Indian Politics Questions and Answers

Answer: B

Correct answer: Government of India Act, 1935

The Government of India Act, 1935 is the single largest source of the Constitution - by some estimates around two thirds of its text derives from it. From it come the federal scheme with a division of powers into three lists, the office of Governor, the structure of the judiciary and of the public service commissions, the emergency provisions, and a great deal of administrative machinery. Much of the wording was carried across directly. The Act was itself the longest piece of legislation the British Parliament had passed, and it had introduced provincial autonomy and elected provincial governments in 1937, so its arrangements were already in working order in 1947 - which is the practical reason so much of it was retained. It served as India’s interim constitution between independence and 1950. The other sources contributed particular features: the United States the Fundamental Rights and judicial review, Ireland the Directive Principles, Britain the parliamentary system, Canada the strong centre, and Australia the Concurrent List. The 1919 Act had introduced dyarchy in the provinces.

Answer: C

Correct answer: Rajasthan

Panchayati Raj was inaugurated at Nagaur in Rajasthan on 2 October 1959 by Jawaharlal Nehru, making it the first state to adopt the system. Andhra Pradesh followed within the same year. It implemented the recommendations of the Balwant Rai Mehta Committee of 1957, which had examined the Community Development Programme, found that it had failed for want of popular participation, and proposed a three-tier structure of democratic decentralisation: the gram panchayat at village level, the panchayat samiti at block level, and the zila parishad at district level. The Ashok Mehta Committee of 1977 later recommended a two-tier structure instead, and the G. V. K. Rao and L. M. Singhvi committees of the 1980s pressed for constitutional status. That came with the 73rd Amendment in 1992, which made the three tiers mandatory for larger states, required elections every five years, and reserved seats for Scheduled Castes, Scheduled Tribes and women.

Answer: B

Correct answer: The Lok Sabha

Article 75(3) provides that the Council of Ministers is collectively responsible to the Lok Sabha - the House directly elected by the people. Collective responsibility has two consequences. The ministry stands or falls together: if the Lok Sabha passes a vote of no confidence, the entire Council must resign, not merely the minister concerned. And every minister is bound to defend cabinet decisions in public regardless of private disagreement; a minister unwilling to do so must resign. This is the mechanism that makes the executive answerable to the legislature, and it is the essential difference between a parliamentary and a presidential system. The Rajya Sabha, though it can question and debate, cannot remove a government - a no-confidence motion lies only in the Lok Sabha, which is why ministers drawn from the Rajya Sabha are still answerable through it. Ministers are also individually responsible to the President under Article 75(2), who holds office during the President’s pleasure in form, though in practice at the Prime Minister’s advice.

Answer: B

Correct answer: Parliament

Article 11 expressly empowers Parliament to regulate the right of citizenship by law, notwithstanding anything in the preceding articles of Part II. Parliament exercised it through the Citizenship Act of 1955. Articles 5 to 10 determine only who was a citizen at the commencement of the Constitution on 26 January 1950; everything since is governed by the Act, which has been amended several times, notably in 1986, 2003 and 2019. The Act provides five modes of acquiring citizenship - birth, descent, registration, naturalisation, and incorporation of territory - and three of losing it: renunciation, termination and deprivation. Citizenship is exclusively a Union subject, appearing in the Union List, which follows from India having single citizenship: there is no citizenship of a state, so no state has any role in regulating it. The requirement for citizenship by birth has been tightened over time; since 2004 at least one parent must be a citizen and neither an illegal migrant.

