Wired
Stop striking, bench tells bar: Karnataka HC asks state bar associations to implement the Bar Council of India’s (BCI) 29 September 2002 resolution which limits an advocate’s absence from court proceedings to one day. Court gives three months to the associations to establish a “grievance redressal committee”, and asks them to frame advocates’ “practice conditions” for the high court [The Hindu]
No remake till make up: The Supreme Court stayed the release of Zanjeer remake until arbitration proceedings over rights finished [TOI]
Anand & Anand promos: The intellectual property (IP) firm promoted managing associates Dhruv Anand, Madhu Rewari, Revanta Mathur, Sandhya Singh, Shrawan Chopra and Swati Sharma to partnership effective 1 April 2013. The firm also made 13 fresh hires [Legal Era]
MV Kini promos: MV Kini & Co promoted principal associate Tavinder Sidhu to partnership in its Delhi office effective 1 April 2013. Sidhu is an advocate on record [Bar & Bench]
Engineering rank: Father writs Madras HC to force Eng colleges in Tamil Nadu to be ranked properly, rather than as advertised [The New Indian Express]
Kesavananda doctrine turns 40: India celebrates 40 years of “saving the democracy” on today’s anniversary of Kesavananda Bharati v State of Kerala where a 13-judge constitutional bench held that the parliament cannot amend the constitution to alter its “basic structure”. The Hindu narrates the full run-up to the 703-page judgement [Hindu]
SC sex harassment watchdog: The “Supreme Court Internal Complaints Committee” headed by an “eminent jurist” whose name is not decided yet, will soon come into power, decided the Supreme Court after finding that sexual harassment committees at various high courts of the country exist only on paper [PTI]
Pro bono por promos? Lawyers giving free legal aid and organising Lok Adalats could now earn bonus points that’ll help them become senior advocates and subordinate judges, if NALSA executive chairman P Sathasivam’s proposal at made at the 11th All India Meet of State Legal Service Authorities is accepted [TOI]
CCI moneybags: The Competition Commission of India (CCI) has imposed Rs 8,013 crore of penalties against 19 business entities in anti-competitive behaviour cases in 2012-13 FYI, while closing 262 out of total 347 registered cases [The New Indian Express]
Base judicial practices: A retired judge cannot practice in a court lower than the one in which he served, according to the Bar Council of Gujarat’s recent circular reiterating section 7 of the BCI rules [Daily Bhaskar]
Beyond contempt: The US’s Lewis & Clark law school dean apologises to the school paper’s editors after his pressuring them to take the US Supreme Court’s consent before publishing the news of the US chief justice judging a moot at their law school [Washington Post]
JAC of all trades: The union law ministry proposes a Judicial Appointments Committee comprising of the Chief Justice of India, two sitting SC judges, two presidentially appointed eminent jurists, the union law minister, and secretary department of law and justice [NDTV]
‘Peculiar’ extension: Supreme Court allows Dutt to complete work on a number of films in the next month before returning him to jail to complete his five year term for conviction under the Arms Act, for possession of firearms during the 1993 Mumbai bomb blasts [BBC/Order]
Victim bailed, judge billed: Madras HC fines female district judge Rs 1.1 lakh toward compensation and costs to a woman who was a victim of sex-through-false-promise-of-marriage, whom she had jailed for three days 12 years ago. Also orders departmental proceedings against the magistrate [TOI/Deccan Chronicle]
Cyber stigma: Challenges to tackling cyber-crime in India include the CBI cyber cell’s minimal jurisdiction and lack of data; RBI releases only internet fraud figures, which shot up from Rs 40 crore to Rs 53 crore in two years, while corporates remain reluctant to openly speak about their exposure to cyber fraud [BS]
Nalsar voyeur action: Nalsar Hyderabad executive council has vowed to set up a committee to take short and long term action against the victimisation of women by voyeuristic media. This follows Friday’s incident where TV channels aired and uploaded distorted news segments of an altercation involving party-going female Nalsar students outside a city pub [Hindu / Firstpost]
Hack to check Katju: Markandey Katju “hungry for cheap popularity, “would cause much more harm to Indian society in his remaining term” if not “checked” says journalist Arvind Pansare’s petition in the Bombay HC challenging the Press Council Act 1978 for not providing a process for removal of the PCI chairman [TOI]
