Kindle Notes & Highlights
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April 29 - May 10, 2019
Within India, the meaning, impact and legacy of the Constitution are sites of severe contestation. Supporters of the Constitution—and the tradition of constitutional democracy it has sought to engender—note the huge challenges involved in conceiving and implementing a foundational vision for a subcontinental nation that had never been a single political entity prior to colonialism. To its supporters, the fact that the Constitution has managed to keep the Indian nation together for nearly 70 years as a single national entity is an achievement in itself.
Most political people of mid-20th century expected Balkanisation of India owing to the diversity and culture. India as a democratic experiment has surprised them.
Finally, the critics point to regular outbursts of communal violence and continuing discrimination on the basis of caste and gender to raise doubts about constitutionally sanctioned efforts to tackle these issues.
The Constitution of India has been described as a ‘transformative’ document, given its commitments in relation to secularism, the removal of untouchability, and gender equality. The framers of the Indian Constitution made an important departure from the American model by providing a relatively easy amending procedure, which has, predictably, resulted in more than a 100 amendments to the Constitution in the six decades that it has been in force.
Trying to find balance
On the substantive content and themes of the Constitution, Upendra Baxi has argued that the Indian Constitution can be viewed as oriented towards four goals: ‘rights, justice, development and governance’.
Similarly, Uday Mehta has argued that the framers were guided by three broad objectives: (i) an overriding concern with national unity; (ii) a deep and anxious preoccupation with social issues such as poverty, illiteracy and economic development; and (iii) an intense concern with India’s standing in the world.
Because these issues were primary at that time.
