UPPSC 2024 Prelims GS Paper-I · Question 126 of 150

Correct — C, 1, 2, 3, 4. The four cases are already printed in date order, and the only real difficulty in the question is the reluctance to believe that a chronology item can be answered by leaving the list alone. Fix the years and the item collapses. Shankari Prasad Singh Deo v. Union of India came first, in 1951: it challenged the Constitution (First Amendment) Act, 1951, which had inserted Articles 31A and 31B and the Ninth Schedule to protect zamindari-abolition laws, and the Supreme Court held that the word 'law' in Article 13 does not include a constitutional amendment made under Article 368, so Parliament could amend Fundamental Rights. Sajjan Singh v. State of Rajasthan came next, in 1965, on a challenge to the Constitution (Seventeenth Amendment) Act, 1964; by three to two the Court reaffirmed Shankari Prasad, but the two dissenting judges questioned whether Fundamental Rights were meant to be at the mercy of a special majority, and Justice Mudholkar's opinion is conventionally read as the first judicial hint of the idea that the Constitution has basic features. Third came I.C. Golaknath v. State of Punjab in 1967: an eleven-judge bench, by six to five, overruled the two earlier decisions and held that a constitutional amendment is 'law' within the meaning of Article 13(2), so Parliament could not abridge or take away Fundamental Rights — a holding the Court applied prospectively so as not to unsettle amendments already made. Fourth and last came Kesavananda Bharati v. State of Kerala in 1973, decided by a thirteen-judge bench, the largest ever assembled, by seven to six: it overruled Golaknath and restored Parliament's power to amend any part of the Constitution including Fundamental Rights, but subjected that power to the limit that the basic structure of the Constitution may not be altered or destroyed. The sequence 1951, 1965, 1967, 1973 is therefore 1, 2, 3, 4 and the key marks (c).

• (a)1, 4, 3, 2 — Starts correctly with Shankari Prasad (1951) and then goes badly wrong, putting Kesavananda Bharati (1973) second and Sajjan Singh (1965) last. It inverts the entire middle of the story: on this ordering the basic-structure doctrine would have been laid down before Golaknath was decided and before Sajjan Singh had even reaffirmed Parliament's amending power, which reverses cause and effect. Kesavananda is the last of the four, not the second.
• (b)3, 2, 1, 4 — Opens with Golaknath (1967) ahead of both Shankari Prasad (1951) and Sajjan Singh (1965). Golaknath cannot come first for a structural reason as well as a chronological one — its whole holding was that the earlier two decisions were wrong, and a judgment cannot overrule cases that have not yet been decided. Only the position of Kesavananda at the end is right here.
• (d)3, 4, 2, 1 — Very nearly reverses the true order, placing the two later cases first and the two earliest last. If a candidate remembers nothing else, remembering that Shankari Prasad is the earliest of the four — it arose out of the First Amendment of 1951, the very first amendment India made — eliminates both this option and option (b) at once.

These four cases are the spine of the constitutional debate over the amending power under Article 368. The question is a single one, asked again and again between 1951 and 1973: can Parliament amend Fundamental Rights, and if so, is there any limit? Shankari Prasad and Sajjan Singh answered yes with no limit, reasoning that an amendment is not 'law' for the purposes of Article 13. Golaknath reversed that, holding an amendment to be 'law' and Fundamental Rights therefore beyond Parliament's reach. Kesavananda Bharati settled it on a middle ground that has governed India ever since: Parliament may amend any provision, Fundamental Rights included, but may not alter the Constitution's basic structure. Parliament and the Court were in dialogue throughout, with the Constitution (Twenty-fourth Amendment) Act, 1971 enacted specifically to neutralise Golaknath and itself upheld, in modified effect, in Kesavananda.

