CIVIL SERVICES (PRELIMS) SPECIAL

Quick Revision Notes

on Indian Constitution
1. Idea for a Constituent
Assembly for drafting a constitution for India was first
provided by Bal Gangadhar
Tilak in 1895.
2. The elections for the
first Constituent Assembly
were held in July 1946. Initially it had 389 members,
but later the reformed
Assembly had 324 members.
3. The State of Hydrabad did not participate in
elections to the Constituent
Assembly.
4. The first meeting of
Constituent Assembly was
held on December 9, 1946
its president was Dr Sacchidanand Sinha.
5. The second meeting
was held on December 11,
1946. Its president was Dr
Rajendra Prasad.
6. The Objectives Resolution was passed under
chairmanship of J.L. Nehru.
7. The Draft of Indian
Constitution was presented
in October 1947. President of
the Drafting Committee was
Bhim Rao Ambedkar.
8. The Flag Committee
worked under J.B. Kripalani.
9. The total time consumed to prepare the draft
was 2 years, 11 months, 18
days. Total 11 meetings
were held for this.
10. The Indian Constitution was enacted on November 26, 1946 and put into
force on January 26, 1950.
11. The Constitution
today has 444 Articles and 12
schedules. Originally there
were 395 Articles and 8
schedules.

12. SOCIALIST, SECULAR, INTEGRITYthese

words were added to the
Preamble later, through the
42nd Amendment, 1976.
13. The Preamble contains aims and objectives of
our Constitution.
14. Fundament Rights
are contained in Part III
called Magna Carta of the
Constitution. The idea was
borrowed from USA. Initially there were 7 fundamental
rights, now there are only 6.
(The Right to Property was
deleted by the 44th amendment in 1978. It is now a
judicial rightit has been
moved to Article 300(A).)
15. The Supreme Court
judgement in Keshwanand
Bharti vs Kerala case provided that Fundamental Rights
can be altered by the Parliament as long as the basic
structure of the Constitution
remains intact.
16. The Minerva Mills
case ruling of the Supreme
Court, however, ruled that
Fundamental rights are basic
part of the Constitution. The
power to alter them was
snatched away.
17. Fundamental Right
of Equality provides for:
Equality in government jobs (Article 16).
No discriminations
(Article 15).
No untouchability
(Article 17).
Abolition of titles
(Article 18).
18. The important freedoms granted are:
Against exploitation

(Article 23).
Against child labour
(Article 24).
19. The Right to Constitutional Remedies is provided under Article 32. The
Constitution provides that
High Courts and the
Supreme Court can issue
various writs (written
orders) to safeguard freedom of an individual. There
are five types of writs:
Habeas Corpusmay I
have the bodyit orders to
present reasons as well as
physical presence of a body
in court, within 24 hours of
arrest.
Mandamusissued to
person, office or courtto
enforce dutiesalso called
Param Aadesh.
Prohibitionissued to
inferior courts, by superior
courtsit prohibits (stops)
action of acts outside their
jurisdiction.
Quo Warrantoit asks
how one has gained unauthorised office.
CertiorariHigher
Court takes over case from
lower courts.
Dr Ambedkar has called
this article as soul of the
Constitution.
20. Directive Principles
of State Policy act as guidelines or morals for the government. They are contained
in Part IV of the Constitution. They were borrowed
from Ireland. Some important directive principles are:
Gram
Panchayats
(Article 40).
Uniform civil code

559 ! JANUARY 2004 ! THE COMPETITION MASTER

(Article 44).
Free and compulsory
education (Article 45).
21. Fundamental duties
are contained in part IV(A).
There are ten fundamental
duties listed in the Constitution. This idea was borrowed
from Russia.
22. The Vice President is
the Chairman of the Rajya
Sabha. However, he is not a
member of any House.
23. If a member is found
sitting in another House of
Parliament, of which he is
not a member, he has to pay
a fine of Rs 5000.
24. Rajya Sabha has 250
members238 elected and
12 nominated by the President. Uttar Pradesh elects
maximum number of members for the Rajya Sabha (34),
followed by Bihar (22) and
Maharashtra (19).
25. In one year time, the
President must hold at least
two meetings of the Rajya
Sabha.
26. If a state of Emergency is declared, the Lok
Sabha is dissolved, but not
the Rajya Sabha (It is a permanent House).
27. Lok Sabha has 547
members545 elected and 2
nominated from the AngloIndian Community.
28. During a state of
emergency, the tenure of Lok
Sabha can be extended by a
maximum of one year.
29. Maximum number
of members of Lok Sabha are
elected from Uttar Pradesh
(80 members), followed by
Bihar (54) and Maharashtra

