When can the Preamble be used as an aid to interpretation of a statute?

The Preamble expresses the scope, object and purpose of the Act more comprehensively. The Preamble of a Statute is a part of the enactment and can legitimately be used as an internal aid for construing it. However, the Preamble does not over-ride the plain provision of the Act. But if the wording of the statute gives rise to doubts as to its proper construction, for example, where the words or phrase has more than one meaning and a doubt arises as to which of the two meanings is intended in the Act, the Preamble can and ought to be referred to in order to arrive at the proper construction. In short, the Preamble to an Act discloses the primary intention of the legislature but can only be brought in as an aid to construction if the language of the statute is not clear. However, it cannot override the provisions of the enactment. Example: Use of the word 'may' in section 5 of the Hindu Marriage Act, 1955 provides that “a marriage may be solemnized between two Hindus.....” has been construed to be mandatory in the sense that both parties to the marriage must be Hindus as defined in section 2 of the Act. It was held that a marriage between a Christian male and a Hindu female solemnized under the Hindu Marriage Act was void. This result was reached also having regard to the preamble of the Act which reads: 'An Act to amend and codify the law relating to marriage among Hindus" [GullipoliSowria Raj v. BandaruPavani, (2009) 1 SCC714].