Bharat’s Constitution stands as a living testament and serves as the guarantee to its citizens the ideals of justice, liberty, equality, and fraternity – to secure a democratic republic. Yet, in the course of India’s journey as a modern nation, there have been repeated assaults on the very soul and structure of this Constitution. The phrase “Samvidhan Hatya,” or the murder of the Constitution, is not mere rhetoric but captures a pattern of deliberate actions that have undermined our founding principles for political convenience.
Cong’s Corrupt Track Record
The Congress Party, more than any other, has a record of amending, bending, and bypassing constitutional norms whenever they proved inconvenient to its grip on power. From curbing Fundamental Rights to systematically subverting independent institutions, these were not accidental or isolated acts, rather, they form entire chapters in the history of our Republic. This article highlights ten such major assaults, showing how the spirit and letter of the Constitution have been systematically diluted over time.
Gagging Free Speech: The First Amendment (1951)
The first major blow to Bharat’s constitutional freedoms came barely a year after the Constitution’s adoption. In landmark judgements like Romesh Thappar v. State of Madras and Brij Bhushan v. State of Delhi, both in 1950, the Supreme Court protected the right to Free Speech and Press, striking down Government bans and censorship on Cross Roads and Organiser Weekly as unconstitutional. The First Amendment, brought in response, introduced sweeping provisions called “reasonable restrictions” on Article 19(1) (a), empowering the state to curtail speech and press freedom on the pretext of “public order,” “security,” and “morality.”
Misuse of Article 356
Article 356, though intended as a constitutional safeguard for emergencies, came to be subverted as a recurring tool of political dominance. It was first used in Punjab in 1951 due to internal Congress infighting and not due to any constitutional collapse. In 1959, the dismissal of Kerala’s first democratically elected Communist Government – marked another watershed, exposing the clause’s vulnerability to misuse. Following these early episodes, Article 356 was invoked over a hundred times. During Indira Gandhi’s tenure itself (1966–77), it was used more than 30 times to impose President’s Rule in States, targeting opposition-led governments. This pattern entrenched central dominance and eroded state autonomy, thus converting what should have been a constitutional emergency provision into a destabilising political weapon.
Eroding Property Rights: The 17th Amendment (1964)
The 17th Amendment marked a critical turning point in the erosion of constitutional property rights in India. By expanding the definition of “estate” under Article 31A, it enabled Parliament to place a wider range of land-reform and redistribution laws into the Ninth Schedule. This meant that dozens of state and central laws, many of which directly affected landowners, were now beyond the reach of judicial review, even if they violated fundamental rights under Articles 14, 19, or 31. At the time, the right to property was still a fundamental right guaranteed by the Constitution. The 17th Amendment thus sent a clear signal: if any constitutional right became politically inconvenient, it could simply be insulated from challenge by legislative action.
Key points from the Shah Commission Report (August 6, 1978)
As the nation marked the 50th anniversary of the imposition of emergency, shocking news has emerged that the Congress party that had imposed emergency from June 25, 1975, to March 21, 1977, tried to bury the Shah Commission Report, which was headed by Justice J.C. Shah, a retired Chief Justice of India. The Shah Commission Report was a comprehensive document that investigated abuses of authority during the Emergency period in India, and the report focused on various aspects of the Emergency, including the suspension of civil liberties, censorship of the press, and arbitrary arrests and detentions.
Abuse of Power: The report highlighted how power was concentrated in the hands of a few individuals, leading to widespread misuse of authority. It detailed instances of arbitrary arrests, detentions, and the use of preventive detention laws against political opponents and dissenters.[4]
Violation of Civil Liberties: The commission documented numerous cases where fundamental rights were suspended. It highlighted the illegal detention of people without trial, suppression of freedom of speech, and censorship of the press.
Forced Sterilisations: One of the most controversial policies during the Emergency was the forced sterilization campaign led by Sanjay Gandhi, the son of then-Prime Minister Indira Gandhi. The report condemned these coercive measures and detailed how they were implemented without the consent of the people affected.
Destruction of Slums and Displacement: The report criticized the demolition of slums and the forced eviction of thousands of people in Delhi and other cities. These actions were part of the urban beautification drive, which led to significant human suffering.
Political Manipulation and Interference: The Shah Commission highlighted how the government machinery was misused for political gains. It pointed out the interference in the judiciary, civil services, and law enforcement agencies to serve the interests of those in power.
Recommendations: The report made several recommendations to prevent the recurrence of such abuses. These included the need for greater accountability, strengthening democratic institutions, and ensuring the protection of fundamental rights.
Distorting Equality& Security: 25th Amendment (1971)
The 25th Amendment introduced Article 31C allowing laws aimed at implementing certain Directive Principles of State Policy to override the Fundamental Rights to equality and freedom, thus fundamentally altering the balance between individual rights and state policy. In practice, this meant that as long as a law claimed to pursue distributive justice or prevent wealth concentration, it could bypass protections guaranteed by Articles 14 and 19. This selective elevation of state objectives above individual liberties signaled a clear willingness to sacrifice personal rights for notions of socialism.
