ROAD ACCIDENTS IN INDIA
The cold statistics of deaths and injuries due to road accidents in India do not reflect the true magnitude of the human anguish and the loss of productivity occasioned by them. As the increase in the number of motorized vehicles on the roads continues to outpace the expansion of the road network, the conditions on the road become more and more chaotic. The chaos is confounded by the failure of the Union Government and the State Governments to make the systemic improvements needed for addressing the problem. It was in this context that COMMON CAUSE had approached the Supreme Court in the year 2003 with comprehensive Writ Petition seeking directions of the Court to the Union of India and the States to undertake specific measures to minimize road accidents. The petition was admitted as Writ Petition (Civil) No. 580 of 2003.
During the five years that the petition was being heard, a large number of affidavits, counter-affidavits, rejoinders and sur-rejoinders were filed and an impressive array of expert opinion adduced with a view to evolving a consensus on the steps to be taken to curb the menace of road accidents. The non-adversarial spirit of this public interest litigation is evident from the tenor of the last affidavit filed by COMMON CAUSE in February, 2008 in response to the affidavit of the Government of Tamil Nadu. Our affidavit is reproduced below.
Unfortunately, around this time, the view that the instrument of public interest litigation was being misused and that the judiciary should refrain from straying into the executive and legislative domains began to be articulated by certain sections of the Supreme Court. Mr. Justice Markandey Katju, whose observations in this regard in Appeal (Civil) 5732/2007 :Aravali Golf Club vs. Chander Hass had led to an animated public debate, expressed serious doubts during the arguments of our writ petition regarding its maintainability on the ground that the Court cannot issue directions to improve road safety measures, as it would amount to legislation by the Court. These comments caused a legitimate apprehension that the Judge had made up his mind to dismiss the petition. Our counsel, therefore, made written submissions arguing, among other things, that a two-judge bench of the Court, which was hearing the petition, was bound by the judgment of a three-judge bench of the Court on a similar issue [ (1997) 8 SCC 770 ]. In that case, the Court had, in a PIL, issued certain directions to the Government to check the rising incidence of road accidents in Delhi. Our written submissions are reproduced below.
It was expected that instead of dismissing the petition, the two- judge bench would refer the petition to a larger bench, setting out the reasons why it could not agree with the earlier judgment. The two judges comprising the bench concurred in separate judgments that the petition should be dismissed. Mr. Justice Katju held that the authority cited by our counsel had been overruled by the Supreme Court in P. Ramchandra Rao and proceeded to dismiss the petition in view of the steps taken by the respondents regarding road safety. While doing so, he also made scathing comments about the rampant misuse of the instrument of PIL and attributed the mounting backlog of cases to the proliferation of PILs. Mr. Justice H. K. Seema, while concurring in the decision to dismiss the petition, disagreed with the general observations of Mr. Justice Katju, which seemed to question the jurisdiction of the Court to entertain the petition as a public interest litigation.
The constraints of space do not allow us to reproduce the two judgments in this issue of your journal. We shall do so in the near future since we are convinced that the matter is far from settled. We are, however, able to include in this issue an article by our counsel, Mr. Prashant Bhushan analysing the larger issues raised in the judgment of Mr. Justice Katju.
