If Govt Is Interfering, Judiciary Has To Strike Back : Senior Advocate Dushyant Dave

Senior Advocate Dushyant Dave, speaking at a seminar organized by Campaign for Judicial Accountability and Reforms (CJAR), raised concerns about increasing executive interferences in judicial appointments and urged the judiciary to assert its independence."If the government is interfering, there is every responsibility on the part of the judiciary to strike back.Judiciary cannot say that there is an executive interference and hence we cannot do anything. Judiciary must stand up. That will has to come up within"The Senior Advocate commenced his address by giving the example of protests in Israel against attacks on judiciary and drawing a contrast with the Indian situation."The Prime Minister of Israel, with his extremely right wing government, is wanting to pass a law in his parliament to say that the Parliament will have the last word and have the right to override any judgment of the Supreme Court, and that the Government alone would decide who becomes judges. Millions in Israel are standing up against it. Some of the best tech companies are threatening that we will leave Israel. Civil society members, judges, lawyers, politicians, workers- everyone is up in arms. Cities of Israel have seen large scale demonstrations. To cap it all, the President of Israel told his cabinet and his PM that you are heading for a constitutional and social disaster."He also mentioned that in Pakistan, the entire bar had fought against the attempts made during the dictatorship of General Musharaff to control the judiciary.Turning to the situation in India, Mr. Dave criticised the lack of interest in the independence of the judiciary among the bar and the general public. "The bar- we're not interested in the independence of judiciary. We don't give a damn so long as we're able to get our briefs go about our business...It is impossible in this country for this to happen".Dave lamented that the executive interference in Judiciary is "large scale today". While he acknowledged that there are some exceptional judges, he stated that there are also a large number of judges who are highly questionable."I mean it with greatest respect to Chief Justice Lalit, Justice Lokur, Justice Gupta - whom I regard as the finest judges that I have seen in my career of 44 years. But they're exceptions. They're a dying species. We have a large number of judges who are highly questionable. They either lack expertise, knowledge, most of all the commitment."He said that the good judges and far and few.Dave pointed out that activists and opposition leaders were being arrested and denied bail on flimsy grounds, and even stand-up comedians were being denied bail for making funny comments about the Prime Minister. "Across the country, opposition leaders are being arrested, sometimes on flimsy grounds, sometimes on purely bailable offences but aren't getting bail from lower courts, High Courts and many a times from Supreme Court. This is very very alarming. This shows that there is a large scale interference in judicial appointments. Yes, there is a collegium system, yes collegium deliberates very seriously. But I must say, I started in 1978 in Gujarat. There were 14 judges in Gujarat High Court then and I dare say, each one was better than the other, in terms of competence, integrity, intellectual level, hardwork, courtesy. Today, as it happened during Mrs Indira Gandhi's times, judiciary is becoming weaker and weaker."Collegium has failed to pick the best judgesSenior Advocate Dave criticized the collegium system for failing to pick the best judges from those available. In this context, he said–"The Collegium system is in place. The judgement of the Supreme Court is law of land. Yet, there are judges like Akhil Kureshi, Justice Jayant Patel, Justice Muralidhar and many such examples including (Senior Advocate Aditya) Sondhi, who are suffering beyond repair. And who is the loser? The nation, the public interest."He called for the Supreme Court to start exercising its power of contempt to ensure that its judgments on judicial appointments are fully complied with by the government."Not once has the Supreme Court exercised the power of contempt since 1993(to enforce directions on judicial appointments). It shows that the Supreme Court is afraid of taking the executive head on. Unless Supreme Court takes executive head on, this interference will continue. To my mind, Chief Justice Muralidhar's place is only in the Supreme Court. He is one of the most outstanding judges in every sense of how a judge should be. There are exceptional judges in collegium but if you look at the judgement of 1993, there is only one thing which strikes me in that judgement - the judges said "we must pick the best from those available". Have they done that? Not at all."At this juncture, without taking any names, Senior Advocate remarked that he had seen some of his colleagues, who are unworthy of being appointed as judges, getting elevated."I have seen some of my colleagues at the bar...

If Govt Is Interfering, Judiciary Has To Strike Back : Senior Advocate Dushyant Dave

Padmakshi Sharma

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