K.Chandru

 08 Jul 2022, 5:00 am

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Thebiggest mistake made by the CPI(M) government was to get the resignation letter from Fisheries and Culture Minister Shaji Cherian and drop him from the cabinet.

It is said that Shaji Cherian criticized the Constitution while addressing a meeting of Left workers. If you read the news, ‘The law failed to protect the workers; It is only saving the Adanis, Ambanis,” he said. “The Constitution was written on the basis of what the British said and they foolishly wrote democracy and secularism in it!”

Hostility to policies

Shaji Cherian of the CPI(M) was elected as MLA from Chengannur constituency. Later, he was inducted as a minister in the Pinarayi Vijayan-led Kerala government. He has to take oath when he takes oath as a legislator and when he takes oath as a minister. The pledge reads that it will uphold the Constitution of India without any bias and uphold the sovereignty and integrity of India. Is there any evidence that he ignored this pledge?

Following the opposition demanding the resignation of Shaji Cherian, the opinion of Kerala state Advocate General Gopalakrishna Kurup was sought and based on that, he was asked to resign. If the Advocate General had made such a comment, it was wrong; It would also be against the policies of the Left.

Liberal character of the Indian Constitution

The Constitution of India is fundamentally liberal. Unlike the Bangladesh Constitution (Article 7A), which makes contempt of the Constitution a serious offence punishable by death, we do not have a law. There is no such provision in the Constitution of India. In fact, Article 19(1)(a) also gives the citizen the right to criticise the Act on the basis of freedom of expression.

Amendments

The Constitution of India was basically based on the British Government of India Act, 1935, and in fact, most of its provisions are enshrined in the Constitution of India. The Constitution of India has been amended 102 times so far.

The word ‘secularism’ in the opening lines of the Constitution does not exist in the Constitution of 1950; Its insertion under the 42nd Constitutional Amendment Act, 1976 is an example of the kind of amendments it has allowed for.

In many cases, amendments have been made to override the basis of the judgment of the courts. In the late 1960s, the Supreme Court struck down the nationalisation of private banks and the Kings Subsidy Abolition Act, which centred on the right to property under Article 31 of the Constitution.The 24th and 25th Amendments to the Constitution were introduced to remove the basis of those judgments. When those amendments were debated in Parliament, the CPI(M) voted in favour of those amendments by Prime Minister Indira Gandhi.

Supporting the amendments, CPI(M) leader P Ramamurthy, in his speech, lashed out at the courts and said in the House itself that “the Constitution which is not needed by the people should be thrown into the Bay of Bengal.” The Supreme Court dismissed the petitions challenging the amendments, saying that Parliament has the power to amend the Constitution. Thereafter, even the CPI(M) issued a statement discussing the amendments to the Constitution in its Central Committee.

During the Emergency, fundamental rights enshrined in the Constitution were postponed. As a result, even illegal arrests could not be taken to court. It was a time when not only the Left parties but also the leaders of the Right parties were imprisoned. BJP leaders like Vajpayee, Advani and now Prime Minister Narendra Modi were kept in jail for 21 months without trial. The Supreme Court said that victims cannot approach the court during the Emergency. The judges, on their part, delivered a humiliating verdict in the ADM Jabalpur case. Prime Minister Indira Gandhi, who had crippled the activities of the opposition parties, hurriedly introduced several amendments to the Constitution through the 42nd Amendment, which the opposition parties criticized as a black law.

After this, the Marxists stopped criticizing the Constitution and started upholding the Constitution to prevent the erosion of democratic rights. This is because the defence of the Constitution became necessary to protect democratic rights.  

When elections were held in 1978, the Janata Party came to power. At that time, the Janata Party promised to repeal Section 42 and brought the 44th Amendment to pass it in Parliament. George Fernandes won from Muzaffarpur constituency while he was in jail.

promise

Indira Gandhi had undemocratically amended the Constitution through the 42nd Amendment. A case was filed against George Fernandes, who was released from prison and was about to take oath as a Member of Parliament, on the grounds that he had taken an oath to protect the Constitution between the lines of the 42nd Amendment to the Constitution. By the time the verdict was pronounced, he had become the Industries Minister in the Morarji Desai-led cabinet. All India Radio was ordered to produce an audio tape recording of the pledge ceremony. His head escaped prosecution because the partial tape on which he took the oath had worn out the area.

Legislators and MPs who take the oath must say that they will defend the Constitution of India. DMK general secretary Anbazhagan and 10 legislators were permanently expelled from the House by the Speaker for copying Part 17 of the Constitution and burning it in public during the 1986 agitation against the domination of Hindi. Part of the Constitution The reason given was that the burners were chased away for violating the pledge. The cases filed against it were also dismissed by the courts. But all these disqualifications were taken to court and the events that arose thereafter.

When the BJP won and came to power for the first time, they took up the Ram temple issue. Its leaders said that the courts could not solve all problems and began to criticize the constitution. Not only that, a review committee was set up under the chairmanship of retired Chief Justice Venkatachalaiah. Their real aim is to change this Constitution and achieve all their objectives. But their objectives were not fulfilled as they had to resign in a few months.

Due to many such incidents, the Constitution has been severely criticized from various quarters. So far, no legislator, parliamentarian or minister has been forced to resign because of those critical speeches. But today the Marxists have made a big mistake by sending the minister home after getting a wrong legal advice because the opposition raised their voice.

The Great Mistake

When Shaji asked Cherian to resign, the Marxists did not say that he was anti-party or against the party’s views. So far, no philosopher has said that just because one operates in a bourgeois democratic system, one must remain in power without criticising its constitution.

On the contrary, E.M.S. Namboodiripad, who was the Chief Minister of the 1967 Left Front government, commented on the courts at a press conference, “In this situation where the capitalist economy is at the forefront, the courts cannot go beyond that. They will also be pro-capitalist organisations,” he said, leading to a contempt of court case filed against him. The Supreme Court said that the Marxist philosopher EMS did not understand Marxism. The then party published an article in their English weekly ‘People’s Democracy’ strongly criticizing this verdict. On the contrary, no one took action against the columnist, Comrade Basavaponniah.

Similarly, no one has demanded any action against the speeches of many leaders of the BJP who are going on a fascist course today criticizing the Constitution at different times. In fact, many legal scholars have made worse comments than those made by Minister Shaji Cherian. If anyone felt that the minister’s remarks would not allow him to continue in office, he could have asked them to go to court and seek relief. If his views were against the party, he could have been given personal advice and asked to refrain from such speeches in future. This action is wrong.

This is a time when rulers are not only those who have anti-national views but also those convicted of serious corruption charges are rulers. That being the case, it is by no means acceptable to send home a minister who has not done anything wrong for his views. The Marxists have made a grave mistake by sending their party minister home to stop opposition campaigns.Please follow the ‘Arunchol’ WhatsApp channel to get our articles from time to time.

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K.Chandru

K. Chandru, former judge of the Madras High Court; Apart from being a vocal critic of society, he is a regular proponent of ideas for judicial reforms. ‘Order . . . He is the author of books including ‘Order!’, ‘Righteous, Believe!’