Important Doctrines of Constitutional Law — UPSC Polity
Doctrines on the Survival of Laws — Severability, Waiver & Eclipse
🎯 Exam priority: Important. This chapter is pure legal method — how courts actually decide whether a law survives, whose legislature had the power to pass it, and how the Constitution's own words should be read. Learn each doctrine's one-line test first, then its headline case; the surrounding case tables reward recognition, not memorisation of every fact.
Three related doctrines answer the same underlying question: when a law conflicts with the Constitution, what actually happens to it — is it dead, dormant, or does the conflicted person simply get to give up their objection?
Doctrine of Severability
Rooted in Article 13, this doctrine (also called separability) resolves what happens when only part of a law is unconstitutional. If the offending part can be separated from the rest, only that part is void — the rest survives. If the valid and invalid parts are so mixed up they can't be separated, or together form a single intended scheme, the whole law falls. The test is the legislature's intent: would it have enacted the valid part alone, had it known the rest was invalid?
Case (Year) | Supreme Court Judgement |
A.K. Gopalan v. State of Madras (1950) | Struck down only Section 14 of the Preventive Detention Act, 1950; the rest of the Act remained valid (already covered in this playlist's Landmark Judgements article) |
State of Bombay v. F.N. Balsara (1951) | Declared eight sections of the Bombay Prohibition Act, 1949 ultra vires; the rest of the Act stayed valid |
R.M.D. Chamarbaugwalla v. Union of India (1957) | Severed the Prize Competitions Act, 1955's provisions on skill-based competitions from those on gambling, since Article 19(1)(g) lets Parliament restrict only gambling |
Minerva Mills v. Union of India (1980) | Struck down only Sections 4 and 55 of the 42nd Amendment Act, 1976; the rest of the amendment survived (already covered in this playlist's Landmark Judgements article) |
Kihoto Hollohan v. Zachillhu (1992) | Struck down only paragraph 7 of the Tenth Schedule; the rest of the anti-defection law survived (already covered in this playlist's Anti-Defection article) |
Doctrine of Waiver
A person entitled to a right can normally choose to voluntarily give it up — that is a "waiver." In the USA, citizens can waive their fundamental rights. In India, they cannot — the Supreme Court has held Fundamental Rights aren't there merely for individual benefit but as a matter of public policy, mandatory on the state to protect the Preamble's objectives; a citizen cannot invite discrimination by saying "you can discriminate," nor waive Article 20/21's protections to get convicted.
Case (Year) | Supreme Court Judgement |
Behram Khurshid Pesikaka v. State of Bombay (1954) | An accused cannot waive their fundamental rights to get themselves convicted |
Basheshar Nath v. Commissioner of Income Tax (1958) | Voluntarily agreeing to pay a tax does not waive the Article 14 fundamental right against it |
Olga Tellis v. Bombay Municipal Corporation (1985) | No one can waive a fundamental right by their own act; there is no estoppel against the Constitution (already covered in this playlist's Article 21 Expansion article) |
Nar Singh Pal v. Union of India (2000) | Fundamental rights cannot be bartered away, and there is no estoppel against exercising them |
Doctrine of Eclipse
A pre-constitution law inconsistent with a Fundamental Right isn't void from the moment the Constitution commences — it becomes only dormant, "eclipsed" by the right, but not dead: it stays valid for past transactions, for rights/liabilities that arose before the Constitution, and against non-citizens (who don't hold Fundamental Rights). If the eclipsing Fundamental Right is later amended away, the shadow lifts and the law becomes enforceable again.
The doctrine was formulated in the Bhikaji case (1955): a 1947 Motor Vehicles Act provision letting the state monopolise motor transport became void in 1950 for violating Article 19(1)(g) — but the 1st Amendment (1951), which widened Article 19(6), lifted the eclipse and made the very same provision valid again.
Does eclipse apply to post-constitution laws too? In Deep Chand (1959) and Mahendra Lal Jain (1962), the Court said no — a post-constitution law violating a Fundamental Right is "still-born," void from inception, and can't be revived by a later amendment (only Article 13(1)'s pre-constitution laws get the eclipse treatment). But in Ambica Mills (1974), the Court reversed course: a post-constitution law violating Article 19 remains valid against non-citizens (who hold no Article 19 right to violate), even while void against citizens — and Dulare Lodh (1984) went further still, applying eclipse to a post-constitution law even against citizens.
