Contemporary Issues in Indian Public Law Conference

The Faculty of Law, University of Oxford, Melbourne Law School, University of Melbourne and National Law University, Delhi hosted a workshop and conference on 10-12 April 2015 at National Law University, Delhi, India. Both events were generously supported by a grant from Mr Allan Myers AO QC. The co-convenors were Associate Professor Tarunabh Khaitan (Oxford), Dr Farrah Ahmed (Melbourne) and Dr Anup Surendranath (National Law University, Delhi).

The two-day workshop on ‘Contemporary Issues in Indian Public Law’ provided an opportunity for early career researchers to present an original unpublished paper to a small group of participants. After a short presentation, they obtained valuable feedback from selected international experts from Oxford (Nicholas Bamforth, Paul Craig, Tarunabh Khaitan and Alison Young), Melbourne (Farrah Ahmed, Sarah Biddulph, Carolyn Evans, Pip Nicholson and Cheryl Saunders) and India (Sudhir Krishnaswamy, M.P. Singh and Anup Surendranath). They were also joined by scholars from the National University of Singapore (Arun Thiruvengadam) and University of Birmingham (Jane Norton).

Workshop papers covered topics relating to Indian constitutional law, including Indian discrimination jurisprudence, media coverage of the Indian Supreme Court, the salience of constitutional cases, conflicts with the right to education and the role of republicanism, constitutional issues in the first year of the Modi government, judicial review in Indian environmental law, and mercy and the death penalty.

The international conference held on 12 April discussed ‘Contemporary Issues in Indian Public Law: Transnational Perspectives’. International scholars (selection from list above) presented on topics such as transnational engagement with the Indian Constitution, separation of powers (focussing on institutions and inter-institutional dialogue), human rights and religious freedom, and human rights and the death penalty. The conference was attended by more than 100 people, including students, academics, lawyers and the general community interested in law in India.

We thank the National Law University, Delhi for their generous hospitality during the conference and workshop, which brought together a diverse range of scholars from around the world.