Hon’ble Minister Mr.Ravi Shankar Prasad is trying to be clever by half when he suggests to let the Nation to debate the Preamble. May be the use of the watermark of the original Preamble in the Republic Day advertisements had been innocent, as clarified by his cabinet colleague Mr. Rajyavardhan Rathore. However, innocence should remain a virtue; it should not be allowed to be used to stoke up a controversy.
It is true that the Founding Fathers of the Constitution, in their wisdom and vision, had not included the words “socialist and secular” in the Preamble and the amendment made during Emergency in 1976 had been an overreach. But the present times, post-liberalisation and post-Babri Masjid and Godhra riots, are different; any debate amounts to a negotiation.
