Wed Jan 01 03:00:00 UTC 2025: ## Indian and US Supreme Court Dissents: A Tale of Two Democracies
**New Delhi, January 1, 2025** – While dissenting opinions are a hallmark of robust democracies, the nature of such disagreements varies significantly between nations. A recent analysis in *The Hindu* compares the dissenting judgments of the Indian Supreme Court (SC) and the US Supreme Court (SCOTUS), revealing stark differences in their underlying motivations.
In the US, dissenting opinions often reflect the judges’ political leanings, largely due to the presidential appointment process. The example of Justices Stephen Breyer (pro-affirmative action) and Samuel Alito (anti-abortion) highlights this partisan divide.
Indian judicial dissents, however, are more multifaceted. Unlike their US counterparts, Indian judges are selected through a collegium system and are not direct appointees of the ruling party. Their disagreements stem from a broader range of sources, including political considerations, social interpretations, and purely intellectual differences in legal interpretation.
The article cites several landmark cases to illustrate this point. Justice H.R. Khanna’s dissent in the ADM Jabalpur case (1976), which upheld fundamental rights during a national emergency, is presented as a courageous stand against political pressure. Dissents in the P.V. Narasimha Rao case (1998) and the Shayara Bano case (2017) – concerning parliamentary privilege and triple talaq, respectively – demonstrate how dissenting opinions can eventually reshape legal understanding. The Aishat Shifa case (2022) and the Lalta Prasad Vaish case (2024) exemplify disagreements rooted in differing interpretations of secularism and constitutional text, respectively.
The analysis concludes that while both the Indian SC and SCOTUS utilize dissenting opinions to foster robust debate and refine legal principles, the sources and nature of these disagreements reflect fundamental differences in judicial selection processes and the broader socio-political contexts within which they operate.
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