Legal Mirror

You might Not be the Owner of the Land Registered in your Name – The Land Acquisition Act says so

Do you know a 100 year old Act may deprive you of your property in a couple of days?

The Land Acquisition Act, 1894 gives considerable power to the government to to acquire any land for “public purposes”. The Act is being misused by both State and Central governments to acquire multitude of lands specially in the rural areas in the illusion of development and urbanization.

Purpose of the Act

Acquisition of land was a primary requirement of the British in order to carry out some of their most ambitious projects ...read more

Why a business tycoon killed his own driver?

“If I speak the truth, I will not live.”  were the last few words spoken by Janeshwar Sharma in a television interview. The deceased was working as a driver of the affluent business tycoon Anil Nanda.

In his interview, he alleged that Anil Nanda, his partner Jitendra Pandey and Manager Dhiraj Balani were involved in a sex scandal. He claimed that Nanda paid some boys to have sex with him at one his houses in the Friends Colony, Delhi. He also sexually exploited his employees at the said house. If the employees ...read more

India’s Cruel Torture Bill

Statistics

1. Every year number of custodial deaths increase considerably.

2.  From 1994-2008; 16,886 custodial deaths were recorded.

3.  In 2007-08; 188 and 1789  people died in police and  judicial custody respectively.

Definition of Torture

Article 1 of United Nations Convention against torture, 1984 defines torture as:-

Any act by which public officials intentionally  inflict severe pain or suffering ( physical or mental) to a person for fullfiling certain purposes like seeking information or a confession, punishment, intimidation or discrimination of the victim.

Indian Position

India signed the UN Convention against ...read more

Married in India but Divorced in US

Everyone celebrated their wedding. The groom was an NRI engineer settled in Boston who came to Punjab to marry Manjeet, a beautiful village girl. No one had ever anticipated that this fairy tale would turn into a nightmare until the groom decided to abandon Manjeet and marry again.

He obtained a divorce decree in US. Subsequently, Manjeet filled a petition in an Indian Court. The court declared the divorce null and void although it hardly had jurisdiction over the foreign decree. Now, her husband is divorced in States but married in India.

According to NCW ...read more

Insight to Bhopal Gas Tragedy: A case lost before trial

Almost everyone around the globe is aware of the catastrophe that happened in Bhopal but there are a very few people who actually know what were the legal lacunae involved in the Bhopal case. The battle was lost before the trial and the victims were betrayed at every step of legal proceedings.

The Battle in United States

At that time Indian Law had no provision of punitive damages to effectively deal with the Bhopal Gas Tragedy. The Government of India through an act appointed itself the sole representative of the victims for any legal ...read more

Male Rapes – Some Myths, Statistics, True Incidents and Legal Insight

A True Story

Is Rape attempted only on females? I would request you to think again. Male rapes are not fiction created in novels and movies. What happened in Shawshank Redemption can happen to anyone at any place.

Shikhar (name changed) was popular at his college for being a philanderer. He had multiple girlfriends and at age of 22, he had everything a student could aspire for. He shared his room with two of his classmates. His relations with them were not cordial. He had some unresolved issues with them. One night ...read more

Selling their bodies killing their souls: Plight of widows in Vrindavan and Mathura

Sati as a practice was not invented by Ancient Indian texts but by the greed of people. Most of the contemporary historians believe that the practice of Sati was encouraged to deprive the widows from the property of their deceased husbands. Family members (usually the surviving brothers of the deceased) cloaked their desires under the shadow of religion. Hinduism was used as a weapon to rightly ask for the lives of innocent widowed women. The women under societal pressure were made to self immolate themselves. This served twin purposes; the family was ...read more

Does justice look this monstrous?

Whatever little bit of respect I had for some of the ‘mainstream’ media, is shrouded in agitation today. Almost every channel from one of the acclaimed ‘world-democracy’ flashed the news of ‘ Kasab sentenced to death – justice served’. It is of great misfortune that common brains are being fed with such contaminated views and disdain prevails in our thoughts and comprehensions. I do not want to get into the legal implications of the trial or the verdict and nor the sentence is of much of sensation as almost everyone knew the ...read more

Improper postmortem can lead to the death of justice

A dead body was found in a remote village of Madhya Pradesh. It had been discovered in a well after seven days of the death of the deceased. It was in a heinous condition and the people were even scared to look at it. The matter was reported to the police. The constable went running to the house of the government doctor who was posted in the village.

There was party organized at his house. Everyone a couple of doctors, their wives and children were enjoying some quality time with each other.

The news ...read more

Decoding the D.N.A legislation in India

The forensic technology has played an integral role in solving criminal cases. D.N.A (Deoxyribonucleic Acid) tests, first discovered by Prof. Alec Jeffreys in 1985 in England has now become a credible source for identifying a person with the help of his blood, hair, sperm, muscle, nerve or tissue sample. Sometimes when the victims resist, they scratch their attackers, in such cases skin cells underneath the victim’s fingernails are extracted to identify the criminal. Compared to a blood test, the possibility of a D.N.A finger printing going wrong is one in 30,000 million.

D.N.A fingerprinting: ...read more