COMMENTARY Interpreting the Constitution: Supreme Court Constitution Benches since Independence Nick Robinson, Anjana Agarwal, Vrinda Bhandari, Ankit Goel, Karishma Kakkar, Reeba Muthalaly, Vivek Shivakumar, Meera Sreekumar, Surya Sreenivasan, Shruti Viswanathan Constitution benches have been vital for Supreme Court jurisprudence. But, the number of these benches has fallen since the 1960s. This article examines all constitution benches from independence until the end of 2009. Using this analysis, which paints a far more textured picture of these benches than has previously been available, it makes recommendations to help strengthen the Supreme Court’s constitution benches. We would like to thank Aparna Chandra, Aditi Srivastava, Asma Tajuddin, Madhav Khosla, Pratap Bhanu Mehta, Siddhartha Gupta and Vikram Raghavan for their assistance with this article. Nick Robinson (nickrobinson5@gmail.com) is with Jindal Global Law School, Haryana. Anjana Agarwal (anjana.agarwal@gmail.com), Ankit Goel (ankitpost@gmail.com), Karishma Kakkar (karishmakakkar@gmail.com), Vivek Shivakumar (shivakumar.vivek@gmail. com), Surya Sreenivasan (surya.sreenivasan@ gmail.com) and Shruti Viswanathan (shruti. viswanathan@gmail.com) have graduated from the National Law School at Bangalore in law. Vrinda Bhandari (vrinda.bhandari@gmail.com), Reeba Muthalaly (reeba1989@gmail.com) and Meera Sreekumar (meerasreekumar@gmail) are currently studying law at the National Law School, Bangalore. Economic & Political Weekly EPW february 26, 2011 T he Indian Supreme Court spreads out over more than a dozen bustling Court rooms. Stepping into one of these rooms, most days a visitor will find two, or maybe three, judges disposing of a long list of matters, from the mundane to the controversial. Today, these smaller benches take up most of the Court’s work. But the Constitution also requires that the Court sit in larger benches, stating that at least five judges must decide any case “involving a substantial question of law as to the interpretation” of the Constitution.1 Such five-judge or larger benches are traditionally known as constitution benches, and have decided many of India’s best-known and most important Supreme Court cases, such as A K Gopalan vs State of Madras, AIR 1950 SC 27 (right to life); Kesavananda Bharati vs State of Kerala, AIR 1973 SC 1461 (basic structure doctrine); and Ashoka Kumar Thakur vs Union of India (2008) 6 SCC 1 (reservations). Yet, despite these benches’ central role in the Court’s constitutional jurisprudence, their number has been on the decline. While the Court averaged about a 100 five-judge or larger benches a year in the 1960s, by the first decade of the 2000s, this had decreased to about nine a year. Viewed in this light, despite deciding about 5,000 regular hearing cases a year in the 2000s, the Indian Supreme Court arguably produces less jurisprudence involving substantial questions of constitutional law than a Court like the United States Supreme Court, which wrote just 72 judgments in 2009, but whose cases often involved such questions. Beyond this mere decline in numbers, it seems intuitive that other changes are also occurring on constitution benches. To examine what these changes might be we systematically analysed all constitution bench decisions we could identify from vol xlvi no 9 independence through the end of 2009 (1,532 cases). We found that even as constitution benches have become less frequent, their judgments have become longer, more prone to split decisions, increasingly delayed, and more likely to have been brought under both appellate and writ jurisdictions. In fact, given the more convoluted nature of these decisions in recent years, it has become increasingly difficult to even determine the winning party. That said, appellants/petitioners now do better than respondents before constitution benches, while the government continues to do disproportionately well and companies have significantly improved their records. The Court is relatively open to citing foreign judgments, although it cited them most frequently in the decade after independence. Meanwhile, the chief justice plays a dominant role in not only choosing when constitution benches are heard, but also which judges will hear the case. Perhaps tellingly, he has been in dissent only 10 times on a constitution bench since independence. A more detailed history of the constitution bench is helpful when weighing the merits of current Supreme Court reform proposals. Some of these proposals are discussed at the conclusion of this article, where we argue that, more constitution benches should be encouraged, as well as clearer, shorter opinions, and a less dominant role for the chief justice. The work presented here builds on others. George H Gadbois Jr undertook a review of the voting behaviour of all Supreme Court judges from independence until 1967 (Gadbois 1970). Rajeev Dhavan has painstakingly looked at the changes in the Supreme Court’s docket from independence to the 1980s (Dhavan 1986). However, no work that we are aware of, has