The happenings in Manipur and, as a result, Prime Minister Narendra Modi, have been in the eye of a storm for the last few weeks.

Manipur, because its two major population groups, the Kukis who are tribals and the Meitis who want to be declared tribals, are literally at war with each other. And Prime Minister Modi because he appears to have lost his greatest asset, the ability to lead. So it will be interesting to hear him in the no-confidence motion against his government.

Whatever views one might hold on these problems as a matter of personal preference, there is a much larger one that we need to look at. This is the in-built contradictions in our Constitution which periodically result in huge political, social and moral conflicts.

The bloody violence over status for the Meitis, who are Hindus, is just the latest of these. There is a view that Hindus can’t be tribals. But the counter-view then is how can Christians be tribals and enjoy special benefits?

The broad reasons why these contradictions exist are well known. Basically, when aspirations for the best outcome are expressed via voting by members of a group, there is always a risk that the final outcome will be suboptimal, requiring periodic adjustments. This problem has been studied deeply and extensively and the world has decided to live with suboptimal outcomes. Democratic process is considered, rightly, superior to the inconvenience of poor outcomes — provided they are temporary. The same democratic process, however, renders them permanent.

All written constitutions are an example of this but ours is an outlier. Many parts of it just don’t seem to work. It’s a huge problem.

That’s why the time has come to finally admit this, if only because of the sheer number of times our Constitution has been amended — 105! Just see. It was adopted on January 26, 1950 and less than a year later it was amended via the first amendment. That amendment made free speech conditional to certain requirements.

Since then there have been 104 more amendments. The last was in 2022 which revived the power of State governments to identify socially and educationally backward classes.

The contrast with other written constitutions speaks volumes about ours. As I have written earlier, too, “the US Constitution has been amended only 33 times in 227 years. The Australian Constitution has been amended eight times in 122. There it takes a referendum to get it done.

The Irish Constitution, from which ours borrowed quite a lot, has been amended 33 times in about 82 years. The French have made about 30 amendments in 65 years, but most of these are about their colonies and elections, etc”.

Special treatment

Since this article is about Manipur, let us restrict ourselves to just one aspect of our Constitution: its stated preferences for special treatment to groups chosen by the government of the day. And guess which amendment started this. The very first one, which actually had two parts. One is the now famous part on restrictions on free speech. But the other is the empowerment to grant special treatment. This is what that amendment says: “Nothing in this article or in clause (2) of article 29 shall prevent the State from making any special provision for the advancement of any socially and educationally backward classes of citizens or for the Scheduled Castes and the Scheduled Tribes.”

That this went contrary to the right to equal treatment guaranteed in Articles 14-18 by taking refuge under Article 46, which says: “The State shall promote with special care the educational and economic interests of the weaker sections of the people, and, in particular, of the Scheduled Castes and the Scheduled Tribes, and shall protect them from social injustice and all forms of exploitation.” There aren’t many international examples of such contradictions being embedded in constitutions. Little wonder that we find ourselves in perpetual conflict.

So should something be done to fix the problem? Obviously, yes. But can it be done? Equally obviously, no. Or maybe it’s not that obvious. Remember Article 370? It started off being temporary, then became impossible to delete — until one day it was deleted. The heavens didn’t fall. Only Pakistan got upset. But it’s always upset anyway.

This is not to say that removing the articles that offer special treatment to chosen groups will be as easy. But we need to start the debate now. The alternative of continuing with them is most unpleasant.

Remember Article 370? It started off being temporary, then became impossible to delete — until one day it was deleted. The heavens didn’t fall.

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