Comparison with Other Constitutional Schemes

The United States turned 250 in July 2026, and our Constitution turned 75 in January 2025. Both are durable democracies, built on different tenets.

Tenets they share

Popular sovereignty and a written constitution: Both open with "We the People" and treat the constitution as supreme law above every organ of the state.

Judicial review: America's court claimed it in Marbury v. Madison (1803), while India wrote it into Articles 13 and 32 and added the basic structure doctrine.

Rights and the rule of law: The Bill of Rights and Part III both restrain the state through independent courts.

Tenets that differ

Separation or fusion of powers: The American President has a fixed term and faces no confidence vote. India's executive survives only while it keeps the confidence of the Lok Sabha.

Federalism: America is an indestructible union of indestructible states. India is a union of destructible states, since Article 3 let Parliament reorganise Jammu and Kashmir in 2019.

Citizenship: Americans hold dual citizenship of nation and state, while Indians hold a single citizenship.

Nature of rights: American rights are largely limits on government. India adds Directive Principles of State Policy, which commit the state to social and economic justice.

Secularism: America keeps a wall of separation between church and state. India follows principled distance, which permits reform such as abolishing untouchability under Article 17.

Amendment: America has only 27 amendments and India over a hundred, though the basic structure limits Parliament.

The two share a liberal core of consent, rights and judicial review. They differ because America designed its government to restrain power, while India designed its government to use power for social change.

Decode

Examine the basic tenets of two political systems. The word tenets asks for founding principles, not a list of institutions.

Implicit demand

A pure contrast misses half the question, because the two systems share a liberal core. The answer should show both what is common and what differs, and explain why.

Architecture

A current hook of anniversaries → shared tenets → differing tenets across powers, federalism, citizenship, rights, secularism and amendment → verdict on design philosophy.

Articulation

Anchor: Marbury v. Madison, Articles 3, 13, 17 and 32, the reorganisation of Jammu and Kashmir, 27 American amendments. Money line: America designed its government to restrain power, while India designed its government to use power for social change.

The shared liberal core

Both constitutions derive authority from the people rather than from a monarch or a religious text.

India borrowed judicial review, the idea of a written Bill of Rights and the office of Vice President acting as chair of the upper house from the American model.

The Preamble of our Constitution was inspired partly by the American Preamble, which also begins with "We the People".

Both have independent election bodies at some level, though India's Election Commission is a single constitutional authority while American elections are run by states.

Both allow the removal of top officials by impeachment, under Article 61 in India and Article II in the United States.

The structural contrasts

Presidential system: fixed terms, strict separation, checks and balances such as the presidential veto and Senate confirmation of appointments.

Parliamentary system: collective responsibility under Article 75, a nominal head of state and a real executive drawn from the legislature.

The American Senate gives every state two seats, while our Rajya Sabha allots seats by population.

American states have their own constitutions. In India, only Jammu and Kashmir had one, and it ceased to apply after 2019.

Residuary powers lie with the states in America but with the Union in India under Article 248.

Emergency provisions under Articles 352, 356 and 360 have no American equivalent and reflect Partition era anxieties about unity.

The American Supreme Court's judges are nominated by the President and confirmed by the Senate. Indian judges are chosen by the collegium, after the court struck down the National Judicial Appointments Commission in 2015.

Rights, secularism and amendment

The American doctrine of due process shaped our reading of Article 21 after Maneka Gandhi (1978).

India permits reasonable restrictions on speech under Article 19(2), while American courts protect speech far more broadly under the First Amendment.

Affirmative action in America rests on court rulings and was curtailed for college admissions in 2023. India entrenches reservation in the Constitution itself.

American amendment needs two thirds of Congress and three fourths of the states. India uses three procedures under Article 368, and only some amendments need state ratification.

The basic structure doctrine from Kesavananda Bharati (1973) has no direct American counterpart.

France banned the abaya in state schools in 2023, after earlier bans on religious symbols and the face veil. India took another road.

What India does differently

Principled distance: The state keeps no wall, and may enter religion to secure equality, as Article 17 did against untouchability.

Positive freedom: Article 25 protects the right to profess and practise, so the turban and the hijab are constitutional.

Minority institutions: Articles 29 and 30 let minorities run their own schools, since identity needs institutions.

Reform from within: Temple entry laws and the ban on instant triple talaq reform practice rather than banish it.

Diversity is managed: Personal laws and religious holidays coexist, so citizens need not choose between faith and nation.

France keeps religion out of public space, which pushes visible minorities to the margin. India's lesson is that even handedness serves equality better than invisibility.

