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Fundamental Rights, Directive Principles and Fundamental Duties of India

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A good, comprehensive, well-referenced article, which has been FACed once previously (archive), through peer review thrice (1 - 2 - 3). All objections since these reviews have been satisfied. The main concerns of poor style of writing have been corrected solely due to the efforts of users Rama's Arrow and Sundar. See changes done since previous FAC: [1]

--May the Force be with you! Shreshth91($ |-| ŗ 3 $ |-| ţ |-|) 04:21, 9 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]


  • Comments. Rama, sorry to be pernickety, but it's kind of redundant to post "Strong support" when you're one of the two sole contributors, as announced just above. It's a lot better than last time, and congratulations on your work. However, I'd like to see further improvements to the writing during this FAC process. I've copy-edited the lead as an example, and although a few of my changes result from merely personal preferences, many of them were technically necessary.

A few more queries, just from the lead:

  • By "government" and "state" (lower case preferred), are you referring only to the central (New Delhi) government? If the three texts at issue have different scope in this respect, it will need to be explained.
  • So only one of the three texts is legally enforceable. This needs to be fleshed out later in the article. What would happen, for instance, if the central government decided to ignore its obligations under the "Principles": nothing? If so, has their true status been debated in India?
This issue is covered in the "Criticism" section. Yes there is a debate going on about these very issues. Basically the people of India may remedy the situation at election time. Rama's arrow 14:31, 9 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • You might mention in the lead when they were developed and promulgated. In 1947?
  • I'd minimise the number of dictionary-type links: you need to focus your readers on the really important links.
  • There's a slight tendency to be repetitive in the lead (but I haven't checked the rest of the article in this respect).

Tony 10:48, 9 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Replies to Tony:
  • I've added a note to the notes section explaining the use of "state", "State" ad "govt."
  • explained above
  • there is a whole separates section on "Genesis" explaining promulgation; redundant to add more.
  • to be done
  • to be done
I'll be very busy in the near future, so I would request Rama's Arrow to look into further comment. --May the Force be with you! Shreshth91($ |-| ŗ 3 $ |-| ţ |-|) 13:17, 9 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Reply to Tony: There is no redundancy - you are obviously unaware of this article's development. Don't take Shreshth's exaggeration literally - he has developed this article for over a year now. I only helped in the last legs. And not to be uncivil or rude, but I don't expect others to tell me to what degree I should support or object on issues. I will work on your other suggestions as per Shreshth's reply above. Rama's arrow 14:06, 9 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]
I will comment on your "Strong support" if I find it inappropriate, coming as it does immediately after your nomination text; this is a review process, not a vote. The guidelines now insist that supporters who have been significant contributors to an article should state this. Here, if you declare strong support for your own work in what is essentially a review process, you should probably remind us that you were a contributor, again. Tony 15:45, 9 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]
To repeat, this is not my own work. Yes I have helped in copyediting to a large degree, but this is not proportional to the massive amount of work Shreshth has done himself. I am also not a co-nominator. "Support" and "Object" is a common way to express your views here. I happen to feel Strong Support for this article. Case closed. Rama's arrow 16:06, 9 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]
I welcome you - it is rare to find one who just registered few days before and coming to this page with less than fifty edits to the Project: you are certainly well informed, and it is really nice that you are taking interest in various matters pertaining to wikipedia. I am looking forward to some interesting value addition to wikipedia as decided: Wales to upgrade quality of Wiki. --Bhadani 12:14, 9 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support reading the article I found it well read and don't really see any objections per fac criteria. The only thing that stuck out for me is the bolding through out the article of some names but ofcourse this is only a personal preference. - Tutmosis 17:25, 9 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Weak Object.Neutral These are my concerns:
  • The article is incomplete. It covers history, political implications, amendments etc. very well, but where is the role of the courts and of the jurisprudence? Just 2 judicial decision are mentioned in the begining of section 2! Afterwards we have nothing else mentioned. I cannot believe that in a country, whose judicial system is based on the case-law, the courts and the jurisprudence do not deserve mentioning in all the other sections. Haven't the courts influenced the interpretation of all these articles? Aren't there any milestone decisions concerning freedom of press, freedom of religion or right to equality? In section "Critisism and analysis" again nothing about the courts? In the article these important parameters are almost inexistant. Hence, as a jurist I regard the level of analysis as inadequate.
  • Of the 77 citations 51 are cross-references to constitutional and other provisions. Only 26 inline-citations (and 10 references) constitute an effort to interpretate, analyse and elaborate on the legal texts through other sources and writers. All the other citations just link us to the text of the Constitution itself or to other legal provisions without further alalysis. I have serious doubts about the FA level of such a research.
  • Less important: Some links in the "See also" section are not necessary there. They could easily be incorporated within the prose of the main article.--Yannismarou 07:47, 10 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Reply to Yannismarou

