By Vijay Kumar

The policy of courts to abide by or adhere to principles established by decisions in earlier cases.

It is well settled principle of law that every quasi-judicial authority/court/Tribunal had inherent power to review its own earlier order in order to correct the error. The principle of stare decisis cannot be invoked in such a situation. – CESTAT

It is the decisions of the Supreme Court and of the High Courts which can operate as precedents. Stare decisis applies only to the decision of the highest courts. The Central Government is not a court and its decisions are not binding precedent. – Delhi High Court

The doctrine of precedent is not applicable to an order passed by this Court rejecting a Special Leave Petition. Any such order cannot be held to be stare decisis so that it is binding on us – Supreme Court

I think overruling a case or reconsidering a case is a very serious matter. Certainly, you would have to be of the view that a case is incorrectly decided, but I think even that is not adequate. There are some cases that you may not agree with that should not be overruled. Stare decisis provides continuity to our system, it provides predictability, and in our process of case-by-case decision-making, I think it is a very important and critical concept. A judge that wants to reconsider a case and certainly one who wants to overrule a case has the burden of demonstrating that not only is the case indirect, but that it would be appropriate, in view of stare decisis, to make that additional step of overruling that case. - Justice Clarence Thomas