systematically analysed the Supreme Court’s constitution benches from independence to the present day. It is into this gap which this article steps. History of the Constitution Bench Despite being almost an anomaly today, the five-judge bench has long been considered vital to the Court’s work, and it was originally envisioned that its sittings would be routine. In the 1950s, about 13% of the Court’s decisions were from five judge – 27 COMMENTARY or larger – benches. However, as Table 1 shows, as the number of backlogged cases increased, it sat less often on these larger benches, presumably because the Court was now preoccupied with smaller benches. In particular, the more populist era immediately following the Emergency increased an access to the Court, exacerbating its pendency problems. There were on average 71 five-judge or larger benches per year before the Emergency, and just 11 per year after. This decline was despite the Court increasing its number of judges in 1956 from 8 to 11, and then, again in 1960 (14), 1977 (18), 1986 (26) and 2008 (31). Table 1: Average Number Per Year of Five +Judge Benches, Regular Disposals and Pending Cases Five+ Judge Benches(%) Regular Disposals Pending Cases Five+ Judge Benches as % of Disposals 1950-54 45.6 1955-59 49.8 293 364 15.5 435 1,458 1960-64 11.5 134.4 1,441 1,635 9.3 1965-69 69.4 2,018 3,957 3.4 1970-74 45 2,292 8,785 2 1975-79 15 3,561 13,522 0.42 1980-84 9 4,785 32,643 0.19 1985-89 12.6 8,483 41,830 0.15 1990-94 10.6 8,476 33,470 0.13 1995-99 9.2 8,651 15,595 0.1 2000-04 14 6,119 14,489 0.23 2005-09 6.4 5,557 18,574 0.12 Source: Supreme Court of India Annual Report (2009) and All India Reporter (AIR). Constitution benches were not the only victims of the Court’s backlog. After independence, it was felt that all benches should have “at least three judges as a rule”2 to provide an adequate hearing for a case. Yet, by the 1970s, the number of reported two-judge judgments surpassed the number of reported three-judge judgments, and two-judge benches are now considered the norm. There is no case law which defines when a case poses a “substantial question” of constitutional law, and must therefore be decided by a constitution bench. Instead, such cases are historically referred to the chief justice by smaller benches. The chief justice can then place the matter before a larger bench if he thinks it appropriate.3 This ambiguity has meant that many cases, perceived to involve a “substantial question” of constitutional law, have been settled by two- or three-judge benches, especially in recent years. For example, 28 Selvi vs State of Karnataka (2010) 7 Sec 263, a landmark case from last year that struck down the use of narco-analysis without consent as unconstitutional was decided by three judges. Most public interest litigation, from far-reaching environmental matters to the right to food case, is decided by smaller benches as well. Methodology the time. In India, in 11% of constitution benches, there was a majority with at least one dissent; while a majority with only a concurrence (8%) or a majority with both a concurrence and dissent (4%) were somewhat less common. However, as Figure 1 shows there has been an increase in split decisions since the 1970s, with only a brief revival towards unanimity in the late 1990s. It is not clear that judges now disagree with each other more. Instead, in hearing fewer constitution benches in recent years, the We systematically tracked a range of criteria for every constitution bench decision from 1950 to 2009 in the All India Reporter (AIR) electronic data Figure 1: Judge Voting Patterns (in %) base, one of the 90 standard law re- 80 Unanimous porters. We also cross-referenced 60 this source with the Supreme 40 Court’s online Dissent only Both Concurrence only Judgment Infor20 mation System. AIR lists 2,094 five-judge or lar- 0 1950-54 1955-59 1960-64 1965-69 1970-74 1975-79 1980-84 1985-89 1990-94 1995-99 2000-04 2005-09 ger cases during Each data point represents an average for a five-year period. For example, from 1980 to 1984 an average of this time period. 51% cases were unanimous, while 23% had only a concurring opinion, 13% had only a dissent, and 13% had a dissent and a concurrence. In the last three decades, there were an average of 40 constitution benches in Out of these, we each five-year period, compared to 215 in each five-year period prior. Therefore, greater fluctuations seen in the last three decades may sometimes simply reflect this smaller data set. identified 1,532 as constitution benches, while determin- Court might also be hearing more cases ing that the remaining 562 cases did not that the judges are likely to be divided involve any question of constitutional in- in deciding. terpretation. These cases did not reference the Constitution and were frequently on Jurisdiction shorter service, criminal or tax matters. A small number of constitution bench cases may not have been included in AIR. Further, some cases that we counted as constitution bench cases may not involve what some might consider a “substantial