BLS LLB 5 Years Sem 9 Interpretation of Statutes 2025-26 Question Paper with Solutions

Ejusdem generis means "of the same kind". Where a statute lists specific words that form a distinct genus or category and follows them with general words, the general words are read as confined to things of the same kind as the specific ones listed, and are not given their widest natural meaning.

A consolidating statute gathers the existing statute law on a subject, scattered across several enactments, and re-enacts it in one Act without changing the law. A codifying statute states the whole of the law on a subject in one Act, absorbing the common law, custom and case law as well as the earlier statutes, and replacing them. Consolidation collects; codification declares the entire law and becomes the exhaustive source.

A taxing statute is construed strictly and literally. There is no room for intendment, nothing is to be read in and nothing implied; the subject is taxed only if the charging section plainly covers him, and if the words fail the tax fails, however clear the policy behind them. The classic statement is Rowlatt J. in Cape Brandy Syndicate v. Inland Revenue Commissioners (1921) 1 KB 64, approved in India in A.V. Fernandez v. State of Kerala AIR 1957 SC 657.

Section 3(23) of the General Clauses Act, 1897 provides that "Government" or "the Government" shall include both the Central Government and any State Government. The definition is inclusive and applies to the Act itself and to every Central Act and Regulation made after it, unless there is anything repugnant in the subject or context.

Expressio unius est exclusio alterius means that the express mention of one thing implies the exclusion of another. Where a statute specifies particular cases, persons or things to which it applies, the inference is that what it has not mentioned was deliberately left out, and the provision is not extended to those cases by construction.

2. The Golden Rule. Where the literal meaning leads to absurdity, repugnance or inconsistency with the rest of the instrument, the grammatical sense may be modified so far as is necessary to avoid that result, and no further. Lord Wensleydale stated it in Grey v. Pearson (1857) 6 HLC 61. Lee v. Knapp (1967) is the standard illustration: a driver required to "stop" after an accident was held not to comply by halting for a moment and driving on, because a momentary pause would defeat the object.

3. The Mischief Rule, or the rule in Heydon's Case (1584). The court asks the four questions set out in that case and construes the Act so as to suppress the mischief and advance the remedy. Bengal Immunity Co. v. State of Bihar AIR 1955 SC 661 applied it in terms.

4. Harmonious Construction. Where two provisions of the same statute conflict, the court reads them so that both are given effect and neither is rendered otiose. Venkataramana Devaru v. State of Mysore AIR 1958 SC 255 reconciled Article 25(2)(b) with Article 26(b) in exactly this way.

For full marks, cover: the rule of strict construction, the four consequences that follow from it, mens rea, and the modern qualification.

A penal statute is one that creates an offence or imposes a penalty, a forfeiture or a punishment. The governing rule is strict construction: the statute must be construed narrowly, in favour of the person proceeded against, and where after every legitimate aid to construction has been used the provision remains genuinely ambiguous, the ambiguity is resolved in favour of the accused.

The rule produces four practical consequences.

No offence by implication. A person cannot be brought within a penal provision unless the words plainly cover him. Tolaram Relumal v. State of Bombay AIR 1954 SC 496 states it: if two constructions are reasonably possible, the court must adopt the one that exempts the subject from penalty.

The punishment cannot be enlarged. Where a section prescribes a maximum, the court cannot exceed it, and where the words describing the offence are capable of a narrower meaning, that meaning is preferred.

Conclusion. The rule is a rule of last resort and its true operation is narrow: it decides the case only when the ordinary tools of construction have left two genuinely open readings, and then it chooses the one that does not punish. What actually does the work in most penal cases is the presumption of mens rea, which is why an answer that stops at "penal statutes are construed strictly" is only half of one.

When sub-delegation is valid. Three situations. Where the parent Act expressly authorises it, as where a section empowers the Government to make rules and to authorise an officer to do anything the rules prescribe. Where authority arises by necessary implication, which is found where the sheer volume or the technical nature of the work makes personal exercise impossible. And where what is passed on is ministerial or administrative rather than discretionary; the rule bites on the exercise of discretion, not on the mechanics of carrying a decision out.

The limits. A sub-delegate cannot receive more than the delegate holds. He cannot be given an essential legislative function, because In re Delhi Laws Act AIR 1951 SC 332 holds that the legislature cannot part with its essential function, which is the laying down of policy and the enacting of that policy into a binding rule of conduct, even at the first stage of delegation. And the sub-delegate must apply his own mind; he cannot sub-delegate again.

