[IAC#RG] Rajaji's views on amendment to nullify Supreme Court verdict

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India Against Corruption

                  Rajaji's views on amendment to nullify Supreme Court verdict           

 

The move of the parliamentarians to make amendment  to ensure that Supreme Court's verdict barring convicted persons from entering parliament and assemblies  is causing concern to citizens who want probity in public life.

Rajaji, the foresighted statesman  wrote an article titled "Lawless Legislation" in Swarajya  dated 14th September,1963, disapproving the tendency of parliamentarians to undo the verdict of Supreme Court.  The extract  from  Rajaji's article  is given below.

The President and Prime Minister as well as the leader of the opposition in Lok Sabha and Rajya Sabha should read this and derive the right lessons.

  QUOTE                                             LAWLESS  LEGISLATION

Laws passed contrary to fundamental principles of law have been called  `lawless‟ laws. When they are contrary not only to fundamental principles but to  the express Articles of the Constitution embodying them, they are still more lawless.

And the climax of lawlessness is reached, when the law actually seeks to amend the  Constitution itself, in order to bring it into line with itself. The lawlessness is  aggravated by a spirit of open rebellion against the Constitution.

The Constitution has, no doubt, laid down procedure for amending the Constitution.  To utilize those provisions in order to legalize what is contrary to the intent and  purpose of the Articles relating to fundamental – that is, inviolable – basic rights is to use the letter of the Constitution to defeat the Constitution itself and to “make  faith void and sacred promises of none effect”.

These rights embodied in the Constitution are called fundamental, because they are  not rights newly conferred on the citizen by the State but are a recognition and  confirmation of freedom coeval with birth in a civilized country.

If each time the Supreme Court gives an adverse verdict against the Government in  respect of the validity of a law passed at its instance, the Government organize a  constitutional amendment to be steam rolled  though  Parliament in order to make the  judicial pronouncement of none effect.

In the process, the image of the Supreme Court is bound to lose all public respect.  Supreme Court will ultimately lose its own sense of confidence and independence. It  is superfluous to point out that this is against the spirit and structure of the Constitution.

UNQUOTE

N.S.Venkataraman

Nandini Voice For The Deprived

Email :- nsvenkatchennai@gmail.com