Book Announcement : "The Finished Article: Essays on Indian Designs Law"

The Finished Article: Essays on Indian Designs Law (Thomson Reuters, 2022, ISBN-13: 978-9393702173) is a recent book published by Eashan Ghosh, intellectual property lawyer. The book is available for purchase online at this link. This is his second book on Indian intellectual property law, following Imperfect Recollections: The Indian Supreme Court on Trade Mark Law (2020). The Finished...

Book Review : "Soli Sorabjee – Life and Times" By Abhinav Chandrachud

When Abhinav Chandrachud started chasing eminent jurist Mr.Soli Sorabjee, Senior Advocate and former Attorney General for India, to convince him to write latter's autobiography in 2018, he didn't know that he himself will have to write it in the form of a biography a few years later. Soli Sorabjee succumbed to Covid in on 30th April 2021 leaving behind his legacy and an...

Book Review: Arvind Narrain's 'Undeclared Emergency: Constitutionalism And The Politics Of Resistance'

Arvind Narrain's "Undeclared Emergency" is one of the pioneer books in capturing the legal and political dynamics of the Indian state in the process of ongoing transformation. It is both empirically fulfilling and analytically detailed. It traces the analogical similarity between the two phases of the Indian political epoch, namely, Indira Gandhi's Emergency era of 1975-77 and...

Book Review| Patients' Rights in India by Dr Mohamed Khader Meeran

Past few years, there have been increasing incidents of assault on doctors without adequate condemnation from civil society or effective intervention by Police. There were jury awards of heavy compensation to the patients on avoidable medical negligence. Very often the clarifications provided by the treating doctor about the dilemma in diagnosis and uncertainty of prediction of...

BOOK REVIEW: Rohan Alva's: "Liberty after Freedom: A History of Article 21, Due Process and the Constitution of India"

Rohan Alva seems to be the best sort of dangerous man. The astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson, arguably the world's most popular scientist living today, writes in a letter to a well-wisher: "My aim is simply to empower people to think for themselves, rather than have others do the thinking for them. Therein blooms the "soul" of skepticism and the "spirit" of free inquiry."[i] Alva is...

Josy Joseph's 'Silent Coup' : How Inherent Biases of Non-Military Security Establishment Lead to Constitutional Subversion

Democratic erosion in a constitutional democracy, according to Aziz Haq and Tom Ginsburg, occurs either through authoritarian reversion or constitutional retrogression. Reversion is a sudden collapse like a coup. Since the Constitution of India came into force in 1950, around 460 coup attempts have been made across the globe, none of which were in India. In comparison, retrogression is...

Supreme Whispers: Unheard Stories Of Supreme Court

Among the three organs of government, Judiciary has great respect for its working, judgments, and impartiality, and Higher judiciary has more respect than its lower counterparts. Although we see the inclination of the judges towards the government, yet these stories of allurements could not shake the people's faith in the judiciary. It is undisputable fact that if there is a group of persons...

'Law, Humour And Urdu Poetry': Off-Record And On-Record Anecdotes And Poetry

Indian courts are courts of record, which means that the court proceedings are recorded for the purpose of appeal and the precedent value. There is however so much that happens in courtrooms "off the record" which is later discussed in court corridors and at the canteen. These corridor and canteen conversations are probably one of the things the whole fraternity has been missing the...

From Doon to Tihar: Notes from Fractured Freedom

On 17 September 2009, a senior citizen of nearly 62 years with multiple health issues was dragged inside an SUV at a busy bus stop in Delhi. The 'abduction' or an arrest, as Kobad Ghandy writes in his prison memoir – Fractured Freedom was done by none other than the Andhra Pradesh Intelligence Bureau. Little Kobad knew that this arrest on his journey from Mumbai to Delhi for...

Book Review : 'White-Collar Crimes in India: Contemporary Issues and Complexities'

The conceptual genesis of white-collar crimes occurred as early as the latter half of 19th Century. However, it was the renowned American sociologist – Edwin Sutherland, who delved into the meaning of white-collar crimes in 1940s, at a period when crimes were perceived to be committed mainly by the lower sections of the society. According to Sutherland, "white-collar crimes"...

Book Review: We The People: Towards An Accountable Democracy

We The People: Establishing Rights and Deepening Democracy is the fourth volume in the Rethinking India series, assuming its title as the opening phrase of the Preamble of the Indian Constitution. The book is divided into nine essays, including the introduction. These essays altogether make space for many profound arguments on accountability, economic and social inequalities. The...

'Sex and the Supreme Court' : Book Review

The individual is at the centre of the constitutional firmament. Sex and the Supreme Court (2020), edited by Senior Advocate Saurabh Kirpal runs along this theme from cover to cover. This idea is brought to life more often by the Supreme Court of India or High Courts than the legislature. There is a growing trend in recent books to portray the courts, especially the Supreme Court,...