GUIDING RULES

Ms. Neha Tripathi

Assistant Professor (Law)
MNLUA
 c) Avoiding rejection of words
• As on hand, it is not permissible to add words or to fill in a gap or lacuna, on the
other hand, efforts must be made to give meaning to each and every word used
by the Legislature.
• It is incumbent on the court to avoid construction, if reasonably permissible on
a language, which would render a part of the statute devoid of any meaning or
application.
• The courts always presume that the Legislature inserted every part thereof for a
purpose and the legislative intention is that every part of the statute should have
effect.
• The Legislature is deemed not to waste its words or to say anything in vain and
a construction which attributes redundancy to the Legislature will not be
accepted except for compelling reasons.
• Hill v. William (1949); Though a parliamentary enactment is capable of saying
the same thing twice over without adding anything to what has already been
said once, this repetition in the case of any Act of Parliament is not to be
assumed. When the Legislature enacts a particular phrase in a statute the
presumption is that it is saying something which has not been said immediately
before. The rule that a meaning should, if possible, be given to every word in
the statute implies that, unless there is good reason to the contrary, the words
add something which would not be there if the words were left out. (Gaming
Act, 1845)

• Chloro Controls India Pvt. Ltd. v. Severn Trent Water Purification Inc & Ors.
(2013) 1 SCC 641 (Section 45 of Arbitration & Conciliation Act)- every word
used should be given its due meaning
• State of Bombay v. Ali Gulshan, AIR 1955 SC 810. (Bombay Land Requisition
Act, 1948)

• D Velusamy v. D Patachaiamal, (2010) 10 SCC 469. (Protection of Women

from Domestic Violence Act, 2005)

• Balwant Kaur v. Chanan Singh, AIR 2000 SC 1908. (Hindu Adoption &
Maintenance Act, 1956)
 d) Departure from the rule

• In discharging its interpretative function, the court can correct obvious drafting
errors and so in suitable cases, “the court will add words, or omit words or
substitute words”.

• However, in interpreting a statute, court must be abundantly sure of three

matters: (1) the intended purpose of the statute or provision in question, (2) that
by inadvertence the draftsman and Parliament failed to give effect to that
purpose in the provision in question, and (3) the substance of the provision
Parliament would have made, although not necessarily the precise words
 i) Addition of the words when permissible
• We have already studies that it is not allowed to read words in a statute which
are not there, but “where the alternative lies between either supplying by
implication words which appear to have been accidentally omitted, or adopting
a construction which deprives certain existing words of all meaning, it is
permissible to supply words.

• Words may also be read to give effect to the intention of the Legislature which
is apparent from the Act read as a whole. Application of mischief rule or
purposive construction may also enable reading of words by implication when
there is no doubt about the purpose which the Parliament intended to achieve.
• But even before such words are read to cover an omission in the Act, it should
be stated without doubt, that these or similar words would have been inserted
by the draftsman and approved by the Parliament, had their attention been
drawn to the omission before the bill was passed into law.

• In Siraj-ul-Haq v. Sunni Central Board of Waqf, AIR 1959 SC 198,

Gajendragadkar, J. observed it is well settled that in construing the provisions
of a statute courts should be slow to adopt a construction which tends to make
any part of the statute meaningless or ineffective and where the literal meaning
of the words used in a statutory provision would manifestly defeat its object by
making a part of it meaningless and ineffective, it is legitimate and even
necessary to adopt the rule of liberal construction so as to give meaning to all
parts of the provision and to make the whole of it effective and operative.
• State Bank of Tranvancore v. Mohammad, AIR 1981 SC 1744 (Kerala
Agriculturists Debt Relief Act, 1970)

• Gujarat Composite Limited v. Ranip Nagarpalika, AIR 2000 SC 135 (Gujarat

Gram and Nagar Panchayats Taxes and Fees Rules, 1964)

• Union Bank of India v. Seppo Rally, AIR 1999 SC 62 (Consumer Protection

Act, 1986)

• Ramaswamy Nadar v. State of Madras, AIR 1958 SC 56 (Section 423 (i) (a)
of CrPC)
 ii) Rejection of words when permissible
• At times the intention of the Legislature is clear but the unskilfulness
of the draftsman in introducing certain words in the statute results in
apparent ineffectiveness of the language. Since, courts strongly lean
against reducing a statute to a futility, it is permissible in such cases to
reject surplus words to make the statute effective and workable.

• Labour Contact Co-operative Society Palikur v. Director & Mines of

Geology, Hyderabad, AIR 1993 SC 147 ( word ‘within’ under Rule
12(4) of Minor Mineral Concession Rules was ignored)
 iii) Treating words or provisions as
superfluous
• The Legislature sometimes uses superfluous words or provisions or tautological
expressions because of ignorance of law or as a matter of abundant caution.
• Such superfluous provisions cannot lay foundation for an argument resting on
the maxim, ‘expression unius est exclusion alterious’ and the maxim is
inapplicable in such cases.
• However, insertion of any superfluous provision always give rise to difficulty of
construction as Courts starts with presumption that every portion of a statute has
some purpose and its presence was necessary to effectuate that purpose.
• It is only when other provisions of an Act give out that a provision in the Act
owes its origin to a confusion of ideas or to a misunderstanding of the law or to
abundant caution, the court reaches a conclusion that the provision is
superfluous.