question” of constitutional law. However, since the Court has not defined what a “substantial question” is, we erred on the side of inclusion if the Constitution was mentioned. We feel confident that this data set at least allows us to accurately portray the general trends in constitution benches which this paper analyses. Judge Voting Patterns Since independence, most of the constitution bench decisions (76%) consist of a single majority opinion with which all the other judges agree. By way of comparison, in the 2000s the US Supreme Court had a unanimous opinion well less than half Historically, over 60% of constitution benches were receiving appeals (Figure 2, p 29). While about 30% of the time they were brought directly to the Court under its writ jurisdiction, 6% of the time the same case was both appealed and brought under writ jurisdiction. The remaining 4% of constitution benches were presidential references, election matters, or cases of one government bringing a case against another under Article 131 of the Constitution. Jurisdiction patterns though have not remained constant. From 1980 to 1994 the number of constitution benches based on a writ petition actually overtook the number of those which were appeals, perhaps because this period was in the immediate wake of the Court relaxing its locus standi rules. Additionally, over the past three decades, an increasing number of cases are being brought under both writ and appellate jurisdictions. february 26, 2011 vol xlvi no 9 EPW Economic & Political Weekly COMMENTARY Second, although time), the government wins approximately the government has 54% of the time. 70 The reason the government does disalways done well as 60 a litigant, its record proportionately well in the cases surveyed 50 has improved over could have multiple causes. The governthe past decade, and ment may use more scrutiny to screen the 40 Writ there are more cases cases it decides to pursue before the Court 30 in which the govern- than other litigants, or have superior re20 Other Both ment is the appel- sources to represent itself. Alternatively, 10 lant/petitioner dur- since the government frequently defends 0 legislation, which is presumed valid, from 1950-54 1955-59 1960-64 1965-69 1970-74 1975-79 1980-84 1985-89 1990-94 1995-99 2000-04 2005-09 ing this period (up from 11% in the constitutional challenge, this could help Figure 3: Winning Party (in %) 1980s to 24% in the its record. 70 A few high courts seemed to fare better 2000s). Companies’ Respondent wins than others when reviewed. For example, records as a chal60 lenging party in the Delhi High Court was affirmed 70% of 50 recent years have the time historically, and the Kashmir Appellant/petitioner 40 also become mark- High Court 73% of the time. On the other end of the spectrum, the Gujarat High edly better. 30 About half of all Court had an affirmation rate of 38%. 20 constitution bench Still, these statistics by themselves do not Not clear cases involve an indicate that the Supreme Court favours 10 individual bringing any particular high court. Instead, they 0 either an appeal or reflect that certain types of appeals with 1950-54 1955-59 1960-64 1965-69 1970-74 1975-79 1980-84 1985-89 1990-94 1995-99 2000-04 2005-09 writ petition against higher success rates arise out of some high Winning Party and Appeal the government. The individual though courts over others. Since independence, there has been a 33% does relatively poorly in these cases, winchance the appellant/petitioner will win a ning about 26% of the time, a win-ratio Length and Foreign Citation constitution bench decision; a 60% chance which has remained steady throughout the Opinions have been getting longer. In the the respondent; and a 7% chance that either Court's history. 1950s and 1960s, about 10% of majority The next most common type of case (at opinions were above 10 pages (or 109 no side wins or the decision is too mixed to determine a clear winner (Figure 3). In about 16%) is companies challenging cases). By the 1990s and 2000s over the last 15 years though this trend has the government (again either on appeal 50% were over 10 pages (or 87 cases). It is reversed and the appellant/petitioner now or writ). Traditionally, companies win important to note that in raw numbers wins just as much, or slightly more often, against the government only slightly more there has not been as marked a decline in than the respondent. Cases in which it is than individuals, or about 33% of the time. longer opinions by constitution benches. unclear which side has won have also Yet, their record has been improving, in- This could support an argument that the grown in frequency as decisions increas- creasing from 13% of the time in the 1980s overall decrease in constitution benches to 70% in the 2000s. (This sample set is has not been as detrimental to constiingly involve more parties and issues. The improvement of appellants’/peti- too small to find constitution benches are tutional jurisprudence as one might initioners’ victory record correlates with at becoming more