A PARLIAMENTARY DEBATE

After a Covid-curtailed monsoon session and with the winter session looking unlikely, India’s Parliament has lapsed into silence.

- Kai Friese

But in recent days, the historic precincts were ringing with a clatter of construction workers, lorries and falling trees, causing controversy, debate and some sharp words to be uttered. Not in Parliament of course—or in any physical location as such—but in an online session of the Supreme Court, which saw the solicitor general (SG), Tushar Mehta, being admonished “respond in five minutes or we will pass this order!” The SG responded with “sincere apologies” and an assurance that there would be no “construction, demolition or felling of trees” at the site.