Chennaiite recreates copy of Indian Constitution

Considered as the longest written constitution of any country in the world, the Indian Constitution was written around 70 years ago. The content was the outcome of close to 290 odd people meeting regularly over three years. But 70 years later, most of the surviving copies are in bad shape. 

The original copies are kept safely inside helium-filled cases in the library of the Parliament of India and are not accessible to the public. Saddened by this, Chennai-based Vijay Anand decided to bring out the replica of the first edition of the Indian Constitution. 

“I strongly feel that people should read the Constitution. I am not being a nationalist in my approach, but it’s a part of our history. The original copy of the Constitution was hand-written with calligraphy by Prem Raizada and every page was decorated by various artists from Shantiniketan. 

Around 1,000 copies were made — each with hand-made paper, litho printed and 200 odd pen nibs were used up in the process. It’s just an elaborate labour of love,” says Vijay. 

Low-resolution scanned copies of the Indian constitution are available on the internet, but they aren’t of good quality. 

“Two years ago, a copy went on auction in London Sothebys for 40,000 pounds (Rs 40 lakh). And there aren’t a lot of such auctions happening. 

Though digital copies are available, I always wanted a hard copy. I took on this project to create a replica — an almost perfect replica,” he says. 

Vijay dedicated the past two years to track some of the surviving originals to see the prints, the paper used and to get a sense of the print. 

“I also collected photographs to see how the original print looked. A lot of the vibrant colours have faded in the copies that survive. So, two years later, our project is nearing completion. Two days ago we did our test print and I am quite happy with the results. We spent a lot of time looking for options to use in terms of paper and found one closest to the original (and paper quality is much better these days). A lot of care and effort have gone into the process,” he smiles. 

Many have already approached the team for copies. 

“We also intend to make copies for school libraries — the artwork is something that the future generations should see, I believe. The sheer ability to produce something like this in 1950 sounds like an achievement and we are just doing our bit to save one of the largest documents in the world. This is a national treasure and it doesn’t look like the government is going to do this task,” he says. 

The team is expecting to be done with the layout, page setting and colour correction in a couple of weeks and the prints would be ready by October.