Digging up due process

The Supreme Court's latest interim order on a batch of petitions stating that no demolition should take place in the country without its express permission for the next 15 days restores the criticality of due process in the Indian justice system.

Warning against "grandstanding" and "glorification" of this practice by political leaderships, the Supreme Court Bench specified that it had passed the direction invoking its special powers under Article 142 of the Constitution. Article 142 empowers the Supreme Court to pass any decree or order necessary for doing complete justice in a matter pending before it. In doing so, the two-judge Bench of Justice B R Gavai and Justice K V Viswanathan asserted its powers over the executive for acts that were deemed violating the ethos of the Constitution. The apex court clarified the order would not be applicable to encroachment on public roads, footpaths, railway lines, and other public property.