The principle that the conduct of the State, institutions and citizens must conform to the values and spirit of the Constitution (such as liberty, equality, dignity and the rule of law), rather than to prevailing social or popular morality.
- The phrase was used by B.R. Ambedkar in the Constituent Assembly, drawing on the historian George Grote, to mean a paramount reverence for constitutional forms and a disciplined respect for the rule of law.
- The Supreme Court has invoked it to give primacy to constitutional values over majoritarian or social morality, for example in the Naz Foundation and Navtej Singh Johar (2018) line of cases on Section 377, and in the Sabarimala temple-entry judgment (2018).
- It underpins individual dignity, autonomy and the protection of minorities and dissent against the tyranny of the majority.
- It is a guiding interpretive value, not a separate enforceable provision; critics caution it should not become a vague judicial preference.
It is an increasingly cited polity and rights concept linking the Preamble, Fundamental Rights and judicial reasoning; useful for Paper II security-and-rights essays.
Constitutional morality is not the same as public or social morality; the Constitution's values prevail even when they run against popular sentiment.
Conduct must reflect the Constitution's values, not popular morality; invoked by Ambedkar and revived in the Navtej Singh Johar and Sabarimala judgments (2018).