Polity · 15 Aug 2026

Article 194(3) legislative privilege free speech

Assertion (A): Contradictory Supreme Court precedents on whether legislative privilege overrides free speech have remained unreconciled for decades.
Reason (R): Article 194(3) imports the privileges of the House of Commons as they stood in 1950 and Parliament or state legislatures have never exercised their power to codify these privileges by law.
Which one of the following is correct in respect of the above statements?

ABoth A and R are true and R is the correct explanation of A
BBoth A and R are true, but R is not the correct explanation of A
CA is true, but R is false
DA is false, but R is true
This question is based on: The Seven-Word Clause That Let a Legislature Order Its Own Critics Arrested
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About this question

Why in news

A seven-judge Supreme Court bench headed by CJI Surya Kant has fixed October 6 for hearing a case tracing back to a 2003 Hindu editorial, after the matter was twice referred upward due to conflicting 1959 and 1964 precedent on legislative privilege versus free speech.

Why for UPSC

Assertion-Reasoning is well suited to testing whether an aspirant understands the causal mechanism behind a legal gap - here, that it is the uncodified, borrowed nature of Article 194(3) that structurally produces unresolved judicial contradiction, not a coincidental disagreement between benches.

Prelims summary

Article 194(3) grants state legislatures House-of-Commons-style privileges as they stood in 1950, with Parliament/state legislatures free to codify them by law - a power never exercised, leaving the 1959 (privilege prevails) and 1964 (fundamental rights not automatically subordinate) precedents in unresolved conflict.

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