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NEW DELHI: Supreme Court’s decision on Monday — its last working day of 2025 — to stay its own 40-day-old order on the Aravali controversy was only the latest in a series of flip flops witnessed in the year, during which orders were set aside within months after they were passed — a fact noticed by SC itself, which emphasized in one of its judgments that the trend would cost the court’s credibility.The cases and issues that witnessed judicial reversals include menace of stray dogs, a governor’s power regarding assent to bills forwarded by a state legislature, ban on firecrackers, retrospective environmental clearance, insolvency of Bhushan Steel Ltd, and finally, the Aravali controversy.
This phenomenon of one bench’s order being overturned by another within a short interval, even when there was no change in circumstances, perhaps indicates that the original orders were passed in a hurry without analysing all relevant issues related to the case. It also reflects the judge-centric approach, rather than principle-centric approach, in deciding a case.In the Bhushan Steel case, SC on May 2 quashed acquisition of bankrupt company Bhushan Power & Steel Ltd (BPSL) by JSW Steel under the Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code (IBC) and ordered liquidation of the debt-laden company. Three months later, the court on July 31 recalled the order. It passed a judgment on Sept 26 upholding the National Company Law Appellate Tribunal’s decision approving the Rs 19,700-crore resolution plan of JSW Steel to takeover BPSLIn the stray dogs case, SC took suo motu cognisance and passed a slew of directions on Aug 11 for catching of strays and putting them in shelter homes in view of rising number of dog bites and death caused by rabies. The case was transferred to another bench within a week and the new bench had on Aug 22 modified the order and directed that strays after being sterilised, vaccinated must be released to their territories under the Animal Birth Control Rules and they should not be confined to shelter homes.A similar thing happened in the Vanashakti petition, when SC on May 16 declared ex post facto (retrospective) environmental clearances illegal under the Environment (Protection) Act but the three judge bench of the court by a 2:1 majority recalled that order in Nov.Expressing concern over benches overturning orders passed by earlier benches, SC mentioned this in a judgment delivered on Nov 26, and said that it was “painfully” observing this growing trend which would “undermine this court’s authority”.In a rare instance of self-introspection on SC’s functioning, a bench of Justices Dipankar Datta and AG Masih had said public confidence in the judiciary would be undermined if cases are reopened and special benches are set up to re-hear a case at the behest of some party aggrieved by the verdict.“In the recent past, we have rather painfully observed a growing trend in this Court (of which we too are an indispensable part) of verdicts pronounced by judges, whether still in office or not and irrespective of the time lapse since pronounced, being overturned by succeeding benches or specially constituted benches at the behest of some party aggrieved by the verdicts prior in point of time,” it had said.“To us, the object of Article 141 of the Constitution seems to be this: the pronouncement of a verdict by a bench on a particular issue of law (arising out of the facts involved) should settle the controversy, being final, and has to be followed by all courts as law declared by the Supreme Court,” the bench had said.It had held that judicial discipline, propriety and comity, which are also inseparable parts of a just and proper decision-making process, demand that a subsequent bench of different combination defers to the view expressed by the earlier bench, unless there is something so grossly erroneous on the face of the record or palpably wrong that it necessitates a re-look in exercise of inherent jurisdiction either by a review petition or through a curative petition. Go to Source