Category: LEGAL NEWS

The Madras High Court Monday sought affidavits from three top Puducherry officials on a petitioner’s claim that he had obtained confidential reports through RTI, using which he challenged the recent appointment of a retired IAS officer as OSD to Lt Governor Kiran Bedi.Petitioner P Saravanan, who has sought to quash the appointment of G Theva Neethi Dhas as the officer on special duty, filed, along with a PIL, confidential reports and documents in the form of typed set of papers, claiming he had obtained them through the Right to Information…

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The Supreme Court Thursday said the existing mechanism was “not adequate” to curb incidents of sexual abuse of children and girls at shelter homes and asked the Ministry of Women and Child Development (MWCD) to apprise it on the formulation of a child protection policy.A bench headed by Justice Madan B Lokur asked the joint secretary of MWCD to appear before it on October 8 to assist the court in understanding what exactly was proposed to deal with issues like counselling and rehabilitation of such victims, conditions prevailing at child…

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The Supreme Court Monday said it was “extremely unfortunate” that around 5,000 construction workers in Mumbai were not registered under an Act meant for their welfare and directed the Maharashtra government to take action against builders and contractors in this regard.  A bench headed by Justice Madan B Lokur asked the state government to identify the contractors and builders who have employed these 5,000 construction workers without they being registered and directed the slum rehabilitation authority to ensure compliance of the provisions of the Act. The apex court observed that…

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The Supreme Court judgement Friday refusing to grant relief to the five arrested rights activist in connection with the Koregaon-Bhima violence case gave a graphic description of their activities and the earlier cases against them for their alleged links with outlaws, including naxals and maoists. Three of the five accused persons were prosecuted in the past for offences filed under the Sections of Indian Penal Code (IPC), Arms Act, and the Unlawful Activities Prevention Act (UAPA) in a number of cases.They were however absolved of all the charges in most…

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The Supreme Court Thursday declared that adultery is not a crime and struck down the anti-adultery law, saying it was unconstitutional as it dented the individuality of women and treated them as “chattel of husbands”. The apex court’s five-judge Constitution bench was unanimous in striking down Section 497 of the Indian Penal Code dealing with the offence of adultery and holding it as manifestly arbitrary, archaic law which is violative of the rights to equality and equal opportunity to women. Section 497 of the 158-year-old IPC says: “Whoever has sexual…

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The Supreme Court Wednesday declared the Centre’s flagship Aadhaar scheme as constitutionally valid but struck down some of its provisions including its linking with bank accounts, mobile phones and school admissions.A five-judge constitution bench headed by Chief Justice Dipak Misra held that while Aadhaar would remain mandatory for filing of IT returns and allotment of Permanent Account Number (PAN), it would not be mandatory to link Aadhaar to bank accounts and telecom service providers cannot seek its linking for mobile connections.It would not be mandatory for school admissions, as also…

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The Supreme Court Tuesday took strong exception to BJP Delhi chief and MP Manoj Tiwari for allegedly violating its directions on the sealing of illegal structures in the national capital, and said that being an MP does not give him liberty to take the law in his hands.Tiwari was present before the court in pursuance to the contempt notice issued to him for allegedly breaking the seal of a premises which was being run in violation of the Delhi Master Plan.The apex court expressed its anguish against his statement in…

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The Delhi High Court today banned slaughtering of birds in the Ghazipur murga mandi here.Only selling of live birds will be permitted in the area, the court said in its interim order.”Taking note of the circumstances and the inaction of the authorities, we have no option but to direct that in the Ghazipur murga mandi, no slaughtering of birds will be permitted henceforth. Only sale of birds will be permitted,” said a bench of Chief Justice Rajendra Menon and Justice V K Rao.The court asked the authorities to file within…

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A day after 30 passengers of a Jet Airways flight suffered bleeding through ears and nose, a Mumbai activist on Friday asked the police to book the airline for ‘attempted murder’. Activist Asad Ashraf Patel, who also runs a local newspaper, filed the complaint with Sahar Police Station through his lawyer, Rajkumarlaxman Arjunrao Rajhuns.  In the four-pager, Mr Patel has accused the crew of Jet Airways of ‘dereliction of duty’ and ‘poor crisis management’ leading to the incident on September 20 on its Mumbai-Jaipur flight No. 9W-0697.  The complainant said…

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A special court has granted two weeks to the Enforcement Directorate to respond to a plea of former Himachal Pradesh Chief Minister Virbhadra Singh seeking certain documents in a money laundering case against him. Special Judge Arun Bhardwaj directed the probe agency to file by October 5 its reply to the applications moved by Singh and other accused, including his wife Pratibha Singh and LIC agent Anand Chauhan Special public prosecutors N K Matta and Nitesh Rana, appearing for the ED, had sought six weeks from the court for filing…

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