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1. [Surrogacy Case] The Delhi High Court has dismissed a plea filed by a 54-year-old man seeking a no-objection certificate (NOC) from his estranged wife for pursuing surrogacy. The man argued that due to his advancing age and the expected lengthy divorce proceedings, he had no alternative but to opt for surrogacy to continue his DNA lineage.The petitioner contested a family court's decision that denied directing his estranged wife to issue the required NOC for a surrogate mother.The bench expressed difficulty understanding the husband's intention to pursue surrogacy while the marriage was still in effect, highlighting potential complications for the couple and the child.The court pointed out that the Surrogacy (Regulation) Act, 2021, outlines a comprehensive procedure for individuals seeking surrogacy. The Act specifies that the child is to be handed over to the "intending couple," defined as a "legally married Indian man and woman above the age of 21 years and 18 years, respectively."
Bench: Justice Suresh Kumar Kait and Justice Neena Bansal
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2. [Excise policy case; Amit Arora] The Delhi High Court on Friday last week issued notice on the interim bail plea of the excise policy case accused Amit Arora. He has sought an interim bail for a period of 12 weeks. While extending his Hospitalization at RML Hospital, the bench directed the RML hospital to place all test reports on record within 2 days."...the RML Hospital through Medical Superintendent, is directed to provide all the medical reports pertaining to the petitioner (Amit Arora) to him within a period of two days from the service of this order", the judge ordered. Amit Arora is one of the Directors of Buddy Retail Pvt. Ltd, who was arrested by the Directorate of Enforcement in connection with the alleged Delhi Excise Policy Scam case.Senior Advocate Vikas Pahwa along with Advocates Prabhav Ralli and Namisha Jain appeared for Amit Arora. The senior counsel requested the court to permit legal mulaqat with Arora twice a week. "Accordingly, it is directed that the advocates of the petitioner (not more than two at a time) be permitted to meet the petitioner twice a week between 04.00 – 05.00 P.M. The names of the advocates are (i) Mr. Prabhav Ralli, (ii) Ms. Namisha Jain and (iii) Mr. Aditya Shukla", the court said.
Bench: Justice Vikas Mahajan
Case Title: Amit Arora v. Directorate of Enforcement
3. [Subramanian Swamy's plea] The Delhi High Court on Monday issued notice to the Centre on former Rajya Sabha Member and BJP leader Subramanian Swamy’s plea seeking information under the Right to Information (RTI) Act regarding Chinese encroachment on Indian territory. The bench issued notice to the Ministry of Home Affairs, Ministry of Defence and the Central Information Commission. The court also sought response from the Central Public Information Officer (CPIO) and the First Appellate Officer. Accordingly, court posted the matter for further hearing on January 8, 2024. Swamy, in his plea, stated that he had filed an RTI application on November 10, 2022 and sought information regarding Chinese encroachment on Indian territory. He stated that the application was transferred between various departments and continued to be transferred even after the expiry of the timeline for receiving reply to the RTI Application. “Aggrieved by not receiving an effective response to his RTI Application, the Petitioner filed an RTI First Appeal dated 12th January 2023”, the plea said.
Bench: Justice Subramonium Prasad
Case Title: Dr. Subramanian Swamy v. Union of India & Ors.
4. [Live Streaming of proceedings] In a new development, the Delhi High Court has begun live streaming of court proceedings from Wednesday last week i.e. October 11. For now, Court No. 01, a bench comprising Chief Justice Satish Chandra Sharma and Justice Sanjeev Narula, is being live-streamed from 10.30 a.m. onwards on October 11. The live streaming will be conducted on a case-to-case basis as per the High Court's directions. “The live streaming link is available on the home page of the official website of Delhi High Court, https://delhihighcourt.nic.in, under the title – LIVE STREAMING,” the press release stated."In pursuit of greater access to justice, the High Court of Delhi is going to start the live streaming of court proceedings on 11 October, 2023 at 10:30 am in Court No. 1 (comprising Hon'ble Mr Justice Satish Chandra Sharma, Hon'ble the Chief Justice and Hon'ble Mr Justice Sanjeev Narula) in an identified matter," it said.
