RSS journal quotes Ambedkar to question 'secular, socialist' in Constitution

RSS journal Organiser on Monday cited Dr BR Ambedkar's opposition to amendments suggesting insertion of words "secular, socialist" to the Constitution, and said late Prime Minister Indira Gandhi made these additions to secure her position after an adverse court ruling and to perpetrate the Gandhi family's dynastic rule.

Days after RSS general secretary Dattatreya Hosabale sought a review of the two words in the Preamble, Sangh mouthpiece Organiser today quoted key debates to say that the Constitution of Babasaheb Ambedkar did not feature the words secular and socialist.

Recalling the discussions on the draft Constitution, Organiser mentioned how while deliberating on the political formation of India ingrained in Article 1 of the Constitution, KT Shah, a member of the Assembly with socialist leaning moved one amendment to the Article.

This Amendment said: "India that is Bharat shall be a union of states. India shall be a secular, federal, socialist union of states."

Opposing this amendment, Dr Ambedkar, as revealed by Constituent Assembly debates, said, "I regret that I cannot accept the amendment of professor KT Shah. My objections are two. In the first place, the Constitution ...is merely a mechanism for the purpose of regulating the work of the various organs of the state. It is not a mechanism whereby particular members or particular parties are installed in office."

Ambedkar added, "What should be policy of the state, how society should be organised in its social and economic site are matters, which must be decided by the people themselves, according to time and circumstances. This cannot be laid down in the Constitution itself because that is destroying democracy altogether."

He argued that if you state in the Constitution that the social organisation of the state shall take a particular form, you are taking away the liberty of the people to decide what should be the social organisation in which they wish to live.

"It is perfectly possible today for the majority of people to hold that the socialist organisation of society is better than the capitalist organisation. But it would be perfectly possible for thinking people to devise some other form of social organisation which might be better than the social organisation of today or of tomorrow. I do not see why the Constitution should tie down the people to live in a particular form and not leave it to the people themselves to decide for themselves. This is one reason why the amendment should be opposed," Ambedkar said.

The RSS journal, defending the demands to review the two words, attacked regional parties such as the SP and RJD for standing with the Congress despite "emerging from the anti-Emergency struggles."

The mouthpiece also slammed Congress chief Mallikarjun Kharge's son Priyank Kharge for his recent claim that the Congress, if reelected, would ban the RSS. "Whenever the Congress had to strangulate the spirit of the Constitution, the RSS became its favourite target," the RSS said.