BLS LLB 5 Years Sem 7 Administrative Law 2019-20 Question Paper with Solutions

Section 2(f) of the Right to Information Act, 2005: "information" means any material in any form, including records, documents, memos, e-mails, opinions, advices, press releases, circulars, orders, logbooks, contracts, reports, papers, samples, models and data material held in any electronic form, and information relating to any private body which can be accessed by a public authority under any other law for the time being in force.

An institutional decision is one taken by an organisation as a whole rather than by the individual who heard the case: the hearing is conducted by one officer, the file is examined and processed by others, and the order is signed by a superior who has not himself heard the party. It is the ordinary mode of decision-making in a large department, and it is sometimes called the institutional decision-making process.

Delegated legislation is law made by an executive or administrative authority under a power conferred on it by the legislature. Salmond: subordinate legislation "proceeds from any authority other than the sovereign power, and is therefore dependent for its continued existence and validity on some superior or supreme authority".

It takes the form of rules, regulations, bye-laws, orders, notifications, schemes and directions.

1. the legislature, which makes the law: Parliament under Articles 79 to 122, the State legislatures under Articles 168 to 212;
2. the executive, which enforces and administers it: the President, the Council of Ministers and the civil services, under Articles 52 to 78 and 153 to 167;
3. the judiciary, which interprets the law and adjudicates disputes: the Supreme Court under Articles 124 to 147, the High Courts under Articles 214 to 231.

A speaking order is an order which speaks for itself, that is, one which records the reasons on which it is based. It is also called a reasoned decision, and the duty to pass one is now the third principle of natural justice.

4. Its main branches, as the writers describe them: the law relating to the status of administrative personnel; the law relating to the administration of public services; and the law relating to administrative adjudication.

5. Dicey's criticism. Dicey treated droit administratif as the antithesis of the rule of law, on two grounds: it gave officials a separate law, and it gave them separate courts, withdrawing them from the ordinary tribunals and so conferring a privileged position.

6. The answer to Dicey. The criticism is now regarded as based on a misunderstanding:

1. the Conseil d'Etat is not a department of the executive and is in practice independent, manned by career judges of great standing;
2. its control over the administration is in several respects stricter than the English courts'. It developed the liability of the State for the faults of its servants (faute de service) at a time when the English Crown could not be sued at all, and it annuls acts for detournement de pouvoir, the use of power for an improper purpose, a doctrine English law reached much later;

1. The doctrine. Montesquieu, L'Esprit des Lois (1748): the legislative, executive and judicial powers should be vested in three separate organs; no organ should exercise the functions of another; and no person should be a member of more than one organ. The object is liberty, because concentrated power is abused.

2. Comparative. The United States applies it strictly by constitutional text, tempered by checks and balances. England has never applied it. India takes a middle position: functions differentiated, organs not insulated.

3. What reflects the doctrine in India. Article 50 (separation of the judiciary from the executive, a Directive Principle); Articles 53 and 154; Articles 121 and 211 (no discussion of a Judge's conduct); Articles 122 and 212 (no judicial inquiry into legislative procedure); Article 361 (immunity of the President and Governors); and the independence of the judiciary under Articles 124 to 147 and 214 to 231.

Citation. A.K. Kraipak v. Union of India, AIR 1970 SC 150.

Facts. A Selection Board was constituted to select officers of the State Forest Service of Jammu and Kashmir for the Indian Forest Service. Naquishbund, the Acting Chief Conservator of Forests, was a member of the Selection Board and at the same time a candidate for selection. He did not sit when his own name was considered, but he took part in the deliberations on the claims of his rivals, and in the preparation of the final list in which he was placed at the top. The unsuccessful candidates challenged the selection.

Held. The selection was quashed. The Supreme Court laid down three propositions:

1. There was a real likelihood of bias. A person cannot sit in judgment on the claims of his own competitors, and it is immaterial that he withdrew when his own name came up: his participation in judging his rivals was itself decisive. The test is not actual bias but a real likelihood of bias, because justice must not only be done but must be seen to be done.

1. Object and constitutional foundation. The Act sets out a practical regime of the right to information for citizens, to secure access to information under the control of public authorities in order to promote transparency and accountability and to contain corruption. Its constitutional root is Article 19(1)(a): State of Uttar Pradesh v. Raj Narain (1975), "the people of this country have a right to know every public act, everything that is done in a public way by their public functionaries"; S.P. Gupta v. Union of India (1981); Union of India v. Association for Democratic Reforms (2002).

2. Salient provisions.

1. Section 2(f), "information", defined widely, including records, documents, memos, e-mails, opinions, advices, orders, contracts, reports, samples and models, and information relating to a private body accessible to a public authority under any other law;
2. Section 2(j), the right: to inspect work, documents and records, to take notes and certified copies, to take certified samples, and to obtain information in electronic form;

3. The case law. Central Board of Secondary Education v. Aditi Singh (2011): a candidate may inspect his own evaluated answer sheets. Reserve Bank of India v. Jayantilal N. Mistry (2015): the RBI could not withhold inspection reports and defaulter lists on a plea of fiduciary relationship. Central Public Information Officer, Supreme Court of India v. Subhash Chandra Agarwal (2019): the office of the Chief Justice of India is a public authority under the Act.

4. Criticism. The Amendment Act of 2019 empowered the Central Government to fix the tenure, salary and conditions of service of the Information Commissioners, previously fixed by the Act itself, which is said to weaken their independence; there are heavy backlogs and long vacancies in the Commissions; and Section 4 is poorly implemented.

Atlas Cycle Industries Ltd. v. State of Haryana (1979): where the statute merely requires laying, the requirement is directory, so failure to lay does not invalidate the rule; where laying is a condition of validity, it is mandatory.

3. Scrutiny by committee. The Committee on Subordinate Legislation of the Lok Sabha (1953) and of the Rajya Sabha (1964), each of fifteen members with no Minister among them, examines whether a rule is within the power conferred, and in particular whether it imposes a tax, bars the jurisdiction of the courts, has retrospective effect without authority, involves expenditure from the Consolidated Fund, makes an unusual or unexpected use of the power, or has been laid or published after unjustifiable delay. It hears the department and reports to the House.

4. Other devices. Questions, half-an-hour discussions, motions and resolutions; the debate on the annual report of a statutory authority; and the ultimate control, amendment or repeal of the parent Act.

1. What it is. The apex integrity and anti-corruption institution of the Union, exercising superintendence over the vigilance administration of the central Government and over the Delhi Special Police Establishment, that is the Central Bureau of Investigation, in so far as it investigates offences under the Prevention of Corruption Act, 1988.

