Open justice and live streaming in the Supreme Court approved in principle, subject to safeguards for privacy, fairness, and confidentiality.

Open justice was treated as a foundational principle extending to live streaming as a technological means of improving transparency, access to justice, public confidence, legal awareness, and accountability. The Court recognised, however, that live access must be balanced against dignity of the institution, privacy of litigants and witnesses, confidentiality, and the proper administration of justice. It therefore approved live streaming in principle only within a structured regulatory framework, including phased implementation, limits to suitable categories of cases, prior consent and judicial control, exclusion of sensitive matters, transmission delay, archiving, copyright retention by the Court, and limits on unauthorised use. Judicial discretion was preserved to exclude or suspend coverage where justice requires.

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Issues: Whether proceedings before the Supreme Court in cases of constitutional and national importance should be live streamed, and what safeguards and regulatory framework should govern such live streaming.

Analysis: Open justice was treated as a foundational principle of the judicial process, supported by the constitutional requirement of pronouncement in open court, the public character of civil and criminal trials, and the public's right to receive information. Live streaming was held to be a technological extension of open courts and access to justice, capable of improving transparency, public confidence, legal awareness, and accountability. At the same time, the Court recognised competing concerns of dignity of the institution, privacy of litigants and witnesses, confidentiality, and the administration of justice, and therefore held that live streaming must operate within a structured regulatory framework. The framework contemplated phased implementation, initial limitation to appropriate categories of cases, prior consent and judicial control, exclusion of sensitive categories, delay in transmission, retention of copyright by the Court, archiving, and restriction on unauthorised use.

Conclusion: Live streaming of Supreme Court proceedings was approved in principle, subject to rules and safeguards framed under the Court's constitutional power, with judicial discretion retained to exclude or suspend coverage where the interests of justice so require.

Final Conclusion: The petitions succeeded, and the Court directed implementation of live streaming through a phased and regulated mechanism designed to balance open justice with fairness, privacy, confidentiality, and institutional dignity.

Ratio Decidendi: The principle of open justice extends to virtual access through live streaming, but such access can be implemented only through a controlled framework that preserves fair trial rights, privacy, confidentiality, and the effective administration of justice.

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