ARTICLE 370

It is a proud moment for the Indian democracy as the BJP government is successful to cleverly scrap the article 370 of the Indian constitution. Article 370 was a very controversial law that needed to be amended, better never should have been made.

A brief introduction on article 370:-

Article 370 of the Indian constitution gave special status to the state of Jammu and Kashmir, allowing it to have a separate constitution, a state flag and autonomy over the internal administration of the state.

The article was drafted in Part 20 of the Constitution: Temporary, Transitional and Special Provisions.^[3] The Constituent Assembly of Jammu and Kashmir, after its establishment, was empowered to recommend the articles of the Indian constitution that should be applied to the state or to abrogate the Article 370 altogether.

Just to clear a misconception among the people regarding the scrapping of the article 370, no constitutional amendment has taken place to scrap article 370 as that would require the legislative assembly of Jammu and Kashmir to pass a resolution itself to amend article 370- which is practically impossible. It would be wrong to say that the Indian constitution itself has been amended. What the BJP has done is it has used the article itself to amend it. The article has a small loophole in it. I will explain this to you in detail.the legal part is a bit long so you can directly skip to the political analysis if the bill.

Legal analysis

Under Article 370(1)(d), constitutional provisions could be applied to the state from time to time, as modified by the President through a Presidential Order, and upon the concurrence of the state government. Perhaps the most important part of 370, however, was the proviso to clause 3. Clause 3 itself authorised the President to pass an order removing or modifying parts of Article 370. In other words, therefore, for Article 370 itself to be amended, the recommendation of the Constituent Assembly of Jammu and Kashmir was required. Now, the Constituent Assembly of the state ceased functioning in 1957. This has led to a long-standing debate about whether Article 370 has effectively become permanent.

 Article 370(1) allows the President – with the concurrence of the government of Jammu and Kashmir – to amend or modify various provisions of the Constitution in relation to Jammu and Kashmir. Article 370(3) proviso states that Article 370 itself is to be amended by the concurrence of the Constituent Assembly.

the above is the pdf of court order 272.

Court order 272, therefore, uses the power under 370(1) to amend a provision of the Constitution (Article 367) which, in turn, amends Article 370(3), and takes out the Constituent Assembly’s concurrence for any further amendments to Article 370. And this, in turn, becomes the trigger for the statutory resolution, that recommends to the President the removal of (most of) Article 370 (as the Constituent Assembly’s concurrence is no longer.  Under Article 370(1)(d), constitutional provisions could be applied to the state from time to time, as modified by the President through a Presidential Order, and upon the concurrence of the state government.

POLITICAL ANALYSIS

The legal part is a bit hard to understand but what matters the most is that the bill is in the interest of the nation.

Apart from the above mentioned changes the seperate Jammu and Kashmir constitution will now have no effect and the Indian constitution will prevail . The most importantly the Jammu and Kashmir state flag will now be banned. It is a very great achievement for the present government. The article has divided the opposition. Even among large parties there are differences of opinions for example in the congress many notable leaders have welcomed the move like Jyotiraditya Scindia and Aditi singh( Rae bareli). The only reason some people hate this change is that the muslim majority of the state is threatened by the abolition of the article. I think that abolishing the article will bring out better outcomes for the violence ridden state. The change will bring peace and harmony to the state and provides scope for development of tourism in the state. I would like to mention that the change doesn’t take away the rights of the Kashmiris or it doesn’t make them a minority in their own land instead it provides better rights by the imposition of the Indian constitution there. The change actually brings the state into the Indian Union. Though it is sad that there has been a lot of chaos in the state causing a lot of trouble to the common man. A kashmiri is no greater than a guajrati , bengali, or a keralian nor any inferior. We all are simply just Indians divided by the borders of castes, languages, geography and culture but we stay united by a greater force the feeling of nationalism and the love for this holy land.

Jai hind!!!!