Gender And The Supreme Court Of India

A few days ago, the Learned Attorney General for India ('AG') Shri. K.K. Venugopal, made some important observations about the representation of women in the Supreme Court of India. Speaking on the occasion to recommend ways to gender sensitize the Judges, the AG remarked that more women judges in Constitutional Courts (i.e. Supreme Court and the High Courts) would improve gender sensitivity in the judiciary. He highlighted the under-representation of women in the Supreme Court i.e. 2/34...

Versus

While Lawyers are no strangers to taking sides and arraying themselves as 'versus' – a Latin term that means taking opposing stands in a lawsuit, the new fault-lines in the legal community are not just between those who are 'activist' and 'conformist' lawyers but it's giving rise to a new third category – those who seem to have entered into a Faustian Bargain – seemingly determined to use all their intellectual and legal prowess in the service of defending the Government. Activist v....

Two Pathbreaking Judgements: Undoing The Dickensian Nightmare

A survey of the functioning of the Family Courts in India will reveal the Dickensian nightmare faced by the children in custody proceedings. The children are mute spectators and at the receiving end of the harsh system of divorce and custody litigations. The voices of these children are never ever heard. According to a recent report, 1.36 million people in India were divorced. Using the law of averages, we are looking at a million children crying for their voices to be heard. The Indian...

Admission & Denial Of Documents In Suits

Prior to enacting the Commercial Division and Commercial Appellate Division of High Courts Act, 2015 ("Commercial Courts Act"), documents filed with the plaint and the written statement, especially in respect of the existence of the documents, were denied by the parties with impunity. With the introduction of the Commercial Courts Act an elaborate process was formulated in order for a party to admit and deny documents. This, along with other measures/ mechanisms such as discovery, ...

Dr. Ambedkar's Thoughts On Nation, Democracy, And Constitutionalism

[This is an edited excerpt from the introduction titled "The Resurgent Icon" written by Anurag Bhaskar for the book "A Stake in the Nation" (2020), which is a collection of Dr. BR Ambedkar's selected speeches. The volume is the result of life-long struggle of late Bhagwan Das, one of the Ambedkarite chroniclers. Das brought out the first edition of this book as far back as 1963 under the title 'Thus Spoke Ambedkar'. It was the first serious, professional effort to bring out an edition of...

Important Supreme Court Judgments: November 2020

The Supreme Court of India has pronounced numerous judgments in the month of November, 2020. In this write-up, the important pronouncements are briefly discussed. Arnab Manoranjan Goswami v. State of Maharashtra, Criminal Appeal No. 742 of 2020 (Decidedon 27/11/2020). A Bench of Justices Dr DY Chandrachud and Indira Banerjee summarized the factors which the High Courts must take into account while considering an application for the grant of bail under Article 226, which are, the...

Trial Lessons From K G Kannabiran: Nitya Ramakrishnan Remembers Parliament Attack Case

[This lecture, originally titled "Justice Measured Out in Coffee Spoons: Parliament Attack Case" was delivered on 30 November 2020 as part of the KG Kannabiran Lectures on Law, Justice and Human Rights – organised by the family of KG Kannabiran (1929-2010) to celebrate his life, work and its futures]. [Abstract: Nitya Ramakrishnan reviews the legal challenges in the Parliament attack case, where she and the legendary lawyer KG Kannabiran had appeared for the defence. She speaks about...

Democratising The Cyber Laws

According to Professor Ronald Dworkin, freedom for hate speech or group defamation is the price we pay for enforcing the laws that the haters and defamers oppose. His argument which appeared as a foreword in the book 'Extreme Speech and Democracy' came to be referred to as the 'Legitimacy theory'. It focuses on the significance of free and unrestricted speech in ensuring the legitimacy of democracy. The expression of opposition must be allowed no matter how foul or vicious the expression...

Professionalism- Bar And Bench

December 3 is observed as Advocates Day. It marks the birth anniversary of Dr. Rajendra Prasad, our first President, who was also the President of the Constituent Assembly, and, of course, a truly eminent lawyer. He had a brilliant academic career. After a Master's degree in Economics, he obtained his Master of Law from Calcutta University and later Doctor of Law from Allahabad University. He joined the Bar at Calcutta in 1911. Rajen Babu caught the eye of Sir Asutosh Mookerjee who sent...

'Judiciary And Social Justice, Dignity And Personal Liberty, Human Rights And Frights': Justice Madan Lokur

"Dissent and disagreement are slowly being turned into sedition; sedition is slowly being turned into an offence under the UAPA and an offence under the UAPA will soon be turned into a national security issue inviting the frightening prospect of an invocation of the draconian preventive detention law".

What's In A Name?: The Need For The Government To Take IPR Seriously

On 27th October, 2020, the Ministry of Railway inconspicuously published a short Notification in the National Gazette which simply stated that the Central Government has decided to change the name of "Diesel Locomotive Works", Varanasi to "Banaras Locomotive Works". The obsession of the present regime to change names of cities and names of Railway Stations is not unknown. However, this time around, it is not just a logistical trouble that they have created for themselves. Unlike...

Punishing 'Faithless' Electors: The Case Of Chiafalo Vs. Washington Of The US Supreme Court

In a significant development touching upon the voting behavior of presidential electors the American Supreme Court has come down heavily on 'faithless' electors of the electoral college which elects the American President. The American President, like the Indian President, is not directly elected by the people but is indirectly elected by electors of an electoral college constituted in terms of Article II section 1 of the US Constitution. The 2016 Presidential election in USA had ...