Union government taking U-turn from its earlier stand to make appointment-process in higher judiciary public

The Union government surprisingly takes a U-turn on its earlier view of making appointment-process in higher judiciary public. Unfortunately reverse-stand of the government comes a few months after the luminaries from bar and bench apart from Union government agreed to make appointment-process in judiciary to be covered by RTI Act. It is significant that such matters were in open discussion including the one by the then Chief Justice of India on non-appointment of Gopal Subramaniam as Supreme...

How the Legal Industry is Getting more Technology Driven

The legal industry in India is a mysterious market that even its regulators don’t seem to have good grip on. The number of students for the law profession is increasing. From completing legal research and billings to document reviews and assembly, including project management had not evolved from much older methods for the past few years.These tasks require a huge amount of a lawyer’s time, and since the most preferred format used by lawyers is hourly billing, that time costs their clients’...

Freedom of Dissent and Constitutional Morality

Freedom of expression is the hallmark of a democratic society. Voltaire legendarily observed- “I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it.”  In United States, scholars have analyzed freedom of expression from colonial times to the battle over the Sedition Act of 1798, yet for the period after the expiration of that statute in 1801, there is little, but silence. This article undertakes to probe the question whether in a newly democratic nation like India;...

The Rebel and the Judge; A Critical Note on #Kanhaiya Bail Order

Jail or bail; bail or jail; jail if not bail; bail if not jail - This was the swinging proposition of heated debates since 12th February when Kainhaiya Kumar was arrested by Delhi Police. Under Hindu Mythology, Lord Krishna (another name for whom is Kanhaiya) was born inside jail. His mother was jailed by the maternal evil uncle Kansa as he was apprehensive of death by hands of Krishna. The then Kanhaiya made a narrow escape from the prison, killed Kansa, played a vital role in Hindu epic...

JNU row: Rethinking Fetters on the Media

Much has been said and discussed about the events that unfolded at the JNU campus, the reactions of the police and the politicians, and the propriety thereof. Despite massive media coverage and discourse, it seems that in the entire series of events, a very important aspect has been missed, or perhaps ignored. A rational opinion seems to have lost its relevance between the polarized reactions to the issue.On the 10th of February left leaning students at JNU planned to organize a cultural program...

Budget 2016 - Challenging Times to Continue

While there are a few hits and misses, the budget was a positive plethora of positive announcements focusing on core sectors such as agriculture, rural investments, etc. There has been a continued focus on skill development and job creation, and further strengthening of Digital India which is a welcome move. The budget is in line with economic survey, however, much could have been done to boost India Inc. and create macroeconomic stability. The budget highlighted a long term view for the growth...

Prosecution and Police in India: Time for the Twain to Meet

As in the lines of Rudyard Kipling, “OH, East is East, and West is West, and never the twain shall meet,” the decision of the Hon. Supreme Court in Sarala v. Velu AIR 2000 SC 1732, rendered the final push in tearing apart the two arms of the criminal justice system – prosecution and investigation. First the 1973 amendment to the Criminal Procedure Code extinguished police supervision over prosecution.  Then the decision in Sarala ended the practice of consultation between the police and...

The ball is in the Court

It must lay down clearly what constitutes sedition.The current controversy over the ready resort to Section 124A of the IPC in the case of Kanhaiya Kumar has once again revived the debate over the need to retain this provision in the law. As a lawyer who appeared on his behalf in the Supreme Court last week, I would refrain from going into the merits of the case against him. But it is necessary to state my position on the debate, which started with Arundhati Roy and continued with Binayak...

Is Sedition Law Anti-Indian?: Legal Analysis

The current debate on sedition arises from the state intrusion into the cultural event held in one of the epitome of educational institutions of learning in India, Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi. It is also further interesting to note that the charges of sedition was based on a video aired by the Zee news and FIR was filed only on 11th February, 2016, after two days of rally at JNU despite police presence during the event on 9th February, 2016. We have come across filing of sedition...

#JNU : From Sedition to Unlawful Activities: A Road to Perdition?

As newspaper reports keep coming in, the JNU controversy grows ever murkier and conjectured. From claims of ‘freedom of speech’ to ‘anti-nationalism’, ‘disunity’, ‘sedition’ and now ‘terrorist group backing’ have all done the rounds, in what appears to be a cacophony of vested interests, highly polarized and devoid of any impassioned call for principles. That a series of enquiry commissions, from magisterial to internal university probes have been ordered, has not deterred groups from agitating...

Law of Terrorism Vis-a-Vis Terrorism of Law

“An avidity to punish is always dangerous to liberty. It leads men to stretch, to misinterpret, and to misapply even the best of laws. He that would make his own liberty secure must guard even his enemy from oppression; for if he violates this duty he establishes a precedent that will reach to himself.”__Thomas Paine (On First Principles of Government, 1795) 1. IntroductionIt is always necessary for the rulers in a democratic country to be reminded of the words of American Jurist Schaefer that...

Antonin Scalia & Originalism : A Critique

Justice Antonin Scalia, a famous Judge of the US Supreme Court was found dead yesterday at a resort in West Texas. Scalia, 79, was considered one of the most influential judges of the last quarter century and an expert in constitutional law. His most important and perhaps the most controversial work was the theory of Originalism as a tool of constitutional interpretation.In his address delivered on September 16, 1988 at the University of Cincinnati as the William Howard Taft Constitutional Law...