OPINION | Surge in PILs raises concerns over misuse and judicial efficiency in India

PIL has undergone a noticeable transformation

In just the past week, courts across the country have witnessed a strikingly diverse range of Public Interest Litigation (PIL) petitions. These include a plea highlighting the environmental and public health hazards allegedly arising from the transportation of fly ash from the Jhabua power plant; a petition seeking disclosure of the precise moment the fuel switch on the London-bound Air India aircraft that crashed in Ahmedabad last June was moved from “run” to “cut-off”; a challenge to a Waqf notification issued 46 years ago; a demand for compulsory NAT testing in all blood banks across India; and litigation seeking directions for the installation of EV chargers in housing societies.

The sheer breadth of these petitions illustrates how expansively the PIL jurisdiction is being invoked. What was once conceived as an extraordinary remedy to secure justice for the marginalised has, over time, evolved into a forum for addressing almost every matter of public debate. While many such petitions undoubtedly raise genuine concerns, the growing frequency and diversity of filings have also prompted questions about whether the jurisdiction is being stretched beyond its intended contours.

It is in this context that the recent remarks of Chief Justice of India (CJI) Surya Kant acquire particular significance. On February 24, the Chief Justice expressed concern over what he described as the “mushroom growth” of PIL petitions, observing that it appeared some “prominent faces” had made it their agenda to read newspapers in the morning and file a petition by the evening.

Origins of PIL

PIL in India find its genesis in a petition filed by a lawyer named Kapila Hingorani in 1979. She had filed the PIL to seek relief for the prisoners who spent years and years behind bars waiting for the verdict, and many cases even waiting for the trial to start.

Kapila Hingorani was permitted to pursue a case in which she had no 'locus standi' because her petition involved a matter of 'public interest'. Her plea was heard by Justice PN Bhagwati, who, along with Justice VR Krishna Iyer, is known as the pioneer of public interest litigation (PIL) in India.

After the petition of Hingorani, the Supreme Court took up such cases and issued guidelines to ensure speedy trials of those languishing in jails and also released 40,000 undertrial prisoners. Since then, PILs have become a widely used mechanism to address issues of social, economic, and political significance.

PIL became a means of seeking justice for those who could not do so for themselves.

If one traces the genesis of Public Interest Litigation, it was never meant to be an instrument of routine judicial intervention.

PIL: The Original Vision

What Public Interest Litigation was conceived to be in its truest sense, and the dimensions it has gradually assumed can perhaps best be understood through the reflections of two eminent legal scholars and jurists, Professor Upendra Baxi and Soli Sorabjee.

Preferring the term “Social Action Litigation” (SAL) over PIL, Professor Baxi has warned against blurring the distinction between the two. In an interview published in [In] Complete Justice, he observed: “I believe that keeping SAL distinct from PIL would enable us to better articulate a socially responsible criticism of SAL. PIL can be appropriated by special interests (such as the resident welfare associations in which courts act as slum demolition apparatuses, or rather ‘governance machines’—to here deploy Giorgio Agamben's term). Judges can also appropriate SAL to increase their judicial power. But SAL was never intended by its founding judges to help property-owners (or ‘propertiat’, to deploy Justice Krishna Iyer's vivid imagery); it was specifically intended to transform the conditions of life for the constitutional have-nots — the disadvantaged, depressed, disenfranchised and disabled Indian peoples. The questions before the Court in any SAL case are the rights of the rightless, or as Hannah Arendt put it, the human ‘right to have rights’.”

A Tool to Expand Jurisdiction

However, PIL has undergone a noticeable transformation, assuming dimensions far removed from its original emancipatory purpose. As eminent jurist and former Attorney General for India, Soli Sorabjee, observed in a conversation with this author in 2016, “Public Interest Litigation (PIL) is a valuable mechanism to redress the problems of the neglected, alienated and marginalised sections of society.

One prerequisite is that it must be instituted bona fide and must avoid the three pitfalls associated with PIL: namely ‘private interest litigation’, ‘political interest litigation’ and ‘publicity interest litigation’.”

He added, "In a way, the Supreme Court has itself brought upon itself the problem by entertaining PILs very liberally, if I may say so, extravagantly. Every matter of public interest cannot be a matter of public interest litigation. For example, a rise in the price of onions. So public interest litigation requires a good jockey in the saddle to keep it on the right track and fulfil the objectives for which it was originally designed".

Sorabjee’s caution captures the contemporary dilemma succinctly: the strength of PIL lies in its moral credibility. Once that credibility is diluted by personal agendas, partisan motivations or the pursuit of limelight, the instrument risks undermining both judicial time and public trust.

Judicial Backlog and the Way Forward

The Supreme Court has, on several occasions, imposed exemplary costs and strongly admonished petitioners found to have misused the PIL jurisdiction. In July 2017, a bench of Justices Dipak Misra and A.M. Khanwilkar imposed costs of Rs 25 lakh on an activist who challenged the shifting of the mini-Vidhan Sabha in Karnataka’s Gulbarga district, terming the petition “an abuse of the concept of public interest litigation as it does not espouse any kind of public cause.” In 2018, the apex Court imposed Rs 25,000 in costs on advocate Ashok Pandey for seeking to reduce the marriageable age for men to 18, with a bench led by Chief Justice Ranjan Gogoi remarking, “Wait till an 18-year-old boy moves SC seeking permission to marry.

A bench led by Chief Justice D.Y. Chandrachud and Justice P.S. Narasimha in 2018 imposed Rs 50,000 in costs on a petitioner who filed PILs seeking reclassification of the caste system and the phased withdrawal of reservation in public employment — reinforcing the message that the extraordinary jurisdiction of PIL cannot be invoked for sweeping policy debates or personal causes under the guise of public interest.

With 91,977 cases presently pending before the Supreme Court, 63,82,696 before various High Courts, and an overwhelming 4,87,84,350 before district courts, a substantial number of which will eventually travel upward in appeal, the burden on the judicial system is staggering.

In such a scenario, the higher judiciary, entrusted with adjudicating constitutional questions of the gravest significance, can scarcely afford to expend scarce judicial time on frivolous or publicity-driven pleas. At the same time, it must be remembered that PIL emerged as a response to deep societal needs and has been instrumental in driving transformative social change. Its misuse, however, risks eroding its moral authority and institutional credibility, a cost the justice system can ill afford.

(Views are personal, and do not represent the stance of this publication.)