Ozasvi Amol & Fariya Sharaf, Amity University, Patna
Whatever the Constitution may or may not provide, the welfare of the country will depend upon the way in which the country is administered. That will depend upon the men who administer it.
- Dr B R Ambedkar
ABSTRACT
The present article holds constitutionalism as a feature or ideology towards nationhood. Constitutionalism must be distinguished from a similar term ‘constitution’. Narrowly, constitution is a way or road to political life whereas ‘constitutionalism is a normative political theory wherein the will of people, citizen, an elite or a party with an overwhelming majority has limited power’. In brief it imposes restrictions on the government. The constitution of a nation is like an organism which will grow and develop with the evolution in the society. Constitutionalism prohibits arbitrariness and preserves the basic freedom of the individual by maintaining their dignity in this way constitution must be permeated with the term constitutionalism by imposing some inbuilt restrictions. The Indian perspective of the term constitutionalism which makes it distinct is it’s self -consciously cosmopolitan character. At the core level constitutionalism signifies a politics of restraint. In order to understand the commitment to constitutionalism one has to be well versed with the idea of constitutional morality which acts as an agent to the constitution. Constitutionalism favours the view that a country can have the government which it deserves, therefore any incompetent authority will not be able to serve the subjects. The article begins with an introduction of constitutionalism and give detailed aspect of constitutionalism in India blended with case laws related to it. Further the article also addresses secularism, rule of law, democracy with respect to constitutionalism. The article ends on suggesting that how constitutionalism act as a changing paradigm in the present world and the various cases that depicts the fact of how our constitution works with an essence of constitutionalism attached to it.
