Between movements: the 1935 Act and provincial governments

The Government of India Act of 1935 was the longest and most detailed constitutional measure the British Parliament ever passed for India. It proposed an all-India federation, combining British provinces with princely states, and gave the provinces a large measure of autonomy, with elected ministries responsible to provincial legislatures. The federal part was never implemented, because the princes did not join, but the provincial part came into force, and elections were held in 1937.

In the 1937 elections the Congress won majorities in most provinces and formed ministries in eight of them, including the United Provinces, Bihar, Bombay, Madras, and the Central Provinces. The Congress ministries, in office from 1937 to 1939, passed measures for debt relief, prohibition, and primary education, and released political prisoners, but they also faced limits: governors kept special powers, the civil service and police remained under British control, and the ministries had little money for their programmes. Their record is debated, with supporters pointing to reforms and critics pointing to the Congress's failure to protect Muslim and labour interests.

The ministries resigned in October 1939, when the Viceroy, Lord Linlithgow, declared India at war with Germany without consulting Indian leaders. The Muslim League, which had performed poorly in the 1937 elections, used the resignation to argue that the Congress did not represent Muslims, and in March 1940 it adopted the Lahore Resolution, calling for independent states in the Muslim-majority areas of the north-west and east, a demand that later became the call for Pakistan.

The 1935 Act matters because it became the working basis for independent India's Constitution: the federal structure, provincial autonomy, and many administrative provisions were carried over, with democratic changes, into the Constitution of 1950. It also matters as a lesson in partial reform: by giving Indians office without real power over finance, defence, or foreign affairs, it satisfied neither those who wanted full self-government nor those who feared majority rule.