Chapter - 5 Judiciary

An independent judiciary is necessary to carry out the function of 'upholding the law and enforcing
Fundamental Rights'. Anyone can approach the courts if they believe that their rights have been
violated. If any law passed by the Parliament violates anyone's Fundamental Rights, the judiciary has
power to declare such law null and void.

The Right to Constitutional Remedies connects to the idea of judicial review in its capacity of protecting the rights of an individual against the working of the State legislature or executive. The Right to Constitutional Remedies allows citizens to move the court if they think that any of their Fundamental Rights are being violated by the State administration. Judicial review implies invalidation of legislative or executive action if it is seen to violate Fundamental Rights. Hence, the Right to Constitutional Remedies and judicial review are inter-connected because the latter is practiced when a Fundamental Right is violated by the State. In this case, a higher court can repeal the judgments of a lower court based on its own investigation.

Lower Court (Trial Court): Laxman, his mother Shakuntala and his brother-in-law Subhash
Chandra were sentenced to death
High Court: Laxman, Shakuntala and Subhash Chandra were acquitted.
Supreme Court: Laxman, Shakuntala were given life imprisonment while Subhash Chandra
was acquitted for lack of sufficient evidence.

(a) True
(b) False
(c) False

The Supreme Court in the early 1980s devised a mechanism of Public Interest Litigation or PIL to increase access to justice. It allowed any individual or organisation to file a PIL in the High Court or the Supreme Court on behalf of those whose rights were being violated. The legal process was greatly simplified and even a letter or telegram addressed to the Supreme Court or the High Court could be treated as a PIL. In the early years, PIL was used to secure justice on a large number of issues such as rescuing bonded labourers from inhuman work conditions; and securing the release of-prisoners in Bihar who had been kept in jail even after their punishment terms was complete. Thus, the introduction of PIL is really a significant step in ensuring access to justice for all.

In Olga Tellis vs. Bombay Municipal Corporation case, the judges said that the Right to Livelihood was part of the Right to Life. They stated that life does not merely imply an animal existence; it cannot be lived without a means of living, that is, "the means of livelihood". In the case of Olga Tellis vs Bombay Municipal Corporation, the people live in slum. They have small jobs in the city and for them there is nowhere else to live. The eviction of their slum will lead to deprivation of their livelihood and consequently to the deprivation of life.
Thus, it can be said that Right to Life means the need of basic requirements of livelihood i.e., food, shelter and cloth.

Nitin Narang was a bank officer. After retirement he came back to his forefather's house. He requested the tenant to vacate the house. But the tenant did not vacate the house. Tenant challenged that if Nitin Narang wanted to have his house vacated, he should move to court for justice. He was compelled to live in a rented house. The owner lodged litigation against the tenant. After fighting the case for five years, the owner won the case. The decision was made in his favour by the Trial Court. But the tenant appealed in the High Court against the lower court decision. It again took five years for justice. In the meantime Nitin Narang kept on living in the rented house because unless there was judgement, he had no other option. In such a situation we can definitely say, 'Justice delayed is justice denied'.

(a) Acquit - The case in favour of Manish led the High Court to acquit him of all charges of guilt that the Trial Court had levied on him.
(b) To appeal - The women's organization lent strong support to the domestic maid to appeal against
charges of theft that her employer had accused her of.
(c) Compensation - The central government paid compensation to the victims' families after an
unfortunate train accident that killed hundreds.
(d) Eviction - The Company's claims to land occupied by slum-dwellers led to the poor people's eviction from their homes, which were bull-dozed by municipal authorities.
(e) Violation - The judiciary takes stringent action against any violation of Fundamental Rights.

The constitution of India grants all Indian the Right to Live. Right to Live is some short associated with the Right to Food.

The duties of the government to uphold the Right to Food are as follows:

• To provide at least minimum food stuff to the citizens at nominal cost or free.
• To check unnecessary inflation in price of food items.
• To check the hoarding of grains of daily use like wheat, rice, sugar, etc.
• To provide meal to poor children in the school.

'Hungry stomachs, overflowing godowns' is not at all acceptable in a civilized society. If the hoarding of food is not discouraged, the people with hungry stomachs will attempt to commit crimes.