Thread by @ideepakjoshi

Lets take a little walk through the history of reporting of decisions to understand this phenomenon (now rendered obsolete). The practise of reporting decisions through private law journals has thrived ever since the establishment of legal system in British India.
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https://twitter.com/indlawyer/status/1275360093811294208

The initiative was taken by lawyers & judges in furtherance to the theory of precedent. One can find law reports from 1774 (SC at Cal) through the Sadar Adalats to the HCs in 1860s. Please remember all of this was through private enterprising lawyers & judges.
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Then came a tactonic shift in 1875 when at the instance of Sir James F Stephens, the Indian Law Reports Act was passed. He was responsible for codification of Indian laws, more famously for Indian Evidence Act, 1872.
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It was felt that the law reports published by private entities were mere copies of the decisions with no statement of facts, ratio, etc. To avoid multiplicity, only those decisions ought to be reported which are considered "worthy" by the HCs o of those times.
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u/s 3 no court was bound to hear a decision except those reported by Governor General in Council. This is how the almost ubiquitous ILR was born. Every HC began having its official ILR - ILR Bom, ILR All, ILR Del, ILR Cal, ILR Mad, etc. For the SC, it's SCR (yes, not SCC).
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Thus, maybe that's the reason one finds many decisions carry reported/unreported segment - if a substantial & new point of law is discussed, judges consider it worthy to be reported in the official report of that court. This has changed now for primarily 4 reasons
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delays & omissions in the ILRs to report cases, low quality reporting, expensive pricing & the fact that a decision by a court is a precedent irrespective of it being reported or not. Act only gave authenticity to a reported copy but didn't say precedents shall not be binding
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This is where private law journals have stolen a march over the official law reports - a decision reported in SCC is reported in SCR with a delay of month or two.Add to this the effective law reporting by platforms like @LiveLawIndia & @barandbench
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As one can notice, interestingly, reporting of decisions has come full circle now - what started as a purely private initiative, was attempted to be monopolised by the courts & government which now in the present day is wholly dependant on private law journals.
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And yet, like for all emotional nostalgia that we cling onto, the judges still pay a hat tip to this relic of the past - reported or unreported? :)

Thanks to @indlawyer 's query, I embarked on educating myself on this interesting issue.

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For the benefit of anyone interested in legal history of reporting the orders/judgments of courts

@itihaasnaama @mjsharafi @advsanjoy @gautambhatia88 @Preddy85 @royradhika7 @karunanundy @Ghair_Kanooni @anujbhuwania @MandhaniApoorva

Thanks!