CDS (II) 2022 General Knowledge · Question 42 of 120

Correct — A, 1. Exactly one pair survives, and it is the third. The Fifth Schedule is headed 'Provisions as to the Administration and Control of Scheduled Areas and Scheduled Tribes' and is applied by Article 244(1), so pair 3 is right as printed. Every other pair has been shifted by two or three places. Pair 1 gives the First Schedule the content of the Third: the First Schedule lists the States and Union territories and describes their territories, while Forms of Oaths or Affirmations is the Third Schedule. Pair 2 gives the Third Schedule the content of the Fourth: allocation of seats in the Council of States is the Fourth Schedule. Pair 4 gives the Ninth Schedule the content of the Sixth: administration of tribal areas in Assam, Meghalaya, Tripura and Mizoram is the Sixth Schedule, while the Ninth Schedule is the list of laws protected by Article 31B, created by the First Amendment of 1951 for land-reform legislation.

• (b)2 — Requires a second pair to be right, and none is. The commonest way to reach two is to let pair 4 pass because both the Sixth and the Ninth Schedules feel like places where 'special provisions' live.
• (c)3 — Would mean only one of the four is displaced. Three of them are, and each by a different distance — First for Third, Third for Fourth, Ninth for Sixth.
• (d)4 — The all-correct pick, and it is wrong by a wide margin. Only one pair in the list is matched as the Constitution actually stands.

The Constitution had eight Schedules when it came into force and has twelve now. In order: First, the States and Union territories and their territories; Second, emoluments and allowances of the President, Governors, Speakers, judges and the Comptroller and Auditor General; Third, forms of oaths and affirmations; Fourth, allocation of seats in the Council of States; Fifth, administration and control of Scheduled Areas and Scheduled Tribes; Sixth, administration of tribal areas in Assam, Meghalaya, Tripura and Mizoram; Seventh, the Union, State and Concurrent Lists; Eighth, the languages; Ninth, validation of certain Acts and Regulations, added by the First Amendment in 1951; Tenth, disqualification on the ground of defection, added by the Fifty-second Amendment in 1985; Eleventh, the twenty-nine panchayat subjects, added by the Seventy-third Amendment in 1992; Twelfth, the eighteen municipal subjects, added by the Seventy-fourth Amendment in 1992.

Schedule questions are pure list recall and are won by learning the list in order rather than by learning individual entries, because the examiners test it by sliding contents up or down by one or two places. Three of the four pairs here are exactly that kind of slide. Two distinctions are worth fixing separately because they are the ones that cost marks year after year. The first is Fourth against Second: allocation of Rajya Sabha seats is the Fourth Schedule, and the Second is about salaries — a swap UPSC and the State commissions have both used. The second is Fifth against Sixth: 'Scheduled Areas' is a Fifth Schedule term and 'Tribal Areas' a Sixth Schedule term, and the Constitution keeps them apart deliberately, because the Fifth Schedule itself provides that in that Schedule the expression 'State' does not include Assam, Meghalaya, Tripura or Mizoram. The two regimes cannot overlap. The Fifth is supervisory — the Governor reports to the President, and a Tribes Advisory Council of not more than twenty members advises; the Sixth is devolutionary, creating autonomous district and regional councils with their own law-making powers.

• First Schedule — the States and the Union territories. Third Schedule — forms of oaths or affirmations. Fourth Schedule — allocation of seats in the Council of States.
• Fifth Schedule — administration and control of Scheduled Areas and Scheduled Tribes, under Article 244(1).
• Sixth Schedule — administration of tribal areas in Assam, Meghalaya, Tripura and Mizoram, under Articles 244(2) and 275(1).
• Ninth Schedule — validation of certain Acts and Regulations, inserted by the First Amendment, 1951, and shielded by Article 31B; after I. R. Coelho (2007), laws added to it after 24 April 1973 remain open to basic-structure review.
• The Fifth Schedule expressly provides that in that Schedule the expression 'State' does not include Assam, Meghalaya, Tripura or Mizoram — so the two tribal regimes never overlap.
• The Constitution began with eight Schedules and has twelve; the Ninth, Tenth, Eleventh and Twelfth were all added by amendment.

• Placing the allocation of Rajya Sabha seats in the Second Schedule instead of the Fourth.
• Treating 'Scheduled Areas' and 'Tribal Areas' as synonyms; the first belongs to the Fifth Schedule and the second to the Sixth.
• Believing a law put in the Ninth Schedule is beyond all judicial scrutiny; anything inserted after 24 April 1973 can still be tested against the basic structure.

As a schedule-to-content match or a how-many-pairs count, and very often with the Fifth and Sixth Schedules deliberately crossed.

• practice — not a real PYQ

  Provisions as to the administration of tribal areas in the States of Assam, Meghalaya, Tripura and Mizoram are contained in which Schedule of the Constitution of India?

  • (a)Fifth Schedule
  • (b)Sixth Schedule
  • (c)Ninth Schedule
  • (d)Eleventh Schedule

  Answer(b) Sixth Schedule — the Fifth Schedule covers Scheduled Areas in the other States and expressly excludes these four.

• practice — not a real PYQ

  The Ninth Schedule was added to the Constitution of India by which amendment?

  • (a)The First Amendment, 1951
  • (b)The Seventh Amendment, 1956
  • (c)The Forty-second Amendment, 1976
  • (d)The Fifty-second Amendment, 1985

  Answer(a) The First Amendment, 1951 — inserted along with Article 31B to protect land-reform laws from challenge.