Question

Doctrine of legitimate expectation and wednesbury principles were read by Supreme Court into:

• A. Art. 12
• B. Art.14
• C. Art. 23
• D. Art.22

Answer 1

The Correct Option is B

Legitimate expectation and Wednesbury unreasonableness are both administrative law doctrines borrowed from English law, but Indian courts had to root them in a constitutional provision to apply them against State action here. That anchor is the place to start.

1. Art.14: Since State of A.P. v. McDowell and later rulings, courts have treated arbitrariness as the antithesis of equality, so any State action that is unreasonable in the Wednesbury sense, or that unfairly defeats a legitimate expectation created by the State's own conduct, is treated as violating Article 14.
2. Art. 12: A definition clause identifying which bodies count as "the State" cannot itself be the source of a substantive standard like reasonableness, it only decides against whom Part III rights can be claimed.
3. Art. 23: This deals with forced labour and trafficking, a subject matter with no overlap with administrative fairness.
4. Art.22: This is confined to arrest and detention safeguards, a narrower and different context from general administrative decision-making.

Ruling out the definitional Article and the two Articles tied to unrelated rights leaves Article 14 as the only provision broad enough, through its equality and non-arbitrariness doctrine, to house both principles.

Let's summarize:

• Article 14's anti-arbitrariness reading is the constitutional basis for Wednesbury unreasonableness and legitimate expectation in Indian law.
• Articles 12, 22 and 23 serve unrelated purposes and cannot support these doctrines.

The correct answer is Article 14.