  1. Firstly, I don't think you should generalize based on what happened with the U.S. Supreme Court. Only Indian court decisions relevant to illustrating the FR are stated. Secondly, both Directive Principles and Fundamental Duties are non-justiciable, which leaves only fundamental rights. Of these, only court cases relevant to fundamental rights are given - we are not here to illustrate how the Indian courts have worked on constitutional implementation. If I may add some historical perspective, the Indian constitution was written 150 years after the U.S. constitution, thus incorporating many of the judicial decisions made on the principles of the U.S. constitution. Post-WWII there have not been as many constitutional landmark decisions.
  2. I think your perspective is wrong - in your first point, you admitted that implications, amendments are well-covered. What analysis is given, is properly cited. This is an article about a constitution, so the provisions are stated (Wikisource) and analyzed (with extra citations). All aspects of this article are well analyzed, for which there are enough citations.
  3. On citations, you should remember that these are not compulsory for any FA. Since most data has been adequately cited, I don't see a basis for lack of citations.
  4. The "Criticism" section deals with the broad debates, questions and challenges. It is not inadequate just becoz there has been limited number of legislation or court decisions affecting the FR. Rama's arrow 15:05, 10 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  5. To the Point this article is about FR/DP/FD. We run the significant risk of deviating too much into analyzing India's socio-economic problems. Thus we've limited giving examples and analysis solely to explain the constitutional provisions in question. Rama's arrow 15:13, 10 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment: "we are not here to illustrate how the Indian courts have worked on constitutional implementation" - Why not? At least in a narrow, legal sense, judicial interpretations should be covered. "Post-WWII there have not been as many constitutional landmark decisions" - well, let's hear about the few landmarks that there have been. Tony 16:02, 10 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    • Tony, judicial interpretations have been covered as far as possible. The "Critical analysis" section shows all the judicial constraints which are felt, like the ambiguity of wording, some rights such as freedom of press not defined.
    • By "Post-WWII there have not been as many constitutional landmark decisions", I think Nirav was referring to the US judiciary. In India, the landmark court cases have been listed, as well as bills passed have been listed (off the top of my head: Kesavananda Bharati vs. State of Kerala, Bodhisattwa Gautam, Electricity Bill, and all the Constitutional amendments, which are the most important, as well as all the Programmes and Schemes implemented) --May the Force be with you! Shreshth91($ |-| ŗ 3 $ |-| ţ |-|) 16:11, 10 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Reply to Tony We have to limit this article to explain and analyze the FR/DP/FD. To this end, as Shreshth reiterates all practical examples have been sufficiently provided. We are not here to examine how the courts have dealt with constitutional cases. We don't need to mention a large number of cases which have a greater implication on society than the interpretation of these constitutional provisions. It is a fine line, a tight-rope walk.
  • Plus, why is the generalization being made that India has had a large number of constitutional cases relevant to this article? This article deals well with the formulation of the doctrines between 1947-50, and their interpretation and implementation through the decades till today. Rama's arrow 16:28, 10 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]
OK. Tony 03:56, 11 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Reply to Rama's arrow:My concerns are still actionable, but I turned my "reluctant objection" to "weak objection", in order to clarify my position. Rama's arrow recognizes that "this article deals well with the formulation of the doctrines between 1947-50, and their interpretation and implementation through the decades till today". So, where are the courts through all these decades? Don't they deserve a more thorough mentioning? And I donot think that the length argument stands. FA articles now are up to 100 Kb. We will not sacrifice analysis in favor of the size. Thorough covering of the material is our importance. "We are not here to illustrate how the Indian courts have worked on constitutional implementation". I agree. But, when the the courts influence the "implementation through the decades till today",we have to talk. And I repeat: I cannot believe that in a case-law country the role of the courts was so limited. And, even if the jurisprudence of India is influenced by the American jurisprudence, this does not mean that it does not exist. Especially, in terms of implementation of the constitutional articles, the role of the courts is fundamental all around the world. I think the article is very very good, but in this particular aspect it is weak. This is my only concern. In any case, my intention is not to fight the article. Whatever I believe, if the large majority supports it, the article will prevail.--Yannismarou 16:26, 11 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Second Reply to Yannismarou - ok, first off I completely respect your argument that any important court cases and decisions should be well-covered in this article. I respect your motives, and I believe that you're not being unreasonable. The FA director is obligated to study the issues raised in an FAC and not just go by the tally of "opinions." For the rest of the duration of this FAC, I will search for fresh examples of court cases affecting this article. I will add any data I can find to assuage your concerns. But to reiterate - for the purpose of illustrating the Fundamental Rights, Directive Principles and Fundamental Duties, Shreshth has already provided example court cases. I brought up the U.S. judiciary only to illustrate a difference in perspective - the U.S. has seen tones of cases on constitutional issues. India has seen less, and even less when it comes specifically to FR/DP/FD. Nevertheless, I'll do my best to make sure that we aren't missing any relevant examples. Thanks, Rama's arrow 16:38, 11 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]


