Tim Tim Rights Collective

v.

Republic of Tim-Tim

1. The Republic of Tim-Tim is located in the southern hemisphere and is a welfare

democracy with a written constitution. Tim-Tim was progressive and prized human
rights and freedoms. Almost all international treaties and conventions having the
status of customary international law were signed, acceded to, and ratified by Tim-
Tim. It promulgated a lengthy written constitution in 1950.

2. Chin-Min was the founding President of Tim-Tim. In one of the speeches at the time
of the promulgation of the Constitution of Tim-Tim, Chin-min said “We are a new
country now. We have all freedoms that we give to ourselves. We will have minimum
government control over all aspects of life. All are born free, and shall remain free in
this country. We shall guarantee all human rights to all persons on the territory of
Tim-Tim, whether or not they are our citizens.” This phrase has been quoted
numerous times by the Constitutional courts while interpreting the constitutional
provisions of Tim-Tim.

3. Tagde, a celebrated writer on human rights, and one of the few persons acknowledged
as a jurist by the International Court of Justice, wrote a 3-column article praising the
work done by Chin-Min.

4. On an evening walk, Tagde saw numerous children begging on the streets of Natchin,
the capital of Tim-Tim. It was observed that some of these young children were
infants who were seemingly drugged and changed hands in shifts, while those
begging would plead for money in their name. There was another set of children who
were also under some intoxication and they held a piece of cloth which they would
keep smelling from time to time. Tagde wrote an elaborate article on the issues
concerning the welfare of children and their right to life and education being violated

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 by such activities.

5. The Commissioner of Police took cognisance of the matter based on the newspaper
article and issued directions to conduct an investigation. Upon a thorough and
detailed investigation, it was revealed that there are organized gangs which facilitate
trafficking of young children who are to be sent on streets for begging. Most of the
infants are not with their parents, but with complete strangers who use them to
generate sympathy to get money. They are constantly drugged and their life span
reduces due to constant and heavy dosage of narcotic substances administered in their
early years. Some of these children were sourced from immigrant camps in the city
and parents of some of them were not citizens of Tim-Tim. It was also found that
majority of minor girls were trafficked and pushed into prostitution. A lot of them
suffered from various ailments including HIV at a very young age. There were a
number of raids conducted and a lot of persons were arrested.

6. Appropriate criminal proceedings were filed and trials remain pending. However, the
begging on streets by children continues unabated so also their trafficking.

7. Taking note of the situation, Tim Tim Rights Collective, after detailed research on the
subject filed a petition before the Supreme Court and asked, inter-alia for
enforcement of rights of such children under Art. 21 and 21A of the Constitution. It
also demanded legalisation and regulation of prostitution in order to safeguard the
right to life, liberty, health and dignity of sex-workers, and to stop minors from being
forced into prostitution.

8. During the preliminary hearing , the Court observed :

“1.8.2023

Heard.

Ld. Counsel for Petitioner Tim Tim Rights Collective

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argued at length that the matter involves
interpretation of Constitutional provisions and
therefore it ought to be referred to a bench of 5
judges. In the meantime, Petitioner has pressed for
grant of urgent interim relief to rehabilitate all
children who are on the streets or in prostitution.

One Shri Madhav Lal Verma apprised the Court that his
petition on the subject was filed first, but the
defects could not be cured and hence it could not come
up as the first petition on the subject. He requests
the Court to take up his petition as the first petition
and list the present matter as a tagged matter.

At our request, the ld. Attorney General appeared and

conveyed his views on the matter, stating inter-alia
that enforcement of fundamental rights cannot be
utopian and the capacity, and ability of State to fund
such an exercise must be factored in at first. In
essence, the ld. Attorney General has underlined the
requirement of a prior Judicial Impact Assessment,
before enforcing a new dimension of Part-III rights. He
has further stressed that interpreting Art. 21A in the
manner as sought by the Petitioner would cause a huge
financial burden, and therefore it is important to
first cater to those children who are citizens, before
the Court even considers granting any relief to such
children who are not citizens. Further, the ld.
Attorney General advocated for issuing guidelines to
legalise prostitution as a pro-tempore measure till

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appropriate legislation comes into force.

