MAHARASHTRA NATIONAL LAW UNIVERSITY, NAGPUR

B.A.LL.B. (Hons.) IV Year Semester- VII

First Open Book Assessment

Course Code and Name: 7.1 PRINCIPLES OF INTERPRETATION OF STATUTES

Name of Student: RUDRANSH. UID: UG2017-88

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Answer 2.

DEPARTURE SOMETIMES INDISPENSABLE

A departure from the rule of Literal construction maybe legitimate so as to avoid any part of the
statute becoming meaningless. Words may also be read to give effect to the intention of the
legislature which is apparent from the act as a whole. Application of the mischief rule or
purposive construction may also enable reading of words by implication when there is no doubt
about the purpose which the parliament intended to achieve. But before any words are read to
repair an omission in the act, It should be possible to state with Certainty that these or similar
words would have been inserted by the draftsman and approved by the parliament had their
attention being drawn to the omission before the bill passed into the law.

JUDICIAL TRENDS

In Seaford Court Estates Ltd. v. Asher_, [1949] 2 KB 481** the Court took an approach in
favour of determining the intention of legislature. When a defect appears, i.e. clearly a case of
casus omisus, a judge cannot simply fold his hands and blame the draftsman. He must set to
work on the constructive task of finding the intention of the parliament and then he must
supplement the written words so as to give ‘force and life' to the intention of the legislature. A
judge should ask himself the question how, if the makers of the act had themselves come across
such type of omission, they would have straightened it out ? He must then do as they would have
done. “A judge must not alter the material of which the Act is woven but he can and should iron
out the creases.”

The observation of Lord Denning discussed above has been cited with approval by the Supreme
Court of India in case of M Pentiah v Muddala Veeramallapa, AIR 1961 SC 1107. In the case
of Gangu v Chandrabhagabai (1908) 10 BOMLR 149
“A murderer must for the purpose of the inheritance, be treated as if he were dead when the
inheritance opened and as not being a fresh stock of descent; the exclusion extends to the legal
as well as beneficial estate, so that neither he can himself succeed nor can the succession be
claimed through him.”

PRINCIPLE OF JUSTICE, GOOD CONSCIENCE

The legal position mentioned above is enunciated on the principle of justice, equity and good
conscience and as a measure of public policy. The murderer, thus, has to be treated as non-
existent and would not thus create a fresh line of descent. The murderer for the purpose of
inheritance has to be treated as if, he was not there when the inheritance opened and not for the
purposes of a fresh stock of descent. Thus, neither can he claim succession nor can the
succession be claimed through him. Intention of the legislature would not have been otherwise
i.e against justice, public policy.

CONCLUSION

In the present scenario if Mr. Joe succeeds to the property , then it would result in grave injustice
being administered and as the legislature would never have intended that the murderer of the
testator should succeed to the property. So there is a clear case of casus omisus and court in the
present scenario must supply the words in order to give effect to the intention of legislature and
so as to make the ends of justice to meet.

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Answer 3.

SCOPE OF INTERPRETATION

The expression in the Section 123(c) , Railways Act,1989 ‘the accidental falling of any
passenger from a train carrying passengers' can be brought under the ambit of two
interpretations. One being that it only applies when a person has actually got inside the train and
thereafter falls down from the train, while the second being that it includes a situation where a
person is trying to board the train and falls down while trying to do so.

JUDICIAL TRENDS
Since the provision for compensation in the Railways Act is a beneficial piece of legislation, it
should receive a liberal and wider interpretation and not a narrow and technical one. Hence , the
latter of the abovementioned two interpretations i.e. the one which advances the object of the
statute and serves its purpose should be preferred.

The Supreme court while dealing with a similar set of facts in a different case i.e. Union Of
India vs Prabhakaran Vijaya Kumar CIVIL APPEAL 6898 of 2002 wherein the passenger fell
down while trying to board the train when it was moving and the passenger was run over by the
train. Justice Markande Katju was of the opinion that it will not legally make any difference
whether the deceased was actually inside the train when the she fell down or whether the she was
only trying to get into the train when she fell down. So, in either case it amounts to an 'accidental
falling of a passenger from a train carrying passengers'. Hence, it is an 'untoward incident' as
defined in Section 123(c) of the Railways Act.”
It is well settled that if the words used in a beneficial or welfare statute are capable of two
constructions, the one which is more in consonance with the object of the Act and for the benefit
of the person for whom the Act was made should be preferred. In other words, beneficial or
welfare statutes should be given a liberal and not literal or strict interpretation. In this regard the
Supreme Court in case of Workmen Of American Express v. Management Of American
Express AIR 1986 SC 458 wherein it was of the opinion that the principles of statutory
construction are well settled. Words occurring in statutes of liberal import such as social welfare
legislation and human rights' legislation are not to be put in ‘Procrustean beds or shrunk to
Lilliputian dimensions'. In construing these legislations the in light of literal construction must be
avoided and, its misapplication must be recognized and reduced. Judges ought to be more
concerned with the 'colour', the 'content' and the 'context' of such statutes (Prenn v. Simmonds).
Law is not to be left behind in some island of literal interpretation but is to enquire beyond the
language, unisolated from the matrix of facts in which they are set; the law is not to be
interpreted purely on internal linguistic considerations.
In another case Surender Kumar Verma v. Central Government Industrial Tribunal Cum
Labour court 1981 AIR 422, the dictum was that the luxuries that are semantic in nature are
misplaced in the interpretation of 'bread and butter' statutes. It is very necessary to interpret
welfare legislation liberally. Where legislation is designed to give relief against certain kinds of
mischief, the Court is not to make inroads by making etymological excursions.
If one looks back to the actual decisions of the House of Lords on questions of statutory
construction over the last 30 years one cannot fail to be struck by the evidence of a trend away
from the purely literal towards the purposive construction of statutory provisions'. No reluctance
to adopt a purposive construction where to apply the literal meaning of the legislative language
used would lead to results which would clearly defeat the purposes of the Act. But in doing so
the task on which a court of justice is engaged remains one of construction, even where this
involves reading into the Act words which are not expressly included in it. (House of Lords,
*Jones v. Wrotham Park Settled Estates, [1980] A.C. 74* ).

