Exam-useful questions from this chapter, grouped by marks, each with a full model answer. Try writing the answer yourself first, then check it against this one.
1 1-Mark Questions
Q. What is a Bill of Rights?
Answer: A Bill of Rights is a list of citizens’ rights that a constitution itself mentions and protects, and it guarantees a remedy if these rights are violated.
Q. In which Part of the Constitution are the Fundamental Rights listed?
Answer: Part III of the Constitution lists the Fundamental Rights.
Q. Within how many hours must an arrested person be produced before a magistrate?
Answer: Within 24 hours of the arrest.
Q. What is the maximum period for which preventive detention can continue without review?
Answer: Three months, after which the case goes before an advisory board.
Q. Below what age is a child banned from working in hazardous jobs like factories and mines?
Answer: Below 14 years of age.
Q. In which year was the National Human Rights Commission set up?
Answer: In 1993.
Q. Under which Article does the right to property exist today?
Answer: Under Article 300A, as an ordinary legal right.
Q. How many Fundamental Duties did the 42nd Amendment add?
Answer: Ten Fundamental Duties.
2 2-Mark Questions
Q. Why do most democratic countries list citizens’ rights inside the constitution itself?
Answer: Because a right that is not written down anywhere is a right the government can quietly ignore. Listing rights in the constitution stops the government from acting against them and guarantees a remedy when they are violated.
Q. How are Fundamental Rights different from ordinary legal rights?
Answer: Ordinary legal rights are protected and enforced by ordinary law and can be changed by the legislature through the normal law-making process. Fundamental Rights are protected by the Constitution itself and can be changed only by amending the Constitution.
Q. What does Article 16(4) of the Constitution say?
Answer: It says nothing in Article 16 stops the State from reserving appointments or posts for backward classes not adequately represented in government services, so a policy like reservation is not a violation of the right to equality.
Q. What protection does a person get immediately after being arrested?
Answer: They must be told the grounds of arrest, they have the right to a lawyer of their choice, and the police must produce them before the nearest magistrate within 24 hours, who alone decides whether the arrest was justified.
Q. What two things does the Right against Exploitation ban?
Answer: It bans begar or forced labour without payment, and the buying and selling of human beings such as slaves. It also bans employing children below 14 in hazardous work.
Q. What restrictions can the government place on the freedom of religion?
Answer: The government can restrict religious practice to protect public order, morality and health. This is why practices like sati, bigamy and human sacrifice were banned without that being treated as interference in religion.
Q. How does the Constitution define a minority?
Answer: A minority is a group that shares a common language or religion and is numerically smaller than other groups, either in a particular part of the country or in the country as a whole.
Q. What is a writ, and who can issue one?
Answer: A writ is a special order that a High Court or the Supreme Court can issue to enforce a citizen’s Fundamental Right, such as ordering an unlawfully arrested person’s release.
Q. Why are the Directive Principles called ‘non-justiciable’?
Answer: Because they cannot be enforced through the courts: if the government fails to implement a Directive Principle, a citizen cannot ask a court to order the government to implement it.
3 4-Mark Questions
Q. Explain the right to life and personal liberty under Article 21, and how the Supreme Court has expanded its meaning.
Answer: 1. Article 21 says no person shall be deprived of life or personal liberty except according to procedure established by law.
2. This means no citizen can be arrested without being told the grounds, and every arrested person has the right to a lawyer of their choice.
3. The police must produce the arrested person before the nearest magistrate within 24 hours, and it is the magistrate, not the police, who decides if the arrest is justified.
4. Supreme Court judgments have expanded this right well beyond a bare guarantee against being killed: it now includes the right to live with human dignity, free from exploitation.
5. The Court has also held that the right to life includes the right to shelter and livelihood, because no person can truly live without a means of living.
6. So the right is not just about staying alive, it is about living with dignity, and the courts keep widening what that means.
Q. What is preventive detention, and why is it controversial?
Answer: 1. Preventive detention means arresting and holding a person without trial, simply because the government suspects they are likely to commit an unlawful act.
2. It can last a maximum of three months, after which an advisory board must review the case.
3. On the face of it, it looks like a useful tool against genuine anti-social or subversive elements.
4. But governments have often misused this power against ordinary critics and protesters rather than genuine threats.
5. This creates a real tension between the right to personal liberty under Article 21 and the government’s power of preventive detention.
6. Many people believe the law needs stronger safeguards so it cannot be misused for reasons other than the ones it is meant for.
Q. Explain any four writs that a High Court or the Supreme Court can issue.
Answer: 1. Habeas Corpus: orders that an arrested person be produced before the court, and the court can order their release if the arrest is unlawful.
2. Mandamus: issued when a public office holder is failing to perform their legal duty, and this failure is affecting someone’s rights.
