Book Summary: "Our Living Constitution: A Concise Introduction & Commentary" - Shashi Tharoor
Shashi Tharoor Describes the Constitution of India as of paramount importance to every Indian. It bestows fundamental rights on all citizens, speaks in their name, holds those it empowers accountable for protecting these rights, and seeks to shield the people from abusers of power and privilege. It establishes the fundamental framework of our democracy, comprising the three primary organs of the state—the legislature, the executive, and the judiciary. The Constitution defines their powers, delimits their jurisdictions, demarcates their responsibilities, and regulates their relationships with one another and with the people. It privileges an idea of India that transcends religious, ethnic, linguistic, and other sub-national identities. In the words of its principal architect, Dr Babasaheb Ambedkar: ‘Our Constitution provides us a magnificent structure beneath which all Indians, of all castes, creeds and languages, can equally seek shelter.’
Yet, despite its significance and value, and the fact that it seems to be in vogue at the moment, not many have a proper understanding of the various aspects of the Constitution that are currently being debated and challenged. Although numerous studies and interpretations of the Constitution have been conducted, there are few accessible books available to intelligent lay readers that enable them to familiarise themselves with its essential elements, history, and immeasurable grandeur. Our Living Constitution seeks to fill that gap.
With the clear-eyed scholarship, cogent arguments, and readable prose that are the hallmarks of his books, bestselling writer and leading public intellectual Shashi Tharoor provides readers with a compelling narrative about the world’s longest written national Constitution. He describes the various parts of the Constitution, beginning with its resounding preamble, and then explains its historical roots. He explores the civic nationalism that animated India’s Founding Fathers, which in turn invested the Constitution with its progressiveness, pluralism, tolerance, liberalism, and concern for the individual. He analyses how it has been able to resist attempts by autocrats and religious fanatics to change its basic structure. However, the perils remain—in the twenty-first century, the growth of sectarianism and illiberalism has threatened to undermine Indian society and the Constitution that undergirds it; constant vigilance is necessary to ensure that these threats to the idea of India do not succeed. Yet, as the author writes: ‘There is no reason to lose hope. Over the past five years, democracy- and liberty-loving citizens of India have risen to reclaim our republic…’ Will they prevail? Will the Constitution continue to protect and advance the idea of India? Our Living Constitution provides nuanced answers to these important questions. Informative, learned, and lucid, this is a book that every Indian should read to gain a deeper understanding of the Constitution that safeguards every aspect of their lives.
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Book publication date: May 2025.
Brief about the Author:
Shashi Chandran Tharoor: He completed a bachelor’s degree at the University of Delhi in New Delhi. In 1978, at the age of 22, he was awarded a PhD from the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts University in Medford, Massachusetts.
His tenure:
1985–89: Subsequent 23-year career as a diplomat in the United Nations, Tharoor served in various capacities, including deputy chief of the UNHCR Secretariat.
1989–96: Special assistant for the United States and the UN for peacekeeping.
1997–2000: Executive assistant to the secretary-general.
2001–07: Under-secretary-general for communications and public information.
In 2009, Tharoor joined the Indian National Congress.
In 2006, Tharoor was chosen as India’s official candidate for the post of secretary-general. He finished second out of the seven candidates in the 2007 election, which was won by former South Korean diplomat and politician Ban Ki-moon. Following his defeat, Tharoor resigned from the UN and became the chairman of an investment company based in the emirate of Dubai.
Currently, in his fourth term, he is the longest-serving member of the Lok Sabha from Thiruvananthapuram and has chaired Parliament’s Standing Committees on External Affairs and Information Technology.
Our Living Constitution: A Concise Introduction & Commentary - Book Review
On January 26, 1950, the nation’s tryst with destiny was complete, as we adopted a Constitution drafted by and for Indians. The Constitution of India is an extraordinary document, one that solemnly resolves to build an inclusive democracy in a country marked by deep diversity, entrenched differences and enduring discrimination.
In 2024, the Constitution re-entered the heart of public discourse, animated by two key developments: its conspicuous invocation during the general elections and the commemoration of its 75th anniversary. As a result, the Constitution has been thrust back into focus, its provisions examined, its origins debated and, in the eyes of many, its foundational values increasingly imperilled. Against this backdrop, Our Living Constitution: A Concise Introduction & Commentary, authored by Member of Parliament and scholar Dr Shashi Tharoor, arrives at a moment of heightened constitutional consciousness.
The book aims to provide an accessible overview of the world’s longest Constitution, highlighting its enduring significance and alerting readers to the threats it currently faces. As the blurb notes,
“Yet despite its significance and value, and the fact that it seems to be in vogue at the moment, not many have a proper understanding of the various aspects of the Constitution that are currently being debated and challenged. Although numerous studies and interpretations of the Constitution have been conducted, there are few accessible books available to intelligent lay readers that enable them to familiarise themselves with its essential elements, history, and immeasurable grandeur. Our Living Constitution seeks to fill that gap.”