Bench: Chief Justice Satish Chandra Sharma and Justice Sanjeev Narula
5. [AAP MP Raghav Chadha] Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) MP Raghav Chadha has moved the Delhi High Court challenging the trial court’s order which paved the way for the Rajya Sabha Secretariat to evict him from his Type VII government bungalow. The matter was listed for urgent listing today before a division bench. The Chief Justice allowed the matter to be listed for hearing tomorrow i.e. October 11, 2023. The counsel for Chadha submitted that the Member of Parliament had been served with a notice and eviction proceedings were going on. She said that there was a stay from the trial court but now it has been removed.On October 5, Additional District Judge Sudhanshu Kaushik vacated an earlier order that stopped the Rajya Sabha Secretariat from evicting Chadha from his government accommodation. The judge had said that Chadha had “no vested right” to continue to occupy his government bungalow after the cancellation of its allotment."Plaintiff (Chadha) cannot claim that he has an absolute right to continue to occupy the accommodation during his entire tenure as a Member of Rajya Sabha. The allotment of Government accommodation is only a privilege given to the plaintiff and he has no vested right to continue to occupy the same even after the cancellation of allotment," the court had said.
Bench: Chief Justice Satish Chandra Sharma and Justice Sanjeev Narula.
6. [IIT Delhi Fest] The Delhi High Court took suo moto cognizance of an incident wherein women students of Bharati College, University of Delhi were ‘secretly filmed’ in the washroom, while they were changing costumes during the “Rendezvous festival”, organized by Indian Institute of Technology, Delhi on October 6. The court took note of a newspaper article titled “Harassment at college fests leaves students anguished, shaken”, published in the Indian Express on October 9, 2023, which brought to the fore the “lapses in security measures” employed for annual college festivals organized by universities across the State, resulting in injuries, violations, and trauma for students attending such festivals.On perusal of the newspaper article, a division bench noted, “During the Rendezvous festival, organized by Indian Institute of Technology, Delhi [IIT-D] on 06th October, 2023, a group of students enrolled in Bharati College, University of Delhi, who had been invited to participate in a fashion show event, spotted an individual secretly filming them while they were changing costumes in a washroom”.The news report stated that upon reviewing the CCTV footage, the individual was identified to be a part of the IIT-D’s housekeeping staff.“This episode has left the victims distraught, and has understandably raised concerns regarding misuse of the videos, including their circulation on various social media platforms”, the bench said.
Case Title: Court on its own motion v. Govt of NCT of Delhi & Ors
7. [Bail Bond Requirement] The Delhi High Court has recommended changes to Section 438 of the new Criminal Procedure Code (CrPC) [Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita, 2023], specifically relating to the requirement of furnishing a personal bond with a surety by an accused upon acquittal. The court suggested replacing the word "shall" with "may" and replacing "bail or bail bond" with "personal bond with or without surety." Under Section 437A of CrPC [BNSS], the accused must execute bail bonds with sureties and appear before the higher court when served notice in an appeal or petition against the judgment. The bond remains in force for six months, making it mandatory for the acquitted accused to furnish a personal bond with a surety. The court made these suggestions while hearing a plea highlighting the mandatory requirement, especially when the accused is compelled to remain in jail despite acquittal due to the non-furnishing of surety.
