By S.N. Sahu
The statement by Dattatreya Hosabale, the general secretary of Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), that a decision must be made to remove the words “socialist” and “secular” from the preamble of the constitution after a debate constitutes an attack on the Indian constitution – something which RSS and BJP find difficult to accept.
They have expressed their intent, from time to time, to review it or change in toto. However, Hosabale advanced an absurd argument that it was during the Emergency period of 1975-1977, that the two words were added to the original preamble and that the Constitution drafted by Ambedkar on November 26, 1949, never contained those words.
Vice president Jagdeep Dhankar and Union ministers Shivraj Singh Chouhan and Jitender Singh have also joined the call for removal of the two words from the preamble.
Clearly, such a concerted move expresses their intent to assail the constitution which BJP and RSS has recurrently done.
What BJP’s constitution says
Article II of the BJP’s 2012 Constitution, dealing with its objective, states: “The Party shall bear true faith and allegiance to the Constitution of India as by law established and to the principles of socialism, secularism and democracy and would uphold the sovereignty, unity and integrity of India.”
So, it is rather strange that the RSS and BJP leaders, who accept the above provision, are demanding the removal of the words “secular” and “socialist” from the constitution.
Supreme Court’s validation of the words “secular” and “socialist”
On the eve of the 75th anniversary of the constitution on November 25, 2024, the Supreme Court bench comprising Chief Justice of India Sanjiv Khanna and justice P.V. Sanjay Kumar dismissed a batch of petitions challenging the inclusion of the words “socialist” and “secular” in the preamble and held that the addition of these terms could not be invalidated merely on the ground that the preamble in the original form did not contain them at the time of the adoption of the constitution.
This story was originally published in thewire.in. Read the full story here.
