The Riots of 1953 — Page 92
92 actual negotiations for the acquisition of the land. After the land had been acquired, some difficulties of a technical kind arose and I remember I spoke to Mr. Daultana as well as to Mr. Dasti about them. Q. Were you a member of the Muslim League before partition? A. I was a member of the Muslim League before I become a Judge of the Federal Court in 1941. From 1935 to 1941, however while I was a Minister of the Central Cabinet, I took no active part in the League’s deliberations. Q. Did you renounce your title in obedience to the League’s mandate in 1946? A. I am not aware of any such mandate, but I have not used my title since I have assumed after Partition. Q. There is a complaint that you have been preferring the members of your community in Government offices, whether in your own Ministry or any other departments. Is there any truth in it? A. With regard to my own Ministry, the position is this. I make no appointments myself to the Foreign Service. All appointments to the Foreign Service are made on the recommendation of the Public Service Commission. There are, to my knowledge, four members of the Ahmadiyya community in the Foreign Service, out of a total of about eighty to a hundred. One of them was already in the Ministry, and I believe had come on option from India. He is a pre-Partition government servant. He was in the Ministry before I became the Foreign Minister. One of them had been selected as the result of a competitive examination held before Partition. Two of them have been selected subsequently through the Public Service Commission, but both were Government servants when they were selected. Out of these three who have been recruited