Orders of constitutional courts would prevail over statutory tribunals: SC

In a recent development, the Supreme Court set aside a National Green Tribunal order prohibiting construction work at Rushikonda hills in Visakhapatnam, saying orders of ‘constitutional courts would prevail over statutory tribunals’.

Key-points made by the court

• The National Green Tribunal or NGT is subordinate to the high court in so far as territorial jurisdiction is concerned.
• The conflicting orders passed by the NGT and the high court would lead to an anomalous situation.
• The authorities would be faced with difficulty which orders to follow. In such a case orders from the Constitutional court would prevail over statutory tribunals.
• Thus the continuation of proceedings before the NGT for the same which is also seized with the high court cause of action cannot proceed in interest of justice.
• We, therefore, quash and set aside the proceedings before the NGT.
• The top court, however, said though development is necessary for economic development of a nation, it’s equally necessary to safeguard the environment to preserve pollution free environment for future generations.

What are Tribunals?

• Tribunals are judicial or quasi-judicial institutions established by law.
• They intend to provide a platform for faster adjudication as compared to traditional courts, as well as expertise on certain subject matters.

What are the reasons behind constitution of Tribunals?

• Pendency of cases in courts is one of the key challenges faced by the judicial system.
• In certain technical cases, the traditional courts need expert knowledge for adjudication.

Why tribunal cannot be considered as court?

• This term ‘court’ has not been defined in any of the statutes.
• However, on the basis of judicial ruling in case of S D Ghatage v. State of Maharashtra, these are the basic characteristics of a Court:
  1. It is an adjudicating body.
  2. It performs a judicial function of rendering definite judgments having finality.
  3. The judgment binds the parties litigating before it.
  4. They derive their power from the state.

On the basis of these characteristics the tribunal is a court.

Debate around the structure of tribunal

• These debates basically revolve around few basis presumptions. The fundamental presumption is that the Tribunal is not a Court. Hence the powers of the Courts are not available to the Tribunal.
• Since it is not a Court, it has no inherent powers.
• The Tribunal is a mere fact finding body, it cannot order anything apart from what has been stated in the statute.
• It cannot order anything in the name of doing complete justice.
• The Tribunal cannot enforce its orders like a Court, which can enforce its decrees.
• Tribunal is a creature of a statute and hence it cannot go beyond the words of the statute.