The Reminiscences of Zafrulla Khan — Page 237
221 REMINISCENCES OF SIR MUHAMMAD ZAFRULLA KHAN Committees also were very helpful. I suggested to them fairly early that they should have a timetable for each item which their committee had to deal with, and as soon as they found that their committee was falling behind the provisional timetable that they had made, they should start having evening sittings rather than wait until more than half the Session was over and everybody started saying, "We are falling behind. We must have evening sittings and catch up. " I felt this would also have a psychological effect: If the delegates felt that if they fell behind, they would have to sit in the evening, they would probably work a little more diligently and make the evening sitting unnecessary. That proved to be the experience of the Chairmen of Committees. Another thing that helped was that I gave as much advance notice to the Assembly of the proposed timetable as was possible in the circumstances of each week's work. As soon as I was able to have some idea myself of what the Assembly should be doing the following week, I told the Assembly what I had in mind, and that helped in two ways: one was that if anybody had any objection to it or found it inconvenient, they could always come round and tell me, and I went as far as I could to suit everybody's convenience. Secondly, they had time to prepare for items. If they knew a certain item was coming up the following week, they had time for preparation and were ready for it when it came up. On very few occasions did one have to postpone something because the Assembly was not yet ready to deal with it, and when one had to do that it was not the result of any lack of information which they could have had from the President; it was due to some element inherent to the subject itself, perhaps some attempt at a compromise was being made, or some other factor made it convenient or helpful to deal with it a little later. Even that saved time. I believe during the 17th Session the Assembly began to feel that the Presidency was being run in partnership. The President was keen and anxious to know their views and kept in touch with delegations. For the purpose of maintaining continuous contact with my colleagues, I declined to make use of the beautiful suite provided for the President, at the top of the Secretariat building on the 38th floor, at the other end of the corridor from the Secretary-General's suite. They showed it to me the day I was elected. I had never been there before. I asked, "Well, when do I have to use it?" They said, "You come in here in the morning, and then you come in in-between, whenever you like, and