Supreme Court and Civil Liberties

SUPREME COURT OF INDIA AND CIVIL LIBERTIES based on case studies and government documents, examines whether or not the Supreme Court has succeeded in protecting civil liberties and administering justic in a manner that promotes the welfare of the common man-the role assigned to it by the framers of the Constitution. The book makes an in-depth apraisal of the role of the Court vis-a-vis personal liberty, since 1950, the efficacy of judicial review as a safeguard against the misuse of power by the executive during the period of internal emergency (1975-77), the Court's new perspective on civil liberties inspired by judicial activism in the postemergency period, and the resultant expansion of the scope and content of the concept of "personal liberty" as embodied in Article 21 of the Indian Constitution. It also unfolds the relevance of judicial activism in India and the United States and the political and policy-formulating role of the Supreme Courts of the two contries. It evaluates the activist role of the Supreme Court of India in entertaining Public Interest Litigation cases through the liberalisation of the rules of locus standi, the effectiveness of the Court's directives in such cases, and the problems and challenges confronting this type of litigation. The present study will be found useful not only by the students and research scholars of Indian Politics and Law but by all others concerned with the future of democracy- academecians, jurists, lawyers, social workers and civil libertarians.

Dr. (Miss) Uma Gupta (b. 1958) Lecturer in the Department of Political Science, Kirori Mal College (University of Delhi) has had a brilliant academic career. Dr. Gupta did her masters in Political Science from the University of Delhi in 1980 and topped the M.-Phil batch in the year 1982. In 1987, she was awarded Ph.D. degree by the University of Delhi. Her thesis entitled, "The Supreme Court of India as a Guardian of Civil Liberties" was highly appreciated by eminent academicians such as justice V.R. Krishna lyer. She has published several articles on the subject. She takes keen interest in the organisations working for the promotion of civil liberties.