A seven-judge Supreme Court bench closed the two-decade-old N. Ravi reference on legislative privilege and free speech as infructuous on October 6, because the Tamil Nadu Assembly had withdrawn its 2003 resolution, while keeping the constitutional questions open.
The reference had waited about two decades for a hearing, and it ended almost as soon as it began. The resolution that caused the dispute had been withdrawn in 2004, and the reference order had not taken notice of that.
Senior Advocate A.M. Singhvi remarked that the court had set records for the shortest hearing and quickest disposal of a seven-judge matter, according to LiveLaw.
The result is a pause and not an answer. The court did not decide whether fundamental rights override legislative privileges, and it left the interplay of Articles 194(3), 19(1)(a) and 21 to be pursued in appropriate proceedings.
Until such a case arrives, lawyers can cite the order for the disposal and not for any ruling on privilege versus free speech.
A bench of Justices Y.K. Sabharwal and S.B. Sinha stayed the arrests on November 10, 2003, according to LiveLaw.
In December 2003, the court framed substantial questions of law and referred the matter to a five-judge bench.
That bench noted a conflict between earlier rulings on legislative privileges and referred the matter to seven judges.
The reference then remained pending for about two decades, and the court fixed the hearing for October 6 in August 2026.
The Tamil Nadu Assembly had unanimously withdrawn its November 7, 2003 resolution in 2004, according to ThePrint.
Senior Advocate Raju Ramachandran told the court about the withdrawal, and the bench noted that the reference order had not taken notice of it.
Because the resolution stood recalled, the court held that there was no surviving cause of action.
The writ petitions were disposed of as infructuous.
Supreme Court of India (file image), Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0