KSLU Solved Question Papers
Law and Social Transformation in India
Previous Year Question Paper with Solution
LL.M. (Two Years) · Sem 1
2013 Jun Examination
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Mumbai
LL.M. (Two Years) Sem 1 Law and Social Transformation in India 2013 Jun Question Paper with Solutions
First published on munotes.in on 1 November 2026.
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Contents
The questions below are the paper as Karnataka State Law University set it at the 2013 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 2013 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 questions. (2) Figures to the right indicate marks. (3) Answer one essay type and one short note from each Unit
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
(a)The relation between law and social transformation is mutual and multilinear. Discuss.[10]
Answer
For full marks, cover: the two words of the statement ("mutual": law and society act on each other; "multilinear": change runs along many lines, not one road, after Julian Steward's "multilinear evolution" set against the single-path theories of Comte, Spencer and Maine); the two one-way views it rejects (law as mirror: Savigny, Marx; law as master: Bentham); the first line, society moving law (the right to information movement and the RTI Act 2005); the second line, law moving society (article 17, the 73rd Amendment's seats for women); three feedback loops worked through cases (Mohd. Ahmed Khan v. Shah Bano Begum to the 1986 Act to Danial Latifi; Subhash Kashinath Mahajan to the 2018 Amendment to Prathvi Raj Chauhan; Indian Young Lawyers Association and the review reference); the many agents in a table; uneven change; the limits of the thesis; a conclusion.
What the statement means
The statement makes two claims about law and social transformation.
- The relation is mutual. Law and society act on each other. Each is at once a cause and an effect. Social forces press law to change, and a changed law then reshapes social life.
- The relation is multilinear. Change does not travel along one straight road. It moves along many lines at once, through many agents, at different speeds and sometimes in opposite directions.
The word "multilinear" comes from social theory. The nineteenth-century thinkers Auguste Comte and Herbert Spencer saw every society moving along one fixed path of stages. Sir Henry Maine's "from status to contract" (Ancient Law, 1861) also described a single line of legal progress. In 1955 the anthropologist Julian Steward, in Theory of Culture Change: The Methodology of Multilinear Evolution, rejected the single path. He argued that similar pressures produce different outcomes in different settings. Applied to law, the statement says the same: legal change and social change move together, but by many routes.
The two one-way views it rejects
- Law as mirror. Savigny held that law grows out of the spirit of a people (Volksgeist) and follows custom. Marx treated law as part of a superstructure resting on the economic base. On both views law only follows society.
- Law as master. Bentham saw legislation as the engine of reform: a wise lawmaker could reshape society by rewarding and punishing. On this view society follows law.
Both views hold part of the truth. Neither holds all of it. Indian experience shows law sometimes following, sometimes leading, and most often doing both in turn.
The first line: society moves law
The Mazdoor Kisan Shakti Sangathan (MKSS) is a union of workers and peasants in rural Rajasthan. In the early 1990s it began holding public hearings called jan sunwai. At these hearings the accounts of village works were read aloud. Villagers then exposed false muster rolls and fake bills. The demand to see official records spread into the National Campaign for the People's Right to Information, formed in 1996. Several States passed their own laws. Parliament then enacted the Right to Information Act 2005, in force in full from 12 October 2005.
Here society moved first. A local practice became a national demand, and the demand became law.
The second line: law moves society
- Article 17 abolished untouchability and forbade its practice in any form, and made the enforcement of any disability arising out of it an offence punishable in accordance with law. The Untouchability (Offences) Act 1955, renamed the Protection of Civil Rights Act in 1976, followed. Law here ran ahead of a society that still practised exclusion.
- The 73rd Amendment (1992) reserved one-third of panchayat seats for women (article 243D). About 14.5 lakh women now sit in panchayats, about 46 per cent of all elected members. Many of them entered public life only because the law opened the door.
Here law moved first, and social roles began to change behind it.
