Dr. T. S. N. Sastry tsnsastry@gmail.

com

Head, Dept. of Law Date : 31-1-2011

Respected Sir,

I am glad to bring to your kind notice, the Department is conducting the Annual Moot
Court Competition for the Post Graduate Students during 11-12March 2011. As you are
well aware, this is the second year of the first Moot Competition in the history of Post Graduate
Legal Education in the country. The event is conducted in order to emphasize for the post
graduate students that the techniques of research skills learnt by them and I am sure that this will
be of immense help in joining the legal profession apart from teaching and research or the
corporate world.

A copy of the Moot problem and the rules of the competition is enclosed to be displayed
in your campus and to bring to the knowledge of the PG students of your esteemed institution.
For the Moot Court problem and the rules and regulation, students may visit the official website
of the University. (www.unipune.ac.in).

I solicit your cooperation in bringing the same to the attention to the faculty and students
and in sending a team from your institution to make the event a grand success.

Thanking you and with regards.

Yours faithfully,

(T. S. N. Sastry)

Head, Dept. of Law

 UNIVERSITY OF PUNE

DEPARTMENT OF LAW

Invites you to participate in the

Annual Post Graduate National Moot Court Competition

On
Social Networking - National Security, Right to
Privacy and Human Rights
Date: 11-12 March 2011
at
Department of Law
University of Pune
Chief Patron Organising Committee
Dr. R.K. Shevgaonkar Dr. Dilip. Ukey
Vice Chancellor, Uni. Of Pune Dr. Durgambini Patel
Co-Patron Mr. Naresh Waghmare
Dr. T.S.N.Sastry, Professor, HOD Ms. Sonia Nagarale

Co-ordinator- Dr. Jyoti Bhakare, Reader, Dept. of Law

Mobile- 91+ 9422008075

Student Co- Ordinators

Hassain Kaazi- mob. +91-9422578178
Bhalchandra Shinde- mob.+91- 9975943575
Sheetal Bagal- mob.- 91+9881864953
Deepak Hole- mob.-91+ 9881738022

Last date of registration – 25th Feb. 2011

Last date of submission of Memorials- 4th March 2011

For further details refer our website www.unipune.ac.in

e-mail : pulawdept@gmail.com, jyotibhakare@gmail.com
Phone : (Off.) 020-25601304 Fax : 020-25692879
 University of Pune

Department of Law

Annual Post Graduate National Moot Court Competition

To be held on 11 -12 March 2011

Petition filed before the Hon’ble Supreme Court of Indiana for the adjudication of the
issues of Leakage of Information by Social Networking Groups, Public and private
Institutions vis-à-vis Protection of Law of Privacy and human rights.

NAME OF THE PARTIES:

People’s Union for Human Rights v. State of Indiana

© Dept of Law, University of Pune

 FACTS OF THE CASE

The State of Indiana is located in the South Asian Region of Asia. It is one of the
ancient nations in the world. The country is well equipped with a cultural outlook with
civilization. It is a democratic country with a Republican constitution. The constitution of
the country guarantees fundamental rights to the citizens on par with the principles of
international Law of Human Rights.

Apart from the Constitution, the country has rich number of texts dealing with
number of aspects relating to culture, Dharma, and Privacy. But there is no specific
legislation dealing with the law of Privacy.

In order to cater to the needs of the society and to develop its growth rate in
conjunction with number of developing countries around the world, the State of Indiana
too opened up its economy in 1990. After the opening up of economy, the country made a
leeway of administrative norms for a number of information centers in the country with a
huge number of concessions. With this, in a quick span of time, the country became one of
the leading exporters of software. Almost all the states of the country and the Union have
fallen in line with the information technology and started rendering various services
through information technology.

Due to the lenient view of the Government, a number of IT parks and individuals
established social service centers to provide services in various sectors of the country. A
number of mobile phone companies too joined in providing a number of social networking
services to their customers. In the process, the multinational companies in order to provide
their services have developed formats to get extensive information of individuals to provide
various services. Basing on this, the information parks and mobile phone companies
entered into tie-ups with a good number of social sector organization s and launched a host
of websites. Almost all the websites made it mandatory with strict legal terms and
conditions to fill the application forms online with a detailed description of details for
rendering any service form their organization. The data has been generated by each
provider, started supplying to various other organizations for legal consideration. Further,
the Government in order to attract foreign currency into the country has relaxed a number
of clauses to provide licenses to mobile companies on the name of providing cheapest
service in mobile industry in the world to its citizens. Further, considering the usefulness of
information technology and the quick delivery system of service, the Government has also
updated its administrative machinery and most of the public institutions fallen in line with
the private competitors and sought personal information of individuals.

