Preamble to a constitution is the window to what is there inside the constitution. The Constitution of India has also got a preamble. It is mentioned in the beginning of the Constitution, before the main part, i.e., the part I. If you read the Preamble, it gives you a glimpse about the philosophy and goals of Indian Constitution. It is a resolution which people of India have passed themselves for their overall development. It is not given to them by any other source than the people themselves.
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It is interesting to note that Preamble to Indian Constitution was written towards the end of the session of Constituent Assembly debate – i.e. in October 1949. The first meeting of the Constituent Assembly took place on 6 December 1946 and ended on 26 November 1949 with the adoption of the Constitution of India which commenced on 26 January 1950.
BACKGROUND
Objectives Resolution
The text of aims and objectives which were to be discussed in the Constituent Assembly first were prepared by Jawaharlal Nehru in the form of Objectives Resolution. In the Constituent Assembly, it was presented by Jawaharlal Nehru and seconded by Purushottam Das Tandon.
After the discussion in the Constituent Assembly, most of provisions of Objectives Resolution were accepted as Preamble.
The purpose of the Objectives Resolution was to give some indications to the Constituent Assembly as to what its members were supposed to do, what they sought to achieve, and where they were going. Objectives Resolution meant to lay certain ground on which structure of the Constitution could be built after the debates and deliberations in the Constituent Assembly.
Objective Resolutions were “in the nature of pledge” which the people of India through Constituent Assembly took for their fulfilment in future. The Resolution laid down certain “Fundamentals” for future constitution of India. And the most important was that Indians would have “Sovereign Indian Republic”.
Indeed, it was the first time that as a “Fundamental” for Indian political structure the concept “republic” was used in the Constituent Assembly in Objectives Resolution. When Objectives Resolution was laid in the Constituent Assembly, the representatives of the States were not present, and those of the Muslim League had boycotted it. But Nehru emphasized that despite their absence, the “republic” shall include all of India.
Significance of Objectives Resolution
In Jawaharlal Nehru’s words the purpose of the Resolution was to “send out a message to show what we have resolved to attempt to do”.
And after deliberations for around three years the Constituent Assembly succeeded in forming a Constitution, which commenced on January 26, 1950. After having designed the Constitution, the Constituent Assembly drafted Preamble.
Objectives Resolution did not mention the word “democratic”. About this, Jawaharlal Nehru opined that the word “republic” mentioned in Objectives Resolution implies democracy. He also clarified that the Objectives Resolution had not only “content of democracy” but also “content of economic democracy”.
Nehru also felt that there may be objection that the Resolution did not mention attainment of “a Socialist State” among the objectives of the Resolution. To this, he responded that India would move towards “Socialist State”, and what form of Socialism would develop would depend on the nature of deliberations.
The Objectives Resolution was going to be the part of the Constitution that the Assembly was expected to make. This was not binding on the members of the Constituent Assembly. They had “perfect freedom” to draw up the Constitution. The Resolution only laid down “certain fundamentals”.
PREAMBLE: THE TEXT
WE, THE PEOPLE OF INDIA, having solemnly resolved to constitute India into a SOVEREIGN SOCIALIST SECULAR DEMOCRATIC REPUBLIC and to secure to all its citizens
JUSTICE, social, economic and political;
LIBERTY of thought, expression, belief, faith and worship;
EQUALITYof status and of opportunity; and to promote among them all
FRATERNITY assuring the dignity of the individual and the unity and integrity of the Nation; IN OUR CONSTITUENT ASSEMBLY this 26th day of November ,1949, do
HEREBY ADOPT, ENACT AND GIVE TO OURSELVES THIS CONSTITUTION.
The members who prominently participated in the debate on Preamble were: Maulana Hasrat Mohani, K.M. Munshi, H.V. Kamath, Purnima Banerj, Rohini Kumar Chaudhuri and Prof. Shibban Lal Saksena. The Constituent Assembly discussed various aspect of the Preamble.
