In a landmark judgment today, the Supreme Court struck down the 99th Constitutional Amendment for being ultra vires the basic structure of the Constitution. The 99th Amendment was intended to replace the “collegium” system, in which the three senior-most judges...
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Constitutional Law
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Earlier today, the Supreme Court struck down the two Acts that created an independent body for the appointment of judges to the higher judiciary.One of the Acts amended the Constitution to replace the method of appointment of judges by a...
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October 12, 2015 · 1:18 pm Harvard Law School is seeking submissions for a workshop on Animals in Comparative Constitutional Law to be held on Thursday, February 18, 2016.We invite scholarly submissions on any theme relevant to this topic, including...
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From reports of today’s Supreme Court proceedings in the Aadhaar review petitions, it appears that counsel invoked the doctrine of waiver: it was argued that citizens were entitled to waive their fundamental right to privacy (assuming that privacy is a...
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On this blog, I – as well as guest essayists – have written extensively about Rajasthan and Haryana’s moves to impose educational and other restrictions upon the right to contest Panchayati Raj elections. One way or another, this issue will...
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(We are starting a new series called ‘Notes from a Foreign Field’, focusing on decisions of other constitutional courts, and constitutional controversies in other jurisdictions, written by specialists from those jurisdictions. In the opening post, Max Harris, a New Zealand lawyer and presently...
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Supreme Court advocate KV Dhananjay argues that if the Supreme Court would strike down criminal defamation as unconstitutional on the ground that it is an unreasonable restraint on freedom of speech, it must also specify on what will happen...
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Recently, my attention was drawn to a fascinating judgment of a division bench of the Delhi High Court, delivered last month. Inspector (Mahila) Ravina vs Union of India concerned a challenge to the CRPF’s denial of promotion to a female inspector....
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Yesterday, the Supreme Court admitted the State of Gujarat’s appeal against a decision of the High Court of Gujarat, which had set aside the Gujarat State Tax Commissioner’s denial of tax exemption to the film “The Colour of Life“. The...
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In a significant judgment delivered yesterday, the Bombay High Court rejected the National Stock Exchange’s application for injunction, in a defamation action, against the journalist Sucheta Dalal (and others), for articles published on the financial news website, moneylife.in. Justice Gautam...
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K.V.Dhananjay, an advocate at the Supreme Court of India points to growing ignorance among High Court judges of even the most basic provisions of our Constitution.
Shocking ignorance of our Constitution!
Shockingly, some High Court Judges are writing in their judgments...
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September 9, 2015 · 7:08 pm Previously on this blog, we have discussed the Rajasthan legislature’s imposition of educational qualifications as a pre-requisite to contest local body elections, via an Ordinance, strategically passed last December, just before local body polls. The Supreme...
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(This is a guest post by Ayushi Singhal)Under the present legal system of India, people from different religions are governed by their own personal laws in matters of inheritance, marriage, separation, guardianship etc. In this regard, the succession in Hindus is...
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Initial DraftsThe initial drafts of the equality and non-discrimination provisions were prepared by B.R.Ambedkar (B Shiva Rao Ed. “The framing of India’s Constitution- Select Documents’ Universal law publishing co. Pvt. Ltd Vol II (2004) PP 86-88) and K.M.Munshi (Vol II...
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(Dovetailing with the previous discussion of sex discrimination on this blog, the following three-part guest post series by Professor Sanjay Jain focusses on the discussions surrounding women and the Constitution, during the Constituent Assembly Debates)—Representation of women in Constituent AssemblyRepresentation of women...
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The set of cases that we have discussed in this series is not comprehensive. To the best of my knowledge, though, it is largely representative of the major lines of argument followed by the High Courts and the Supreme Court...
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Before ending our discussion on sex discrimination under the Constitution, it would be interesting to take note of two (overruled) High Court cases that pushed interpretive boundaries in their understanding of Article 15(1). The first is the Delhi High Court’s...
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We have seen that in Anuj Garg, the Supreme Court adopted the anti-stereotyping principle: sex-based classifications could not be saved under Article 15(1) if their only justification was to invoke stereotypes about women’s sexual or social roles in the community. What,...
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In the last three essays, we discussed the complex intersections between labour and service laws, and sex discrimination. Let us now return to our original line of cases, which present discrimination claims in a simpler and starker background. In A.M....
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(In this guest post, Vansh Gupta explores a recent ruling of the US Equal Opportunity Commission that speaks directly to the Indian debate over the constitutionality of s. 377)The U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission recently issued a ruling (available here) recognising...
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