Decode

A comparative question. The subject is what France can learn, so the Indian model must be explained in terms that answer a French problem.

Implicit demand

The answer needs the contrast between strict separation and principled distance, and it should stay honest about India's own difficulties.

Architecture

A hook from the French bans → five features of the Indian approach → verdict comparing the two models.

Articulation

Anchor: the abaya ban of 2023, Articles 17, 25, 29 and 30, temple entry reform. Money line: equality is better served by treating faiths even handedly than by making them invisible.

The French model

Laicite derives from the law of 1905 separating church and state, and is a founding value of the Republic.

A law of 2004 barred conspicuous religious symbols in state schools, and a law of 2010 banned the full face veil in public.

The law of 2021 against separatism tightened rules on associations, home schooling and foreign funding of mosques.

The state recognises no community, only citizens, so it does not collect data on religion or ethnicity.

Critics argue that a neutral rule can weigh unequally on a minority whose practice is visible.

The Indian model in the courts

S.R. Bommai (1994) held secularism part of the basic structure.

The essential religious practices test, from the Shirur Mutt case (1954), lets courts decide what faith requires protection for.

Sabarimala (2018) placed equality above custom, and the review is before a larger bench.

The Karnataka hijab case (2022) ended in a split verdict in the Supreme Court and awaits a larger bench.

Shayara Bano (2017) struck down instant triple talaq, after which Parliament criminalised it.

Where India must be honest

State control of temple endowments in several states applies unevenly across faiths.

Communal violence and hate speech test the promise of even handedness more than any law does.

The uniform civil code debate pits Article 44 against the protection of personal laws.

Religious identity in electoral mobilisation strains the neutrality the Constitution expects.

Both countries face the same question: how to keep the state neutral without making believers feel unequal.

The British court struck down a prorogation in 2019, while the Indian court in November 2025 declined to fix timelines for a Governor. Both were drawing one line from opposite ends.

Where they converge

Judicial review has grown: The Human Rights Act, 1998 lets British courts test statutes against rights, which brings them closer to the Indian practice.

A separate apex court: The United Kingdom created a Supreme Court in 2009, ending the judicial role of the House of Lords.

Where they diverge

Sovereignty: Parliament is supreme in Britain, while in India the Constitution is supreme and even amendments fail the basic structure test.

Remedy: A British court can only declare a statute incompatible with rights, whereas an Indian court can strike it down.

Access: Public interest litigation and epistolary jurisdiction have no British parallel.

The two systems are converging in method and diverging in authority. Britain has borrowed the habit of review, while India retains the power to overrule the legislature itself.

Decode

Two lists are asked for, convergence and divergence, and the phrase judicial practices invites method as well as doctrine.

Implicit demand

The examiner expects the sovereignty contrast to anchor the divergence, and the growth of review in Britain to anchor the convergence.

Architecture

A hook pairing two recent rulings → four points of convergence → three of divergence → verdict.

Articulation

Anchor: the prorogation ruling of 2019, the Human Rights Act 1998, the United Kingdom Supreme Court of 2009, the basic structure doctrine. Money line: converging in method and diverging in authority.

Convergence in more detail

The Miller cases of 2017 and 2019 showed British courts reviewing the exercise of prerogative powers.

Britain's Constitutional Reform Act, 2005 separated the judiciary from the legislature and created the Judicial Appointments Commission.

Both systems use judicial review of administrative action on grounds of illegality, irrationality and procedural impropriety.

India's courts cite British cases on natural justice and proportionality, and the exchange runs both ways in commonwealth jurisprudence.

Both face similar debates on court delays, legal aid and the cost of access.

Divergence in more detail

Britain has no codified constitution, so constitutional rules sit in statute, convention and case law.

India's Kesavananda Bharati (1973) placed limits on Parliament's amending power, which has no British equivalent.

Indian judges are appointed by the collegium after the court struck down the National Judicial Appointments Commission in 2015; British judges come through an independent commission.

Article 142 gives the Indian Supreme Court a power to do complete justice, which the court itself limited in the Presidential Reference opinion of November 2025.

The Indian court hears constitutional, criminal, civil and service matters, which contributes to a pendency of about 93,000 cases.

India has an integrated judiciary, while the United Kingdom has separate systems for England and Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland.

What each could learn

India could adopt clearer criteria and published reasons for judicial appointments.

Britain's practice of concise judgments and strict case management addresses the delay India struggles with.

India's public interest jurisdiction has widened access for the poor, though the court itself warned in May 2026 that it is being misused.

Both must balance judicial power against democratic accountability, which is the common theme of recent rulings in each country.