Locus standi

Also called: Standing · Topic: Judiciary: Independence, Structure, Judicial Review and Activism · NCERT: Class 11, Ch 6 "Judiciary"

Meaning

Locus standi (also called standing) is the right of a person to bring a case to court and be heard. It decides who may go to court, not whether that person's case is right. It matters because the old rule kept the poor out of court. Once the Supreme Court relaxed it, from about 1979, public interest litigation (PIL) became possible.

Explanation

The old rule: only the injured person can sue

• Traditional locus standi: only the person who was actually harmed could go to court.
• The problem: many victims could not come to court themselves because of:
• poverty
• illiteracy

• being in prison

• So their rights existed on paper but could not be enforced.

The relaxed rule: anyone acting in good faith can sue for others

• Why it changed:
• The Supreme Court's reputation suffered during the Emergency (1975–77).
• After 1977 it won back public trust by turning towards the poor and voiceless.

• Justices P.N. Bhagwati and V.R. Krishna Iyer led this change.

• From about 1979: public-spirited people, groups and lawyers were allowed to sue on behalf of those who could not reach the court.

• S.P. Gupta v. Union of India (1981), also called the First Judges case:
• Any member of the public acting bona fide (in good faith) may go to court under Article 32 or Article 226 for people who cannot do so themselves.

• The same case warned against busybodies, meaning outsiders who interfere for their own reasons.

• Result: groups, not only individuals, can now seek justice. NCERT calls this democratising access to courts.

The form of the petition was relaxed too

• Once anyone could sue, the court also accepted simpler ways to reach it.
• Epistolary jurisdiction (treating a letter as a writ petition): the Supreme Court has treated letters, telegrams, postcards and news reports as writ petitions on many occasions [2].
• A petitioner can approach the Supreme Court by a formal writ petition or by a letter to the Chief Justice of India that raises a question of public importance [2].

Limits: the standing is wide, but not open to everyone

• Busybodies are barred: meddlesome outsiders have no locus standi in a PIL (Janata Dal v. H.S. Chowdhary, 1992).
• Checks before a court accepts a PIL:
• The court should verify the petitioner's credentials.
• It should be satisfied, on a first look, that the petition's contents are correct.

• It should be satisfied that a substantial public interest is involved [3].

• What the petition must contain: the relief sought, the grounds, the petitioner's credentials, and a declaration that the petitioner has no personal interest, direct or indirect, in the matter [3].

• Costs: courts may impose exemplary costs (heavy fines) on frivolous petitions (State of Uttaranchal v. Balwant Singh Chaufal, 2010).
• Letter-petitions are screened: under the Supreme Court's PIL guidelines on letter-petitions (1988, later revised), only listed categories are accepted. These include bonded labour, neglected children, complaints from jails, police harassment, atrocities on women, SCs and STs, and environmental pollution.

In the Constitution and practice

• Where it sits: the word "locus standi" is not in the Constitution. It is a rule the courts made. The relaxed rule works through two Articles:
• Article 32: the right to go to the Supreme Court to enforce Fundamental Rights. It is itself a Fundamental Right.

• Article 226: the power of a High Court to issue writs for Fundamental Rights and also "for any other purpose", so its reach is wider.

• Landmark cases where someone other than the victim was allowed to sue:

Case	Year	Who came to court	Outcome
Hussainara Khatoon v. State of Bihar	1979	An advocate, using newspaper reports about undertrials (people in jail not yet tried)	Speedy trial is part of Article 21. Thousands of undertrials were freed.
Sunil Batra v. Delhi Administration	1980	A Tihar Jail prisoner's scribbled note to Justice Krishna Iyer, turned into a petition	Prisoners keep their Fundamental Rights.
S.P. Gupta v. Union of India	1981	—	Locus standi formally relaxed for bona fide public-spirited persons.
PUDR v. Union of India	1982	Petition on behalf of Asiad workers	Paying below the minimum wage is forced labour under Article 23.
Bandhua Mukti Morcha v. Union of India	1984	Petition on behalf of bonded labourers in Haryana's stone quarries	The poor need a non-adversarial approach (Bhagwati).
Janata Dal v. H.S. Chowdhary	1992	—	Busybodies have no locus standi in a PIL.
State of Uttaranchal v. Balwant Singh Chaufal	2010	—	PIL guidelines; exemplary costs on frivolous petitions.

• Spread abroad: the PIL model spread to South Asia and Africa. South Africa's Constitution (1996) lets anyone acting in the public interest approach the courts (NCERT box).

Don't confuse with

• Public interest litigation (PIL): locus standi is the rule on who may sue. PIL is the type of case that became possible once that rule was relaxed.
• Suo motu cognizance: under relaxed locus standi a third person still files the case. In suo motu, the court takes up the matter on its own, and no petitioner is needed (e.g. Suo Motu W.P. (C) No. 6 of 2020 on migrant workers [4]).
• Epistolary jurisdiction: this is about the form of the petition (a letter treated as a writ petition). Locus standi is about the person filing it.
• Amicus curiae: a lawyer the court appoints to help it. The lawyer does not represent either side and is not a petitioner with standing.

Prelims Hooks

• S.P. Gupta v. Union of India (1981) relaxed locus standi. It is also the First Judges case.
• A PIL can be filed under Article 32 (Supreme Court) or Article 226 (High Courts). Trap: Article 136 (special leave to appeal) is not the PIL route.
• Hussainara Khatoon (1979): filed by an advocate using newspaper reports. It is often called the first reported PIL, and it held speedy trial to be part of Article 21.
• Janata Dal v. H.S. Chowdhary (1992): busybodies have no locus standi in a PIL.
• Balwant Singh Chaufal (2010): PIL guidelines and exemplary costs on frivolous petitions.
• A PIL petition must declare that the petitioner has no personal interest, direct or indirect, in the matter [3].

Mains Points

• Access to justice: relaxed locus standi closed the gap between rights on paper and rights in practice.
• Undertrials, prisoners, bonded labourers and workers reached the court through others (Hussainara 1979; Bandhua Mukti Morcha 1984).

• It made the government answer for its actions and turned Article 21 into a living guarantee.

• Misuse and overreach: wide standing also invited "private interest litigation", where a private dispute is dressed up as a public cause, and petitions filed for publicity or as political or business weapons.

• These clog dockets that already have huge backlogs.

• Courts acting on such petitions sometimes enter executive work, which blurs the separation of powers (the division of work between the legislature, the executive and the judiciary).

• The balance: filter abuse without closing the door on the poor.

• Screen petitioners' credentials and demand a declaration of no personal interest [3].
• Impose exemplary costs on frivolous petitions (Balwant Singh Chaufal, 2010).
• Publish clear criteria for admitting letter-petitions, and strengthen legal aid so the poor need PIL "proxies" less often.

Related concepts

• Judicial activism
• Public interest litigation
• Hussainara Khatoon case
• Sunil Batra case
• Bandhua Mukti Morcha case
• Epistolary jurisdiction
• Suo motu cognizance
• Amicus curiae

Read more

• Judicial activism and the rise of PIL