Right to life and liberty cannot be taken away sans due procedure, says Supreme Court Observing that the right to life and liberty guaranteed to a citizen under Article 21 of the Constitution cannot be taken away without following due procedure, the Supreme Court has held that mere apprehension of the authorities that an accused was likely to be released on bail was not a ground for passing preventive detention orders. A...

River Brahmaputra has eaten more than half of Asia's largest riverine island Majuli over the last 60 years. With land disappearing, there is progressive loss of the traditional means of livelihood of its people, leading to their displacement. Some lately are migrating even as far away as Andhra Pradesh, finds out Sangeeta Barooah Pisharoty after a visit. Farmer Sridhar Bora stops mid-way as he brings down his axe on a tree...

-The Telegraph   The Malom neighbourhood, which witnessed the killing of 10 civilians leading to Irom Sharmila’s 11-year fast, rose in union today to lend a voice to the Iron Lady against the Armed Forces (Special Powers) Act. Mass sit-ins were held in various parts of the state to mark the beginning of the 12th year of Sharmila’s fast, demanding scrapping of the “draconian law”. Police dispersed a group of students who staged...

Some of the recent cases in the higher courts bring into sharp focus the dilemmas on the death penalty. ON October 10, the Supreme Court Bench of Justices Aftab Alam and C.K. Prasad stayed the execution of Ajmal Kasab, the lone surviving assailant in the November 2008 Mumbai terror attack, by admitting his appeal against the death sentence awarded to him by the Bombay High Court. The Bench wondered whether Kasab deserved...

Have the National Law Schools, the counterparts of IITs and IIMs in the legal field, faltered in inculcating social responsibility in the bright young lawyers passing out from the prestigious institutions? Justice M K Sharma, a Supreme Court judge, feels so and has expressed strongly against the trend of "bright young law students" flocking to become corporate lawyers rather than opting for training in litigation. "Unfortunately, the statistics available indicate that 85%...