Dr Tharoor positions the book as both timely and necessary, given the Constitution’s landmark anniversary and the growing anxieties about its values being under threat. However, while the book does succeed in sketching its salient features and gestures towards some lesser-discussed aspects of Constitution-making, it ultimately falls short of its ambition, as it lacks critical depth and nuance, and fails to cover key dimensions of the Constitution.
Bringing back Nehru and Patel in the conversation
To begin with, the book offers a commendably concise overview of the Constitution, its features, values and enduring significance. It highlights the global acclaim the document has received and its influence on constitutional design in other jurisdictions, notably South Africa. Yet, much of this terrain would be familiar to any reader with a reasonable grounding in constitutional law or civics. Where the book does make a notable contribution, however, is in reintroducing Jawaharlal Nehru and Vallabhbhai Patel into contemporary conversations about India’s Constitution-making.
For reasons better known to political actors across the spectrum, public discourse on the framing of the Constitution seldom mentions Nehru and Patel, despite their roles as the key architects of the Constitution. As Dr Rajendra Prasad, the Chairman of the Constituent Assembly, noted in his concluding speech, the two were instrumental in shaping the document. They must be acknowledged as its key architects. In an earlier column, I drew attention to their roles: Nehru, for articulating the values embedded in the Preamble, which served as the Assembly’s terms of reference; and Patel, for his decisive influence over critical provisions relating to electorates, privy purses, and citizenship. That neither figure was invoked during this year’s constitutional celebrations was a telling omission. Our Living Constitution corrects this lapse by reinstating Nehru and Patel, alongside Dr Ambedkar, as central figures in the making of the Indian Constitution.
Fact, law and the risk of oversimplification
Surprisingly, the book takes several factual liberties, resulting in demonstrably incorrect claims about the functioning of the Constitution. For instance, while discussing Part III (Fundamental Rights), the author states: “the entire palette of rights can be enforced through courts of law, from the lowest sessions court up to the Supreme Court of India” (p. 7). This is inaccurate. Fundamental rights are enforceable only before the Supreme Court and the High Courts under Articles 32 and 226, respectively. It is possible that the author intended to suggest that the judiciary, in general, plays a role in upholding rights. However, such imprecision results in a misleading claim, especially in a work aimed at general readers seeking clarity on constitutional fundamentals.
A similar inaccuracy appears in the discussion of the First Amendment, where the book states that it “stopped short” of granting an absolute right to freedom of speech and expression by introducing ‘reasonable restrictions’ on grounds such as public order, decency, morality, defamation and even friendly relations with foreign states (pp. 11–12). While the First Amendment did expand the grounds on which Article 19(1)(a) could be restricted, it did not introduce the idea of restrictions for the first time. The original Constitution already permitted laws relating to libel, slander, defamation, contempt of court, decency, morality and the security of the State. The First Amendment built on this framework; it did not create it anew.
This distinction is not merely pedantic. It is particularly relevant because critics of Nehru and the Constituent Assembly often invoke the First Amendment to suggest that the framers were hostile to free speech. To his credit, the author clarifies that the First Amendment was enacted by the same Constituent Assembly that functioned as the interim Parliament before the first general elections, and thus, the amendment was drafted by the very framers of the original text; nonetheless, the earlier mischaracterisation risks reinforcing a misleading narrative.
A more striking misstep emerges in the author’s treatment of the Basic Structure doctrine. While discussing IC Golaknath v. State of Punjab, the author cites the dissenting opinion, particularly that of Justice Wanchoo, which held that Parliament had the authority to amend any part of the Constitution and that there were no implied limitations such as a Basic Structure (p. 53). However, the book fails to make clear that this was the dissenting opinion, not the view adopted by the majority. The majority judgment, delivered by Chief Justice Subba Rao, held that Parliament’s power under Article 368 could not be used to amend or abridge the fundamental rights enshrined in Part III. While the Basic Structure doctrine itself was not articulated in Golaknath, the judgment did mark a decisive shift towards imposing limits on the amending power. This shift culminated in the seminal Kesavananda Bharati decision.
By presenting the dissenting opinion as the Court’s conclusion, the book risks distorting the historical trajectory of constitutional interpretation. This is especially problematic given that Golaknath and Kesavananda Bharati are not obscure judicial footnotes, but landmark cases well known to law students and scholars alike.
The Constitution through a narrow prism
This critique is offered with due regard for the author’s considerable credentials, both scholarly and political. Yet, our Living Constitution at times suffers from a lack of objectivity, most discernibly in its selective treatment of political history and its narrow engagement with critical perspectives on the Constitution. The author’s political and ideological affiliations become evident in the choice of material highlighted and, perhaps more tellingly, in what is left unsaid.
Throughout the book, the author draws attention to landmark policies and legislative measures introduced by successive Congress governments, such as the Right to Education Act, the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act, and the inclusion of the words ‘secular’ and ‘socialist’ through the often-criticised 42nd Amendment. However, these references are not matched by equal engagement with constitutional contributions made under non-Congress regimes. For instance, the 44th Amendment, enacted by the Janata government to undo some of the excesses of the Emergency, is only briefly mentioned despite its significance in restoring democratic safeguards. Similarly, the 103rd Amendment, passed by the NDA government to introduce economic reservation, a measure arguably rooted in constitutional values of equality, is not discussed.
