The year may be just a few weeks old, but it has already seen three moments that have flagged the significance of the Constitution in the life of the citizen. The first was the Supreme Court verdict of January 11, which ruled that the court can declare as null and void any law which is not compatible with the basic structure of the Constitution, including one under the Ninth Schedule. The second was the Tamil Nadu government call on January 20 to rewrite the Constitution to better reflect the aspirations of the marginalised; and the third, the 58th anniversary of constitutional rule which was celebrated on Friday.The first two developments frame the familiar tension between an intransigent judiciary and the legislature that has been in evidence since the republic came into being. While the Tamil Nadu’s demand appears as quixotic as the Brechtian exhortation to “elect a new people”, it does rather eloquently reflect the anxiety of the legislature on the prospect of confronting the judiciary. We do know for a fact that the immediate cause for the Tamil Nadu government’s umbrage is the possibility of the politically sensitive Tamil Nadu Act, 1993, providing for 69 per cent reservations — despite the apex court-ordered cap of 50 per cent — being declared as ultra vires of the Constitution. But if immediate fears lead to the inability on the part of our politicians to see the larger picture, we find ourselves in an extremely grey area indeed. The Emergency is an apt instance of how proximate fears of personal survival led Mrs Indira Gandhi to attempt an audacious undermining of the entire constitutional edifice. The judiciary, for its part, even as it remains the final interpreter of the Constitution, requires to be ever-conscious of the freedoms and autonomy of the legislature — reiterated felicitously in a recent Supreme Court judgement — which draws its authority directly from the people.The health of the republic is dependent on a fine balance between judiciary and legislature, even if this balance is occasionally recalibrated by court pronouncements and legislative action. Fifty-eight years of the existence of the republic testifies to the fact that this fine balance has been largely achieved. And precisely because of the overarching vision and wisdom of the Constitution.
