Plea against insertions in 1976: Can Preamble be amended without altering date, asks SC

The last part of the Preamble states, “… In our constituent assembly, this twenty-sixth day of November, 1949, do hereby adopt, enact and give to ourselves this Constitution.”

The query came as a bench of Justices Sanjiv Khanna and Dipankar Datta took up a Public Interest Litigation (PIL) by BJP leader Subramanian Swamy questioning the legality of the insertion of the two words by way of the constitutional amendment in 1976.

The PIL contends that the Preamble comes with a specific date and, thus, could not be amended without discussion.

Raising the query, Justice Datta said he was not implying that the Preamble cannot be amended but told Swamy and the other counsel appearing in the matter that it must be considered, at an academic level, whether a Constitution which has a date mentioned can be changed without also altering the date.

“That’s precisely the question,” the counsel said.

Swamy pointed out that the two words were added during the Emergency imposed by the then government led by Prime Minister Indira Gandhi.

The court then fixed the matter for hearing next in the week commencing April 29.