Which of the following rights was considered the “Heart and Soul” of the…

Concept: A Fundamental Right is only as strong as the machinery available to enforce it. Part III of the Indian Constitution therefore separates the substantive guarantees, which state what a person is entitled to, from a single remedial guarantee, whose whole purpose is to give a person direct access to a court when any of the other rights is violated.

Application: That remedial guarantee is the Right to Constitutional Remedies under Article 32. It allows a person to move the Supreme Court directly for the enforcement of any Part III right, and it empowers the Court to issue five writs:

• Habeas corpus — an order to produce a detained person before the court and justify the detention.

• Mandamus — a command to a public authority to perform a legal duty it has refused to perform.

• Prohibition — an order restraining a lower court or tribunal from exceeding its jurisdiction.

• Certiorari — an order quashing an act already done by a lower court without jurisdiction.

• Quo warranto — an order questioning a person’s legal title to hold a public office.

Moving this Article in the Constituent Assembly on 9 December 1948, Dr. B.R. Ambedkar said: “If I was asked to name any particular Article in this Constitution as the most important — an Article without which this Constitution would be a nullity — I could not refer to any other Article except this one. It is the very soul of the Constitution and the very heart of it.” That single sentence is the source of the “Heart and Soul” description.

Cross-check: Every other right listed is substantive rather than remedial, so none of them can carry the enforcement role:

• Freedom of Speech — Article 19(1)(a), one specific liberty inside the Right to Freedom, subject to the reasonable restrictions in Article 19(2).

• Right to Equality — Articles 14 to 18, covering equality before the law, non-discrimination, equality of opportunity, abolition of untouchability and of titles.

• Right to Freedom of Religion — Articles 25 to 28, covering freedom of conscience, management of religious affairs, and freedom from compelled religious taxation or instruction.

Each of these tells a person what they may claim; only Article 32 supplies the means of claiming it in court. Hence the right described as the Heart and Soul of the Constitution is the Right to Constitutional Remedies.