INTERESTING AND LITTLE KNOWN FACTS

• Under the Indian Sarais Act, 1867, it is a punishable offence for ‘inn-keepers’ not to offer free drinking water to passer-by. Recently, a Delhi five-star hotel was taken to court by the municipal corporation on the grounds that the hotel was not doing so
• The oldest law in the country has been in operation for over a century and half. The one sentence 1836 Bengal District Act empowers the Bengal government to create as many zillas as it wants. The Act still exists
• Only about 40 per cent of our laws are in regular use. Independent India has till now found no conceivable use for the rest
• The Indian Telegraph Act, which was passed in 1885, when the concept of television obviously didn’t exist, has been invoked five times in the past three years by Doordarshan over telecast rights of cricket matches played in India. This very nearly derailed the telecast of the 1996 World cup
• The Police Act, 1861, still requires a policeman to take off his cap or helmet before a member of royalty. A ridiculous provision that nobody has thought of removing so far.
  The Indian Contract Act and the Specific Relief Act, 1963 have overlapping areas, leaving enough room for confusion. A person sacked from a job may decide to sue his employer under the Indian Contract Act, while the employer may take refuge under the Specific Relief Act
• Section 108 of the Customs Act and Section 171A of the Sea Customs Act are identical, offering a wide choice to both trigger-happy enforcement people and offenders looking for a loophole to slip through
• The Smugglers and Foreign Exchange Manipulators Act, 1976, a variant of COFEPOSA, whose sole objective is to forfeit illegally acquired properties of smugglers or forex manipulators and applies only to those convicted under the Sea Customs Act, 1878 and Customs Act, 1962
• One can prove that the economic reforms are actually against the Indian Constitution. Article 39 of the Directive Principles opposes polices that raise disparities in income and wealth. Therefore reforms, or for that matter, any policy statement, can be stayed on the ground that it’s widening the guilty between the rich and the poor
• Under section 14 of the Hindu Marriage Act, a couple cannot get a divorce within one year of the marriage, even if one of the parties is found to be insane or a warranted criminal. Even in case of divorce by mutual consent, Section 13B allows a lock-in period of one year before the grant of a divorce
• Section 377 of the Indian Penal Code says whoever voluntarily has carnal intercourse "against the order of nature" can be imprisoned for life and fined. Which means homosexuals and lesbians are outlawed. And oral sex is illegal. All this, by laying down a behavior code, violates the privacy of citizens
• Only rape is jailable offence, not sexual molestation
• The Lunacy Act takes a harmless epileptic to be the same as a certified lunatic
• Poor, homeless person are often harassed as the Vagrancy Act allows anyone who’s "loitering with intent" to be booked. (How do you prove that you had no "intent" as you loitered?)
• Thanks to a piece of ridiculous legislation called the Prevention of Seditious Meeting Act, 1911, an independent India can still disallow a prisoner from wearing a khadi Gandhi Cap.
  The Police (Incitement to Disaffection) Act, 1920, has been used just twice. Once against Lokmanya Tilak. The second time was in 1981-against the author of a pamphlet that commended the police for forming an association to demand better rights. (Striking textile mill workers had rioted and the cops had stayed way)
• The Indian Stamp Act or the General Court Fees Act, of which every state has individual versions
• Each state also has its own civil procedure code apart from the Central Code
• The provisions of the Indian Electricity Act, 1910, Electricity (Supply Act), 1948, and the Indian Electricity Rules, 1956, prevent Central intervention at the state level, while also discouraging foreign/ private investment
• The Hire-Purchase Act of 1972, never metamorphosed into an Act. For a Bill to become an Act, it must be passed by both Houses of Parliament, but this was passed by only one House. Due to lack of interest in the Bill, it just lapsed. This has resulted in a piquant situation, buyers of vehicles on hire-purchase/bank loans can’t be prosecuted by the financier not the vehicle repossessed even if they default on repayment, because there’s no law for it. In such cases, the only recourse open to the financier is to send thugs to the defaulter. However, a wily defaulter can run rings round the lender by lodging dacoity cases against the lender, and claiming that he had a large amount of money lying in the car when it was seized
• The State of Rajasthan has always opposed provisions of the Narcotics, Drugs and Psychotropic Substances Act, as many of its communities ritually smoke marijuana at wedding ceremonies
• No one have a foreign coin collection work over #500
• Even a visiting foreigner can’t mail a cheque abroad because the law doesn’t allow "sending currency instruments out of the country"
• An exporter can’t sell a consignment at a discount after it has reached the buyer. He must bring it back and declare it to the RBI afresh, an impossibility in the case of consignments of perishables or goods with low shelf life. Naturally, if you are an Agro exporter, you take big loss and shut up, or you break the law
• The Rent Control Act, which not only discourages private investment in real estate by disallowing market fixation of rent, it forbids landlords from evicting or taking any step against defaulting tenants