2. Origin and status. Set up by a Government resolution in February 1964 on the recommendation of the Santhanam Committee on Prevention of Corruption. Given statutory status by the Central Vigilance Commission Act, 2003, enacted in consequence of the directions of the Supreme Court in Vineet Narain v. Union of India (1998), the Jain Hawala case, which directed that the Commission be given statutory status and the CBI be insulated from executive interference.

6. to be the designated agency under the whistle-blower mechanism of the 2004 Resolution and the Whistle Blowers Protection Act, 2014;
7. superintendence over the Chief Vigilance Officers in the ministries and public sector undertakings.

5. Limitations. Its advice is advisory only, though a departure must be recorded and reported; it cannot register a criminal case or investigate directly; it has no jurisdiction over State Government servants; and it depends on the Government for staff.

(a) Guide miss Varsha to reinstate her service?

She should challenge the suspension as mala fide and as an interim measure prolonged into a punishment, and seek reinstatement, before the Central Administrative Tribunal and thereafter the High Court.

1. What a suspension is. Suspension pending inquiry is an interim, preventive measure, not a punishment. It neither decides guilt nor imposes a penalty, and a prior hearing is therefore not required for it. But it must be made by a competent authority, must be followed by a charge sheet and an inquiry within a reasonable time, and must not be used as a substitute for punishment.
2. The grounds she should take.

7. Articles 14 and 16, since arbitrary action in service matters is a denial of equality.
8. The steps to advise.
9. Make a representation to the suspending authority and to the reviewing committee, which most service rules require to review a suspension periodically;
10. call for the file and the reasons, if necessary under the Right to Information Act, 2005;
11. approach the Central Administrative Tribunal, she being a member of an All India Service, and thereafter the High Court on review by a Division Bench: L. Chandra Kumar v. Union of India (1997);
12. seek quashing of the suspension, a direction for reinstatement, and, if a charge sheet has issued, a direction that the inquiry be completed within a fixed time;
13. where the transfer or suspension is part of a pattern, invoke the directions in T.S.R. Subramanian v. Union of India (2013), which required a minimum fixed tenure, a Civil Services Board to advise on postings and transfers, and that oral instructions from political superiors should not be acted upon.
14. What she cannot ask for. The court will not decide whether she is guilty of the misconduct alleged, and it will not ordinarily stay a departmental inquiry. It will control the process, not the merits.

4. Article 312, which constitutes the All India Services, and the All India Services Act, 1951 and the rules made under it, are what give an IAS officer a status that a State Government cannot unilaterally alter: her cadre control, discipline and major penalties rest with the Central Government.
5. Article 309 makes the service rules statutory, so their breach is itself actionable.
6. Articles 14 and 16 forbid arbitrariness and secure equality of opportunity in public employment: E.P. Royappa (1974).
7. Articles 323A and 226 supply the forum in which all of this is enforced.

Why it exists. No legislature can foresee every case, and a welfare State must license, allot, exempt, subsidise and regulate on facts that vary case by case. Dicey thought discretion the enemy of the rule of law; the modern answer is that the enemy is unstructured and unreviewable discretion, and that the remedy, in Davis's phrase, is to confine, structure and check it.

Its four inherent limits. A statutory discretion is never a free power. It must be exercised by the authority named, for the purpose for which it was given, on relevant considerations, and by a fair procedure. Every ground of judicial review is one of those four limits stated differently, and the courts group them under two heads: failure to exercise the discretion, and abuse of it.

(b) Can the rule made by the Director be challenged? Give reason.

Yes. The Director's invariable rule is bad, and an applicant refused under it is entitled to have his case considered on its merits.

4. The order refusing exemption is a nullity, because the authority has not performed the statutory duty of applying its own mind to the individual case. It is not a case of deciding wrongly but of not deciding at all.
5. The remedy. A petition under Article 226 for certiorari to quash the refusal and mandamus directing the Director to consider and decide the application according to law. The court will not itself grant the certificate; the discretion is the Director's, and the applicant obtains the right to be considered, not the right to succeed. In a clear case the High Court may mould the relief further: Comptroller and Auditor General v. K.S. Jagannathan (1986).
6. What the Director may lawfully do. Issue guidelines indicating the kind of case he would ordinarily treat as deserving, while making clear that every case will be considered on its merits. That preserves both consistency and the discretion.

1. The facts. Admission to the Regional Engineering College, Srinagar, run by a society registered under the Jammu and Kashmir Registration of Societies Act, was by a written test followed by an oral interview. Of a total of 150 marks, 50, that is one-third or 33 and one-third per cent, were allotted to the viva voce. The petitioners complained that the interviews lasted two to three minutes on average, and that they were asked superficial questions about their parentage and residence rather than questions relevant to the qualities for which the marks were allotted.
2. The threshold question: is the society "the State"? The Court held that it was, and in doing so laid down the six tests of instrumentality or agency under Article 12: the entire share capital or funding held by the Government; financial assistance meeting almost the whole expenditure; a monopoly conferred or protected by the State; deep and pervasive State control; functions of public importance closely related to governmental functions; and a Government department transferred to the body. The form in which the body is clothed, whether a corporation or a registered society, is immaterial: what matters is whether it is an instrumentality of the State.

1. the society running the Regional Engineering College is an instrumentality of the State and therefore "other authorities" within Article 12, so it is bound by the fundamental rights; the six tests of instrumentality were laid down, and it was held that the form of the body is irrelevant;
2. the allocation of 33 and one-third per cent of the total marks to the oral interview is arbitrary and violative of Article 14, and the admissions made on that basis were set aside;
3. an oral interview may lawfully carry marks, but ordinarily not more than about 15 per cent of the total, and it must be conducted properly, with relevant questions and adequate time;
4. the Court nonetheless declined to unsettle the admissions of students who had already completed part of their course, moulding the relief so that the declaration operated for the future. Bhagwati J., delivering the judgment, held that the constitutional philosophy of a democratic socialist republic requires the State and its instrumentalities to act in a manner that is fair, reasonable and non-arbitrary.

2. Nature, in short. Public law; judge-made and uncodified in India; functional rather than conceptual; dynamic; and organised around power and its control.

