Politics and Ethics of the Indian Constitution

This collection of essays analyzes the Indian Constitution as a political or an ethical document, from a political theory perspective, reflecting configurations of power and interest or articulating a moral vision. This study of the constitution provides a platform on which extensive political deliberations and arguments over procedural and substantive issues relating to Indian society can take place. The essays discuss ideas of equality, freedom, citizenship and property, minority rights, democracy and welfare as found in the Constitution. It also asks questions like: Does the Constitution recognize all moral rights possessed by the citizens? What importance does the Constitution accord to the rights that it recognizes? Is the section on duties consistent with the section on fundamental rights? If so, then why do tensions between rights and duties still exist? Is it because the Constitution prescribes duties over rights? Does the Constitution support liberty, equality, and fraternity in equal measure?

The contributors critically examine the potential, achievements, and limitations of the Indian Constitution. They further emphasize the need to examine whether or not a serious disjunction exists between the ideals as enshrined in the Constitution and their expression. The volume also aims to resuscitate political theory in India, evolve a form of political theory that is suitable in the Indian context, and to simultaneously open up Western political theory as it exists today.

• In-depth reading of the Indian Constitution
• Highlights contesting interpretations to different features of the Constitution
• Well-known contributors such as Bhikhu Parekh, Upendra Baxi, Pratap Bhanu Mehta, among others

Table of Contents

• Acknowledgements
• Introduction: Outline of a Political Theory of the Indian Constitution,?Rajeev Bhargava
• Section One:
• 1. The Constitution as a Statement of Indian Identity,?Bhikhu Parekh
• 2. Gandhi and the Constitution: Parliamentary Swaraj and Village Swaraj,?Thomas Pantham
• 3. Institutional Visions and Sociological Imaginations: The Debate on Panchayati Raj,?Peter Ronald deSouza
• 4. Outline of a 'Theory of Practice' of Indian Constitutionalism,?Upendra Baxi
• 5. A Text Without Author: Locating the Constituent Assembly as an Event,?Aditya Nigam
• Section Two:
• 6. The Indian State: Constitution and Beyond,?Suhas Palshikar
• 7. Citizenship and the Indian Constitution,?Valerian Rodrigues
• 8. Citizenship and the Passive Revolution: Interpreting the First Amendment,?Nivedita Menon
• 9. Democracy and Constitutionalism,?Sanjay Palshikar
• 10. Constitutional Justice: Positional and Cultural,?Gopal Guru
• Section Three:
• 11. Containing the Lower Castes: The Constitutent Assembly and the Reservation Policy,?Christophe Jaffrelot
• 12. Affirmative Action for Disadvantaged Groups: A Cross-constitutional Study of India and the US,?Ashok Acharya
• Section Four:
• 13. Religion and the Indian Constitution: Questions of Separation and Equality,?Gurpreet Mahajan
• 14. Passion and Constraint: Courts and the Regulation of Religious Meaning,?Pratap Bhanu Mehta
• 15. Rights versus Representation: Defending Minority Interests in the Constituent Assembly,?Shefali Jha
• 16. Minority Representation and the Making of the Indian Constitution,?Rochana Bajpai
• Notes on Contributors
• Index