Right in the Indian constitution

The Importance of Right

In 1982 during the construction work for Asian Games the government engaged a few contractor .
These workers were kept in poor working condition and were paid less than the minimum wage decided by the government
A team of social scientists studied their poor condition and petitioned the Supreme Court.
They argued that employing a person to work for less than the minimum prescribed wage amount to begar or forced labour, which is a violation of the fundamental right against exploitation.
Machal lalung was 23 when he was arrested.
Chuburi village of Morigaon district of Assam, Machal was charged of causing grievous injuries .
Machal was treated successful and doctors wrote twice to jail authorities in 1967 and 1996 that he was fit to stand trial.
Machal Lalung remained in " judicial custody. "
Machal lalung was released in July 2005. He was 77 then.
He spent 54 years under custody during which his case never came up for hearing.
Machal's entire life was wasted because a proper trial against him never took place .

Bill of rights

A democracy must ensure that individuals have certain right and that the government will always recognize these rights
A bill of rights prohibits government from thus acting the right of the individuals and ensures a remedy in case there is violation of these rights.
The right of a person may be threatened by another person or private organisation.
The organs of the government, in the course of their functioning , may violate the right of the person.

Fundamental Rights in the Indian constitution

The Motilal Nehru committee had demanded a bill of rights as far back as in 1928.
The constitution listed the right that would be specially protected and called them 'fundamental rights '.
The word fundamental suggest that these rights are so important that the constitution has separately listed them and made special provision for their protection.
The fundamental right are so important that the constitution itself ensure that they are not violated by the government.
Fundamental rights are protected and guaranteed by the constitution of the country.
Fundamental Rights are not absolute on unlimited rights.
Government can put reasonable restriction on the exercise of our fundamental rights.

Right to Equality

Right to equality tries to do away with such and other discrimination.
It provides for equal access to public places like shop, hotel , places of entertainment , wells , bathing ghats and places of worship .
There cannot be any discrimination in this access on the grounds only of religion , race , caste sex ,ar place of birth .
This right is very important because our society did not practice equal access in the past .
The practice of untouchability is one of the crudest manifestations of inequality .

The preamble mentions two things about equality :

Equality of status
Equality of opportunity

Equality of opportunity means that all sections of the society enjoy equal opportunities.
The constitution clarifies that the government implement special schemes and measures for improving the conditions of certain section of society : children , women ,and the socially and educationally backward classes .

Right to freedom

Equality and freedom or liberty , are to rights that are most essential to a democracy .
Liberty means freedom of thought , expression and action .

Right to life and personal liberty

The foremost right among rights to freedom is the right to life and personal liberty.
No citizens can be denied his or her life except by procedure as laid down under the law.
If arrested, the person has the right to defend himself by a lawyer of is choice.
It is mandatory for the police to take that person to the nearest magistrate within 24 hours.
The Supreme Court has ruled that this right also includes right to live with humans dignity, free from exploitation .
The court has held that right to shelter and livelihood is also included in the right to life because no person can live without the means of living, that is ,the means of livelihood .

Preventive detention

Ordinarily , a person would be arrested after he or she has reportedly committed some offence .
A person can be arrested simply out of an apprehension that he or she is likely to engage in unlawful activity and Imprisoned for some time without following the above mentioned procedure. This is known as preventive detention .
This preventive detention can be extended only for three months.
After three months such a case is brought before an advisory board for review.

Other freedom

Right to freedom of speech and expression is subject to restrictions such as public order, peace and morality etc.
Freedom to assemble too is to be exercised peacefully and without arms.
The government may impose restrictions in certain areas declaring the assembly of five or more person as unlawful.
In the constituent assembly itself, some members had expressed their dissatisfaction about restrictions on right.

Right of accused

Our constitution ensures that person accused of various offences would also get sufficient protection.

To ensure a fair trial in courts the constitution has provided three rights :

No person would be punished for the same offence more than once,
No law shall declare any action as illegal from a backdate, and
No person shall be asked to give evidence against himself or herself.

