Outgoing NALSAR students don't want CJI at convocation
The outgoing batch at a national law university in Hyderabad has asked its administration to reconsider inviting the Chief Justice of India to deliver the convocation address — a role the country's senior-most judge has traditionally filled there. What makes the request unusual is where it comes from. These are students training to practise before the very court whose head they are declining to honour, and they have chosen a written representation to their Vice-Chancellor rather than litigation or disruption.
The trigger was a bench led by the Chief Justice declining to take suo motu cognisance of alleged police excesses during a protest march to Parliament, together with remarks from the bench — refusing to view video material, and telling those before it not to waste the court's time — that circulated widely. Campus solidarity first appeared on 20 July, the representation followed on 23 July, and within two days roughly 380 students across five junior batches had endorsed it.
For the exam the value is not the controversy but what it exposes. Suo motu cognisance is discretionary: no litigant can compel it, and a refusal settles nothing about whether the conduct complained of occurred. Yet a court's authority rests on being seen to hear. This is judicial independence and judicial accountability pulling against each other in public.
Ammunition
An example, a case study and a counterpoint you can lift straight into an answer.
Subscribe to unlock the Mains angle, MCQs and the model question.3 Prelims Drill
UPSC-pattern questions from this article, with an explanation on every option.
Subscribe to unlock the Mains angle, MCQs and the model question.Mains Practice
A full question with its answer framework and the verified previous-year questions it echoes.
Subscribe to unlock the Mains angle, MCQs and the model question.Summary and analysis are written by The Insight Express and reviewed before publishing. We link to the original report; we do not reproduce it.