The Shifting Imagination of Justice under the Constitution

The shifting Imagination of Justice under the Constitution of India has been seen. There are instances and dimensions of law and justice, human rights and constitutionalism, wherein the government needs to acts as a helping hand in the emergencies like Covid-19 Pandemic, etc, so the focus in such kind of situations should be on the right to health and the empathy on the poor workers of the state or the country at large. The role of Constitution of India is to see that the State must secure the social, political, economic, etc, making it mandatory to provide speedy and just and fair justice as per Article-14 of the Constitution of India which provides equality before the law and equally protecting every citizen of India. The procedure of law established in India is as per the English common law because India was under the British Colonial Rule for a long period. 

This article contemplates the brief introduction about the shifting imagination of justice under the constitution, Situation of Indian Constitution pre-Keshvananda Bharti Verdict, Revolution in Criminal System with the introduction of Alternative Dispute Resolution, Brief Introduction to the Doctrine of Basic Structure of the Constitution, 10 landmark judgments that changed the shape of the Constitution of India in 2018 and conclusion.

Introduction:

“Human Beings are not made for the law but the Law is made for them”, It is true that the law indeed controls the deviant behaviour of every individual of the society and no law can work properly if both of them do not interact with each other by their own. As per Article-14 of Constitution of India, it provides equality for all and equally protecting every individual of the Indian society. There are instances and dimensions of law and justice, human rights and constitutionalism, wherein the government needs to acts as a helping hand in the emergencies like Covid-19 Pandemic, etc, so the focus in such kind of situations should be on the right to health and the empathy on the poor workers of the state or the country at large. The role of Constitution of India is to see that the State has the duty to secure the social, political, economic, etc, making it mandatory to provide speedy and just and fair justice. The procedure of law established in India is as per the English common law because India was under the British Colonial Rule for a long period . The shifting Imagination of Justice under the Constitution India has been seen. 

Constitution of India Pre-Keshvanda Bharti Case:[1]

The Parliament of India time to time has a right to amend the Constitution of India specially the Part-III of the Constitution of India which cannot be amended by our Parliament. Article-39 (b) (c) of Directive Principle of State Policy which states that every individual should have an equal distribution of resources and to prevent the concentration of wealth with few people which affected the property adversely and filed the petition in the court of law. Later the court struck down the land reform laws which dealt with the fundamental right dealing with property guaranteed by the Constitution of India, Parliament placed all these laws under 9th Schedule of the Constitution of India by the 1st and 4thAmendment 1951 and 1952, leading to the removal from the scope of the judicial review. This was again challenged the constitutional validity of the amendment being violative of Article-13(2) (it provides for the protection of fundamental rights of every individual citizen of the Indian Society), by the property owners in the Supreme Court of India. As per Article-13 of Constitution of India, Parliament of India is restricted to make any type of law that is violating the rights of the individuals of the society.

Sankari Prasad Singh Deo v Union of India[2] and Sajjan Singh v Rajasthan[3]:

In these two cases, the Supreme Court upheld that the Parliament does not have the power to an amendment that part of the Constitution of India which affects the fundamental rights of the individuals. 

GolakNath v State of Punjab [4]:

In this case, 11 bench judges, in the year 1967, The Supreme Court in this case held that the two power of Parliament of amending the constitution are mostly the same and any such amendment made by the Parliament under Article-13(2) of the Constitution of India will be regarded as a law. The majority decision solicits the implied limitations on the powers of the Parliament of India to amend the Constitution of India. In other words, The Supreme Court held  the some of the features of the Constitution of India are so important that it’s better not to change them but adopt an alternative method for their implementation.

The terms “Basic Structure” got introduced through this case only but it got recognition in the year 1973. 