3. Prohibition: issued by a higher court to stop a lower court from hearing a case that goes beyond its jurisdiction.
4. Quo Warranto: stops a person from acting in a public office they are not legally entitled to hold.
5. (A fifth, Certiorari, transfers a pending case from a lower court or authority to a higher one, if space is needed for a fifth writ.)
Q. What three kinds of things do the Directive Principles of State Policy contain? Give an example of each.
Answer: 1. Goals and objectives society should adopt, for example promoting the welfare of the people and raising the standard of living.
2. Rights individuals should enjoy beyond the Fundamental Rights, for example the right to work and equal pay for equal work.
3. Policies the government should adopt, for example a uniform civil code and promotion of village panchayats.
4. Together these guide government policy even though no court can force the government to follow them.
Q. Trace how the Right to Property changed from a Fundamental Right into an ordinary legal right.
Answer: 1. Originally, the Constitution gave a Fundamental Right to acquire, possess and maintain property, though the government could still take property for public welfare.
2. From 1950, the government passed many laws restricting this right, starting with zamindari-abolition laws.
3. Landowners challenged these as violations of their Fundamental Right, leading to a long legal battle between the executive and the judiciary.
4. In 1973, the Supreme Court ruled that the right to property was not part of the Constitution’s basic structure, so Parliament could restrict it by amendment.
5. In 1978, the 44th Amendment removed the right to property from the Fundamental Rights list entirely, turning it into an ordinary legal right under Article 300A.
Q. Describe the composition and functions of the National Human Rights Commission.
Answer: 1. The NHRC is made up of a former Chief Justice of the Supreme Court, a former Supreme Court judge, a former Chief Justice of a High Court, and two other members with knowledge or experience in human rights.
2. It inquires into complaints of rights violations, either on its own initiative or on a victim’s petition.
3. It visits jails to study the condition of inmates, and it promotes research in the field of human rights.
4. It receives thousands of complaints every year, mainly about custodial deaths, custodial rape, disappearances and police excesses.
5. It has no power of prosecution: it can only recommend action to the government or recommend that courts initiate proceedings.
Q. How are Fundamental Rights and Directive Principles complementary to each other?
Answer: 1. Fundamental Rights restrain the government from doing certain things, such as discriminating against citizens.
2. Directive Principles exhort the government to do certain things, such as raising the standard of living.
3. Fundamental Rights mainly protect the rights of individuals, while Directive Principles look after the well-being of society as a whole.
4. Most of the time, following one helps achieve the other, so the two are meant to work together rather than against each other.
5. The Right to Property episode shows that they can still clash, and how the Constitution resolved that clash through amendment and court rulings.
4 6-Mark Questions
Q. Read Somnath Lahiri’s statement in the Constituent Assembly quoted in this chapter. Do you agree with him? Give reasons for your view.
Answer: 1. Lahiri said many Fundamental Rights were framed from the point of view of a police constable, that very few rights were conceded, and that almost every article was followed by a proviso that took the right away almost completely.
2. There is real substance to this: the right to freedom of speech is restricted by public order and morality, the right to assemble peacefully can be denied by declaring five or more people unlawful, and preventive detention lets the government hold someone without trial.
3. Machal Lalung’s 54 years in custody, and the misuse of preventive detention noted in the chapter, both show that restrictions written for genuine emergencies can be turned against ordinary people.
4. On the other hand, a right with no restriction at all would let any individual’s freedom threaten everyone else’s, which is exactly why the chapter says freedom is not the freedom to do anything one likes.
5. So a fair view is a middle one: Lahiri was right that the restrictions were extensive and open to misuse, but not right that this made the rights meaningless. The Right to Constitutional Remedies and the judiciary’s record since 1950 show that courts have repeatedly expanded rights rather than let restrictions swallow them.
6. The lesson worth taking from Lahiri’s statement is less about deleting the restrictions and more about staying alert to when they are misused, which is exactly what the chapter says keeps such misuse rare.
Q. Which Fundamental Right do you think is the most important? Summarise its provisions and argue why it matters most.
Answer: 1. A strong case can be made for the Right to Constitutional Remedies (Article 32), which Dr. Ambedkar called the heart and soul of the Constitution.
2. It lets a citizen approach the High Court or Supreme Court directly whenever any other Fundamental Right is violated, and the court can issue any of five writs, Habeas Corpus, Mandamus, Prohibition, Quo Warranto and Certiorari, to enforce it.
3. Without this right, every other Fundamental Right would only be a promise on paper: Machal Lalung’s case shows exactly what happens when a right exists but there is no way to actually get it enforced.
4. It is also the right that made the workers’ case in this chapter succeed: the right against exploitation only helped the Asian Games workers because it could be challenged in court and enforced.