Doctrines on Legislative Competence I — Territorial Nexus & Pith and Substance
Federal systems inevitably see the Centre's and states' legislative lists overlap — these two doctrines are how courts decide which legislature actually had the power to pass a disputed law.
Doctrine of Territorial Nexus
Tied to Article 245: Parliament can legislate for all of India and even extra-territorially (covering Indian citizens/property anywhere in the world); a State Legislature normally cannot legislate beyond its own state — except where there is a sufficient nexus between the state and the object being regulated. Pre-constitution courts applied this to income-tax disputes (the Raleigh, Wadia and Wallace cases). Post-constitution, R.M.D. Chamarbaugwalla (1957) — on a gambling tax — set the modern test: the nexus must be real, not illusory, and the tax liability must be relevant to that nexus; TISCO (1958) extended this to sales tax, and NTPC (2002) reaffirmed it.
The doctrine reaches beyond tax law too: Charusila Dasi (1959) let Bihar legislate on a charitable trust with property partly in West Bengal, and Shrikant (1994) let Gujarat count a person's out-of-state agricultural land toward its own land-ceiling law. Two exceptions exist: a state's inter-state transport scheme under the central Motor Vehicles Act, and a state's trade/business under Article 298 — in Khazan Singh (1973), the Court upheld a UP inter-state bus-route scheme and held state trade under Article 298 need not stay within the state's own borders.
Doctrine of Pith and Substance
Tied to Article 246 and the Seventh Schedule's three lists: if a law incidentally touches a subject outside the enacting legislature's own list, it stays valid so long as its "pith and substance" — its true nature and character, looked at as a whole — falls within that legislature's own domain. The doctrine originated with the Privy Council, deciding federal-competence appeals from Canada and Australia, before India adopted it. Its founding case, Prafulla Kumar (1947), upheld a Bengal law on "money-lending" (a state subject) even though it incidentally touched "promissory notes" (a central subject) — since clear demarcation between Federal and Provincial powers is impossible, and the true question is always what the law's pith and substance actually is.
Case (Year) | Supreme Court Judgement |
State of Bombay v. F.N. Balsara (1951) | Upheld the Bombay Prohibition Act, 1950 despite a Union List challenge |
D.N. Banerji v. P.R. Mukherjee (1952) | Upheld the Industrial Disputes Act's application to municipalities, despite a 'local government' (State List) challenge |
State of Rajasthan v. G. Chawla (1958) | Upheld a Rajasthan law restricting sound amplifiers, despite a 'broadcasting' (Union List) challenge |
State of Gujarat v. Shantilal Mangaldas (1969) | Held pith and substance decides legislative competence only — it is wholly irrelevant to whether a law violates a Fundamental Right |
M. Ismail Faruqui v. Union of India (1994) | Upheld the Ayodhya land-acquisition Act as, in pith and substance, about 'acquisition of property' (Concurrent List), not 'public order' (already covered in this playlist's Landmark Judgements article) |
Zameer Ahmed Latifur Rehman Sheikh v. State of Maharashtra (2010) | Upheld the Maharashtra Control of Organised Crime Act, 1999 despite a Union List challenge |
Doctrines on Legislative Competence II — Colourable Legislation & Implied Powers
These two doctrines run in opposite directions — one strips away a disguise to expose incompetence; the other reads a genuine grant of power generously enough to make it actually workable.
Doctrine of Colourable Legislation
Built on the maxim "you cannot do indirectly what you cannot do directly": a law that appears within a legislature's competence but is, in substance, outside it — an attempt to achieve indirectly what could not be achieved directly — is void. What matters is the law's substance, never its outward "colour" or form. Crucially, the doctrine involves no question of bona fides or mala fides — it is purely a question of legislative competence; if the legislature is competent, its motives are irrelevant, and if it isn't, motive doesn't save it either.
