{"id":18913,"date":"2018-04-20T14:35:19","date_gmt":"2018-04-20T09:05:19","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.forumias.com\/?p=18913"},"modified":"2018-04-20T14:36:05","modified_gmt":"2018-04-20T09:06:05","slug":"misuse-of-public-interest-litigations","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/misuse-of-public-interest-litigations\/","title":{"rendered":"Misuse of Public Interest Litigations"},"content":{"rendered":"

Context:<\/u><\/strong><\/p>\n

Recently the Supreme Court observed that \u00a0Public Interest Litigation(PIL) has become an \u201cindustry of vested interests\u201d rather than a powerful tool to espouse the cause of the marginalised and oppressed.<\/p>\n

What is a Public Interest Litigation?<\/u><\/strong><\/p>\n

1) Public Interest Litigation (PIL), means a legal action<\/strong> initiated in a court of law for the enforcement of public interest or general interest<\/strong> in which the public or class of the community have pecuniary interest or some interest by which their legal rights or liabilities are affected.<\/p>\n

2) PIL is a powerful instrument to preserve the rule of law<\/strong> and to ensure the accountability of <\/strong>and transparency within structures of governance.<\/strong><\/p>\n

3) An essential aspect of a genuine PIL petition is that the person who moves the court has no personal interest in the outcome of the proceedings, apart from a general standing as a citizen before the court.<\/p>\n

Guidelines to be followed for entertaining letters\/petitions received: <\/u><\/strong><\/p>\n

Letter-petitions falling under the following categories alone will ordinarily be entertained as Public Interest Litigation<\/strong>:-<\/p>\n

1) Bonded Labour<\/strong> matters.<\/p>\n

2) Neglected Children<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

3) Non-payment of minimum wages <\/strong>to workers and exploitation of casual workers and complaints of violation of Labour Laws (except in individual cases).<\/p>\n

4) Petitions from jails<\/strong> complaining of harassment and seeking release after having completed 14 years in jail, death in jail, transfer, release on personal bond, speedy trial as a fundamental right.<\/p>\n

5) Petitions against police<\/strong> for refusing to register a case, harassment by police and death in police custody.<\/p>\n

6) Petitions against atrocities on women<\/strong>, in particular harassment of bride, bride burning, rape, murder, kidnapping etc.<\/p>\n

7) Petitions complaining of harassment or torture of villagers<\/strong> by co- villagers or by police from persons belonging to Scheduled Caste and Scheduled Tribes and economically backward classes.<\/strong><\/p>\n

8) Petitions pertaining to environmental pollution<\/strong>, disturbance of ecological balance, drugs, food adulteration, maintenance of heritage and culture, antiques, forest and wild life and other matters of public importance.<\/p>\n

9) Petitions from riot -victims.<\/strong><\/p>\n

10) Family Pension.<\/strong><\/p>\n

All letter-petitions received in the PIL Cell<\/strong> will first be screened in the Cell and only such petitions as are covered by the above mentioned categories will be placed before a Judge to be nominated by Hon’ble the Chief Justice of India for directions after which the case will be listed before the Bench concerned.<\/p>\n

Cases falling under the following categories will not be entertained as Public Interest Litigation <\/strong>and these may be returned to the petitioners or filed in the PIL Cell, as the case may be:<\/p>\n

1) Landlord-Tenant<\/strong> matters.<\/p>\n

2) Service matter <\/strong>and those pertaining to Pension and Gratuity.<\/p>\n

3) Complaints against Central\/ State Government Departments and Local Bodies<\/strong> except those relating to item Nos. (1) to (10) above.<\/p>\n

4) Admission<\/strong> to medical and other educational institution.<\/p>\n

5) Petitions for early hearing of cases <\/strong>pending in High Courts and Subordinate Courts.<\/p>\n

Famous PILs filed which made a positive impact:<\/u><\/strong><\/p>\n

1)A Public Interest Litigation against Ganga water pollution<\/strong> led to the implementation of Ganga Action Plan.<\/p>\n

2)Supreme Court held in the Public Interest Litigation to give medical aid to every injured citizen as soon as possible<\/strong> without waiting for any procedural formalities.<\/p>\n

3)The court held that there cannot be any classification of convicts on the basis of their social status, education or habit of living .<\/strong><\/p>\n

4)The court declared Section 66A of the IT Act,2006<\/strong>, null and void thus protecting right to freedom of speech.<\/p>\n

5)In Vishaka v State of Rajasthan a PIL was filed concerning sexual harassment of women at work place<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

How PILs are being misused:<\/u><\/strong><\/p>\n

PIL is being used by people to settle<\/p>\n

1)Personal vendetta, <\/strong><\/p>\n

2)Business scores, and <\/strong><\/p>\n

3)Political scores. <\/strong><\/p>\n

PILs dismissed by the Court:<\/u><\/strong><\/p>\n

1)PIL filed against the sale of a plot of land through public auction.<\/strong><\/p>\n

2)PIL for \u00a0increase in the price of onions <\/strong><\/p>\n

3)PIL on the dilapidated condition of railway stations<\/strong><\/p>\n

4)PIL to enquire the death of Justice Loya<\/strong><\/p>\n

5)When the government of India telecommunication policy<\/strong> was challenged by a PIL the court refused to interfere with the matter on the ground that it concerned a question of policy<\/p>\n

Consequences of misuse of PILs:<\/u><\/strong><\/p>\n

1)The PIL had seriously reduced the \u00a0efficiency of the judicial system<\/strong> by detracting from the ability of the court to devote its time and resources<\/strong> to cases which legitimately require attention.<\/p>\n

2) Huge backlog <\/strong>of cases.<\/p>\n

3) Delayed judgements<\/strong><\/p>\n

4) Right to speedy trial<\/strong> under Article 21 affected.<\/p>\n

Way forward:<\/u><\/strong><\/p>\n

1) Time for the judiciary to do a reality check <\/strong>on the advent of PIL petitions which flooded the courts.<\/p>\n

2) The court must be careful to see that the petitioner who approaches it is acting bona fide<\/strong> and not for personal gain, private profit or political or other oblique considerations.<\/strong><\/p>\n

3) Civil society<\/strong> to play a proactive role in condemning misuse of PILs.<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Context: Recently the Supreme Court observed that \u00a0Public Interest Litigation(PIL) has become an \u201cindustry of vested interests\u201d rather than a powerful tool to espouse the cause of the marginalised and oppressed. What is a Public Interest Litigation? 1) Public Interest Litigation (PIL), means a legal action initiated in a court of law for the enforcement… Continue reading Misuse of Public Interest Litigations<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":61,"featured_media":8657,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-18913","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-featured-editorials","entry"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/09\/supreme-court_7f9c8246-c2c5-11e6-913d-826c0833a15d.jpg?fit=1008%2C508&ssl=1","views":{"total":1144,"cached_at":""},"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18913","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/61"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=18913"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18913\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/8657"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=18913"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=18913"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=18913"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}