The Constitution of India: Amendments - Revision history

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‎See also

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‎See also

Jyoti: /* Grouping The important amendments into three categories */

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‎Grouping The important amendments into three categories

Pdewan: /* Amendments to the Constitution: an overview */

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‎Amendments to the Constitution: an overview

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‎The important amendments

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‎Is amending the Constitution common?

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‎The important amendments

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‎The important amendments

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‎What are the important amendments so far?

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‎The most fundamentally transformative amendments

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 [[The Constitution of India: Amendments 51-75]]<>
 [[The Constitution of India: Amendments 76-100]]
 [[Category:Government|CTHE CONSTITUTION OF INDIA: AMENDMENTSTHE CONSTITUTION OF INDIA: AMENDMENTS
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 THE CONSTITUTION OF INDIA: AMENDMENTS]]
 [[Category:Law,Constitution,Judiciary|CTHE CONSTITUTION OF INDIA: AMENDMENTSTHE CONSTITUTION OF INDIA: AMENDMENTS
 THE CONSTITUTION OF INDIA: AMENDMENTS]]

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 L Chandra Kumar v Union of India (1994) which struck down part of the 42nd Amendment for taking away the power of the High Court to review judgments of tribunals.
 =See also=
-[[The Constitution of India (articles about) ]]<>
+[[The Constitution of India (issues) ]]<>
 [[The Constitution of India: Amendments]]<>
 [[The Constitution of India: Amendments 1-25]]<>
@@ Line 266: / Line 266: @@
 [[The Constitution of India: Amendments 51-75]]<>
 [[The Constitution of India: Amendments 76-100]]

← Older revision		Revision as of 20:19, 10 September 2022
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	Finally, The First Amendment inserted Article 31A in the Constitution which stipulated that nothing in the Fundamental Rights could be used to strike down laws for the appropriation of property. During the parliamentary debate on the First Amendment, Jawaharlal Nehru made the oft-quoted statement on the regressive nature of the judiciary: “Somehow we have found this magnificent Constitution we have framed, was later kidnapped and purloined by lawyers.” He added for good measure that the amendment was meant “to take away, and I say so deliberately, to take away the question of zamindari and land reform from the purview of the courts.”		Finally, The First Amendment inserted Article 31A in the Constitution which stipulated that nothing in the Fundamental Rights could be used to strike down laws for the appropriation of property. During the parliamentary debate on the First Amendment, Jawaharlal Nehru made the oft-quoted statement on the regressive nature of the judiciary: “Somehow we have found this magnificent Constitution we have framed, was later kidnapped and purloined by lawyers.” He added for good measure that the amendment was meant “to take away, and I say so deliberately, to take away the question of zamindari and land reform from the purview of the courts.”

