---
title: "Government of India Act 1909: Definition & Meaning"
description: "The Government of India Act 1909 (Morley-Minto Reforms) expanded legislative councils and introduced separate electorates for Muslims, shaping India's politics."
url: "https://modeldiplomat.com/learn/glossary/government-of-india-act-1909"
---

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Model Diplomat Research Team · Last reviewed July 7, 2026

TL;DR

- The Government of India Act 1909, known as the Morley-Minto Reforms, expanded legislative councils in British India and introduced separate communal electorates for Muslims.
- What was the most significant provision of the Government of India Act 1909?
- How did the Morley-Minto Reforms differ from the Montagu-Chelmsford Reforms of 1919?
- Who was the first Indian appointed to the Viceroy's Executive Council under the Act?
- Did the Act introduce responsible government in India?

[Civil Service & Diplomatic Exams](https://modeldiplomat.com/learn/civil-services/glossary)Updated July 7, 2026

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### Indian National Congress

The Government of India Act 1909, popularly termed the Morley-Minto Reforms, received royal assent on 25 May 1909 and derived its name from John Morley, the Liberal Secretary of State for India in H.H. Asquith's cabinet, and Gilbert John Elliot-Murray-Kynynmound, the 4th Earl of Minto, who served as Viceroy from 1905 to 1910. The statute amended the Indian Councils Act 1861 and the Indian Councils Act 1892, and was a legislative response to the political ferment generated by Lord Curzon's 1905 partition of Bengal, the rise of the Swadeshi and Boycott movements, and the growing assertiveness of the Indian National Congress, whose moderate leadership Morley sought to accommodate while isolating the rising extremist wing. The reforms were the constitutional product of an extended Morley-Minto correspondence between London and Calcutta, and they translated into law the principle that limited Indian participation in governance could function as a safety valve for nationalist pressure.

### All-India Muslim League

The single most consequential and enduring feature of the Act was the introduction of separate electorates for Muslims, a system whereby Muslim voters elected Muslim representatives from exclusively Muslim constituencies. This followed the Simla Deputation of October 1906, when a delegation of Muslim notables led by the Aga Khan III petitioned Minto for separate representation weighted beyond their numerical proportion, a request Minto received sympathetically. The All-India Muslim League, founded at Dhaka in December 1906, became the institutional vehicle for this demand. The Act also extended a property and educational franchise that was narrow and class-based, and it permitted, for the first time, the appointment of an Indian to the Viceroy's Executive Council—Satyendra Prasanna Sinha (later Lord Sinha) became the first such member in 1909, holding the law portfolio.

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Example

In October 1906, a Muslim delegation led by the Aga Khan III met Viceroy Lord Minto at Simla to demand separate electorates, a request later enshrined in the Government of India Act 1909.

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