COMPARATIVE CONSTITUTIONALISM IN SOUTH ASIA

by Sunil Khilnani (Editor), Vikram Raghavan (Editor), Arun K. Thiruvengadam (Editor)

The countries of South Asia share a colonial past, have common cultural and civilizational connections, and share some common elements in their constitutional systems, governance structures, and legal systems. Yet despite these attributes, South Asian countries have had differing political and
constitutional experiences and comparative constitutional law has not systematically evolved in this region.

This volume, the first of its kind in scope, addresses this issue. It points out that in several cases exchanges at the judicial level have already resulted in borrowing of constitutional concepts and legal principles between South Asian countries. There is, however, considerable potential for
greater trans-constitutional and judicial borrowing within South Asia. Moreover, the scope for comparative regional borrowings goes beyond the judiciary or the appellate legal profession and can also be shared and exchanged by other entities, including legislatures, independent regulatory agencies,
and non-governmental organizations. The essays in this volume bring together the various common elements that are already present in the constitutions and governance structures of South Asian countries and explore new ways to answer critical questions from a comparative perspective.

Due to a lack of any previous study of this nature, this volume has the potential to become the best introduction to the field of South Asian constitutional law. It will be immensely useful to scholars and teachers of law, politics, modern history, and development studies as well as lawyers, judges,
and policymakers with an interest in India and other South Asian countries.

401 pages, Hardcover

First published April 15, 2013

About the author

Sunil Khilnani is holder of the Avantha Chair and Director of the India Institute, which he established at King’s in 2011.
Born in New Delhi, he grew up in India, Africa, and Europe. He was educated at Trinity Hall, Cambridge, where he took a first in Social and Political Sciences, and at King’s College, Cambridge, where he gained his PhD in Social and Political Sciences.

Prior to becoming Director of the King’s India Institute he was, from 2001 to 2011, the Starr Foundation Professor at the Johns Hopkins University’s School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS) in Washington D.C., and Director of South Asia Studies at SAIS, a program that he established in 2002.

Sunil Khilnani was formerly Professor of Politics at Birkbeck College, University of London. He has been a visiting professor of politics at Seikei University, Tokyo, and was elected a Research Fellow of Christ’s College, Cambridge. He has also held a Leverhulme Fellowship, and has been a Fellow of the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars in Washington DC, a Fellow of the Institute for Advanced Study (Wissenschaftskolleg) in Berlin, and a Fellow of the American Academy in Berlin.
His publications include: Arguing Revolution: The Intellectual Left in Postwar France (1993); The Idea of India (7th edn. 2016); with Sudipta Kaviraj, Civil Society: History and Possibilities (2000); with Nandan Nilekani, Pratap Mehta etc al., NonAlignment 2.0: a Foreign Policy for India in the 21st Century (2013); with Arun Thiruvengadam and Vikram Raghavan, Comparative Constitutionalism in South Asia (2013);
His most recent book is Incarnations: India in 50 Lives (2016), which accompanies his 50-part podcast and radio series broadcast on BBC Radio4 in 2015-2016.
Sunil Khilnani’s research interests lie at the intersection of various fields: intellectual history and the study of political thought, the history of modern India, democratic theory in relation to its recent non-Western experiences, the politics of contemporary India, and strategic thought in the definition of India’s place in the world. His is regular contributor to the Indian and international media.