Case Title: Firasat Hussain v. State of NCT of Delhi
8. [Sexual Assault on Minor] The Delhi High Court has rejected anticipatory bail pleas of the daughter and son of suspended Delhi government officer Premoday Khakha in a case of alleged sexual assault on a minor girl by the arrested official. “I have dismissed the application at this stage,” said the bench. Premoday’s son and daughter, accused of abetting the crime, had approached the high court last week seeking pre-arrest bail in the case after they failed to secure the relief from trial court. Premoday Khakha allegedly raped the girl several times between November 2020 and January 2021. She was staying at the residence of the accused, a family friend, after her father passed away on October 1, 2020, the police said.The minor was allegedly impregnated and Khakha’s wife, Seema Rani (an accused in the case) gave medicine to her to terminate the pregnancy.The couple was arrested on Monday i.e. August 2, 2023 after the victim recorded her statement before a magistrate at a hospital.
Bench: Justice Saurabh Banerjee
Case Title: Prateeksha Khakha v. The State of NCT of Delhi & Harsh Prateek Khakha v. The State of NCT of Delhi
9. [2018 Contempt Case] Author, Dr. Anand Ranganathan’s counsel Advocate J Sai. Deepak submitted before the Delhi High Court on Wednesday last week, “As directed in the last hearing an affidavit has been filed clarifying that his speech was never meant to be read as a comment on the facts". The court was hearing the suo-motu criminal contempt case initiated against Ranganathan and others in 2018 in connection with relief provided by Justice S. Muralidhar to UAPA-accused Gautam Navlakha. At the outset, Adv Deepak submitted, "My lords rightly observed on the last hearing that he is just a conceptual objector, who believes in absolute free speech but beyond that he has no dog in the race, no skin in the game".
Bench: Justice Siddharth Mridul and Justice Anish Dayal
Case Title: Court in its Own Motion Vs S. Gurumurthy
10. [Students' Safety at Coaching Centres] While observing that there can be no compromise on the issue of the safety of students, the Delhi High Court on Tuesday last week said that coaching centres not complying with statutory requirements under the Delhi Master Plan, 2021 will have to be shut down. A division bench said, “There can be no compromise on the issue of safety of students”. At the outset, the counsel for an association of coaching centres claimed that they are complying with the norms. However, the court said that it is for the authorities to see whether they are compliant or not. The bench was dealing with a batch of pleas concerning the operations of coaching centres in Mukherjee Nagar, a coaching hub for government job aspirants. The court was also hearing a suo moto plea after a June 15 blaze at a coaching centre in north Delhi’s Mukherjee Nagar which resulted in the injury of 61 students.
Case Title: Kanchan Gupta v. Lt. Governor, State of Delhi & Ors (a batch of petitions)
11. [Copyright Infringement] The Delhi High Court has decreed a copyright infringement suit filed by the storytelling platform ‘Humans of Bombay’ (HOB) against the Instagram handle namely ‘People of India’ (POI). The bench directed HOB and POI to not copy each other's copyrighted contents."In the context of the suit, the core idea is storytelling. There cannot be any monopoly in running of a storytelling platform. However, all platforms ought to adopt their own creative expression to communicate and disseminate the said stories," the judge said. "If photos are commissioned or videos produced by the platform (POI or Humans of Bombay), the copyright would be vested in the respective platform and they would be cinematograph works," it added.
Bench: Justice Prathiba M. Singh
Case Title: Humans of Bombay Stories Pvt Ltd v. POI Social Media Pvt Ltd
12. [Govt. Bungalow Row] In a plea against eviction from government accommodation, Senior Advocate Abhishek Manu Singhvi on behalf of Aam Aadmi Party MP Raghav Chadha has contended before the Delhi High Court that Chadha is a victim of “selective targeting” as he has been a vocal opposition member of Parliament. The senior counsel said that Chadha is the only sitting lawmaker in the Rajya Sabha ever to have been sought to be evicted from the bungalow allotted to him. Singhvi contended, “Chadha has been provided Z+ security in view of threats, and a large contingent of security personnel was required to be deployed at his residence. The personnel cannot be accommodated in the bungalow earlier allotted to him at Pandara Park. Punjab’s Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) government has accorded Z+ security to Chadha who is a Rajya Sabha MP from there”.