sympathetic to companies’ tially suppose. Constitution benches in least two other factors we tracked. First, cases, as there were only 16 such cases in the Court’s early years were far less likely appellants win more often when they the 1980s and 10 in the 2000s, but could to produce longer, and presumably, more bring an appeal from a high court (38% of be indicative of such a claim.) meaningful, decisions. Indeed, in the The next most Figure 4: Length of Majority Judgment (in pages) the time) than compared to petitioners in writ petitions (28% of the time). Therefore, common case (at 100 0-10 the return of appellant rates to higher, 15%) is the gov- 90 more traditional levels after the spike in ernment challeng- 80 70 writ petitions from 1980 to 1994 may have ing an individual. 60 helped improve the record of the challeng- Here the govern50 ing side overall. Strangely, in cases brought ment wins about 40 under both appellate and writ jurisdictions, 53% of the time. 30 11-25 the appellants/petitioners only have a 22% Similarly, when the 20 Over 25 chance of winning, although that chance government chal- 10 has improved markedly in the last two lenges a company 0 1950-54 1955-59 1960-64 1965-69 1970-74 1975-79 1980-84 1985-89 1990-94 1995-99 2000-04 2005-09 (about 4% of the decades (and was at 36% in the 2000s). Figure 2: Jurisdiction (in %) 80 Appeal Economic & Political Weekly EPW february 26, 2011 vol xlvi no 9 29 COMMENTARY 1950s and 1960s, over 60% of majority judgments were less than five pages, seemingly deciding little of constitutional significance. This argument though may overconflate length with constitutional importance. There are frequent complaints that today’s decisions are, in fact, too long, adding confusion rather than clarity with additional pages. In the four-year period from 2006 to 2009, there were 12 constitution bench decisions, of which three (or 25%) were over 100 pages and two (or 17%) were over 200 pages, making determining the law an almost monumental reading feat. Some contend that the increasing length of decisions was driven by the introduction of computers into the Supreme Court in the 1990s, allowing judges to cut and paste lengthy excerpts from the parties’ briefs and previous decisions with new ease. Our analysis provides some support to this claim as decisions saw a jump in average length in the 1990s and 2000s and are now longer than ever before. Still, judgment length was already increasing THE INDIAN JOURNAL OF INDUSTRIAL RELATIONS A REVIEW OF ECONOMIC & SOCIAL DEVELOPMENT in the 1970s and 1980s before the introduction of computers. The length of judgments could also be driven by the increasing number of split decisions as judges feel they need more space to explain differences with their colleagues. Providing some evidence for this theory, in the late 1990s, when there was a spike in unanimous decisions, there was also a marginal decline in the percentage of lengthy majority opinions. In its judgments the Court has frequently cited foreign cases, which are not binding on the Court, but are cited for their persuasive value. In the 1950s and 1960s about 70% of cases cited to less than five cases, and so were far less likely to cite a foreign case than later decisions. To control for this phenomenon, we isolated cases that had five or more citations across all years. As Table 2 shows we found that amongst these cases foreign citation was greatest (71% of cases) immediately after independence, when the Court was also much more likely to rely on cases from the UK over the US or other jurisdictions (countries like Canada, Australia, New Zealand and South Africa, although rarely neighbours like Pakistan, Sri Lanka and Bangladesh). Table 2: Frequency (%) Court Cites to Foreign and Pre-independence Cases in Judgments with Five or More Cites Foreign Overall UK 1950s 1960s 1970s 1980s 1990s 2000s 71 55 64 68 50 61 56 48 49 51 40 51 US Other Pre-Independence 33 20 40 40 38 36 14 9 14 8 20 16 62 35 36 23 15 28 Cases from pre-independence India, such as federal court and high court decisions under British rule, were cited at the greatest rate (62%) in the 1950s, immediately after independence, after which their citation goes into general decline. Time in Court Historically, 71% of all constitution bench cases were decided within two years of being filed in the Supreme Court; and just 6% took eight years or more. Backlog though A Special (April 2011) Issue on Beyond GDP Guest Editor: Gyorgy Szell University of Osnabrueck Contributors to the issue include: K.V. Kamath, ICICI Bank, Mumbai Zhuming Zhao, Nanjing University, China Editor : N.K Nair Frederich Furstenberg, Bonn University, Germany IJIR online www.irhrjournal.com Wolf Gaertner, University of Osnabrueck, Germany Price : Single issue Rs. 250. Annual Subscription Rs. 1000 N. Balasubramanian, Indian Institute of Management, Bangalore Contact : A.C. Mishra, Asst. Manager Sudipto Mundle, National Institute Public Finance & Policy, New Delhi Ashwini Deshpande, Delhi School of Economics, Delhi 4 Safdar Hashmi Marg, New Delhi 