CONCLUSION

Adopting a restrictive meaning to the expression 'accidental falling of a passenger from a train
carrying passengers' in Section 123(c) of the Railways Act, will cause deprivation to a large
number of railway passengers from getting compensation in railway accidents. It is well known
that in our country there are crores of people who travel by railway trains since everybody cannot
afford traveling by air or in a private car. By giving a restrictive and narrow meaning to the
expression will be depriving a large number of victims of train accidents (particularly poor and
middle class people) from getting compensation under the Railways Act. Similar reasoning was
given by the court in Union Of India vs Prabhakaran Vijaya Kumar CIVIL 898 of 2002 .

The court in the above mentioned case held that “In our opinion, the expression 'accidental
falling of a passenger from a train carrying passengers' includes accidents when a bona fide
passenger i.e. a passenger traveling with a valid ticket or pass is trying to enter into a railway
train and falls down during the process. In other words, a purposive, and not literal,
interpretation should be given to the expression.”

Therefore in the present scenario the incident that resulted in death of Ms. Arohi while trying to
board the running train will be come within the definition of ‘untoward accident ' under Section
123( c ) of the Railways Act, 1989. Further she will also not come under the ambit of proviso to
Section 124A that deals with self inflicted injury as an exception to untoward accident. Hence
the claim will be granted to her.

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Answer 5.
PUPRPOSE OF THE LEGISLATURE

The Cardinal principle that says “ Statute must be read as a whole and in its context” is of
grave significance when one is observing the subject of Statutory Interpretation. Whenever there
emerges a question as to the interpretation of certain provision of a statute , It must be read as a
whole i.e. Prime importance must be given as to what was the intention of the legislature when
the law was enacted. The rule is well settled that reading a statute as a whole can be done
whenever their arises a necessity to discover the intention of the legislature.

INTENTION OF THE LEGISLATURE

Supreme court in State of West Bengal v Union of India AIR 1963 SC 1241, laid emphasis on
intention of the legislature. The court must ascertain the intention of the legislature by directing
its attention not merely to the clauses to be construed but to the entire statute. In such type of
cases the court must compare the clause with the other parts of the law, and the setting in which
the clause to be interpreted occurs.

In A G v. HRH Prince Ernest Augustus, (1957)1 All ER 49 (HL) before the House of Lords,
Justice Viscount Simonds said: “ I Conceive it to be my right and duty to examine every word of
a statute In its context, and I use context in its widest sense as including not only other enacting
provisions of the same statute, but its preamble, the existing state of law other statutes in pari
materia and the mischief which I can, by those and other legitimate means, discern that the
statute was intended to remedy.”

The pivotal rule in construction of every law is the reasoning behind the law and it’s spirit, that
can be only cracked when the animus imponentis, i.e the intention of the imposing body, is
known. This principle means that even when there is no ambiguity and the meaning of the
provision is starkly lucid, it is the duty of the court to bring in the context of the statute before or
during the provision is constructed. However, a caveat here that must be considered at all times
of construction is that 'The context is heeded to aid the court in effectuating it’s fundamental duty
to give meaning to the legislative command according to the terms in which it has been
expressed and not to deflect it from this duty which ultimately is always a text based activity.

In District Mining Officer v. Tata Iron and Steel co AIR200 1SC3134 the question under
consideration was by the validation act passed what in fact has been validated, Is it only the taxes
already realized under the invalid law or the right to levy and realize the same which became due
upto 4th of April 1991? The court applied the ratio propounded in Steavenson's case and also the
court paid attention to the true object and purpose for which the validation act had been enacted
by the parliament. It is not possible for a court hold that any right can be said to have been
created in favour of the state of an enduring nature, which could be enforced even after the
expiry of the life of the act itself .The parliament had stepped in and had fictionally created
certain provisions of the state laws being confronted with Situation that the liability to refund the
taxes, illegally collected would have disastrous effect on the state economy. A validation act
had been promulgated by the president to validate the collection of such levies by the
state government up to the 4 th of April 1991. In the context , It obviously refers to the
Collection to be made thereafter. The interpretation was the real intention of the parliament
and it never intended to confer a right of collection of cess.

CONCLUSION

The court in Padma Sundara Rao v. State of Tamil Nadu (2002) 3 SCC 533 reiterated that
two principles of construction one relating to casus omissus and the other in regard to
reading the statute as a whole appear to be well settled. Under the first principle a casus
omissus cannot be supplied by the Court except in the case of clear necessity and when
reason for it is found in the four corners of the statute itself but at the same time a
casus omissus should not be readily inferred and for that purpose all the parts of a statute
or section must be construed together and every clause of a section should be construed
with reference to the context and other clauses thereof so that the construction to be put
on a particular provision makes a consistent enactment of the whole statute. This would be
more so if literal construction of a particular clause leads to manifestly absurd or anomalous
results which could not have been intended by the Legislature.