Right Word | Constitution Day: How RSS played key role in defending Constitution of Bharat

November 26 is celebrated as Constitution Day every year as Bharat’s Constituent Assembly had adopted the Constitution of the Country on 26 November 1949. It came into force on 26 January 1950.

The Constitution of Bharat is a living document and it has faced several onslaughts in the past from communists and Congress while the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) has emerged as one of the key forces defending the Constitution.

The first onslaught on our Constitution came when the first Prime Minister of independent Bharat Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru pushed for the first Amendment in the Constitution even though he was heading an interim government and the first general elections were yet to be held.

The first Amendment that restricted freedom of expression was an outcome of the Nehru government’s intent to clamp down on voices critical of the government. The immediate trigger for restricting freedom of expression by Nehru was primarily the battle between him and Organiser, an English weekly backed by Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS). Nehru had imposed pre-censorship on Organiser as its reports were critical of his government’s handling of the partition and the exodus of Hindu refugees from east Pakistan. The Organiser went to the Supreme Court and got the order quashed. Nehru responded by restricting the freedom of expression by amending the Constitution of Bharat.

The Nehru vs Organiser case is known in constitutional history as Brij Bhushan vs The State of Delhi. The case ignited a nationwide debate. A large number of prominent personalities became wary of the Nehru government’s onslaught on the Constitution.

The then Chief Justice of the Bombay High Court, Justice MC Chagla, castigated the Nehru government in a public lecture at Pune on 1 May as he said, “The Constitution had not left it to the party in power in the legislature or the caprice of the executive to limit, control or impair any fundamental rights… The right to express opinion, however critical it might be of the government or society as constituted, was one of the most fundamental rights of the individual in a democratic form of government.”

PR Das, brother of Congress stalwart CR Das, who also happened to be a prominent jurist and former judge of Patna High Court and remarked, “The danger, which I apprehend is that the government may suppress all political parties that do not believe in the Congress government on the plea that the interests of the public order demand that these parties should be suppressed.”

Kailash Nath Katju, another prominent jurist and Governor of Bengal at that time, warned, “We must take care that in the name of preservation of state and stopping of subversive activities, we may not stifle democracy itself.”

During the parliamentary debate on first amendment, the leader of Opposition Syama Prasad Mookerjee brilliantly exposed this attack on Constitution as he told Nehru, “You can pass a law and say that the entire task of framing, interpreting and working the Constitution will be left in the hands of Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru, assisted by such people, whom he may desire to consult…You are treating this Constitution as a scrap of paper.” Mookerjee was the founder of Bharatiya Jana Sangh (BJS), a political outfit that drew inspiration and many key workers from the RSS. BJS was a predecessor of Bharatiya Janata Party and along with RSS was on the forefront to oppose another attack on the Constitution in 1975.

Emergency: Constitution under threat

Congress leader and Prime Minister Indira Gandhi imposed internal Emergency in India at midnight on 25-26 June 1975.This was the most serious threat to Bharatiya Constitution since independence. She not only suspended all civil liberties but made a mockery of the Constitution by altering even its Preamble through 42nd amendment.

This amendment was passed by Parliament that was devoid of any Opposition as all the leaders had been sent to jail by the Indira government! This amendment added the words ‘Socialist’ and ‘Secular’ in the Preamble. This was like tampering the soul of the Constitution and the most undemocratic move in the history of independent Bharat.

However, had it not been for the RSS that led from the front the movement to restore constitutional norms and democracy in Bharat, the onslaughts on Constitution by the Congress government would have continued unabated.

It is important to note what the foreign press said about the role of the RSS in the anti-Emergency movement as the Bharatiya press had largely been reeling under the strict censorship imposed by the government during Emergency.

The Economist, published an article titled Yes there is an Underground on 24 January 1976 where it explained the ground situation in Bharat during Emergency, “In formal terms, the underground is an alliance of four Opposition parties: The Jana Sangh (the RSS’ political wing), the socialist party, the breakaway fraction of the Congress party and the Lok Dal… But the shock troops of the movement come largely from the Jana Sangh and its band affiliate RSS, which claim a combined membership of 10m (of whom 80,000, including 6,000 full-time party workers, are in prison).”

Later The Economist wrote on 12 December 1976: “The underground campaign against Mrs Gandhi claims to be the only non-left wing revolutionary force in the world, disavowing both bloodshed and class struggle. The ground troops of this operation (the underground movement), consist of tens of thousands of cadres who are organized to the village level into four men cells. Most of them are RSS regulars, though more and more new young recruits are coming in. The other underground parties which started out as partners in the underground have effectively abandoned the field to Jan Sangh and RSS.”

Incidentally the communists and the Congress were hand in glove during the Emergency. UK based daily newspaper The Guardian exposed this nexus in an article dated 2 August 1976, titled The Empress Reigns Supreme: “Pro-CPI (Communist Party of India) journals in India are being given some latitude by the censors because the party is in favour of even stronger measures to suppress the non-communist opposition.”

The New York Times published a report on 28 October 1976 where it clearly said, “The only political parties which are supporting Congress Party of the government in the actions that it is taking are the Communist Party of India, the pro-Moscow Communist party and the Moslem League.”

Violation of spirit of Constitution

Even after the Emergency, there have been repeated attempts by the Congress governments or Congress led governments to tamper with the soul and spirit of the Constitution.

To give a few examples: Legislation brought by Rajiv Gandhi government under the pressure of Muslim hardliners to upturn the judgement of Supreme Court in Shah Bano case; in 1988, perturbed over the reporting of Press on Bofors scandal, Rajiv Gandhi tried to bring draconian anti-defamation bill but it had to withdraw it due to a strong backlash from all sections of society; in 2014, the Congress led United Progressive Alliance(UPA) government tried to bring an anti-Hindu bill in the name of ‘Anti-Communal Violence’ bill. A strong opposition from the BJP and various sections of society compelled the UPA to drop this bill. This bill was drafted by a body called National Advisory Council (NAC), a body dominated by civil society representatives who were well known for their anti-Hindu and Leftist stance. The formation of this body was itself a violation of the spirit of the Constitution as it had become a power centre and significantly influenced the policy apparatus and decision making of the then UPA government. The then Congress President Sonia Gandhi was the chairperson of NAC.

Conclusion

There have been repeated attempts to violate the spirit of our Constitution in the past but organisations like the RSS have always come to the forefront to restore this spirit. The Narendra Modi government has also done well to restore, maintain and perpetuate the dignity of the Constitution by removing hundreds of archaic laws and through amendments in Article 370 that have corrected a long pending anomaly. As we move ahead in the Amrit Kaal, it is time to learn lessons from the past so that we can evolve our Constitution to suit the needs of the future while ensuring that the democracy in Bharat continues to thrive.

The writer, an author and columnist, has written several books. Views expressed are personal.

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