The difference between a democracy and a dictatorship is that in a democracy you vote first and take orders later; in a dictatorship you don't have to waste your time voting.
Charles Bukowski
At the outset the first government of India gave an impression of being sincere in putting all its efforts to build the nation. But the very fact that it has curtailed the fundamental rights given in the constitution in the first year of India becoming a republic, brings out into the open, the real motive behind it's governance.
In one single amendment about 5 fundamental rights available to the citizen and guaranteed by the founding fathers of the constitution were damaged by Nehru's first government.
a) Right to equality
b) Right to freedom of speech
c) Right to occupation
d) Right to property
e) Right to judicial review
b) Right to freedom of speech
c) Right to occupation
d) Right to property
e) Right to judicial review
The motive is - to weaken the citizen.
Why does a leader wants to weaken his own people?
You might have thought that answer can be found again in the two cases that rattled Nehru, and prompted him to heed to his whims and send the law to the gallows.
Look at both the cases of crossroads of Romesh Thapar and organizer .
Organizer was banned for its cartoons and articles on the newly created state of Pakistan, which Nehru regarded as communal and inflammatory. In order to counter the bias argument, Crossroads was banned at the same time as Organizer, for its critical and defamatory views on congress party.
Now some details about Crossroads editor to clear the picture - Romesh Thapar. This man was a close relative of Nehru. After this ban, his new paper Seminar was given full support by the govt in the form of advertisements and allocation of prime property at a low rate by the then government in a special scheme that also included many magazines and newspapers.
It may be highly possible that the first amendment to constitution - to curtail freedom of speech was a planned affair and not just a reaction to the acts of those news papers.
Only ray of hope to save us from the effects of this blatant encroachment of the fundamental rights by the legislature, is the supreme court ruling in the Golak Nath case on February 27, 1967 that the Parliament has no power to abridge or take away the fundamental rights by amending the constitution under Article 368.
According to this ruling, parliament can still amend the fundamental rights, but the supreme court reserved the power to determine in each specific case whether the amendment in question, took away or abridged the rights contained in part III of the constitution, thus leaving the supreme court supreme so far as the fundamental rights are concerned.
to be continued...
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