3. The sources of administrative law in India.

(a) The Constitution. This is the primary source, and it distinguishes Indian from English administrative law. It supplies:

1. Article 12, the definition of "the State", which fixes who is bound; Article 13, making inconsistent law void, and defining "law" to include rules, regulations, notifications and bye-laws, which is what brings delegated legislation within the fundamental rights;
2. Articles 14, 19 and 21, the standards of equality, reasonableness and fairness, from which the Indian law of natural justice and of arbitrariness is derived after E.P. Royappa (1974) and Maneka Gandhi (1978);
3. Articles 32 and 226, the remedies, and Articles 136 and 227;
4. Articles 298, 299 and 300, the contractual and tortious liability of the State;
5. Articles 308 to 323, the services, the doctrine of pleasure and the Public Service Commissions;

(d) Judicial decisions and precedent. This is the most important source of the governing principles, because almost none of them is enacted in India. Natural justice, the doctrine of ultra vires, the grounds of review of discretion, promissory estoppel, legitimate expectation, the instrumentality test under Article 12 and the constitutional tort are all judge-made: A.K. Kraipak (1970), Maneka Gandhi (1978), In re Delhi Laws Act (1951), Barium Chemicals (1967), Ajay Hasia (1981), Nilabati Behera (1993).

(e) Administrative directions, circulars and departmental practice. These are not law in the strict sense and confer no enforceable right by themselves, but they bind the administration internally, may found a legitimate expectation, and may be enforced under Article 14 where a departure from them is arbitrary: Food Corporation of India v. Kamdhenu Cattle Feed Industries (1993).

(f) Reports of committees and commissions, persuasive rather than binding: the Committee on Ministers' Powers (Donoughmore), 1932 and the Franks Committee, 1957 in England; the Administrative Reforms Commissions of 1966 and 2005 and the Law Commission of India reports in India.

For full marks, cover: the origin of the idea; Dicey's three propositions in his own terms, since the question names him; the criticism of each; the modern restatement; the reception of the doctrine in India, with the constitutional provisions; six Indian cases; and the departures.

1. Origin. The rule of law means that the State and every officer of it is subject to law, that power may be exercised only under and according to law, and that no one is above the law. The phrase renders the French la principe de legalite. Its ancestry runs from Bracton in the thirteenth century, that the King is under God and the law, to Sir Edward Coke in Dr. Bonham's Case (1610) and in his contests with James I.

2. Dicey's three propositions, from the Introduction to the Study of the Law of the Constitution (1885).

1. The first proposition would abolish the modern State. Discretion is unavoidable in a welfare administration, and Dicey confused arbitrary power with discretionary power. The answer of modern law is not to forbid discretion but to confine, structure and check it, which is exactly what the grounds of judicial review do.
2. The second rested on a misunderstanding of droit administratif. The Conseil d'Etat is not a device for protecting officials; in several respects its control is stricter than that of the English courts, and it developed State liability long before the Crown could be sued in England. Nor was English law itself free of special rules for public bodies: the Crown's immunity in tort survived until the Crown Proceedings Act, 1947.
3. The third is a description of English constitutional history, not a universal principle. In India the position is the reverse, and the reverse is stronger: a right guaranteed by a written Constitution and enforced under Article 32 cannot be taken away by ordinary legislation, while a right resting on judicial decision can.

2. Indira Nehru Gandhi v. Raj Narain (1975): clause 4 of the 39th Amendment, which withdrew the Prime Minister's election dispute from every court, was struck down; a legislature cannot decide a particular dispute by declaring the result.
3. ADM Jabalpur v. Shivkant Shukla (1976): the majority held that during the Emergency, Article 21 being suspended, no habeas corpus petition lay. It is the low-water mark of the doctrine in India; Justice H.R. Khanna's dissent is now the law, the majority having been overruled in K.S. Puttaswamy v. Union of India (2017).
4. Maneka Gandhi v. Union of India (1978): Articles 14, 19 and 21 form a golden triangle, and the procedure must be right, just and fair. This is where the Indian rule of law becomes substantive.
5. Bachan Singh v. State of Punjab (1982), Bhagwati J.: "the rule of law excludes arbitrariness; its postulate is intelligence without passion and reason freed from desire."
6. Som Raj v. State of Haryana (1990): the absence of arbitrary power is the first postulate of the rule of law upon which the whole constitutional edifice depends.

For full marks, cover: why judicial control is the effective control; substantive ultra vires under nine heads with a case for each; procedural ultra vires with the publication cases; the presumption of validity and the limits of review; the effect of a rule being struck down; and the remedies.

1. Why judicial control matters most. Parliamentary control is weak: several thousand instruments are laid each year, the laying requirement is usually directory (Atlas Cycle Industries Ltd. v. State of Haryana, 1979), and the Committee on Subordinate Legislation can only report. Procedural control operates only where the parent Act provides for it. Judicial control operates always, at the instance of the person affected, and it works through the doctrine of ultra vires, which has two branches.

2. Substantive ultra vires: the content is beyond the power.

1. The parent Act is unconstitutional, for want of legislative competence or for breach of a fundamental right under Article 13; everything made under it falls with it.

5. Manifest unreasonableness or arbitrariness. Kruse v. Johnson (1898) for bye-laws; in India arbitrariness is itself a breach of Article 14; Indian Express Newspapers v. Union of India (1985) collects the grounds and holds that subordinate legislation does not enjoy the same immunity as a statute, while making clear that the court is not the judge of policy.
6. Mala fides, rarely established, the burden being heavy.
7. Unauthorised sub-delegation: delegatus non potest delegare, Agricultural Market Committee v. Shalimar Chemical Works (1997).
8. Retrospective operation without express authority, a delegate having no inherent power to legislate for the past.
9. Imposing a tax, creating an offence, or ousting the jurisdiction of the courts without clear statutory authority; Article 265 requires that no tax be levied except by authority of law.

3. Procedural ultra vires: the rule was made in the wrong way. The question is whether the prescribed procedure is mandatory or directory; breach of a mandatory requirement is fatal, of a directory one is not.

4. The presumption of validity and the limits of review. Subordinate legislation is presumed valid and the burden lies on the challenger. The court will not strike a rule down because it thinks it unwise, harsh or capable of improvement; it reviews legality, not merit, and will not sit in judgment on policy, expert opinion or the allocation of resources.

5. Effect of a rule being held ultra vires. The rule is void and treated as never having been made. Severance is possible where the offending part is separable and the remainder can operate independently. Acts already done under it may in some circumstances be protected, and the court may confine the effect of its declaration prospectively.

6. The remedies. A writ petition under Article 226 or Article 32 for a declaration that the rule is void, with certiorari to quash an order made under it and prohibition to restrain its enforcement; a civil suit for a declaration and an injunction; and a collateral challenge, by way of defence to a prosecution or a demand founded on the rule.

