News Analysis India

Tag: Delhi High Court

  • Revised National Litigation Policy under process, Centre tells Delhi HC

    By PTI
    NEW DELHI: The Centre told the Delhi High Court on Wednesday that a “new and revised” National Litigation Policy (NLP) was in the works and would be in place in times to come.

    The submission by the central government was made before a bench of Chief Justice D N Patel and Justice Jyoti Singh during the hearing of a PIL seeking implementation of the NLP launched in June 2010.

    Additional Solicitor General (ASG) Chetan Sharma, appearing for the Law Ministry, told the court that presently there was an application called Legal Information Management and Briefing System (LIMBS) which allows various government departments to see the status of their cases at a glance.

    He said, “A new and revised NLP would be in place in times to come. ” Taking note of the ASG’s submission, the bench simply adjourned the matter to February 12.

    The PIL by N Bhaskara Rao, a mass communications expert and Shanmugo Patro, a lawyer, has said that NLP was launched in 2010 with the purpose that the government should not involve in frivolous litigation, especially where the stakes are not high.

    “The policy aimed to transform the government into an efficient and responsible litigant.

    The underlying purpose of the policy is to reduce government litigation in courts so that valuable court time is spent in resolving other pending issues to enable the average pendency of a case in a court reduced from 15 years to 3 years,” the petition has said.

    During the brief hearing, Patro told the court that the central government has been over the years claiming before various fora that the NLP would be implemented soon, but till date nothing has been done.

    He urged the court to issue notice in the matter, but the bench declined to do so at the present stage.

    The petition has claimed that under the NLP, the government would identify bottlenecks and appeals would not be filed where stakes are not high.

    The policy would also ensure that all pending cases involving the government would be reviewed to filter frivolous and vexatious matters from the meritorious one.

    “Cases so identified would be withdrawn, which would also include cases covered by previous decisions of courts. Such withdrawal of the cases would be done in a time-bound fashion,” the petition has said.

     It has further said that “Union of India, however, was not adhering to its own aforesaid policy.

    Neither it is implementing the policy uniformly nor in totality and was, thereby, causing great injustice to the poor.

  • HC directs agencies to remove hanging wires, cables in Chandni Chowk or face action

    By PTI
    NEW DELHI: The Delhi High Court Tuesday directed various agencies including North MCD, MTNL, BSES and mobile service providers to comply with the order of removing hanging wires and cables in the Chandni Chowk area here which is undergoing redevelopment.

    The high court made it clear that non-compliance of the order will invite contempt action against the agencies.

    A bench of justices Vipin Sanghi and Rekha Palli said, “We direct all the agencies including North MCD, MTNL and BSES, etc to ensure compliance so that all hanging wires and cables are removed. All service providers shall ensure compliance failing which we will be compelled to initiate contempt action.”

    The bench passed the order following a plea by the counsel for nodal officers, appointed by the court earlier, that an inspection of redevelopment project of Chandni Chowk was carried out on December 28, 2020 and MTNL was not cooperating in the project and feeder pillars are yet to be shifted despite repeated directions in this regard.

    Advocate Naushad Ahmed Khan, representing the Chief Nodal Officer and nodal officers of Shahjanabad Redevelopment Corporation (SRDC), said hanging wires and cables are required to be removed and sought direction to various agencies to remove wires.

    To this, the bench remarked, “if those hanging wires are removed, half of the Chandni Chowk will be left without electricity”.

    Khan informed the court that ‘redevelopment of Chandni Chowk project’ may be the theme of Republic Day tableau for Delhi for this year and the agencies were not adhering to the timeline.

    The court was informed that the hanging wires on both sides of footpaths/ colonnades in the entire stretch are not electrical wires but they may be internet cables or DTH cables.

    The nodal officers had directed to ensure removal of hanging wires by mobile service providers and cable operators from entire stretch by January 7 and also asked the officials of North MCD and Delhi Police to take punitive action in accordance with relevant provisions of Delhi Municipal Corporation Act and Defacement of Public Property Act, if it reappears in future after its removal.

    The inspection was conducted of entire stretch of Chandni Chowk road that is from Red Fort road to Fatehpuri Masjid road.

     

  • PIL in HC to remove Bachchan’s voice from caller tune on COVID-19 awareness

    By PTI
    NEW DELHI: A PIL has been filed in the Delhi High Court seeking direction to the Centre to remove megastar Amitabh Bachchan’s voice from the caller tune on precautions against coronavirus on the grounds that he himself, along with some family members, had been infected by the virus.

    The plea, which said there were some famous corona warriors who were willing to give their services for free, came up for hearing on Thursday before a bench of Chief Justice D N Patel and Justice Jyoti Singh.

    The bench listed it for January 18 as the petitioner’s counsel expressed inability to appear for physical hearing.

    The petition, filed by Delhi resident and social worker Rakesh, said the government engaged Bachchan for making people aware of preventive measures to fight the COVID-19 pandemic while the superstar himself, as well as other members of his family, could not escape it.

    The government of India has been paying fees to Amitabh Bachchan for chanting such preventive measures on the caller ringtone, said the plea, filed through advocates A K Dubey and Pawan Kumar.