As there was no enacted law to regulate the information sector and the social
networking groups, most of the service providers started leaking the information of their
clients to a host of websites for different purposes and the photos that were placed by
individuals especially, children and women were digitally modified and started using for
various illegal activities which are offensive and blemishing the personality of the
individuals. Apart from that some of the service providers started encrypting the various
websites and taking information of the individuals and using it for several types of
wrongful purposes.

Taking into consideration of the activities of the IT and Social network groups, the
Government has enacted an Information Technology Law and Regulation in the year 2000.
However, there were a number of lope sided provisions in the legislation to help the IT
industries and the Government organizations. The law also does not contain provisions to
protect the privacy of individuals and permits data banks to reveal the information to
Government and other agencies approved by Government on the name of Security of the
Country. The Criminal Laws and the Law of Evidence though have provisions; they are
not of much help. Most of the provisions of the criminal law is not updated in tune with the
latest developments and are less consequential as they are not affectively deter wrongdoers.
Further, in the year 2008 though the Government of Indiana amended the law extensively,
still left untouched those provisions which are related to social networking groups.

In the above scenario in the name of security, the Government took a decision to
issue national identity cards to all the citizens before December, 2012. In this regard the
Government wanted entire information of every individual including all the personal
details which will be under the control of the office of the Prime Minister of the country.
Apart from the above, in the name of security, the Government has asked some of the
mobile phone companies to provide all information in detail whenever it is sought, of their
subscribers and access to their information at any point of time. Further the Government
issued another order that the various security organizations like police, vigilance etc., have
a right to tap of the mobile phones and to encrypt the computers of any person in the
country at any point of time without any prior information through the internet providers.
It has also said that the news channels should not broad cast any item with respect to the
uses and misuses of information technology and no bulk messaging by individuals or by
internet providers which are identified from time to time. Further, it said that all the
information avenues need to provide any information in their custody including the
identity of persons need to be revealed to the state.

The opposition parties opposed all the moves advocated by the government and
contended that all these steps initiated by the government are violative of a number of
fundamental rights guaranteed by the Constitution and human rights to which the state
being a party to a number of International Conventions of Human Rights. They tried their
best in the Parliament to stop the Government including complete stalling of the entire
session of the Parliament. The government thrashed all the contentions, and said that in the
era of good governance, the state always has a right to exercise its power on any issue that
affects the security of the country. It started arguing that the Right to Information is
available not only to individuals to seek information from the Government, but the
Government also has a right under the philosophy of Human Rights. The Government
further launched a propaganda that the information that it tries to sought and tapping of
mobile phones of individuals is a well conceived idea to protect the people from terrorist
acts for which the state is prone.

At this juncture, a communiqué issued by the Ministry of Home Affairs of the

country further stated that all the steps taken by the Government are only in tune with the
Constitution and the philosophical contours of human rights. It further stated that the
paramount consideration of the Government is to provide security to all its citizens under
any circumstances and to prevent the breach of security by foreign invaders. In this
situation as argued by the opposition parties, privacy is not the only sole criteria to collect
information of individuals by the state. The communiqué also assured that information
received by the state in no way will be either misused or leaked to private agencies for
illegal purposes. The communiqué also stated that even the human rights law is not above
the interests of the state in providing security to its citizens. The state is only taking
precaution in protecting the human rights of the individuals, especially from the massive
attacks of terrorists and other national groups fighting for various reasons and killing
innocent people. It also said that seeking of such information of individuals whenever it
deem fit will effectively help the state to identify the acts of any group which tries to
destabilize the peace and security of the country and the mass killings and other destructive
activities aimed at the innocent lives of people.

The communiqué blamed the opposition parties and the media that they are
unnecessarily exacerbating the issue to gain popularity and to create chaos in the country
by misguiding the people in the name of violation of their right of privacy. The
communiqué appealed the people to cooperate with the steps taken by the government and
not to listen to false propaganda of the media and the Opposition parties. The communiqué
also stated that if any individual or organization refuses to adhere to the norms laid down
by the government from time to time in providing information to it whenever it is sought,
civil and criminal action will be initiated. It empowered the police to take cognizance of
any incident of refusal to provide information, and to proceed further sternly including
arresting the persons, and sealing the organizations who refused to divulge such
information or to cancel the licenses.