1. Notice. It must precede the decision, must give reasonable time, and must state the charge and the proposed action with sufficient particularity for a defence to be prepared. A vague notice, or a notice of one charge followed by punishment on another, vitiates the proceeding.
2. Opportunity of hearing. An oral hearing is not invariably required; a written representation may suffice where the facts are simple, but an oral hearing is required where credibility, complex facts or a serious penalty are involved.
3. Disclosure of the material relied on. The authority must not act on material it has not shown to the person: Dhakeswari Cotton Mills v. Commissioner of Income Tax (1955), where an assessment based on undisclosed material was set aside.
4. Evidence and cross-examination, where the case turns on the testimony of witnesses, though the mode may be regulated.
5. Legal representation, not an absolute right, but required where the case is complex or where the other side is represented by a legally trained officer.

3. A.K. Kraipak v. Union of India (1970). Natural justice applies to administrative as well as quasi-judicial action; the line between them is "gradually being obliterated".
4. Maneka Gandhi v. Union of India (1978). The petitioner's passport was impounded "in the public interest" without notice or hearing. The rule was held implicit in Articles 14 and 21; a procedure denying a hearing is not "right, just and fair"; and the rule may be excluded only by express words or necessary implication. A post-decisional hearing was accepted on the facts.
5. Swadeshi Cotton Mills v. Union of India (1981). A takeover under Section 18AA of the Industries (Development and Regulation) Act without a hearing was set aside: a post-decisional hearing is a "poor substitute", and the words "immediate action" do not by themselves exclude a prior hearing.
6. Mohinder Singh Gill v. Chief Election Commissioner (1978). The cancellation of a poll without hearing the candidates was held bad, and an order must be judged by the reasons stated in it.

6. Effect of a breach. The order is void, not merely voidable: Nawabkhan Abbaskhan v. State of Gujarat (1974). The court quashes it and remits the matter to be decided afresh from the stage at which the illegality occurred; it does not decide the merits itself. Relief may still be refused for laches, waiver or acquiescence, and may be moulded where no prejudice is shown (Managing Director, ECIL v. B. Karunakar, 1993), but the "no prejudice" argument is construed narrowly: S.L. Kapoor v. Jagmohan (1980) holds that non-observance of natural justice is itself prejudice.

7. Its flexibility. The content of the rule is variable. What fairness requires in the dismissal of a public servant is not what it requires in the cancellation of a ration licence or the seizure of adulterated food, and the courts have consistently refused to prescribe a fixed procedure. That flexibility is a feature and not a defect: a rigid rule would either cripple the administration or fail the individual.

3. The four-part test, as settled in India by Modern Dental College and Research Centre v. State of Madhya Pradesh (2016) and K.S. Puttaswamy v. Union of India (2017):

1. the measure must pursue a legitimate aim;
2. it must be rationally connected to that aim (suitability);
3. it must be necessary, in that no less restrictive alternative capable of achieving the aim is reasonably available; and
4. it must strike a fair balance between the rights of the individual and the interests of the community (proportionality in the narrow sense).

4. Its two fields of operation in Indian administrative law.

(a) Restrictions on fundamental rights. The word "reasonable" in Articles 19(2) to (6) has always demanded something close to proportionality, and the modern cases apply the four-part test in terms: Puttaswamy on privacy; Anuradha Bhasin v. Union of India (2020), where internet shutdowns and orders under Section 144 were held to require the least restrictive measure, publication of the order and recorded reasons; Modern Dental College on the regulation of private professional colleges.

2. Proportionality asks a question about the decision: was this much interference necessary to secure that much benefit? It is a primary review: the court itself weighs the balance.
3. Om Kumar v. Union of India (2001) settled the Indian division of labour. Where fundamental rights are affected, the court applies proportionality as a primary reviewing authority. Where the challenge is to an ordinary administrative decision or to the quantum of punishment, the court applies Wednesbury, interferes only if the decision or the penalty is so disproportionate as to shock the conscience, and then ordinarily remits the matter rather than substituting its own penalty.

6. Criticism. Proportionality is said to draw the court into the merits, and so to blur the line between review and appeal; to require the court to weigh incommensurable interests, such as liberty against security, for which it has no expert competence; and to trespass on the separation of powers, since the choice among available means is ordinarily for the executive. The answer is that the court is not choosing the policy but testing whether the chosen means bears a rational and necessary relation to it, and that where a fundamental right is in issue, a deferential test would leave the right unprotected.

For full marks, cover: the definition and the change in locus standi; why it arose; the procedural innovations with cases; the role of the Supreme Court under subject heads with the leading case in each; the criticism; and the safeguards the Court has itself laid down.

1. Definition. Public interest litigation is litigation brought before a constitutional court not by the person whose right is infringed but by a public-spirited citizen or organisation, for the enforcement of the rights of a person or class who, by reason of poverty, disability or a socially or economically disadvantaged position, are unable to approach the court themselves. It is also called social action litigation.

3. Non-adversarial procedure: the object is compliance, not the defeat of the State.
4. Continuing mandamus: the court retains the matter and monitors compliance: Vineet Narain v. Union of India (1998).
5. Compensation as a public law remedy: Rudal Shah v. State of Bihar (1983), fourteen years' illegal detention after acquittal; Nilabati Behera v. State of Orissa (1993), custodial death, where the remedy was held to rest on strict liability and sovereign immunity was held to be no defence.
6. Guidelines with the force of law until Parliament legislates: Vishaka v. State of Rajasthan (1997).

5. The role of the Supreme Court as protector of rights, by subject.

1. Personal liberty and the criminal process. Hussainara Khatoon v. State of Bihar (1979): undertrials in Bihar had been in custody longer than the maximum sentence for their offences; the right to a speedy trial was held part of Article 21 and they were ordered released. Sheela Barse v. State of Maharashtra (1983), women in police custody. D.K. Basu v. State of West Bengal (1997), the eleven custodial safeguards.

6. Food, health and education. People's Union for Civil Liberties v. Union of India, the right to food and the midday meal scheme; Paschim Banga Khet Mazdoor Samity v. State of West Bengal (1996), emergency medical treatment; Unni Krishnan v. State of Andhra Pradesh (1993), education under Article 21, later Article 21A.
7. Probity in government. Vineet Narain v. Union of India (1998), which produced the statutory Central Vigilance Commission; Common Cause v. Union of India, on the arbitrary allotment of public largesse.