Lawbreaker lawmin? Lawmin Ashwini Kumar does not deny charges of vetting the CBI’s status report on the coal blocks allocation controversy, along with other PMO officials. BJP demands his resignation for misuse of the CBI [IE]
Tackling school suicides: Nalsar organises 21 April meet to discuss student suicides in universities; two-judge bench of the Andhra Pradesh HC orders all state universities to attend [TOI]
Pondering porn: SC’s chief justice bench admits PIL on making watching pornography a non-bailable offence. Senior advocate MN Krishnamani appearing for the petitioner asserts that porn is affecting “peace of mind, health and wellness, happiness and human potential” [TOI]
Nalsar fights media: Nalsar Hyderabad students launch online campaign and vow to sue for slander over local television channels that allegedly forcefully filmed them and edited telecast to show them as drunk and topless outside a city pub where they were celebrating their farewell [Hindu/TOI]
Fashionable arbitration: The Karnataka high court’s arbitration centre – India’s second high court arbitration centre after Delhi – gets launched in Bangalore with arbitration fees ranging from Rs 50,000 and Rs 8 lakhs [New Indian Express]
Canning Katju: Bombay high court admits petition challenging the Press Council Act that does not allow for removal of Press Council of India (PCI) chairman (vis ex-Supreme Court judge Markandey Katju). [Spread_law via Twitter]
Pre-legal aid: Mumbai University Legal Aid Clinic in collaboration with the Maharashtra State Legal Services Authority will now offer pre-litigation mediation and arbitration services to citizens [TOI]
Top billing: GNLU Gandhinagar third-year student Tanya Nayyar wins Pravin Gandhi College of Law’s national legislative drafting competition, for her draft Mobile Towers (Installation and Regulation) Bill (2013), which will now be submitted to the DoT. NLIU Bhopal stands second [HT]
Declining judicial aspirations: Bombay high court chief justice Mohit Shah urges state bar council to train candidates for judgeship. Cites finding only 55 suitable judges in a 2012 advertisement for 159 posts, as compared to 41 judges for 100 posts in 2011, and 100 for 100 in 2010 [HT]
Elysium collegium: CJI Kabir defends collegium system of judges’ appointment, which he says involves “intense deliberations” and adds that people who are not fully aware of the system should refrain from commenting on it [Outlook]
Double vision 2018: SC and HC judges mega conference agrees to double the number of Indian judges from 18,871 to 37,000 over the next five years. The National Court Management Systems Committee appointed by the SC reported that India would need 75,000 judges in the next 30 years [Dailymail]
Lawyers don't dream of electric writs: Court Computerisation Committee chairman and Karnataka high court judge Ram Mohan Reddy says e-courts are a distant dream when lawyers aren’t willing to adjust to even electronic cause lists [Hindu]
Votive vs ILI vote: Alleged fraud at ILI governing council elections [IANS / Bar & Bench]
Blame bar for pendency: RTI filer asks Delhi HC for list of oldest pending suits and reasons for delay. Delhi HC responds: reason is lawyers continually seeking adjournments and litigants being “in no hurry” even while the court tries expedition [TOI]
Anti-terror paper: Prof Faizan Mustafa says, all newspapers, except The Hindu, should cover terrorism less to deprive terrorists of publicity oxygen [The Hindu]
ILI governatored: Delhi HC’s justice Gita Mittal, senior advocate Rakesh Munjal, CNLU Patna vice chancellor Prof Lakshmikanth and others elected to ILI governing council [ILI]
Right to AG info: RTI Activist SC Aggarwal appeals in Delhi HC against CIC decision holding attorney general’s office not “public authority” under the RTI Act. Senior advocate and additional solicitor general (ASG) Sidharth Luthra to reply for Vahanvati; next hearing 18 August [TOI]
Airtel 3G reamed: Reliance Communications wins embargo in Delhi HC on Bharti Airtel providing 3G roaming services in pockets for which it does not have the spectrum licence. A division bench overrules justice Rajiv Shakdher’s earlier order [IE]
Drugs are for losers: US drug maker Merck Sharp & Dohme could not obtain an interim injunction in the Delhi HC against Indian pharma co Glenmark on making and selling anti-diabetes meds [NDTV]