Update I apologize for my ignorance regarding this question. Please see these recent edits in which I've added details of some major court cases to different sections of the article. I will continue to search for more examples Rama's arrow 17:24, 11 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Further comment. Recognizing Rama's arrow effort I've turned my "objection" into "neutral". I'll wait the additional efforts of Rama's arrow and of the other editors, in order to decide whether I'll support or not the article. In any case, the first samples of this effort are positive.--Yannismarou 17:40, 11 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Strong support: I have watched the development of the page from its earliest stages. A well written article, which developed and matured over a long months. I think several comments have appeared as some of us may not have heard of these things before, and we all learnt about these things here only - I too learn many things from wikipedia. These are unique features of the Constitution of India, and similar comparison does not exist in the world. This aspect of the Indian constitution is a constitutional heritage of the constitutional practices of the modern world. Moreover, I think that there is nothing like "ownership" of articles, one should write and forget - bringing the issues of who wrote what and when and how much may bring subjectivity to our discussion to decide the merit of the article to be elevated to FA status. --Bhadani 01:12, 11 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]
True points. I apologize to all for the irrelevant debate about contributions. Rama's arrow 01:18, 11 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support - 77 citations, lots of pictures, imformative info. What more could a reader want? Also the neatness, compared this to how how most Indian law/politics pages look. They are metamorphized by edit wars. This one is so clean, and exceptional by wiki standards. Its got 20x more valid sources than the Constitution of India page. The only issue is that the criticism section is a bit long.Bakaman Bakatalk 01:21, 11 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Weak Support- For the most part, the article is excellent and it definitely deserves to be FA. However, due to the significance of the topic, I am judging it by a much higher standard than what I usually look at in FA articles. My only regret with the article is that it does not include more landmark cases in the text. I believe someone else pointed this out too. At the same time, I do not believe it is enough to stop it from being a FA. I would definitely encourage the editors to include (even if it is just wikilinking) some more court cases. It would be a great contribution to do so. --Blacksun 02:42, 11 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Update I apologize for my ignorance regarding this question. Please see these recent edits in which I've added details of some major court cases to different sections of the article. I will continue to search for more examples Rama's arrow 17:24, 11 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Strong support, yes I helped out with reviewing and copyediting. Excuse me for reopening a closed issue, but I feel that there was a minor communication gap regarding Nirav's (Rama's arrow) vote. True to local cultural traditions, Shreshth attributed a lot more credit to Nirav and even more disproportionately to me. Since Tony didn't know this, I don't fault him for what he said and similarly Nirav's feelings are justified too. Also, regarding the Blacksun's concern above, let me tell that I had a similar concern and was very anal about several things during the final unofficial review ahead of this FAC. And now I'm convinced that it meets the FAC criteria. -- Sundar \talk \contribs 09:00, 11 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks for your point, Sundar. I just want to say that this is not a vote, but a forum for establishing consensus. Tony 12:52, 11 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Yes, though most of us know this, it would be better if it's internalised into the process itself. Perhaps a form-based interface would help? -- Sundar \talk \contribs 13:06, 11 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support--Dwaipayan (talk) 14:00, 11 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Strong support, leaves nothing to be desired. —Nightstallion (?) 14:44, 11 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support. I made a few improvements in the article, and now feel its worth FA level. — Ambuj Saxena (talk) 17:12, 12 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support. Since most of my concerns seem to have been addressed, I feel this is the right thing.--Yannismarou 09:55, 14 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Object: further comment about 1a. It's particularly important in an article on legal issues that the prose be crystal clear and easy to read. Why is it that I can still easily find glitches in a randomly chosen section, such as these from "History"?
