‘Socialism’ in India means ‘social welfare state’: Supreme Court | India News – Times of India

NEW DELHI: The issue of legality of insertion of ‘socialism’ in the Preamble to the Constitution through the 42nd Amendment during the infamous state of emergency, which has been dormant for decades, will be decided on Monday. The Supreme Court on Friday reserved its injunction on petitions challenging the changes in the preamble to include “socialism” and “secularism” in 1976, even as it made clear that it had no intention of intervening, saying that ” socialism’ in the Indian context meant ‘social welfare state“.
Lawyer Vishnu Jain cited the recent judgment of a nine-judge SC bench in which the court had said that during the nascent years of the nation, the country had followed the mixed economy model, which gave way in the 1960s and 1970s for a socialist model. cartridge. “Since the decade of the 1990s, i.e. the liberalization years, there has been a shift towards pursuing policies of market-based reforms,” the report said.
Jain said the nine-judge bench had ruled against the imposition of a particular economic ideology, for example, socialism, and argued that since the preamble was also part of the basic structure of the Constitution, it was not inconsistent with the Constitution in 1976 could have been amended by Parliament. of the ruling of the thirteen judges on the ‘basic structure’ in the Kesavananda Bharati case. Similar arguments were advanced by Subramanian Swamy and proponents of Ashwini Upadhyay and Alakh A Srivastava.
However, a bench of Chief Justice Sanjiv Khanna and Justice Sanjay Kumar said: “As we understand it socialism in India is different from the way it is understood in other parts of the world.”
The CJI said: “In India, this means a welfare state. Despite the inclusion of the word “socialism” in the preamble of our Constitution, we have turned to privatization and benefited from it. But we have also focused on equal opportunities for everyone. So why would the court address the validity of the inclusion of ‘socialism’ in the preamble?”
The CJI-led bench said the 1976 constitutional amendment has not stopped the courts from striking down many legislations.
In favor of the amendment incorporating ‘socialism’ in the preamble, the bench said, “The power under 168 of the Constitution (to amend the Constitution) extends to amending the preamble, which is an essential part of the Constitution.” When arguments were raised that the preamble was also part of the basic structure, which could not have been changed, SC asked: “Who says the preamble is part of the basic structure?”