−	'	+
		+	==10 Key Amendments==
		+	[https://epaper.timesgroup.com/article-share?article=14_08_2022_027_014_cap_TOI ARGHYA SENGUPTA, August 14, 2022: ''The Times of India'']
		+
		+
		+	Acharya Kripalani is said to have remarked when lying ill in hospital: “I have no constitution. All that is left are amendments. ” He said this during the Emergency, at the time the 42nd Amendment to the Constitution of India was in the offing. This amendment, more like a mini-Constitution itself, changed large portions of the original constitutional text, including the Preamble and the powers of the Supreme Court.
		+	Kripalani, like others, was apprehensive that with the amendments the Constitution would become a pale shadow of itself. However, with Indira Gandhi’s electoral defeat, the successor Janata Government enacted the 44th Amendment to undo much of the damage. These two amendments, in quick succession, demonstrated the power of the Constitution to fundamentally shape and reshape the lives of ordinary Indians.
		+	Here are 10 constitutional amendments of the last seven decades that left their mark on democracy in India, restructured institutions of government and established the rights and responsibilities of citizens and their governments.
		+
		+	'' BACK AND FORTH ON CONSTITUTION ''
		+
		+	''' 42nd Amendment \| 1976 '''
		+
		+	It was the Indira Gandhi government’s imprimatur on the Constitution of India. With lofty proclamations on the need for a “living” Constitution, it amended the Preamble to state that India would be “socialist” and “secular”. To project the image of a powerful nation, it stressed that the “integrity of the nation”, apart from its unity, would be assured. It also gave wide powers to the government to suspend fundamental rights during the Emergency, curtailed the power of high courts and set up tribunals to speed up the delivery of justice.
		+
		+
		+
		+	''' 44th Amendment \| 1978 '''
		+
		+	The Morarji Desai government that succeeded Indira in 1977 moved to restore the Constitution to its pre42nd Amendment condition. It’s remarkable that the 44th Amendment, which added crucial safeguards against the deprivation of fundamental rights, curtailed the wide-ranging emergency powers of the Centre, and downgraded the right to property from a fundamental right to a constitutional right, passed despite the ruling Janata Party’s internal tensions.
		+
		+	''' 52nd Amendment \| 1985 '''
		+
		+	Gaya Lal, an Independent MLA in Haryana, joined Congress, switched to the United Front, came back to Congress and on the same day went back to the United Front. All in the space of two weeks. The 52nd Amendment was enacted to stop such defections. It introduced the 10th Schedule disqualifying MPs and state legislators who hopped parties. Recent events, including in Maharashtra, however, have shown its limits.
		+
		+	''' 61st Amendment \| 1988 '''
		+
		+	This amendment reduced the voting age from 21 to 18, and in one stroke added 5 crore voters for the next elections. In a speech in Parliament, PM Rajiv Gandhi declared it was “an expression of our full faith in the youth of the country”. The amendment changed India’s electoral landscape and the campaign strategies of parties for good.
		+
		+	'' FREE SPEECH LOST, EDUCATION GAINED ''
		+
		+
		+	''' 1st Amendment \| 1951 '''
		+
		+	The Constituent Assembly had to amend the Constitution within months of its coming into force after the Supreme Court severely restricted the government’s ability to restrict free speech. The SC overturned the censorship of two magazines – the left-leaning CrossRoads and the right-leaning Organiser. Under the guise of fixing the “moral problem” of “vulgarity and indecency and falsehood” which “poisoned the mind of the younger generation” Nehru supported the
		+	amendment that gave vast powers to governments to arrest citizens for expressing their views.
		+
		+	The unfortunate legacy of this amendment lives on.
		+
		+
		+	''' 86th Amendment \| 2002 '''
		+
		+	The framers of the Constitution had not made education a fundamental right because they felt the State would not have the resources to uphold this right for every child. In 2002, with the economy booming, the right to education was made a fundamental right for children aged 6-14, which led to the Right to Education Act, 2009.
		+
		+	''' 103rd Amendment \| 2019 '''
		+
		+	The original Constitution was against granting reservation in universities and jobs on economic criteria alone. Ambedkar was clear that backwardness would have to mean both social and educational backwardness. This logic was fundamentally changed by the 103rd Amendment that provided reservation on the basis of economic criteria. Later, the family income cut-off was set at Rs 8 lakh per annum.
		+
		+	'' PANCHAYATS ADVANCE, INSTITUTIONS EVOLVE ''
		+
		+	''' 73rd and 74th Amendments \| 1992 '''
		+
		+	Mahatma Gandhi was a steadfast advocate of self-contained ‘village republics’ as the basic unit of governance in independent India. The Constituent Assembly had the opportunity to formalise this idea, but the opponents of this view, led by Ambedkar, emerged victorious. Ambedkar said Indian villages were a “sink of localism, a den of ignorance, narrow-mindedness and communalism”. But 40 years on, in 1991, the Union government introduced and passed the 73rd and 74th Amendments mandating the creation of panchayats
		+
		+	and municipalities in every state. These amendments decentralised governance and administration in India and increased the involvement of the community in planning and
		+	implementing schemes, at least on paper.
		+
		+	''' 99th Amendment \| 2014 '''
		+
		+	On New Year’s Eve in 2014, the Modi government’s first major constitutional amendment changed the method of appointment of judges to the Supreme Court and high courts. The National Judicial Appointments Commission, a longstanding demand of all political parties, was brought in by consensus to bring to an end the opaque system of appointments led by a collegium of senior Supreme Court judges. In a controversial judgment, the SC struck down the amendment for violating the basic structure of the Constitution. With reasoning that was altogether tenuous, it underlined the need for judicial independence which could only be protected by judges themselves. Recent history has shown otherwise.
		+
		+	''' 101st Amendment \| 2016 '''
		+
		+	Indian federalism espoused the principle that states and the Union were sovereign in their own respects. The 101st Amendment changed that fundamental understanding when the Union and the states pooled their sovereignty to enact the Goods and Services Tax – a single indirect tax for the entire country, bringing simplicity and ease of living for Indians. Addressing a joint session of Parliament to usher in GST, then finance minister Arun Jaitley described it as one of “India’s biggest and most ambitious tax and economic reforms in history” that would awaken India to “limitless possibilities”. Sengupta is Research Director, Vidhi Centre for Legal Policy
		+
		+	[[Category:Government\|CTHE CONSTITUTION OF INDIA: AMENDMENTSTHE CONSTITUTION OF INDIA: AMENDMENTS
		+	THE CONSTITUTION OF INDIA: AMENDMENTS]]
		+	[[Category:India\|CTHE CONSTITUTION OF INDIA: AMENDMENTSTHE CONSTITUTION OF INDIA: AMENDMENTS
		+	THE CONSTITUTION OF INDIA: AMENDMENTS]]
		+	[[Category:Law,Constitution,Judiciary\|CTHE CONSTITUTION OF INDIA: AMENDMENTSTHE CONSTITUTION OF INDIA: AMENDMENTS
		+	THE CONSTITUTION OF INDIA: AMENDMENTS]]

