By Binny Yadav Few ideas sound as persuasive in a democracy as speedy justice. Fewer still are as dangerous when pursued without constitutional caution. The Supreme Court’s December 29, 2025, directive introducing a Standard Operating Procedure (SOP) to regulate oral arguments is presented as an administrative necessity. Yet, in attempting to discipline time, the Court…
By Kumkum Chadha Sanjeev Bikhchandani has been nicknamed the “father of start-ups”: till then a concept unknown, at least in this part of the world. Some also call him the “Sachin Tedulkar of the dot.com business”. Modest as he is, he shrugs off these descriptions. “Exaggerated…flattering, but exaggerated. Being available for younger people gives me…
The conviction recently of a Kerala legislator in a criminal case is bizarre not only because of the facts involved, but also because of the extraordinary length of time it took to finally lead to his arrest and disqualification. What makes the case even more unusual is that while criminal cases against politicians are alarmingly…
By Dr Swati Jindal Garg The Supreme Court’s decision in Kiran vs State of Karnataka marks another crucial reaffirmation of Indian sentencing jurisprudence—specifically, the limits of a sessions court’s power to impose life imprisonment “till the end of natural life” and to deny statutory remission. Far from being a technical correction, the judgment underscores the…
By Sujit Bhar The Supreme Court’s recent dismissal of a public interest litigation seeking the adoption of World Health Organization (WHO) standards for permissible levels of antimony and Di (2-ethylhexyl) phthalate (DEHP) in packaged food and drinking water has sparked a debate far larger than plastic bottles and chemical migration. At its core lies a…
By Abhinav Mehrotra and Biswanath Gupta The recent turmoil in Bangladesh—marked by recurring episodes of violence, intimidation, and displacement affecting religious minorities—has once again drawn international attention to the precarious position of minority communities under international law. Periods of political instability in the country have repeatedly coincided with minority bashing, revealing the limits of constitutional…
By Sanjay Raman Sinha One of the world’s oldest mountain systems—the Aravallis—has once again become the site of a high-stakes legal and ecological contest. At the heart of the dispute lies an apparently simple, but deeply consequential question: What constitutes a mountain? On November 20, 2025, a three-judge bench of the Supreme Court led by…
By Shaan Katari Libby Shakespeare famously wrote in Romeo and Juliet, “What’s in a name? That which we call a rose/By any other name would smell as sweet.” In theory, a name may be incidental. In practice—especially in India—it is existential. A name confers identity, religion, community, legitimacy, and access. It opens doors—or closes them…
By Inderjit Badhwar This week’s cover story is not about Venezuela alone. It is about a moment when the architecture of restraint—legal, constitutional, moral—gave way to raw assertion of power. Kenneth Tiven documents what may become one of the most consequential acts of this US presidency: the extrajudicial seizure of a foreign leader without Congressional…
By Kenneth Tiven As President Donald Trump and Nicolás Maduro, Venezuela’s former leader, share striking personality traits and political behaviours—making Maduro’s military kidnapping by US Special Forces all the more extraordinary. The irony is inescapable. Trump governs from the White House; Maduro is confined to a Federal Detention Facility in New York City. Maduro retained…