Preamble like parenthood, cannot be changed 'howsoever you try': VP Dhankhar

Kochi: Vice President Jagdeep Dhankhar on Monday said the Preamble of the Indian Constitution is like parenthood to children, and it cannot be changed, no matter how hard one may try.

"There have been a lot of issues about the preamble to the Constitution. The Preamble of the Indian Constitution is something like parenthood to children. Howsoever you may try, you can't change your parenthood. That is not possible," he said.

While interacting with students and faculty at the National University of Advanced Legal Studies (NUALS), Kochi, he also said that, historically, no country's preamble has ever been changed, but lamented that the Preamble of the Indian Constitution was altered during the Emergency era.

"The Preamble of our Constitution was changed during a time when hundreds and thousands of people were behind bars, the darkest period of our democracy--emergency era," he said.

His statement comes against the backdrop of the RSS calling for a review of the words 'socialist' and 'secular' in the Preamble of the Constitution, stating that these were included during the Emergency and were never part of the Constitution drafted by B R Ambedkar.

Addressing an event on 50 years of Emergency in New Delhi on June 26, RSS general secretary Dattatreya Hosabole said, "Babasaheb Ambedkar never used these words in the preamble of the Constitution. The words were added during Emergency, when fundamental rights were suspended, Parliament did not function, and the judiciary became lame."