Maulana Hasrat Mohani wanted the words “We, the people of India, having solemnly resolved to constitute India into a sovereign socialist secular democratic republic” with “We, the people of India, having solemnly resolved to constitute India into a sovereign federal republic” or “We, the people of India, having solemnly resolved to constitute India into a sovereign independent republic” or “We, the people of India, having solemnly resolved to constitute India into a Union of Indian Socialist Republic (U.I.S.R)”.
H.V. Kamath wanted “having solemnly resoled” to be replaced with “in the name of God”, while Rohini Kumar Chaudhury wanted these words to be replaced with “in the name of Goddess”. These amendments/suggestions were rejected in the Constituent Assembly.The preamble was added to the Constitution after discussion on its various aspects. Towards the end of the debate with “the Preamble question” of President Rajendra Prasad “That the Preamble stand Part of the Constitution” placed Preamble for vote.
The question was often raised if the Preamble is part of the Constitution or not. Two cases gave contradictory reply to this question:
One, Berubari case (1966), it ruled that the Preamble to Constitution is not part of the Constitution.
Two, Kesavananda Bharati case (1973), reversing the verdict of the Berubari case, the Kesavananda Bharati case ruled that the Preamble is Part of the Constitution. The Kesavananda Bharati case (1973) held that Preamble is part of the Constitution. It reversed the decision of Berubari case (1966).
It also suggested that Parliament can amend any part of the Constitution provided it did not violate the basic structure of the Constitution.
According to Article 368, the Parliament amended the Constitution (42nd Constitutional Amendment) and inserted “Secular”, “Socialist “, and “and Integrity” in the Preamble of the Constitution.
The Supreme Court in Bommai case (1994) which was specifically about the President’s power to dismiss government and dissolve legislature (according to Article 356) also dealt with secularism. It held that inter alia Preamble along with the Articles about religious freedom (25-30) are part of the basic structure of the Constitution.
The verdict mentioned: “We do not know how the Constitution can be amended so as to remove secularism from the basic structure of the Constitution. Nor do we know that the Constitution does not provide such a course – that it does not provide for its own demise”
In the debate on Objectives Resolution, the original source of Preamble, Nehru had said that it was not going to be part of Constitution. But, as mentioned earlier, before placing the draft Preamble for voting in the Constituent Assembly, President of the constituent Assembly, Dr. Rajendra Prasad, raised question “That the Preamble stand Part of the Constitution”. The Kesavananda Bharati settled this question, and since then the Preamble is part of the Constitution.
In 1995, in the LIC of India case also the Supreme Court confirmed that Preamble is part of the Constitution.
“Socialism”, “Secularism” and “and Integrity”in Preamble
Initial version of the Preamble did not have “Secularism”,”Socialism” and “and Integrity”. The constitution makers did not feel the need to include “Secularism” and “Socialism” in the Constitution because various provisions of the Constitution imply that Indian Constitution was secular document and can attain socialism. These concepts were inserted in the Constitution in accordance with the 42nd Constitutional Amendment in 1976.
CONCLUSION
Preamble of Indian Constitution provides a glimpse into the philosophy and goals of the Constitution. It is a resolution of Indian people to establish a sovereign, socialist, secular and democratic republic. In this republic, people will have justice – social, economic and political; liberty of thought, expression, belief, faith and worship; and equality of status and opportunity; this will promote fraternity among them and assure the dignity of the individual and the unity and integrity of the Nation.
The preamble was written after the Constituent Assembly had written the whole constitution. It emerged from the Objectives Resolution which was introduced by Jawaharlal Nehru on the fifth day of the inaugural session of the Constituent Assembly debates.
It was seconded by Purushottam Das Tandon. The Objectives Resolution was a pledge of the people which they had taken through their representatives in the Constituent Assembly to give themselves a Constitution. And they had fulfilled the pledge by having written the Constitution of India.
The Objectives Resolution was not part of the Constitution, but the Preamble is. It became part of the Constitution after the Kesavanand Bharati judgement of 1973. Before that Berubari judgement in 1966 stated that Preamble was not part of the Constitution.
The Kesavanand Bharati judgement reversed the Berubari judgement and established that the Preamble is part of the Constitution. The original Preamble did not mention “Secularism”, “Socialism”, and “and Integrity”. They were inserted in it through the 42nd Constitutional Amendment. The Bommai case (1994) ruled that secularism in the Preamble was part of basic structure of the Constitution.