Revolution in Criminal System with the introduction of Alternative Dispute Resolution:[5]

In India, the adversarial approach is been followed to solve the criminal cases which they adopted from the English Common Law as India was under a British Rule for a long period. At first instance, the accused is assumed to be innocent until proven guilty and it needs to be proven by the victim to prove the charges made against the accused by presenting all the necessary facts and figures in the court of law. This system follows the two-sided approach under which the prosecution put forward his or her arguments and wins the case when he or she can convince the judge and make the case fall in their favour. It is seen that from past few decades there has been an increase in the number of pending cases in India. It is mostly because of the bribery system. It is done mostly by identifying the financially weak witness in the criminal cases and by giving them a  certain amount of money so to speak in their favour eventually making the case fall in their own favour which is not a good thing it not only delays the speedy and just and fair system but also makes people doubt in our Judicial system which also increase the level of crime rate in the country. To curb some of the above stated problems, ADR system was adopted as it not only increases the speed for providing  justice to the people they are said to be more just and fair in their approach which is mostly preferred in solving the criminal cases. In the criminal cases, parties to the dispute cannot compromise with each other to end the case. 

Introduction to Doctrine of Basic Structure:

The Supreme Court of India, again in the year 1975 in the Indira Gandhi’s Election Case, had to opportunity to look into the matter relating to the doctrine of the basic structure. In this case, then Prime Minister Indira Gandhi’s election victory was upheld by the Allahabad High Court. In this case 4 out of 5 judges upheld the 39th Amendment act after removing it said that it lessened the judicial powers to adjudicate then election disputes but her election were held to be valid based on the election laws which were recently amended.

 Landmark judgments that changed the shape of the Constitution of India in 2018:[6]

Romila Thapar v Union of India:[7]

The court in 2:1 ratio, rejected the plea of the Special Investigation Team for probing into the investigation for getting the evidence and proving them being the part of some terrorist organization. In this case, one was forced to cross-examine the right of speech and expression which is required for successfully convicting a person. 

KS Puttaswamy v Union of India (Aadhar Challenge):[8]

The apex court ,in this case, upheld the constitutional validity of the Aadhar Act, but it curtailed the provisions by striking them out and making it mandatory for all the citizens to have an Aadhar card but Section-7 of the act was not struck down which makes the Aadhar Card mandatory for all the citizens of India.

Conclusion:

It is observed from the above discussion itself that there has been a shift in the imagination of the Justice under the Constitution of India starting from Golak Nath case to the Keshvananda Bharti Case, and if we see the change in the privacy of individuals then it got changed from the judgments like KS Puttaswamy.It is important to note that there are still so many loopholes in our judicial system which need to be changed and to speed up the just and fair judicial procedure.


Question and answers:

Q-1 What was the ratio of the verdict passed in the Romila Thappar’s Case?

The ratio of the judgment was 2:1 in the case of Romila Thappar.

Q-2 Which article of the Constitution of India guarantees equal protection of the law?

Article-14 of the Constitution of India guarantees equal protection of law to all the citizens of the country.

Q-3 Who does not have the power to amend the Part-III of the Constitution of India?

No one has the power to amend the Part-III of the Constitution of India, not even the Parliament of India.

Q-4 What does Part-III of the Constitution of India deals with?

Part-III of the Constitution of India deals with the fundamental rights of the citizens of the country.

Q-5 What is the best method to solve criminal cases?

Alternative Dispute Resolution (ADR) is said to be the best method to solve criminal cases.

References:


[1] http://constitutionnet.org/vl/item/basic-structure-indian-constitution

[2] AIR 1951 SC 458

[3] AIR  1965 SC 845

[4] 1967 AIR 1643, 1967 SCR (2) 762

[5] https://www.lawteacher.net/free-law-essays/indian-law/the-indian-constitution-guarantees-justice-to-all-law-essay.php

[6] https://blog-iacl-aidc.org/2019-posts/2019/3/8/10-cases-that-shaped-india-in-2018

[7] AIR 2018

[8] WRIT PETITION (CIVIL) NO 494 OF 2012

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *