There are two ways of rewriting a constitution.
There was a time when ordinary people didn't know what the constitution was. Now everybody knows that the thing can't be rewritten- there is no point doing so- but that the Bench can interpret it any which way it likes.
You can take a formal route, as Indira Gandhi did, via the infamous 42nd Amendment, and mutilate the original Constitution. Or you can take an informal route, as preferred by the Narendra Modi government. You need not change the text, but simply abandon the Constitution altogether, trespass its sacred boundaries, repudiate its guarantees and make sure there is no one to enforce the original contract.
But the Bench is still around! Yadav has a complaint against the Bench. But he is welcome to approach them himself or with the help of his pal Prashant Bhushan. There was a time when the Jat farmer may not have understood this. But now everybody knows that Bhushan and Yadav were slung out of the AAM party and that they have failed to establish a political identity of their own. Neither the Bench nor the voters are willing to listen to them. Kejriwal has now taken Punjab. Yadav got nothing from the Farmers except some free chai or a bidi or two.
In many ways, the informal route is more effective. For an ordinary citizen, the Constitution is what the local thanedaar says it is.
Local thanedaars don't quote the Constitution while beating you. Does Yadav really believe otherwise?
The text called the Constitution is relevant only if the station house officer (SHO) and the district magistrate (DM) — or the chief minister and the prime minister, for that matter — are expected and forced to abide by it.
No. The Constitution is only relevant when a legal challenge to an action of the Executive is brought to the Courts. That's how the law works.
Otherwise, a shift in the thanedaar’s conduct is as good as an amendment to the Constitution.
It is irrelevant. The Constitution is about what the Judiciary can do to change the behavior of the Executive. Moreover, it can strike down laws passed by the Legislature if they are not in conformity with the basic structure of the Constitution.
For the privileged few who can access courts, the judiciary’s failure to enforce constitutional provisions is as good as its abrogation.
But the privileged few don't need constitutional provisions because....they are privileged. Does Yadav not understand this?
Why say 'constitution only matters to a few rich people'? Most of India is very very poor. What you are saying is 'forget the Constitution. It has nothing to do with you.'
Let there be no ambiguity about it. What we have witnessed between Ram Navami (10 April) and Hanuman Jayanti (16 April) this year is a de facto repeal of the bedrock of the Constitution — its guarantee of equal citizenship.
Equal citizenship did not protect Kashmiri Pandits. Why should Hindus, the majority in India, care if Muslims, not Hindus, suffered disproportionately during the recent violence? Hindus are perfectly happy to be superior citizens.
What Yadav should be doing is finding a reason why it is in the interests of the majority to protect the minority. Instead he first says 'Constitution only matters to the rich' and then 'Muslims are not getting equal protection' when the majority are not Muslim and don't want anybody who attacks Hindus to get any sort of protection. This is a self-defeating strategy. No wonder Kejriwal ran circles around this stupid jhollawallah.
Other parts have already been annulled, redacted and distorted, or are in the process of being disfigured. The Constitution that came into force on the 26 January 1950 could soon turn into a rulebook that has no relation to the ground.
So what? Yadav has already said that it only mattered to the 'privileged few'. Why should the vast majority of Indians weep over it?
This is no rhetoric. The role of a written constitution in a constitutional democracy is not just that it lays down rules of governance.
Yadav used to teach Political Science. He should know that Constitutions, written or unwritten, define the various institutions of government; prescribe their composition, powers and functions; and regulate relations between them. They do not lay down rules of governance which are formulated by the Executive and which apply within certain institutions of governance. However the Judiciary may decide some such rules are ultra vires or otherwise improper. That is a separate matter. Yadav lives in a make believe world where the Indian Constitution tells the 'thaneedar' whom to beat with his laathi.
Dictators too need a rulebook for orderly governance.
No. The reverse was the case. The classic example was the Führerprinzip which prescribed the fundamental basis of political authority in Hitler's Germany. This principle can be most succinctly understood to mean that "the Führer's word is above all written law" and that governmental policies, decisions, and offices ought to work toward the realization of this end'. This meant anticipating what Hitler wanted and then doing it regardless of any rules or laws or ethical considerations.
The sacred rulebook in a constitutional democracy is about constraining democratically elected governments.
No. A constitutional democracy- like India's- can give a democratically elected government unlimited powers during a period of internal or external emergency. Moreover, the Constitution itself can be amended or dispensed with during such a period thus removing all right of judicial review of violations of fundamental rights. Why does Yadav not know this?
Democratic constitutions draw inviolable boundaries of spheres of influence:
Neither India's, nor Britain's, does any such thing.
More than who does what, it specifies who cannot do what.
But it can't specify that it might not itself be done away with by anyone with the power to do so.
Democratic constitutions do not simply provide for majority rule; they spell out what a majority cannot do.
This is wholly false. The Indian constitution places no barrier to its own amendment such that the majority can do as it pleases. This has been amply demonstrated.
If a constitution does not constrain the rulers, it is no constitution at all.
If a constitution is not useful to the rulers, it ceases to exist.
This is exactly what we are witnessing.
No. We are witnessing an ignorant man writing nonsense.
What happened across India during the week between Ram Navami and Hanuman Jayanti was no accident, local conflagration or mere hooliganism. There was a clear pattern and an unmistakable design to this ritual of humiliation. Step one: Organise a religious procession, with or without permission, armed with loud DJs, lathis, swords and possibly firearms. Step two: Take the procession through Muslim localities and ensure a stopover outside a mosque, with the acquiescence or collaboration of local police. Step three: Provoke, provoke and provoke. This could be a verbal provocation by way of hate-filled slogans, bigoted songs or direct action, by way of desecration of the sacred place or planting saffron flags, etc.
What was the outcome? Disproportionate losses to Muslims because they were a minority. What hasn't yet happened is ethnic cleansing of Muslims. But if it could happen to Pandits in Kashmir, who is to say it can't happen to Muslims where Hindus are the majority? The Police may believe that there was a conspiracy- a Muslim one- to store arms and to shoot policemen. If Yadav is seeking to appeal to Muslims he should play up his own possible utility as a peace-maker between the local police and respected leaders of the community. That is how you build political support and gain a constituency. Talking garbled nonsense makes you look foolish and hysterical.
Muslims have only two choices: being bullied or bulldozed.
That's just one choice. First the bullying then the bulldozing. Why? Like Kashmiri Pandits in the Valley, they are a minority. They need the interessement of sensible politicians like Kejriwal, not crazy jhollahwallahs like Yadav. It is obvious that there is a 'positive sum game' here by which all communities can benefit economically. Kejriwal will get around to it in his own good time. He is positioning himself as an alternative Hindu leader who appeals to better educated urban people who want to see commerce thrive and their neighborhoods grow in affluence.
If they put up with this public humiliation, they are cowards in their own eyes. If they retaliate, they are criminals to be swooped down on by the police that have been sleeping all this while. There is nowhere they can turn to.
Yadav does not understand that Indian Muslims have pride and self-worth. They don't want to be treated as helpless victims. They know they are making an increasing contribution to the economy and that Kejriwal's own 'Bania' caste wants to hire more young Muslims because they have a clean image. Get rid of the ruffian element by all means. Yadav is saying the opposite to what Muslims want to hear. He is hinting that they should back some Mafia don who can provide guns and ammunition. But this just means you will have Muslims extorting Muslims with some occasional riots being orchestrated when politically convenient.
Just consider the multiple violations of the Constitution that make this public ritual possible. “Hindustan me rehna hai to Jai Sri Ram kahna hoga”, the war cry of these organisations, is a direct denial of the Right to Freedom of Religion.
No. It is merely a statement of belief. A 'direct denial' of a Right would involve an overt action or plausible threat of such an action. This is a justiciable matter. I am welcome to say 'If you wish to live on this Earth, you must pray to the Holy Spaghetti monster'. This is because I have the freedom to express my religious beliefs.
More than that, the State’s failure to protect the minority community against orchestrated attacks is a denial of the Protection of Life and Personal Liberty guaranteed under Article 21.
No. Such failure may arise by lack of State Capacity. There has to be evidence that such capacity existed and that there were 'orchestrated attacks' which specific organs of the State were aware of and which they could have prevented.
What Yadav has written is that anytime anyone suffers any injury, the Constitution has been violated. The obvious rejoinder is that Hindus and policemen have an equal right to protection which was violated by certain Muslims in this context.
While self-styled representatives of the majority community violate all legal restrictions on hate speech and incitement to violence, others dare not even think about it. This is a plain annulment of the Right to Equality and the constitutional prohibition of discrimination on grounds of religion.
Yadav has already told us that the Constitution does not matter at all except to 'the privileged few'. He is now saying any time Mummy slaps me, Constitution is violated. Why stop there? Why not say Holy Scripture is violated anytime anybody steals something or says something mean about me? Is it not the case that God is wounded wherever even a tiny sparrow falls victim to the claws of a kitty cat?
Cutting across all these violations is a fundamental division between two classes of citizens: Hindus and non-Hindus.
No. Where non-Hindus are the majority, Hindus are running scared.
First-class citizens enjoy constitutional protections and rights, if not impunity. Second-class citizens may enjoy some of these protections but only if the government and the majority so desire. This is as deep a stab into the heart of the Constitution as one can imagine.
Also it is the insertion of bumboo up bum-hole of Constitution. God is weeping tears of blood at the sight of such naked anal intrusion into Constitutionji.
This latest violation comes on top of a series of contraventions that we have witnessed, especially since 2019. The state of Jammu and Kashmir was split without the constitutionally-mandated reference to the state assembly (Article 3). Since the Supreme Court has shown no willingness to hear this case and enforce the Constitution, we can only assume that some key provisions in Part I of the Constitution stand annulled.
No. A 2016 decision of the Bench held that J&K had no 'shred of sovereignty'. Part I says India is a Union of territories with the Union Government getting to decide what is or isn't a State or Union Territory.
The Citizenship Amendment Act 2019, not reviewed so far by the Supreme Court, has already struck a blow at Part II of the Constitution.
No. Since 1948, only non-Muslims refugees were granted citizenship even if they had only crossed the border in panic the previous year.
Part III, which provides for Fundamental Rights, has too many holes to recount. Equality before Law (Article 14), Freedom of Expression (Article 19), Protection from Conviction for Offences (Article 20), Freedom of conscience and free profession, practice and propagation of religion (Article 25) and Remedies for Enforcement of Rights (Article 32) are all de facto suspended or scrapped.
In the opinion of a cretin.
The State’s duty to reign in economic inequalities and concentration of wealth (Article 38(2) and 39 (c)) has always been a bit of a joke and now is a complete farce. It seems that new unsaid insertions have taken place in the Fundamental Duties (Article 51A): a duty not to dissent.
So, what Yadav is really saying is that the Constitution is completely useless. Why? Obviously, it was shitty to start off with and just kept getting shittier as time went by. But who wrote the Constitution?
Not to put too fine a point on it: The Constitution is being stabbed to death, every day, on the streets. For all practical purposes, the citizens, especially those who belong to the religious minorities, are living under a new arrangement. The republic that Babasaheb’s Constitution gave birth to is all but over.
Aha! There it is! Yadav is saying that everything is Ambedkar's fault. Yet Kejriwal is replacing portraits of Mahatma Gandhi with Ambedkar! This proves Kejriwal is the new Hindu hriday samrat! He even has a moustache just like Hitler!
Can we save the Indian republic?
Could Yogendra Yadav save his deposit if he stood for election? No. Fuck can he do for the Republic?
