Amendments in Indian Constitution

The Constitution of India is the Supreme Law of India. It lays down the framework  defining fundamental political principles, establishes the structure, procedures,  powers, and duties of government institutions, and sets out fundamental rights, directive principles, and the duties of citizens. It is the longest written  constitution of any sovereign country in the world, containing 448 articles  in 22 parts, 12 schedules and 97 amendments.

The constitutional head of the Executive of the Union is the President.  As per Article 79 of the Constitution of India,  the council of the Parliament of the Union consists of the President and two Houses to be known as the Council of States (Rajya Sabha) and the House of the People (Lok Sabha).

Three subject lists, the Union list, the State list, and the Concurrent list, define the legislative powers of each level of government. The Union government reserves the right to make laws in areas specified on the Union list, the state governments allowed to make laws in areas specified on the State list, and laws in areas listed on the concurrent list may be made at either a state or federal level. The Constitution distributes legislative powers between Parliament and State legislatures as per the lists of entries in the Seventh Schedule to the Constitution.  The residual powers vest in the Parliament.  The centrally administered territories are called Union Territories.

Indian Constitution Amendments have been done for the purpose of variation, addition or cancellation of any provision made in the constitution. Since the enactment of the Indian Constitution important amendments is on 26 November 1949, there have been 94 amendments made to it till 2006. Number of Bills are introduced before Lok Sabha and Rajya Sabha for further improving the Constitution.

The method of an amendment to the constitution is considered to be a highly complicated procedure. Amendment can be made by various methods, which have been modeled based on the South African Constitution. The initial step of an amendment of the constitution is the introduction of Bills regarding it in any one of the houses of the Parliament. The Bills can be passed by simple majority of the Parliament. Before sending the Bills for President’s assent, there can be a voting among the members of Parliament present. If majority of them votes in favor of the amendments, it is accepted.

An amendment can also be finalized if two-thirds of the members of Parliament present vote in its favor. However, the number of voters should be more than half of the total number of members of the house. This method is known as ‘special majority of the Parliament’. In some cases, Bills for amendments to the Indian Constitution, finalized in this method, may also require the ratification of the Legislatures of at least half of the Indian States.

First Amendment 1951	Added Ninth Schedule
Seventh Amendment 1956	Necessitated on account of reorganization of states on a linguistic basis.
Eight Amendment 1959	Extended special provision for reservation of seats for Sacs, Sets and Anglo-Indians in Look samba and Leg. Assemblies for a period of 10 years from 1960 to 1970.
The Ninth Amendment 1960	Gave effect to transfer certain territories to Pakistan following the 1958 indo-pak agreement.
The tenth amendment 1961	Incorporated Dadra and Nagar Haveli as a UT.
Twelth Amendment 1962	Incorporated Goa, daman and diu as a UT.
Thirteenth Amendment 1962	Created Nagaland as a state.
Fourteenth Amendment 1963	Puducherry, karaikal, mahe and yanam, the former French territories were included in the I scheduled as UT of puducherry.
Eighteenth Amendment 1966	Reorganised Punjab into Punjab Haryana and UT of Chandigarh.
Twenty first Amendment 1967	Included Sindhi as the fifteenth regional language.
Twenty Second Amendment 1969	Created a sub-state of meghalaya within asom.
Twenty third Amendment 1969	Extended the reservation of seats for SC/ ST and nomination of Anglo-Indians for a further period of 10 years (till 1980).
Twenty sixth Amendment 1971	Abolished the titles and special privileges of former rulers of princely states.
Twenty seventh Amendment 1971	Established Manipur and Tripura
Thirty first Amendment 1973	Increased the elective strength of LS from 525 to 545. the upper limit of representatives of states went up from 500 to 525.
Thirty sixth Amendments1975	Made Sikkim a state.
Thirty eighth Amendment 1975	Provided that the president can make a declaration of emergency, and the promulgation of ordinances by the president, governors and the administrative heads of UTS would be final and could not be challenged in any court. It also authorized the president to declare different kinds of emergencies.
Thirty ninth Amendment 1975	Provide supremacy of parliament and gave primacy to directive principles over fundamental rights. It also added 10 fundamental duties. New words- socialist, secular and unity and Integrity of the Nation, were added in the preamble.
Forty fourth Amendment 1978	The right to property was deleted from part III. Article 352 was amended to provide ‘Armed Rebellion’ as one of the circumstances for declaration of emergency.
Forty fifth Amendment 1985	Extended reservation for SC/ ST by another 10 years (till 1990).
Fifty second Amendment 1985	Added the tenth Schedule ( regarding anti-defection).
Fifty third Amendment 1986	Mizoram was made a state.
Fifty sixth Amendment 1987	Hindi version of the constitution of India was accepted for all purposes. The UT of Goa, daman and Diu was divided and Goa was made a state Daman and Diu remained as a UT.
Sixty first Amendment 1989	Reduced the voting age from 21 to 18 years for the LS as well as Assemblies.
Sixty first Amendment 1989	Also extended reservation of seats for SC/ ST till 2000 AD.
Seventy first Amendment 1992	Konkani, Manipuri and Nepali were included in the VIII Schedule.
Seventy third Amendment 1993	(Panchayati Raj Bill) provided among other things Gram Samba in villages, constitution of panchayats at the village and other levels direct elections to all seats in panchayats and reservation of seats for the SC and ST fixing of tenure of 5 years for panchayats.
Seventy fourth Amendment 1993	(Nagarpalika bill) provides for, among other things, Constitution of three types of municipalities, reservation of seats in very municipality for the SC and ST, women and the backward classes.
Eighty second Amendment 2000	Reinstaled the provision of reservation of SC and Sets in matters related to promotion. Besides, the qualifying marks for passing an examination for them has also been lowered.
Eighty sixth Amendment 2002	Makes education a fundamental right for children in the age group of 6 – 14 years.
Eighty seventh Amendment 2003	Made the 2001 census the basis for delimitation of constituencies of the Lower House of Parliament (Lok Sabha) and State assemblies (Vidhan Sabhas)
Ninety first Amendment 2003	Amended the Anti – Defection Law and also made a provision that the number of ministers in the Central & State Govts. Cannot be more than 15% of the strength of Lok Sabha & respected Vidhan Sabha.
Ninety second Amendment 2003	Bodo, Maithili, Santhali and Added into the VIII Schedule.