IN RE KESHAV SINGH AIR 1965 SC 745

INTRODUCTION:

Who would have imagined that a pamphlet published by a local politician would bring up a constitutional crisis, paralyse government operations, and strain relations amongst institutions of the state? This is exactly what took place in 1964. To restore order, it needed the combined efforts of a number of Supreme Court and high court judges, MPs and MLAs, and, in the end, the Prime Minister and Chief Justice of India. The crisis occurred near the conclusion of Nehru’s term as prime minister. The whole case is regarding contempt of the Uttar Pradesh Legislative Assembly.

FACTS OF THE CASE:

Keshav Singh, a member of the Socialist Party in Uttar Pradesh, was involved in a corruption case against Congress party member Narsingh Narain Pandey. The booklet, which made corruption claims against Pandey, was distributed in both local and state assemblies. The Congress party MLAs and Pandey claimed that the booklet violated their privileges and rights. To get punishment, Singh and his co-workers were required to come before the assembly in Lucknow. However, Singh neglected to do so due to an absence of assets.

The Uttar Pradesh bureaucracy responded by treating the situation like any other, suggesting the government attend the following hearing and submit affidavits in the standard manner. However, the assembly speaker’s response was not as positive, believing that the court’s approach was against the separation of powers. A resolution calling for Singh to be returned to the assembly to answer for the petition filed in the high court and to remain in prison was passed by an overwhelming majority of the assembly just two days after the court’s order.

The skirmish between Singh and the assembly evolved into a serious conflict between constitutional institutions. Judges Ask and Sehgal, who were not informed of this goal through true channels, claimed that the assembly’s resolution violated Article 211 of the Constitution, which forbids state assemblies to discuss the conduct of the Supreme court or any high court judge. Justices Beg and Sehgal requested a delay in the implementation of a resolution against them, which was represented by Jagdish Swarup, an attorney and scholar who later served as India’s solicitor general. The case was assigned to a bench by the next highest-ranking judge, but Chief Justice MC Desai resisted, fearing the assembly would have the same effect. Jagdish Swarup suggested that the high court’s judges, except for Beg and Sehgal, should sit together to hear the case. A bench of 28 judges was assigned, and the high court granted the judges’ petitions, preventing the government from issuing arrest warrants. This led to disarray and vulnerability among the police and regulatory officials.

The President has asked the Supreme Court to consider five questions under Article 143(1) of the Constitution. These include whether the Lucknow Bench of the High Court of Uttar Pradesh was competent to handle Mr. Keshav Singh’s petition challenging the imprisonment sentence and releasing him on bail. The President also questions whether Keshav Singh committed contempt by presenting the petition to the High Court and the two Judges, the authority of the Uttar Pradesh Legislative Assembly to detain them, and the jurisdiction of the Full Bench of the High Court.

PETITIONER’S ARGUMENTS:

The House has no criminal jurisdiction and no authority to punish anyone who disobeys it.
Even if the House had such authority, the petitioner’s imprisonment is unconstitutional since it violates Article 22(2) of the Constitution.
The petitioner’s conviction by the House was in breach of Articles 21 and 22(1) of the Constitution, as well as natural justice principles.
The House’s actions to punish the petitioner were ill-intentioned and motivated by political animosity.

RESPONDENT’S ARGUMENTS:

Under Article 194(3), the House has criminal jurisdiction, and because it is also a court of record, it can punish people who defy it.
Part III of the Constitution has no bearing on a matter brought under Article 194(3) of the Constitution; the former always gives way to the latter.
The petitioner’s liberty is taken away per the legal procedure.
The fact that the person charged with contempt belongs to a political party other than the House’s majority party is no proof that the House acted in bad faith.

JUDGEMENT:

The Supreme Court thoroughly examined numerous cases and precedents worldwide, ultimately reaching specific conclusions regarding the answers.

The Lucknow Bench was competent to hear Habeas Corpus petitions.
Neither Keshav Singh nor the judges were in contempt for filing the petition because there was no evidence that it was done illegally.
The House lacked the power to order the Judges’ detention and to accuse them of contempt without first allowing them a hearing.
The House lacks the power to punish a judge for hearing a petition against a House order, nor does the judge itself constitute contempt of the House.

It was argued that the right to personal liberty should take precedence over legislative rights in the case of a disagreement. The Supreme Court concurred, adding that while these two fundamental clauses should, to the greatest degree feasible, be interpreted harmoniously, Article 21 would have precedence in the case of a conflict. Article 211 was the second constitutional clause in question. The debate of the actions of the Supreme Court or high court judges in state legislatures was completely prohibited under this clause. The high court justices stated that the assembly resolution calling for their presence to give an explanation for their actions was in violation of this clause. The Supreme Court concurred, pointing out that the resolution of the assembly constituted a violation of the independence of the court. Article 211 could not be reduced to a “meaningless declaration” because it was an integral feature of the system that allowed the courts to make tough decisions, even if they were wrong, without fear of political repercussions. Chief Justice Gajendragadkar’s majority opinion concluded, on the whole, that the high court was right.

