Supreme Court plans guidelines on PILs

Agreeing on the need to end the controversy over the jurisdiction of courts, following the two-judge Bench ruling on “judicial activism and overreach"...

Agreeing on the need to end the controversy over the jurisdiction of courts, following the two-judge Bench ruling on “judicial activism and overreach”, Chief Justice of India K G Balakrishnan today said a larger Bench would frame appropriate guidelines governing Public Interest Litigation (PIL) petitions.

“It is better to have some guidelines whether these types of PILs can be entertained,” said a three-judge Bench headed by Chief Justice K G Balakrishnan today. Yesterday, he had said that the two-judge Bench ruling on “judicial activism” was not binding.

The Chief Justice decided to address the issue today when a PIL relating to rehabilitation of sex workers, referred to it by a Bench headed by Justice S B Sinha, came up for hearing. The PIL was filed by an NGO, Prajwala.

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Appearing for the NGO, advocate Aparna Bhatt informed that the Bench headed by Justice Sinha had refused to take up the PIL in view of the uncertainty following the observations on “judicial overreach”.

She said the Bench had categorically sought to know whether it had the jurisdiction to entertain such PILs. “Keeping in view the nature of the relief sought in the writ petition vis-a-vis the larger issues involved, namely, the jurisdiction of this court to deal with a matter of this nature, we are of the opinion that it deserves hearing by a larger Bench,” Justice Sinha had said in his order, while referring the matter to the CJI.

“We will examine the questions raised by Justice Sinha,” said the Bench headed by the CJI today. “Whether such type of PILs can be entertained or not, this court will lay down certain guidelines,” it added. The Bench posted the PIL for hearing on February 23 next year.