The law, dignity and death

The Supreme Court’s recent ruling on the right of a person to make a ‘living will’ has underlined the inevitable. The petition, filed by registered society Common Cause, was about the right of a person to decide on the chain of events that would determine the future course of treatment should that person become incapable of making such a decision. In the unanimous judgment by a constitution bench headed by Chief Justice Dipak Misra, the court upheld the constitutional values of liberty, dignity, autonomy and privacy while laying down procedural guidelines governing the advance directive of a living will, which will operate till a legislation is put in place. This judgment spells out perhaps the most logical stand on an issue that should have been legislated upon long back.

Palekar PIL Could Change Censorship Law

A Report on the Censorship Law

Gajanan Khergamker

Films are closely associated with freedom. Actor-filmmaker Amol Palekar’s Public Interest Litigation (PIL) challenged the ‘pre-censorship’ of films and, in particular, the provisions of the Cinematograph Act, 1952, and the Cinematograph (Certification) Rules, 1983, which, in turn, impose pre-censorship on the freedom of speech and expression of the artistes as well as the audience. The issue isn’t a new one.