Supreme Court to be a court of record

Article 108, Draft Constitution 1948

The Supreme Court shall be a court of record and shall sit in Delhi and at such other place or places, if any, as the Chief Justice may, with the approval of the President, from time to time, appoint.

Article 129, Constitution of India 1950

The Supreme Court shall be a court of record and shall have all the powers of such a court including the power to punish for contempt of itself.

Draft Article 108 (Article 129) was debated on 27 May 1949. It stated that the Supreme Court would be a court of record.

A member proposed an amendment to wholly replace the Draft Article:

‘The Supreme Court shall sit at such place or places as the Chief Justice may, with the approval of the President, from time to time appoint.’

He argued that the amendment was necessary for two reasons: firstly, the phrase ‘court of record’ was unnecessary since the function and powers of the Supreme Court had been exhaustively dealt with in the previous draft articles. The Chairman of the Drafting Committee responded that it was necessary to explicitly confer this power on the Supreme Court, as the legal system in India was not as fully defined as in England. He further proposed that the Draft Article be wholly substituted for the following:

‘The Supreme Court shall be a court of record and shall have all the powers of such a court including the power to punish for contempt of itself.’

Secondly, the member argued that specifying Delhi as the seat of the court gave the city undue importance, and was improper since the city had not been finalized as the capital. The Chairman of the Drafting Committee then proposed the insertion of Article 108-A (Article 130) to separately address the matter of seat of the Supreme Court.

The amendment proposed by the Chairman of the Drafting Committee was accepted by the Assembly without debate, while the other amendment was negatived. The amended Draft Article was adopted on 27 May 1949.