Excessive delegation is the companion doctrine. Delegation is invalid where the legislature has not itself laid down the policy and left only the filling in of details. In re Delhi Laws Act is the foundation, and Hamdard Dawakhana v. Union of India AIR 1960 SC 554 struck down a power to add to a list of diseases because the Act supplied no guidance at all.

For full marks, cover: what a presumption is and how it works, then at least six presumptions with a case or provision for each.

A presumption in statutory interpretation is a starting position the court adopts about what the legislature must have intended, which holds unless the statute displaces it expressly or by necessary implication. Presumptions are rebuttable, and they operate where the language leaves room for doubt.

Constitutionality. Every statute is presumed constitutional, and the burden of showing otherwise lies on the person who challenges it. Charanjit Lal Chowdhury v. Union of India AIR 1951 SC 41 and Ram Krishna Dalmia v. Justice Tendolkar AIR 1958 SC 538 lay it down; the court presumes the legislature understood and correctly appreciated the needs of its own people.

That the legislature knows the existing law. It is presumed to legislate with knowledge of the existing law and of judicial decisions on it, so re-enacting a provision in the same words after a settled construction is taken as approval of that construction.

Against implied repeal. Repeal by implication is not favoured, and two Acts are read together if they can stand together.

Conclusion. Presumptions are the court's default settings, and their practical effect is to fix the burden: the party who wants the unusual result, retrospective operation, extraterritorial reach, strict liability, the ouster of a civil court, is the party who must point to language that displaces the default. That allocation, rather than any single presumption, is what an examiner is testing.

(a) The principle is the doctrine of PROSPECTIVE OVERRULING.

I.C. Golak Nath v. State of Punjab AIR 1967 SC 1643 held, by 6 to 5, that a constitutional amendment is "law" within Article 13(2) and cannot take away or abridge a fundamental right, but Subba Rao C.J. applied the new rule only to the future, so that the First, Fourth and Seventeenth Amendments already passed, and everything done under them, remained valid.

(b) The doctrine explained.

Its source and its later use. The doctrine was borrowed from American practice, chiefly Linkletter v. Walker (1965). In India it has since been applied outside the pure constitutional field: in Managing Director, ECIL v. B. Karunakar (1993) 4 SCC 727 on the supply of an inquiry report, and in Somaiya Organics v. State of Uttar Pradesh (2001) 5 SCC 519, and in Ashok Kumar Gupta v. State of Uttar Pradesh (1997) 5 SCC 201 the Court treated the first condition as flexible.

What happened to Golak Nath. The holding was overruled in Kesavananda Bharati v. State of Kerala AIR 1973 SC 1461, which held that Article 368 does permit amendment of fundamental rights but not so as to damage the basic structure. The doctrine of prospective overruling survived the overruling of the case that introduced it, and that is the point worth making.

Conclusion. Golak Nath is remembered for two things that must be kept apart: its holding on Article 13 and Article 368, which is no longer good law, and the technique it introduced, which is. Prospective overruling is the court's answer to the tension between correcting the law and protecting those who ordered their affairs on the strength of it, and its conditions exist to keep that discretion with the Supreme Court alone.

Why it is invalid on these facts. Sub-delegation is good only where the parent Act permits it expressly or by necessary implication. Nothing in the problem suggests either. Granting a business licence is not a mechanical act; it involves judging whether the applicant satisfies the statutory conditions, so it is discretionary and falls squarely within the maxim. And the legislature's choice of the Mayor, an elected office answerable to the electorate, rather than an appointed official, is exactly the choice the maxim protects.

(b) The legal action available.

A writ petition under Article 226 to the High Court is the principal remedy. Three writs are available on these facts and they do different work.

Certiorari to quash a licence already granted or refused by the city official, the official having acted without jurisdiction. An order made by a person on whom the power was never conferred is a nullity.

Mandamus to compel the Mayor to exercise the power himself. This is the remedy for the applicant whose licence is pending: the authority in whom the discretion vests has failed to apply its mind, and mandamus lies to require it to do so, though not to dictate the outcome.

(a) The Act came into operation on 1 April 2010, the day it received the President's assent, and it is perfectly valid.

Section 5(1)(b) of the General Clauses Act, 1897 provides that where a Central Act is not expressed to come into operation on a particular day, it comes into operation on the day it receives the assent of the President. The Act in the problem says nothing about commencement, so section 5 supplies the answer, and the date of assent, 1 April 2010, is the date of commencement.