Right against exploitation

In our country There are millions of people who are underprivileged and deprived .
One such form of exploitation in our country has been begar or forced labour without payment
Another closely related from of exploitation is buying and selling of human being and using them as slaves
Both of these are prohibited under the constitution
The constitution also for B employment of children below the age of 14 year in dangerous job like factories and mine
Child labour being made illegal and right to education becoming a fundamental right for children, this right against exploitation has become more meaningful.

Right to freedom of religion

According to our constitution ,everyone enjoys the right to follow the religion of his or her choice
This freedom is considered as a Hallmark of democracy.
Persons following a religion different from that of the ruler were either persecuted or forced to convert to the official religion of the rulers

Freedom of faith and worshiph

In India, everyone is free to choice a religion and practice that religion.
Freedom of religion also include the freedom of conscience.
Freedom of religion include the freedom to Profess, follow and propagate and religion.
Freedom of religion is subject to certain limitation.
The government can impose restrictions on the practice of freedom of religion in order to protect public order, morality and health.
The government can interfere in release really matters for rooting out certain special Evils.
The limitations on the right to freedom of religion always produce tension between followers of various religion and the government.
The constitution has guaranteed right to propagate one's religion.

Equality of all religions

Being a country which is home to several religion ,it is necessary that the government must extend equal treatment to different religion.
India does not have any official religion.
The Institutions run by the state will not preach any religion or give release education or will they favour person of any religion.
The objective of these provisions is to sustain and nurture the principle of secularism.

Cultural and educational rights

India has not made up of Monolithic society. We are a society that has a vast diversity.
In such a society that is full of diversity ,,there would be social sections which are small in numbers compared to some other groups.
Our constitution believes that diversity is our strength therefore, one of the fundamental right is the right of the minorities to maintain their culture.
Linguistic and cultural minorities are also included in this provision.
Minorities are group that have common language or religion and in a particular part of the country or in the country as a whole they are out numbered by some other social section.
All minorities,religious linguistic comic can set up their own educational institutions.

Right to constitutional remedies

One would agree that our constitution contains a very impressive list of fundamental rights.
Right to constitutional remedies ise is the means through which this is to be achieved.
Dr Ambedkar considered the right to constitutional remedies as heart and soul of the constitution.
The supreme court and high the high court's can issue order and give directive to the government for the enforcement of rights.

The courts can issue various special order known as writs.

1 . Janessa corpus

Width of heaviest Corpus mean that the court orders that the arrest person should be presented before it.
It can also order to set free and arrested person if the manner or Grounds of arrest are not lawful for satisfactory.

2 . Mandamus:

This Writ is issued when the court finds that a particular office holder is not doing legal duty and thereby is infringing on the right of an individual.

3 . Prohibition:

This writ is issued by a Higher Court when a lower Court has considered a case going beyond its jurisdiction.

4 . Quo warranto :

If the court finds that a person is holding office but is not entitled to hold the office, it issues the width of quo and restrict that person from acting as an office holder.

5 . Ceriorari:

Under this writ the court order a Lower court or another authority to transfer a matter pending before it to the higher authority or Court.

Descriptive Principles of State Policy

The maker of our constitution knew that independent India was going to face many challenges.
The constitution did not want physical payments to be bound by certain policy decisions.

What do the district principal contain?

The chapter on Directive principles lists mainly three things:

The goals and objectives that we as a society should adopt;
Certain rights that individuals should enjoy apart from the Fundamental Rights ;
Certain policies that the government should adopt.

Directive Principles include the right to education , formation of panchayati raj institutions all over the country , partial right to work under employment guarantee programme and the mid - day meal scheme etc.

Relationship Between Fundamental Rights and Directive Principles

Fundamental Rights restrain the government from doing certain things while Directive Principles exhort the govrnment to do certain things .
Fundamental Rights mainly protect the rights of individuals while directive priniciples ensure the well - being of the entire society .
The executive and the Judiciary took different positions .
The government claimed that rights can be abridged for giving effect to Directive Principles .
The court held the view that Fundamental Rights were so important and sacred that they cannot be limited even for purposes of implementing Directive Principles .
The government was saying that Parliament can amend any part of the Constitution .
The court was saying that parliament cannot make an amendment that violated Fundamental Rights .

B.R.Foundation

Class -11 NCERT Political chapter - 2