How do you compensate a Freedom Fighter?

It is disturbing to know that a 99-year old freedom fighter has to face inaction and non-governance. There was no respect for his sacrifice, sufferings like floggings in custody, bullet injuries and travails while resisting British forces.Present generation should not forget that it was the united effort of all the freedom fighters like 99 year old Radha Krishan made us free. After a few years, we may not find any freedom fighters living. Respecting and rewarding them is the least we could do....

Legal Advisor to the Kerala CM – A Post Most Unwarranted

The recent development in Kerala regarding appointment of Senior Advocate M.K. Damodaran as the Legal Advisor to the Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan is indeed a fertile ground for illustrative study in legal concepts. On the one hand it helps dissect morality and legality; on the other, ethics and professional conduct. “Conflict of interest” is confused with “Office of profit”, and Legal Advisor to Chief Minister is seen glorified over and above the constitutional post of Advocate General.The...

Proposal to balance judicial review and Parliamentary power

I rejoiced with the rest of India when the thirteen judge bench of the Supreme Court of India ruled in Kesavananda Bharathi case, though only with a wafer-thin majority that Parliament’s power to amend the Constitution does not include the power to destroy its basic structures. I felt that thenceforth the Constitution will ever remain unimpaired. But when I read the verdict of the majority of the five judge bench of the Supreme Court in the NJAC case, I had the portend of the dangerous extent to...

Uniform Civil Code or ‘Unilateral Civil Code’

Dust and din again started surfacing with the Ruling Party’s resolution to go ahead with framing of Uniform Civil Code. Sceptics would see the attempt as a ‘plank formation exercise’ for the coming elections to the Legislative Assembly of Uttar Pradesh. Hoping to ride on this juggernaut, the Bharathiya Janatha Party is making it as its main poll issue. In fact, the deliberations over Uniform Civil Code are often triggered not by political parties. The observations of Courts as well keep the...

Treading on the Tramlines of Judicial Review: Supreme Court on AFSPA and Extra-Judicial Killings in Manipur

In a recent judgment [Judgment dated 8 July, 2016 in Extra Judicial Execution Victim Families Association v. Union of India, Writ Petition (Criminal) No. 129 of 2012], the Supreme Court has laid the legal ground-work for conducting an enquiry into alleged fake encounters in Manipur. It held that use of excessive force by the Manipur Police or the Armed Forces of the Union is not permissible, even in areas declared as “disturbed” under the AFSPA and against militants, insurgents and terrorists....

Need for a United or Unified Code? Understanding the Implications of the Uniform Civil Code

Before the NarendraModi-led BJP government came to power, one of its primary propaganda in its manifesto was the implementation of a Uniform Civil Code (UCC), which has been a question of long debate and discussion for several decades. The Supreme Court of India, recently questioning the Government‘s confusing stance on this issue on a PIL filed before it, initially sought for an effective reply and status update on its implementation. But on subsequently hearing the matter at length, arrived at...

Abolish office of profit disqualification

The ‘office of profit’ controversy is back. This time, 21 MLAs of the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) in Delhi are under threat of losing their membership of the State Assembly. These legislators were appointed Parliamentary Secretaries under various ministers. The President of India has returned the Bill, which was passed to save their membership, and now, the Election Commission has asked them to present their case to it as the President can cancel their membership only on its advice.Jaya Bhachan in...

Certificate of Practice Rules, 2015 - An Analysis

The urgent necessity for this academic analysis is that the direct effect of these Rules are expected to be felt from 01 July, 2016 to the detriment of all advocates in this country, especially those who are actually sincere and loyal to this profession.The Bar Council of India Certificate and Place of Practice (Verification) Rules, 2015 states that there are a number of different problems that are allegedly faced by our legal community; and as a measure to counter all those different alleged...

Trust the Chief Justice of India and allow him to to lead judicial reforms from within

The BJP government’s first two years have been marked by an acrimonious relationship with the judiciary. Notable developments have taken place in the last few days in the executive-judiciary relationship. While no one can dispute that the independence of judiciary is not an end in itself and is rather an instrumental value defined by the purposes it serves, at the same time government's efforts to control the judiciary are dangerous.Rejecting the charge of “judicial outreach” by the senior...

Six Opinions, One Problem: Why a Nine-Judge Bench of the Supreme Court will Rethink a Fifty-Year Old Case?

While the Constitution of India has to be engaged with and interpreted as an indivisible whole, there are some parts of the Constitution that are clearly in tension with others. One such example is the tension between the power of the State Government to tax and raise revenues on the one hand, and the constitutional directive to ensure free movement of trade and commerce within the territory of India, protected under Part XIII of the Constitution, on the other. Intuitively, it is easy to see...

Perumal Murugan and the Judicial Defence of Free Speech

In a welcome decision, Sanjay Kishan Kaul, who as a Judge of the Delhi High Court had once spoken up in defence of the artist M F Hussain, has once again, along with Pushpa Sathyanarayana, J, issued a decision dated July 5, 2016, which defends the right to free speech. It isn’t quite the victory for absolute free speech which it appears to have been made out to be in some quarters: the decision clearly recognizes that the right to free speech – or, with reference to the factual matrix in which...

Police and Doctors killed on duty should get equal compensation

Equity demands equality. It is the duty of state to value each life equally. The law mandates that if any employee dies during course of employment, his family or legal representatives are entitled to compensation from the employer, whether private or Government. For injury or death of worker due to working conditions, the employer has to compensate the injured or family of the deceased employee as per Workmen’s Compensation Act, 1923. This Act says, if personal injury caused to a worker by...