New Delhi, Feb. 2 -- On 26 January 1950, India adopted its Constitution and began the great experiment of building not only a vast democratic state, but a sovereign one. As our nation approaches the seventy sixth anniversary of that momentous day, it is only natural to reflect on how a polity as large, diverse, argumentative and aspirational as ours has not merely survived but strengthened with time. That endurance, however, cannot be attributed solely to the foresight of a constitution that set us on firm institutional footing. It is equally the result of a country that has evolved in tandem with a world transforming around it. For, sovereignty itself does not mean what it once did. Its definition has shifted, its demands have multiplied, ...