X NOTES: Public Interest Litigation

Introduction

Public-Interest Litigation is litigation for the protection of the public interest.
Article 32 of the Indian constitution contains a tool which directly joins the public with judiciary.
In consonance with the principles enshrined in Article 39A of the Constitution of India to protect and deliver prompt social justice with the help of law.
A PIL may be introduced in a court of law suo motu, rather than the aggrieved party or another third party.
member of the public may be a non-governmental organization (NGO), an institution or an individual.
vigilant citizens of the country can find an inexpensive legal remedy because there is only a nominal fixed court fee involved in this.
litigants can focus attention on and achieve results pertaining to larger public issues, especially in the fields of human rights, consumer welfare and environment.

PIL in India first appeared in Husnara Khatoon Vs State of Bihar 1979. Husnara Khatoon was the prisoner.
petition regarding the condition of the prisoners detained in the Bihar jail, whose suits were pending in the court.
not filed by any single prisoner, rather it was filed by various prisoners of the Bihar jail
In this case, the Supreme Court upheld that the prisoners should get benefit of free legal aid and fast hearing.
Justice P. N. Bhagwati and Justice V. R. Krishna Iyer were among the first judges to admit PILs in court.
there have been instances when letters and telegrams addressed to the court have been taken up as PILs and heard.
Before the 1980s, only the aggrieved party could approach the courts for justice. After the emergency era the high court reached out to the people, devising a means for any person of the public (or an NGO) to approach the court seeking legal remedy in cases where the public interest is at stake.

the person (or entity) filing the petition must prove to the satisfaction of the court that the petition is being filed for the public interest and not as a frivolous litigation for pecuniary gain.

In Kalyaneshwari vs Union of India, the court cited the misuse of public-interest litigation in business conflicts.
PIL seeking the closure of asbestos units, stating that the material was harmful to humans.
The Gujrat HC dismissed the petition, stating that it was filed at the behest of rival industrial groups who wanted to promote their products as asbestos substitutes

Justice S. H. Kapadia, has stated that substantial fines would be imposed on litigants filing frivolous PILs.
handy tool of harassment since frivolous cases could be filed without investment of heavy court fees as required in private civil litigation and deals could then be negotiated with the victims of stay orders obtained in the so-called PILs.
lowering of the locus standi requirement has permitted privately motivated interests to pose as public interests.
abuse of PIL has become more rampant than its use and genuine causes either receded to the background or began to be viewed with the suspicion.

At present, the court can treat a letter as a writ petition and take action upon it. But, it is not every letter which may be treated as a writ petition by the court. The court would be justified in treating the letter as a writ petition only in the following cases-

It is only where the letter is addressed by an aggrieved person or
a public spirited individual or
a social action group for enforcement of the constitutional or the legal rights of a person in custody or of a class or group of persons who by reason of poverty, disability or socially or economically disadvantaged position find it difficult to approach the court for redress.