2022: A year of high-profile cases for Delhi High Court

New Delhi: A high-profile political tussle over controlling the Shiv Sena and a bittter turf war between the Delhi government and the lieutenant governor played out in the Delhi High Court in 2022, while it had under the lens the privacy policy of WhatsApp and delivered landmark verdicts including the one upholding the right of women to terminate pregnancy.

The Centre's contentious 'Agnipath' scheme for recruitment in the armed forces saw some searching questions being asked by the high court which also pronounced a split verdict on criminalising marital rape and allowed the parties to approach the Supreme Court.

It also dealt with important commercial matters, including staying the prohibition on automatic levy of service charge on food bills by restaurants, and those involving Chinese smartphone maker Vivo. The feud between the US-based e-commerce giant Amazon and Future group also hogged the limelight.

The high court welcomed a new Chief Justice in Justice Satish Chandra Sharma and got 18 more judges this year.

It also made some momentous decisions this year as it stepped in to clean up the mess in the sporting arena. The high court struck down as illegal the posts of Life President, Life Member and CEO in Hockey India and constituted a committee of administrators to conduct its affairs.

In separate cases, the court also appointed “administrators” to manage the affairs of Table Tennis Federation of India and Judo Federation of India.

While the world debated the US Supreme Court overturning of the constitutional right to abortion, the Delhi High Court in 2022 said the “ultimate decision” in matters of abortion ought to recognise a woman’s choice to give birth and the possibility of dignified life of the unborn child.

In a significant ruling which allowed a 26-year-old to undergo medical termination of her 33-week pregnancy as the foetus was suffering from cerebral abnormalities, the high court emphasised that the “choice of a woman” was recognised by Indian law.

It also allowed the termination of over 30-week pregnancy due to a rare chromosomal disorder in the foetus in one case, while permitting a 16-year-old rape survivor to undergo abortion at 28 weeks of pregnancy in another.

While deciding on whether to criminalise marital rape, a hot button issue, one of the judges of the division bench favoured striking down the exception given to husbands in the law and said it would be "tragic if a married woman's call for justice is not heard even after 162 years" since the enactment of the IPC.

The other judge, however, said the exception under the rape law is not "unconstitutional and was based on an intelligible differentia".

The Centre, which faced Opposition flak over 'Agnipath', defended the short-term recruitment scheme before the high court which reserved its verdict on several petitions assailing the policy.

The government claimed the scheme was introduced in exercise of its sovereign function to make national security and defence more "robust, "impenetrable" and "abreast with changing military requirement".

The dispute between two rival factions of the Shiv Sena reached the high court which dismissed former Maharashtra chief minister Uddhav Thackeray’s challenge to an Election Commission interim order freezing the party's name and election symbol.

It also restrained Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) and its leaders from making “defamatory" statements against Delhi Lieutenant Governor Vinai Kumar Saxena.

It directed Congress’ Jairam Ramesh, Pawan Khera and Netta D'Souza to take down social media posts on allegations levelled against Union minister Smriti Irani and her daughter relating to ownership of a bar in Goa.

The high court ruled the AAP government's doorstep ration delivery scheme in Delhi cannot be implemented in its present form as it has not been approved by the LG who was not on the same page.

The high court, at the same time, voiced displeasure over the "failure" of police to prevent an incident of vandalism at Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal's house in March, terming it "very disturbing state of affairs".

The high court paved the way for vacation of sprawling official bungalows in possession of MP Chirag Paswan, former Janata Dal (United) president Sharad Yadav and ex-MP Subramanian Swamy, and stayed the Lokapal proceedings against JMM chief Shibu Soren.

Several cases connected with the North East Delhi riots of February 2020 continued to demand the high court’s time.

It denied bail to former JNU student Umar Khalid in a related Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act case and dismissed a plea by some CPI(M) leaders for registration of an FIR against BJP’s Anurag Thakur and Parvesh Verma for their alleged hate speeches concerning anti-CAA protests at Shaheen Bagh.

Congress leaders Sonia Gandhi and Rahul Gandhi opposed a plea for lodging FIRs against them over alleged hate speeches, contending that preventing a citizen from expressing a bonfide opinion against any bill or law passed by Parliament is violative of the right to free speech and principles of democracy.

While dealing with commercial and business disputes, the high court dismissed a plea by a Future Group company seeking termination of arbitral proceedings initiated against it by Amazon.

It allowed chinese smartphone maker Vivo to operate its various bank accounts frozen in connection with a money laundering probe, subject to furnishing of a bank guarantee of Rs 950 crore.

Significantly, the high court also held that WhatsApp’s 2021 privacy policy places its users in a “take it or leave it” situation, virtually forcing them into an agreement by providing a “mirage” of choices and then sharing their sensitive data with its parent company Facebook.

The high court refused to grant bail to Christian Michel James in the AgustaWestland Chopper scam cases and dismissed TMC’s Abhishek Banerjee’s plea against summons issued to him in a money laundering probe linked to an alleged coal scam in West Bengal.

It also refused to suspend the 7-year jail term awarded to Sushil and Gopal Ansal in the Uphaar fire tragedy evidence tampering case. It stayed an order granting bail to Congress leader Sajjan Kumar in a 1984 riots case.

The court granted bail to Chitra Ramkrishna, the former MD and CEO of the NSE, in CBI’s colocation scam case.

The high court closed the proceedings in several pleas relating to the COVID-19 pandemic, including those concerning tests and disposal of the dead, as the situation improved.

It also directed St Stephen's College to follow the admission policy formulated by Delhi University and accord 100 per cent weightage to the CUET 2022 score while granting admission to non-minority students in its undergraduate courses.

Terming it a 'publicity interest litigation', high court dismissed with costs a PIL seeking directions for the Shraddha Walkar murder investigation to be transferred from Delhi Police to the Central Bureau of Investigation.

She was strangled and her body cut into 35 pieces allegedly by her live-in partner who kept them in a fridge for almost three weeks at his home and then dumped the body parts across the city over several days in the dead of the night.