ABSTRACT
This chapter argues that while the Indian Constitution attempted to deal with social justice through subjective categories, it is brought into the rhythms of everyday life by squatters through a continuous interpretation of its original intent' as just'. Das was discussing police First Information Reports (FIRs) filed after communal violence in Delhi slums, which through their rewriting of violence made the state illegible' in everyday life. The chapter argues on the other hand that it is the threat of law-preserving violence experienced through the demolition of their homes. And which ensures a continuous discursive presence of the Indian Constitution as the final arbitrator of justice and legitimacy for its subaltern citizens. The rich scholarship around Indian law has noted that law' during the colonial period was an amalgam of earlier autochthonous systems of Hindu legal tradition and the Islamic Sharia laws, which had governed different parts of society.