110001 Phone: 011-43213100, Fax: 23352410 E-mail: ijir04@yahoo.in, src@srcirhr.com website: www. Srcirhr.com 30 Udo E. Simonis, Science Centre, Berlin, Germany Pulin Nayak, Delhi School of Economics, Delhi Woosik Moon, EU-Korea Centre, Seoul february 26, 2011 vol xlvi no 9 EPW Economic & Political Weekly COMMENTARY has created a significant delay in the Court’s constitution bench docket. By the 2000s, just 27% of constitution benches were decided within two years of being filed in the Court and 39% took eight years or more. Topic It is difficult to classify constitution benches by topic. One case might involve several topics; and different observers can reasonably disagree about how to best categorise the case. We encountered such difficulties while trying to categorise cases and so do not present detailed information about the topics of constitution benches. We are confident enough though to broadly say a few things. After the Emergency, the frequency of cases involving reservation, the right to life and minority institutions all increased, along with cases involving elections and criminal and company law. Meanwhile, cases involving the interpretation of pre-independence legislation and the right to property (which was removed as a fundamental right in 1978) became less prevalent. Service and tax matters, which represent about a quarter of all constitution benches, seem to have remained relatively constant in prevalence since independence. Chief Justice The Indian Supreme Court can be described as chief justice-dominant. The chief justice plays a prominent role in appointing new judges, filtering public interest litigation, assigning cases to judges, and is the Court’s best-known spokesperson. He performs a similarly dominant role in relation to constitution benches. The chief justice has historically sat on about 77% of constitution benches, and wrote the majority opinion in 21% of them. His presence on these benches has declined somewhat in recent years and was at 60% in the 2000s, but he still disproportionately sits on these cases. Historically, the presence of the chief justice may make it slightly more likely that there will be a unanimous decision or a decision without a dissent. Still, the difference is marginal, and this trend seems to reverse itself in the 1990s and 2000s. In any given vote on a constitution bench, there has been about a 5.2% chance Economic & Political Weekly EPW february 26, 2011 a judge will dissent. However, if it is the chief justice that is voting that chance decreases to 0.8%. Strikingly, we could only locate 10 times the chief justice has been in dissent in the history of all constitution benches (he wrote a dissenting opinion in eight of these cases). This record may indicate that the chief justice is potentially picking benches that are more likely to decide in a way that he favours. George Gadbois Jr documented this phenomenon in the Court’s early years, finding that Chief Justice K Subba Rao, with his stark anti-government bias was in dissent more than any other judge before becoming chief justice. After becoming chief justice though he was never in dissent, while the entire Court gave more anti-government decisions than ever before (Gadbois 1970: 166). This discrepancy between the chief justice and other judges’ dissent rates, although still substantial, has become much less pronounced in recent years. For example, in the 1960s, another judge was 27 times more likely to be in dissent than the chief justice. By the 2000s, this had become four times as likely. These results might seem counter-intuitive if one thought the chief justice was inclined to pick benches whose decision preferences were more likely to match his own. More judges to choose from would arguably make this easier. Still, more judges could also make it more difficult for the chief justice to predict any specific judge’s voting behaviour in advance. Conclusions The Supreme Court’s attention has been diverted by thousands of more mundane decisions at the expense of developing its constitutional jurisprudence. As of November 2010, there were 754 five-judge or larger matters pending to be heard for regular hearing in the Supreme Court. A lthough many of these matters could be clubbed together to be heard in fewer hearings, this still represents a major backlog of vital constitution bench matters. The Indian Law Commission in 2009 proposed creating a dedicated constitution bench in Delhi and cassation benches in four regions of the country to improve access and deal with backlog.4 Proposals to allow the Court to hear more constitution vol xlvi no 9 benches should be welcomed, but they do not necessarily need to involve the Court’s division or the addition of more judges. For example, the Court could more strictly filter the numerous relatively ordinary matters it hears before smaller benches, and create a dedicated constitution bench on which judges would rotate. Renewed attention on constitution benches should also address other concerns. The Court should endeavour for clearer decisions, which