6. The criticism. That PIL breaches the separation of powers and amounts to judicial legislation; that courts decide questions of policy and resource allocation for which they have neither expertise nor accountability; that many orders are unenforceable and unmonitored; that PIL has become publicity interest and private interest litigation, used by busybodies, commercial rivals and for political ends; and that it has sometimes been used against the very poor for whom it was created, as in some eviction and street-vendor matters.

Sub-delegation is the further delegation, by a delegate, of the power that the parent statute delegated to him. The rule is delegatus non potest delegare, a delegate cannot further delegate, so sub-delegation is invalid unless the parent Act authorises it, expressly or by necessary implication.

From Article 320:

1. to conduct examinations for appointments to the services of the Union; and
2. to be consulted on methods of recruitment, principles to be followed in appointments, promotions and transfers, and on disciplinary matters affecting a person serving under the Government of India.

Judicial review is the power of the superior courts to examine the validity of legislative and executive action and to declare void anything that exceeds or abuses the power conferred by the Constitution or by a statute. Its sources are Articles 13, 32, 136, 226, 227, 245 and 246, and it is part of the basic structure.

Its three grounds, from the GCHQ case (1985), are illegality, irrationality and procedural impropriety, with proportionality where fundamental rights are affected.

A speaking order is an order which speaks for itself, that is, one which records the reasons on which it is based. It is also called a reasoned decision, and the duty to pass one is now the third principle of natural justice.

Legitimate expectation is the doctrine that where a public authority has made an express promise, or has followed a regular and settled practice, a person affected may reasonably expect it to be honoured or continued, and that expectation cannot be defeated without fairness, which at the least means a hearing.

It is not an enforceable right to the benefit; it is a ground of judicial review, treated in India as an aspect of the non-arbitrariness required by Article 14.

1. The author and the work. A.V. Dicey, Introduction to the Study of the Law of the Constitution (1885). He treated the rule of law, along with parliamentary sovereignty, as one of the two pillars of the English constitution.

2. His three propositions.

1. Supremacy of law, or the absence of arbitrary power. "No man is punishable or can be lawfully made to suffer in body or goods except for a distinct breach of law established in the ordinary legal manner before the ordinary courts of the land." He added that "wherever there is discretion there is room for arbitrariness".

2. The second rested on a misunderstanding of droit administratif. The Conseil d'Etat is independent and its control is in several respects stricter than the English courts', having developed State liability long before the Crown could be sued in England. English law itself had special rules for public bodies, and the Crown's tort immunity survived until 1947.
3. The third describes English constitutional history, not a universal principle, and the Indian arrangement, rights guaranteed by a written Constitution with remedies under Articles 32 and 226, is the stronger one.

4. What survives of Dicey. The core survives and is still the foundation of the subject: that power must have a legal source; that no one is above the law, including the Government; and that the courts, and not the executive, decide whether power has been lawfully exercised. It is the second and third propositions in their historical detail, and not the idea itself, that have been discarded.

1. What they are. The civil service is the body of permanent, professional, salaried officials, recruited on merit, who carry on the administration under the direction of the political executive. Its characteristics are permanence, political neutrality, anonymity, merit recruitment and hierarchy.

2. Origin. From the covenanted service of the East India Company; the Charter Act of 1853 introduced open competition; the Macaulay Committee, 1854 designed the examination; and the Indian Civil Service was the "steel frame" of British India. After independence Sardar Patel secured the retention of an All India service, and the IAS and IPS were constituted under the All India Services Act, 1951.

3. Classification.

1. All India Services, common to the Union and the States: the IAS, the IPS and the Indian Forest Service, under Article 312, which empowers the Rajya Sabha by a two-thirds resolution to declare it necessary in the national interest to create a new one;

6. Safeguards and controls. Article 311(1), no removal by a subordinate authority (State of Madhya Pradesh v. Shardul Singh, 1970); Article 311(2), an inquiry with a reasonable opportunity of being heard, subject to the three exceptions in the second proviso (Union of India v. Tulsiram Patel, 1985); Articles 14 and 16 (E.P. Royappa, 1974); and, on the other side, control through the Central Vigilance Commission, the Lokpal, the Comptroller and Auditor General and the Right to Information Act, 2005.

7. Criticism and reform. Excessive generalism at senior levels; political interference in postings and transfers; frequent transfers destroying continuity; delay; and the difficulty of removing an inefficient officer. T.S.R. Subramanian v. Union of India (2013) directed a minimum fixed tenure, a Civil Services Board to advise on postings and transfers, and that oral instructions from political superiors not be acted on.

2. Statutory corporations, created by a special Act which fixes their objects, powers, capital and management: the Life Insurance Corporation of India (1956), the Reserve Bank of India (1934), the Food Corporation of India (1964), the Damodar Valley Corporation (1948), the Airports Authority of India, and the State Road Transport Corporations under the Road Transport Corporations Act, 1950;
3. Registered or Government companies under the Companies Act. Section 2(45) of the Companies Act, 2013: a company in which not less than 51 per cent of the paid-up share capital is held by the Central Government, a State Government or both, including subsidiaries: Steel Authority of India, Bharat Heavy Electricals, Coal India, ONGC.

3. By function.

1. Commercial and industrial: Steel Authority of India, Indian Oil;
2. Financial: the Reserve Bank of India, the Life Insurance Corporation, NABARD;
3. Developmental and promotional: the Damodar Valley Corporation, the National Highways Authority;

1. Meaning. Droit administratif is the French system of administrative law: a body of rules developed by the administrative courts, not by the legislature, governing the relations between the citizen and the administration and the liability of the State and its officials, applied by a separate hierarchy of courts headed by the Conseil d'Etat.

2. Origin. It grew after the French Revolution out of distrust of the ordinary courts, the parlements. The law of 16 to 24 August 1790 forbade the ordinary courts from interfering with the administration; the Conseil d'Etat was created by Napoleon in 1799 and acquired the power to decide, justice deleguee, in 1872.

3. Characteristics. Judge-made and uncodified rules; no jurisdiction in the ordinary civil courts over the administration; the Conseil d'Etat at the head of a separate hierarchy; the Tribunal des Conflits to resolve conflicts of jurisdiction; cheap, inquisitorial and accessible procedure; and the central remedy, the recours pour exces de pouvoir, the action to annul an act for excess of power.

1. Meaning. An Ombudsman is an independent, non-partisan officer of the legislature who investigates complaints by citizens of maladministration by public authorities, reports his findings and recommends redress. The word is Swedish and means a representative or agent.

