Ravi Prakash

From courtroom to classroom, the debate over a banned NCERT textbook raises urgent questions about the constitutional limits of banning school textbooks, and the tension between judicial authority, pedagogical autonomy, and the freedom of speech under Article 19(1)(a).

Justice Dipankar Datta's separate opinion in Aligarh Muslim University v. Naresh Agarwal lifts the curtain on a critical, and entirely unregulated, phase of India's judicial process. Four decades after Justice Thakkar sounded the same alarm, the Supreme Court of India has yet to act.