Cannot cripple Parliament's power, says SC in AMU case

The Supreme Court will be averse to interpreting the law in a manner that may substantially cripple the power of the Parliament, a seven-judge bench observed on Wednesday, sounding a word of caution that the "eagerness" by the government and other parties to question the 1981 amendments in favour of the Aligarh Muslim University (AMU)'s minority status ought not to circumscribe the authority of the lawmaking body.

- Utkarsh Anand

The bench, led by Chief Justice of India (CJI) Dhananjaya Y Chandrachud, emphasised that it has to lay down the law for the future and therefore, the efforts by the parties to impugn the 1981 amendments by Parliament should not lead to a general principle curtailing the Parliament's authority.

"Let's not go into a wider context and dilute the power of Parliament by laying such a broad proposition that it's not open to Parliament, while legislating, to take a view of historical facts to the contrary... even if it is embodied in a judgment... The legislature is not bound to take notice of facts as they emerge, as you and we would think emerge. Powers are with the legislature and that's what they do every time in the Income Tax law when they bring about retrospective changes," said the bench, which also comprised justices Sanjiv Khanna, Surya Kant, JB Pardiwala, Dipankar Datta, Manoj Misra and Satish Chandra Sharma.

The court's observations came after senior counsel Neeraj K Kaul, representing one of the parties that has opposed the minority status for AMU, questioned the 1981 amendment in the AMU Act. The impugned amendment changed the definition of "university" to state that the institution was established by Muslims, in an endeavour to grant minority status to AMU.

The 1981 amendments were passed apparently to get over the Supreme Court's five-judge bench judgment in the Azeez Basha case in 1967, which declared that AMU was neither established nor administered by Muslims and could not enjoy protection for minorities to administer educational institutions under Article 30(1) of the Constitution.