At our request, the ld. Attorney General has also given

his suggestions on the question of sequencing of
Petitions and suggested that in PILs, as a matter of
rule the Petitions must be listed in a generic issue
based manner so as to avoid “publicity interest
litigations” as identified by this Court in its
judgment dtd. 18 October 2000 in W.P.(C) No.319 of 1994
and a series of other judgments, and to this effect an
appropriate modification may be done in the guidelines
issued by this Court in its judgment dtd. 18 January
2010 in Civil Appeals 1134-1135 of 2002. This would
help in curbing the tendency of fastest-filers-first
and push for genuine petitions that are based on
thorough research that serve larger public interest.
The ld. Attorney General clarified that these are his
views on the matter and not necessarily those of the
Government.

Thereafter, the ld. Solicitor General addressed us and

clarified that the State asserts that constitutional
provisions, including Art. 21A cannot be interpreted in
this manner, and while the Government respects the
views of the ld. Attorney General, it differs from
these views. He further apprised the Court that the
mandate of Art. 21A is limited to primary education,
which by itself is a huge financial burden on the State
and nothing further should be added to it. Regarding
legalising Prostitution, the ld. Solicitor General

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 apprised the Court of the steps taken so far by
successive governments and said that it being a matter
of policy, is best left to be decided by the
Parliament. He further asserted that the present legal
framework sufficiently takes care of the grievances
raised.

Ld. Counsel for Petitioner and Shri Verma argued in

rejoinder that the present guidelines on PILs suffice
to cover the issue and there is no need to modify them.
They further contended that the stand taken by the
Government is contrary to its own published policies as
well as its international obligations.

The following questions would be considered by us in the

present matter:

A. Whether PILs should be listed under generic-

cause-based titles as against fastest-filers-
first ? What would be its impact on genuine
petitioners espousing larger public interest?

B. Whether this Court should adopt judicial impact

assessment as a thumb rule, before considering
any prayer for enlargement of the scope of Part-
III?

C. What is the scope of Part-III, including Art. 21

and 21A of the Constitution vis-à-vis the rights
of children begging on the streets?

D. Whether Art. 21A can be interpreted to mandate

the State to put all children found begging on
the streets into primary schools? Whether
rehabilitation of such children can be read as a
constitutional duty of the State?

E. Whether the legal framework permits judicial

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 intervention to legalise prostitution? Whether
this issue can rest as a ‘policy matter’ beyond
the writ of this Court, or whether the
protection of vulnerable groups of society
requires judicial intervention?

F. Any other matter, which the parties seek to

raise as an issue ancillary to the above
questions.

Fix the matters for final hearing in the month of

October, 2023.”

9. In the above backdrop, the matters are fixed for final hearing as above. Now, Tim
Tim Rights Collective is to argue as Petitioner and the ld. Solicitor General would
argue for the State on the respondent side..

***

Nota Bene:

1. All referencesare fictional. The legal system and legal history of India, applies
mutatis mutandis, with all its laws (including subordinate legislation), international
obligations and judgments.

2. Participants stand advised to devise a ‘litigation strategy’. The issues can be argued in
the alternative/without prejudice, be divided into sub-issues, and can be added to or
amended upon. Some of the questions do not have a binary ‘for-against’ argument,
and as future lawyers, mooters are expected to think as officers of the court before
taking a stand on any given issue. Written submissions/memorials must address all
the issues.

3. Any citations, without actual para/page references, will invite negative marking.
Unnecessary citations and passim references are to be avoided. In case of oral
arguments, primary references for all case-laws being referred to is mandatory and
no participant will be allowed to cite a case-law from secondary sources like text-
books or commentaries. Primary reference may be made to select treatises which are
treated as authorities in their own right.

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4. No queries or requests for clarifications will be entertained.

5. Please avoid use of any plastic materials or binding for the Memorials. Use simple
color-paper sheets for identification of respective sides. Use of any plastic, or binding
material will invite negative marking.

-DRAFTED BY
RISHABH SANCHETI,
ADVOCATE, SUPREME COURT OF INDIA

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