---
title: "Communal Award 1932: Separate Electorates | Model Diplomat"
description: "The Communal Award of 1932 granted separate electorates to India's minorities, impacting political representation and shaping modern electoral politics."
url: "https://modeldiplomat.com/learn/glossary/communal-award-1932"
---

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Model Diplomat Research Team · Last reviewed June 22, 2026

TL;DR

- The Communal Award was British Prime Minister Ramsay MacDonald's 1932 decision granting separate electorates to India's minorities, including the Depressed Classes.
- What was the Communal Award and who issued it?
- Why did Gandhi object to the Communal Award when he tolerated separate electorates for Muslims?
- How did the Poona Pact change the Communal Award?
- How does the Communal Award relate to the Indian Constitution's reservation system?

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## Timeline

1. 16 August 1932

   The Communal Award was a unilateral pronouncement issued on by British Prime Minister Ramsay MacDonald, head of the National Government in London, settling…

2. 20 September 1932

   Gandhi, then imprisoned in the Yerawada Central Jail in Poona, responded on with a fast unto death against the separate electorate for the Depressed Classes…

3. 24 September 1932

   Intense negotiation among Hindu leaders, including Madan Mohan Malaviya, and Ambedkar produced the Poona Pact (Pune), signed on .

## Positions at a glance

### Indian National Congress

The Communal Award was a unilateral pronouncement issued on 16 August 1932 by British Prime Minister Ramsay MacDonald, head of the National Government in London, settling the question of communal electoral representation in British India after the three Round Table Conferences (1930–1932) failed to produce an agreed formula. Its legal foundation lay in the British prerogative to arbitrate constitutional questions arising from the reform process that would culminate in the Government of India Act, 1935. At the Second Round Table Conference (1931), Indian delegates—Muslim, Sikh, Christian, Anglo-Indian, European, and the Depressed Classes representative B. R. Ambedkar—could not reconcile their competing claims, and Gandhi, attending as the sole Indian National Congress delegate, refused to concede separate electorates to any group beyond those already enjoying them. MacDonald accordingly assumed the role of arbiter, declaring that His Majesty's Government would impose a settlement that any community remained free to revise by mutual agreement.

### All-India Muslim League

The Communal Award must be distinguished from the Poona Pact, which amended only its Dalit provision while leaving its Muslim, Sikh, and other allocations intact; from separate electorates as a generic device, of which the Award was the most expansive application; and from the Lucknow Pact of 1916, a voluntary Congress–Muslim League agreement, whereas the Award was an imposed governmental decision. It also differs from the system of reserved seats with joint electorates that the Poona Pact substituted for Dalits and that became the constitutional template for Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes under Articles 330 and 332 of the Constitution of India after 1950.

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Example

In September 1932, Gandhi began a fast unto death in Poona's Yerawada Jail against the Communal Award's separate electorate for the Depressed Classes, forcing the Poona Pact with Ambedkar within days.

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