Scaling Justice: India’s Supreme Court, Anti-Terror Laws, Social Rights and Civil Liberties

Most experts agree that India's Supreme Court and lower courts' pro-active behaviour on social rights can be traced back to the immediate post-Emergency era. Post-Emergency, judges have become ‘embedded negotiators’. Their judgments have carefully avoided conflict with the political wings while being mindful of their role as safe keepers of the rights of citizens. While the Court has sometimes been charged with judicial overreach, this book attempts to understand why certain choices were made by the Supreme Court judges and the circumstances in which they were made. Qualitative analysis of the constitutional and legal framework, landmark rulings, and dissenting opinion, along with a multivariate analysis of civil liberties and social rights cases are used. This book evaluates the judgments on preventive detention, anti-terror, health, and education cases and shows how judges seek legitimacy for their decisions.