Celine Mary
06-08 -2016
The Emergency is often remembered as the dark age of our democracy, riddled with uncertainty and paranoia. Individual voices were gagged by posters saying “‘Batein kum, kam ziyadah’ (Speak less, work more) and newspapers were published with blank pages because the content was censored. Sounds scary, doesn’t it?
But in this darkness, something extraordinary happened which today is perhaps one of the few things that is keeping fascist forces from pushing the country over the edge into a communal abyss- The 42nd Amendment to the Constitution which otherwise tried to suppress the fundamental rights, also added the word ‘secular’ along with ‘socialist’ to the Preamble of the Constitution.
Many in BJP oppose to the word in the Preamble by saying that it was never thought of, by the authors of the Constitution and it was by mere road-rolling that Indira Gandhi thrust this term down our throat. Nothing could be further away from the truth. It was first sought to be added to the Preamble way back in 1948 when Professor K.T Shah, though speaking about the past, had said prophetically that “The secularity of the state must be stressed in view not only of the unhappy experiences we had last year and in the years before and the excesses to which, in the name of religion, communalism or sectarianism can go, but I intend also to emphasize by this description the character and nature of the state which we are constituting today, which would ensure to all its people, all its citizens that in all matters relating to the governance of the country and dealings between man and man and dealings between citizen and Government the consideration that will actuate will be the objective realities of the situation, the material factors that condition our being, our living and our acting. For that purpose and in that connection no extraneous considerations or authority will be allowed to interfere, so that the relations between man and man, the relation of the citizen to the state, the relations of the states inner se may not be influenced by those other considerations which will result in injustice or inequality as between the several citizens that constitute the people of India.” So, it was not something that Indira Gandhi had imagined out of thin air, in 1976.
The Sangh today says that B.R Ambedkar opposed the addition of the word ‘Secular’ to the Preamble. Again a misrepresentation. Professor K.T Shah had proposed the Preamble to read “India shall be a Secular, Federal, Socialist Union of States.” When B.R Ambedkar responded to this proposal, he spoke only about his reservation to the word “Socialist” and not on “Secular”. His reasons being that firstly the people of the country should be able to decide what kind of a social organization the State should have and secondly that to add the word ‘socialist’ would be superfluous since the Directive Principles specifically point towards a welfare state and so the addition of the word was not required in the Preamble. So, when Rajnath Singh said in 2015, that Ambedkar never thought of the word ‘Secular’, he was being dishonest, mischievous and playing with words.
The Law Minister who steered the 44th Amendment to the Constitution during the Janata Government was Shanti Bhushan, his colleagues in the ministry being L.K. Advani and A.B. Vajpayee. The main aim of the amendment was to bring back the Constitution to its pre-42nd Amendment form and it was successful in doing that as well. But even while reverting all the other changes, the grand old men of BJP didn’t touch the two sacred terms “Secular” and “Socialist” in the Preamble. It would do well to the present crop of BJP supporters to remember that we are all in it together; even their ancestors.
Shortly after adopting the Constitution, we got the Representation of Peoples Act, 1951, which was amended to reflect this secularism which was required in our democracy. It states that every registered political party in India has to incorporate the words “secular” and “socialist” into their own constitutions and profess allegiance to these values. Even though the word ‘Secularism’ grates on the mind of most of the BJP supporters, it would do them a lot of good to look at the Constitution of the party. The Constitution of BJP states that “The party shall bear true faith and allegiance to the Constitution of India as by law established and to the principles of socialism, secularism and democracy and would uphold the sovereignty, unity and integrity of India”. With this Constitution in place, when BJP proudly canvassed Modi with banners which read “ Main deshbhakt hoon; Main Hindu Rashtravadi hoon” (I am a patriot; I am a Hindu nationalist), I’m surprised why the Election commission wasn’t perturbed. This kind of campaign was not only going against the Constitution of India, it was going against the Party’s own Constitution. I think that should be treated as a breach of trust that a voter would be placing on Mr.Modi or on the party.
The Supreme Court has stated in its majority judgment in Kesavananda Bharati (1973), as well as in its majority judgement in SR Bommai (1994) that the Preamble, as it stands amended by the 42nd Amendment, is part of “the basic structure of the Constitution.” So, whether anyone likes it or not, any change to the Preamble will have to go the way, any other amendment in the Constitution would take.
Secularism can be crushed by brute force but to kill it, it would take more than just the cowardly gau rakshaks on the street.
The Prevention of Insults to National Honour Act, 1971 states that Whoever in any public place or in any other place within public view burns, mutilates, defaces, defiles, disfigures, destroys, tramples upon or otherwise shows disrespect to or brings into contempt (whether by words, either spoken or written, or by acts) the Indian National Flag or the Constitution of India or any part thereof, shall be punished with imprisonment for a term which may extend to three years, or with fine, or with both. When a random Minister for Social Justice and Empowerment tries to justify the atrocities of gau rakshaks, they should remember they are defiling and trampling upon the Constitution and they are on very shaky grounds.
India is a land of many religions and so her secularism has never been perfect by any stretch of imagination. Where secularism in another part of the world would mean that the State should be equidistant from all religions, in India it would mean treating all religions the same. But either way, Secularism has to mean that the State shall have no religion. The only consideration for the Legislature, Judicial and Executive should be natural justice and the Law of the Land. The Preamble is our aspiration.
So, friends, Indians, countrymen, let’s abuse Indira Gandhi for the Emergency, all we like and rightly so, but in this bleak time that we find ourselves in, I feel heavily indebted to her that she reiterated that day that India is a “Sovereign, Socialist, Secular, Democratic Republic”. And all the communal hate-mongers can go eat their heart out. “Hindustan kisi ki jaageer thode hi hai”.