Transforming The Constitutional Mandates

Dr. N. Pramod Singh, Head, Department of Law, Dhanamanjuri University, Manipur

Mapping the national document

After a prolonged struggle against the colonial ruler, India got independence on 15th August, 1945; however, attainment of independence was not the end for the people of India as it was only the beginning for Indians to set up a democracy based on the principles of justice, liberty, equality and fraternity. Such tireless movement of Indian masses against the colonialism and imperialism was one of the basic sources for the legitimacy of the constitution of India. One may also recall the relative background and reasons for the enactment of the Indian Independence Act, 1947 by the British parliament that had allowed to terminate the suzerainty of British Crown over India and also authorised to set up a dominion of India and a dominion of Pakistan as well. Eventually, the Act of 1947 enabled both nations to adopt and make their own national constitution and government. Henceforth, the actual task for drafting a constitution of independent India was basically entrusted to the Constituent Assembly which was primarily elected by the Provincial Assemblies of those days through the indirect election in accordance with the Cabinet Mission of 1946. The Constituent Assembly comprising of 385 members, who happened to be elected on the basis of proportionate representation from the constituencies confined to the provincial legislatures and princely states as well, had its first meeting on 9th December, 1946; however, the Muslim League boycotted the said meeting. Despite the stern objection from the Muslim frontier political organization to the purposed meeting of the Assembly, a substantial resolution was adopted in the meeting which later became the sources of the preamble to the constitution of India. To mention some of the historical features, one may cite the very background for boycotting its first meeting of Constituent Assembly by the Muslim League. Barring those inevitable situations prevailing at that point of time, a very limited franchise was adopted in the process of electing the members to the Constituent Assembly that had virtually misled the citizens of India more particularly, minorities and people of those princely states. As such, the very composition of the said Constituent Assembly and its process of conducting election for membership still remain as one of the debatable issues even today. Eventually, it has entangled the democratic values and practices in the mindset of certain sections of the Indian society till date. Another endemic issue for them was that of the process of making a unique national constitution having adopted with a limited franchise and limited scope of democratic norm and space. In a way, it was also contended that the scheme of the Constituent Assembly, as provided in the Cabinet Mission of 1946, was circumscribed to be accepted by all the stakeholders on certain factual grounds and conditions. The Constituent Assembly, headed by Dr. Rajendra Prasad, the then the first President of independent India, constituted a Drafting Committee for preparing a national legal document of India. The Committee took 2 years 11 months 18 days in preparing the purposed draft. After having finalised the proposed national constitution under the chairmanship of Dr. B.R. Ambedkar, the same was published in January 1948, basically for larger democratic debate and discourse on the contents of the proposed national document for a period of 8 months i.e. from January to August 1948. Finally, the constitution of India was officially declared enacted and adopted on the 26th November, 1949 by bringing 15 provisions of the Constitution into force with immediate effect and the rest of the provisions of the Constitution were brought into effect from the 26th January, 1950 which later, became the actual date of commencement of Indian Constitution