Azeri Ashwani: Indian law minister Ashwani Kumar signs Legal and Judicial Cooperation in Civil and Commercial Matters Treaty with Azerbaijan. Citizens of both countries can now (theoretically) obtain legal assistance in the other without any discrimination [PIB]
More drug wars: Global pharma major Merck and domestic co-plaintiff Sun Pharma filed in Delhi HC claiming Glenmark violated two of its diabetes drug patents (Januvia and Janumet) [Financial Times]
Crown jewel auction: Tata's Indian Hotels files injunction to stop auction of its leased Taj Mahal Hotel Delhi [Economic Times]
Stashed cop: A retired police inspector hires senior advocates Harish Salve, Mukul Rohatgi, and Uday Lalit – with a combined fee of Rs 15 lakh per appearance – to defend him in the Supreme Court against the charge of falsely implicating Provogue owner Salil Chaturvedi in a 2005 drug possession case [Pune Mirror]
Karnataka judactivism: Karnataka high court directs filling of vacancies in the state’s consumer forums and takes suo moto cognizance, based on a newspaper report, of the non-implementation of the Right to Education Act in the state – leaving 54,000 children still out of school [New IE]
Shah Commission: Senior advocate Gopal Subramanium makes a presentation in Ahmedabad before Justice MB Shah’s illegal mine probe commission, pledging mine owner’s Rs 100 crore trust fund for the socio-economic development of people living in mining districts [New IE]
Sibal gooses SC: Kapil Sibal said that the Supreme Court has damaged the Indian telecoms sector, ensuring that the "golden goose will not lay golden egg[s] again for a little while" [ZDNet]
Bring home the beacon: Restrict beacons and sirens on cars to select few (including CJI and high court CJs, but not SC judges), say SC Justices GS Singhvi and Kurien Joseph, aided by Harish Salve [Telegraph India]
Public Display Litigation: Mumbai court acquits man for lack of evidence of “indecent behaviour in public”, after Bandra police fined him Rs 1,200 for kissing a girl on the cheek while seeing her off on the road. The amount has been refunded and the man plans to lodge a public interest litigation on the issue next [Express]
Moving up: Bombay HC Justice Ajay Manikrao Khanwilkar to become Himachal HC chief justice [Hill Post]
Merger semi-approved: Bombay HC approves Sterlite-Madras Aluminium merger, Madras HC still to give nod [Indian Express]
IPL protection money: Bombay high court tells Maha’ government to look into legal action against cricket associations that have not paid the police Rs 9 crore dues for IPL security cover [Hindu Business Line]
Glivec hangover: US Chamber of Commerce says Supreme Court’s Novartis-Glivec patents judgment could damage FDI [Mint]
Dirty ore: SC orders Sterlite to pay Rs 100 crore for pollution from its copper smelting plant in Tamil Nadu [PTI]
Marinara for diplomat: CJI Altamas Kabir bench lifts Italian ambassador’s travel-ban as marines return, tells Subramanian Swami to go away, wants special court faster [Economic Times]
Education luncheon: Madras HC Justice V Ramasubramanian slams universities that offer ‘buffet spread’ degrees without specialisation [TOI]
Indefinite strike: Dwarka Court Bar Association lodges protest writ in Delhi HC against its 19 February notification reassigning criminal cases in Delhi’s West, Southwest and South districts from Saket and Dwarka courts to Tis Hazari and Patiala House. Association lawyers went on indefinite strike as the order was implemented on Friday [Express/HT]
Madurai advocates’ protest and hunger strike against Sri Lankan government for fourth day running. In 2009 similar protests had resulted in a clash with the police after hurling eggs at Janata Party president Subramaniam Swamy [Hindu/TOI]
Vacancies reduce at Patna, Guwahati and Chhattisgarh high courts, after three additional judges are made permanent in Patna, one additional judge is made permanent in Guwahati, and the Chhattisgarh high court gets two new additional judges [NetIndian]
NLS VC chats: NLSIU Bangalore vice chancellor Prof R Venkat Rao on NLSIU’s 100 per cent autonomy, default position on the Rhodes Scholars list and more in an interview with the Express [New Indian Express]
No air fare cap: CCI refuses to hold guilty of unfair competition, the Directorate General of Civil Aviation and the Ministry of Civil Aviation, for increasing air fares. Says a cap on air fares is not tenable as they are governed by market forces [Zee News]