	==Amendments were foreseen==		==Amendments were foreseen==

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 Article 368 of the Constitution of India gives Parliament the power to amend the Constitution, through a procedure described by Dr. B.R. Ambedkar in the Constituent Assembly as one of the simplest in the world. For a Bill seeking to amend the Constitution to pass, it must secure a majority of the total membership of the House and a majority of not less than two-thirds of the members present and voting, in each House of Parliament. Some special cases — amendments that affect the functioning of State governments, High Courts or the Supreme Court for example — also require the ratification of half the State legislatures in the country.
 =Amendments to the Constitution: an overview=
-[http://epaper.timesofindia.com/Default/Client.asp?skin=pastissues2&enter=LowLevel From the archives of '' The Times of India '' 2007, 2009]
+First is technical and administrative category like the increase in the retirement age of HC judges and so on.
-''' India’s Living Constitution '''
+The second category constitutes amendments to clarify the interpretation of the Constitution itself. There might be a difference in interpretation of the Constitution by government and judiciary, and hence, it is amended to make the interpretation clear.
-''' Ronojoy Sen '''
+Third, a consensus among political parties about a particular issue may also result in amendment of the Constitution.
 ==Amendments were foreseen==
 It has been amended 94 times since it was adopted in 1949, often in an attempt to curb the judiciary. And yet, as the aftermath of the Emergency showed, reckless tampering with the Constitution can backfire on governments
@@ Line 57: / Line 81: @@
 WEIGHTY ISSUE OF A DIFFERENT KIND: B R Ambedkar is snapped in a jovial mood with S K Bole during the reception at Mumbai’s Victoria Terminus Railway Station in 1951. Amid peels of laughter, the former law minister invited his old associate to sit on his lap when it was found that there were not enough chairs
 =How is the Constitution amended?=

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 When an amendment aims to modify an article related to distribution of powers between the Centre and the states, or to representation of states in House, or to changing the provision of Article 368, it is necessary for the amendment to be ratified by legislatures of at least half of all the states of India — 14 in present scenario. However, to prevent the amendment process becoming impractical, only a simple majority is required in state legislatures.
-The second category constitutes amendments to clarify the interpretation of the Constitution itself. There might be a difference in interpretation of the Constitution by government and judiciary, and hence, it is amended to make the interpretation clear.
+[[Category:Government|CTHE CONSTITUTION OF INDIA: AMENDMENTS
+THE CONSTITUTION OF INDIA: AMENDMENTS]]
-Third, a consensus among political parties about a particular issue may also result in amendment of the Constitution.
+[[Category:India|CTHE CONSTITUTION OF INDIA: AMENDMENTS
+THE CONSTITUTION OF INDIA: AMENDMENTS]]
+[[Category:Law,Constitution,Judiciary|CTHE CONSTITUTION OF INDIA: AMENDMENTS
+THE CONSTITUTION OF INDIA: AMENDMENTS]]
-'''Ronojoy Sen's ''' view:
-−
-Of the several amendments to the Indian Constitution, all are of course not of equal importance. But like the US Constitution, the ''' First Amendment ''' to the Indian Constitution must rank up there as one of the most critical. It would also set in motion a series of face-offs with the judiciary over who was the final arbiter of the Constitution – Parliament or the courts. It is estimated that of the first 45 amendments to the Constitution, about half were aimed at curbing the judiciary. Indeed, the First Amendment was primarily triggered by adverse court judgments. The Madras high court and subsequently the Supreme Court had struck down a legislation which put in place a quota system in government-run medical and engineering colleges for lower castes. At around the same time the major plank of the socialist policy of theCongress government in the 1950s — land reform — was being short-circuited by high courts across the country. The last straw was when the
-Supreme Court upheld the right to circulate a Communist journal in Madras against the state government’s wishes.
-−
-Parliament stepped in by amending the Constitution to ensure that equality before law and provisions for ensuring caste equality did not bar legislation for providing reservation for backward classes. It also amended Article 19 – which guaranteed the fundamental right to freedom of speech among other things – by introducing “reasonable restrictions” on speech in the interests of the state.
-−
-Finally, The First Amendment inserted Article 31A in the Constitution which stipulated that nothing in the Fundamental Rights could be used to strike down laws for the appropriation of property. During the parliamentary debate on the First Amendment, Jawaharlal Nehru made the oft-quoted statement on the regressive nature of the judiciary: “Somehow we have found this magnificent Constitution we have framed, was later kidnapped and purloined by lawyers.” He added for good measure that the amendment was meant “to take away, and I say so deliberately, to take away the question of zamindari and land reform from the purview of the courts.”
 =The most fundamentally transformative amendments=