Colourable legislation is also called "fraud on the Constitution" — a picturesque way of saying a legislature is pretending to act within its power while it isn't. This is distinct from "fraud on legislative power": the latter is when a legislature genuinely has a power but merely pretends to have exercised it (so, in law, no valid Act exists at all); the former is when a legislature has no power at all yet enacts a law pretending otherwise.
Case (Year) | Supreme Court Judgement |
State of Bihar v. Kameshwar Singh (1952) | Invalidated the Bihar Land Reforms Act, 1950 — its compensation clause was a pretension, not a reality |
K.C. Gajapati Narayan Deo v. State of Orissa (1953) | Upheld the Orissa Agricultural Income Tax (Amendment) Act, 1950 as within the State Legislature's genuine competence |
K.T. Moopil Nair v. State of Kerala (1960) | Struck down the Travancore-Cochin Land Tax Act, 1955 as confiscatory, violating Articles 14 and 19(1)(f) |
M.R. Balaji v. State of Mysore (1962) | Struck down a state order reserving 68% of educational seats for backward classes as a fraud on the Constitution, violating Article 15(4) |
Doctrine of Implied Powers
Built on the maxim "whoever grants a thing is deemed also to grant that without which the grant would be of no effect": when a statute confers a duty or power on an authority, it implicitly also grants whatever auxiliary power is genuinely indispensable to actually exercise it — otherwise the statute would be a dead letter.
The Supreme Court has applied this in several cases: Gopal Chandra Misra (1978) — a High Court judge has an implied power under Article 217 to revoke a resignation even after it is received; Rupa Ashok Hurra (2002) — the Supreme Court has an implied (inherent) power to reconsider even its own final judgments, via a "curative petition" after a review petition is dismissed, to cure a gross miscarriage of justice; Raja Ram Pal (2007) — Parliament has an implied power under Article 105 to expel its own members for contempt; Salil Sabhlok (2013) — a Governor's Article 316 power to appoint State Public Service Commission members implies the power to also lay down the procedure for those appointments.
Its opposite, the doctrine of implied prohibition ("express mention of one thing implies exclusion of another"), applies in the USA and Australia, where only the Centre's powers are enumerated and residuary powers implicitly belong to the states. It does not apply in India, since both the Union's and the states' powers (List I/II/III) are separately enumerated, with the residuary power explicitly given to Parliament.
Doctrines on Legislative Competence III — Incidental/Ancillary Powers & Occupied Field
The last pair of legislative-competence doctrines answer two related questions: how far does an expressly granted power stretch, and what happens when the Centre and a state both try to legislate on the very same Concurrent List subject?
Doctrine of Incidental and Ancillary Powers
Every legislative power the Seventh Schedule expressly grants also carries the incidental or ancillary power genuinely necessary to exercise it — called "necessary and proper" powers in the USA. Entries shouldn't be read narrowly: the power to tax includes the power to check tax evasion, and the power to legislate on rent collection includes the power to legislate on rent remission. But this reading has real limits — the power to levy tax does not extend to a power to confiscate goods, and the doctrine can never be stretched to cover a subject the Constitution has already listed separately (the State List's "betting and gambling" entry doesn't carry an implied power to tax betting and gambling, since that is its own separate entry).
Case (Year) | Supreme Court Judgement |
Chaturbhuj v. Union of India (1959) | The power to impose tax includes the power to raise revenue via a licence fee |
Rai Ramkrishna v. State of Bihar (1963) | The power to legislate on a subject includes power to validly re-enact a law retrospectively after it was struck down |
Pathumma v. State of Kerala (1978) | The power to legislate on agricultural indebtedness includes power to legislate on relief for debts already paid via forced property sale |
State of Haryana v. Sant Lal (1993) | The power to levy sales tax cannot be stretched to include merely transporting goods |
Godfrey Phillips India Ltd. v. State of U.P. (2005) | The power to impose a tax includes all events concerning that tax, unless the event is separately listed elsewhere |
Doctrine of Occupied Field & Repugnancy
Once Parliament legislates on a subject and "occupies the field," a State Legislature loses the authority to legislate on that same field — this "covered field" doctrine is relevant only for the Concurrent List (List I subjects are already exclusively Parliament's, and List II subjects already exclusively the states', so there is no "occupation" question there at all). It flows from Article 254, which resolves inconsistency between a parliamentary and a state law on a Concurrent List matter: the parliamentary law prevails, and the state law is void to the extent of the conflict.
