-The Hindu   Greater the power to punish for contempt, higher the responsibility Fair reporting of court proceedings and fair comments on the legal issues do not amount to contempt, the Supreme Court has ruled. “The power to punish for contempt is inherent in courts of record and described as a necessary incident to every court of justice. The power is an alienable attribute of court and inheres in every court of record. This...

Information obtained under Right To Information Act is increasingly becoming the basis of public interest petitions seeking judicial redress of grievances. The Supreme Court on Monday disapproved of this modus operandi and said from now, it would not entertain PILssolely based on RTI information. "Petitioners banking on information obtained through RTI Act must approach the concerned ministry, bring the facts to its notice and demand justice. If the ministry does not...

Bench says it's not averse to idea of setting up independent regulatory body The Supreme Court on Friday indicated that it would not go into the safety aspects of all nuclear plants in the country and all such concerns could be addressed to respective High Courts. A Bench of Chief Justice S.H. Kapadia and Justice Swatanter Kumar, however, said it was not averse to going into the issue of setting up an...

-The Hindu   In a historic first, a special court in Gujarat has convicted and awarded life sentences to as many as 31 mostly high caste, landed Patels for burning alive 33 Muslims — the majority of them women and children — of Sardarpura village in Mehsana district. The village was among numerous Muslim habitations targeted across the State by irate Hindu mobs as part of a pogrom ruthlessly executed in the...

From hypocrisy and secrecy to arrogance, nepotism and plagiarism, all bedevil the higher judiciary, said former Supreme Court Justice Ruma Pal today in one of the most scathing indictments of the higher judiciary by one who has been part of it. With sitting and retired judges of the Supreme Court and Delhi High Court listening, Pal, delivering the fifth V M Tarkunde Memorial Lecture on ‘An Independent Judiciary’, turned the searchlight...