@@ Line 62: / Line 62: @@
 [http://epaper.timesofindia.com/Default/Client.asp?skin=pastissues2&enter=LowLevel From the archives of '' The Times of India '' 2010]
-==''' Is amending the Constitution common? '''==
+== Is amending the Constitution common? ==
 Globally, its not uncommon to amend or even rewrite constitutions. Our own Constitution specifically provides for a procedure to amend it. The preface says that the Constitution is a living document, an instrument which makes the government system work and that its flexibility lies in its amendments.
 ==Can the Constitution be amended by a simple majority?==

← Older revision		Revision as of 16:15, 11 May 2015
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	Third, a consensus among political parties about a particular issue may also result in amendment of the Constitution.		Third, a consensus among political parties about a particular issue may also result in amendment of the Constitution.
		+
		+	*

	'''Ronojoy Sen's ''' view:		'''Ronojoy Sen's ''' view:

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 =The important amendments=
-'''Ronojoy Sen's ''' view
+From the Times of India's archives:
 Of the several amendments to the Indian Constitution, all are of course not of equal importance. But like the US Constitution, the ''' First Amendment ''' to the Indian Constitution must rank up there as one of the most critical. It would also set in motion a series of face-offs with the judiciary over who was the final arbiter of the Constitution – Parliament or the courts. It is estimated that of the first 45 amendments to the Constitution, about half were aimed at curbing the judiciary. Indeed, the First Amendment was primarily triggered by adverse court judgments. The Madras high court and subsequently the Supreme Court had struck down a legislation which put in place a quota system in government-run medical and engineering colleges for lower castes. At around the same time the major plank of the socialist policy of theCongress government in the 1950s — land reform — was being short-circuited by high courts across the country. The last straw was when the
@@ Line 89: / Line 99: @@
 Finally, The First Amendment inserted Article 31A in the Constitution which stipulated that nothing in the Fundamental Rights could be used to strike down laws for the appropriation of property. During the parliamentary debate on the First Amendment, Jawaharlal Nehru made the oft-quoted statement on the regressive nature of the judiciary: “Somehow we have found this magnificent Constitution we have framed, was later kidnapped and purloined by lawyers.” He added for good measure that the amendment was meant “to take away, and I say so deliberately, to take away the question of zamindari and land reform from the purview of the courts.”
 =The most fundamentally transformative amendments=
 What are some of the most fundamentally transformative amendments that India’s Constitution has seen over the years? [http://www.thehindu.com/data/land-boundary-bill-set-to-become-a-landmark/article7182262.ece Rukmini S  of ''The Hindu''] asked Alok Prasanna Kumar, Senior Fellow at the Vidhi Centre for Legal Policy for his opinion, and here are his Top 10.

← Older revision		Revision as of 16:12, 11 May 2015
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	When an amendment aims to modify an article related to distribution of powers between the Centre and the states, or to representation of states in House, or to changing the provision of Article 368, it is necessary for the amendment to be ratified by legislatures of at least half of all the states of India — 14 in present scenario. However, to prevent the amendment process becoming impractical, only a simple majority is required in state legislatures.		When an amendment aims to modify an article related to distribution of powers between the Centre and the states, or to representation of states in House, or to changing the provision of Article 368, it is necessary for the amendment to be ratified by legislatures of at least half of all the states of India — 14 in present scenario. However, to prevent the amendment process becoming impractical, only a simple majority is required in state legislatures.
−
−	~~==What are the important amendments so far?==~~
−
−	There have been 94 amendments so far. They can be broadly classified into three categories. First is technical and administrative category like the increase in the retirement age of HC judges and so on. The second category constitutes amendments to clarify the interpretation of the Constitution itself. There might be a difference in interpretation of the Constitution by government and judiciary, and hence, it is amended to make the interpretation clear. Third, a consensus among political parties about a particular issue may also result in amendment of the Constitution.

	=The important amendments=		=The important amendments=