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In India
(A complete study of the evolution of tribunals in India with reference
to the British Tribunal System)
Submitted To:
Prof. (Dr.) I.P. Massey
(Faculty of Law)
Submitted By:
Mukul Krishna Vyas
BBA LL.B (Hons.)
Roll no.- 959
SECTION A
6th Semester
National Law University, Jodhpur
Winter Session
(January-May 2015)
TABLE OF CONTENTS
INTRODUCTION .............................................................................................. 3
CONCLUSION ................................................................................................ 11
BIBLIOGRAPHY ............................................................................................. 14
1 http://supremecourtofindia.nic.in/judlib/Rellks.pdf
clause (i) of clause 2, by referring to the Tribunals in the First Schedule to
the Tribunals Bill. However, the First Schedule does not contain an
exhaustive list of all tribunals set up by the Central Government.2 The First
Schedule to the Bill lists only twenty six such bodies, including the Coastal
Aquaculture Authority, Press Council of India and the National Industrial
Tribunal, all three of which, strictly speaking, are not ‘tribunals’. At the
same time, the list also excludes certain key tribunals. In order to get a grip
on the term ‘tribunals’, the law laid down by the Supreme Court and other
judicial bodies will have to be evaluated. While the term has received
extensive interpretation over a long period of time,3 relevant here would be
an instrumental definition of the term “tribunal” that was adopted by the
Supreme Court of India in NCLT case where it was distinguished from a
Court as follows:
“Though both courts and tribunals exercise judicial power and
discharge similar functions, there are certain well-recognised
differences between courts and tribunals. They are:
(i) Courts are established by the State and are entrusted with the
State's inherent judicial power for administration of justice in
general. Tribunals are established under a statute to adjudicate
upon disputes arising under the said statute, or disputes of a
specified nature. Therefore, all courts are tribunals. But all
tribunals are not courts.
(ii) Courts are exclusively manned by Judges. Tribunals can have
a Judge as the sole Member, or can have a combination of a
judicial Member and a technical Member who is an “expert” in
the field to which the Tribunal relates. Some highly specialised
fact-finding tribunals may have only technical Members, but
they are rare and are exceptions.
(iii) While courts are governed by detailed statutory procedural
rules, in particular the Code of Civil Procedure and the
Evidence Act, requiring an elaborate procedure in decision
making, tribunals generally regulate their own procedure
applying the provisions of the Code of Civil Procedure only
where it is required, and without being restricted by the strict
rules of the Evidence Act.”4
2
The Tribunals, Appellate Tribunals and Other Authorities (Conditions of Service) Bill, 2014 (the “Tribunals
Bill”), First Schedule as on March 16 2015
3
Alok Prasanna Kumar and Rukmini Das, “State of the Nation’s Tribunals: Introduction and Part 1: Telecom
Disputes Settlement and Appellate Tribunal”, Vidhi Centre for Legal Policy, 2014 available at
http://www.vidhilegalpolicy.in/140618_State%20of%20the%20Nation's%20Tribunals%20-%20TDSAT.pdf
4
Madras Bar Association v Union of India, Writ Petition 150 of 2006
It also follows the distinction between ‘tribunals’ and ‘quasi-judicial
authorities’ as recently explained by the Supreme Court in State of Gujarat v
Gujarat Revenue Tribunal Bar Association, where it held that:
“18. …Where there is a lis between two contesting parties and a
statutory authority is required to decide such dispute between them,
such an authority may be called as a quasi-judicial authority i.e. a
situation where, (a) a statutory authority is empowered under a statute
to do any act; (b) the order of such authority would adversely affect the
subject; and (c) although there is no lis or two contending parties, and
the contest is between the authority and the subject; and (d) the
statutory authority is required to act judicially under the statute, the
decision of the said authority is a quasi-judicial decision. An authority
may be described as a quasijudicial authority when it possesses
certain attributes or trappings of a “court”, but not all. In case certain
powers under CPC or CrPC have been conferred upon an authority, but
it has not been entrusted with the judicial powers of State, it cannot be
held to be a court.”5
Therefore the definition of a tribunal can be split up into six criteria, which
collectively are necessary and sufficient to designate a body as a tribunal.
These are:
(1) Permanency;
(2) Independence from the Executive;
(3) Set up by or under law made by Parliament;
(4) To solely decide a lis between parties;
(5) Specific jurisdiction vested by statute;
(6) Not part of the regular judiciary.
5
State of Gujarat v Gujarat Revenue Tribunal Bar Assn, (2012) 10 SCC 353, p. 365 para 18
Law Commission Report.6 In order to avoid clogging the judicial machinery
with cases which would have arisen by the operation of these new socio-
economic legislations, a number of tribunals were established by the
government. The tribunals were established with the object of providing a
speedy, cheap and decentralised determination of disputes arising out of the
various welfare legislations7. Another important reason for the new
development is that law courts, on account of their elaborate procedures,
legalistic fronts and attitudes can hardly render justice to the parties
concerned, in technical cases. Ordinary judges, brought up in the traditions
of law and jurisprudence, are not capable enough to understand
technical problems, which crop up in the wake of modem complex economic
and social processes.Only administrators having expert knowledge can
tackle such problems judiciously. To meet this requirement, a number of
administrative tribunals have come into existence.
