The Relaxation of Locus Standi

In one line

The traditional rule was that only a person whose own legal right was violated could move a court, and the Indian courts relaxed it so that any member of the public acting bona fide may move the court for a person or class who cannot come themselves.

The traditional rule, and why it existed

The rule. A petitioner must show a legal right of their own that has been infringed, or a legal injury suffered personally. A stranger has no standing however meritorious the complaint.

Three reasons the rule existed, and none is foolish.

It keeps courts to disputes. A court is constituted to resolve a controversy between parties, and a rule of standing is what distinguishes a controversy from an opinion.

It protects the real party. A person whose rights are litigated by a stranger may be bound by a result they did not seek, on arguments they did not choose.

And it manages volume. A jurisdiction open to anyone about anything is a jurisdiction that cannot function.

A good answer states these before describing the relaxation, because the criticisms of public interest litigation are simply these three reasons restated.

The relaxation, stated as a rule

Where a legal wrong or a legal injury is caused to a person or to a determinate class of persons, and that person or class is by reason of poverty, helplessness, disability or a socially or economically disadvantaged position unable to approach the court for relief, any member of the public acting bona fide may move the court under article 32 or article 226.

Every element of that formulation is doing work.

A legal wrong or a legal injury to a person or determinate class. The proceeding is still founded on a right, and there must be somebody whose right it is. This is what excludes an abstract complaint about policy.

Poverty, helplessness, disability or a socially or economically disadvantaged position. These are the reasons the real party cannot come, and the list maps almost exactly onto the groups on MU's paper.

Unable to approach the court. The test is inability and not merely unwillingness or inconvenience.

And acting bona fide. The petitioner's motive is examinable, and it is the principal control on the jurisdiction.

The decision that settled it

The case. S.P. Gupta v. Union of India, 1981 Supp SCC 87.

Facts. Petitions were filed by practising advocates challenging the circular of the Law Minister concerning the transfer and appointment of judges, the non-appointment of certain additional judges and the transfer of a Chief Justice. A preliminary objection was taken that the petitioners, being practising lawyers with no personal right at stake, had no locus standi to raise questions about the appointment and transfer of judges.