The Supreme Court on Monday dismissed the pleas
challenging the 1976 amendment to the Constitution adding terms "socialist",
"secular" and "integrity" to the Preamble.
A bench of Chief Justice Sanjiv Khanna and Justice
Sanjay Kumar had on November 22 reserved its verdict on a batch of pleas filed
by former Rajya Sabha MP Subramanian Swamy, advocate Vishnu Shankar Jain and others,
challenging the inclusion of the words "socialist" and
"secular" in the Preamble to the Constitution.
The petitions do not require a detailed hearing, the
CJI said.
"The two expressions 'socialist' and 'secular' were made in 1976
through amendments and the fact that the Constitution was adopted in 1949 does
not make any difference... the retrospectivity arguments if accepted will apply
to all amendments," noted the CJI.