In the Preface to his recent book, The Basic Structure Doctrine, Protector of Constitutional Integrity, Justice Rohinton Nariman writes’
“I would have thought that this doctrine has been tried and tested and attempts to undo it have all failed thus far. However, in certain quarters, high ones, people in high places in the executive have started re-examining this doctrine saying that it is anti-Parliament and anti-the people of India.”
Quoting from Alexander Hamilton’s Federalist Paper No. 78, Justice Nariman extracts that “judiciary is beyond comparison the weakest of the three departments of power”, the three departments being the Executive, Legislature and the Judiciary. Writing further, the author says that the Basic Structure Doctrine is a facet of the principle of diffusion of power, which steps in to correct or stop a creature of the Constitution when there is an arrogation to supremacy, which such creature of the Constitution neither has nor derives from the Constitution.
Concluding the preface authoritatively, Justice Nariman says in no uncertain terms:
“It is important to remember that the interpretation of the Constitution is expressly only in the judiciary’s hand (see Article 145(3) of the Constitution of India).”
These concluding words are presumably directed towards the category of people mentioned by the author who are trying to challenge the supremacy of the Constitution or bring in a constitution that would be self-servient, attempting it while having no challenge to their capacity to amend, legislatively.
The preface having set the tone, it would be a constitutional law student’s delight to understand the Basic Structure Doctrine through the words of the scholarly Justice Rohinton Nariman.
