Precedent — Meaning and nature of Precedent as a source of law

A junior advocate at the Bombay High Court is asked by a client, 'Will I win?' He does not open a statute first. He searches for an earlier judgment on the same facts and checks which court decided it. If the Supreme Court has already ruled, the High Court has little choice. Why should one judge's decision tie the hands of another, and how far does that tie stretch?

In two minutes

A precedent is an earlier judicial decision that later courts must follow or may consider; under Art.141 the law declared by the Supreme Court binds all courts in India, and only the ratio decidendi, not obiter dicta, binds.

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