Is there a way out? Can the Constitution still be defended? Can the republic be reclaimed?
Getting elected is the key. Talking bollocks won't help.
Yes, but this is not going to be easy. The Constitution was a grand arrangement built on the edifice of an ideological consensus forged by our freedom struggle and a political equilibrium sustained by the rainbow coalition of the Congress party.
This is utterly false. There was no ideological consensus. Muslims wanted to keep reserved seats. Socialists wanted something closer to the Burmese model. Gandhians too had their crazy claims. What emerged was based on the Nehru report and the 1935 Act with one or two idiosyncratic flourishes- e.g. 'Directive Principles' and 'autochthony' on the Irish pattern.
Does Yadav believe Ambedkar belonged to the Congress Party? What about B.N Rau or Surendra Nath Mukherjee? Both were Civil Servants. KM Munshi was a Congress man at that time but he was well to the right of Nehru. Muhammed Sadulla supported the Pakistan resolution. Alladi Krishnaswamy Iyer had no political affiliation. He supported suspension of fundamental rights during an Emergency. N. Gopalaswami Ayyangar was non-political. Khaitan and TTK were businessmen. Mitter and Madhava Rao were Dewans or lawyers and considered non-political. Thus, apart from Munshi- who was right wing, there was not a single Congress-wallah on the Drafting committee!
Anyway, the Constitution was swiftly amended with the approval of Rajaji, Ambedkar etc. It was crystal clear that it would pose no impediment to the proper exercise of Executive authority in curbing any and all threats to the polity.
Both these pillars are on the verge of collapse. Our Constitution is meant to be a self-sustaining arrangement, with the judiciary in charge of enforcing it.
Says a cretin who thinks it is being stabbed in the heart or anally probed or is looking for its contact lenses or something of that sort.
Over the last few years, we have learnt a hard lesson about the fragility of this arrangement.
Yadav tried his hands at politics and lost. He refused to learn the 'hard lesson' that he was taught. Nobody now wants him. Congress has made space for Kanhaiya and Hardik Patel. It may give itself over to Prashant Kishore. But poor old Yogendra is avoided by all. Will Harsh Mander take him into his campervan of lurve? I hope so. Those two old men can make each other very happy.
We now know that the highest level of the judiciary cannot resist pressure from the all-powerful government,
unlike Yogendra. Why is nobody applying pressure to him? Is it because they are afraid he will get into Harsh Mander's karwan-e-mohabbat and they will put up a sign saying 'if the campervan is rocking, don't come a knocking?'
nor is it immune from the new ideology that seeks to undermine the Constitution. In the last instance, the Constitution cannot be rescued unless there is a realignment of power, rebuilding of the social coalition and re-articulation of the constitutional values.
In which case, why rescue the useless thing?
Ultimately, the Constitution cannot defend itself. There are no internal or external guarantees that can save it. The public must be mobilised to defend the republic.
Which they can do without bothering with a Constitution which is constantly being stabbed in the heart while taking a bumboo up its butt-hole.
The last few days have been a grim reminder that the time is running out for the defenders of the republic.
Time has run out for Yogendra Yadav. His Swaraj Party is a joke. The question is why Yadav- a handsome and honey toned orator- kept losing again and again. I suppose the answer is 'messaging'. He never picked a particular constituency and then articulated its concerns in a consistent and rational manner. Like Swami Agnivesh, he is an opportunist jumping on bandwagon after bandwagon without anything to show for it in terms of 'deliverables'. Yesterday it was the Farmers. Today it is Muslims. Tomorrow it will be Kejriwal's moustache which is tickling Constitutionji too much. But, by then it will be too late. AAM storm troopers will have taken over the Republic. It will be revealed that Kejriwal is actually a Sith Lord. Yogendra and Harsh Mander will drive away in the campervan of Lurve. Constitutionji will join them for erotic escapades. It is what Ambedkarji would have wanted. Jai Bhim!
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