The National Human Rights Commission was established under the statute of:

Correct — A, The Protection of Human Rights Act, 1993. The Commission is a statutory body, and the statute is the Protection of Human Rights Act, 1993, whose long title promises a National Human Rights Commission, State Human Rights Commissions and Human Rights Courts. The sequence is worth carrying: an Ordinance was promulgated on 28 September 1993, the Commission was constituted on 12 October 1993, and the Act followed to give it a permanent basis. The other three options are plausible-sounding titles that do not exist on the Indian statute book — and note that the framing matters, because the Commission is not a constitutional body. Nothing in the Constitution creates it, which is why an Act had to.

• (b)The Protection and Implementation of Human Rights Act, 1993 — No such Act exists. The words 'and Implementation' are inserted to make the real title look incomplete — a common way of building a distractor out of the correct answer.
• (c)The Human Rights Act, 1993 — There is no Indian statute of this name. A Human Rights Act does exist in the United Kingdom, passed in 1998, which is probably where the familiarity comes from.
• (d)The Human Rights Commission Act, 1993 — Names the body instead of the subject. The Act is titled for what it protects, not for the commission it sets up, and even UPSC's own 2004 prelims question used this loose form in its stem.

The National Human Rights Commission is a statutory body, not a constitutional one. It was set up by the Protection of Human Rights Act, 1993, which defines human rights as the rights relating to life, liberty, equality and dignity of the individual that the Constitution guarantees or the International Covenants embody, and that are enforceable by courts in India. The same Act lets a State Government constitute a State Human Rights Commission and provides for Human Rights Courts at the district level.

Three of the four options are built by rearranging the real title, which is the standard way this kind of question is made. The discipline that saves you is remembering what an Indian statute is usually named after — the subject it protects rather than the institution it creates. Compare the Right to Information Act with the Central Information Commission, or the Consumer Protection Act with the consumer commissions it establishes. Note one change since: the Protection of Human Rights (Amendment) Act, 2019 widened the chairperson's eligibility from a former Chief Justice of India to a former Chief Justice or a former Judge of the Supreme Court, and cut the term of office from five years to three.

• The Protection of Human Rights Act, 1993 constitutes the NHRC, permits State Human Rights Commissions and provides for Human Rights Courts.
• The NHRC was constituted on 12 October 1993, following an Ordinance of 28 September 1993.
• The Act's definition of human rights covers life, liberty, equality and dignity guaranteed by the Constitution or embodied in the International Covenants and enforceable by Indian courts.
• The Commission is statutory rather than constitutional, and its recommendations are not binding on the government.
• The 2019 amendment allows a former Judge of the Supreme Court, and not only a former Chief Justice of India, to chair it, and fixed the term at three years or up to the age of seventy.

• Calling the NHRC a constitutional body — nothing in the Constitution creates it.
• Quoting the pre-2019 five-year term and the requirement of a former Chief Justice of India, both of which the 2019 amendment changed.
• Assuming the Commission's findings are enforceable; it recommends, and follow-up rests with the government or the courts.

Set as a straight statute-naming item where every wrong option is a rearrangement of the right one, so the marks go to whoever remembers the exact title rather than the general idea.

• practice — not a real PYQ

  The National Human Rights Commission of India is best described as

  • (a)a constitutional body
  • (b)a statutory body
  • (c)an executive body created by a Cabinet resolution
  • (d)a regulatory authority under the Ministry of Home Affairs

  Answer(b) a statutory body — it owes its existence to the Protection of Human Rights Act, 1993, and not to any article of the Constitution.

• practice — not a real PYQ

  Human Rights Courts at the district level are provided for by

  • (a)the Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973
  • (b)the Protection of Human Rights Act, 1993
  • (c)a direction of the Supreme Court in 1997
  • (d)the Legal Services Authorities Act, 1987

  Answer(b) the Protection of Human Rights Act, 1993 — the same Act that creates the NHRC also provides for State Commissions and for Human Rights Courts.