Which one among the following was eliminated by the 44th Amendment Act of the Parliament?
- (a)Right against Exploitation
- (b)Right to Constitutional Remedies
- (c)Right to Property
- (d)Right to Education
Correct — C, Right to Property. The Constitution (Forty-fourth Amendment) Act, 1978, passed by the Janata government after the Emergency, omitted Article 19(1)(f) — the freedom 'to acquire, hold and dispose of property' — and repealed Article 31, and in their place inserted Article 300A in Part XII: 'No person shall be deprived of his property save by authority of law.' The proof of the deletion is visible in the text to this day: Article 19(1) now runs (a), (b), (c), (d), (e) and (g), with the lettering skipping (f) altogether. The effect is that property ceased to be a Fundamental Right and became a constitutional or legal right. Two consequences follow. It can no longer be enforced by moving the Supreme Court directly under Article 32, and because Article 300A says 'person' rather than 'citizen' it now protects non-citizens and companies as well, unlike the citizens-only right it replaced.
- (a)Right against Exploitation — Intact in Articles 23 and 24 — the prohibition of traffic in human beings and forced labour, and the ban on employing children under fourteen in factories, mines or other hazardous work.
- (b)Right to Constitutional Remedies — Article 32 remains, and Ambedkar called it the heart and soul of the Constitution. The 44th Amendment in fact strengthened rights protection — among other things it provided that Articles 20 and 21 cannot be suspended even during an Emergency.
- (d)Right to Education — Not only intact but added later, and in the opposite direction. The 86th Amendment of 2002 inserted Article 21A, making free and compulsory education for children of six to fourteen years a Fundamental Right.
The 44th Amendment was the Janata government's undoing of much of the 42nd Amendment of 1976. It replaced 'internal disturbance' with 'armed rebellion' as a ground for a national Emergency, required the Cabinet's written advice before a proclamation, made Articles 20 and 21 non-suspendable during an Emergency, restored the original terms of the Lok Sabha and the State Assemblies, and removed property from Part III. The property clauses had been the most litigated part of the Constitution since 1950, generating the First, Fourth, Seventeenth and Twenty-fifth Amendments and the long line of cases from Shankari Prasad through Golaknath to Kesavananda Bharati.
The confusion to guard against is a mirror-image one: the 42nd Amendment is remembered for what it added, the 44th for what it took away, and candidates who half-remember the pair sometimes credit the deletion of property to 1976. A second trap is the assumption that removing a right from Part III abolishes it. It does not — Article 300A still forbids deprivation of property except by authority of law, and the courts have read real content into that requirement. The practical difference is procedural and it is significant: a claim under Article 300A goes to the High Court under Article 226 or to the ordinary courts, not to the Supreme Court under Article 32. One drafting detail worth handling carefully is the date: the Act was passed in 1978 and its provisions were brought into force in stages during 1979, and sources differ on the exact commencement day for the property sections, so the safe formulation is that the Act is of 1978 and the property change took effect in 1979.
- The Constitution (Forty-fourth Amendment) Act, 1978 omitted Article 19(1)(f) and repealed Article 31.
- It inserted Article 300A: 'No person shall be deprived of his property save by authority of law.'
- Article 19(1) today has clauses (a), (b), (c), (d), (e) and (g), and no clause (f) — the lettering skips it.
- Article 300A speaks of 'person', so it covers non-citizens and companies, whereas Article 19 rights belong to citizens only.
- The same amendment made Articles 20 and 21 non-suspendable during an Emergency and substituted 'armed rebellion' for 'internal disturbance'.
- Attributing the removal of the property right to the 42nd Amendment; the 42nd added, the 44th subtracted.
- Concluding that property is no longer protected at all; Article 300A survives, but it is enforced differently.
- Missing that Article 300A widened the class of holders protected, from citizens to any person.
Asked as an amendment-to-change match, and in the harder version as a statements item on where the right now sits and who can enforce it.
What is the position of the Right to Property in India?
- (a) Legal right available to citizens only
- (b) Legal right available to any person
- (c) Fundamental Right available to citizens only
- (d) Neither Fundamental Right nor legal right
Answer(b) Legal right available to any person
Set in the same year as this paper, and it completes the story. The CDS item asks which amendment removed the right; UPSC asks what became of it afterwards, and the answer turns on Article 300A using the word 'person' rather than 'citizen'.
Consider the following statements: 1. Article 301 pertains to the Right to Property. 2. Right to Property is a legal right but not a Fundamental Right. 3. Article 300 A was inserted in the Constitution of India by the Congress Government at the Centre by the 44th Constitutional Amendment. Which of the statements given above is/are correct?
- (a) 2 only
- (b) 2 and 3
- (c) 1 and 3
- (d) 1, 2 and 3
Answer(a) 2 only
A harder version of the same material, and it catches two errors worth avoiding — Article 301 is about freedom of trade and commerce, not property, and the 44th Amendment was the work of the Janata government, not the Congress.
- practice — not a real PYQ
After the 44th Constitutional Amendment, the Right to Property in India is
- (a)a Fundamental Right available to citizens only
- (b)a legal or constitutional right available to any person
- (c)a Directive Principle of State Policy
- (d)neither a Fundamental Right nor a legal right
Answer(b) a legal or constitutional right available to any person — placed in Article 300A, which uses the word 'person' rather than 'citizen'.
- practice — not a real PYQ
Which one of the following changes was made by the Constitution (Forty-fourth Amendment) Act, 1978?
- (a)The words 'socialist' and 'secular' were added to the Preamble
- (b)Fundamental Duties were inserted as Part IVA
- (c)Articles 20 and 21 were made non-suspendable during a Proclamation of Emergency
- (d)The term of the Lok Sabha was extended from five years to six
Answer(c) Articles 20 and 21 were made non-suspendable during a Proclamation of Emergency — the other three were changes made by the 42nd Amendment of 1976.