"The Constitution, not Parliament, is supreme in India." Critically analyse this principle with reference to the Basic Structure Doctrine and its implications for judicial review.

India's founders consciously rejected the British model of parliamentary sovereignty, adopting instead a written Constitution whose amending power under Article 368 is itself constitutionally limited [1]. The principle is broadly sound, but its content is judge-made and therefore contested.

Basis of constitutional supremacy

• Art. 13 voids any law inconsistent with Fundamental Rights; Art. 32 makes the Supreme Court guardian of those rights; Art. 141 binds all courts to its declarations [1].
• Kesavananda Bharati (1973) held by 7:6 that Parliament may amend any provision but cannot destroy the Constitution's basic structure — supremacy of the Constitution, rule of law, judicial review, federalism [2].
• Institutional design reinforces it: no organ is supreme, each works within its constitutional domain [3].

Implications for judicial review

• Review extends beyond ordinary laws to constitutional amendments themselves — a shield tested during the 1975–77 Emergency.
• Enables purposive interpretation and constitutional morality, used to expand rights of marginalised groups (Navtej Johar, 2018).
• Sustains separation of powers; no organ may usurp another's essential functions (Ram Jawaya, 1955).

Critical appraisal

• Basic structure is nowhere in the text — its content is defined case-by-case, inviting the charge of judicial subjectivity.
• Counter-majoritarian concern: unelected judges override an elected legislature's amendments.
• Supremacy remains partly formal: enormous pendency across Indian courts blunts delivery of the rights the doctrine protects.
• The collegium system, evolved in the Second (1993) and Third Judges (1998) cases, insulates appointments from the executive but is itself criticised for opacity.

Constitutional supremacy is thus best read not as judicial supremacy but as the shared subordination of legislature, executive and judiciary to a common charter [3]. Its promise is realised when review is exercised with restraint and reasoned consistency, and when judicial capacity is strengthened so that the guarantees of Part III reach citizens in fact, not only in doctrine.