The Government of India is on a mission to decolonise the country. Edwin Lutyens and Herbert Baker’s grand Parliament building has just given way to Bimal Patel’s modern reinterpretation and the name “Bharat” is being used more frequently to describe the country, challenging the monopoly of “India”. So far, names and buildings are on the chopping block. But what about the Constitution? Should it change? If so, in what way? And following whose ideas?
Hind Swaraj
When we think of the Constitution of India, our mind may naturally go back to 1950 when it came into force. But constitutional ideas in India predated it. A startlingly original, indigenous account of what the Constitution would look like was presented by Mahatma Gandhi in 1908. Gandhi was steadfast in his view that without decolonising the Constitution, we may become independent but would not have swaraj. The English would be driven away and India would get itself a new democratic government, but the nature of government itself would not change. It would be “English rule without the Englishman”, “not Hindustan but Englistan”.