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On March 31, the World Economic Forum (WEF) released its annual Gender Gap Report 2021. The Global Gender Gap report is an annual report released by the WEF. The gender gap is the difference between women and men as reflected in social, political, intellectual, cultural, or economic attainments or attitudes. The gap between men and women across health, education, politics, and economics widened for the first time since records began in 2006.
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The Global gender gap index aims to measure this gap in four key areas : health, education, economics, and politics. It surveys economies to measure gender disparity by collating and analyzing data that fall under four indices : economic participation and opportunity, educational attainment, health and survival, and political empowerment.
The 2021 Global Gender Gap Index benchmarks 156 countries on their progress towards gender parity. The index aims to serve as a compass to track progress on relative gaps between women and men in health, education, economy, and politics.
Although no country has achieved full gender parity, the top two countries (Iceland and Finland) have closed at least 85% of their gap, and the remaining seven countries (Lithuania, Namibia, New Zealand, Norway, Sweden, Rwanda, and Ireland) have closed at least 80% of their gap. Geographically, the global top 10 continues to be dominated by Nordic countries, with —Iceland, Norway, Finland, and Sweden—in the top five.
The top 10 is completed by one country from Asia Pacific (New Zealand 4th), two Sub-Saharan countries (Namibia, 6th and Rwanda, 7th, one country from Eastern Europe (the new entrant to the top 10, Lithuania, 8th), and another two Western European countries (Ireland, 9th, and Switzerland, 10th, another country in the top-10 for the first time).There is a relatively equitable distribution of available income, resources, and opportunities for men and women in these countries. The tremendous gender gaps are identified primarily in the Middle East, Africa, and South Asia.
Here, we can discuss the overall global gender gap scores across the index’s four main components : Economic Participation and Opportunity, Educational Attainment, Health and Survival, and Political Empowerment.
The indicators of the four main components are
(1) Economic Participation and Opportunity:
o Labour force participation rate,
o wage equality for similar work,
o estimated earned income,
o Legislators, senior officials, and managers,
o Professional and technical workers.
(2) Educational Attainment:
o Literacy rate (%)
o Enrollment in primary education (%)
o Enrollment in secondary education (%)
o Enrollment in tertiary education (%).
(3) Health and Survival:
o Sex ratio at birth (%)
o Healthy life expectancy (years).
(4) Political Empowerment:
o Women in Parliament (%)
o Women in Ministerial positions (%)
o Years with a female head of State (last 50 years)
o The share of tenure years.
The objective is to shed light on which factors are driving the overall average decline in the global gender gap score. The analysis results show that this year’s decline is mainly caused by a reversal in performance on the Political Empowerment gap.
Global Trends and Outcomes:
– Globally, this year, i.e., 2021, the average distance completed to gender parity gap is 68% (This means that the remaining gender gap to close stands at 32%) a step back compared to 2020 (-0.6 percentage points). These figures are mainly driven by a decline in the performance of large countries. On its current trajectory, it will now take 135.6 years to close the gender gap worldwide.
– The gender gap in Political Empowerment remains the largest of the four gaps tracked, with only 22% closed to date, having further widened since the 2020 edition of the report by 2.4 percentage points. Across the 156 countries covered by the index, women represent only 26.1% of some 35,500 Parliament seats and 22.6% of over 3,400 Ministers worldwide. In 81 countries, there has never been a woman head of State as of January 15, 2021. At the current rate of progress, the World Economic Forum estimates that it will take 145.5 years to attain gender parity in politics.
– The gender gap in Economic Participation and Opportunity remains the second-largest of the four key gaps tracked by the index. According to this year’s index results, 58% of this gap has been closed so far. The gap has seen marginal improvement since the 2020 edition of the report, and as a result, we estimate that it will take another 267.6 years to close.
– Gender gaps in Educational Attainment and Health and Survival are nearly closed. In Educational Attainment, 95% of this gender gap has been closed globally, with 37 countries already attaining gender parity. However, the ‘last mile’ of progress is proceeding slowly. The index estimates that it will take another 14.2 years to close this gap on its current trajectory completely.