Repugnancy is assessed on three principles — is there a direct conflict; did Parliament intend its law to be an exhaustive code replacing the state Act; and do both laws occupy the same field — refined into four tests: the provisions must be genuinely irreconcilable; there is no implied repeal unless the inconsistency is facial; if both laws can operate together without collision, there is no repugnancy; and if the state law merely creates distinct, separate offences without contradicting the central law, again there is no repugnancy.
Article 254 carries one exception: if a state law was reserved for the President's consideration and received assent, it prevails in that state even over a conflicting parliamentary law — though Parliament can still later override it by legislating on the same matter again. And repugnancy questions outside the Concurrent List (a List II law overlapping List I or III) aren't decided under Article 254 at all — they're resolved through Article 246(1)'s non-obstante clause, under which Union legislation simply predominates.
Doctrines on Judicial Method — Precedent & Prospective Overruling
Two doctrines govern not what a law says, but how courts themselves are bound to behave when deciding cases and, occasionally, deliberately reshaping the law.
Doctrine of Precedent (Stare Decisis)
An English doctrine — stare decisis et non quieta movere, "to stand by decisions and not disturb what is settled" — under which lower courts are bound by higher courts' decisions. In India, this is constitutionally entrenched in Article 141: the law the Supreme Court declares binds every court in the country. A High Court judgment that refuses to follow the Supreme Court, or that revives a High Court decision the Supreme Court had already set aside, is a nullity.
The rationale is consistency: in a hierarchical court system, someone must have the "last word," and that word must be loyally accepted by every tier below — otherwise, contradictory rulings on identical facts produce not harmony but "judicial anarchy." As the Court itself put it, its "judgments are decisional between litigants but declaratory for the nation" — and stare decisis "is not a ritual of convenience but a rule with limited exceptions," yielding only where a question is of truly fundamental importance or where later reasoning shows the earlier view was plainly wrong.
Doctrine of Prospective Overruling
An American doctrine, first applied in India in the Golak Nath case (1967) (already covered in this playlist's Landmark Judgements article): when a court overrules an earlier precedent, it can confine the new ruling to future transactions only, leaving past transactions undisturbed. In Golak Nath, the Court held Parliament could no longer amend Fundamental Rights from that date forward — but let the 1st, 4th and 17th Amendments, already made under the old rule, continue to stand.
The Court grounded this in Articles 32, 141 and 142, framed broadly enough to let it "formulate legal doctrines to meet the ends of justice," and laid down three limiting propositions: the doctrine applies only to matters arising under the Constitution; only the Supreme Court (not any other court) can invoke it; and the exact scope of retroactivity is left entirely to the Court's own discretion. Even though Golak Nath's actual holding was later overruled by Kesavananda Bharati (1973), the doctrine of prospective overruling itself survived and has been reused since — including to postpone, by five years, the operation of the Mandal judgment, Indra Sawhney (1992) (already covered in this playlist's Landmark Judgements article), and in Karunakar (1993), where its benefit was confined only to pending cases, not already-closed ones.
Doctrines on Constitutional Interpretation — Harmonious, Literal, Purposive & Creative
The final cluster addresses the most fundamental question of all: what kind of reading should a court give the Constitution's own words?
Doctrine of Harmonious Construction
When two constitutional provisions appear to conflict, courts should interpret them so both can operate, rather than let one cancel out the other — reading the Constitution as a coherent whole the framers never intended to be internally contradictory. The Court has used this doctrine to reconcile Fundamental Rights with Directive Principles, different Fundamental Rights with each other, Fundamental Rights with legislative privileges, and overlapping entries across the Seventh Schedule's three lists.
