Question

what interpretations come out of keshavanandabharat Case

Answer 1

Keshavanand Bharati(KB) vs State of Kerala was a historic case that went into the history as a case that upheld Indian democracy !Before the KB case there was a constant tussle between the Legislature and Judiciary over the amending power of the Parliament. With the Golaknath vs State of Punjab case which declared that Parliament has no power to abrogate any of the fundamental rights. The amending power of the Parliament under Article 368 was curtailed. To overcome this the Parliament enacted 24th constitutional amendment act,which nullified the judgement in the Golaknath case.So the 24thconstitutional amendment made Legislature supreme with unprecedented powers to amend any part of the constitution including the fundamental rights.KB judgement was a landmark ruling by a 13 judge constitutional bench. With a wafer margin of 7:6 the judgmentupheld the 24th constitutional amendment. By this the Parliament’s power to amend any provisions of the constitution including the fundamental rights has been restored.However the court invented a new principle called theBasic structure doctrine which ensures Parliaments amending power is within the basic structure of the constitution and any attempt to tamper with the basic structure will be struck down. But the constitutional bench hadn't defined what constitutes the basic structure. So in succeeding years the judiciary has been interpreting and adding new provisions into the beasic structure doctrine.So any provision/part of the constitution can be amended by the Parliament until it doesn't affect the basic structure doctrine.