Where the lines cross: three feedback loops
Facts. In Mohd. Ahmed Khan v. Shah Bano Begum, AIR 1985 SC 945, a Muslim woman was divorced after forty-three years of marriage. She claimed maintenance under section 125 of the Code of Criminal Procedure. The husband said his duty ended with the iddat period and payment of mahr. Held. Section 125 applies to every citizen whatever the religion, and a divorced Muslim wife unable to maintain herself may claim under it. Why it matters. The judgment moved law ahead of community opinion. Strong protest followed, and Parliament passed the Muslim Women (Protection of Rights on Divorce) Act 1986.
Facts. In Danial Latifi v. Union of India, (2001) 7 SCC 740, the 1986 Act was challenged as denying divorced Muslim women the protection every other woman had. Held. The Act was upheld, but read in her favour. The husband must make a reasonable and fair provision for her future, not limited to the iddat period. Why it matters. Court, society and Parliament each acted on the others. The final law reached Shah Bano's result by a winding route. That is a mutual and multilinear process in one story.
Facts. In Subhash Kashinath Mahajan v. State of Maharashtra, (2018) 6 SCC 454, the Supreme Court found misuse of the Scheduled Castes and the Scheduled Tribes (Prevention of Atrocities) Act 1989. It directed a preliminary enquiry before an FIR and an approval before arrest. Held. These directions were issued to prevent false implication. Why it matters. Dalit groups saw the ruling as weakening the Act. A nationwide bandh was held on 2 April 2018, and several people died. Parliament inserted section 18A by the Amendment Act of 17 August 2018 to undo the directions. In October 2019 a three-judge Bench, hearing the Union's review, recalled directions (iii) and (iv), approval before arrest and the preliminary enquiry, and with them direction (v).
Facts. In Prathvi Raj Chauhan v. Union of India, (2020) 4 SCC 727, section 18A was challenged. Held. It was upheld, with a narrow window for anticipatory bail where no prima facie case is made out. Why it matters. A judgment provoked social protest, protest produced a statute, and the Court accepted the statute. Each actor changed the others.
Facts. In Indian Young Lawyers Association v. State of Kerala, (2019) 11 SCC 1, women aged ten to fifty were barred by custom from the Sabarimala temple. Held. By four to one, the exclusion was struck down. Why it matters. Law moved ahead of many devotees, and resistance followed. Review petitions led to a reference of wider questions to a larger Bench in November 2019. A nine-judge Bench began hearing it in April 2026. The line of change is still open.
The many agents at once
| Line of change | Agent | Example |
|---|---|---|
| Constitution | Constituent Assembly, amending Parliament | Article 17; article 243D |
| Statute | Parliament and State legislatures | RTI Act 2005; Muslim Women Act 1986 |
| Judgment | Supreme Court and High Courts | Shah Bano; Prathvi Raj Chauhan |
| Social movement | Unions, Dalit and women's groups | MKSS hearings; the 2018 bandh |
| Administration | Police, panchayats, officials | Enforcement, or its absence |
Uneven change
Multilinear change is also uneven. The same law can transform one region or class and barely touch another. Child marriage has fallen in cities while it persists in parts of rural India, though the law applies to all. Women hold panchayat seats, yet some husbands still act in their name. Change on paper and change in practice move along separate lines.
The limits of the thesis
- Mutual does not mean equal. The State usually holds the strongest hand. Weak groups move law only with great effort.
- Feedback can run backwards. A law that runs too far ahead of society can provoke backlash and a step back, as the 1986 Act first appeared to be.
- Many lines can hide responsibility. When change depends on many agents, each can blame another for failure.
- The thesis describes more than it predicts. It does not say which line will lead in a given case.
Conclusion. The statement is sound. Law and social transformation act on each other: the RTI movement made a law, and article 17 and article 243D remade social roles. The relation is also multilinear, as Steward's idea suggests. Change runs through the Constitution, statutes, courts, movements and administration together, often in loops. Shah Bano and Danial Latifi, Subhash Kashinath Mahajan and Prathvi Raj Chauhan, and the Sabarimala litigation show those loops at work. Its limit is that mutual influence is rarely equal, and the State's line is usually the strongest.
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