Indian Polity: Introduction

Polity section find its place in many exams like FCI, SSC and other government exams. Here in this blog, I am explaining some fundamentals of Indian Polity. After reading this, you would be able to understand the following points:

• Making of the Indian Constitution
• Sources of the Indian Constitution
• Fundamental Aspects of the Constitution

CONSTITUTION :
A constitution is a fundamental law of a country and all other laws of the country must conform with it in order to be valid. It defines the principal functions of the Government as well as relations between the Government and its citizens.
Constitutions are of two types- "Unwritten" and "Written".
The Constitutions of the U.K. and New Zealand are unwritten whereas the Constitutions of all other countries of the world are written.

MAKING OF THE INDIAN CONSTITUTION
The demand of Indian Constitution was first put forth by M.N. Roy.

After the formal announcement of Independence of India, the first major task of Indian leaders was to framework a legal document of their own possessing legal sanctity. Hence Constituent Assembly was set up under the framework of Cabinet Mission (1946) for drafting the Constitution of Independent India.

 It was a large representative body initially having 385 members, of which 292 were elected by the elected members of the Provincial Legislative Assemblies(they were under direct British control) while 93 members were nominated by the Princely States(indirectly controlled by British). But after the Muslim League separated on creation of Constitution of Pakistan on July 16, 1947, the membership reduced to 299 out of which 229 represented the provinces and 70 were nominated by the Princely States.

The present constitution of India was framed by an elected Constituent Assembly, and was formally adopted on 26 November, 1949. It came into force on 26 January 1950.(to commemorate the day when Congress observed Poorna Swaraj in Lahore session of 1930 )

Constituent Assembly formed major committees to outline the proposed constitution such as Constitution on Union Constitution, Union Powers Committee, Committee on Fundamental Rights etc. The all-important Drafting Committee- which bore the responsibility of drafting the Constitutional document during the recess of the Constituent Assembly from July 1947-September 1948-- was formed on August 29, 1947 under the chairmanship of Dr. B. R. Ambedkar and included among others, two distinguished jurists and lawyers Alladi Krishnaswamy Ayyar and K. M. Munshi.

CHRONOLOGICAL SEQUENCE OF EVENTS DURING THE MAKING OF CONSTITUTION

• December 9, 1946: First meeting of the Constituent Assembly with Dr. Sachidanand Sinha as its interim President.(Dr. Sinha was chosen as he was the oldest member at that time)
• December 11, 1946: Dr. Rajendra Prasad elected as its President
• February 1948: Draft Constitution came out in open for public opinion.
• November 1948: Provisions of the Draft Constitution were considered and discussed in detail.
• November 26, 1949: It finally received the signature of the President of the Constituent Assembly. It was declared as passed and adopted.
• January 24, 1950: Dr. Rajendra Prasad elected as the President of India.
• January 26, 1950: Indian constitution came into effect and this day is celebrated as Republic Day of India. 

The Constituent Assembly took 2 years 11 months and 18 days in framing the Constitution of India.

OBJECTIVE RESOLUTION: Constitution of India is the supreme law of the nation. It must have a philosophical base. The philosophy underlying the Indian Constitution was embodied quite early in the Objective Resolution which was moved in the first session of the Constituent Assembly (on December 1946) by Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru and adopted on 22 January, 1947.

SOURCES OF THE INDIAN CONSTITUTION
Indian constitution is often referred to as 'bag of borrowings'. It is because architects of the Indian Constitution went through all the then existing major constitutions before drafting their own to accommodate the best possible and time-tested features of each of them to the requirement of the country. The largest influence was of the Government of India Act, 1935.
Government of India Act, 1935                          
The Federal Scheme, office of Governor, power of judiciary, emergency powers.
Britain                                                                
Law making procedures, provision of single citizenship, Parliamentary system, office of CAG, parliamentary privileges.
Constitution of USA                                          
Independence of judiciary, Judicial review, fundamental rights, removal of Supreme court and High Court judges, Preamble and Functions of Vice-President.
Constitution of Canada                                    
Federation with strong centre, to provide residuary powers with the centre.
Constitution of Ireland                                      
Directive Principles of State Policy, method of Presidential elections.
Constitution of Germany                                  
Provisions concerning the provisions of fundamental rights during emergency.
Constitution of South Africa                              
Amendment with 2/3rd majority in the Parliament and election of the members of Rajya Sabha on the basis of proportional representation.