Constitution Part 1 Short Notes

1) Preamble to the Constitution of India

The preamble to the Constitution of India is an act sets out the main objectives which the legislation is intended to achieve.

The preamble is not an integral part of the Indian constitution to be enforceable in a court of law. However, Supreme Court of India has, in the Kesavananda case, recognised that the preamble may be used to interpret ambiguous areas of the constitution where differing interpretations present themselves.

As originally enacted the preamble described the state as a ""sovereign democratic republic". In 1976 the Forty-second Amendment changed this to read "sovereign socialist secular democratic republic

2) What is the nature of Indian Constitution

Typically, democratic constitutions are classified into two categories - Unitary and Federal. In a unitary constitution, all the powers are concentrated in a central authority. The states or the constituents of the country are subordinate to such central authority. In a federal constitution, powers are distributed among the center and the states. States are not subordinates of the center. According to Prof. Wheare, the constitutions of USA, Australia, and Switzerland are prime examples of a federal constitution.
Dr. Ambedkar has categorically said in Constituent Assembly discussions that notwithstanding certain provisions that centralize the powers, Indian Constitution is essentially federal. Prof. Wheare and some other academicians, however, are hesitant in calling it a federal constitution and prefer to term it as "quasi-federal" or "federal with strong centralizing tendency".

3) Nature of Citizenship

The Indian Constitution, which came into force on 26th January 1950 provides for single citizenship for the entire country. Matters concerning Indian citizenship are contained in Articles 5 to 11 in Part II of the constitution of India. The law states that any person born in India on or after 26th January 1950 but before the commencement of the 1986 Act was a citizen of India. A person born in India after 1 July 1987 was a citizen of India if one of the two parents was a citizen of India at the time of birth. The law further states that those born in India on or after 3rd December 2004 are considered citizens of India only if both of their parents are citizens of India or if one parent is a citizen of India and the other is not an illegal migrant at the time of birth.

4) Definition of state

A state is a political association with effective sovereignty over a geographic area and representing a population. These may be nation states, sub-national states or multinational states. A state usually includes the set of institutions that claim the authority to make the rules that govern the people of the society in that territory, though its status as a state often depends in part on being recognized by a number of other states as having internal and external sovereignty over it.

Union generally refers to two or more things joined into one, such as an organization of multiple people or organizations, multiple objections combined into one, and so on.

“the State’’ includes the Government and Parliament of India and the Government and the Legislature of each of the States and all local or other authorities within the territory of India or under the control of the Government of India.

5) Judicial review

Judicial review is adopted in the Indian constitution from the constitution of the United States of America. In the Indian constitution, Judicial Review is dealt with under Article 13. Judicial Review refers that the Constitution is the supreme power of the nation and all laws are under its supremacy. Article 13 states that

1. All pre-constitutional laws, after the coming into force of constitution, if in conflict with it in all or some of its provisions then the provisions of constitution will prevail and the provisions of that pre-constitutional law will not be in force until an amendment of the constitution relating to the same matter. In such situation the provision of that law will again come into force, if it is compatible with the constitution as amended. This is called the Theory of Eclipse

2. In a similar manner, laws made after adoption of the Constitution by the Constituent Assembly must be compatible with the constitution, otherwise the laws and amendments will be deemed to be void-ab-initio.

In such situations, the Supreme Court or High Court interprets the laws as if they are in conformity with the constitution. If such an interpretation is not possible because of inconsistency, and where a separation is possible, the provision that is inconsistent with constitution is considered to be void. In addition to article 13, articles 32, 124, 131, 219, 226 and 246 provide a constitutional basis to the Judicial review in India.