Bench: Justice Anup Jairam Bhambhani
Case Title: Raghav Chadha v. Rajya Sabha Secretariat
13. [Directions to ensure confidentiality of sexual offences victims] In a step to ensure that anonymity and confidentiality of survivors of sexual offences are maintained, the Delhi High Court has recently issued directions that their name, parentage and address should not be reflected in documents filed in courts.The high court, in its 'practice directions' issued through the registrar general, directed that the court registry must carefully scrutinise all filings relating to sexual offences to ensure that anonymity and confidentiality of the prosecutrix/victim/survivor is strictly maintained and the name, parentage, address, social media credentials and photographs of the victim must not be disclosed, including in memo of parties. The directions have been issued in compliance of Justice Anup Jairam Bhambhani's judgment passed in April this year, in which it was held that there is no requirement in law to implead the victim of sexual offences as a party to any criminal proceedings instituted by the State or the accused. The directions said that the Registry must ensure that such particulars do not get reflected in the cause list of the court in any manner.
14. [Child Safety Monitoring Committee] The Delhi High Court has recently set up a three-member committee to inspect safety standards in schools to prevent crimes against students. A division bench said that a committee called the Child Safety Monitoring Committee (CSMC) will be responsible to ensure that the safety measures mentioned in the Delhi Government’s 2017 circular are implemented and monitored. The Committee will be headed by former Legal Services officer, R.M. Sharma, as the Chairperson and the other two members are; Ranjana Prasad, Delhi Commission for Protection of Child Rights (DCPCR) and Maini Brar, Advocate. “The CSMC headed by the Chairperson is assigned the job of inspecting the schools in Delhi in respect of minimum standards of school safety and other ancillary matters related to the issue”, the court said in its order dated September 27. The court directed the CSMC to submit its report in six months. “The time of the CSMC shall also be extendable in case the CSMC is not able to submit a report within six months”, the court clarified.
Case Title: Court on its own motion v. Government of NCT of Delhi
15. [Govt. Bungalow Row] The Delhi High Court 'reserved order' in Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) MP Raghav Chadha's appeal challenging the trial court’s order which paved way for the Rajya Sabha Secretariat to evict him from his Type VII government bungalow.
16. [Cricketer Kapil Dev's plea] The Delhi High Court has issued notice in Former Indian cricket captain Kapil Dev and his wife's plea against the provisions of the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (PCA) Act that allows the destruction of stray dogs in lethal chambers or by such other methods as may be prescribed and the extermination or destruction of any animal under the authority of any law. A division bench issued notice to the Animal Welfare Board (AWB) and the Delhi Police. Accordingly, the court listed the matter for further consideration on December 19, 2023. The petitioners namely Kapil Dev, his wife Romi Dev and animal rights activist Anjali Gopalan have moved the High Court through Advocates Shraddha Deshmukh, Nikhil Singhvi, Shikhar Kishore, Bilal Ikram, Parth Aggarwal and Milind Raj Dixit. The plea has been filed on account of repeated instances of barbaric treatment meted out to animals showing the “most brutal and cruel face of humanity” and the “utter effete” response of law and the law enforcing agencies.
Case Title: Kapil Dev & Ors. v. Union of India & Ors.
17. [AAP MP Sanjay Singh] In Aam Aadmi Party MP Sanjay Singh's plea challenging his arrest and ED remand in a money laundering case related to the Delhi excise policy scam, Senior Advocate Vikram Chaudhari appearing for Singh contended before the Delhi High Court that, "This is rampant abuse of process of law". The senior counsel contended, “This action of arresting a reputed leader in the country without showing a sham or pretense of complying with due process is an act that deserved your indulgence….The question is the rampant abuse of process of law. On August 17, 2022, CBI registered an FIR. Till today, after 1 year and 2 months, I have not even been called; no summons”. “PMLA is a child in the womb of the mother. Mother is the predicate offence. No notice or summon was ever issued to me. I wasn’t called for any inquiry or investigation. 1 year has passed and no notice under Section 50 PMLA is there. No summons was issued to me. On October 4, in the morning they came to my house, with a search and seizure operation, and at 5:25 pm in the evening I was arrested”, Chaudhari contended. Taking note of the submissions, the bench issued notice to the ED and sought its response on the plea.
