Indian Constitution: Salient Features, Basic Structure and Amendments

What the official syllabus says

GPSC Main Examination, Paper V: General Studies-II, (A) Indian Polity and Constitution:

• Indian Constitution: salient features, basic structure and important amendments.

Topics in detail

Making of the Constitution

• Historical background in brief: Government of India Acts of 1919 and 1935 and what the Constitution took from the 1935 Act (federal scheme, three lists, office of Governor, emergency provisions)
• Constituent Assembly under the Cabinet Mission Plan, 1946: members for the provinces elected indirectly by the provincial assemblies, those for the princely states nominated; first sitting on 9 December 1946
• Objectives Resolution (13 December 1946) and its place in the Preamble
• Drafting Committee chaired by Dr B. R. Ambedkar; other major committees of the Assembly
• Adoption on 26 November 1949 (Constitution Day) and commencement on 26 January 1950
• Sources of borrowed features: United Kingdom (parliamentary government, rule of law, single citizenship), United States (Fundamental Rights, judicial review, independent judiciary), Ireland (Directive Principles), Canada (federation with a strong Centre, residuary powers with the Centre), Australia (Concurrent List), Weimar Germany (suspension of rights during emergency), former USSR (Fundamental Duties)

Salient features

• Lengthy written Constitution: originally 395 Articles, 22 Parts and 8 Schedules; today 12 Schedules
• Preamble: sovereign, socialist, secular, democratic republic; justice, liberty, equality and fraternity; the words socialist, secular and integrity added by the 42nd Amendment, 1976
• Blend of rigidity and flexibility: the three ways of amending (simple majority, special majority, special majority plus ratification by half the States)
• Parliamentary form of government at the Union and in the States
• Federal system with unitary features: single Constitution, single citizenship, integrated judiciary, all-India services, emergency provisions
• Fundamental Rights (Part III, Articles 12 to 35): equality, freedom, against exploitation, freedom of religion, cultural and educational rights, constitutional remedies (Article 32)
• Directive Principles of State Policy (Part IV, Articles 36 to 51): socialist, Gandhian and liberal-intellectual principles; their non-justiciability and relationship with Fundamental Rights
• Fundamental Duties (Part IVA, Article 51A): ten added by the 42nd Amendment, 1976; the eleventh (education of children aged 6 to 14) by the 86th Amendment, 2002
• Universal adult franchise; voting age lowered from 21 to 18 years by the 61st Amendment, 1988
• Independent and integrated judiciary; judicial review
• Secular state; special provisions for Scheduled Castes, Scheduled Tribes, backward classes and minorities
• Emergency provisions: national emergency (Article 352), failure of constitutional machinery in States (Article 356), financial emergency (Article 360)
• Special provisions for certain States (Articles 371 to 371J), including Article 371(2) for Maharashtra and Gujarat

Basic structure doctrine

• Article 368 and the question of Parliament's power to amend Fundamental Rights
• Shankari Prasad (1951) and Sajjan Singh (1965): amendments upheld
• I. C. Golaknath (1967): Parliament cannot abridge Fundamental Rights; the 24th Amendment, 1971 in response
• Kesavananda Bharati (1973): Parliament can amend any part but cannot alter the basic structure
• Indira Gandhi v. Raj Narain (1975): free and fair elections part of the basic structure
• Minerva Mills (1980): limited amending power and the balance between Fundamental Rights and Directive Principles are themselves basic features
• Waman Rao (1981) and I. R. Coelho (2007): laws placed in the Ninth Schedule after 24 April 1973 open to review on the basic structure test
• S. R. Bommai (1994): federalism and secularism as basic features
• Elements commonly held to be basic: supremacy of the Constitution, republican and democratic form, secularism, federalism, separation of powers, judicial review, rule of law, free and fair elections, independence of the judiciary

Important amendments

• 1st Amendment, 1951: Ninth Schedule; reasonable restrictions on free speech widened
• 7th Amendment, 1956: reorganisation of States on linguistic lines; Part A, B, C, D States abolished
• 42nd Amendment, 1976: Preamble words, Fundamental Duties, transfer of subjects (such as education and forests) to the Concurrent List
• 44th Amendment, 1978: right to property made a legal right (Article 300A); 'armed rebellion' in place of 'internal disturbance' for national emergency
• 52nd Amendment, 1985: anti-defection law (Tenth Schedule)
• 73rd and 74th Amendments, 1992: panchayats (Part IX) and municipalities (Part IXA)
• 86th Amendment, 2002: right to education (Article 21A)
• 91st Amendment, 2003: size of the Council of Ministers capped at 15 per cent of the lower House
• 97th Amendment, 2011: co-operative societies (Part IXB)
• 101st Amendment, 2016: Goods and Services Tax and the GST Council (Article 279A)
• 102nd Amendment, 2018: constitutional status for the National Commission for Backward Classes (Article 338B)
• 103rd Amendment, 2019: reservation of up to 10 per cent for economically weaker sections
• 106th Amendment, 2023: one-third of seats in the Lok Sabha and State Legislative Assemblies reserved for women

Overlaps

Constitutional values return in General Studies-IV (ethics and the values of public service), and the freedom struggle that shaped the Constitution is in General Studies-I. The Prelims paper General Studies tests the same provisions in objective form.