Dissenting opinion:

In a dissenting opinion, one of the justices offered a more cautious assessment of the circumstances. personal liberty would take precedence over parliamentary rights. One constitutional clause would be preferred above another, which is not a harmonic construction. His assertion that the assembly has the authority to demand an explanation from Solomon and Justices Beg and Sehgal was perhaps his most contentious conclusion. According to him, the assembly’s authority to penalise for contempt included the authority to look into the circumstances to see if there had actually been a violation of the law. Justice Sarkar did not appear to be as concerned as the others about the prospect of high court justices being called to give explanations before the assembly. What if the justices were truly convicted in contempt by the assembly, as Justice Sarkar ruled that the high court judges might have been requested to explain themselves before the assembly to determine whether contempt had been committed? Could they be penalised in any manner, or would they be entitled to immunity (under Article 211 or other constitutional provisions)? It would have been too extreme for Justice Sarkar to conclude that the judges may have likewise been subject to a contempt proceeding. Instead, he ‘decided not to decide’ on this issue in the hopes that it would never come up: ‘Theoretical debates should be allowed to lay buried in erudite tracts and not be permitted to taint our daily life.

CRITICISM:

Soon after the Supreme Court’s decision was made, criticism began to pour in. Despite the fact that this criticism took various forms, it was largely confined to one question: Did the judgment properly distribute power among two constitutional institutions with equal status? To begin, the Supreme Court examined the issues at hand within a framework that left little room for a more nuanced perspective. It was possible, for instance, for the Supreme Court to rule that the assembly had no authority to imprison the judges for contempt for deciding that question and that the high court had no authority to consider Keshav Singh’s petition. If the Supreme Court wanted to avoid the unpleasant outcome of high court judges being interrogated in the assembly, it was forced to hold that the high court had the authority to decide the petition by framing this as a contest for custodianship of the Constitution. The court’s refusal to acknowledge the assembly’s role in interpreting the scope of its own privileges was the second criticism levelled against the judgment. This was partly prompted by the mention of the Supreme Court itself (instead of leaving the question up to the assembly to decide). However, the court’s statement that the assembly should interpret Article 194(3), which stated that the powers, privileges, and immunities of state legislatures should be defined by law and that this was a matter of the assembly’s internal operation, may have been appropriate. The assembly was a democratically elected body that was held accountable to the state’s voters. Instead, the court decided how to interpret that clause, indicating that it would be the only one who could interpret the Constitution, even those that only addressed one branch. The most significant criticism of the Supreme Court’s decision was directed at how parliamentary privileges and fundamental rights interact. The court had come to a different conclusion in a case that occurred just a few years prior to the decision made by the Supreme Court. A deleted portion of the Bihar Assembly’s proceedings had been published by Searchlight, a Patna newspaper. The editor of Searchlight argued that, in the event of a conflict, parliamentary privileges would yield to the fundamental right to freedom of speech and expression. A notice for breach of privilege was issued. The court at the time was against this position. In the Keshav Singh reference, the High Court took the contrary view – that parliamentary honour would respect the major right to individual freedom. Be that as it may, it did as such without upsetting the choice in the Searchlight case. Consequently, the legal position was that some fundamental rights would be prioritized over others by parliamentary privilege. Legislators were less motivated to codify the law on privileges because of these decisions. Because this ordinary law would be inferior to all (rather than just some) fundamental rights, Parliament and the state assemblies had no incentive to codify privileges into law at this time. The end consequence was that, despite the Constitution’s provision for parliamentary privileges to be codified, this never happened.

ANALYSIS:

Interestingly, 70 years after Indian independence, privileges remain linked to those of the House of Commons, just as they were in January 1950. Albeit a restorative revision was made to Article 194 to dispense with the reference to the Place of Hall in 1978 , its impact stays a lot of something very similar. Dr Rajendra Prasad’s assertion in the Constituent Get together that ‘Parliament might very well never enact on this issue and that the individuals ought to ‘be careful was farsighted.” That was done with good reason, not by accident. Legislative codification has always been seen as having little to gain and a lot to lose, according to political calculations. If the Searchlight case verdict had been decisively overturned, privileges might have been written into the Constitution.The Supreme Court’s decision is supported by the idea that the legislative, executive, and judicial branches of a democratic state should function together. The Court emphasised the significance of these three institutions cooperating harmoniously. The State Legislature is prohibited under Article 211 of the Constitution from debating the behaviour of a High Court Judge in the Assembly, hence the House cannot punish a High Court Judge for anything done while doing his official responsibilities. The case involves constitutional crises and abuses of fundamental rights, but the emphasis is on the judicial authorities’ symbolic acts of solidarity and how they settle conflicts when they arise. It entails defending citizens’ fundamental rights and dignity in the Indian Constitution is entrenched. This case underscores the significance of the division of powers as one of the fundamental tenets of the constitution and how each may restrain abuses and take the proper course of action. The two peers’ authority was properly balanced thanks to this choice.

Author: Veerjot Kaur, a student of the University Institute of Legal Studies, Panjab University, Chandigarh