    “There are some corona warriors who have been doing great service to the nation and helping poor and needy people in their needy times as well as providing them food, cloth and shelter and it is very indispensable to mention herein that some corona warriors have distributed their hard earnings among the poor and needy people,” the plea said.

    It added that some famous corona warriors are still ready to give their services without any payment and are ready to serve the nation.

    “Amitabh Bachchan is not having a clean history as well as he is not serving the nation being a social worker,” the plea alleged while referring to several matters pending against him in various courts.

    The petitioner said he made representation to the authorities in November 2020 but no reply was given to him after which he approached the court with his grievance.

    “Remove the caller tune of Amitabh Bachchan of corona from the mobile in the interest of justice,” it sought.

  • Delhi HC seeks Centre’s stand on selection of candidates for civil services mains, interview

    By PTI
    NEW DELHI: The Delhi High Court on Wednesday said that selecting candidates for All India Civil Services mains exam and subsequent interview without declaring the actual number of vacancies, particularly for the disabled category, amounts to “arbitrariness” and asked it to explain how it was deciding who qualifies for the mains and interview.

    “When your vacancies are fluctuating, how many people will you call for the mains and interview? If you have power to call any number of candidates for mains and interviews without declaring the actual vacancies, it is known as arbitrariness,” a bench of Chief Justice D N Patel and Justice Jyoti Singh told the Centre and Union Public Service Commission (UPSC) which conducts the civil services exam.

    The bench also asked them to explain how there was a difference of eight in the vacancies for disabled calculated by the petitioner organisation, Sambhavna, and the number advertised in the exam notification.

    According to Sambhavna the number should be 32, whereas the exam notice indicates a figure of 24 vacancies for disabled category.

    “You have to explain these two aspects,” the court said to the Centre and UPSC and listed the matter for hearing on January 29.

    The court was hearing two PILs by two different organisations — Sambhavna and Evara Foundation — which have challenged the civil services exam notification on the ground that only approximate vacancies for the disabled are mentioned and not the four per cent mandatory reservation mandated under the law.

       During the hearing, they urged the bench to stay the mains exam which is scheduled to commence from January 8 and would end on January 17 or direct the Centre to hold exams for the disabled persons later if the two petitions were allowed.

    The court, however, refused to pass any interim directions and said that if the petitioners were successful, the reliefs would be moulded accordingly at that stage.

    On the last date of hearing in September 2020, the court had termed as “absurd” the UPSC’s argument that while the number of vacancies in the All India Civil Services may vary before the final selection of candidates, the number of seats for the disabled would remain fixed.

    “You cannot say the number of reservations is fixed, but the number of vacancies might vary.

    What is this absurd argument? Either both are frozen or neither are frozen,” the court had said.

    The petition by Sambhavna, filed through advocates Krishan Mahajan and Ajay Chopra, has contended that the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (RPWD) Act of 2016 mandates that every government establishment shall reserve 4 per cent of its total vacancies for those with benchmark disabilities.

    However, the UPSC exam notice only mentions “expected approximate vacancies” — a category that does not exist under the law, it has said.

    “The notice becomes a fraud on the Act since it gives four per cent reservation of 796 expected approximate vacancies.

    To reserve something of that which does not legally exist is to legally give nothing,” the petition has contended.

    The NGO further claims that there is a mathematical error in calculating the four per cent reservation in the expected vacancies numbering 796.

    It has said that four per cent reservation of 796 would come to 31.

    8 or 32 vacancies, whereas according to the notice the number is 24.

    The petition further claims that even the subsequent distribution of the vacancies at the rate of one per cent per category of disability — deaf, blind, locomotor and multiple disabilities — is also not mathematically accurate.

    It also said that even the backlog of vacancies have not been mentioned.

     

  • HC asks SBI to maintain status quo on accounts of RCom, Reliance Telecom, Infratel

    By PTI
    NEW DELHI: The Delhi High Court Wednesday asked SBI to maintain status quo with regard to accounts of Anil Ambani’s firms — RCom, Reliance Telecom and Reliance Infratel, which have been declared by the bank as fraud accounts.

    Justice Prateek Jalan passed the order on a plea by erstwhile directors of the three companies challenging a 2016 circular of the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) regarding declaration of accounts as fraud by banks.

    According to the plea, the circular allows banks to declare an account as fraud without giving any prior notice or communication to the account holder against the principles of natural justice.

    Their lawyers told the court that several similar petitions against the circular have been filed since 2019 and the petitioners in those matters have been protected by the high court.

    In view of the orders passed earlier by the high court in similar matters, Justice Jalan directed State Bank of India to “maintain status quo till next date of hearing” with regard to the accounts of the three companies.

    The court further said that the respondents, including RBI and the three companies, were at liberty to file their replies to the petition by January 11 and listed the matter for hearing on January 13.

    The court further said that SBI and RBI were at liberty to take any steps in the nature of an investigation or filing of complaint proceedings against the erstwhile directors and the three companies independent of the impugned action of declaring the accounts of the three companies as fraud accounts.