the ruling Janata Party wanted him to head the Commission of Inquiry against the illegal imposition of the emergency and the various atrocities committed during it but Khanna refused, as he felt he would appear biased against Indira Gandhi and her son Sanjay Gandhi. He was then offered the Chairmanship of the Finance Commission, a position he also refused. He did however accept the office of Chairman of the Law Commission, a post he held without any pay. He resigned from its chairmanship in 1979 when he was inducted into the cabinet as Union Law Minister by Charan Singh. However, he resigned within 3 days. As it so happened, the entire government fell within six months. In 1982 Khanna was nominated for President of India, as a combined opposition candidate supported by as many as nine opposition parties. However, the Congress Party had a huge majority numerically and he lost to Giani Zail Singh. From 1985 until 2000, he was the national president of the Bharat Vikas Parishad, after which he became patron to the organisation. He was a long time board member of, and for many years the chairman of the Press Trust of India. In 1998, the Justice HR Khanna committee was constituted by the railway ministry with the mandate of "reviewing the implementation of previous accident inquiry committees, of examining the adequacy of existing practices for the safe running of trains and to suggest safety measures." Under his chairmanship, the Railway Safety Review Committee made 278 recommendations, out of which 239 were accepted by the railways. In 2001 he chaired the advisory panel to the Government of India on strengthening the institutions of parliamentary democracy. A prolific writer, he also lectured regularly and many of his lectures were later published in book form. Among the books he has authored, are "Judicial Review or Confrontation" (1977), Constitution and civil liberties (1978, based on the B. R. Ambedkar memorial lectures), Making of India's Constitution (1981, based on the Sulakshani Devi Mahajan lectures), "Judiciary in India and Judicial Process" (1985, based on the Tagore Law Lectures), Liberty, Democracy and Ethics, Society and the Law, which mainly deal with Indian law and the constitution. He also wrote an autobiography, Neither Roses nor Thorns, (Lucknow, 1985). In the conclusion of his Making of India's constitution, he writes: If the Indian constitution is our heritage bequeathed to us by our founding fathers, no