2. Origin and spread. Created in Sweden in 1809, when the Riksdag appointed the Justitieombudsman to supervise the observance of the law by judges and officials. It spread to Finland (1919), Denmark (1955), Norway (1962), New Zealand (1962) and the United Kingdom's Parliamentary Commissioner for Administration (1967).

3. Characteristics. Independence, being appointed by and answerable to the legislature with a fixed tenure; jurisdiction over maladministration, meaning bias, neglect, delay, inattention, incompetence, arbitrariness and rudeness, and not merely over illegality; easy access, on a simple complaint without fee, formality or advocate, and often on his own motion; wide powers of investigation, including access to files and the power to summon officials; and recommendatory conclusions, enforced by report and publicity rather than by decree.

4. In India.

5. Merits and limitations. He is cheap, quick and informal; he can reach conduct no court can review; and he improves administration by the mere possibility of scrutiny. Against that, his findings bind nobody; his jurisdiction is hedged with exclusions; he depends on the executive for staff and funds; and in India appointments have often been delayed for years, the first Lokpal being appointed only in March 2019.

2. Three classes of dismissal must be distinguished: dismissal from an office held at pleasure, where no hearing is required; dismissal under a contract of service, governed by the contract; and dismissal from an office from which a man can be removed only for cause, where a hearing is required. A Chief Constable fell into the third class.
3. The Watch Committee had failed to inform him of the charges and to give him an opportunity to be heard, so the dismissal was a nullity.

But the Director made an invariable rule that he will grant exemption only if the person has completed thirteen years of age.

This is the same problem as question 18 on the first paper of this scan, set again on the second. The answer is the same, and it is worth noticing that the University set it twice in one sitting.

1. He has converted a discretion into a rule. The parent rule empowered him to exempt "under certain circumstances in deserving cases", which requires consideration of each case on its own facts. By fixing thirteen years as an invariable minimum he has excluded from consideration every applicant below it, however deserving, and has narrowed a benefit the parent rule conferred.
2. The head is "self-imposed fetter", a failure to exercise discretion. A policy is permissible; a closed mind is not. R. v. Port of London Authority, ex parte Kynoch (1919); British Oxygen Co. v. Board of Trade (1971), where Lord Reid required the authority to be "always willing to listen to anyone with something new to say".
3. It is also substantive ultra vires. A subordinate rule inconsistent with the rule under which it is made is void, and a delegate cannot amend the instrument under which it acts: State of Karnataka v. H. Ganesh Kamath (1983); General Officer Commanding-in-Chief v. Dr. Subhash Chandra Yadav (1988).
4. The refusal is a nullity, because the authority has not applied its own mind to the individual case: it has not decided wrongly, it has not decided at all.

It was contended that the provisions of Article 299(1) of the Constitution had not been fulfilled and therefore the contract was not enforceable.

These are, in substance, the facts of State of West Bengal v. B.K. Mondal and Sons, AIR 1962 SC 779.

(a) What is the provision of Article 299(1) of the Constituion?

Article 299(1) provides that all contracts made in the exercise of the executive power of the Union or of a State:

1. shall be expressed to be made by the President, or by the Governor of the State, as the case may be;

The character of the requirements. They are mandatory, not directory. The purpose is protective: to safeguard the public exchequer from being bound by the casual or unauthorised promises of individual officers, and to ensure that public money is committed only by a person the Government has authorised. Consequently a contract not made in the prescribed form is void, unenforceable against the Government, and incapable of ratification, because there is nothing in existence to ratify: Mulamchand v. State of Madhya Pradesh (1968); Bihar Eastern Gangetic Fishermen Co-operative Society v. Sipahi Singh (1977). Chatturbhuj Vithaldas Jasani v. Moreshwar Parashram (1954) took a more indulgent view where the contract was in substance made by an authorised officer, but later decisions have applied the Article strictly.

(b) What can the contractor do in these circumstances?

He cannot sue on the contract, but he can recover the value of the building under Section 70 of the Indian Contract Act, 1872, on the principle of quantum meruit.

1. Section 70: "Where a person lawfully does anything for another person, or delivers anything to him, not intending to do so gratuitously, and such other person enjoys the benefit thereof, the latter is bound to make compensation to the former in respect of, or to restore, the thing so done or delivered."

6. An alternative route. Section 65 of the Contract Act, restoration of a benefit received under an agreement discovered to be void, is often pleaded alongside, but Section 70 is the surer ground because it does not depend on there ever having been an agreement.
7. Procedure. He must give notice under Section 80 of the Code of Civil Procedure before suing the Government, and he may in an appropriate case move the High Court under Article 226, since the award and performance of Government contracts is State action subject to Article 14: Ramana Dayaram Shetty v. International Airport Authority of India (1979).

3. Its four conditions, from University of Mysore v. C.D. Govinda Rao (1965) and Jamalpur Arya Samaj Sabha v. Dr. D. Ram (1954): the office must be a public office created by the Constitution or a statute; of a substantive character, permanent and independent; the respondent must be in actual possession of it; and the appointment must be contrary to law, or the holder must lack the prescribed qualification.
4. Locus standi is relaxed, which is the direct answer to the question. Because the object is to protect the public from the exercise of authority by a usurper, and not to vindicate a private right, any member of the public acting bona fide may apply. The court will refuse relief to a petitioner acting from malice or as a front for a disappointed rival.

3. Burden. Once the petitioner shows that the office is public and substantive and that the respondent holds it, the burden shifts to the respondent to establish his title.
4. Discretion. The writ is discretionary and may be refused for unreasonable delay, where the term of office has expired or is about to expire, where the defect is technical or has been cured, or where the petition is motivated.
5. Effect of the order. The appointment is declared void and the holder is ousted. The court appoints nobody and does not decide who ought to have been appointed; it leaves the authority to fill the post according to law.
6. The de facto doctrine. Acts done by the holder before his ouster are generally protected, so that third parties who dealt with him in good faith are not prejudiced. Public business would otherwise unravel every time a title was found defective.
7. Alternative forum in a service matter. Where the dispute falls within the Administrative Tribunals Act, 1985, the Central or State Administrative Tribunal is the court of first instance, subject to review by a Division Bench of the High Court: L. Chandra Kumar v. Union of India (1997).

For full marks, cover: three definitions with criticism; the nature of the subject; ten heads of scope; nine reasons for growth with illustrations; the distinction from constitutional law; and the sources, briefly.

1. Definitions. Ivor Jennings: "the law relating to the administration; it determines the organisation, powers and duties of administrative authorities" (criticised as too wide, and silent about control). K.C. Davis: the law concerning the powers and procedures of administrative agencies, especially the law governing judicial review (criticised for neglecting rule-making). Sir William Wade: "the law relating to the control of governmental power." The Indian Law Institute adds the procedure for obtaining relief and the legislative control of the administration.