might sometimes involve shortening judgments. Further, constitution benches could be selected randomly to ensure that the chief justice does not have too much power in picking which judges sit on these benches. The chief justice’s discretion in deciding when constitution benches are heard could also be reduced. Any reform of the Supreme Court will require a clear understanding of both its workload and output. It is hoped that an analysis such as that presented here will help the Supreme Court in taking control of its sprawling docket, reversing the current situation in which the Court’s docket too often controls the Court. Notes 1 2 3 4 Constitution of India, Article 145(3). K K Basu speaking in debate over Supreme Court (number of judges) Bill, Lok Sabha debates, 20 August 1956, 3,809. See, Bengal Immunity Company vs the State of Bihar, AIR 1955 SC 661; Central Board of Dawoodi Bohra vs State of Maharashtra (2005), 2 SCC 673. Law Commission of India, “Need for Division of the Supreme Court into a Constitution Bench at Delhi and Cassation Benches in Four Regions at Delhi, Chennai/Hyderabad, Kolkata and Mumbai”, Report No 229, August 2009. References Dhavan, Rajeev (1986): Litigation Explosion in India (Bombay: N M Tripathi). Gadbois, George H Jr (1970): “Indian Judicial Behaviour”, Economic & Political Weekly, 3(5): 149. Venkatesan, J (2010): “Supreme Court Again Says ‘No’ to Regional Benches” , The Hindu, 21 February. Permission for Reproduction of Articles Published in EPW No article published in EPW or part thereof should be reproduced in any form without prior permission of the author(s). A soft/hard copy of the author(s)’s approval should be sent to EPW. In cases where the email address of the author has not been published along with the articles, EPW can be contacted for help. 31 COMMENTARY Homi Bhabha Centre for Science Education Tata Institute of Fundamental Research (A Deemed University) V. N. Purav Marg, Mankhurd, Mumbai 400 088 PhD Programme in Science Education – 2011 Do you have a • Flair for teaching and writing? • Curiosity about how children learn? • Concern to improve science and maths education? • Interest in design and technology education for children? • Wish to do research in science, maths or design and technology education? We are looking for young people who combine a basic training in the natural sciences with a lively interest in society, technology or the arts, to explore issues in school and college education. HBCSE carries out research and development in education in science, technology and mathematics from primary school up to undergraduate level. This research is informed by current perspectives in cognitive science, developmental psychology, history and philosophy of science and socio-cultural aspects of science and education. Pre-Ph.D. programs in these areas serve to orient students who may enter with varied backgrounds. Science and maths teachers and educators are welcome to apply. They would spend a minimum of two years at HBCSE to complete their course work and initiate their research work. Areas of research • Development of scientific and mathematical thinking in children • Design and technology in the school curriculum • Visual and spatial modes in learning • Socio-cultural and gender factors in learning • Structure and dynamics of knowledge • Environment education • Innovative curricula, laboratories and teaching methods Eligibility B.Sc. in any subject followed by M.Sc./ M.A./ M.S.W. or B.Tech./B.E./ M.B.B.S. or equivalent Important Dates: Application request deadline: April 1, 2011 Submission deadline: April 15, 2011 Written test: May 22, 2011 Interview: June 3rd week, 2011 Note: This is a programme in education. It is not a pure or applied science research programme. Admissions are made initially for one year, renewable annually up to a maximum of five years. Students receive a monthly scholarship of Rs. 16,000/- (enhanced to Rs. 18,000/- after registration) and an annual contingency grant of Rs. 20,000/-. Accommodation may be provided on campus at nominal cost. In lieu of accommodation HRA amounting to 30% of the fellowship will be paid. For application forms write, enclosing a 25.5 cm x 15.5 cm self-addressed envelope with stamps worth Rs.10/- to The Dean, Homi Bhabha Centre for Science Education, TIFR, V. N. Purav Marg, Mankhurd, Mumbai 400 088. Alternatively, you may download the form from http://www.hbcse.tifr.res.in/downloads/ Completed forms should be sent latest by April 15, 2011 with two passport size photographs along with a demand draft for Rs. 350/- (non-refundable) payable at Mumbai in favour of Homi Bhabha Centre for Science Education. A written test for eligible applicants will be held at six Centres around the country: Chennai, Bangalore, Pune, Mumbai, Delhi and Kolkata. For information see http://www.hbcse.tifr.res.in/graduate-school/examinfo/ . Those who qualify will be called for an interview. Phones:(022) 25580036/25072230; Fax: (022) 25566803; email: hbcdean@hbcse.tifr.res.in 32 february 26, 2011 vol xlvi no 9 EPW Economic & Political Weekly