Constitutional Amendments: Is it Uncommon?

There is unbelievable scaremongering that the BJP will change the Constitution if it comes to power again. There are secularists and leaders who swear by the infallibility or unchangeability of the Constitution, like the religious scriptures. Unfortunately, the most human-made legal document, the Indian Constitution, is also the most amended Constitution in the world. The first amendment was just one and a half years after it was proclaimed as the greatest blueprint for uplifting a new democracy. Tripurdaman Singh brilliants documents the story of the First Amendment in the book Sixteen Stormy Days.

It is another matter that it was mostly a rehashed version of a previous 1935 document under the guidance of B.N. Rau. The Bicameral Legislature, the division of powers between the Centre and the states, the residuary powers, emergency provisions in the event of a collapse of the constitutional machinery, the posts of the Governor, the powers of the judges and the Supreme Court, the laws regarding interstate relations, and the establishment of the Public Service Commission almost made the 1950 Constitution an amended version of the 1935 Act, according to many critics. One member had cryptically commented that theConstitution was essentially the Government of India Act of 1935, with only adult franchise added. 

The then-Congress government’s finding that the Constitution significantly interfered with its policies led to the introduction of the First Amendment in 1951. It created reservations based solely on birth, as well as curbed press and judiciary freedom. The courts had previously passed a variety of judgements that questioned the reservation system and the government’s zamindari abolition methods, particularly those related to compensations. It is a fantastic story about how the government used the Constitution itself, along with arm-twisting the President, to change it, particularly Articles 15 and 19.

The Constitution has undergone 106 changes since its inception in 1950, nearly every eight months, which may come as a surprise to some. There are many reasons to critique the BJP government, but this is actually ignorance. If this is any relief, the BJP government has amended the Constitution only eight times or once every 15 months. Before 2014, the various governments changed the Constitution 98 times! The Constitution appears to be India’s most pliable, flexible, mouldable, bendable, and plastic document, with words written not on stone but on the sand beaches of a stormy sea.