In India such tribunals were set up immediately after independence. In fact,
the most important adjudicatory function is carried out by statutory
tribunals created by the legislature to adjudicate upon certain disputes
arising from administrative decisions or to determine issues judicially. The
Railway Rates Tribunal, the Income Tax Appellate Tribunal, Labour
Tribunals, the Companies Tribunal, various Compensation Tribunals,
Revenue Courts of various States, etc., can be cited as examples of such
tribunals.8 Regarding the problem of backlog and delayed disposal of case
the Government set up the Administrative Reforms Commission in 1967. It
was to examine the problem, suggests solutions and also to recommend the
suitable areas in which tribunals could be set up, according to this
commission The reasons for the growth of administrative tribunals are as
follows:
1) Inadequacy of the traditional judiciary to effectively decide
administration-related matters especially when it came to
technicalities.
2) The traditional judiciary was seen to be slow, costly and excessively
procedural.
The Commission also recommended the establishment of independent
tribunals in the following areas:
a) Service matters and dispute of employees under the state
b) Orders of assessment on adjudication under Customs, Central
Excise, Sales Tax and orders under the Motor vehicles Act.
CONCLUSION
It has been noted since the mid of the twentieth century particularly after
the second world war that in the modem state vast expansion of social
legislation and unprecedented growth of the administrative process has
taken place. The problems arising out of this development have become the
most important issue of law and its administration in the present age. They
have affected many aspects of the legal system. Whatever be the causes and
sources of the growth, every student of law observes that the problem of
control of administrative process has assumed gigantic proportions.
Administrative tribunals resolve disputes between, for example, the citizen
and an officer of a government agency or between individuals in an area of
law in which the government has legislated the conduct of their relations.
According to Seervai, “the development of administrative law in a welfare
state has made administrative tribunals a necessity”23. Administrative
tribunals are authorities outside the ordinary court system, which interpret
and apply the laws when acts of public administration are questioned in
formal suits by the courts or by other established methods. They are not a
court nor are they an executive body. Rather they are a mixture of both.
They are judicial in the sense that the tribunals have to decide facts and
apply them impartially, without considering executive policy. They are
administrative because the reasons for preferring them to the ordinary
courts of law are administrative reasons. The Supreme Court in Jaswant
Sugar Mills v. Lakshmi Chand24 aid down the following characteristics or
tests to determine whether an authority is a tribunal or not:
1. Power of adjudication must be derived from a statute or statutory
rule.
2. It must possess the trappings of a court and thereby be vested with
the power to summon witnesses, administer oath, and compel
production of evidence, etc.
3. Tribunals are not bound by strict rules of evidence.
4. They are to exercise their functions objectively and judicially and to
apply the law and resolve disputes independently of executive
policy.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Books Referred
1. C.K. Thakker, Administrative Law 226 (1996).
2. H. M. Serwai, Constitutionsl law of India (1968 ed.).
3. H. P. Chattopadhyay, InduBaghel, Theory of Public
Administration 211 (1st ed. 2009).
4. History of Law of England, Vol. I, 57-63 (4thEdn.).
5. I. P. Massey, Administrative Law 605-606 (8th ed. 2012).
6. M. P. Jain, Principles of Administrative Law, 246-248 (1996).
7. R. Nayak, Administrative justice In India 38 (1989).
8. Wade & Forsyth, Administrative Law 771(10th ed. 2009).
9. Webster’s New World Dictionary 1517 (1972); Concise Oxford
Dictionary, 1530-1531 (2002).
Articles Referred
1. Administrative Reform Commission, Report on Personnel
Administration (1969).
2. Law Commission of India, Fourteenth Report, Reform of Judicial
Administration(1958).
3. Perspective, SLJ (Journal Section) 1-5 (1986).
Web Resources
1. Abhishek Kumar Jha, Administrative Tribunals of India- a Study In
The Light Of Decided Cases, (October 20, 2013)
http://www.academia.edu/4614327/ADMINISTRATIVE_TRIBUNALS_
OF_INDIA_A_Study_in_the_light_of_decided_cases.
2. Central Administrative Tribunal, Principal Branch, New Delhi, Central
Administrative Tribunal: Introduction, (October 23, 2013)
http://cgat.gov.in.
3. Industrial Tribunals and the Fair Employment Tribunals, Northern
Ireland, Industrial Tribunals, (October 30,
2013),www.employmenttribunalsni.co.uk/index/employment_tribunals
/industrial_tribunals.htm.
4. Ministry of Labour and Employment, Government of India, Central
Government Industrial Tribunal cum Labour Courts, (October 30,
2013),labour.gov.in/content/division/central-govt-industrial-
tribunal.php.
5. Rajib Hassan, Judicial Review of the Decisions of Administrative
Tribunals by the Supreme Court and High Courts: A Long-standing
Controversy- Settled (October 26, 2013),
http://www.articlesbase.com/national-state-local-articles/judicial-
review-of-the-decisions-of-administrative-tribunals-by-the-supreme-
court-and-high-courts-a-long-standing-controversy-settled-
4912243.html.
6. Tribunalisation in India, http://legalsutra.org/1446/tribunalisation-
in-india/ (last updated October 16, 2011).