- Muzaffarpur
Shelter Home case transferred to Delhi – The Supreme Court
has shifted the case concerning sexual assaults in the Muzaffarpur Shelter
Homes from a Bihar CBI court to POCSO court in Saket, criticising its conduct
and the overall management of shelter homes by the State Government. The Saket
court has been ordered to complete the trial within 6 months. The CBI has also
been asked to file an affidavit explaining why the officer investigating the
case was transferred. The Court also threatened to order the presence of the
Chief Secretary if all information was not provided. [Nivedita Jha v State
of Bihar, Special Leave to Appeal (Civil) No. 24978 of 2018, date of order:
07.02.2019]
- Court to
examine whether Governor’s Office amenable to RTI – The Supreme Court
would be looking into whether the office of the Governor of a state can be
covered within the ambit of the RTI Act. The issue arose because the Chief
Commissioner of Goa asked the Office of the Governor of Goa to furnish some
information and the Office appealed against the order to the Bombay High Court.
The case has been transferred unto itself by the Supreme Court on the basis of
a petition filed by the Governor’s office since a petition on the issue was
already pending in the Supreme Court. The original petition has been pending in
the court for the past 10 years and so the Court has decided to deal with the
issue expeditiously and transferred the case to itself. [Secretary to
Governor, Goa Raj Bhavan v Chief Information Commissioner, Transfer
Petition No. 151 of 2019, date of order: 04.02.2019]
- Petitions
against EWS quota to be heard early – The Supreme Court
has agreed to give an early hearing to all the petitions challenging the
amendment introducing quota for economically backward sections. The court
passed the order while issuing a notice on a new petition filed by Tehseen
Poonawalla. The Court again refused to stay the amendment in the interim. The
petitions challenge the amendment on the grounds that it crosses the 50% quota
for reservations that was imposed by the Indira Sawhney judgment and that it is
based solely on economic backwardness and does not take into account social
backwardness of the class involved. [Tehseen Poonawalla v Union of India,
Writ Petition (Civil) No.122/2019, date of order: 08.02.2019]
- NCLT
cannot look into the justness of rejection of a resolution plan – The
Supreme Court rejected an appeal against a NCLAT decision, which held that the
75% requirement for the approval of a resolution plan (now 66%) is mandatory.
It observed that the NCLT cannot go into the justness of rejection of the plan
by the minority shareholders. The legislative intent, according to the judgment
was to recognise the dissent by the 25% (or 44%) of the creditors. The Code
only provides for circumstances in which plans approved by the Committee can be
tampered with. The fact that the threshold for approval was revised from 75 to
66 does not mean that the decisions taken prior to the amendment will also be
revised i.e. the amendment would only apply to decisions of the CoC
prospectively. [K. Sashidhar v Indian Overseas Bank, Civil Appeal No.
10673 of 2018, date of judgment: 05.02.2019]
- FIRs
against Republic TV and Arnab on complaint filed by Tharoor – A Delhi
court has ordered the registration of FIRs against Republic TV and its editor
in chief Arnab Goswami, on the basis of a complaint made by Shashi Tharoor alleging
that Goswami stole confidential documents pertaining to the investigation into
the death of his wife Sunanda Pushkar and hacked into his e-mail account, all
in the name of increasing viewership. According to a status report on the issue
given by the police, a vigilance inquiry was being conducted into the matter,
since the documents accessed by Republic TV were not in the public domain.
Tharoor supported his claims with RTI responses, which showed that the
documents were the part of the confidential record and could only be accessed
by the investigation team. In the light of this, the Metropolitan Magistrate
ordered registration of an FIR against the channel.[Dr. Shashi Tharoor v
Arnab Goswami, Complaint Case No. 7485 of 2018, date of order: 21.01.2019]
- Teesta
Setalvad and Javed Anand get anticipatory bail–The Gujarat High
Court has granted anticipatory bail to activists Teesta Setalvad and her
husband Javed Anand in the embezzlement scam relating to their NGO Sabrang
Trust. The couple though has been asked to ensure cooperation in the
investigation. The complaint had been lodged by former employee of the Trust,
Raees Khan Pathan who claims that the couple and certain unidentified officials
of the MHRD who embezzled close to 1.4Cr between 2010 to 2013, through the NGO.
The funds were allegedly used for the personal and political uses.[Javed
Anand v State of Gujarat, Criminal Miscellaneous Application No. 10200 of
2018, date of order: 08.02.2019]
- Court
hears arguments against the Maratha reservation–The Bombay High
Court has been hearing petitions against 16% reservation for the Maratha
community in government jobs and educational institutions. The petitioners argued
that the reservation was against Articles 15 and 16 of the Constitution which
prohibit discrimination on the basis of sex, caste, creed etc. Marathas, they
further argued, could not be called backward in order to be provided
reservation. The legislation giving the reservations has been criticised for
providing exclusive reservation to Marathas as a separate class. The arguments
are to continue.
(IPA Service)
Prepared
by Amritananda Chakravorty (amritananda.c@gmail.com) and Mihir Samson (mihirsamson@gmail.com), Delhi based practicing Advocates.
The post Weekly Round-Up of Major Decisions of the Courts in India as also Legal Policy Developments appeared first on Newspack by India Press Agency.