This imbalance is also evident in the author’s treatment of political developments since 2014. The book is rightly critical of the present government’s tendency to label dissenters as ‘anti-nationals’, and the author also refers to scholarly work which terms the current period as an ‘undeclared emergency’. Yet, there is little engagement with the actual National Emergency declared between 1975 and 1977, nor with the fact that the term ‘anti-national’ first entered Indian legal vocabulary through the 42nd Amendment, a striking omission in a book otherwise attentive to constitutional symbolism.
The lack of objectivity is also evident in the treatment of critiques of the Constitution’s colonial lineage. The author references the oft-quoted remark by Assembly member Kengal Hanumanthaiah that the Constitution reads like the music of an English band, but quickly dismisses it via Ambedkar’s response, without unpacking the substance of the critique. This is particularly surprising given that one of the most frequent contemporary criticisms is that the Constitution reproduces a significant portion of the Government of India Act, 1935. Even a brief engagement with this argument, if only to contest it, would have served the reader better.
A loss of nuance
The book’s blurb promises that Our Living Constitution will provide “nuanced answers to important questions” in an “informative, learned, and lucid” manner. However, that promise remains unfulfilled. As noted above, the author often makes broad claims without fully developing or evidencing them, thereby flattening the constitutional terrain he seeks to map. While simplification may be the goal to make the Constitution more accessible, this comes at the cost of the very nuance that constitutional discourse demands.
Consider, for instance, the author’s treatment of critiques by the Hindu Mahasabha and the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), who opposed the Constitution for its allegedly Western origins. What goes unmentioned is that the Hindu Mahasabha itself prepared a draft Constitution whose language and values bore remarkable similarity to the final text. Dr Arghya Sengupta’s Colonial Constitution discusses this counterpoint in detail, but it is absent from Dr Tharoor’s account. Engagement with this surprising fact warranted a brief mention, particularly to counter the very critique made by the Mahasabha.
A similar lack of complexity appears in the treatment of the Uniform Civil Code (UCC). The author presents it mainly as a contentious contemporary issue, without engaging with the original debates in the Constituent Assembly, particularly the strong support it received from women members and Dr Ambedkar himself. It is notable that while the book frequently invokes Dr Ambedkar as a moral and constitutional guidepost, it does not do so on matters where his views may not align with the author’s own. Likewise, the author critiques the abrogation of Article 370 and the Supreme Court’s recent track record on liberty without sufficient nuance, which creates a narrative that feels selective rather than balanced.
Epilogue:
The Indian Constitution is neither infallible nor immune to critique; it is a living document, shaped by compromise, aspiration and pragmatism. In seeking to simplify its complexities for a general readership, the book sometimes overlooks the nuances that animate constitutional discourse. As a result, it tends to adopt a reverential tone rather than offering sustained critical engagement, risking the impression of a hagiographical account that smooths over the document’s inherent tensions and evolving character.
One crucial aspect that the book does not explore in sufficient detail is the process of the Constitution’s creation. The making of the Constitution was not confined to the formal proceedings of the Constituent Assembly. It was a deeply participatory process that involved princely states, provincial leaders, civil servants, judges and members of the public, who responded thoughtfully to published drafts. Equally significant was the contribution of BN Rau, the Constitutional Adviser, whose comparative research and consultations with global experts helped shape the document’s architecture. That this process was both inclusive and deliberative serves as a meaningful counterpoint to the claim that the Constitution is purely colonial in origin. Instead, it reflected a conscious and informed choice by the framers, drawing on global models, but moulded to the Indian context. That Rau’s name is not mentioned in the book, particularly at a moment when the nation reflects on 75 years of constitutional democracy, is a notable and unfortunate omission.
Learning:
Shashi Tharoor describes the various parts of the Constitution, beginning with its resounding preamble and then explains its historical roots. He explores the civic nationalism that animated India’s Founding Fathers, which in turn invested the Constitution with its progressiveness, pluralism, tolerance, liberalism, and concern for the individual. He analyses how it has been able to resist attempts by autocrats and religious fanatics to change its basic structure.
However, the perils remain—in the twenty-first century, the growth of sectarianism and illiberalism has threatened to undermine Indian society, and the Constitution which undergirds it, and constant vigilance is necessary to ensure these threats to the idea of India do not succeed.
Yet, as the author writes: ‘There is no reason to lose hope. Over the past five years, democracy- and liberty-loving citizens of India have risen to reclaim our republic....’ Will they prevail? Will the Constitution continue to protect and advance the idea of India? Our Living Constitution provides nuanced answers to these important questions. Informative, learned, and lucid, this is a book that must be read by all Indians to gain an understanding of the Constitution that safeguards every aspect of our lives.