Supreme Court
The other day, in the corridor outside the government law officers’ chambers in the Supreme Court a well-dressed man sat outside the solicitor general’s office. Visibly uncomfortable on one of the rickety wooden benches, he was also livid with rage and his gaze seemed intent on burning a hole through the firmly shut door to the SG’s chambers.
Supreme Court Postcard: Chief Justice SH Kapadia does not preside over the Chief Justice’s Court so much as dominate its vaulting, almost cavernous interiors with his presence. In part his impact is a product of his voice - a booming thunder somewhere between tenor and baritone - which is what you’d expect to hear from the Grand Inquisitor as you are confronted with heresies you have allegedly committed.
But if Kapadia is to have a place of pride in Indian judicial history – and everything so far signifies that he might - it will be for his administrative role as the Chief Justice of India even more than for his purely judicial output. Like Hercules before him Kapadia is in the midst of cleaning the Augean Stables that the Supreme Court of India has become under his predecessors but only part of the task is done.
- 57,179 cases pending in SC as of 30 June; on 1 May 2011 only 54,547 cases were pending. [Supreme Court / PIB]
- Law ministry to examine deal for Mukesh Ambani Mumbai residential tower, may get referred to CBI [Mint] (via @SonyBhatt)
- Bail denied to three company promoters in CWG scam [ET]
- Men in Black ‘Follow the Money’ as CJI Kapadia battles fight against graft [Bloomberg]
- Court summons Shilpa Shetty, Richard Gere for lip-kiss in 2007 TV show on AIDS: indecent act and crime under IPC hurts Bhojpuri community [TOI]
Round up of the latest and most legal from around the web.
- Supreme Court: Don’t open our judgments on flimsy grounds [The Hindu]
- Deadline for Greater Noida ‘hi tech court’ with video conferencing and servers was March 2010, now slated to be done in two months [Times of India]
- “A Challenge, An Opportunity!” AZB’s Abhijit Joshi talks of motivation and his philosophy behind law firm management following his appointment as AZB CEO. [Moneycontrol.com]
- P&H student files writ v BCI against 20 year age-limit for applying to 5-year LLB courses [Indian Express]
- Supreme Court hikes 1996 chemical company pollution damages from Rs 37 crore to Rs 200 crore for failing to pay [Economic Times]
- New independent environmental regulator for granting industrial environmental clearances [Business Standard]
On 7 July, his final day in court, Justice B Sudershan Reddy sat on the Bench with Chief Justice of India SH Kapadia in the Chief’s Court, as is custom for a departing judge. The custom was never more apt. Reddy and Kapadia shared a great rapport while on the Bench and although their outlook in matters judicial and otherwise were quite similar, they could not have been more different in demeanour and action.
The contentious Supreme Court Bar Association (SCBA) election has now been challenged in the Delhi High Court, claiming that the use of electronic voting machines was unconstitutional and the election results invalid. This follows incumbent candidate Ram Jethmalani having strongly questioned his defeat at the hands of PH Parekh in mid-May.
Exclusive: Pravin Parekh has won the Supreme Court Bar Association (SCBA) election, defeating former vice chairman Adish Aggarwala by a margin of only two votes, also leaving behind the incumbent Ram Jethmalani.
The Supreme Court has stayed the operation of the landmark September 2010 Allahabad high court’s Ayodhya judgement, which divided the disputed Ram Janmabhoomi-Babri Masjid site into three, calling it “something strange”.
A five-judge bench of the Supreme Court has issued notices to Union Carbide Corp and Dow Chemicals for increasing compensation to victims of Bhopal gas leak from Rs 750 crore to Rs 7,844 crore while hearing the Union government’s curative petition today.
The Supreme Court today offered little relief by way of clarification while dismissing Allahabad High Court’s application to expunge the apex court’s earlier castigating remarks that “something was rotten” in the lower court amid a prevalence of “uncle judges syndrome”, while holding that there were “excellent and good judges too” and incorrigibles should be transferred.
A forum for advocates of South India have petitioned the President and the Chief Justice of India to set up a Supreme Court Bench in the southern states dedicated to adjudication of disputes involving/originating from the areas to save litigant’s time and effort, reported The Hindu.
The Supreme Court has granted three more days to the Bar Council of India (BCI) for completing the summoning process in the All India Bar Examination (AIBE) transfer petition case today in its repeated attempt to get the regulator to clear procedural hurdles for a merit-based adjudication.
The Supreme Court of India has raised the stipends for graduates joining as judicial clerks for one year from Rs 20,000 per month to Rs 25,000, having taken on roughly 50 to 55 students this year, with further stipend increases rumoured for 2011.
Procedural delays were set to derail the discussions on the merits in the All India bar examination court challenges, as the Supreme Court has adjourned the hearing in the transfer petition to 20 October after ordering the issue of fresh notices to the respondents and the shifting of the case to the Delhi High Court was not mentioned.
The Supreme Court has issued notice to ex-Satyam director B Rama Raju and four others following the Central Bureau of Investigation’s (CBI) challenge of the High Court’s grant of bail to the defendants, who were allegedly responsible for the Rs 7,000 crore scam that almost brought the IT company to its knees.
The Supreme Court today outright dismissed one public interest litigation (PIL) against the bar exam filed by a Delhi University law graduate and issued directions to combine the pending national high court writ petitions against the bar exam for hearing before the Delhi High Court, as Friday's Bonnie FOI case hearing was adjourned.
The Supreme Court Bar Association (SCBA), which has been marred by controversies and an early dissolution in January, finally elected a committee and president as Ram Jethmalani rose to victory today by defeating his rival Raju Ramachandran by 367 votes.
The Supreme Court has ruled in favour of Mukesh Ambani-promoted Reliance Industries Limited (RIL) in its battle against Anil Ambani-controlled Reliance Natural Resources Limited (RNRL).
The bench decided two-to-one that the private memorandum of understanding (MOU) between the brothers was not binding on the companies, the shareholders or the Government, according to preliminary media reports, and that RIL and RNRL will have to renegotiate the prices of the gas supply agreement that has been subject of the dispute.
Supreme Court judge Sarosh Homi Kapadia will take over as Chief Justice of India (CJI) from outgoing CJI K G Balakrishnan on 12 May 2010, while the Supreme Court will have its first female judge in almost four years, the government of India announced today.