This is the only
Preamble
I have seen that comes with a date… The text says ‘in our
Constituent Assembly
this 26th day of November, 1949, do hereby adopt, enact, and give to ourselves this Constitution’,” Justice Dipankar Datta said, adding it was not that the Preamble could not have been amended, but from an
academic point of view
, could it have been done without changing the
date
?
Swamy told SC bench also comprising Justice Sanjiv Khanna that amendments were pushed through during the “dark era of Emergency”.
Advocate Vishnu Jain, who was appearing for another petitioner, said the Preamble did come with a date and therefore, amending it (in 1976) without any debate was questionable.
It is not that Preamble could not have been amended (in 1976), but for academic purpose, could it have been done without changing its date of adoption (’49)?
Justice Dipankar Datta, SC
Secularism’ and ‘socialism’ are Constitution’s inherent features, so their insertion did not alter its nature
Binoy Viswam, CPI
Opposing Swamy’s plea, advocate Sriram Parakkat, appearing for CPI’s Binoy Viswam said “secularism” and “socialism” are inherent features of Constitution and hence addition of these words in Preamble did not alter Constitution’s nature.
“It is respectfully submitted that insertion of “secular” and “socialist” to Preamble is only an act of making explicit what was implicit and it cannot be argued these violate basic structure of Constitution. Because of the fact that secular nature of Constitution was already embodied in enacting provisions (Articles 25 to 30) that this Hon’ble Court could observe that secularism was a basic feature of Constitution even before it was inserted into Preamble in 1976,” Viswam said in his impleadment application.
English (US) ·