Judiciary, Social empowerment, Parliament, Federalism, State legislature,Constitutional Bodies, E-Governance | Indian Constitution

* National Law University, Delhi (NLUD) in a report titled ‘Quality of Legal Representation: An Empirical Analysis of Free Legal Aid Services in India’revealed that people have no trust on free legal Services of Legal Aid Counsel (LAC) and wil go for private lawyer if have money.

Legal service authority act 1987 paved the way for NALSA (art 39A, 14 & 22) and give free legal aid to SC,ST,women,children,Victim of human trafficking,differently abled person n industrial worker.

Acrdng to commenwealth human right initiative India have one lawyer for every 736 people which is greater than many countries but 1 legal aid lawyer per 18609 people.

Facts 

75% take support of free legal coz they don't hv money to pay fees, 22.6% will not go fir free legal aid at all. 60% women who r aware abt free legal aid will prefer private lawyer as they wl hv better control n faith. 33% legal aid lawyer demanded for Money n 56% lawyer spends 1-10 hours per week on LAC. 

Way ahead - Full time empanelment, honouranium (money help to lawyer ) n Remuneration

* Whip – Starte from colonial era to manage the floor of house. It is guideline for members of any political party to be present or vote as per given instruct written in whip. Mostly seniormost member of the party becomes chief which with additional whips to help him. Anybody who dowsnot follow whip can face Anti defection law under 10th Schedule.

Type of Whip –

1 line whip – Member can abstain from being present.

2 Line whip – Members have to be present but no instruction is given whether they have to follow party line.

3 Line whip – Members have to b present and vote in accordance with the instruction given by whip.

* Electronically transferred postal ballet system – records highest vote turnouts in 2019 election. Service voters (central govt personel posted at any location can cast their vote from anywhere apart from their own constituency)

Developed by Election commisision of India with the help from Centre for Development of Advanced Computing (C-DAC).

Eligibility – Service voters (apart from those who opt for Proxy voting), wife of Service voters who resides with him and Overseas voter.

Features – Flexibility, database, Security (2 layer security with OTP and then PIN), Less time consuming and No duplication.

* NHRC - New amendment include that even supreme Court judge or high Court judge is eligible for the post of chairperson of National human right commission (act 1993) n state human right commission respectively.

Earlier it was only chief justice of India n high court fir national n state respectively. Tenure is also proposed to b reduced from 5 yrs to 3 yrs n are eligible for reappointment

New additional members proposed are national commission for child right,backward class n disabled people.

 

* Public safety act j&k - preventive detention law - upto 2 years under j&k public safety act 1978.

Detention can b passed by district magistrate or divisional commissioner. It can be challenged by relatives of detenee through heabus corpus.

Can be imposed any no of tyms even after HC or SC passed order in favour of detenee n no legal proceedings against official who passed the order.

Similarlity with NSA Act - NSA empowers central govt or state govt to detain a person upto 12 months but can b extended if govt find fresh evidence.

Art 21(1) - person arrested can not be denied the right to consult n to b defended by n legal practitioner.

Art 22(2) - person arrested shall b produced b4 magistrate withing 24 hours excluding travel time to reach court.

Art 22(3) (b) - allows preventive detention n restrictions on personal liberty for the reason of state security n public order.

Art 22(4) - no law to provide preventive detention longer than period of 3 months unless -

- advisory board reports sufficient cause for extended detention.

- accordance with the provision of any law passed by parliament

* Judiciary under art 142 has said voice sample can be taken in criminal cases same as fingerprints, handwriting etc even against person's will. It can be termed at against art 21 as individual's right to life is not greater than public good. Even law commission 87th report mentions that individual voice is different n can be taken same as other fingerprints etc.

Under art 142, judiciary is empowered to pass such order to give complete justice. For eg. Cleansing of Taj Mahal, Union carbide case (Bhopal gas tragedy).

SC in bar association vs union of india said art 142 can not be used as supplant of Existing law but only supplement the law.

Recent Judicial overreach 

- Ban of alcohol on national n state highways While central govt has banned liquor on national highway only.

- SC ST atrocity act modification in 2018 led to parliament amending the Atrocity act 1989.

Way forward- art 142 must be held by 5 judge bench n separation of power must be respected. White paper should be brought out to check the judgement within 6 months.

* Vidhi Centre for Legal Policy’ has released a report titled, ‘Sunshine in the Courts: Ranking the High Courts on their compliance with the RTI Act'.

They have developed convenience index on which Evaluates the Extent to which RTI Rules are framed by high court for convenience of filing RTI by citizen.

• High Courts at Patna, Delhi and Kerala performed the best on the index.
• The High Courts at Gujarat, Madras, Meghalaya and Chhattisgarh performed the worst
• Gujrat court don't define mode of payment for filing the RTI unclear. Many court charge 5 times more than the fees defined by court which hinders RTI filing also many courts online allow postal or on location court payment which should be worked on.

* First ever justice delivery "India Justice Report (2019)" prepared by the Tata Trusts in collaboration with the Centre for Social Justice, Common Cause, and the Commonwealth Human Rights Initiative has been released.

MH topped followed by kerla n tamilnadu the list large n medium state category worst are jharkhand, UP n Bihar.

- 4 Parameters states got rated on are Policing, judiciary, Prison and legal aid.

- Women are poorly represented across the Justice system. They account for 7% of the Police, 10 % of Prison staff and about 26.5 % of all judges in the High Court and subordinate courts

Issues - budget allocation is low, per capita expenditure on legal aid is 75 paise. 

- nationally average pendency of cases are for 5 yrs.

- prisons r over occupied with 114% out of which 68% is under trial.

 

* Places of worship act 1991 - section 3 of act prohibits conversion of religious places of worship n even section of it as it existed at the tym of independence.

* Whistleblower protection - law commission of India in 2001 Recommended to inacted a law to protect the whistleblower. 2nd ARC in 2007 aslo suggested the same.

The UN Convention against Corruption to which India is a signatory (although not ratified) since 2005, also suggest the law on same.

To abide by such suggestion Whistleblower protection bill was introduced in 2011 n became Act in 2014.

Whistleblower protection bill, 2014 - authorize any person to complaint against any public authority or org involved in curruption.

Act also defines competent authority to get complaint such as corruption against minister can b disclosed to PM.

But the act doesn't allow for anonymous complaint n if identity isn't disclosed it will not take action against such complaint.

Competent authority will prepare a report n submit it to central or state govt n further will b laid b4 the each house of the parliament Or state legislature.

This bill has replaces official secret act, 1923.

* Art 72 of Indian constitution confers Prez of India authority of pardoning any sentence.

* Contempt of court - the expression "Contempt of court" is not mentioned in constitution. Contempt of court act 1971 defines contempt of court as disrespect to court. 

2 types

1. Civil contemp

2. Criminal contempt

Art 129 - court can punish itself.

Art 142 (2) - can investigate n punish any1 for it's contempt

Art 215 - HC can punish as contempt of court for itself or subordinate court as mentioned in 1971 act.

In 1991, SC ruled that it not only can punish someone for it's contempt but also for HC and subordinate court and tribunals in entire country. However it is mentioned in 1971 act for HC as special power

 

* Haryana govt amended Section 31 of the panchayati Raj act 1994 which empowers the panchayati to ban the liquor from Next financial year. To pass the law qourum should be 1/10th. It is also in line with art 47 of DPSP.

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