Mill's Influence on the Indian Constitution

In one line

The Indian Constitution takes Mill's structure, freedoms first and restrictions requiring justification, and then permits restrictions on grounds Mill's principle would not allow.

In the wording a student can write in an exam: Mill's influence on the Indian Constitution is structural rather than textual: article 19 confers the freedoms of speech, assembly, association, movement, residence and occupation on all citizens and permits the State to restrict them only by law and only by reasonable restrictions imposed for stated purposes, which places the burden of justification on the State exactly as Mill's principle requires; but the stated purposes include public order, decency or morality, defamation and contempt of court, which are grounds wider than harm to others, so the Constitution adopts Mill's method and departs from his test.

What article 19 actually says

Clause (1) confers on all citizens the right (a) to freedom of speech and expression; (b) to assemble peaceably and without arms; (c) to form associations or unions, and since 2012 co-operative societies; (d) to move freely throughout the territory of India; (e) to reside and settle in any part of the territory of India; and (g) to practise any profession, or to carry on any occupation, trade or business.

Sub-clause (f), the right to acquire, hold and dispose of property, was omitted by the Constitution (Forty-fourth Amendment) Act 1978 with effect from 20 June 1979, and property became a constitutional right under article 300A instead. That removal is itself the classical to modern liberal shift of chapter 580, made in the text.

Clause (2) permits reasonable restrictions on freedom of speech and expression in the interests of the sovereignty and integrity of India, the security of the State, friendly relations with foreign States, public order, decency or morality, or in relation to contempt of court, defamation or incitement to an offence. The words "sovereignty and integrity of India" were inserted by the Sixteenth Amendment in 1963, and the clause as a whole was substituted with retrospective effect by the First Amendment in 1951.

Clause (3) permits reasonable restrictions on assembly in the interests of the sovereignty and integrity of India or public order.

Clause (4) permits reasonable restrictions on association in the interests of the sovereignty and integrity of India, public order or morality.

Clause (5) permits reasonable restrictions on movement and residence in the interests of the general public or for the protection of the interests of any Scheduled Tribe.

Clause (6) permits reasonable restrictions on profession, occupation, trade or business in the interests of the general public.

What is Millian about it

The structure is exactly Mill's. The freedom is stated first and without qualification; the power to restrict is an exception; and the exception must be justified. That is the arrangement Mill's principle demands, and it is not the only arrangement a constitution could have adopted.