    • In the lead, "Fundamental Duties" is in italic and is unlinked, whereas the other two sections are different in both respects—could confuse.
    • "In 1928, the Nehru commission, composing of representatives from Indian political parties proposed constitutional reforms for India." "Composed", not "composing"—who's copy-editing it to allow that slip to remain? Comma after "parties" would be much easier to read, marking off the boundaries of the nested clause. There's another "composing" a few sentences later.
    • Overuse of additive back-references and clause links: "also called for"—remove "also" for better, stronger flow; "as well as socio-economic rights"—just "and", unless adding this item is somehow unexpected or notable (doesn't seem to be).
    • "Committing themselves to socialism in 1936, the Congress leaders ..."—"CongressionAL leaders"? (Unless that's too American ...). Otherwise "the leaders of the Congress". Is a reference required for such a sweeping statement? (Or just a tiny bit of detail—under the leadership of ... or inspired by ....?)
    • "The task of developing a constitution for independent India"—"an independent India" would be idiomatic. "which has to be passed by two-thirds majority in both houses of the Parliament." Sorry, deictics are a bore, but basic to readability—"a" two-thirds majority; you could drop "the" before "Parliament" if you wanted to (idiomatic). Consider "must" rather than "has to", which is a bit informal here.
    • "The process was influenced by the adoption of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights by the U.N. General Assembly on 10 December 1948. The U.N. called upon all member states to adopt these rights in their respective constitutions." Remove "respective". Replace "The UN called" with "The Declaration called", for required cohesion (I presume you're not referring to another call, apart from the Declaration?) "Upon" better as "on", but that's my personal preference for plain, direct English; the topic is complex enough already, without old-fashioned words. Tony 01:06, 16 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • I just had my first look, and found some awkward prose - these are only random samples from the first section I looked at, suggestive of further copyedit needs:
    • In 1919, the Rowlatt Acts gave the British government the powers of arrest and detention, conduct searches and seizures without warrants, restrict public gatherings, and censor the press. (Is it powers of conduct searches or powers to conduct searches? Is it powers of restrict public gatherings, or powers to restrict public gatherings?)
    • In 1928, the Nehru commission—comprising of representatives from Indian political parties—proposed constitutional reforms for India. (Comprised of?)
    • The task of developing a constitution for independent India was undertaken by the Constituent Assembly of India, comprising of elected representatives under the presidency of Rajendra Prasad. (Another comprising of) Sandy 18:42, 16 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment. I was asked whether I'd review my Object, and inspected the text hoping to be able to do so. But at random, my eyes fell on lots of little problems, some of them things that anyone should be able to pick out. This can't possibly be considered "professional" writing as required.
    • State or state? Be consistent.
    • There are still mistakes in the deictics; I know that they're tedious, but they're basic to readable English (let alone the required "professional" standard here): "Living wage and safe working conditions for citizens must be ensures ...". "A" living wage, or pluralise it.
    • "Gandhian philosophy, originally propounded by Mahatma Gandhi (pictured) has greatly influenced the Directive Principles." This is a caption; do you really need to add "(pictured)"? Who else would it be, given the theme of the caption? And his name twice here is awkward.
    • This paragraphs is unsatisfactory: "The Directive Principles commit the state to raise the standard of living and improve public health,[39] organise agriculture, and animal husbandry on modern and scientific lines. The State must also safeguard the environment and wildlife of the country.[40] The protection of monuments and objects of national importance and separation of judiciary from executive in public services are also obligations of the State.[41] The State must also strive for the maintenance of international peace.[42]" Why a comma after "agriculture"? Also also also. It would be better reworded as a formal inline list, even though it would be a long sentence. That would avoid the redundant alsos, and the awkward attempts to vary the pro forma wording in each item. It's easier to read if it's not varied. So save the repetitions by casting it as a list.
    • "Article 31-C, inserted by the 25th Amendment Act of 1971[30] states that"—comma missing somewhere ...
    • Remove "from time to time"—it adds nothing.
    • Please fix the following list, which is apparently cast as a single sentence. You need lower-case initial letters for each item, and "the" is missing from all but No. 5. Why bother numbering them if there's no other reference to them by number? Bullets would be smoother.

