-The Telegraph   BMW hit-and-run key accused Sanjeev Nanda, who is a free man now, today urged the Supreme Court not to use his case to settle the law on whether culpable homicide not amounting to murder or criminal negligence charges should be invoked in such cases. Those accused in hit-and-run cases are routinely slapped with IPC Section 304A (causing death by negligence), which carries a maximum jail term of two years or...

The use of tracker technology to zero in on the misuse of diagnostic techniques for sex determination has evoked mixed reactions. ONE of the least discussed issues in the context of the data thrown up by Census 2011 is the worrisome decline in the child sex ratio (CSR) and the not-too-perfect implementation of the Pre-Conception and Pre-Natal Diagnostic Techniques (Prohibition of Sex Selection) Act, or PCPNDT Act. There is reason to...

-The Economic Times   All of us are bothered, or should be, about interminable delays in adjudication through formal legal systems. Gypsies are believed to have originated in India and there is a gypsy curse - may you have a lawsuit in which you are in the right. In 2010, there were 54,600 cases stuck in Supreme Court, 4.18 million in high courts and 27.89 million in lower (district and subordinate) courts. Pedantic...

-EPW Despite curative measures and judgments, undertrials who are poor continue to rot in jails. The public debate over bail to the 2G spectrum accused and the controversy over the parole granted to murder convict Manu Sharma has unfortunately sidestepped a much more pressing concern – the plight of poor undertrial prisoners who have spent years inside jail without being convicted of any offence. A series of Supreme Court judgments over the...

-The Indian Express   The Cabinet today approved the Companies Bill 2011 which, once approved by Parliament, will replace half-a-century-old Act. "The Cabinet has cleared Companies Bill, 2011. It is likely to be tabled (for consideration and passage) in the ongoing Winter Session," a Corporate Affairs Ministry official said after the Cabinet meeting. The Bill, which has already been vetted by the Parliamentary Standing Committee of Finance and also by different ministries, seeks to...