Three related situations the section does not cover directly.

Where the Act does fix a date, that date governs and section 5 has no application.

Where the Act says it shall come into force on such date as the Central Government may by notification appoint, the Act is on the statute book from assent but is not in force until the notification. Different provisions may be brought into force on different dates, which is why an Act can be partly in force.

Where a power to make rules is conferred by an Act that is not yet in force, section 22 allows that power to be exercised after the passing of the Act, but the rules do not take effect until the Act commences.

Conclusion. The two limbs of the question have one answer between them: section 5 is a gap-filling provision, and a statute silent on commencement is not defective but simply governed by the general law. The Act in the problem commenced on 1 April 2010, from the very beginning of that day, and its validity is untouched.

Expressio unius est exclusio alterius supports the same conclusion. The legislature has named one class of beneficiary. Divorced and deserted women are an obvious neighbouring class, and if the legislature had meant to include them it would have said so, as many welfare statutes in fact do.

The doctrine of casus omissus is the answer to the argument the other way. If the omission of divorced women is a gap, it is a gap for the legislature to fill. Padma Sundara Rao v. State of Tamil Nadu (2002) 3 SCC 533 holds that a casus omissus cannot be supplied by the court, since that would be legislating, and the court's function is jus dicere and not jus dare, to declare the law and not to give it.

(b) The presumption is that the LEGISLATURE DOES NOT WASTE WORDS AND SAYS WHAT IT MEANS, that is, the presumption that the legislature knows the existing law and chooses its language deliberately, so an omission is taken to be intentional.

Two further presumptions support the same result. The presumption that a statute is to be read as a whole, so that a defined class is not enlarged by construction; and the presumption of constitutionality, under which a court leans towards upholding the statute as enacted rather than rewriting it.

To provide for contingencies the individual Act forgets. Commencement where the Act is silent, the effect of a repeal, the meaning of service by post.

To avoid the errors of repeated drafting, since a provision drafted once and applied generally cannot vary from Act to Act through slips.

The scheme of the Act

The Act has 31 sections in five parts.

Preliminary, sections 1 to 2. Short title; section 2 was repealed in 1903.

General definitions, sections 3 to 4A. Section 3 is the core and contains 66 clauses, each opening under the words "unless there is anything repugnant in the subject or context". It defines, among many others, "affidavit" (3(3)), "Central Act" (3(7)), "document" (3(18)), "enactment" (3(19)), "father" (3(20)), "financial year" (3(21)), "good faith" (3(22)), "Government" (3(23)), "immovable property" (3(26)), "imprisonment" (3(27)), "Magistrate" (3(32)), "month" (3(35)), "movable property" (3(36)), "offence" (3(38)), "person" (3(42)), "rule" (3(51)), "schedule" (3(52)), "son" (3(57)), "vessel" (3(63)), "will" (3(64)) and "year" (3(66)). Sections 4 and 4A apply certain of those definitions backwards to earlier enactments.

Section 6, effect of repeal. Unless a different intention appears, a repeal does not revive anything not in force; does not affect the previous operation of the repealed enactment or anything duly done under it; does not affect any right, privilege, obligation or liability acquired, accrued or incurred; does not affect any penalty, forfeiture or punishment incurred; and does not affect any investigation, legal proceeding or remedy in respect of them, which may be continued as if the repealing Act had not been passed. This is the section that keeps pending prosecutions and accrued rights alive across a repeal, and it is expressly preserved by section 358(2) of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita, 2023 when the Indian Penal Code was repealed.

Section 8, construction of references. Where an enactment repeals and re-enacts a provision, references elsewhere to the repealed provision are read as references to the re-enacted one. This is what allows the whole statute book to keep working after a large recodification.

Section 21, power to add to, amend, vary or rescind. A power to issue notifications, orders, rules or bye-laws carries with it the power to amend or rescind them, exercisable in the same manner and subject to the same conditions.

It generally does not apply to Acts made before 1897, except so far as sections 4 and 4A carry particular definitions backwards.

It is not a substitute for the Act being construed. It supplies default rules; it cannot enlarge the scope of a statute or create a power the Act has not conferred.

