Sixteen Stormy Days Quotes

“There is a strange fear in the minds of some that Parliament might misbehave and therefore should not have too much power given to it.”
― Tripurdaman Singh, Sixteen Stormy Days: The Story of the First Amendment of the Constitution of India

“Mr Nehru’s sentiment was more than outmatched by the impassioned logic of Dr Mookerjee.’99”
― Tripurdaman Singh, Sixteen Stormy Days: The Story of the First Amendment of the Constitution of India

“It has become a matter of great distress to me to see from day to day some of these newssheets which are full of vulgarity and indecency and falsehood, day after day, not injuring me or this House much, but poisoning the mind of the younger generation, degrading their mental integrity and moral standards. It is not for me a political problem but a moral problem. How are we to save our younger generation from this progressive degradation and the progressive poisoning of their mind and spirit?”
― Tripurdaman Singh, Sixteen Stormy Days: The Story of the First Amendment of the Constitution of India

“Too many dictatorships have been reared in the sacred name of public order,’ warned the commentator, ‘and to leave the interpretation of this term to the tender mercies of officialdom is to barter away a precious privilege.”
― Tripurdaman Singh, Sixteen Stormy Days: The Story of the First Amendment of the Constitution of India

“Wherever there is a written Constitution, the Supreme law is the law of the Constitution and for even the Parliament to accept that its powers are limited by the written Constitution is not in any manner to derogate from its sovereignty but only to accept that its sovereignty, like the sovereignty of the executive and the judiciary, is limited by the written Constitution.”
― Tripurdaman Singh, Sixteen Stormy Days: The Story of the First Amendment of the Constitution of India

“any special concessions can be made only for really backward classes of citizens and solely on that ground and not on the ground of equal distribution for all communities or on a basis of rationing for the several communities.’18”
― Tripurdaman Singh, Sixteen Stormy Days: The Story of the First Amendment of the Constitution of India

“The amendments proposed are in respect of Article 14 guaranteeing equality before the law, Article 15 prohibiting discrimination on grounds of religion, Article 19 guaranteeing certain personal rights of the citizen such as freedom of speech, Article 31 relating to compulsory acquisition of private property and Article 32 regarding the right to move the Supreme Court for the enforcement of fundamental rights. Amendments to the Constitution became necessary as judicial interpretations of fundamental rights created difficulties in the execution of the policy of the Government”
― Tripurdaman Singh, Sixteen Stormy Days: The Story of the First Amendment of the Constitution of India

“K.R. Malkani,63 the dedicated editor of the Organiser (who would go on to achieve the dubious honour of becoming the first man to be arrested during the Emergency), however, was not to be cowed. In the very next issue, he defiantly wrote: To threaten the liberty of the press for the sole offence of non-conformity to official view in each and every matter, may be a handy tool for tyrants but (is) only a crippling curtailment of civil liberties in a free democracy . . . A government can always learn more from bona fide criticism of independent thinking citizens than the fulsome flattery of charlatans.64”
― Tripurdaman Singh, Sixteen Stormy Days: The Story of the First Amendment of the Constitution of India

“When a citizen challenged a particular piece of legislation it was the duty of the Supreme Court to state whether the legislation was right or wrong. If the courts did not know what their function was, there would be dictatorship. While law was necessary for the upkeep of society, equally essential were courts to determine whether the legislature passed the law within the written word of the Constitution.4”
― Tripurdaman Singh, Sixteen Stormy Days: The Story of the First Amendment of the Constitution of India