Dr. Janel Jeyapaul v. SRM University: Private Organisations and Public Rights

Author(s):  
Akhileshwar Pathak

A person can approach the High Court directly under Article 226 for a violation of a Fundamental Right. The Fundamental Rights, however, are available only against the bodies which are ‘state’ within Article 12 of the Constitution. The judgement of the Supreme Court in Dr. Janet Jeyapaul v. SRM University extends the ambit of Article 226 to all bodies, whether governmental or private, which are performing ‘public function’ or ‘public duty’. Imparting education is taken to be a public function. The judgement opens new dimensions of constitutional law

2019 ◽  
Vol 17 (4) ◽  
pp. 1258-1282
Author(s):  
Rehan Abeyratne

Abstract This article, a contribution to a symposium on dominion constitutionalism, looks at sovereignty in Ceylon’s Dominion period (1948–1972). While the Ceylon Constitution has been the subject of in-depth historical and sociopolitical study, it has received less attention from legal scholars. This article hopes to fill that gap. It analyzes Ceylon Supreme Court and Privy Council judgments from this era on both rights-based and structural questions of constitutional law. In each area, sovereignty-related concerns influenced the judicial approach and case outcomes. On fundamental rights, both the Supreme Court and the Privy Council adopted a cautious approach, declining to invalidate legislation that had discriminatory effects on minority communities. This reluctance to entrench fundamental rights resulted, at least in part, from judges’ undue deference to the Ceylon Parliament, which was wrongly looked upon like its all-powerful British progenitor. On constitutional structure, the Ceylon Supreme Court deferred to Parliament even when legislation encroached into the judicial realm. The Privy Council, though, was not so passive. It upheld a separate, inviolable judicial power that Parliament could not legislate away. But by asserting itself as a check on legislative power, the Council—as a foreign judicial body intervening in Ceylonese affairs—stoked concerns that Ceylon was less than fully sovereign, which ultimately ended Dominion status.


2020 ◽  
Vol 1 (54) ◽  
pp. 425
Author(s):  
Edith Maria Barbosa RAMOS ◽  
Pedro Trovão do ROSÁRIO ◽  
Sara Barros Pereira de MIRANDA

RESUMOA presente pesquisa por escopo analisar os fenômenos da judicialização e do ativismo judicial a partir das experiências da Suprema Corte do Canadá e do Supremo Tribunal Federal brasileiro. Observou-se que, em ambos os países, tem havido, nas últimas décadas, uma contínua expansão da autoridade do Poder Judiciário e da sua atuação em temáticas de natureza política até então abordadas apenas pelos Poderes Legislativo e Executivo, o que pode ser evidenciado a partir da análise das decisões proferidas pelas Cortes Supremas dos dois países. Apesar das diferenças na arquitetura constitucional, ambas as Cortes atuam como condutoras do processo de expansão alcance do poder de suas estruturas judiciárias. O presente artigo foi desenvolvido a partir de levantamento bibliográfico em artigos obtidos em diferentes bancos de dados e indexadores, publicados na integra em português e inglês, acessados de forma gratuita. Foram selecionadas revistas científicas na área do Direito Constitucional Comparado com extratos elevados, qualis A e B. Utilizou-se, ainda, dados constantes em documentos oficiais e na legislação pertinente com recorte epistemológico e científico fundado na construção teórica contemporânea dos Direitos Fundamentais. PALAVRAS-CHAVE: Judicialização; Ativismo Judicial; Suprema Corte do Canadá; Supremo Tribunal Federal brasileiro. ABSTRACTThis research by scope analyzes the phenomena of judicialization and judicial activism from the experiences of the Supreme Court of Canada and the Brazilian Supreme Court. It has been observed that, in both countries, there has been, in the last decades, a continuous expansion of the authority of the Judiciary Power and its action in themes of a political nature hitherto addressed only by the Legislative and Executive Powers, which can be evidenced by from the analysis of the decisions of the Supreme Courts of both countries. Despite differences in constitutional architecture, both courts act as drivers of the process of expanding the power of their judicial structures. This article was developed from a bibliographic survey in articles obtained in different databases and indexers, published in full in Portuguese and English, accessed for free. Scientific journals were selected in the area of Constitutional Law Compared with high extracts, qualis A and B. It was also used data in official documents and relevant legislation with epistemological and scientific basis based on the contemporary theoretical construction of Fundamental Rights. KEYWORDS: Judicialization; Judicial activism; Supreme Court of Canada; Brazilian Supreme Court.


Legal Studies ◽  
2007 ◽  
Vol 27 (3) ◽  
pp. 361-378
Author(s):  
Michael Kirby

For much of the second half of the twentieth century, HM Seervai was a leading advocate of the Bombay High Court. He argued some of the most important constitutional cases decided by the Supreme Court of India and eventually resolved in 1970 to write his Constitutional Law of India. It became the leading text on Indian constitutional law. It is still in widespread use. Many instances of recent citations are quoted. But it is not the usual commentary on the text of the Indian constitutional and case law. Instead, the book contains a running discussion on the shifts in direction as well as sharp criticisms where Seervai felt that the courts had strayed from correct constitutional doctrine. Seervai died in 1996 as the fourth edition was just completed. In this paper, originally given as a lecture in Mumbai in 2007 on the centenary of Seervai’s birth, the author questions Seervai’s testamentary prohibition on posthumous editions of his text. He urges that a new edition should be produced to keep Seervai’s legacy alive not only in India but in other constitutional democracies where Indian judicial authority is increasingly cited.