Its application to the Constitution is limited. The Constitution is not a Central Act, and it has its own interpretation provision in Article 367(1), which applies the General Clauses Act to the interpretation of the Constitution subject to any adaptations and modifications made under Article 372. So the Act reaches the Constitution through Article 367 and not of its own force, and where the Constitution defines a term itself, that definition governs.

It does not apply to instruments that are not enactments, such as contracts and deeds, except where a statute makes it so.

For full marks, cover: the four basic rules with a case each, then the two lists of aids with a sentence of explanation for each item, and finally the rule that governs when an external aid may be used at all.

Part one: the basic rules

The Literal or Grammatical Rule. Words are given their ordinary, natural and grammatical meaning; if they are plain, the court gives effect to them whatever the result, because it is not for a court to redraft. Sussex Peerage Case (1844); Tata Consultancy Services v. State of Andhra Pradesh (2005) 1 SCC 308. In Ramavatar Budhaiprasad v. Assistant Sales Tax Officer AIR 1961 SC 1325 the Court held that "vegetables" in a sales-tax Act must be understood in its popular sense, as things grown in a kitchen garden and used for the table, so betel leaves were not vegetables.

Internal aids are found within the four corners of the statute itself.

Long title. States the general purpose and may be used to ascertain the object and scope. Aswini Kumar Ghose v. Arabinda Bose AIR 1952 SC 369.

Preamble. The key to the mind of the maker. It may be used where the enacting words are ambiguous, but cannot restrict plain words. Kesavananda Bharati v. State of Kerala AIR 1973 SC 1461 treated the Preamble to the Constitution as part of it and as a guide to the basic structure, departing from In re Berubari Union AIR 1960 SC 845, which had said it was not part of the Constitution.

Short title. A label for citation only; it is not an aid to construction.

Headings and titles of parts and chapters. May be referred to where a section is ambiguous, but cannot override plain words.

Marginal notes. The general rule is that marginal notes to an ordinary Act are not an aid, since they are inserted by the draftsman and not voted on. Marginal notes to the Constitution may be referred to, because they were part of what the Constituent Assembly adopted. Bengal Immunity Co. v. State of Bihar.

Punctuation. Of little weight in older Indian statutes, which were originally engrossed without it. Aswini Kumar Ghose. But where a modern statute is punctuated, the punctuation is read: Mohd. Shabbir v. State of Maharashtra (1979) 1 SCC 568 turned on the comma in "manufactures for sale, sells, stocks or exhibits for sale" in section 27(b) of the Drugs and Cosmetics Act, and held that mere storage without an intention to sell was not an offence.

Part three: external aids

External aids lie outside the statute.

Historical background and surrounding circumstances, to identify the mischief.

Statement of Objects and Reasons. Admissible to show the circumstances in which the Bill was introduced and the mischief it addressed, not to construe the words finally enacted, since the Bill may have been amended in passage. Aswini Kumar Ghose; State of West Bengal v. Subodh Gopal Bose AIR 1954 SC 92.

Subsequent social, political and scientific developments, on which the Constitution and other organic statutes are read as living instruments.

The rule that governs the use of external aids

An external aid may be used to find the context and the mischief, and to resolve a genuine ambiguity. It may not be used to displace the plain meaning of words that admit of only one construction. That single sentence is what the whole of part three is for.

Conclusion. The rules and the aids answer two different questions. The rules tell a court how to read the words; the aids tell it what it may look at while doing so. The internal aids are always available because they are part of what the legislature enacted; the external aids are admitted only so far as they illuminate the mischief, because they are not. Getting that division right is worth more than reciting a longer list.

1. Principle of harmonious construction. Every provision must be given effect and none reduced to a dead letter. Venkataramana Devaru v. State of Mysore AIR 1958 SC 255 is the model: Article 25(2)(b) allows the State to throw open Hindu religious institutions to all classes; Article 26(b) gives a denomination the right to manage its own affairs in matters of religion. The Court held that the denominational right yields to the extent necessary to give effect to the social-reform power, but survives in respect of purely religious matters, and both provisions live.

2. Doctrine of pith and substance. Where a law is challenged as trespassing on a field allotted to the other legislature, the court looks at the true nature and character of the enactment as a whole, and if in pith and substance it falls within the enacting legislature's list, an incidental encroachment does not invalidate it. Prafulla Kumar Mukherjee v. Bank of Commerce, Khulna AIR 1947 PC 60; State of Bombay v. F.N. Balsara AIR 1951 SC 318.

