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Political Science (Organisation and Institutions)
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B.A. LL.B. (Five Years) · Sem 2
2019 Jun Examination
munotes.in
Mumbai
B.A. LL.B. (Five Years) Sem 2 Political Science (Organisation and Institutions) 2019 Jun Question Paper with Solutions
First published on munotes.in on 21 October 2026.
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The question paper reproduced here is the paper as set by Karnataka State Law University at the 2019 Jun examination.
Contents
The questions below are the paper as Karnataka State Law University set it at the 2019 Jun examination, in the order it was set.
MarksPage
MarksPage
The Paper as Set
The questions in this volume are the questions asked at the 2019 Jun examination, reproduced as Karnataka State Law University set them, in the order it set them. Long reading passages are shortened to their first and last lines and our summary; the original paper prints them in full. Only the answers are ours. See the original question paper.
Duration 3 hours · Total marks 80 · 20 questions answered
Instructions printed on the paper
- N.B. (1) Answer all five Units. (2) One essay type question and short note is compulsory from each Unit. (3) Figures to the Right indicate marks. (4) Answer should be written either in English or Kannada completely.
How to use this volume
Solve the paper first, under exam conditions and against the clock. Then read the answers here and mark your own. Reading a solution before attempting the question feels productive and teaches very little, because recognising an answer is not the same as being able to write one.
Q1
Unit I
(a)Define Constitution. Explain briefly the types of Constitution.[10]
Answer
For full marks, cover: the meaning of the word and three or four standard definitions; why every state has a constitution; the kinds, explained one by one (written and unwritten, enacted and evolved, rigid and flexible, by source, and Maine's historical and a priori); examples, with the Indian Constitution placed in the scheme; and a conclusion.
Meaning of the term
In political science a constitution is the body of fundamental rules by which a state is organised and governed. It says who holds power and how that power is shared between the organs of government. It also says how power is to be used, and what rights the people keep against it.
Garner sums up the settled modern meaning in one line. A constitution is "the body of fundamental law, either written or customary, which has to do with the organization of the state."
Standard definitions
- Sir James Mackintosh: "the body of those written or unwritten fundamental laws which regulate the most important rights of the higher magistrates and the most essential privileges of the subjects."
- Judge Cooley: "the body of rules and maxims in accordance with which the powers of sovereignty are habitually exercised."
- Bryce: those rules or laws "which determine the form of its government and the respective rights and duties of it toward its citizens and of the citizens toward the government."
- Borgeaud: "the fundamental law according to which the government of a state is organized and agreeably to which the relations of individuals or moral persons to the community are determined."
Two ideas run through all four. A constitution organises government, and it fixes the relation between government and citizen.
Every state has a constitution
The historian Lecky once called the English constitution "still unformed" in 1660. Garner answers that this cannot be right. Following Schulze, he says every community that is a state must have a set of norms that fixes the legal relation between rulers and subjects. In his words, "the state, in short, is unthinkable without a constitution of some kind". It may be rough and imperfect, but it is always there.
The kinds of constitution
1. Written and unwritten. A written constitution is one whose main rules are set down in a formally enacted document. Garner calls it "a work of conscious art". The constitutions of the United States and India are examples. An unwritten constitution is one whose main rules were never collected in one document. It rests on customs, conventions, court decisions and scattered statutes. Britain is the standard example. Bryce describes it as "a mass of precedents" mixed with statutes and covered with "a parasitic growth of legal decisions and political habits". The saying that constitutions "grow instead of being made" fits this kind.
2. Enacted and evolved. This is the same contrast seen through origin. An enacted (conventional) constitution is made by an assembly or a ruler at a fixed date. An evolved (cumulative) constitution grows slowly through usage and has no starting date.
3. Rigid and flexible. Bryce proposed this as the more useful test, because it looks at how the constitution stands to ordinary law. A flexible constitution has no higher legal status than an ordinary law and is changed in the same way. Britain is the example, because Parliament can change any rule by an ordinary Act. A rigid constitution stands above ordinary law and can be changed only by a special, harder procedure. The United States is the example: an amendment needs two-thirds of both Houses of Congress and ratification by three-fourths of the States (Article V).
4. By source. Garner classifies constitutions by who made them:
- charters granted by a king to his subjects, such as the French charter of Louis XVIII in 1814;
- constitutions framed by an ordinary legislature;
- constitutions framed by a constituent assembly chosen for the purpose, such as those of the United States (1787) and India (1949).
5. Historical and a priori. Sir Henry Maine divided constitutions into historical ones, built up from experience, and a priori ones, "founded on speculative assumptions remote from experience". The British constitution is historical. The French constitutions of the 1790s were a priori. Garner notes that the a priori kind often failed because it broke with the nation's past.
6. By the share of the people. Older writers also classed constitutions as monarchical, aristocratic or democratic, according to how far the people take part in government.
| Basis | Kinds | Example |
|---|---|---|
| Form | Written / unwritten | USA, India / Britain |
| Origin | Enacted / evolved | USA / Britain |
| Method of change | Rigid / flexible | USA / Britain |
| Source | Royal grant / legislature / constituent assembly | France 1814 / India 1949 |
| Basis of design | A priori / historical | France 1791 / Britain |
The limits of the classification
Garner warns that "written" and "unwritten" differ in degree, not in kind. Every written constitution gathers custom and judicial interpretation. Bryce says such constitutions become "developed by interpretation, fringed with decisions, and enlarged by custom". Every unwritten constitution has a large written part, such as Magna Carta and the Bill of Rights in Britain. That is why Bryce preferred the rigid and flexible test.
Where India stands
India has a written and enacted constitution, framed by a Constituent Assembly. By method of change it is a mix. Most provisions need a special majority of each House of Parliament under article 368(2). Some federal provisions also need ratification by half the State Legislatures. A few matters, such as forming a new State by a law under article 3, are changed by an ordinary law. Article 4 says such a law is not an amendment for the purposes of article 368. So India is partly rigid and partly flexible.
India also shows that even a rigid constitution has limits on change. In Kesavananda Bharati v. State of Kerala, AIR 1973 SC 1461, the petitioner challenged the Kerala land reform laws and three constitutional amendments. Thirteen judges sat. By seven to six they held that Parliament's power under article 368 is wide, but it does not extend to altering the "basic structure or framework of the Constitution". The case matters here because it shows that a written constitution can protect its own core even against its own amending body.
Conclusion. A constitution is the fundamental law, written or customary, that organises the state and fixes the rights of citizens against government. Every state has one. Constitutions are classed as written or unwritten, enacted or evolved, rigid or flexible, by their source, and as historical or a priori. The rigid and flexible test is the most useful, because written and unwritten differ only in degree. India's Constitution is written and enacted, and it is partly rigid and partly flexible, with a basic structure that even amendment cannot destroy.
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