Amendments to the Indian Constitution 1947-2019

September 1, 2020

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Kesavananda Bharti case with regard to the basic nature of the Indian constitution forms an important part of the amendments to the constitution. Article 368 of Part XX deals with the powers of the Parliament to amend the constitution.

Article 368 can be classified into two types of amendments:

Special majority and ratification through half of the states by simple majority.
Special majority of the Parliament.

The Indian Constitution can be amended in three ways, by:

Simple majority of the Parliament
Special majority of the Parliament
Special majority of the Parliament and ratification of half of the state legislatures

Some of the important amendments are as follows:

Amendment Act	Articles/Scheduled/Parts affected	Amendments
7^th Amendment Act, 1956		Reorganization of states on linguistic basis Abolition of Class A, B, C and D states Introduction of Union Territories.
9^th Amendment Act, 1960	Schedule 1 of Indian Constitution	Adjustments to Indian Territory as a result of an agreement with Pakistan.
10^th Amendment Act, 1961	Article 240 First Schedule	Dadra and Nagar Haveli incorporated into the Union of India as a Union Territory.
12^th Amendment Act, 1961	Article 240 First Schedule	Goa, Daman and Diu incorporated into the Indian Union as a Union Territory.
13^th Amendment Act, 1963	Article 170 Added new article 371A	Nagaland was formed with special status under Article 371A.
14^th Amendment Act, 1962	Articles 81 and 240 First and fourth Schedules Added Article 239A	Pondicherry incorporated into the Indian Union.
21^st Amendment Act, 1967	Eighth Schedule	Sindhi was added as a language into 8^thSchedule of Indian Constitution.
26^th Amendment Act, 1971	Article 366 Added Article 363A Removed Articles 291 and 362	Privy Purse was abolished.
36^th Amendment Act, 1975 40^th Amendment Act, 1975	Articles 80 and 81 First and fourth Schedules Added Article 371F Removed Article 2A	Sikkim incorporated as an Indian state.
42^nd Amendment Act, 1976	Seventh Schedule Added Articles 31D, 32A, 39A, 43A, 48A, 131A, 139A, 144A, 226A, 228A and 257A Added Parts IVA and XIVA	“Mini constitution”. The Act inter-alia gave preponderance to Directive Principles of State Policy over Fundamental rights, curtailed the power of Judiciary and established the supremacy of Parliament. An overview of the amendments brought about by this Act are as follows: 1. Preamble: “Sovereign Democratic Republic” was changed to “Sovereign Socialist Secular Democratic Republic”. The words “Unity of Nation” was changed to “Unity and Integrity of Nation”. 2. Executive: Art. 74 was amended to state explicitly that the President shall act in accordance with the advice of the Council of Ministers in discharge of his functions. 3. Judiciary: Inserted Art.32A in order to deny Supreme Court the power to consider the constitutional validity of a state law. Art. 131A added. Gave SC exclusive jurisdiction to determine question relating to the constitutional validity of a central law. Art. 144A and Art. 128A made further innovation in the area of judicial review of constitutionality of legislation. Under Art.144A, the number of judges of SC to decide on the constitutional validity of a central or state law was fixed as at least 7 and further this required a 2/3^rd majority of the judges sitting to declare a law as unconstitutional. 4. Federalism: According to Art. 257A, center could deploy any armed force of the union or any other force under its control for dealing with any grave situation in any state. 5. Fundamental Rights: Primacy to directive principles over Fundamental rights contained in Art.14, 19 or 31. 6. Fundamental Duties: Inserted Art. 51–A to create a new part IV-A in the Constitution as Fundamental Duties. 7. Emergency: Prior to this Act, President could declare emergency under Art. 352 throughout the country. This Act authorized the President to proclaim emergency in any part of the country. The dominant thrust of this Amendment was to reduce the role of courts and strengthen the Parliament.
44^th Amendment Act, 1978	Ninth Schedule Added Articles 134A and 361A Deletion of Articles 31, 257A and 329A	Right to Property removed from the list of fundamental rights.
61^st Amendment Act, 1989	Article 326	Voting age decreased from 21 to 18.
71^st Amendment Act, 1992	Article 332	Manipuri, Konkani, and Nepali were added in the 8^th Schedule of Indian Constitution.
73^rd Amendment Act, 1992	Added Part IX	Introduction of Panchayat Raj. Addition of Part IX to the Indian Constitution.
74^th Amendment Act, 1992	Article 280 Article 280 Added Part IXA	Introduction of Municipalities and Nagarpalikas.
86^th Amendment Act, 2002	Amended Articles 45 and 51A Added Article 21A	Free and compulsory education of children between 6 and 14 years.
87^th Amendment Act, 2003	Eighth Schedule	Santhali, Bodo, Dogri, and Maithili in the 8^thSchedule of Indian Constitution. Service Tax introduced.
95^th Amendment Act, 2010	Article 334	Extension of reservation of seats for SC/ST. Nomination of Anglo-Indian members in Parliament and State Assemblies.
96^th Amendment Act, 2011	Eighth Schedule	Replaced Odia for Oriya in the 8^th Schedule to the Indian Constitution.
97^th Amendment Act, 2012	Articles 19 Added Part IXB	Introduction of Part IXB in the Constitution of India relating to Co-operative Societies.
100^th Amendment Act, 2015	Amendment of First Schedule	Exchange of some enclave territories with Bangladesh. Conferment of citizenship rights to citizens of enclave’s resulting to signing of Land Boundary Agreement (LBA) Treaty between India and Bangladesh.
101^st Amendment Act, 2016	Amended Sixth Schedule and Seventh Schedule Deletion of Article 268A	Introduction of Goods and Services Tax (GST).
102^nd Amendment Act, 2018	Article 338B	Establishment of National Commission for Backward Classes.
103^rd Amendment Act, 2019	Articles 15 and 16	Reservation for economically weaker sections of the society.