SUPREME COURT’S LINKAGE OF CLIMATE CHANGE AND FUNDAMENTAL RIGHTS: A STEP IN THE RIGHT DIRECTION

Abstract

Dr. B.R. Ambedkar was inevitably accurate and unerring in saying that, “Constitution is not mere a lawyer’s document, it is a vehicle of life and its Spirit is always the spirit of the age.” This invariably, lucidly, and unambiguously means that a constitution cannot be caged in the webbing or plexus of time and interpretations, thinking and ideologies, past and present or future, stillness or motion, correctness or fallaciousness, sorrow or happiness, originalism or living constitutionalism, textualism or contextualism, intentions or understandings, public meanings, or opinions of the framers; and lifelessness or submissiveness. This postulates that Constitution and the dynamics that are associated with it, should keep changing with the time, according to the needs of the society and legal morality as well. Recently, the Supreme Court of India has been giving out judgments and ratios that are in line with a progressive society, seeped deep into the constitutional morality that we seek to uphold. A lot of rights of the people have been recognised since a long time and today as well. So, when on April 7, 2024, the Indian national dailies, and a number of international news articles published that the Apex Court has recognised the rights of the persons (not just citizens), against the adverse impacts of climate change under articles 14, 21, 48A, 51A (g)- the Constitution of India once again became alive in sentience and rejoiced in happiness as well as zest.

Keywords:  Constitution; Fundamental rights; Citizens; Climate change; Supreme Court