BCI & Gov must resurrect directorate of legal education that was killed due to shortage of central funds, says parliament committee. The Parliamentary Standing Committee on Personnel, Grievances Law and Justice wrote: “The committee fails to comprehend why the government did not accede to the request made by the BCI for sustaining the Directorate of Legal Education. It, therefore, desires that the BCI in conjunction with the ministry should take a re-look in the matter and explore how the scheme can be revived.” [Deccan Herald]
The Supreme Court denies Novartis patent protection for its own amended form of caner drug Glivec in major IP judgment [Times of India / Download judgment via @thefirmupdate]
Ex-Supreme Court Justice Markandey Katju and current Press Council of India (PCI) chairman will stop blogging and writing newspaper columns after his comments attracted too much controversy. He announced on his blog today:
“It is true that I wish to be uncontroversial […] In this connection, I may refer to Chapter 2 Shloka 34 of the Geeta where Lord Krishna said to Arjun ‘For a self respecting man, death is preferable to dishonour’.” [via Katju blog]
The judge has made his fair share of enemies and friends with his outspoken blogs and newspaper columns, infamously writing in 2012 that 90 per cent of Indians were fools. [And this story too was a bit too foolish, we're afraid. Happy April Fools Day!]
Eight UP RTI information commissioners’ appointments were stalled after last week’s SC judgment mandating the presence of judicial members in benches of two at the information commissions. The panel of names for the UP commission was already finalised last month but will now be scrutinised by the governor in light of the SC ruling. At present, the UP Information Commission has only three commissioners including the Chief Information Commissioner. Information commissioner Gyan Prakash Maurya is a lawyer, but with less than 20 years of experience, while information commissioner Khadijatul Kubra’s background is in social work and mass media [Express India]
Former CJI Ranganath Mishra passes away in Orissa at the age of 86 after spending little more than three months admitted in a hospital for treatment of old-age related ailments. Mishra was chief justice of the Orissa high court in 1980, and CJI in 1990 [City Journal]
Bombay high court bars 36-year-old woman journalist from entering the court’s 150-years-celebration exhibition, for wearing a sleeveless top. Officials of the court attributed the restriction to a 7 September 2011 notification requiring visitors and litigants to enter court-premises wearing “modest dresses and in sober colour”. The exhibition was “open to the public” according to posters publicising it. “Even though I am a senior journalist, who has worked with mainstream newspapers and magazines for over 15 years, I had this unpleasant experience. It is advisable that the authorities put up a notice clearly mentioning their dress code at the entrances. Leaving it to the arbitrary interpretation of sundry personnel will inevitably lead to another situation like this,” said the barred journalist. [Mid-Day]
A 31 August notification makes being a high court judge an eligibility criteria for appointment as president of the CESTAT. The post of vice-president in the tribunal has been abolished. The retirement age for both the president and the members has been increased by three years [ITAT Online]
SEBI plans to open 30 regional offices to catch violation of investment schemes such as the CIS by corporates. This will take the regulator past the current lead of RBI with 19 offices countrywide. Currently SEBI has seven offices including the Mumbai headquarters. In August it opened offices in Jaipur and Bangalore. In March it said it planned to open offices in Chandigarh, Indore, Bangalore, Kochi, Patna, Bhubaneswar and Jaipur [Mint]
The retirement age for high court judges should be increased from 62 to 65 to match the current retirement age of Supreme Court judges, argues former solicitor general of India TR Andhyarujina. For Supreme Court judges it should, in turn, be raised to 70 to match the international standard, he adds.
“With no logic, the Constitution-makers had a poor notion of the fitness of High Court judges after 60, but a higher notion of the competence of Supreme Court judges after 60, for whom they prescribed retirement at 65,” he says.
He asserts that early retirement age is a disincentive to lawyers to take up the judicial post, takes away the opportunity from judges to acquire “maturity, learning and experience”, and increases their anxiety to look for alternate employment after retirement, also high court judges then tend to “unbecomingly” covet Supreme Court judgeships.
