B.A. LL.B. (Five Years) Sem 8 Human Rights Law and Practice 2024 Aug Question Paper with Solutions

The idea is old. The legal protection of it is new. The development can be traced in six stages.

Stage 1: ancient roots in natural law

1. Greece. In Sophocles' play Antigone (around 441 BCE), Antigone disobeys the king's order. She says his edict cannot override the "unwritten and unfailing" laws of the gods. This is the first statement of a law above the ruler.
2. The Stoics taught that reason is common to all human beings. So one law applies to all, and a person is a citizen of the world. This is the root of universality.
3. Rome. Cicero wrote that true law is right reason in agreement with nature, of universal application. Roman lawyers separated ius naturale (law of nature) from the law of the State.
4. Medieval Europe. Thomas Aquinas held that a human law which departs from natural law is not law but a corruption of law.
5. India. The idea of dharma placed the king under a duty to protect his subjects. Ashoka's edicts preached tolerance and humane treatment. These were duties of rulers, not enforceable rights of subjects.

1. The Virginia Declaration of Rights (12 June 1776) and the American Declaration of Independence (4 July 1776). All men are created equal, with unalienable rights to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.
2. The French Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen (26 August 1789). Article 1 says men are born and remain free and equal in rights.
3. The United States Bill of Rights, the first ten Amendments, ratified on 15 December 1791.

These rights were national. They bound only one State towards its own people.

Stage 4: the first international steps

Before 1945, a State's treatment of its own people was its own business. There were narrow exceptions:

1. the movement to abolish the slave trade;
2. the minorities treaties of 1919 to 1920 after the First World War; and
3. the International Labour Organization, founded in 1919 by Part XIII of the Treaty of Versailles, which set labour standards.

Stage 6: development in India

1. The freedom struggle demanded a bill of rights. The Nehru Report of 1928 and the Karachi Resolution of 1931 listed fundamental rights.
2. The Constitution (1950) placed civil rights in Part III (enforceable under Article 32) and social rights in Part IV (Directive Principles).
3. The courts widened these rights. In Maneka Gandhi v. Union of India, AIR 1978 SC 597 (decided 25 January 1978), the petitioner's passport was impounded without reasons or a hearing. The Supreme Court held that the procedure under Article 21 must be right, just and fair, not arbitrary. Article 21 then grew to include speedy trial, legal aid, livelihood and a clean environment.
4. The Protection of Human Rights Act 1993 created the National and State Human Rights Commissions and Human Rights Courts.

Evaluation

The development shows a clear movement. Rights began as moral claims against rulers. They became national legal rights after 1689, 1776 and 1789. After 1945 they became international law. The gap that remains is enforcement, because many international bodies can only recommend.