CIVIL SERVICES (PRELIMS) SPECIAL

(48).
30. Minimum age for
becoming member of Lok
Sabha is 25 years and Rajya
Sabha is 30 years. Minimum
age to be eligible for the post
of the President is 35 years.
31. The President is
elected by members of both
Houses of Parliament and
State Legislative Assemblies.
32. The Vice President is
elected by all members of the
Parliament.
33. To discuss an important topic, the normal procedure of the Parliament is
stopped under the Adjournment motion.
34. Decision about whether a Bill is a Money Bill or
not is taken by the Lok
Sabha Speaker.
35. The first High
Courts in India were established at Bombay, Calcutta,
and Madras, in 1862. Allahabad and Delhi were established next in 1866.
36. Maximum age to
remain a High Court judge is
62 years and maximum age
to remain a Supreme Court
judge is 65 years.
37. The process for
removal of Comptroller and
Auditor General of India is
same as that of judges of the
Supreme Court.
38. Attorney General is
the law expert to government. He can participate and
speak in both Houses of Parliament, but is not allowed to
vote.
39. The idea of having a
Lokpal to check corruption at
the highest level has been
borrowed from Ombudsman of Sweden. In the
States, we have the Lok Ayukta.
40. There are three types
of Emergencies that can be
proclaimed by the President.
Emergency under Article
352due to war or internal

rebellion.
(Implemented
three times (1962, 71, 75).)
Emergency under Article
356Constitutional problems. (Implemented many
times, in various States like
J&K, Punjab, etc.)
Emergency under Article
360Financial Emergency.
(Not implemented so far).
41. The Constitution initially recognised 14 National
Languages. Later, four more
were added. These were:
Sindhi (21st amendment),
Nepali,
Konkani
and
Manipuri (71st amendment).
42. To gain the status of
a National Party, a political
party must be recognised in
four or more States, attaining
at least 4% votes on national
scale and 9% in each State.
43. The flag of the Congress party was accepted as
the National Flag (with few
changes) on July 22, 1947.
44. The new Flag Code
of India gives freedom to
individuals to hoist the flag
on all days, but with due
respect to the flag.
45. The Question hour
in the Parliament is observed
from 11 am to 12 noon. The
Zero hour is observed from
12:00 noon to 1:00 pm.
46. Balwant Rai Mehta
Committee suggested a
three-tier structure for Panchayati RajGram Panchayat village level, Panchayat
Samiti at block level and Zila
Parishad in districts.
47. First Constitutional
Amendment1951put a
ban on propagating ideas to
harm friendly relations with
foreign countries.
48. Planning Commission is only an advisory and
specialist body. Its chairman
is the Prime Minister.
49. National Development Council is the main
body concerned with the
actual planning process. Its

chairman is also the Prime

Minister.
50. The first leader of
the Opposition was Ram
Subhag Singh, in 1969.
51. The shortest Lok
Sabha span was 13 days
(12th Lok Sabha in 1998).
52. Although the Parliament can pass impeachment
motion against judges, their
conduct cannot be discussed
by it.
53. There are at present
18 High Courts in India.
54. Article 370 gives
special status to Jammu &
Kashmir.
55. The Indian Constitution was the first of the
preceding two centuries
which was not imposed by
an imperial power, but was
made by the people themselves, through representatives in a Constituent
Assembly.
56. The Preamble of the
Indian Constitution is not
enforceable in a court of law.
It states the objects which
the Constitution seeks to
establish.
57. The Indian Constitution endows the Judiciary
with power of declaring a
law as unconstitutional if it
is beyond the competence of
the Legislature according to
the distribution of powers
provided by the Constitution, or if it is in contravention of the fundamental
rights or of any other
mandatory provision, e.g.
Articles 286, 299, 301 and
304.
58. As part of the integration of various Indian
States into the Dominion of
India a three-fold process of
integration, known as the
Patel Scheme, was implemented.
(i) 216 States were
merged into the respective
Provinces, geographically

560 ! JANUARY 2004 ! THE COMPETITION MASTER

contiguous to them. These

merged States were included
in the territories of the States
in Part B in the First Schedule of the Constitution. The
process of merger started
with the merger of Orissa
and Chattisgarh States with
the then province of Orissa,
on January 1, 1948. The last
instance was merger of
Cooch-Behar with West Bengal in January 1950.
(ii) 61 States were converted into Centrally-administered areas and included in
Part C of the First Schedule.
(iii) The third form was
consolidation of groups of
States into new viable units,
known as Union of States.
The first Union formed was
the Saurashtra Union on
February 15, 1948. The last
one was Union of Travancore-Cochin on July 1, 1949.
As many as 275 States were
integrated
into
five
UnionsMadhya Bharat,
Patiala and East Punjab
States Union, Rajasthan,
Saurashtra and TravancoreCochin. These were included
in Part B of the First Schedule. Besides, Hyderabad,
J&K and Mysore were also
included in Part B.
59. At the time of accession to the Dominion of
India, the States had acceded
only on three subjects
(Defence, Foreign Affairs
and Communications). Later, revised Instruments of
Accession were signed by
which all States acceded in
respect of all matters included in Union and Concurrent
Lists, except only those relating to taxation.
60. The process of integration culminated in the
Constitution (7th Amendment) Act, 1956, which abolished Part B States as a class
and included all the States in
Part A and B in one list.