Supreme Court Emphasizes The Need To Write Short & Clear Judgments

BACKGROUND

• Delhi faced communal riots and violence between 24th and 29th February 2020 causing loss to life and property.
• The result of these riots led to the formation of the Committee on Peace and Harmony by the legislative assembly of NCT of Delhi under the chairmanship of Mr. Raghav Chadha, MLA.
• It was alleged by the Committee that Facebook had colluded in interests with the riots and Mr. Ajit Mohan, Vice President and Managing Director of Facebook India was summoned in relation to the same.

CASE BEFORE THE SUPREME COURT

• Ajit Mohan approached the Apex Court under Article 32 of the Constitution challenging the summons issued by the Peace and Harmony Committee.
• It was prayed before the Court that the Legislative Assembly should be prevented from taking coercive actions against the petitioner in furtherance of the impugned summons.

ARGUMENTS BY PETITIONERS

• Mr. Harish Salve, on behalf of the petitioners, argued that the Committee's only objective was to file a supplementary chargesheet and tie Facebook with it.
• He stated that the riots were a political issue and Facebook being an intermediary from the US cannot be dragged into it.
• He emphasized that the actions of the Committee were dangerous and coercive and hence in violation of the Fundamental Right of Petitioner 1 (Ajit Mohan).
• Senior Advocate Arvind Datar appeared on behalf of Facebook and submitted that the Public Committee cannot deal with public order situations and it cannot summon private individuals for appearance.

ARGUMENTS BY RESPONDENTS

• Senior Advocates Dr. Rajeev Dhavan and Dr. Abhishek Manu Singhvi appeared on behalf of the Delhi Legislative Assembly argued that remedy under Article 32 cannot be invoked in this case as there was no violation of Fundamental Rights.
• Solicitor-General Tushar Mehta represented the Union of India and submitted before the Court that problems emerging from social media are global and can be examined by a national body like the Parliament.

OBSERVATIONS

• The Bench comprising of Justice S.K. Kaul, Justice Dinesh Maheshwari, and Justice Hrishikesh Roy divided the judgment under three topics: Issue of Privilege, Privileges & Fundamental Rights and Legislative Competence.
• The Court observed that the proceedings before the Court went on for 26 hours which took up a lot of judicial time.
• The Court showed the concern of such long proceedings during the COVID times and stated that the counsels should adhere to a brief and concise synopsis.
• The Court emphasized that the counsels should avoid competition for the duration to present arguments and also it is the need of the hour to write clear and short judgments.

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