Case (Year) | Supreme Court Judgement |
Sri Venkataramana Devaru v. State of Mysore (1957) | A religious denomination's Article 26(b) right to manage its own affairs is subject to Article 25(2)(b) |
M.S.M. Sharma v. Krishna Sinha (1958) | Article 19(1)(a)'s free speech must be read subject to a legislature's Article 194(3) privileges |
O.N. Mohindroo v. Bar Council of Delhi (1968) | Parliament alone can legislate on Supreme Court/High Court practitioners; other practitioners fall under the Concurrent List |
D.A.V. College v. State of Punjab (1971) | No state can prescribe a medium of instruction for higher education if it conflicts with Parliament's Union List power |
Kesavananda Bharati v. State of Kerala (1973) | Held that 'law' in Article 13(2) means only ordinary laws, not constitutional amendments under Article 368 (already covered in this playlist's Landmark Judgements article) |
Literal, Purposive & Creative Interpretation
Literal interpretation (also called strict or positivist construction) reads the Constitution's words in their plain, ordinary, grammatical sense — nothing read in for a "supposed spirit," policy, or to fix a drafting gap; courts cannot invent a limitation the text itself doesn't contain.
Purposive interpretation asks instead what purpose a provision was meant to serve, using the Preamble and Constituent Assembly Debates as guides to the framers' intent — the Constitution read as "a living and vibrant organism" serving current societal needs, not construed narrowly or pedantically.
Creative interpretation goes further still: courts actively evolving genuinely new concepts to meet changing needs. The book gives two landmark illustrations — Golak Nath (1967), which imported the doctrine of prospective overruling into India for the first time, and Kesavananda Bharati (1973), which invented the basic structure doctrine itself, regarded as the high-water mark of Indian judicial creativity (both already covered in this playlist's Landmark Judgements article).
Further Reading
Standard NCERT-level texts and reference books on the Indian Constitution and Polity (any UPSC reading list).
The full text of each judgment is available on the Supreme Court of India website and on Indian Kanoon.
Why UPSC Asks This
Each doctrine has a precise, distinguishing one-line test — don't let severability, waiver and eclipse blur together just because all three trace back to Article 13.
Colourable legislation and implied powers are commonly confused with their near-namesakes — "fraud on legislative power" is not "fraud on the Constitution," and "implied prohibition" is the opposite of, and does not apply alongside, "implied powers" in India.
The occupied-field/repugnancy doctrine applies strictly to the Concurrent List — a List II versus List I/III conflict is resolved differently, via Article 246(1), not Article 254.
Test Yourself: Practice Questions & PYQs
Important Doctrines of Constitutional Law practice — the survival-of-laws doctrines (severability, waiver, eclipse), the legislative-competence doctrines (territorial nexus, pith and substance, colourable legislation, implied powers, incidental/ancillary powers, occupied field/repugnancy), and the judicial-method and interpretation doctrines (precedent, prospective overruling, harmonious/literal/purposive/creative interpretation). Then Prelims-pattern PYQs.
Practice Questions
Q1. The doctrine of severability is primarily based on which Article of the Constitution?
(a) Article 141
(b) Article 12
(c) Article 13
(d) Article 32
Show answer
Answer: (c) — Article 13, through its Clauses (1) and (2) on pre- and post-constitution laws, is the basis of the doctrine of severability.
Q2. Is the doctrine of waiver, which allows a person to voluntarily give up a right, applicable to Fundamental Rights in India?
(a) Only for Article 21 rights
(b) Only with prior court permission
(c) Yes, exactly as in the USA
(d) No — India follows a doctrine of non-waiver of Fundamental Rights
Show answer
Answer: (d) — Unlike the USA, Indian citizens cannot waive their Fundamental Rights; the Supreme Court has held these rights exist as a matter of public policy, not merely individual benefit.
Q3. The doctrine of eclipse was first formulated by the Supreme Court in which case?
(a) A.K. Gopalan case (1950)
(b) Bhikaji case (1955)
(c) Deep Chand case (1959)
(d) Kesavananda Bharati case (1973)
Show answer
Answer: (b) — The Bhikaji case (1955) formulated the doctrine of eclipse, involving a Motor Vehicles Act provision that became valid again after the 1st Amendment widened Article 19(6).
