Case Reviews and Blog

Case Title: Pankaj Sinha Vs. Union of India (UOI) and Ors., MANU/SC/0986/2018 The Supreme Court in this recent judgment, issued directions to the Centre and State governments towards rights of people with Leprosy, including the repeal of archaic and discriminatory laws that categorise leprosy as non-curable and contagious, and the framing of rules for evaluation of disabilities by leprosy affected persons, awareness campaigns for general public, free of cost and in stock medicines in PHC’s

Case Title: Jeeja Ghosh and Ors. Vs. Union of India (UOI) and Ors., MANU/SC/0574/2016 In this 2016 case, petitioner activist Jeeja Ghosh was forced to deboard a Spicejet flight due to her cerebral palsy, when she was on her way to attend a disability rights conference. The Supreme Court ruled in her favour as the conduct of the airlines was against basic rights of human dignity enshrined in Article 21 of the Constitution, contrary to

Case Title: M Selvakumar Vs. Union of India, MANU/SC/0075/2017 In this 2017 case, a physically handicapped person who had appeared for the Civil Services Examination 7 times asked for a 3-year extension in lieu of him also falling under the reserved OBC category. The Supreme Court Bench comprising of Justice Ranjan Gogoi and Justice Ashok Bhushan held that that physically disabled category is a category in itself and cannot avail further reservations. The horizontal reservation

Case title: Deaf Employees Welfare Associations and Ors. Vs. Union of India (UOI) and Ors. The Supreme Court in this 2013 decision, heard the petitioners/government employees who sought travel allowance equal to that given to visual and orthopedically handicapped employees and said that Human dignity of deaf and dumb persons is harmed when they are being marginalized, ignored or devalued on ground that disability that they suffer is less than visually impaired person which clearly

While dealing with denial of promotion of a laboratory technician, who has colour blindness, the Supreme Court held that denial of promotion on grounds of medical standards required for the job is valid. The Court pointed out that denial of promotion on the said grounds is not merely related to disability and is therefore not violative of the Disabilities Act of 1995. The Court also stated that all disabilities and all persons with disabilities are