KSLU Solved Question Papers
Political Science (State and Political Obligations)
Previous Year Question Paper with Solution
B.A. LL.B. (Five Years) · Sem 3
2019 Jun Examination
munotes.in
Mumbai
B.A. LL.B. (Five Years) Sem 3 Political Science (State and Political Obligations) 2019 Jun Question Paper with Solutions
First published on munotes.in on 21 October 2026.
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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
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 100 · 13 questions answered
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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.
Q1Define obligation. Explain the grounds and kinds of Political Obligation.[16]
Answer
For full marks, cover: obligation in general (its root meaning, its four elements, Hart's line between being obliged and having an obligation, and its kinds: moral, legal, social, religious, political); political obligation defined; its grounds, arranged by where the duty is said to come from (God, strength, time, the citizen's own act, the benefits received, justice and membership, results), each with its weakness; a table of the grounds; the kinds of political obligation (legal and moral, positive and negative, by the person bound, by content, absolute and prima facie); two Indian cases (Union of India v. Association for Democratic Reforms on informed consent, Mohammad Salimullah on the person bound); and a conclusion.
What an obligation is
The word comes from the Latin obligare, "to bind". An obligation is a requirement that binds a person to do, or not to do, something. It is owed to someone, and failure to meet it is a wrong, not just a mistake.
Every obligation has four elements:
- A person bound, the one who owes it;
- A person to whom it is owed, the one who may claim it;
- A content, the act or forbearance required;
- A ground, the reason that makes it binding.
Being obliged and having an obligation
H. L. A. Hart drew a famous line here. A gunman who says "your money or your life" makes the victim obliged to hand over the money. But the victim is not under an obligation to do so. Force can produce compliance. It cannot produce a duty.
This line is the starting point of the whole subject. If the State were only a stronger gunman, people would be obliged to obey it, but would owe it nothing. Political obligation asks whether the State is different, and why.
Kinds of obligation in general
- Moral obligation binds the conscience, such as the duty to tell the truth. Its sanction is guilt and the disapproval of others.
- Legal obligation is imposed by law and enforced by the courts, such as the duty to pay income tax.
- Social obligation arises from membership of a family, caste, club or community, and is enforced by custom and opinion.
- Religious obligation comes from a faith, such as fasting or prayer, and is enforced by belief.
- Political obligation is owed to the State and its lawful government. It is the subject of this question.
Political obligation defined
Political obligation is the moral duty of a member of a political community to obey its laws and support its lawful institutions. It is more than legal duty, because it asks why the law itself deserves obedience. It is also general: it covers the laws of one's own State as a whole, not only the laws one likes.
The grounds of political obligation
The grounds are best arranged by the source each one gives for the duty.
1. From God: divine right
Kings were said to rule by the will of God, so disobeying the king was disobeying God. Its leading defenders were James I of England (James VI of Scotland) and Sir Robert Filmer. Weakness: it rests on a belief not all share, and it cannot say which rival claimant God chose.
2. From strength: the theory of force
The State began in conquest and rests on superior power, so obedience is owed to whoever can compel it. Weakness: this is Hart's gunman again. Might explains compliance, not duty, and it cannot tell a lawful government from an occupying army.
3. From time: prescription
An arrangement that has stood for a very long time may not now be questioned. Edmund Burke appealed to the settled constitution in this way. Weakness: age cannot turn a wrong into a right, or every old injustice would become lawful by lasting.
4. From the citizen's own act: consent
This is the leading modern ground. A person is bound because he agreed.
- Express consent, such as an oath of allegiance taken on naturalisation.
- Tacit consent. Locke held that a person who enjoys property or even travels freely on the highway gives tacit consent to the government.
- Consent through elections. Voting in free elections is a modern sign of agreement to the system.
Weakness: most people were born into their State and never agreed to anything. Hume compared staying in one's country to a man carried aboard a ship while asleep. He could not be said to consent to the master's rule merely because leaving meant leaping into the ocean.
