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August 7, 1940: Maurice Linford Gwyer (right), along with Rabindranath Tagore and Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan at Santiniketan after the Oxford University Convocation. In July 1937, three months before he assumed office as the Chief Justice of the Federal Court, he wrote a letter to his two future colleagues on the court asking them to think about the clothes they were going to wear in court.

The judge’s new robe

How the three judges on the Federal Court wrote to one another about the clothes they were going to wear in court and how their appearance would impa
Abhinav Chandrachud
Indian activists from the Akhila Bharata Vidyarthy Parishat (ABVP) organisation shout slogans during a protest outside the Amnesty International in New Delhi on August 17, 2016. Students from the ABVP are demanding police take action against the organisers of an event held on disputed Indian Kashmir, which led to sedition charges being brought against the Amnesty rights group. Amnesty denied August 16 its staff made anti-nationalist comments at one of its events on disputed Indian Kashmir after the rights group was slapped with sedition charges. Police in the southern Indian city of Bangalore filed the initial charges against Amnesty on Monday following complaints that event participants called for independence of the volatile Kashmir region. / AFP PHOTO / SAJJAD HUSSAIN

History of sedition

It is only when a speech incites others to commit acts of insurrection, rebellion or public disorder that it can be considered as constituting the off
ABHINAV CHANDRACHUD
New Delhi, 24/01/2014: Supreme Court in New Delhi on Friday, January 24, 2014. Photo: R. V. Moorthy

From Bar to Bench

The Supreme Court collegium, going against accepted norms, has recommended the appointment of two practising lawyers of the Bar as judges in the Supre
Abhinav Chandrachud
Chief Justices of the High Courts of India met in New Delhi on March 27, 1948 to discuss the legal implications of the draft constitution of India. at the lunch at the Gymkhana club, where Pandit was guest. Photo shows :- (sitting L to R) Mr. M.C. Chagla Chief Justice of Bombay, Sri Saiyid Fazal Ali Judge Federal court, Dewan Ram Lal, Chief Justice, Sir. Harilal J. Kania Chief Justice of India, Pandit Nehru, M. Patanjali Sastri judge, Federal Court. Standing ( L to R) Mr. Bidhubhushan Malik, Chief Justic

‘My dear Chagla’

High Court Chief Justices are now considered inferior to Supreme Court judges. It was not always so, as is clear from the case of Chief Justice M.C. C
ABHINAV CHANDRACHUD
Bangalore :30/03/2011. Lokayukta Santosh Hegde in Bangalore on 30th March, 2011. Photo K . Bhagya Prakash

Age, seniority, diversity

Criteria that were never conceived in the Constituent Assembly now determine who gets to sit on India’s apex court. Each of these unwritten qualificat
ABHINAV CHANDRACHUD

Voice of a bygone era

AMONG over 200 judges, including 39 Chief Justices, who have served on the Supreme Court of India so far, Justice P.N. Bhagwati is one judge who will
Abhinav Chandrachud
The newly appointed judges of the Supreme Court (from left) Justices S.J. Mukhopadhaya, J.S. Khehar and Ranjana Desai.-

The age factor

The appointment of three new judges to the Supreme Court reopens the debate on the need to appoint judges when they are younger.
ABHINAV CHANDRACHUD
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