Bench: Justice Swarana Kanta Sharma
Case Title: Sanjay Singh v. Union of India & Anr.
18. [NewsClick Row] The Delhi High Court 'reserved order' in pleas challenging the arrest of NewsClick founder Prabir Purkayastha and HR department head Amit Chakraborty in a case lodged under UAPA. Senior Advocates Kapil Sibal and Dayan Krishnan appeared for Purkayastha, and Solicitor General of India (SGI) Tushar Mehta appeared for the State. During the hearing today, SGI Mehta submitted that there were mainly two issues— first the arrest of the petitioners and second their remand. As far as the arrest was considered, SGI Mehta contended that a huge sum of Rs. 75 crore came from a person in China, and the purpose was to ensure that the stability and integrity of the country were compromised. “One of the most serious allegations is that they prepare a map with the northern borders of India, showing Arunachal Pradesh & J&K as not parts of India”, he added.
Bench: Justice Tushar Rao Gedela
Case Title: Prabir Purkayastha v. State NCT of Delhi & Amit Chakraborty v. State (NCT of Delhi)
19. [Centre to challenge Apex Court's Verdict Disclosing grounds of arrest] Solicitor General of India (SGI) Tushar Mehta on Monday last week told the Delhi High Court that the Central government is planning to file a review petition against a recent Supreme Court ruling in the Pankaj Bansal & Ors. Vs. Enforcement Directorate case. In an important judgment, the Supreme Court, on October 3, held mandatory for the Enforcement Directorate (ED) to disclose grounds of arrest as a matter of course and without exception in money laundering cases. The review petition was made public during the hearing of petitions filed by Prabir Purkayastha, the NewsClick founder, and Amit Chakraborty, its HR department's head. These petitions challenged their arrest and remand in a case under the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act (UAPA).
20. [NewsClick Row; Pleas dismissed] The Delhi High Court has "dismissed" the pleas challenging the arrest of NewsClick founder Prabir Purkayastha and HR department head Amit Chakraborty in a case lodged under UAPA. The bench said, "Finding no merit in the case, it is dismissed". It is to be noted that Purkayastha and Chakraborty are currently in Judicial Custody. Additional Sessions Judge (ASJ) Hardeep Kaur of Patiala House Court on October 10 remanded the two to judicial custody for ten days. Notably, the high court on October 9, had 'reserved order' in the pleas. Senior Advocates Kapil Sibal and Dayan Krishnan appeared for Purkayastha, and Solicitor General of India (SGI) Tushar Mehta appeared for the State.
21. [Batla House Encounter] The Delhi High Court has refused to confirm death penalty to Ariz Khan following his conviction in the sensational 2008 Batla House encounter case in which decorated Delhi Police Inspector Mohan Chand Sharma lost his life. A division bench of Justice Siddharth Mridul and Justice Amit Sharma upheld the trial court order convicting Khan in the case but said that the sentence of death penalty imposed by the trial court was "not confirmed". The court modified the order on sentence dated March 15, 2021 rendered by the trial court. Accordingly, the court disposed of the reference for confirmation of the death sentence awarded to Khan. Khan had filed an appeal in the high court in July 2021, challenging the order of the Delhi Trial Court which had awarded him the death penalty for killing a Police official. The appeal had been filed through Advocate MS Khan challenging the March 15, 2021 order of the Saket District Court, Delhi. The Trial Court while awarding the death penalty to Khan had said that "the convict had forfeited his right to live on account of his despicable act of killing a police officer on duty."
Bench: Justice Siddharth Mridul and Justice Amit Sharma
Case Title: State v. Ariz Khan alias Junaid alias Anna Alis Salim
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