5. From benefits received: gratitude and fair play
Gratitude. The State gives security, courts, roads and schools, and the citizen owes a return. Weakness: gratitude may call for thanks or service, but it does not show why obedience to every law is the return owed.
Fair play. Hart and John Rawls argued from fairness. Where many people obey rules and so produce a common benefit, a person who takes the benefit must also bear the burden. Otherwise he is a free rider on the others. Weakness: Robert Nozick objected that a benefit forced on someone without his acceptance does not bind him.
6. From justice and membership
The natural duty of justice. Rawls also argued that everyone has a natural duty to support just institutions that apply to him. Weakness: it does not explain why the duty runs to one's own State rather than to any just State.
Associative obligation. Ronald Dworkin argued that membership of a community, like membership of a family, carries duties nobody chose. Weakness: it risks saying that whatever a community demands is owed simply because it is one's own.
7. From results: utility and the common good
Utility. Bentham held that subjects should obey "so long as the probable mischiefs of obedience are less than the probable mischiefs of resistance". The common good. T. H. Green held that the State deserves obedience because it maintains the conditions in which people can live a good life. Weakness: if obedience rests only on results, a person must disobey whenever disobedience would do more good.
The grounds at a glance
| Source of the duty | Ground | Main weakness |
|---|---|---|
| God | Divine right | Rests on faith, cannot pick the ruler |
| Strength | Force | Explains compliance, not duty |
| Time | Prescription | Age does not make a wrong right |
| Own act | Consent | Few people ever consented |
| Benefits | Gratitude, fair play | Unasked benefits may not bind |
| Justice, membership | Natural duty, association | Particularity; blind loyalty |
| Results | Utility, common good | Dissolves when breach pays |
Most modern writers conclude that no single ground carries the whole weight. Political obligation rests on several grounds together: consent through elections, fairness to fellow citizens, the justice of the institutions and the common good they serve.
The kinds of political obligation
- Legal and moral. The legal obligation is what the law requires and the courts enforce. The moral obligation is the deeper duty to accept that law as binding.
- Positive and negative. A positive obligation requires action, such as paying taxes or serving on a jury. A negative obligation requires restraint, such as not committing crimes.
- By the person bound. A citizen owes loyalty as well as obedience. An alien owes obedience to the law while in the country, but not allegiance. A minister, a legislator or a judge owes more. Each takes an oath under the Third Schedule to "bear true faith and allegiance to the Constitution of India".
- By content. The obligation may be to obey the law, to be loyal, to defend the country, or to take part in public life. Article 51A lists such fundamental duties for Indian citizens.
- Absolute and prima facie. Divine right theorists treated the obligation as absolute. Most modern writers treat it as prima facie, meaning it holds unless a stronger moral duty outweighs it.
Two Indian cases
Union of India v. Association for Democratic Reforms, (2002) 5 SCC 294. The Association asked for candidates to disclose their criminal records, assets and education. The Supreme Court held that a voter has a right to know a candidate's antecedents under article 19(1)(a). It said casting a vote is itself a form of expression. It directed the Election Commission to require every candidate to file an affidavit with these details. The case bears on the consent ground. Consent through elections means something only if the voter can choose with knowledge.
Mohammad Salimullah v. Union of India, AIR 2021 SC 1789. Rohingya refugees held in Jammu faced deportation to Myanmar, and they sought release. The Supreme Court refused interim relief. It held that articles 14 and 21 protect all persons, citizens or not. But the right not to be deported goes with the right to reside and settle under article 19(1)(e), which only citizens have. It ordered that they not be deported except by the prescribed procedure. The case shows the obligation graded by the person bound. Aliens owe obedience and receive protection, but they do not share every right of citizens.
Conclusion. An obligation is a binding duty with a person bound, a person entitled, a content and a ground. Political obligation is the duty to obey the State. Its grounds run from divine right, force and prescription to consent, fair play, justice and the common good. None is complete alone, so the duty rests on several together and is prima facie, not absolute. It takes legal and moral, positive and negative forms, and it is graded between citizens, aliens and officials, as the two cases show.
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