On 11 January 2007, a nine-judge Constitution Bench unanimously held that any law inserted into the Ninth Schedule of the Constitution after 24 April 1973 — the date of the Kesavananda Bharati judgment — is open to judicial scrutiny on the ground that it violates the basic structure or the Fundamental Rights forming part of the basic structure. The judgment closes the doctrinal loop that Kesavananda had opened: the Ninth Schedule cannot operate as a constitutional refuge from the basic structure doctrine.
On 5 November 2024, a nine-judge Constitution Bench held by 7:2 that not every private property qualifies as a 'material resource of the community' under Article 39(b) of the Constitution — and overruled Sanjeev Coke Manufacturing Co. v. Bharat Coking Coal (1983), which had adopted Justice Krishna Iyer's expansive minority position in Ranganatha Reddy as the rule. The judgment recalibrates the relationship between private property and the State's redistributive power, and sets out a multi-factor inquiry for what falls within Article 39(b)'s reach.
On 11 March 1994, a nine-judge Constitution Bench delivered the most consequential federalism ruling of the post-Kesavananda generation. The judgment held that the President's proclamation under Article 356 imposing President's Rule in a State is subject to judicial review; that secularism is part of the basic structure of the Constitution; that the dissolution of a State Legislative Assembly cannot precede Parliament's approval of the proclamation; and that a State Government that fails to act in accordance with the secular character of the Constitution can, on appropriate facts, be dismissed. A digest of the bench, the doctrinal holdings, and the architecture they leave.