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The Supreme Court today allowed the live streaming of cases of Constitutional importance that take place in the Court of the Chief Justice of India.
The apex court will soon frame the necessary rules and guidelines in this regard.
The judgment was rendered by a Bench of Chief Justice of India Dipak Misra, Justice AM Khanwilkar and Justice DY Chandrachud. The two opinions penned in today’s judgment are by Justices Khanwilkar and Chandrachud.
The judgment came in a batch of petitions, one of which was filed by Swapnil Tripathi, and another by Senior Advocate Indira Jaising.
Jaising, in her petition, had sought live streaming and webcast of cases of national and Constitutional importance.
The Court had sought assistance from Attorney General of India KK Venugopal. Venugopal had agreed to the proposal by the petitioners and had submitted a set of guidelines for implementing the pilot project in the Chief Justice’s Court for Constitutional cases.
The guidelines proposed by AG Venugopal stated that this exercise could be implemented in other courtrooms based on the success of the pilot project.
After hearing the proposed guidelines, the Court had reserved its order on August 24.
During the course of the hearing, the Bench had observed that a step like live streaming “was the need of the hour” not only for decongesting the courtrooms, but also to fully implement the idea of an “open court”.
Batting for access of the proceedings inside the courtroom to the public at large, CJI Misra had remarked in one of the hearings that remarks made by judges should be recorded.
The issue of misreporting of court proceedings by the media was also touched upon during the course of this case, with Justice Chandrachud opining that the menace of misreporting was already prevalent in the absence of live streaming of court proceedings and could perhaps be curbed by implementing this exercise.
Read the judgment below.
