Reservations In Promotions And The Idea Of Efficiency: B.K. Pavitra v Union Of India

A two-judge bench of the Supreme Court on Friday delivered a fascinating judgment in B.K. Pavitra v Union of India, concerning the relationship between reservations in promotions for Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes [SCs/STs], and issues of seniority. The facts were as follows: in 2002, the state of Karnataka enacted a law stipulating – in effect – that consequential seniority would follow upon the promotions of SC/ST employees. To put it in simple language: if a reserved category employee...

Remembering Prof. N. R. Madhava Menon: The Grand Patriarch Of Legal Education

The life of Prof. Madhava Menon is a great book of teachings: vision, values, dedication and integrity. Prophet and a pragmatist, architect and a mason. Historical narratives attempt to catalogue great teachers, those who spent their life as passionate social investments: investments for no material returns or offices. One indelible common characteristic of any of them is that they were drawn to changing the world, the specific world which they encountered. If biographies of such wonderful and...

Professor Madhava Menon On RTI And CIC

I requested Prof.N.R. Madhav Menon to speak at the tenth Annual Convention of CIC in 2015 addressing issues of character and duties of the Commissioners. He touched upon important aspects saying that 'time came to discuss how far the objectives of RTI Act were realized in making government transparent and accountable. If you are talking about digitalization of information, are you discarding the whole lot of rural population with no access to digitalized world and information? More encompassing...

Technology, Fears of Cultural Submergence, and Video Regulation in India

The practice of determining the legality of a publication based on its ownership and on the nature of its contents has existed for almost as long as recordable communication has existed. We are, of course, no longer confined to the basic forms of communication such as the written word, and content laws, once unabashedly censorship laws, now govern everything from books to videos and gifs. Most of these laws are not of recent vintage and, so, old laws have often been forced to contend with new...

No Institutional Credibility Without Fair Process: Women Lawyers Object To Clean Chit To CJI

On 20.04.2019, a complaint of sexual harassment was submitted against the Chief Justice of India by a woman who had been employed in the Supreme Court as a Junior Court Assistant. Her complaint contained detailed averments on a sworn affidavit along with corroborating materials including phone logs, video recordings, etc. that supported her allegations of sexual harassment, and asked for an external inquiry into the allegations by retired judges of the Supreme Court. What followed thereafter has...

The Lack Of Lemon Laws In India Is Really Squeezing The Juice Out Of The Automobile Owners!

NO, this is not a food column, the 'lemon' I am talking about is the 'car' you bought only to discover that what you now possess does not perform or meet your expectations, or the car that spends more time in the workshop than on the road. The year 2018 can rightly be attributed as 'the year of recalls' for the automobile industry, as according to the statistics revealed by Society of Indian Automobile Manufacturers (SIAM), total vehicles recalled by the automobile industry in between...

Not Only Must Justice Be Done; It Must Also Be Seen To Be Done

I request the Honorable Supreme Court to make Report public to be fair and reasonable, because: We don't know what the truth is! Entire law and procedures are made only to find out the truth. If CJI is innocent he should not be embarrassed. At the same time if the complainant has complaints about the process of inquiry, it is the duty of the institution to assure the integrity of the process. The judiciary shines as a credible pillar of constitutional democracy because of its openness of trial,...

Judicial Emergency: Justice and Country Blindfolded

Panel for enquiry submitted its report to the CJI and says report will not be made public and copy will not be given to the erstwhile lady employee. Report was given soon after Justice DY Chandrachud 's letter to the panel saying do not proceed ex parte. Whether Full Court would get to see the report , we have to wait and see. So the CJI, the person complained against, would get to see the report but not the complainant, not the nation ( maybe not the full court ) but only the CJI or a few...

[Debate] Applicability Of Section 360 CrPC And PO Act - A Response To Vrinda' s Reply To Justice Ramkumar

I have read the response of Miss VrindaBhardwaj to Justice Ramkumar's Article on the applicability of Section 360Cr.P.C., published in the live law. While I have no quarrel about the principles of interpretation highlighted by the author, I am sorry to say that the author has not correctly applied the relevant principles to the issue involved. The question of harmonious construction will arise only for the purpose of harmonising to apparently conflicting provisions both...

Justice Ravindra Bhat's Lasting Contribution To Indian IP Jurisprudence

Last Friday marked the final day of Justice Ravindra Bhat at the Delhi High Court before he takes over as the Chief Justice of the Rajasthan High Court. Over the last 15 years, Justice Bhat has penned landmark judgments in several different areas of law ranging from constitutional law to right to information to administrative law to intellectual property rights. While most of his judgments are intellectually rigorous and lucid, I would like to write a few words about his outstanding...

Section 360 To Be Co-jointly Read With PO Act [A Response To Justice Ramkumar's Article]

Interpretation is the art of finding out the true sense of enactment by giving the words of the enactment their natural and ordinary meaning. According to Gray, interpretation is the process by which a judge constructs from the words of a statute book, a meaning which he either believes to be that of the legislature or which, he proposes to attribute to it.[1] Accordingly, every legal text requires interpretation as the clarity in any legal text doesn't preclude the need for...

Extent Of Criminal Liability Under Competition Law

In M/s. Rajasthan Cylinders & Containers Ltd. vs. Competition Commission of India[1], the Delhi High Court upheld interpretation favored by the Competition Commission of India for initiating criminal action, where a person fails to comply with the directions of the Director General in submitting information/documents during the course of investigation. The judgment has been stayed by the Supreme Court. However, if the view taken by the High Court is upheld, it would have significant...