The six fundamental rights are:[1]

  1. Right to equality
  2. Right to freedom
  3. Right against exploitation
  4. Right to freedom of religion
  5. Cultural and educational rights
  6. Right to constitutional remedies

Or better still, do what most FAC reviewers would like: a running prose list, with the items just separated by commas. Tony 15:16, 28 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]

No, Shreshth has addressed about 5% of my concerns, which involve the whole text, not just the examples I provided. Tony 01:05, 30 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment Sorry to ask an ignorant question, but what is this article trying to achieve? I read through the article and it goes into no small amount of detail about the various concepts. But I note that I can go see the main article for both Fundamental Rights in India and Directive Principles in India which provides the same information. This is more than a quick overview, but less than a comprehensive treatment, so what's the point when each of these have good detailed articles? There seems to be a lot of duplication so it is confusing that readers would have both a quasi comprehensive treatment and a fully comprehensive treatment - although not uniformly. For instance, the criticism section pertaining to fundamental rights appears to be more comprehensive here than at the main article page (which seems counter-intuitive to me) and the information presented is slightly different. What's the rationale? Eusebeus 16:45, 28 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    • These kind of things happen when a general article goes for FAC. When the different articles were forked out, they would have been more comprehensive than this one. But as this article prepared for FAC, much more coverage was given to certain topics as compared to their supposed detailed article. One short term solution could be to at least copy the additional content added in the article to the detailed articles, but in the end, it would just be a one time exercise, as hardly anyone would update the two articles simultaneously. — Ambuj Saxena (talk) 16:58, 28 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Doesn't that beg the question of where in-depth content rightfully should lie? If we are going to have seprate articles on these, then those are the right places for more engaged and detailed discussion. This article instead should seek to provide a synthetic overview that offers basic points and lets readers drill down for further information. Eusebeus 23:12, 28 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  1. ^ Constitution of India-Part III Fundamental Rights.
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