Why our Founding Fathers borrowed from other Constitutions

Why our Founding Fathers borrowed so extensively from other Constitutions was explained by Shri B.N.Rao :-

“Most modern Constitutions do make full use of the experience of other countries, borrowed whatever is good for them and reject whatever is unsuitable. To profit from the experience of other countries or from the vast experience of one’s own is the path of wisdom. 

There is another advantage in borrowing not only the substance but even the language of established Constitutions; for we obtain in this way, the benefit of the interpretation put upon the borrowed provisions by the courts of the countries of their origin and we thus avoid ambiguity or doubt”.

There were two schools of thought in the Constituent Assembly, one complaining that the centre was too strong and the other, it should be made stronger. Dr. Ambedkar clarified the position thus :-

“The Drafting Committee wanted to make it clear that thought India was to be a federation, the federation was not the result of an agreement by the States to join in a federation and that the federation not being the result of an agreement, no State has a right to secede from it. 

The federation is a Union because it is indestructible. Though the country and the people may be divided into different States for convenience of administration, the country is one integral whole, its people a single source. The Americans had to wage a civil war to establish that the States have no right of secession and that their federation was indestructible. 

The Drafting Committee thought that it was better to make it clear at the outset rather than to leave it to speculation or to dispute”.