Does India’s covid-19 Contact Tracing App Violate Digital Rights?
On 14 April 2020, during his speech on the extension of the lockdown in India, Prime Minister Narendra Modi urged citizens to download the Aarogya Setu app to supplement the...
Covid-19, Patents and Access to Medication in India
The Covid-19 pandemic is spreading rapidly across India. India has had a long-drawn struggle around affordable universal healthcare and this disease would be a tough test for its resources. Covid-19...
Covid-19 and Rights of Persons with Disabilities in India
Covid-19 is not uniform in its impact. Persons with disabilities are disproportionately affected by the pandemic. Those with underlying health complications face higher risks of severe illness and fatality. Persons...
The Need for Empathy: Understanding India’s COVID-19 Lockdown (with Kalpana Kannabiran)
“The question really, for me, is not so much one of the degree of deference that courts should grant the State, but the degree of empathy the court demonstrates towards...
Have Prisons In India Become Ticking Time Bombs Amidst COVID-19 Outbreak?
The Apex court in India, right from the latter half of the 20th Century till as late as March 2020, has upheld the status of prisoners as people who have...
Abortion Law Reform in India: One Step Forward & Two Steps Back
In an important development, the Lower House of the Indian Parliament on 17 March 2020 passed the Medical Termination of Pregnancy (Amendment) Bill 2020, providing for purportedly beneficial provisions furthering...
India’s new Abortion Bill Falls Short of Protecting Reproductive Autonomy
India’s Ministry of Health and Family Welfare has introduced the Medical Termination of Pregnancy (Amendment) Bill 2020 (the Bill) in the Parliament. The Bill seeks to make abortions more accessible...
India’s case against intellectual segregation in classrooms
A High Court in India recently handed down a significant judgment relating to equality in educational facilities. The case involved a practice regularly carried out in Indian schools, where children...
Indian Supreme Court Holds For Gender Equality in the Army
On 17th February, 2020, the Supreme Court of India (“SC”), in the case of The Secretary, Ministry of Defence v. Babita Puniya, delivered a landmark opinion, allowing Female Army Officers...
Jammu and Kashmir Public Safety Act, 1978: India’s Use of Preventive Detention Violates Human Rights
On February 5, the Indian Government informed the public that, following the abrogation of Article 370 of the Indian Constitution (which gave special status to the state of Jammu and...
A duty to implement affirmative action/reservations for India and South Africa?
A recent Indian Supreme Court judgement, Mukesh Kumar & Another v State of Uttarakhand & Others, held that there is no right to affirmative action under Article 16(4) of the...
Dilution of the Presumption of Innocence Principle in India
In two cases decided in 2019, the Bombay and Calcutta High Courts adopted diverging positions regarding the applicability of the reverse onus clause contained in Section 29 of the Protection...