Answer: A

Correct answer: Kesavananda Bharati v. State of Kerala

The basic structure doctrine was laid down in Kesavananda Bharati v. State of Kerala in 1973, decided by a bench of thirteen judges - the largest ever constituted - by a majority of seven to six. The Court held that Parliament may amend any part of the Constitution, including the Fundamental Rights, but may not alter its basic structure. That structure has never been exhaustively defined, but the elements identified over time include the supremacy of the Constitution, the rule of law, judicial review, separation of powers, federalism, secularism, free and fair elections, and the independence of the judiciary. It reversed the position in Golaknath (1967), which had held that the Fundamental Rights could not be amended at all, and it has since been used to strike down the 39th Amendment, parts of the 42nd in Minerva Mills, and the 99th Amendment establishing a judicial appointments commission. Maneka Gandhi (1978) is the other landmark of the era, transforming the reading of Article 21.

Answer: D

Correct answer: The executive is drawn from and answerable to the legislature

In a parliamentary system the executive is drawn from the legislature and remains collectively responsible to it, so a government that loses the confidence of the House must resign. Powers are fused rather than separated. In a presidential system, as in the United States, the executive is separately elected, is not a member of the legislature, and cannot be removed by it except through impeachment for specified offences. Powers are separated and checked. The other features follow from this. A parliamentary system has a nominal head of state and a real head of government - in India the President and the Prime Minister - whereas a presidential system combines both in one office. A parliamentary executive has no fixed term; a presidential one does. The framers chose the parliamentary model chiefly because India was already familiar with it from the Government of India Acts, and because they valued day-to-day accountability over the stability a fixed term provides.

Answer: C

The Kerala High Court was the first to declare a bandh illegal, in 1997.

It held that a bandh, unlike a hartal or a general strike, coerces citizens into staying away from work and so violates their fundamental rights under Articles 19 and 21. The Supreme Court upheld the ruling the same year.

Answer: A

Correct answer: The first hour of a sitting, when members question ministers

Question Hour is the first hour of a parliamentary sitting, in which members put questions to ministers and ministers are obliged to answer. It is one of the sharpest instruments of executive accountability, and much of the information that reaches the public about administration emerges from it. Questions are of three kinds. A starred question is answered orally and admits supplementary questions, which is where the real scrutiny happens. An unstarred question receives a written answer and no supplementaries. A short notice question concerns an urgent matter and may be asked at less than ten days’ notice. It is immediately followed by Zero Hour, an Indian innovation not found in the rules of procedure: from noon, members raise matters of urgent public importance without prior notice. The name arose because it begins at twelve o’clock. Question Hour can be suspended by the presiding officer, and its suspension is usually contested by the opposition for that reason.

Answer: C

Correct answer: Six weeks of its reassembly

An ordinance issued under Article 123 ceases to operate at the expiry of six weeks from the reassembly of Parliament, unless approved by both Houses before then. If the two Houses reassemble on different dates, the six weeks run from the later. The President may promulgate one only when at least one House is not in session and only if satisfied that circumstances require immediate action. An ordinance has the same force as an Act, and is subject to the same limitations - Parliament could not have enacted it, neither can it be made by ordinance. The President acts on the advice of the Council of Ministers, so the power is in practice the government’s. Its repeated re-promulgation to avoid legislative scrutiny was condemned by the Supreme Court in D. C. Wadhwa in 1987 and held unconstitutional in Krishna Kumar Singh in 2017, the Court calling it a fraud on the Constitution. Governors have a corresponding power under Article 213.

Answer: A

Correct answer: Article 315

Article 315 provides for a Public Service Commission for the Union and one for each state, and Articles 315 to 323 govern their composition, powers and independence. The UPSC conducts examinations for appointment to the all-India and central services, advises on recruitment rules, promotions, transfers and disciplinary matters, and submits an annual report to the President which is laid before Parliament together with reasons for any advice not accepted. Its advice is advisory only and not binding, which has been criticised. Its independence is protected in the manner familiar from other constitutional offices: members are appointed by the President, hold office for six years or until 65, can be removed only by the President on the ground of misbehaviour after a Supreme Court inquiry, and their conditions of service cannot be varied to their disadvantage. The other articles named cover the Election Commission (324), the Finance Commission (280) and the Comptroller and Auditor General (148).