THE IMBROGLIO OF LEGAL CAPACITY IN INDIAN DISABILITY LAW As already mentioned, legal capacity has been provided in two different ways by the MHCA and the RPDA. This situation raises the logical query: which is the operable law on legal capacity, especially for persons with psycho-social disability? Are they governed by the MHCA or the RPDA? Or do they have a freedom to choose between these two statutory regimes. The last part of this article dwells on this conundrum. 5. Paradigmatic Battles of Legal Capacity The question raised in the previous section can be answered in several ways. The matter can be looked at just as a matter of statutory interpretation and the question answered, depending upon which of the two statutes is categorised as the special legislation. It can be contended that whilst RPDA is a legislation for all persons with disabilities, MHCA is only concerned with the care and treatment of persons with disabilities. So, when it comes to the care and treatment of persons with mental illness and questions of legal capacity associated with it, MHCA and not RPDA is the special legislation. The interpretation rule is that the special statute prevails over the general one. Further, RPDA was enacted in 2016, whereas MHCA became a law in 2017. Again, by virtue of the maxim that between the later and the earlier law, the later law, that is, MHCA prevails over RPDA, the earlier law. This situation is further strengthened by the fact that Section 120 of the MHCA states “that the provisions of the Act shall have overriding effect notwithstanding anything inconsistent therewith contained in any other law for the time being in force.” In comparison, Section 96 of the RPDA states that “the provisions of this law shall be in addition to, and not in derogation of, the provisions of any other law, for the time being in force.” MHCA was not in force when the RPDA was enacted, but the Mental Health Act of 1987 with notions of legal capacity analogous to MHCA was a law in force as were several other statutes, which, contrary to the CRPD mandate, routinely disqualified persons with disabilities. In order to emphasise the paradigmatic shift it was making, it would have been in the fitness of things to include an overriding provision in the RPDA. However, whether due to oversight, negligence or plain laziness,29 such overriding effect has not been incorporated in the RPDA. 29 I am saying this because Section 96 of RPDA has drawn from Section 72 of the PWDA, the statute which was replaced by the RPDA. Only Section 72 stated that the Act and its rules “shall be in addition to, and not in derogation of any other law for the time being in force or any rules, order or any instructions issued thereunder, enacted or issued for the benefit of persons with disabilities” (emphasis supplied). Section 72 was saving the then existing entitlements of persons with disabilities. Section 96 fails to do that. 43