Timeline
1 December 1931
The Second Round Table Conference convened in London from 7 September to as the central session in a three-conference series (1930–1932) summoned by the Bri…
26 January 1930
The conferences originated in the recommendation of the Simon Commission (1927–1930) and the response to the Indian National Congress's Purna Swaraj (complet…
5 March 1931
The second session became politically significant because it followed the Gandhi–Irwin Pact of , an agreement between Mahatma Gandhi and Viceroy Lord Irwin u…
16 August 1932
On 1 December 1931 the conference closed without agreement on the communal question, and MacDonald announced that the British government would itself frame a…
24 September 1932
The Communal Award that emerged after the second session—and the Poona Pact of between Gandhi and Ambedkar that revised it by substituting reserved seats wi…
Positions at a glance
Indian National Congress
The Second Round Table Conference convened in London from 7 September to 1 December 1931 as the central session in a three-conference series (1930–1932) summoned by the British government to settle the future constitutional structure of India. The conferences originated in the recommendation of the Simon Commission (1927–1930) and the response to the Indian National Congress's Purna Swaraj (complete independence) declaration of 26 January 1930. The first session (November 1930–January 1931) had proceeded without Congress, which was then engaged in the Civil Disobedience Movement and the Salt Satyagraha. The second session became politically significant because it followed the Gandhi–Irwin Pact of 5 March 1931, an agreement between Mahatma Gandhi and Viceroy Lord Irwin under which the Congress suspended civil disobedience and agreed to participate, while the government released political prisoners and conceded the right to make salt for domestic use along the coast.
All-India Muslim League
The conference's work split along two axes that proved irreconcilable. The Federal Structure Committee examined a scheme for an all-India federation embracing both the directly governed provinces and the nominally sovereign princely states, with debate over the degree of responsibility to be granted at the centre and the reservation of defence and external affairs to the Crown. The Minorities Committee became the decisive battleground. Gandhi insisted that the Congress alone spoke for the whole nation, including Muslims, Depressed Classes, and other groups, and opposed separate electorates for minorities as a device that institutionalised division. Against him stood the Muslim League under Muhammad Ali Jinnah, the Depressed Classes leader Dr B. R. Ambedkar, who demanded separate representation for untouchables, the Sikhs, Anglo-Indians, Indian Christians, and Europeans, several of whom jointly pressed a "Minorities Pact."
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In 1931, Mahatma Gandhi sailed to London as the Indian National Congress's sole representative to the Second Round Table Conference, returning to India in December without any settlement on the communal question.
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