How many times has the Preamble to the Constitution of India been amended?

The correct answer is The People of India. The Preamble opens with the words "We, the people of India", which name the people as the source from which the Constitution draws its authority. The Constitution was not handed down by a government, a court or a legislature; the people, through their Constituent Assembly, adopted, enacted and gave it to themselves on 26 November 1949.

The Supreme Court, the Indian Parliament and the Central Government are all created by the Constitution, so none of them can be its source of authority. Each of them exercises only the powers the Constitution gives it. This is the first of the four things the Preamble tells us, the others being the nature of the Indian State (sovereign, socialist, secular, democratic, republic), its objectives (justice, liberty, equality and fraternity) and the date of adoption. A fill-in-the-blank question like this one tests whether you know the exact opening words, so learn the text as written.

The correct answer is Sovereign, socialist, secular, democratic, republic. This is the order in which the Preamble describes India: "a SOVEREIGN SOCIALIST SECULAR DEMOCRATIC REPUBLIC". Socialist and secular were inserted between sovereign and democratic by the 42nd Amendment in 1976; before that the phrase read "sovereign democratic republic".

The first option swaps socialist and secular, which is the most common slip, since both words were added at the same time. The third option repeats "secular" and begins with the wrong word, and the fourth moves "sovereign" from the front to the end. A simple way to hold the order is to say the three S-words by sound: So, So, Se (Sovereign, Socialist, Secular), followed by the original last two words, Democratic Republic. The two words added in 1976 sit together in the middle.

The correct answer is Socialist. The 42nd Constitutional Amendment Act, 1976 added three words to the Preamble: "Socialist" and "Secular" to the description of India, and "Integrity" to the phrase "unity and integrity of the Nation". It is the only amendment ever made to the Preamble.

Democratic, Republic and Sovereign were all in the Preamble from the start: as adopted on 26 November 1949, it described India as a "sovereign democratic republic". That is why they are wrong here. Questions on this amendment come in several forms: which word was added, which word was not added, or how many words were added. Keep all three in mind together: Socialist, Secular and Integrity, added in 1976. A related fact worth linking is the Kesavananda Bharati case of 1973, which had held three years earlier that the Preamble is part of the Constitution and can be amended without changing its basic features.

The correct answer is Liberty of thought, expression, belief, faith and worship. These are the exact words the Preamble uses for liberty, and they appear in it just as written here.

Each of the other options changes one word of the real text, which is exactly how this question catches people. The Preamble speaks of fraternity "assuring the dignity of the individual" and the unity and integrity of the Nation, not "human dignity". It promises equality "of status and of opportunity", not of status and employment. And justice in the Preamble is "social, economic and political"; the word "administrative" does not appear. When an option looks almost right, compare it word for word with the text: justice (social, economic, political), liberty (thought, expression, belief, faith, worship), equality (status, opportunity) and fraternity (dignity of the individual, unity and integrity of the Nation).

The correct answer is United States of America. The idea of beginning a constitution with a preamble was borrowed from the Constitution of the USA, whose own text opens with the words "We the People". The content of India's Preamble, however, comes from Jawaharlal Nehru's Objectives Resolution, moved in the Constituent Assembly on 13 December 1946 and adopted on 22 January 1947.

The other countries are sources of different parts of the Preamble or of the Constitution. The USSR is the source of the ideal of social, economic and political justice. Britain gave parliamentary government, the rule of law and single citizenship. Canada gave the model of a federation with a strong Centre. Be careful to separate two different questions that look alike: the idea of having a preamble came from the USA, while the ideals of liberty, equality and fraternity written inside it came from the French Revolution.