5. Every other Fundamental Right, equality, freedom, religion, culture, protects citizens against one particular kind of harm. This one is different: it protects the ability to enforce all the others, which is why losing it would be far more damaging than losing any single right on the list.
6. So while every Fundamental Right matters, the Right to Constitutional Remedies is the one that gives the rest their teeth, which is why it deserves to be called the most important.
Q. An activist working among the poor says the poor don’t need Fundamental Rights, and that Directive Principles being made legally binding is what they actually need. Do you agree? Give your reasons.
Answer: 1. The activist’s underlying point has real force: a poor, illiterate person cannot easily use the Right to Constitutional Remedies to fight a case in the High Court, while a Directive Principle like the right to work would directly change their daily life if it were legally enforceable.
2. But Fundamental Rights are not useless to the poor either. The Asian Games workers’ case in this chapter shows exactly the opposite: their Fundamental Right against exploitation, once challenged in court, forced the government to pay them their due wages.
3. Many Directive Principles have in fact been implemented over time without being made justiciable, for example the right to education, panchayati raj, employment guarantee, and the mid-day meal scheme, through ordinary legislation and political pressure rather than court orders.
4. Making every Directive Principle legally binding could also overload the courts with policy decisions that are really the government’s job, such as how quickly to raise the standard of living.
5. A more balanced answer is that the poor need both: Fundamental Rights that protect them from direct exploitation and abuse of power, and Directive Principles that push governments toward welfare measures, backed by political accountability rather than court orders.
6. So the activist is right that legally binding Directive Principles would help the poor a great deal, but wrong to suggest Fundamental Rights are not needed at all: the workers’ case shows precisely how much a Fundamental Right can do when it is actually enforced.
Q. Explain the long legal and political debate over the Right to Property, and how it was finally resolved.
Answer: 1. The original Constitution gave a Fundamental Right to acquire, possess and maintain property, but allowed government to take property for public welfare.
2. When the government tried to abolish the zamindari system from 1950 onward, landowners challenged the laws as a violation of this Fundamental Right.
3. This created a genuine conflict between a Fundamental Right and the Directive Principles’ goal of social and economic justice, since the government believed land reform was needed for the larger public good.
4. The government’s position was that Parliament could amend any part of the Constitution to implement Directive Principles, even at the cost of a Fundamental Right, while the courts held that Fundamental Rights were too important to be limited this way.
5. In 1973, the Supreme Court ruled in the Kesavananda Bharati case that Parliament could amend the Constitution, but not in a way that destroyed its ‘basic structure’, and separately held the right to property was not part of that basic structure.
6. This let Parliament, through the 44th Amendment in 1978, remove the right to property from the Fundamental Rights list altogether and convert it into an ordinary legal right under Article 300A, finally settling the decades-long conflict.
5 Case Studies
(A) 1 marks Which Fundamental Right is most directly at issue in this case?
Answer: The Right to Equality, specifically the abolition of untouchability and the prohibition on caste-based discrimination.
(B) 2 marks Does this case involve a violation of Fundamental Rights? Explain briefly.
Answer: Yes. Forcing a community to perform a degrading customary task, and violently punishing them for refusing, is discrimination on the ground of caste and a denial of equal dignity, both of which the Right to Equality protects against.
(C) 3 marks What order would you, as the judge, direct the government to give in this case?
Answer: The government should be directed to register criminal cases against those responsible for the assault and the parading, to provide the affected women with medical and legal support, and to make clear that no custom can require members of any caste to perform degrading services for another, since the Constitution abolishes untouchability and the government has a duty to enforce that.
(A) 1 marks Under which Fundamental Right would a petition on behalf of the homeless be filed?
Answer: The Right to Constitutional Remedies, which lets a citizen approach the Supreme Court directly to enforce other Fundamental Rights.
(B) 2 marks Which Fundamental Rights of the homeless are being denied, according to the passage?
Answer: Their right to life with dignity under Article 21 (since they lack shelter, one of the things the Supreme Court has held to be part of the right to life), and effectively their access to other rights and government benefits, since the lack of a ‘proof of residence’ blocks them from ration cards, voting cards and medical help.
(C) 4 marks What kind of order would you request the Supreme Court to issue on the facts given?
Answer: 1. A direction to state governments to increase the number of night shelters so they can accommodate a much larger share of the urban homeless, especially during winter.
2. A direction to simplify or waive the ‘proof of residence’ requirement for ration cards and voter identity documents for homeless applicants, since demanding a fixed address from someone who has none is self-defeating.
3. A direction that homeless persons be treated as eligible for emergency government medical help regardless of whether they hold a ration card.
4. Continued monitoring by the Court, through periodic reports from the government, to make sure these directions are actually carried out and not left only on paper, in the same way judicial monitoring helped in other rights cases discussed in this chapter.