In this scenario, the Peoples Union for Human Rights considering the significant
impact of the decision of the Government on the exercise of Fundamental Human Rights of
the citizens. And, the impact of the decisions on right to privacy and the misuse of
information by the social networking groups of a great cultural country wrote a letter to
the Chief Justice of Indiana requesting the Supreme Court to intervene to protect the
rights of the citizens as guaranteed by the constitution on the following grounds.

1) Any intervention into the personal affairs of the people of the country is opposed
to public policy at large as recognized from ancient period which are part and
parcel of cryptography. Such Encryption would not only violative of privacy of
individuals but infringe the Law of Copyright.

2) In the modern era of democratic governance and good governance, the powers
of the state are restricted and need to be exercised only in the promotion of best
interest of individuals. Instead the state started advocating in an adverse
manner which is not in tune with the concept of good governance evolved all
over the world. Any deviation is tantamount to gross violation of the provisions
of the Constitution and international obligations and especially the culture that
has been developed by a number of texts of the country from ancient periods.
Accordingly the state may be directed to withdraw all the steps and the
communiqué of the Ministry of Home Affairs with immediate effect, before it
further erupts into serious crises.

3) The provisions which are made by the Government to tap the mobile phones at
will and the relaxation of rules in allocation of licenses to the telephone
companies at will by the ruling party in power, are to encourage corruption in
the country in a massive manner and causing loss to the Government and to
further to protect the interest of its ministers and legislators and with an aim to
harass the opposition parties. Further, in order to win the elections this is a
means to gain votes by keeping a vigil on the activities of opposition parties to
thwart their activists by framing false charges and to use the entire machinery
of information for its advantage. It appealed the Court as a custodian of the
human rights and the constitution of the country, to scrap the illegal licenses
given to certain phone companies without adhering to proper norms and to
collect the revenue loss caused by such Ministers and officials.

4) It further requested the court to direct the state to amend the Information
Technology Law and Regulation and other necessary civil and criminal laws of
the country in view of the impact of science and technology especially in the
information era with stringent provisions and deterrent punishment to any
social service provider whomsoever leaks information or uses it for any illegal
purposes. It further requested the court to direct the private and public agencies
which violated the law of privacy and leaked the information to various agencies
and in morphing the photos of women and children and used for promoting
vulgar items affecting the decency of women and children.
5) The petitioner sought further directions, to the investigating agencies and the
police to destroy the files which contain the invading privacy information with
them and not to collect information of individuals without any prior notice and
the purpose for which it is sought.

Taking into consideration of the public spirit in the petition, the Hon’ble
Supreme Court accepted the letter as a writ petition and issued notices to the
Union of Indiana and all the Chief Secretaries of the states and Union
Territories of it to defend their case.

The case is posted for final arguments during 11-12 March 2011 and for
disposal.
 ANNEXURE I

1) All the relevant ancient, modern, texts of Indian law may be referred for arguing
the case.
2) All the international conventions on Human Rights to which India is a party may be
referred.

ANNEXURE II
Rules and Regulations of the competition

1. The Competition is open only to the regular (internal) PG (LL. M/ML) students of Law those
who are on roles at present in the respective institution.
2. The Participating teams should submit registration form in the enclosed format only.
3. TA/DA may be obtained from the respective institution by the participating teams.
4. The teams will be provided with the accommodation. If accommodation is required specific
request must be made in the registration form itself.
5. All the institutions should send the names of the participating teams on or before 25th Feb.
2011.
6. All the mooters appearing for the competition should wear black coat and a tie for gents; and
a coat for the lady mooters.
7. All the participating teams should send the memorials within the prescribed deadline prior to
on or before 4th March 2011.
8. The final round of the competition will be judged by the Hon’ble Judge of the Supreme
Court /High court/ Senior Advocate/ Senior Academician.
9. The memorial should be around 25 pages.
10. The memorial should be prepared in the format of guidelines specified. (Refer Annexure III)
11. Among the memorials the memorial adjudged as the best by the judges will be declared as
the Best Memorial.
12. There shall be following prizes :
a) The best mooting team as Winners with a trophy.
b) The second best team will be given Runners trophy.
c) The Best Advocate mooter will be given a memento and a certificate.
d) The Best Memorial will receive a memento and a certificate.
e) All the participants will be given certificates.
13. Apart from the members of the participating team one teacher of the respective institution or
department may accompany the team. However they have to claim TA/DA from their
respective institution.
14. The Decision of the Host Institution is final in all respects. All disputes if any are only to the
jurisdiction of the Department of Law, University of Pune whose decision shall be final and
binding on the parties concerned and no further appeal is allowed.
15. The names of the participating teams will be kept confidential from the purview of the judges
till the end of the competition.
16. The names of the teams should not be written on the memorials.
17. The marks will be awarded as follows:

Marks Allotted Areas

40 • Memorial (Presentation and arrangement of arguments;

Research Skills, Drafting skills; comparative approach).
20 • Knowledge of the facts
• Framing of the issues
• Familiarity with International Authorities
• Knowledge of substance and process of International
20 Law
• Knowledge of legal principles applied to the facts
10 • Response to the questions
• Convincing ability
10 • Language and Court Etiquettes
100 TOTAL
 ANNEXURE III
Guidelines for Memorial Preparation

The Memorials should adopt the following pattern of the methodology.

Contributions should be made in both electronic (floppy/ CD) and hard copy, and should
be in MS-Word.

Memorials once submitted will not be returned under any circumstances.

After acceptance, it will not be possible to amend texts.

Spelling should follow the British pattern as in the Oxford English Dictionary.

Referencing style for footnotes: The first reference to any book, article or document
should be mentioned in the following way:

Book: 1. A. Shearer, Starke’s International Law, 11th Edition (Butterworth’s, London, 1994), p.
10.

Article appearing in an edited book: T.S.N. Sastry: “Good Governance and Right to Health” in
Good Governance and Development, (ed. K.K. Bagchi) (Abhijeet Publications, New Delhi,
2009) Pp370- 386 at p 374

Article appearing in a Journal: A. Jayagovind, “Legality of Unilateral Measures in

International Trade Law”, Indian Journal of International Law, vol. 40 (2000), pp. 14-27 at p.
18. Full name of the Journal should be provided where it is being referred to for the first
time, thereafter; in subsequent references its abbreviated name should be mentioned.

Article in News magazines: Kuldip Nayar, “Where the NHRC has Failed”, World Focus (New
Delhi), vol. 22 (January 2001), pp. 17-18 at p. 17.

Article from Newspapers: C. Raja Mohan, “Another Sino-Indian Bid to Generate Trust”, The
Hindu (New Delhi), 17th May 2001, p. 1

ICJ Reports: Appeal Relating to the Jurisdiction of the ICAO Council (India v. Pakistan), ICJ
Reports 1972, pp. 46-179 at p. 70.
UN documents: United Nations Millennium Declaration Adopted by the General Assembly on 8
September 2000 at its Fifty-fifth session, UN Doc. A/RES/55/2.

Judicial decisions of the National Courts: Vishaka v. State of Rajasthan, AIR 1997 SC 3011-17,
at p. 3015.

Reference from websites: References from websites should consist of the full address of the
web page browsed with the date of browsing. For example:
http://mumbai.usconsulate.gov/educational_exchange.html (browsed on 3-09-2009)
 ANNEXURE IV
Registration Form

University of Pune

Department of Law

Annual P.G. Moot Court Competition 2011

1. Name of the Institution________________________________________

2. Address of the Institution _____________________________________

______________________________________

______________________________________

______________________________________

3. Names of the Mooters: i) ________________________________(M | F)

ii) ________________________________(M | F)

4. Name of the accompanying Teacher: ____________________________ (M | F)

5. Contact Details of the Mooters:

6. Date & Time of Arrival and Departure:

7. Any other information: whether Accommodation required (Yes/No)

Signatures of the Participants Signature of the Sponsoring Authority with seal

 ANNEXURE V

CERTIFICATE TO BE ANNEXED WITH THE MEMORIAL

This is to certify that Mr/Ms. __________________________________________________

are the bona fide mooters and researcher of our Institution. They are the students of LL M/
ML regular students. The memorial prepared by them is a bona fide research work for the
Annual Post Graduate National Moot Court Competition 2011 conducted by the
Department of Law, University of Pune. To the best of my knowledge, the memorial has
not been submitted for any other competition, or award of any degree/course to any other
institution.

Signature of the

Vice Chancellor/Dean/Head/Principal

Place:

Date :

Official Seal of the Institution