Right to Constitutional Remedies and Writs Questions and Answers

Answer: B

The development is the evolution of Public Interest Litigation.

Traditionally only a person whose own right was infringed could move the court. From the late 1970s the Supreme Court relaxed this rule of locus standi so that any public-spirited person could approach it on behalf of those unable to do so themselves, often the poor or the detained. S.P. Gupta v. Union of India (1981) set out the liberalised rule, and decisions such as Hussainara Khatoon and the bonded labour cases followed it.

Judicial review of administrative action and Article 226 writ jurisdiction existed long before and do not by themselves relax standing. 'Individual petitions alone' is the very opposite of what changed.

Answer: D

The term was first used by Prof. Abram Chayes.

Abram Chayes of Harvard Law School described a new model of 'public law litigation' in his 1976 article The Role of the Judge in Public Law Litigation, in which courts supervise institutional reform on behalf of groups rather than settling private disputes. Indian textbooks credit him with the first use of the expression from which 'public interest litigation' grew.

Justices P.N. Bhagwati and V.R. Krishna Iyer built PIL in India from the late 1970s, but did not coin the term. Prof. Upendra Baxi preferred to call the Indian version 'social action litigation'.

Answer: C

The case is Greene v. Secretary of State for Home Affairs (1942).

Greene was detained during the Second World War under Regulation 18B of the Defence (General) Regulations, 1939 and applied for habeas corpus. The House of Lords decided his case alongside Liversidge v. Anderson, and Lord Wright's speech there stressed the value of habeas corpus as a means of having the legality of a detention decided at once.

The other cases are not about habeas corpus: Ng Yuen Shiu is a leading case on legitimate expectation, Trethowan concerns 'manner and form' requirements for legislation, and Bugdaycay is the asylum case known for 'anxious scrutiny'.

Answer: C

The Supreme Court's power to issue directions, orders or writs, including habeas corpus, mandamus, prohibition, quo warranto and certiorari, is conferred by Article 32 of the Constitution. Article 32 is itself a Fundamental Right, the right to move the Supreme Court for the enforcement of the rights in Part III, which is why the writ list in the question matches its wording.

Article 115 deals with supplementary, additional or excess grants in the Union budget, Article 72 is the President's power to grant pardons, and Article 65 provides for the Vice-President acting as or discharging the functions of the President. None of these concerns writs.

Answer: B

A writ issued by a higher court to a lower court telling it not to proceed with a case that is beyond its jurisdiction is the writ of prohibition. It is issued while the proceedings are still pending, to prevent the lower court or tribunal from exceeding its jurisdiction.

Mandamus commands a public authority to perform a duty, habeas corpus produces a detained person before the court, and quo warranto asks by what authority a person holds a public office. Certiorari, which quashes a decision already made, is the related writ that is not among the options.