistic and marked a welcome change from the prevailing state of political studies in our country. It may be pointed out that the negligence of the problems of Local Government and the immediate problems of the community is more or less a characteristic of students of political science in our country. It is perhaps because the near and familiar are less attractive than the remote. With the progress in decentralization in recent times, there is, however, a welcome increase of interest in the problems of Local Government.

It may not be out of place to recollect the state of Indian studies during roughly the first half of the present century. Indian scholarship, it may be said, was more immediately concerned with establishing our claims to responsible government, especially on the basis of an examination of India’s past. Vincent Smith’s now little known tract disparaging Montagu -Chelmsford proposals as ill conceived in view of our monarchic and autocratic tradition was provoking indeed to the “patriotic” historians who sought to establish, on whatever evidence could be adduced, that nothing that is modern was unknown to ancient India. Understandable though this was, it led to exaggerated claims on behalf of our past and an excessive preoccupation with ancient history. Soon, however, the effort to buttress arguments for national rights and responsible government by an appeal to history was to be no longer necessary as the argument was taken out of the field of history. The argument was turned rather to the establishment of the essential claims of all peoples to self-government. Scholars would not hesitate to make a critical review of our achievements and failures in the past.

Looking at the whole controversy now, we may say that although it was inevitably involved in the historical situation, it was nevertheless a passing phase of our scholarship. Its only permanent value to the future was that it revealed, albeit with the bias of nationalist scholarship, our rich heritage of institutions and traditions. Otherwise the whole controversy now appears to be arid and unedifying. As a modern scholar has remarked, there is no need to force lessons from history which history may be unwilling to communicate. As Sri Aurobindo wrote in the Arya even in 1918-1921 in the series A Defence of Indian Culture: “Indian scholars have attempted to read modern ideas and types of democracy and even a parliamentary system into the past of India, but this seems to me an all ill-judged endeavour. There was a strong democratic element, if we must use the western terms, in the Indian polity and even institutions that present a certain analogy to the parliamentary form, but in reality these features were of India’s own kind and not all the same thing as modern Parliaments and modern democracies. And so considered they are a much more remarkable evidence to the political capacity of the Indian people in their living adaption to the ensemble of the social mind and body of the nation that when we judge them by their very different standard of western society and the peculiar needs of its cultural cycle.” It may be mentioned in this connection that Venkatarangaiya translated into Telugu portions of the series on the defence of Indian culture. His translation appeared in the Sri Aurobindo Mandir Annual (Telugu).

Since Venkatarangaiya published his first work on Local Government in 1928, he has been acknowledged as an authority on the subject.

His interests were not those of the antiquarian; they were those of a scholar deeply interested in the problems of the community. One of the charges against the political scientists in India has been that they have contributed but little to the fundamental thought on the subject of political science, and the explanation offered has been that a dependent country can hardly make any positive contribution to it, engrossed as it must be in the politics of struggle. While the explanation may not be accepted wholly, we may agree that the politics of struggle was not altogether congenial to the development of political science. We may perhaps grant that we had no national status and therefore no significant contributions to modern political thought. Yet we had the politics of the locality to which we might have turned our attention; but most of us did not do so. There have been very few who have effectively resisted the seductive appeal and distinguished themselves by a perception of the importance of the politics available in the community. Prof. Venkatarangaiya was among those who emphasized that it is by understanding and improving the material which we find around us that we can build solidly for the future. His interest in local institutions and local self-government was continuous as is evidenced by the number of publications on the subject he made since his first pioneer studies.

In the earlier part of the period (1900-1950) the idealist school of political philosophy dominated our centres of learning. Among the great teachers of this school of thought Professor P. A. Wadia and the late Professor Pratapagiri Ramamurti (Professor of History and Politics, Wilson College, Bombay, and later Montagu Lecturer in Civics and Politics, Bombay University) must be mentioned. T. H. Green, Bradley and Bosanquest were the most widely read and expounded philosophers. The influence of teachers of this school has been profound and enduring. Yet the exclusive devotion to idealist philosophy had the inevitable shortcomings even if they were not seen in the pioneers of this school of thought. If idealism implanted a sense of values it diverted some of its followers away from the realities of the historical and political context.