In Health and Survival, 96% of this gender gap has been closed, registering a marginal decline since last year (not due to COVID-19), and the time to close this gap remains undefined. For both education and health, while progress is higher than economy and politics in the global data, there are important future implications of disruptions due to the pandemic and continued variations in quality across income, geography, race, and ethnicity.
India-Specific Findings:
India had slipped 28 spots to rank 140 out of the 156 countries covered. The pandemic causing a disproportionate impact on women jeopardizes rolling back the little progress made in the last decades-forcing more women to drop off the workforce and leaving them vulnerable to domestic violence.
India’s poor performance on the Global Gender Gap report card hints at a serious wake-up call and learning lessons from the Nordic region for the Government and policy makers.
Within the 156 countries covered, women hold only 26 percent of Parliamentary seats and 22 percent of Ministerial positions. India, in some ways, reflects this widening gap, where the number of Ministers declined from 23.1 percent in 2019 to 9.1 percent in 2021. The number of women in Parliament stands low at 14.4 percent. In India, the gender gap has widened to 62.5 %, down from 66.8% the previous year.
It is mainly due to women’s inadequate representation in politics, technical and leadership roles, a decrease in women’s labor force participation rate, poor healthcare, lagging female to male literacy ratio, and income inequality.
The gap is the widest on the political empowerment dimension, with economic participation and opportunity being next in line. However, the gap on educational attainment and health and survival has been practically bridged.
India is the third-worst performer among South Asian countries, with Pakistan and Afghanistan trailing and Bangladesh being at the top. The report states that the country fared the worst in political empowerment, regressing from 23.9% to 9.1%.
Its ranking on the health and survival dimension is among the five worst performers. The economic participation and opportunity gap saw a decline of 3% compared to 2020, while India’s educational attainment front is in the 114th position.
India has deteriorated to 51st place from 18th place in 2020 on political empowerment. Still, it has slipped to 155th position from 150th position in 2020 on health and survival, 151st place in economic participation and opportunity from 149th place, and 114th place for educational attainment from 112th.
In 2020 reports, among the 153 countries studied, India is the only country where the economic gender gap of 64.6% is larger than the political gender gap of 58.9%. In 2021 report, among the 156 countries, the economic gender gap of India is 67.4%, 3.8% gender gap in education, 6.3% gap in health and survival, and 72.4% gender gap in political empowerment. In health and survival, the gender gap of the sex ratio at birth is above 9.1%, and healthy life expectancy is almost the same.
Discrimination against women has also been reflected in Health and Survival subindex statistics. With 93.7% of this gap closed to date, India ranks among the bottom five countries in this subindex. The wide sex ratio at birth gaps is due to the high incidence of gender-based sex-selective practices. Besides, more than one in four women has faced intimate violence in her lifetime.The gender gap in the literacy rate is above 20.1%.
Yet, gender gaps persist in literacy : one-third of women are illiterate (34.2%) than 17.6% of men. In political empowerment, globally, women in Parliament is at 128th position and gender gap of 83.2%, and 90% gap in a Ministerial position. The gap in wages equality for similar work is above 51.8%. On health and survival, four large countries Pakistan, India, Vietnam, and China, fare poorly, with millions of women there not getting the same access to health as men.
The pandemic has only slowed down in its tracks the progress India was making towards achieving gender parity. The country urgently needs to focus on “health and survival,” which points towards a skewed sex ratio because of the high incidence of gender-based sex-selective practices and women’s economic participation. Women’s labour force participation rate and the share of women in technical roles declined in 2020, reducing the estimated earned income of women, one-fifth of men.
Learning from the Nordic region, noteworthy participation of women in politics, institutions, and public life is the catalyst for transformational change. Women need to be equal participants in the labour force to pioneer the societal changes the world needs in this integral period of transition.
Every effort must be directed towards achieving gender parallelism by facilitating women in leadership and decision-making positions. Social protection programmes should be gender-responsive and account for the differential needs of women and girls. Research and scientific literature also provide unequivocal evidence that countries led by women are dealing with the pandemic more effectively than many others.
