Shillong, Nov 26: The North-Eastern Hill University, Shillong celebrated the 71st Constitution Day by organizing a special programme attended by the Mr. Justice Biswanath Somadder, the Hon’ble Chief Justice, High Court of Meghalaya as the chief guest on 26th November, 2020 in the campus.
The programme was organized by the Department of Law on the theme “Structure of the Indian Constitution” to commemorate the Constitution Day also known as Samvidhan Divas and was attended by the Vice-Chancellor, NEHU along with the Pro Vice-Chancellor, Registrar, Deans, students as well as online participant.
In his speech on the theme, the Chief Justice stated that the soul of the Constitution is the Preamble. “If we want to study the structure of the Constitution we need to know the Preamble,” he said adding that one need to know how and when to look up the law.
He went on to describe the federal structure and its importance over the unitary structure. “The concept of federalism has its genesis several hundred years before it came into effect in India,” he said adding that the Indian Constitution has its roots in America, albeit with certain deviations.
The Chief Justice further informed on how federalism is recognised by the Indian constitutional scheme. He also urged upon the Vice-Chancellor to start a three year law course in NEHU because what is happening with 5 year law course is that very few people are going into litigation.
Among those who spoke include the Vice-Chancellor, Prof. S.K. Srivastava, the Pro Vice-Chancellor, Prof. H. Lamin, the Registrar, Dr. J. N. Nayak who welcomed the participants and the Convener Prof. J. J. Mozika who gave a brief background on the subject.
There was also a reading of the preamble as well as the Fundamental Duties enshrined in the constitution followed by an interactive session. Earlier in the morning, NEHU joined the Hon’ble President of India in reading the Preamble of the Constitution of India.
The reading of the Preamble in NEHU was led by Prof. S.K. Srivastava, Vice-Chancellor, NEHU in the presence of the Pro Vice-Chancellor, Deans, Registrar, Finance Officer, Controller of Examinations, teachers, students and non-teaching staff.