2019 ◽  
Vol 34 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Sipho Stephen Nkosi

The note is about the appeal lodged by the late Mrs Winnie Madikizela-Mandela to the SCA against the decision of the Eastern Cape High Court, Mthatha, dismissing her application for review in 2014. In that application, she sought to have reviewed the decision of the Minister of Land Affairs, to transfer the now extended and renovated Qunu property to Mr Mandela and to register it in his name. Because her application was out of time, she also applied for condonation of her delay in making the application. The court a quo dismissed both applications with costs, holding that there had been an undue delay on her part. Mrs Mandela then approached the Supreme Court of Appeal, for special leave to appeal the decision of the court a quo. Two questions fell for decision by the SCA: whether there was an unreasonable and undue delay on Mrs Mandela’s part in instituting review proceedings; and whether the order for costs was appropriate in the circumstances of the case. The SCA held that there was indeed an unreasonable delay (of seventeen years). Shongwe AP (with Swain, Mathopo JJA, Mokgothloa and Rodgers AJJA concurring) held that the fact that there had been an undue delay does not necessarily mean that an order for costs should, of necessity, particularly where, as in this case, the other litigant is the state. It is the writer’s view that two other ancillary points needed to be raised by counsel and pronounced on by the Court: (a) the lawfulness and regularity of the transfer of the Qunu property to Mr Mandela; and (b) Mrs Mandela’s status as a customary-law widow—in relation to Mr Mandela.


2007 ◽  
Vol 101 (2) ◽  
pp. 459-465 ◽  
Author(s):  
Daniel Bodansky ◽  
Orna Ben-Naftali ◽  
Keren Michaeli

Public Committee Against Torture in Israel v. Government of Israel. Case No. HCJ 769/02. At <http://elyonl.court.gov.il/files_eng/02/690/007/a34/02007690.a34.pdf>.Supreme Court of Israel, sitting as the High Court of Justice, December 13, 2006.In Public Committee Against Torture in Israel v. Government of Israel1 Targeted Killings) the Supreme Court of Israel, sitting as the High Court of Justice, examined the legality of Israel's “preventative targeted killings” of members of militant Palestinian organizations. The Court's unanimous conclusion reads:The result of the examination is not that such strikes are always permissible or that they are always forbidden. The approach of customary international law applying to armed conflicts of an international nature is that civilians are protected from attacks by the army. However, that protection does not exist regarding those civilians “for such time as they take a direct part in hostilities” (§51(3) of [Additional Protocol I]). Harming such civilians, even if the result is death, is permitted, on the condition that there is no less harmful means, and on the condition that innocent civilians are not harmed. Harm to the latter must be proportional. (Para. 60)


2004 ◽  
Vol 37 (2-3) ◽  
pp. 299-345 ◽  
Author(s):  
Yoram Rabin ◽  
Yuval Shany

AbstractThis article addresses the constitutional discourse surrounding the status of economic and social rights in Israel. It examines the principal interpretive strategies adopted by the Supreme Court with regard to the 1992 basic laws (in particular, with respect to the right to human dignity) and criticizes the Court's reluctance to apply analogous strategies to incorporate economic and social rights into Israeli constitutional law. Potential explanations for this biased approach are also critically discussed. The ensuing outcome is a constitutional imbalance in Israeli law, which perpetuates the unjustified view that economic and social rights are inherently inferior to their civil and political counterparts, and puts in question Israel's compliance with its obligations under the International Covenant of Economic, Social and Cultural Rights. At the same time, encouraging recent Supreme Court decisions, particularly the YATED and Marciano judgments, indicate growing acceptance on the part of the Court of the role of economic and social rights in Israeli constitutional law, and raise hopes for a belated judicial change of heart concerning the need to protect at least a ‘hard core’ of economic and social rights. Still, the article posits that the possibilities of promoting the constitutional status of economic and social rights through case-to-case litigation are limited and calls for the renewal of the legislation procedures of draft Basic Law: Social Rights in the Knesset.


Acta Juridica ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 2021 ◽  
pp. 141-176
Author(s):  
F Brand

The role of abstract values such as equity and fairness in our law of contract has been the subject of controversy for a number of years. In 2002 the Supreme Court of Appeal took the position that these values do not constitute self-standing grounds for interfering with contractual relationships. Despite this being consistently maintained by the SCA in a number of cases, some High Court judges deviated from this position on the basis that they were permitted to do so by some minority judgments and obiter dicta in the Constitutional Court. The uncertainty thus created has fortunately now been removed by the judgment of the Constitutional Court in Beadica v The Trustees for the Time being of the Oregon Trust.