Chronology questions on this quartet are among the most reliably repeated items in Indian polity, and the trap is rarely the dates themselves but the candidate's assumption that the printed order must be shuffled. Anchor the sequence to the amendment each case was about rather than to the case name — First Amendment 1951 gives Shankari Prasad, Seventeenth Amendment 1964 gives Sajjan Singh 1965, the Punjab land-ceiling law under challenge in 1967 gives Golaknath, and the Twenty-fourth, Twenty-fifth and Twenty-ninth Amendments of 1971 and 1972 give Kesavananda 1973. That anchoring also survives the harder version of the question, in which cases and amendments are interleaved in a single list, which is exactly how UPPSC set it in 2021. Note finally that the story does not stop at 1973: Indira Nehru Gandhi v. Raj Narain (1975), Minerva Mills (1980) and I.R. Coelho (2007) applied the basic-structure doctrine, the last holding that laws placed in the Ninth Schedule after 24 April 1973 are open to review on basic-structure grounds.

• Shankari Prasad Singh Deo v. Union of India, 1951 — challenge to the First Amendment Act, 1951; the Supreme Court held that 'law' in Article 13 does not include a constitutional amendment under Article 368, so Fundamental Rights could be amended.
• Sajjan Singh v. State of Rajasthan, 1965 — challenge to the Seventeenth Amendment Act, 1964; the Court reaffirmed Shankari Prasad by 3:2, with the dissents of Justices Hidayatullah and Mudholkar foreshadowing the basic-features idea.
• I.C. Golaknath v. State of Punjab, 1967 — an eleven-judge bench held 6:5 that a constitutional amendment is 'law' under Article 13(2) and that Parliament cannot abridge Fundamental Rights; the ruling was given prospective effect.
• Kesavananda Bharati v. State of Kerala, 1973 — a thirteen-judge bench, the largest in the Court's history, held 7:6 that Parliament can amend any part of the Constitution under Article 368 but cannot alter its basic structure; the judgment was delivered on 24 April 1973.
• Parliament's replies run alongside the cases: the Twenty-fourth Amendment Act, 1971 made explicit that Article 368 covers Fundamental Rights and that Article 13 does not apply to amendments; the Twenty-fifth (1971) and Twenty-ninth (1972) Amendments were among those under challenge in Kesavananda.

• Assuming a chronology option can never be the list as printed. Here the printed order is the correct order, and options that shuffle it are the distractors.
• Attributing the basic-structure doctrine to Golaknath. Golaknath (1967) barred the amendment of Fundamental Rights outright; the basic-structure doctrine came only with Kesavananda Bharati (1973).
• Confusing which amendment each case attacked — First Amendment for Shankari Prasad, Seventeenth for Sajjan Singh, and the 24th, 25th and 29th for Kesavananda. Interleaved case-and-amendment chronologies punish this directly.

UPPSC repeatedly asks this quartet as a chronological arrangement, sometimes mixing constitutional amendment Acts into the same list, and sometimes as a single-fact question on which case laid down the basic-structure doctrine. UPSC asks it obliquely — whether the Constitution itself defines 'basic structure', what Article 368 permits by way of addition, variation or repeal, and how the Ninth Schedule fares after 1973.

• practice — not a real PYQ

  In which case did the Supreme Court of India apply the doctrine of prospective overruling for the first time?

  • (a)Shankari Prasad v. Union of India (1951)
  • (b)Sajjan Singh v. State of Rajasthan (1965)
  • (c)Golaknath v. State of Punjab (1967)
  • (d)Kesavananda Bharati v. State of Kerala (1973)

  Answer(c) Golaknath v. State of Punjab (1967) — the Court held that Parliament could not abridge Fundamental Rights but applied the ruling only to future amendments, leaving the First, Fourth and Seventeenth Amendments undisturbed.

• practice — not a real PYQ

  The Constitution (Twenty-fourth Amendment) Act, 1971 was enacted primarily to neutralise the effect of which judgment?

  • (a)Shankari Prasad v. Union of India
  • (b)Golaknath v. State of Punjab
  • (c)Kesavananda Bharati v. State of Kerala
  • (d)Minerva Mills v. Union of India

  Answer(b) Golaknath v. State of Punjab — the 24th Amendment declared that Article 13 does not apply to an amendment made under Article 368 and that Parliament may amend any provision of the Constitution, including Fundamental Rights; it was itself upheld in Kesavananda Bharati, subject to the basic-structure limit.