5. Doctrine of severability. Where part of a statute is unconstitutional, only that part is struck down if it can be separated from the rest without altering what remains. R.M.D. Chamarbaugwalla v. Union of India AIR 1957 SC 628 lays down seven rules; the touchstone is whether the valid and invalid parts are so inextricably mixed that they cannot stand apart, and whether what survives is what the legislature would have enacted on its own. Article 13 supports it with the words "to the extent of such inconsistency".

6. Doctrine of eclipse. A pre-Constitution law inconsistent with a fundamental right is not dead but dormant; it is overshadowed by the fundamental right and remains in force for pre-Constitution rights and against non-citizens, and revives if the shadow is removed by amendment. Bhikaji Narain Dhakras v. State of Madhya Pradesh AIR 1955 SC 781. For post-Constitution laws, Deep Chand v. State of Uttar Pradesh AIR 1959 SC 648 held them void ab initio as against citizens, though State of Gujarat v. Ambica Mills AIR 1974 SC 1300 confirmed such a law is not void as against non-citizens.

7. Doctrine of ancillary or incidental powers. A power to legislate on a subject carries the power to legislate on matters reasonably incidental to it, though a power on a major subject cannot be spelt out of an incidental one.

12. The doctrine of basic structure. Kesavananda Bharati v. State of Kerala AIR 1973 SC 1461 held that "amendment" in Article 368 does not extend to altering the basic structure or framework of the Constitution. This is itself an act of interpretation: the Court read a limitation into a provision that contains none in terms, on the ground that a power to amend cannot include a power to destroy the instrument that confers it.

Conclusion. Two threads run through all twelve. The first is generosity: a Constitution is read broadly, because a narrow reading of a document meant to last would defeat it. The second is preservation: harmonious construction, severability, eclipse, pith and substance and the presumption of constitutionality all exist so that as much of the law as can validly stand does stand. The basic-structure doctrine is where the two threads meet, since it preserves the Constitution itself by limiting the power to change it.

Noscitur a sociis, a word is known by the company it keeps. An ambiguous word takes colour from the words associated with it. In State of Bombay v. Hospital Mazdoor Sabha AIR 1960 SC 610, "industry" in the Industrial Disputes Act was construed with reference to the surrounding words in the definition. In Pradeep Aggarbatti v. State of Punjab (1997) 8 SCC 511 the entry "perfumery, cosmetics and toilet goods" was read as a whole, so dhoop and agarbatti did not fall within it.

Ejusdem generis, of the same kind. Where specific words forming a genus are followed by general words, the general words are confined to that genus. Amar Chandra Chakraborty v. Collector of Excise (1972) sets out the five conditions. It is a species of noscitur a sociis, and it is displaced by words such as "or otherwise".

Reddendo singula singulis, rendering each to each. Where a sentence has several subjects and several objects, each is referred to its appropriate counterpart. Koteswar Vittal Kamath v. K. Rangappa Baliga AIR 1969 SC 504 is the Indian authority; the classic illustration is a will reading "I devise and bequeath all my real and personal property to A", where "devise" attaches to the real property and "bequeath" to the personal.

Casus omissus, a case omitted. What the legislature has left out, the court cannot supply. Padma Sundara Rao v. State of Tamil Nadu (2002) 3 SCC 533; the court's function is jus dicere, not jus dare. The narrow exception is where the omission is a plain drafting slip and the correction is found within the four corners of the statute itself.

Contemporanea expositio est optima et fortissima in lege. The contemporaneous exposition of an old statute by those who administered it is the best and strongest in law. Desh Bandhu Gupta v. Delhi Stock Exchange AIR 1979 SC 1049. It applies to ancient statutes; the Supreme Court has said it should not be applied to a modern one.

Statutes in pari materia. Acts on the same subject are read as one system, and a term construed in one may be given the same meaning in the other.

In bonam partem. Words are presumed to be used in their lawful and rightful sense, so a statutory power is read as a power to be exercised lawfully.

Is the statement in the question correct?

It is broadly right but overstated, and the overstatement is where the marks are.

Conclusion. The correct statement of the proposition is that the subsidiary rules can never be ignored, but they can very often be displaced. They must be considered in every case, because they are how a court tests a proposed reading against the way legislatures actually draft. They must not be applied mechanically, because they are generalisations about drafting and a particular draftsman may have done something else. That is the sense in which the sentence in the question is true, and the qualification is not a criticism of it but the condition on which it holds.