Gendered inequality, thereby, is a global concern. India should focus on targeted policies and earmarked public and private investments in care and equalized access. Women are not ready to wait for another century for equality. It’s time India accelerates its efforts and fight for an inclusive, equal, global recovery.
India will not fully develop unless both women and men are equally supported to reach their full potential. There are risks, violations, and vulnerabilities women face just because they are women. Most of these risks are directly linked to women’s economic, political, social, and cultural disadvantages in their daily lives. It becomes acute during crises and disasters.
With the prevalence of gender discrimination, and social norms and practices, women become exposed to the possibility of child marriage, teenage pregnancy, child domestic work, poor education and health, sexual abuse, exploitation, and violence. Many of these manifestations will not change unless women are valued more.
[wptelegram-join-channel link=”https://t.me/s/upsctree” text=”Join @upsctree on Telegram”]2021 WEF Global Gender Gap report, which confirmed its 2016 finding of a decline in worldwide progress towards gender parity.
Over 2.8 billion women are legally restricted from having the same choice of jobs as men. As many as 104 countries still have laws preventing women from working in specific jobs, 59 countries have no laws on sexual harassment in the workplace, and it is astonishing that a handful of countries still allow husbands to legally stop their wives from working.
Globally, women’s participation in the labour force is estimated at 63% (as against 94% of men who participate), but India’s is at a dismal 25% or so currently. Most women are in informal and vulnerable employment—domestic help, agriculture, etc—and are always paid less than men.
Recent reports from Assam suggest that women workers in plantations are paid much less than men and never promoted to supervisory roles. The gender wage gap is about 24% globally, and women have lost far more jobs than men during lockdowns.
The problem of gender disparity is compounded by hurdles put up by governments, society and businesses: unequal access to social security schemes, banking services, education, digital services and so on, even as a glass ceiling has kept leadership roles out of women’s reach.
Yes, many governments and businesses had been working on parity before the pandemic struck. But the global gender gap, defined by differences reflected in the social, political, intellectual, cultural and economic attainments or attitudes of men and women, will not narrow in the near future without all major stakeholders working together on a clear agenda—that of economic growth by inclusion.
The WEF report estimates 135 years to close the gap at our current rate of progress based on four pillars: educational attainment, health, economic participation and political empowerment.
India has slipped from rank 112 to 140 in a single year, confirming how hard women were hit by the pandemic. Pakistan and Afghanistan are the only two Asian countries that fared worse.
Here are a few things we must do:
One, frame policies for equal-opportunity employment. Use technology and artificial intelligence to eliminate biases of gender, caste, etc, and select candidates at all levels on merit. Numerous surveys indicate that women in general have a better chance of landing jobs if their gender is not known to recruiters.
Two, foster a culture of gender sensitivity. Take a review of current policies and move from gender-neutral to gender-sensitive. Encourage and insist on diversity and inclusion at all levels, and promote more women internally to leadership roles. Demolish silos to let women grab potential opportunities in hitherto male-dominant roles. Work-from-home has taught us how efficiently women can manage flex-timings and productivity.
Three, deploy corporate social responsibility (CSR) funds for the education and skilling of women and girls at the bottom of the pyramid. CSR allocations to toilet building, the PM-Cares fund and firms’ own trusts could be re-channelled for this.
Four, get more women into research and development (R&D) roles. A study of over 4,000 companies found that more women in R&D jobs resulted in radical innovation. It appears women score far higher than men in championing change. If you seek growth from affordable products and services for low-income groups, women often have the best ideas.
Five, break barriers to allow progress. Cultural and structural issues must be fixed. Unconscious biases and discrimination are rampant even in highly-esteemed organizations. Establish fair and transparent human resource policies.
Six, get involved in local communities to engage them. As Michael Porter said, it is not possible for businesses to sustain long-term shareholder value without ensuring the welfare of the communities they exist in. It is in the best interest of enterprises to engage with local communities to understand and work towards lowering cultural and other barriers in society. It will also help connect with potential customers, employees and special interest groups driving the gender-equity agenda and achieve better diversity.