Australia, Ireland, Israel and South Africa retire their SC judges at 70 while the US prescribes no retirement age. A US judge Blackmum served until the age of 85 while chief justice Rehnquist served till death at 80. [The Hindu]
Calcutta HC lawyers file, while SCBA and West Bengal bar association consider filing, a contempt petition in Cal HC against West Bengal CM Mamata Banerjee who said, “Why should many judgements today be delivered for money? Why?” in the West Bengal assembly on Tuesday. SCBA president Pravin Parekh said: “It is a serious allegation against the entire judiciary, which is very irresponsible, especially for a chief minister.” [Daily Bhaskar]
The UK’s so-called magic circle of top four law firms is not so exclusive anymore: mergers and Swiss Verein alliances have rocketed revenues at CMS Cameron McKenna (combined turnover of £692m – Rs 6,000 crore), Hogan Lovells (more than £1bn), Herbert Smith (£861m) Ashurst (around £590m) and others into some of the UK’s and the world’s largest firms by turnover. [The Lawyer]
Nashik Central Jail inmate grows up to be Bombay HC lawyer, handling civil and criminal cases, after serving his term under conviction for murder. Hitesh Shah who “unintentionally” murdered a relative in a loan scuffle in 1989 and was convicted in 1992, went on to graduate from Narjeevan Law College after his release. “I met lot of good people even in jail. I began getting their cases while I was in jail, even before I enrolled as a lawyer. I did not feel the need to work under a senior lawyer. When in prison, I met a senior advocate from Bombay high court, S G Kudle, who was serving a three-month sentence for contempt of court, and whenever I need guidance, I seek it from him," says Shah [TOI]
Bom HC rules that for public servants to be convicted under POCA, “there first has to be a demand made by the accused, coupled with a voluntary payment of bribe by the complainant”. Just an “offer" of money “without demand” will entitle the accused to benefit of doubt. The Nagpur bench of Bombay HC acquitted a senior clerk in a first class judicial magistrate’s court, more than seven years after his arrest for allegedly accepting Rs 300 for producing case papers in court [DNA India]
Pointing to his own example, CJI Kapadia says that India is the only country where minority community members can aspire to become judicial heads, “because of the full play given to constitutional value and ideals”. Attorney General Vahanvati, also a member of a minority community, seconded his sentiment [TOI]
On 150th anniversary Bombay HC exhibits Gandhi’s 1923 cancellation from the advocates’ rolls after the freedom fighter was convicted for sedition for his articles written in ‘Young India’. The exhibition also displays the letter enrolling BR Ambedkar and Bombay 1948 chief justice MC Chagla as advocates, the three sedition trials of Tilak, ancient court fee stamps and lease deeds, and a Gujarati summons [Express]
Bombay lawyers must plan in advance the filing of matters with court fees in excess of Rs 10,000, which is the per-day cap on the amount of fee stamps available to the lawyers in Bombay courts. Bombay courts are apparently experiencing a shortage in court fee stamps, learnt a solicitor when he approached a city civil court counter for purchasing court fee stamps worth Rs 1.5 lakh for a matter [TOI]
Women, children below age 15, and physically handicapped persons cannot be called to Maharashtra police stations for recording of statements, according to the latest circular issued across the state by the inspector general of police. In accordance with Section 160 of the CrPC, police officers would have to visit their residences if they need to record statements from them. The circular came after a complaint lodged by a lady advocate who was recently made to sit in a police station till late in the night when she tried lodging a complaint against her landlord [TOI]
Attorney general Vahanvati’s legal opinion to the department of telecom states that protection under bilateral investment treaties is not available to foreign investors whose 2G licences were cancelled by the SC recently. The protection could have been available if the government, and not the SC, had cancelled the licences. Foreign telecom players including Telenor, Sistema, Axiata and Vodafone had issued notices to the government claiming protection under the various bilateral agreements [The Hindu Businessline]
Katju says that corruption is here to stay in India for the next 15 years since the country is going through a transitional phase in which there is no moral code, commodity prices will rise sharply, and “Anna Hazare and Ramdev’s movement against graft is nothing but an empty gas”. [Firstpost]