Q4. According to Deep Chand (1959) and Mahendra Lal Jain (1962), the doctrine of eclipse applies to:
(a) Neither pre- nor post-constitution laws
(b) Both pre- and post-constitution laws equally
(c) Only post-constitution laws
(d) Only pre-constitution laws under Article 13(1), not post-constitution laws under Article 13(2)
Show answer
Answer: (d) — These cases held eclipse applies only to pre-constitution laws (Article 13(1)); a post-constitution law violating Fundamental Rights is 'still-born' and void from inception — though Ambica Mills (1974) later qualified this.
Q5. The doctrine of territorial nexus is most closely tied to which Article of the Constitution?
(a) Article 246
(b) Article 245
(c) Article 300-A
(d) Article 254
Show answer
Answer: (b) — Article 245 deals with the territorial extent of laws made by Parliament and State Legislatures, forming the basis of the territorial nexus doctrine.
Q6. The doctrine of pith and substance was originally evolved by which body, before being adopted in India?
(a) The Privy Council, in appeals from Canada and Australia
(b) The Federal Court of India
(c) The Constituent Assembly
(d) The United Nations
Show answer
Answer: (a) — The Privy Council developed the doctrine while deciding legislative-competence appeals from the Canadian and Australian federations, before it was adopted in India.
Q7. The doctrine of colourable legislation is also known by which alternative name?
(a) Doctrine of implied powers
(b) Doctrine of severability
(c) Doctrine of fraud on the Constitution
(d) Doctrine of occupied field
Show answer
Answer: (c) — Colourable legislation is also called 'fraud on the Constitution' — a legislature pretending to act within its power while it is not.
Q8. In Rupa Ashok Hurra v. Ashok Hurra (2002), the Supreme Court held that it has an implied power to:
(a) Appoint State Public Service Commission members
(b) Expel members of Parliament
(c) Revoke a judge's resignation
(d) Reconsider even its own final judgments through a curative petition
Show answer
Answer: (d) — Rupa Ashok Hurra recognised the Supreme Court's inherent power to allow a curative petition, to cure a gross miscarriage of justice even after a review petition is dismissed.
Q9. According to the doctrine of incidental and ancillary powers, the power to levy a tax includes the power to check tax evasion, but does NOT include the power to:
(a) Confiscate goods
(b) Impose the tax retrospectively after a court strikes it down
(c) Cover all events concerning that tax
(d) Raise revenue through a licence fee
Show answer
Answer: (a) — The book explicitly notes the power to levy tax cannot be stretched to include a power to confiscate goods — the doctrine has real limits.
Q10. The doctrine of occupied field, flowing from Article 254, is relevant specifically to which legislative list?
(a) All three lists equally
(b) The State List only
(c) The Concurrent List
(d) The Union List only
Show answer
Answer: (c) — Since Union List and State List subjects are already exclusively assigned, the 'occupied field' question arises only for Concurrent List entries, where both Parliament and states can legislate.
Q11. The doctrine of precedent, under which the Supreme Court's declared law binds all courts in India, is entrenched in which Article?
(a) Article 141
(b) Article 32
(c) Article 136
(d) Article 142
Show answer
Answer: (a) — Article 141 declares that the law declared by the Supreme Court shall be binding on all courts within India.
Q12. The doctrine of prospective overruling was first applied in India in which case?
(a) Golak Nath case (1967)
(b) Kesavananda Bharati case (1973)
(c) Shankari Prasad case (1951)
(d) Minerva Mills case (1980)
Show answer
Answer: (a) — The Golak Nath case (1967) first applied the American doctrine of prospective overruling in India, confining its new ruling to future transactions only.
UPSC Previous Year Questions (PYQs)
Pattern: precise one-line tests distinguishing near-identical doctrines (eclipse's dormancy versus outright voidness; colourable legislation's competence-only focus versus implied prohibition's inapplicability in India); which Article grounds which doctrine; and the specific multi-element tests (territorial nexus's two elements, repugnancy's tests).
Q13. Consider the following statements: (1) The doctrine of prospective overruling was first applied in India in the Golak Nath case. (2) This doctrine originated in the United States. Which of the statements given above is/are correct?
