[Mission 2022] QUIZ – 2020: INSIGHTS STATIC QUIZ , 28 September 2021 – Polity – INSIGHTSIAS

Solution: a)

Supreme Court’s ruling in ‘Kihoto Hollohan vs Zachillhu And Others’ (1992) case:

• The court upheld the sweeping discretion available to the Speaker in deciding cases of disqualification of MLAs.
• While the Speaker’s decisions can be challenged subsequently, the court cannot stay or prevent the process.

Hence, judicial review cannot be available at a stage prior to the making of a decision by the Speaker/Chairman and a quia timet action would not be permissible. Nor would interference be permissible at an interlocutory stage of the proceedings.

• Besides, the Court can review only infirmities based on violation of constitutional mandate, mala fides, non-compliance with rules of natural justice, and perversity.

Solution: b)

• Contempt of court is the offense of being disobedient to or disrespectful towards a court of law and its officers in the form of behavior that opposes or defies the authority, justice and dignity of the court.

Civil contempt means wilful disobedience of any judgment, decree, direction, order, writ or other process of a court, or wilful breach of an undertaking given to a court.

Criminal contempt is attracted by the publication (whether by words, spoken or written, or by signs, or by visible representations, or otherwise) of any matter or the doing of any other act whatsoever which:

1. Scandalises or tends to scandalise, or lowers or tends to lower the authority of, any court; or
2. Prejudices, or interferes or tends to interfere with, the due course of any judicial proceeding; or
3. Interferes or tends to interfere with, or obstructs or tends to obstruct, the administration of justice in any other manner.

Relevant provisions:

• Articles 129 and 215 of the Constitution of India empowers the Supreme Court and High Court respectively to punish people for their respective contempt.
• Section 10 of The Contempt of Courts Act of 1971 defines the power of the High Court to punish contempts of its subordinate courts.
• The Constitution also includes contempt of court as a reasonable restriction to the freedom of speech and expression under Article 19, along with elements like public order and defamation.

Solution: a)

The Supreme Court had stayed an Andhra Pradesh High Court order intending to embark on a judicial enquiry into whether there is a constitutional breakdown in the State machinery.

What has the Supreme Court said?

• It was not up to the High Court to enquire and recommend President’s rule in a State.
• It is Article 356 that deals with failure of constitutional machinery in a State. This is a power [to impose President’s rule] exclusively vests in the Executive.

Solution: b)

The Western concept of secularism connotes a complete separation between the religion (the church) and the state (the politics). This negative concept of secularism is inapplicable in the Indian situation where the society is multi-religious.

Hence, the Indian Constitution embodies the positive concept of secularism, i.e., giving equal respect to all religions or protecting all religions equally.

Solution: c)

Article 3 authorizes the Parliament to:

(a) form a new state by separation of territory from any state or by uniting two or more states or parts of states or by uniting any territory to a part of any state;

(b) increase the area of any state;

(c) diminish the area of any state;

(d) alter the boundaries of any state; and

(e) alter the name of any state.

However, Article 3 lays down two conditions in this regard: one, a bill contemplating the above changes can be introduced in the Parliament only with the prior recommendation of the

President; and two, before recommending the bill, the President has to refer the same to the state legislature concerned for expressing its views within a specified period.

Article 2 empowers the Parliament to ‘admit into the Union of India, or establish, new states on such terms and conditions as it thinks fit’.

Notably, Article 2 relates to the admission or establishment of new states that are not part of the Union of India. Article 3, on the other hand, relates to the formation of or changes in the existing states of the Union of India. In other words, Article 3 deals with the internal re-adjustment inter se of the territories of the constituent states of the Union of India.

The President is not bound by the views of the state legislature and may either accept or reject them, even if the views are received in time.