Adjourning Pawan Khera’s plea for discharge in the case over his 2023 remarks on Prime Minister Narendra Modi, the Supreme Court told the Congress leader’s lawyer, who pressed for an early date, to “learn to be detached”. New Delhi: The Supreme Court on Monday adjourned the hearing on Congress leader Pawan Khera’s plea seeking discharge […]
Where a contract expressly bars interest not only on money withheld due to a dispute but also, as a separate ground, on delayed payments, the bar is complete and disables an arbitral tribunal from awarding pre-reference interest, the Supreme Court held, setting aside a High Court order that had restored such interest. New Delhi: The […]
Supervising the reform of India’s competitive-examination system after the NEET paper-leak controversy, the Supreme Court has said its judges will physically visit the headquarters of the National Testing Agency to see whether a working system, with permanent staff, is actually in place. It also sought a progress report within two weeks from the Nandan Nilekani-led task force, stressing that recommendations must not remain on paper but must be institutionalised and implemented.
In a lighter moment during a hearing, Justice PS Narasimha suggested that the Supreme Court install electric-vehicle charging points, remarking that a litigant could park an EV, and by the time the Court dismissed the matter, return to a fully charged car. He said the absence of charging infrastructure was itself holding people back from buying electric vehicles.
The Supreme Court has stayed the Punjab and Haryana High Court’s judgment striking down Section 147A of the Income Tax Act as unconstitutional, on the Union’s plea, but on the condition that the assessment proceedings shall not proceed further until the appeal is finally decided. The provision, inserted retrospectively to clarify that a jurisdictional officer can conduct faceless-era reassessment, will be finally heard on December 3, 2026.
A truck financed on a loan was seized at 1 a.m. by unidentified men who broke its steering lock, without the seven-day notice the loan agreement required, and later sold. The Supreme Court held the forcible repossession an arbitrary deprivation of livelihood violating Articles 14 and 21, ordered the financier to close the loan accounts, refund the sale price with interest and pay Rs 10 lakh compensation, and directed the RBI to enforce its own repossession guidelines.
Disposing of a batch of about 271 appeals by the Union against the grant of disability pension to ex-servicemen, the Supreme Court held that the 2008 Entitlement Rules, though they removed the automatic presumption of attributability, did not dismantle the claimant-protective structure, and that the primary burden of proof stays on the establishment for claims made within fifteen years. Most of the appeals were also barred by delay.
The Madhya Pradesh High Court has given the CBI a week to respond to the regular bail application of former district judge Giribala Singh in the Twisha Sharma dowry death case. Singh, mother-in-law of the deceased, denies the allegations. The matter is listed for September 21 and nothing has been established at trial.
A Delhi court has granted three weeks’ interim bail to Swatantra Bhardwaj in a case connected to the Cockroach Janta Party protest at Jantar Mantar in July. Two FIRs have been registered against him. The court has ordered the proceedings to be held in camera, and a detailed order is awaited. The allegations remain untested.
Speaking at a talk in Kochi, Senior Advocate and Independent Rajya Sabha MP Kapil Sibal questioned why the Supreme Court has not decided the correctness of the merger exception under Paragraph 4 of the Tenth Schedule since 2022, and argued that treating a legislature party merger as sufficient defeats the anti-defection law. The issue is pending before the Supreme Court.