What is quasi judicial body? Explain with the help of concrete examples.

Meaning

• “Quasi” means “as if”: the body acts like a court for a limited class of disputes, but it is created by statute or by the Constitution as an administrative or regulatory authority, not as a Chapter IV or Chapter V court under Articles 124 to 147 or 214 to 231.
• The minimum legal tests, drawn from natural-justice cases and from tribunal law, are notice, hearing, absence of bias, a speaking order, and a decision that binds the parties unless stayed or set aside.
• It applies law or regulations to facts, rather than only issuing circulars or collecting tax without a contest. A pure executive order with no hearing is administrative; a civil suit before a district judge is judicial; the middle is quasi-judicial.
• Article 323A and Article 323B authorise tribunals for service and other matters; those tribunals are a constitutional species of quasi-judicial bodies, still under High Court review after L. Chandra Kumar.
• Many regulators combine legislative (regulations), executive (licence) and quasi-judicial (penalty, tariff, combination approval) functions in one organisation, which is why the “body” must separate its hearing wing in practice.

Concrete examples

• The National Human Rights Commission, under the Protection of Human Rights Act, 1993, inquires into complaints, summons records, and recommends relief; it is quasi-judicial in inquiry, not a criminal court that can sentence.
• The Central Information Commission and State Information Commissions, under the Right to Information Act, 2005, hear second appeals and can impose penalty under Section 20; those penalty orders are quasi-judicial.
• The National Green Tribunal, under the National Green Tribunal Act, 2010, decides environmental disputes with expert members and has powers of a civil court for defined purposes, yet it is a statutory tribunal, not a High Court.
• The Central Administrative Tribunal, under the Administrative Tribunals Act, 1985, hears service disputes of All India Services and Central civil posts, a classic Article 323A example.
• The Election Commission of India, when it decides disputes on party symbols under the Symbols Order, or when it issues a reasoned order on a Model Code complaint that affects a candidate, acts in a quasi-judicial way, even though Article 324 also gives it wide administrative superintendence.
• The Competition Commission of India under the Competition Act, 2002, the Securities and Appellate machinery around SEBI, TRAI with the Telecom Disputes Settlement and Appellate Tribunal, and income-tax assessing officers when they pass a best-judgment assessment after hearing, are everyday quasi-judicial examples.
• National and State Consumer Disputes Redressal Commissions under the Consumer Protection Act (1986, now 2019) decide consumer complaints with a simplified procedure; they are quasi-judicial forums, not ordinary civil courts.

Why the category matters

• If a body is quasi-judicial, mandamus and certiorari under Article 226 lie more readily against a speaking-order defect, and the record must show reasons.
• If the same body only makes policy, courts give more deference. Labelling a penalty as “administrative” cannot hide a duty to hear.
• Concrete examples therefore train the administrator: NHRC, CIC, NGT, CAT, CCI and consumer commissions all show the same skeleton of notice, hearing and reason, with different subject statutes.