Immunising the Executive: The 39th Amendment (1975)
The 39th Amendment (1975) was a direct response to the landmark judgement in Raj Narain v. Indira Gandhi (1975). In this case, the Allahabad High Court found Prime Minister Indira Gandhi guilty of electoral malpractices, declared her election void, and barred her from holding elected office for six years. The verdict created a political crisis, threatening her premiership during the Emergency. To nullify the impact of this judgement, the Government swiftly passed the 39th Amendment, which removed judicial review over disputes concerning the election of the Prime Minister, President, Vice-President, and Speaker of the Lok Sabha, effectively overruling the court’s decision and protecting Indira Gandhi’s position. By expressly depriving courts of jurisdiction over these office-bearers’ election disputes, it conferred de facto impunity on the highest executive, eroding the principle that the Constitution subjects all public functionaries to its commands.
Cementing Central Power
Enacted at the height of the Emergency, the 42nd Amendment, also known as the “Mini-Constitution” marked an unprecedented centralisation of power. Passed in 1976, during a period of suspended rights and suppressed dissent, it amended the Preamble to add “Socialist” and “Secular,” extended Parliament’s and state legislatures’ terms from five to six years, and curtailed judicial review. Key articles were altered and new provisions inserted to insulate many laws from court scrutiny, weakening both federalism and the separation of powers. By seeking to place core constitutional values beyond judicial challenge, the amendment directly targeted the basic structure of the Constitution, leaving a legacy widely recognised as the watermark of Emergency-era authoritarianism.
Crushing the Press
The Emergency is remembered for the gravest assault on India’s press freedom. Immediately after its proclamation, the Government imposed sweeping pre-censorship, requiring all news reports and editorials to be vetted by officials before publication. Hundreds of journalists and Editors were detained without charge under preventive detention laws, and leading newspapers like The Indian Express and The Statesman were subjected to raids, power cuts, and advertising boycotts. In some instances, blank editorials were published as a silent protest against the censorship regime. Fear and uncertainty permeated newsrooms, as the Fourth Estate lost its role as a guardian of public interest and became little more than a Government mouthpiece.
Systematic Abuse of Preventive Detention Laws
The Congress Party’s reliance on draconian preventive detention laws to curb dissent predates and outlasts the Emergency era. Immediately after Independence, the Preventive Detention Act, 1950 was enacted – in the name of national security but was widely used to suppress political rivals, trade unionists, and activists, especially during the early 1950s and the periods of Communist-led movements. In 1971, at the height of Indira Gandhi’s rule, the even more notorious Maintenance of Internal Security Act (MISA) was passed, giving sweeping powers to detain citizens without trial for extended periods. These laws were systematically used not only during the Emergency but also before and after, as a routine method of political control. Detentions under these acts routinely bypassed the safeguards of Articles 21 and 22 of the Constitution, making a mockery of the right to liberty. The history of preventive detention in India under Congress rule stands as a chilling reminder of how the law can be weaponized to suppress democracy, even outside formal Emergency conditions.
Undermining Institutional Independence
In 1973, anguished by the Supreme Court’s assertion of constitutional limits in the Kesavananda Bharati case, the Government brazenly superseded three senior judges to appoint a more compliant Chief Justice – sending a clear warning to the judiciary. This climate of intimidation culminated during the Emergency with the ADM Jabalpur v. Shivkant Shukla verdict (1976), where the Supreme Court abdicated its duty by permitting the suspension of the Fundamental Right to Life and Personal Liberty. The judiciary’s approach during this period was marked by mass detentions and set a dangerous precedent for executive overreach.
This undermining extended to other constitutional bodies as well and for years to come. The CBI was subsequently reduced to a mere instrument of Government, its investigations guided more by political interests than by law, eventually earning infamy as a “caged parrot.” Similarly, the credibility of the Election Commission suffered repeated blows due to politicised appointments and interference. By turning independent watchdogs into pliant tools of the party in power, the Congress era hollowed out the institutional checks and balances.
Empowering the “Super PM”
The UPA era saw the emergence of the National Advisory Council (NAC), an unelected body chaired by Sonia Gandhi, functioning as a parallel cabinet outside constitutional structures. The NAC wielded enormous influence, drafting major legislations like the RTI Act, MGNREGA, and the Food Security Bill, often bypassing the Prime Minister’s Office, Cabinet, and Parliament itself. This concentration of policy-making power in the hands of a select few, unaccountable to either the electorate or established constitutional processes, blurred the lines of authority and set a troubling precedent. The rise of this extra-constitutional “Super PM” model undermined parliamentary sovereignty and weakened the principle that executive authority must always flow from the Constitution and the people’s representatives.
From arbitrary amendments and the stifling of dissent to the systematic abuse of emergency powers and the undermining of independent institutions, these ten assaults together define what can only be called “Samvidhan Hatya”. This history is not only a repository of past wrongs, but also a warning for the future. Learning from the past and being awake to these historical assaults is essential to ensure that the Constitution remains a living document both in letter as well as in spirit.
Comments