Prof. Venkatarangaiya was not only among the first of Indian scholars to take serious interest in Local Government; he was also among the first to take serious interest in comparative government. His book Federalism in Government appeared in 1935. It is referred to by K. C. Where as a short and illuminating study. “Ever since the opening of the Indian Round Table Conference in London in 1930,” says Venkatarangaiya in his introductory note, “the subject of Federalism has become one of growing importance and interest to leaders of thought and action as well as to the general public in India” and he proceeds to say how although there were several standard works on individual federal constitutions, there was no one book which could serve as an introduction to the subject. His book was intended, when it was written, to supply this need. Although a second edition of this book is eagerly looked for by students of federalism, its value as an introductory essay remains undiminished. By introductory we do not mean an elementary survey, evading the difficulties of the subject. The work is characterised by clarity and wisdom. Take, for instance, Professor Venkatarangaiya’s brief remark on judicial review–the most continuous future of federalism: “The defect lies, therefore, not in the doctrine of judicial review so far as it relates to the distribution of powers, but in its application to those parts of the Constitution where it is irrelevant or harmful. In other respects and with reference to the rest of the Constitution, the position of the judiciary under a federal system need not be different what it is under a unitary system. Here is an illustration of the evils arising from a failure to distinguish between what is essential to federalism and what is essential to maintain the remaining parts of the general framework of government.” Here is a wise distinction which critics of judicial review may ponder. If the brevity of the Constitution of the United States has enlarged the judicial power, the length of the Indian Constitution has not served to restrict it, for what the judiciary does is what the Constitution expressly or tacitly expects it to do. In the same way his remarks in Second Chambers in a Federation, especially in India, though formulated in 1935, may sound radical to most students of the subject, accustomed, to the view that Second Chambers are an inevitable requirement of federalism. Though these views were expressed with reference to the 1935 Constitution Bill, they were expressed as valid generalizations. Here again, Venkatarangaiya’s views are worth quoting: “...representation of units as units does not require a bicameral legislature.” Even in the U. S. A. the Second House was instituted not primarily for severing a federal purpose but as a check against the despotism of a single House and its sudden and violent passions.” This practice was followed by all other federations until it hardened into the superstition that Second Chambers are indispensable to federal systems. Similarly his view on the provision for co-operative action by the units in the proposed federation are also of interest to us now.” One marked feature of the Indian federation is the provision that is made for concerted action by the different governments in matters of common interest. The idea has gained ground in all modern federations that their central and local governments should not look at each other as rivals competing for power but as agencies set up by the people to work in co-operation so that the common welfare may be promoted. In his lectures on Competitive and co-operative trends in federalism (1951) he administers a very necessary and timely warning against the resort to centralization as the only remedy for the drawbacks of federalism. “The federal system of government has shown its capacity to adjust itself to changing needs and circumstances and this process of adjustment has in all federations been facilitated by the growth of co-operative devices. If these co-operative trends are strengthened federalism will continue to be an ideal system of government for countries like India, the United States, Canada and Australia–countries which are vast in size and which consequently develop geographical, economic, social, and cultural diversity.”

Venkatarangaiya’s place in the history and development of political science in India is unique. Like the medieval savant around whom universities grew, Venkatarangaiya figures as one around whom departments of political science, if not universities, have grown. He was a teacher who moulded by the force of his personality and the massiveness of his scholarship, generations of young men. Not only was he a teacher of outstanding genius but a research worker who contributed to the growth and status of political science. The interest in the institutions of Local Self-Government which is so pronounced and widespread today, the interest in government as a whole, in constitutions and comparative government and federalism must be attributed, in no small measure to the inspiration and genius of Prof. Venkatarangaiya. The status which these subjects have acquired in various universities in India is an indication of his abiding influence on the study of political science.

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