Joint Secretary, Political Department, Govt. of Meghalaya v. High Court of Meghalaya
Background
The Meghalaya High Court had, in a suo motu writ petition originally registered over the non-constitution of the State Human Rights Commission, gone further and on its own questioned the eligibility criteria for the Chairperson of the Lokayukta under the Meghalaya Lokayukta Act, 2014, and stayed part of that provision, even though nobody had actually challenged the Act's constitutional validity. The State government appealed to the Supreme Court against this stay, while not disputing the separate direction to get the Human Rights Commission up and running.
Decision Breakdown
The Supreme Court held that a court cannot test the constitutional validity of a legislative provision and grant a stay on its own motion, without a proper pleading or challenge by an aggrieved party, doing so here was "totally fallacious." It set aside the part of the High Court's order staying the Lokayukta Act provision, while expressly declining to give any opinion on whether that provision was actually valid. The Court also directed that the State Human Rights Commission become functional by the end of June 2016 (a point the State had already conceded), and treated the underlying writ petition as fully and finally disposed of.
Lesson Learnt
Courts cannot strike down or stay a law's provisions on their own initiative merely by comparing it to similar statutes elsewhere: a constitutional challenge requires a proper party to plead and prove the specific grounds of invalidity; courts cannot substitute that process with their own suo motu scrutiny.