Glitzy event management and media pomp and pageantry are the Narendra Modi-led government’s unique skills. This year, on 26 November, India’s Constitution—the radical document that defines the identity of the nation-state born in 1947, an exceptionally brave and progressive blueprint for a modern India—completes 75 years of its existence. Predictably, the Modi regime has sprung into action, seizing the opportunity for its next big media spectacle. Seventy-five years of the Constitution will be “celebrated” in a joint session of Parliament in the Central Hall of the old Parliament building.
The irony is unmissable. The Modi government scornfully shunned the same Central Hall last year when it moved into a showy new Parliament building. The original Central Hall was where India’s founders framed the Constitution, where the Constituent Assembly conducted its debates for over three years, crafting every article and every section through rigorous arguments and discussions. In this Central Hall, power passed from the British Crown to Independent India and India’s first Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru delivered his famous Tryst With Destiny speech on the eve of Independence on 14 August.
