Indian Constitution at Work (Class XI, Political Science; NCERT code keps2) is the foundational NCERT text on how India's Constitution was framed and how its institutions work in practice. It is the base text for Indian Polity in GS Paper 2, and its phrasing recurs in Mains questions: "Cabinet dictatorship", "a nation on the move", "principled distance", the Constitution as "a living document".

The ten chapters, in NCERT's order:

  1. Constitution: Why and How? The functions a constitution performs, where its authority comes from, and how the Assembly of 1946-49 worked.
  2. Rights in the Indian Constitution. The six Fundamental Rights, Article 32 and the Directive Principles, with the amendments and cases that changed them.
  3. Election and Representation. First-past-the-post against proportional representation, reservation of constituencies, the Election Commission and electoral reform.
  4. Executive. Parliamentary and presidential systems, the President's discretion, the Prime Minister and Council of Ministers, the Governor, the permanent executive.
  5. Legislature. Why two Houses, the functions of Parliament, how a bill becomes law, the instruments of control, committees, privilege and defection.
  6. Judiciary. Independence and its devices, appointment and removal, the Supreme Court's jurisdictions, PIL and judicial activism, the Parliament-judiciary arc.
  7. Federalism. The division of powers, the Centre's bias, demands for autonomy, President's Rule, new States, inter-State disputes and the special provisions.
  8. Local Governments. Why local government matters, the 73rd and 74th Amendments, reservation, finances and devolution.
  9. Constitution as a Living Document. Article 368, the amendments by period and purpose, the basic structure doctrine and the Venkatachaliah review.
  10. The Philosophy of the Constitution. NCERT's political philosophy approach, the core values, secularism as principled distance, the achievements, criticisms and limitations.

Each page follows the chapter's own sequence, quotes the Articles where the exam turns on a word, works NCERT's exercises, and ends with UPSC-pattern practice questions and a list of the sources used, with figures dated to the record they come from. The pages were rewritten against the Reprint 2026-27 text in October 2026.