2. Nature. Public law; judge-made and uncodified in India; functional rather than conceptual; dynamic; and organised around power and its control.

3. Scope. Administrative law covers:

4. Reasons for its growth.

1. The change from the police State to the welfare State, under the Directive Principles. This is the first reason and every other follows from it.
2. Inadequacy of the legislature, which cannot make detailed law, producing delegated legislation and the law of ultra vires.
3. Inadequacy of the ordinary courts, slow, costly and rigid, producing tribunals and Articles 323A and 323B.
4. Technicality of modern administration, producing the expert regulator: the RBI, SEBI, TRAI and the Competition Commission.
5. Industrialisation, urbanisation and planning: acquisition, zoning, rationing, price control and licensing.
6. Emergency and crisis: the Defence of India Rules, and the rules made under the Disaster Management Act, 2005.
7. The value of experiment, since a new social scheme cannot be got right at once.

For full marks, cover: the doctrine and its author; the three propositions; the position in the United States and England; the Indian legal system, under two lists with Article numbers; six judicial decisions; the modern functional statement; and the consequences for administrative law.

1. The doctrine. Baron de Montesquieu, L'Esprit des Lois (1748), building on Aristotle and Locke. Its three propositions: one organ should not exercise the functions of another; one organ should not interfere with the functions of another; and one person should not be a member of more than one organ. The object is liberty: "when the legislative and executive powers are united in the same person, or in the same body of magistrates, there can be no liberty".

2. Comparative. The United States applies it strictly by constitutional text, tempered by checks and balances. England has never accepted it: the Cabinet sits in Parliament, and the House of Lords was the final court of appeal until 2009. India occupies a middle position.

1. the executive is drawn from and collectively responsible to the legislature: Articles 74, 75, 163 and 164. In a parliamentary system the executive is a committee of the legislature, which is the largest single departure;
2. ordinances under Articles 123 and 213, a legislative power in executive hands, whose repeated re-promulgation was condemned in D.C. Wadhwa v. State of Bihar (1987) and Krishna Kumar Singh v. State of Bihar (2017);
3. the legislature's judicial functions: contempt of itself, impeachment under Article 61, and addresses for the removal of judges;
4. the judiciary's legislative and executive functions: rules under Articles 145 and 227, appointments under Article 229, and the framing of binding guidelines until Parliament legislates, as in Vishaka v. State of Rajasthan (1997);
5. the executive's judicial functions: tribunals under Articles 323A and 323B, departmental adjudication, and the pardon power under Articles 72 and 161;
6. delegated legislation on a very large scale.

5. The judicial decisions.

6. The modern functional statement. In India the doctrine is not a rule that each organ must confine itself to its own work, but a rule that no organ may take over the essential function of another. Delegated legislation and tribunals are tolerated because the essential function stays where the Constitution placed it; a statute deciding a particular case, or a court framing general economic policy, is not.

7. Its consequences for administrative law. Administrative law exists precisely because the doctrine is not applied rigidly. The administration legislates and adjudicates, and the constitutional response is control rather than prohibition, in two specific forms: the essential legislative function must remain with the legislature (In re Delhi Laws Act, 1912, 1951), and the High Court's power of review over tribunals cannot be removed (L. Chandra Kumar, 1997).

1. Pecuniary bias: any financial interest, however small, disqualifies automatically. Dr. Bonham's Case (1610); Dimes v. Grand Junction Canal (1852); Jeejeebhoy v. Assistant Collector, Thana (1965), where the Supreme Court reconstituted the Bench on discovering that a judge was a member of the acquiring co-operative society.
2. Personal bias: A.K. Kraipak (1970), a candidate sitting on the Selection Board that judged his rivals; Manak Lal v. Dr. Prem Chand (1957), the chairman of a disciplinary tribunal having appeared for the complainant; Mineral Development Ltd. v. State of Bihar (1960), the Minister who cancelled a licence having earlier prosecuted the licensee.
3. Subject-matter or official bias: Gullapalli Nageswara Rao v. APSRTC (1959).
4. Departmental or institutional bias, tolerated unless there is a personal interest.
5. Pre-judgment of the issue, a mind closed before the hearing.

The exception: the doctrine of necessity. Charan Lal Sahu v. Union of India (1990); Ashok Kumar Yadav v. State of Haryana (1985), where a Public Service Commission member related to a candidate withdrew only from that candidate's assessment.

The Supreme Court judgments to cite: A.K. Kraipak (1970), extending natural justice to administrative action and holding the line between administrative and quasi-judicial to be "gradually being obliterated"; Maneka Gandhi v. Union of India (1978), holding the rule implicit in Articles 14 and 21, excludable only by express words or necessary implication, and accepting a post-decisional hearing; Swadeshi Cotton Mills v. Union of India (1981), holding a post-decisional hearing a "poor substitute"; Mohinder Singh Gill v. Chief Election Commissioner (1978), that an order must be judged by the reasons stated in it; Olga Tellis v. Bombay Municipal Corporation (1985), pavement dwellers entitled to be heard; National Textile Workers' Union v. P.R. Ramakrishnan (1983), workers entitled to be heard in a winding-up petition although the statute did not name them. The English foundation is Cooper v. Wandsworth Board of Works (1863) and Ridge v. Baldwin (1964).

4. Third principle: the reasoned or speaking order. Siemens Engineering and Manufacturing Co. v. Union of India (1976): recording reasons is "a basic principle of natural justice". S.N. Mukherjee v. Union of India (1990), a Constitution Bench: reasons must be recorded unless expressly or by necessary implication dispensed with. Kranti Associates v. Masood Ahmed Khan (2010) collects the modern propositions.

For full marks, cover: why judicial control is the effective control; substantive ultra vires under nine grounds with a case for each; procedural ultra vires under four; the presumption of validity and the limits of review; the effect of a rule being struck down; and the remedies.

1. Why judicial control matters most. Parliamentary control is weak: several thousand instruments are laid each year, the laying requirement is usually directory (Atlas Cycle Industries Ltd. v. State of Haryana, 1979), and the Committee on Subordinate Legislation can only report. Procedural control operates only where the parent Act provides for it. Judicial control operates always, at the instance of the person affected, through the doctrine of ultra vires.

2. Grounds of substantive ultra vires.

1. The parent Act is unconstitutional, for want of legislative competence or breach of a fundamental right; everything under it falls with it.

