Cash Is King Again - How India's UPI Miracle Just Grew Price Tag

The world's love affair with transacting and paying without even touching legal tender money is older than most of us think. It began in 1958, when Bank of America mailed unsolicited credit cards to approximately 60,000 residents of Fresno, California, under the brand “BankAmericard”. What became known as the “Fresno Drop” was a radical experiment in the history of banking i.e. putting a ready-to-use line of credit into people's hands before they even knew of and had even asked for one.By 1976,...

Missing Piece In BNSS: Why India Urgently Needs Victim Impact Assessment Law

The enactment of the Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita, 2023 (“BNSS”) has been accompanied by a consistent legislative narrative: that Indian criminal procedure is transitioning from a model preoccupied with the rights of the accused to one that gives comparable weight to the interests of the victim. Section 360 of the BNSS, which mandates that a court hear the victim before permitting the withdrawal of a prosecution, is frequently invoked as the clearest illustration of this shift.This shift,...

When Tax Appeal Backfires: How Far Can 'No Reformatio in Peius' Travel Under GST?

An airline challenged a penalty of Rs. 12,000. Its appeal led to a remand. When the matter came back for de novo adjudication, the penalty was no longer Rs. 12,000; it was Rs. 71,29,140. That extraordinary escalation is what brought the Supreme Court, on 1 September 2026, to the doctrine of no reformatio in peius - the principle that a litigant should not be placed in a worse position merely because it used a remedy provided by law. In M/s Saudi Arabian Airlines v. Union of India, 2026 INSC 933...

Forgotten Educated Prisoner: Blind Spot In India's Prison Reform

When prison reform is discussed in India, the conversation naturally gravitates toward overcrowding, healthcare, legal aid, security, and literacy. These are urgent issues. Yet, one demographic is almost entirely missing from the debate: the educated professional. A person's qualifications do not simply evaporate the moment a prison gate locks behind them.We rarely account for the graduates, accountants, engineers, or managers navigating a system entirely unequipped for their backgrounds. We...

One Function, Two Rulebooks: Consent Manager-Account Aggregator Overlap Under DPDP Rules, 2025.

What happens when there are two guards guarding two entrances but into the same vault? The qualifications for both guards are different, one had to prove himself for years to earn the post; the other was waved in on far lighter terms. While the stricter guard is more trusted, the visitor, who sees none of this, simply picks the nearer door. This choice in itself turns out to be problematic.The final DPDP rules were released back in November, 2025. India will now run on two consent intermediaries...

Body Before Birth: Can Article 21 Shield Genome From Non-Consensual CRISPR Editing?

In November 2018, a Chinese biophysicist named He Jiankui announced to the world that he had successfully edited the germline of two human embryos twins, later named Lulu and Nana using the CRISPR-Cas9 gene-editing tool. The global scientific community responded with near-universal condemnation. He was jailed. The twins carry heritable genetic modifications that will, if they have children, pass into the next generation. The change cannot be undone.That episode felt like science fiction then. It...

Anti-Competitiveness When Airports Own Airlines

The government's move to loosen restrictions on cross-ownership between airport operators and airlines deserves deeper scrutiny as a policy choice, even when major private airport operators deny any current proposal to enter the airline industry.The Ministry of Civil Aviation is considering whether a relaxation in cross-ownership restrictions between airport operators and airlines can be allowed. Under the present concession agreements governing Delhi and Mumbai airports, an operator is not...

Beyond Winner And Loser: Reimagining Section 9 In Post-Award Stage

An arbitral award is understood as the culmination of the arbitral process. The pleadings have been closed, evidence has been led and arguments have been heard before rendering an award. The award, however, often marks not the end of the dispute, but the beginning of a distinct post-award phase. The unsuccessful party may challenge the award under Section 34 of the Arbitration and Conciliation Act, 1996 ("Arbitration Act"), while the successful party may move towards enforcement. Between the...

Legal Education In India: An Expensive Dream And Growing Divide In Access To Justice

Law is one of the noble professions in India and in the entire world. Despite being a noble profession, legal education consists of various discrepancies and irregularities which need to be addressed. The Medium of Instruction, the expensive fee structure is ultimately widening the gap in legal education between tier 1 and tier 3 colleges, which is a great matter of concern as it is making legal education inaccessible for students belonging from under privileged families. Discriminatory Approach...

India's Surveillance Gap

The controversial mass surveillance by the Delhi police for criminal profiling of protestors at the recent CJP protests at Jantar Mantar in Delhi has raised serious concern surrounding limits of surveillance and consequences of unauthorized processing of personal data. In July of 2026, the Delhi Police deployed the Ikshana van - a mobile surveillance vehicle with eight fixed cameras, first inducted before the 2023 G20 Summit. Deployed without justification, the facial recognition system,...

Does One Forum Fit All?

The recent decision of the NCLAT, Principal Bench in ARC Research and Development Centre Limited v. Liquidator of Adya Oils and Chemicals Ltd. (“Adya Oils”) through a majority decision of two technical Members had expanded the contours of Section 60(5)(c) of the Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code, 2016 (“Code”) to include a decision on easement rights affecting rights of a third party. Although the Supreme Court has stayed the operation of the NCLAT decision and referred the dispute to mediation,...

Constitution Of Constitution Benches

The recent judgement of the Supreme Court defining the industry in State of U.P. v. Jal Bir Singh etc., Civil Appeal No. 897 of 2022 etc., while reconsidering the little less than a century old definition given in the case of Bangalore Water Supply and Sewerage Board v. A. Rajappa, (1978) 2 SCC 213, has raised an important question regarding the meaning and true spirit of Constitution Benches. In detailed dissenting opinion of HMJ Dipankar Datta writing for himself and HMJ Ujjal Bhuyan,...