Insulating land reform constitutional impugnment: an Indian case study

Abstract

Many parallels can be drawn between the Indian experience and the current situation in South Africa. Not least, both countries share the urgency of all developing nations to achieve greater social justice through a redistribution of wealth. As part of its quest for freedom, India too faced the formidable burden of delivering the mass of its people from poverty and ignorance. The popular demand for the elimination of vast disparities in wealth was accompanied by calls for social control over the economy. Once it took power, the newly elected Congress government embarked upon a selective policy of nationalisation and land reform as the means of attaining political equity in the economy. The process offers an intriguing comparative case study. Another feature the two countries are certain to have in common emanates from the human rights orientation of their popular democratic struggles against domination. The article attempts and analysis of the link between the political and legal processes in the steps undertaken after independence to socialise the Indian rural economy by way of land reform.