CDS (I) 2020 General Knowledge · Question 91 of 120

Correct — C, Article 356. Article 356 is the provision under which the President, on a report from the Governor of a State or otherwise, may declare that the government of that State cannot be carried on in accordance with the Constitution and assume its functions to himself — what everyone calls President's Rule. When the Constituent Assembly attacked the emergency provisions as a licence for the Centre to strangle the provinces, Ambedkar's defence was that they were an insurance policy, not an instrument of routine government. He set out a ladder for the President to climb before reaching the last rung: first a warning to the State that it is not governing constitutionally, then an order for a fresh election so the electorate can settle the matter, and only if both fail, Central rule. His hope, in the words the debates record, was that such articles 'will never be called into operation and that they would remain a dead letter'.

• (a)Article 352 — This is the National Emergency article — a proclamation on the ground of war, external aggression or armed rebellion, covering the whole country or a part of it. It is an emergency of the Union, not a takeover of one State's government, and the last-resort ladder Ambedkar described (warning, then election, then Central rule) makes sense only for a State whose own machinery has failed.
• (b)Article 359 — This is the article that lets the President, during an Emergency already proclaimed under Article 352, suspend the right to move courts for the enforcement of specified Fundamental Rights. It is a consequence of a 352 proclamation, not a standalone power over a State.
• (d)Article 368 — This is the amendment procedure — how the Constitution itself is altered by Parliament. It has nothing to do with emergency or with the Centre stepping into a State's shoes.

Part XVIII of the Constitution carries three emergency regimes. Article 352 is the National Emergency, for war, external aggression or armed rebellion. Article 360 is the Financial Emergency, never yet used. Article 356 sits between them: it is the State emergency, triggered when the President is satisfied — on the Governor's report or otherwise — that a State's government cannot be carried on in accordance with the Constitution. The President then takes over the State's executive functions and Parliament takes over its legislative ones.

The tell in the stem is the phrase 'a matter of last resort'. Article 352 was defended in the Assembly on quite a different footing — that a country facing invasion needs one command — while the last-resort argument, with its ladder of warning and fresh election before Central rule, belongs to the article about a State. Ambedkar's wider hope was that the emergency articles as a group would stay 'a dead letter', and Article 356 is the one that most conspicuously did not: it has been invoked well over a hundred times since 1950. The judicial correction came in S. R. Bommai v. Union of India (1994), which made a proclamation reviewable by the courts and moved the test of a government's majority back to the floor of the House.

• Article 356 empowers the President, on a report from the Governor of a State or otherwise, to assume to himself the functions of the State government where that government cannot be carried on in accordance with the Constitution.
• Ambedkar told the Constituent Assembly that he hoped such articles 'will never be called into operation and that they would remain a dead letter'.
• A proclamation under Article 356 must be approved by Parliament every six months and may run for a maximum of three years.
• Article 356 has been used about 134 times since 1950; Manipur has seen it most often, ten times, with the most recent spell beginning on 13 February 2025.
• S. R. Bommai v. Union of India (1994) held the proclamation judicially reviewable and sharply reduced its arbitrary use.

• Reading Article 352 and Article 356 as two names for the same thing — one is a Union emergency, the other a takeover of a single State.
• Assuming a proclamation under Article 356 automatically dissolves the State Assembly; the Assembly may instead be kept in suspended animation.
• Assuming the Governor's report is indispensable — the article says 'or otherwise', so the President may act on other material.

Either as an article-to-provision match, or as a statements item on what does and does not automatically follow from a proclamation of President's Rule.

• practice — not a real PYQ

  Under Article 356 of the Constitution of India, a proclamation of President's Rule may remain in force for a maximum period of

  • (a)six months
  • (b)one year
  • (c)two years
  • (d)three years

  Answer(d) three years — with parliamentary approval renewed every six months, subject to the further conditions the 44th Amendment attached beyond one year.

• practice — not a real PYQ

  The judgment that made a proclamation under Article 356 subject to judicial review and required a claimed majority to be tested on the floor of the House was delivered in

  • (a)Kesavananda Bharati v. State of Kerala
  • (b)S. R. Bommai v. Union of India
  • (c)Minerva Mills v. Union of India
  • (d)Indra Sawhney v. Union of India

  Answer(b) S. R. Bommai v. Union of India — decided in 1994, it is the case that turned Article 356 from a political question into a reviewable one.