How independent is India’s Supreme Court?
Despite its enormous powers, it rarely challenges the government
India’s Supreme Court has been making waves. On February 21st it overturned the result of a mayoral election in Chandigarh, capital of the northern states of Punjab and Haryana, and chided an official loyal to the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) for having rigged the poll. Two days earlier it ordered the government of Narendra Modi to reverse a dilution in the rules protecting forestland. Last week it struck down electoral bonds, an opaque campaign-finance instrument that had mainly benefited the bjp.
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This article appeared in the Asia section of the print edition under the headline “Courting politics”
From the February 24th 2024 edition
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The Adani scandal takes the shine off Modi’s electoral success
The tycoon’s indictment clouds the prime minister’s prospects
Priyanka Gandhi: dynastic scion, and hope of India’s opposition
Poised to enter parliament, she may have bigger ambitions than that
The Caspian Sea is shrinking rapidly
This has big implications for Russia, which has come to rely on Central Asian ports
Racial tensions boil over in New Zealand
A controversial bill regarding Maori people punctures its relative harmony
Once a free-market pioneer, Sri Lanka takes a leap to the left
A new president with Marxist roots now dominates parliament too
The mystery of India’s female labour-force participation rate
A good news story? Maybe