(a) Neither 1 nor 2
(b) 1 only
(c) 2 only
(d) Both 1 and 2
Show answer
Answer: (d) — Both are correct — prospective overruling is an American doctrine, first applied in India by the Supreme Court in Golak Nath (1967).
Q14. Consider the following statements regarding the doctrine of eclipse: (1) A pre-constitution law inconsistent with a Fundamental Right becomes void from its very inception. (2) Such a law becomes only inoperative or dormant from the date the Constitution commences, and may revive if the relevant Fundamental Right is later amended. Which of the statements given above is/are correct?
(a) 2 only
(b) Both 1 and 2
(c) Neither 1 nor 2
(d) 1 only
Show answer
Answer: (a) — Only statement 2 is correct — the doctrine of eclipse specifically holds that such a law is not void from inception, only dormant, and can revive if the constitutional obstacle is removed.
Q15. Consider the following statements: (1) The doctrine of colourable legislation does not involve any question of the legislature's bona fides or mala fides. (2) The doctrine of implied prohibition is applicable in India, just as it is in the USA and Australia. Which of the statements given above is/are correct?
(a) 1 only
(b) 2 only
(c) Both 1 and 2
(d) Neither 1 nor 2
Show answer
Answer: (a) — Only statement 1 is correct — colourable legislation is purely a question of legislative competence, not motive; but the doctrine of implied prohibition does NOT apply in India, since both Union and state powers are separately enumerated.
Q16. Consider the following statements regarding the doctrine of harmonious construction: (1) In Kesavananda Bharati, the Court held that 'law' under Article 13(2) does not include constitutional amendments under Article 368. (2) In M.S.M. Sharma v. Krishna Sinha, the Court held that Article 19(1)(a)'s freedom of speech must be read subject to a legislature's privileges under Article 194(3). Which of the statements given above is/are correct?
(a) Both 1 and 2
(b) 2 only
(c) Neither 1 nor 2
(d) 1 only
Show answer
Answer: (a) — Both are correct — both are examples of the Supreme Court reconciling apparently conflicting constitutional provisions.
Q17. Consider the following statements regarding the doctrine of territorial nexus, as laid down in R.M.D. Chamarbaugwalla v. Union of India (1957): (1) The nexus between the state and the object of the law must be real and not illusory. (2) The liability sought to be imposed must be relevant to that nexus. Which of the statements given above is/are correct?
(a) Neither 1 nor 2
(b) 1 only
(c) Both 1 and 2
(d) 2 only
Show answer
Answer: (c) — Both are correct — these are the two elements the Supreme Court laid down for assessing sufficiency of territorial nexus.
Q18. Consider the following statements regarding the doctrine of pith and substance: (1) It was first applied within India itself, without precedent from any other country. (2) It was evolved by the Privy Council through appeals from the Canadian and Australian federations, and later adopted in India. Which of the statements given above is/are correct?
(a) 2 only
(b) Neither 1 nor 2
(c) 1 only
(d) Both 1 and 2
Show answer
Answer: (a) — Only statement 2 is correct — the doctrine has a pre-Indian pedigree, evolved by the Privy Council in Canadian and Australian federal disputes before India adopted it.
Mains Practice Questions
Use these to frame full-length answers. You don't have to answer one exactly — they show the angles UPSC tests, so let them guide which points you cover.
Distinguish between the doctrines of severability, waiver and eclipse, with reference to their basis in Article 13 and relevant case law.
Discuss the doctrine of pith and substance and examine how it has been applied by Indian courts to resolve legislative-competence disputes.
Distinguish between the doctrine of colourable legislation ('fraud on the Constitution') and the doctrine of 'fraud on legislative power.'
Examine the doctrine of occupied field and the tests the Supreme Court has laid down for determining repugnancy between a parliamentary law and a state law under Article 254.
Discuss the doctrine of prospective overruling, its origin in the Golak Nath case, and its subsequent application in Indian constitutional law.
'The doctrine of harmonious construction reflects the Constitution's own internal coherence.' Discuss with examples of its application by the Supreme Court.