Youth and Students have onerous responsibility to act as vigilant force to protect constitution: Senior Advocate Vaijnath S Zalki

KALABURAGI; Senior Advocate Vaijnath S Zalki has said that the youth and students of the country have onerous responsibility to act as vigilant force to protect the constitution and reinforce the faith in the constitution among the people.

Delivering a lecture on “Constitution day” organized by the Faculty of Social Science in Sharnbasva University in Kalaburagi city on Tuesday, Mr Zalki said that the confidence among the people about the democracy and the efficacy of constitution to protect it has eroded in the recent time due to the failure of legislature, executive and media and to an extent by the judiciary to discharge their duties to protect the rights of the people enshrined in the constitution and effectively protecting the democracy.

He said that due to various reasons including the narrow parochial and other reasons the legislature, executive and press had failed to discharge their duties to ensure implementation of the fundamental rights of the constitution and the Judiciary on its part have also failed to a certain extent in contributing the erosion of faith among the people about the constitution and the democracy.

Mr Zalki said that the students and youths should first understand their rights and responsibilities provided in the constitution and act as a vigilant force to protect it. “The younger generations are the only hope now to stop the degeneration of the democratic rights and responsibilities and reinforce the faith in the constitution among the people”.

Explaining the various features of the Indian constitution, Mr Zalki said that Indian constitution penned by Dr B R Ambedkar was unique in many ways and it was lengthiest written constitution in the world encompassing all the rights of the people and clearly signifying their rights as the citizen. The Indian constitution was also one among the very constitutions which provided voting rights to all the citizens irrespective of their caste, colour, and religion.

The constitution also took care of the rights and privileges of the under privileged and ensured correctional methods to undo the injustice done to them over several centuries.

He said several amendments were made to the constitution to strengthen the rights of the people including the free education to all upto the age of 14, reducing the age of voting rights to 18 years, Right to Education (RTE) which provided access and free education to weaker sections of the society and Right to Information (RTI) which provided the weapon to the people to get the legal information from the government departments.

Later the participated students and dignitaries read out the preamble of constitution and took the oath to protect the constitution.

Registrar of the University Dr S G Dollegoudar spoke on the occasion. Vice Chancellor of the University Prof Anilkumar Bidve presided over. Dean of the Social Sciences T V Sivanandan welcomed and Chairperson of the Department of Journalism and Mass Communication Dr Sunita Patil proposed vote of thanks.