50 years since Kesavananda Bharati case

April 25, 2023

Kesavananda Bharati case , in which the Supreme Court laid down the “basic structure” doctrine on the limits of Parliament’s power to amend the Constitution, completed 50 years recently .
Kesavananda Bharati case (1973) was involved several key legal issues, including:
- Constitutional Validity of Kerala Land Reforms Act which placed a limit on amount of land that a person could hold.
- Whether Parliament’s power to amend Constitution was unlimited.
- Doctrine of basic structure of Constitution.
SC, in its judgment, established doctrine of basic structure, which holds that certain fundamental features of Constitution cannot be amended or abrogated by Parliament through a constitutional amendment.
Features included -supremacy of Constitution, Judicial review, Parliamentary system, Rule of equality, rule of law, independence of judiciary etc.
Since then, SC has tested constitutional amendments against doctrine of basic structure in several cases including:
- Quota for OBC and Economically Weaker Section (EWS), reservations in promotions, where SC upheld constitutional amendments challenged on grounds of violation of basic structure doctrine.
- SC struck down The Constitution (Ninety-ninth Amendment) Act, 2014, which established National Judicial Appointments Commission (NJAC) on grounds that it threatened “judicial independence”, which the court ruled was a basic feature of the Constitution.
- Other important cases include: Kihoto Hollohan vs Zachillhu And Others (1992) (Tenth Schedule), Minerva Mills Case (1980), L Chandra Kumar v Union of India (1997) (regarding administrative tribunals) etc.