Thaindian News

New Delhi, April 4 (IANS) The central government Monday asked the Supreme Court to reconsider the system of appointment of judges to higher judiciary as the existing collegium procedure has not delivered on expectations.

The apex court bench of Justice Deepak Verma and Justice B.S. Chauhan referred the matter to Chief Justice S.H. Kapadia to place the central government’s plea before an appropriate bench for consideration.

Attorney General G. Vahanvati told the court that though the central government was contemplating a comprehensive law to deal with judicial appointments, it may take time as it involved amending the constitution.

He asked the court to revisit its 1993 judgment on the appointment of judges.

The Supreme Court had taken away all the powers of the government in judicial appointment and placed these with a collegium, a panel of five senior-most judges of the apex court (including the chief justice and four other judges), which decides on the judicial appointments in the apex and high courts.

The court referred the matter to Chief Justice Kapadia after considering the report of senior counsel A.K. Ganguly, who was earlier appointed as amicus curiae (friend of court)in the case. The matter was raised in a public interest litigation by Suraz India Trust.

Gauguly in his 12-page report to the court said that the 1993 decision of the court “needs to be reconsidered as the procedure adopted for the appointment of judges therein is unworkable under the democratic set up in this country and is contrary to the constitutional foundations of democracy, separation of powers and checks and balances.”

The report said that the “supremacy of the chief justice as interpreted in the Second Judges Case (1993) has also come to be perceived as encouraging lack of accountability in the entire system”.

The amicus curiae referred to a report “Law’s Delays: Arrears in Court” which said that the existing system of judicial appointment in higher judiciary has created an anomaly as the executive (government) had no responsibility in filling up vacancies in the court and the entire responsibility was on the collegium of the Supreme court.

“The union law minister is accountable to parliament for delays in filling up vacancies of judges but he has functionally no contribution to make,” the report said.

Ganguly said that “the decision of this court was a result of the perception of the judiciary that it required to be insulated from the interference from the executive”.

He said that the “working of the system shows that independence can be secured through other measures”.