Doctrine Of Impossibility Applicable To Court Orders; Possibility Of Implementation Should Be Considered: SC

What Is The Case

● The doctrine of impossibility also applies to court orders "According to reports, the Supreme Court on Friday stayed the Allahabad High Court's May 17 orders to upgrade medical facilities in Uttar Pradesh on a war-like scale.

● A Bench of Justices Vineet Saran and BR Gavai said, "We are of the opinion that the High Court should normally consider the possibility of the implementation of the directions given by it, and such directions which are incapable of being implemented should be avoided."

● The Court went on to say that the "Doctrine of Impossibility" applied similarly to court orders. It was also noted that the High Court should generally refrain from issuing directions on matters with transnational and international implications, especially when such matters at the national level were being considered by the Supreme Court in separate proceedings.

Details

● The Supreme Court was hearing an appeal by the State of Uttar Pradesh, represented by Solicitor-General Tushar Mehta, against an Allahabad High Court order that issued a slew of urgent directions, including providing ambulances with ICU facilities in all villages, making oxygen beds available in all nursing homes, and upgrading medical college hospitals in the State.

● The SG had told the Supreme Court that the High Court's orders, while well-intentioned, are difficult to carry out.

● The SG stated that the High Court had ordered that within one month, every village in the state be provided with two ambulances with ICU facilities. This directive, according to the SG, would be difficult to enforce in a month because the state of Uttar Pradesh has nearly 97,000 villages.

● Furthermore, the High Court ordered that all nursing homes with more than a certain number of beds have oxygen bed facilities and that nursing homes with more than that number of beds have oxygen processing plants and a certain percentage of ventilators.

● In addition, the High Court ordered that within four months, all medical college hospitals in the state be upgraded to the level of Sanjay Gandhi Postgraduate Institute.

Court’s Order

● In addition, the High Court stated that the health-care system in Uttar Pradesh's towns and villages was similar to "Ram Bharose." According to the SG, such findings demoralized the State's healthcare workers, who worked all hours of the day and night.

● The bench decided that the Solicitor General's arguments had "some force" in this respect. "In our opinion, the submission that such findings were not justified and that they may cause panic among the people of the State, nullifying the State Government's efforts to eradicate the pandemic and provide relief to the patients, has some strength," the SC bench said.

● The SG also told the Supreme Court that the High Court had made some observations about vaccine development and proposed that the government take the vaccine manufacturing formula from companies so that more companies could manufacture it.

● In this case, the SG argued that High Courts should refrain from issuing policy directives, particularly when those directives could have trans-state or even trans-national implications.

● The SG requested that matters of grave significance relating to COVID-19 be heard by a Bench chaired by the respective State's Chief Justice. The Supreme Court, on the other hand, declined to issue any orders in this regard, claiming that the Chief Justice had sole authority over the formation of Benches. The bench did note, that matters of public interest should be handled by benches headed by Chief Justices of High Courts.

What are you say about this?