6. Mala fides, rarely established, the burden being heavy.
7. Unauthorised sub-delegation: delegatus non potest delegare, Agricultural Market Committee v. Shalimar Chemical Works (1997).
8. Retrospective operation without express authority in the parent Act.
9. Imposing a tax, creating an offence, or ousting the jurisdiction of the courts without clear authority; Article 265 requires that no tax be levied except by authority of law.

3. Grounds of procedural ultra vires. The question is whether the prescribed procedure is mandatory or directory; breach of a mandatory requirement is fatal.

1. Prior publication of the draft and consideration of objections; Section 23 of the General Clauses Act, 1897 supplies the standard procedure.
2. Consultation of an affected interest or a named body: Raza Buland Sugar Co. v. Municipal Board, Rampur (1965), the test being the object of the provision and the consequences of non-compliance; Banwarilal Agarwalla v. State of Bihar (1961).

6. The remedies. A writ petition under Article 226 or Article 32 for a declaration that the rule is void, with certiorari to quash an order made under it and prohibition to restrain its enforcement; a civil suit for a declaration and an injunction; and a collateral challenge, by way of defence to a prosecution or a demand founded on the rule.

The words "in the like cases" carry the liability back through a chain: Article 300 to Section 176 of the Government of India Act, 1935, to Section 32 of the Government of India Act, 1915, to Section 65 of the Government of India Act, 1858, which fixed the liability of the Secretary of State for India by reference to the liability of the East India Company. The result is that the extent of the Government's liability today is still governed by the law as it stood in 1858, unless Parliament changes it, and Parliament never has.

3. The sovereign and non-sovereign distinction. Because the East India Company had a dual character, trading and governing, the courts drew a line: the State is liable for acts done in the exercise of its non-sovereign functions, being those a private person could also perform, and not for acts done in the exercise of its sovereign functions, being those only a State can perform, such as defence, the maintenance of law and order, the administration of justice and the collection of tax.

4. The landmark cases.

4. Kasturilal Ralia Ram Jain v. State of Uttar Pradesh (AIR 1965 SC 1039). Gold seized by the police from a partner of the firm was misappropriated by the head constable, who fled to Pakistan. The State was held not liable, the seizure having been made in exercise of a statutory power of arrest and seizure, a sovereign function. Gajendragadkar CJ nonetheless recorded his dissatisfaction with the law and urged legislation, which never came.
5. N. Nagendra Rao and Co. v. State of Andhra Pradesh (1994). Fertiliser and foodgrain seized under the Essential Commodities Act deteriorated in the custody of the State. The State was held liable, and the Court held that Kasturilal has lost much of its relevance: in the modern State the sovereign and non-sovereign classification is outdated, and only inalienable functions, which no private person can perform at all, can claim immunity.
6. Common Cause v. Union of India (1999) and State of Andhra Pradesh v. Challa Ramkrishna Reddy (2000). In the latter an undertrial was killed in a police lock-up despite warnings; the State was held liable, and the Court held that sovereign immunity is not available where a fundamental right under Article 21 is violated.

2. for acts done under statutory powers where the act is beyond the power or negligent, following Nagendra Rao;
3. for the violation of fundamental rights, in a writ petition, without regard to sovereign immunity;

and it remains immune only for the narrow class of inalienable sovereign functions and for acts of State properly so called. In addition, the officer himself is always personally liable for his own tort, whatever the position of the State.

3. Jurisdiction and its limits. Under Section 2 of the 1946 Act its jurisdiction extends to the Union territories; under Section 5 it may be extended to a State, but under Section 6 only with the consent of the State Government. Several States have withdrawn general consent in recent years, which is the source of much current litigation. The Supreme Court and the High Courts may nonetheless direct a CBI investigation without State consent: State of West Bengal v. Committee for Protection of Democratic Rights (2010), a Constitution Bench, which held that such a direction is not a breach of federalism and is within Articles 32 and 226.
4. Superintendence. Under Section 4(1) of the 1946 Act, superintendence in relation to offences under the Prevention of Corruption Act, 1988 vests in the Central Vigilance Commission; in all other matters it vests in the Central Government. That division was introduced to insulate corruption investigations from the executive.
5. Appointment and tenure of the Director. Appointed on the recommendation of a committee of the Prime Minister, the Leader of the Opposition and the Chief Justice of India or a Judge nominated by him, under Section 4A, with a minimum tenure of two years under Section 4B.

2. The case law. State of Uttar Pradesh v. Raj Narain (1975): "the people of this country have a right to know every public act, everything that is done in a public way by their public functionaries", and the Court held that in a Government of responsibility, where the agents of the public must be responsible for their conduct, there can be few secrets. S.P. Gupta v. Union of India (1981): open government is the new democratic culture, and disclosure should be the rule. Secretary, Ministry of Information and Broadcasting v. Cricket Association of Bengal (1995): the right to receive information is part of Article 19(1)(a). Union of India v. Association for Democratic Reforms (2002): the voter's right to know the criminal antecedents, assets and educational qualifications of a candidate.
3. The statutory expression: the Right to Information Act, 2005. Section 2(f), information widely defined; 2(j), the right to inspect, take notes, take certified copies and samples; Section 4, suo motu disclosure; Sections 6 and 7, the application, without reasons, and reply within 30 days or 48 hours where life or liberty is at stake; Section 8, exemptions, with the public interest override in Section 8(2); Sections 18 and 19, complaint and two appeals to the Information Commission; Section 20, penalties; and Section 22, overriding effect over the Official Secrets Act, 1923.

3. The four-part test, settled in India by Modern Dental College v. State of Madhya Pradesh (2016) and K.S. Puttaswamy v. Union of India (2017): a legitimate aim; a rational connection; necessity, no less restrictive alternative being available; and a fair balance.
4. Its two fields. Restrictions on fundamental rights, where "reasonable" in Articles 19(2) to (6) has always demanded something close to it, and Anuradha Bhasin v. Union of India (2020) required the least restrictive measure; and the quantum of punishment, where Ranjit Thakur v. Union of India (1987) set aside a "strikingly disproportionate" sentence, and Hind Construction and Engineering Co. v. Their Workmen (1965) held dismissal for a single day's absence excessive.
5. Proportionality and Wednesbury. Om Kumar v. Union of India (2001): where fundamental rights are affected the court applies proportionality as a primary reviewing authority; where the challenge is to an administrative decision or a punishment, it applies Wednesbury and interferes only if the decision shocks the conscience, remitting rather than substituting. Wednesbury asks about the decision-maker, proportionality about the decision.