Author(s):  
Michael Tsele

When a party refers to evidentiary material in the course of litigation, ordinarily this party is under an obligation to make this evidence available to his opponent, particularly when called upon to do so. However, over the years various principles have developed which make this obligation subject to certain limitations. The Fochville cases dealt with a situation where a party to litigation sought to withhold certain information from its adversary, notwithstanding the fact that the material had been relied upon as a ground for the institution of the litigation. This note critiques the judgments of the High Court and in particular the Supreme Court of Appeal in this dispute. In so doing, it draws on useful foreign law to argue that the Supreme Court of Appeal's judgment was an unfortunate one in that the court failed to clarify with reasonable precision the circumstances in which a party to litigation involving children's interests may legitimately resist disclosing evidence to his adversary, in which the party resisting disclosure invokes the principle of public interest immunity. In this regard, the note concludes that the High Court's overall approach to the issue is to be preferred.       


2020 ◽  
Vol 2 (2) ◽  
pp. 323-352
Author(s):  
Devina Puspita Sari

The photocopy acceptable in the court if it matched with the original letter and the strength of that photocopy is the same as the original letter. However, sometimes the original letter has been lost so that it cannot be shown at trial. This paper discusses whether a photocopy that cannot be matched with the original letter can be accepted in the civil procedural law and if it can be accepted how the strength of it, then the discussion will look at the judge’s consideration in two cases related to the issue. The results of discussions are that photocopies that cannot be matched with the original letter can be accepted as evidence if the photocopy matches or is strengthened with other evidence, as the jurisprudence of Decision Nr. 112 K/Pdt/1996 and Decision Nr. 410 K/pdt/2004. The jurisprudence has been followed by similar cases, which is the Decision of the Central Jakarta District Court Nr. 164/Pdt.G/2004/PN.Jkt.Pst jo. Decision of The Jakarta High Court Nr. 234/Pdt/2005/PT.DKI jo. Decision of The Supreme Court Nr. 1498 K/Pdt/2006 which in this case a photocopy can be accepted because it is strengthened by the recognition of the opposing party and The Pontianak District Court Nr.52/Pdt.G/2003/PN.Ptk which received a photocopy because it was strengthened with  witness testimony. The photocopy has a free power of proof (depends on the judge’s assessment). The use and assessment of the strength of the photocopy cannot be independent, but must be linked to other valid evidence. Abstrak Fotokopi surat dapat diterima dalam persidangan apabila dapat dicocokkan dengan aslinya, dan kekuatan pembuktiannya sama seperti surat aslinya. Tulisan ini membahas, dalam hal surat aslinya tidak dapat ditunjukkan di persidangan, apakah fotokopi surat dapat diterima dalam pembuktian hukum acara perdata, dan, apabila dapat diterima, bagaimanakah kekuatan pembuktiannya. Artikel ini menunjukkan, fotokopi surat yang tidak dapat dicocokkan dengan aslinya dapat diterima sebagai alat bukti surat jika bersesuaian atau dikuatkan dengan alat bukti lain, sebagaimana Putusan Mahkamah Agung Nomor 112 K/Pdt/1996 dan Putusan Nomor 410 K/pdt/2004 yang telah menjadi yurisprudensi. Yurisprudensi ini telah diikuti dalam perkara serupa, yaitu dalam Putusan Pengadilan Negeri Jakarta Pusat Nomor 164/Pdt.G/2004/PN.Jkt.Pst jo. Putusan Pengadilan Tinggi Jakarta Nomor 234/Pdt/2005/PT.DKI jo. Putusan Mahkamah Agung Nomor 1498 K/Pdt/2006, di mana dalam perkara ini fotokopi surat dapat diterima karena dikuatkan dengan pengakuan pihak lawan. Demikian juga dalam Putusan Pengadilan Negeri Pontianak Nomor 52/Pdt.G/2003/PN.Ptk, yang menerima fotokopi surat yang tidak dapat dicocokkan dengan aslinya karena dikuatkan dengan alat bukti keterangan saksi. Dengan demikian, fotokopi surat memiliki kekuatan pembuktian yang bebas, artinya diserahkan kepada penilaian hakim. Penggunaan dan penilaian kekuatan pembuktian fotokopi tersebut tidak dapat berdiri sendiri, tetapi harus dikaitkan dengan alat bukti lainnya yang sah.  


Author(s):  
Motseotsile Clement Marumoagae

This article reflects on the law relating to pension interest in South Africa. In particular, it assesses whether the Supreme Court of Appeal in Ndaba v Ndaba had adequately clarified how this area of law should be understood. In light of the inconsistent approaches from various divisions of the High Court, it has not always been clear how the courts should interpret the law relating to pension interest in South Africa. In this paper, aspects of this area of law which have been clarified by the Supreme Court of Appeal are highlighted. This paper further demonstrates aspects of this area of law which the Supreme Court of Appeal did not settle and would potentially be subject to future litigation. This paper is based on the premise that while Ndaba v Ndaba is welcomed, the Supreme Court of Appeal nonetheless, missed a golden opportunity to authoritatively provide a basis upon which the law relating to pension interest in South Africa should be understood. 


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