Comment

The speaker of the Lok Sabha, Somnath Chatterjee, thinks he is batting on behalf of the people when he periodically rails against the judiciary. He is free to do so — in his chair, he is practically invulnerable. The Supreme Court will not haul him up for contempt because that would be encroaching on the terrain of the legislature. I hope Chatterjee does not haul me up before some Parliamentary committee for contempt, but contempt is what I have for Chatterjee’s views.

In recent off-the-cuff remarks to newspersons, Chatterjee made several questionable comments on the judiciary. Among other things, he said more judges were not the solution to the huge backlog of court cases; that the judiciary was
not accountable to anyone but itself; that the courts were merrily entertaining petitions that did not deserve to be admitted at all.

There is some truth to each of these assertions, but only a wee bit. It is alright to call attention to the quality of the judiciary, but to say that more judges won’t help cannot simply be true. Chatterjee should know that the US has eight times as many judges per million population as India (107 Vs 13). Given the backlog of pending cases in Indian courts, there is no way justice can be delivered in most people’s lifetimes. So it is not clear where he got the idea that quality alone will solve the problem.

The quality of judges is certainly an issue. But Chatterjee’s views would make more sense if he can get anyone in his own backyard to try and improve the quality of legislators before picking on the judiciary to make brownie points. The second issue, that the courts are entertaining too many petitions, is also partly true. The Supreme Court would do well to dismiss certain frivolous cases outright, but for this to happen the legislature and the executive must do their bit. Given the lack of governance, and given Parliament’s inability to legislate new laws and/or implement old ones that are already on the statute book, citizens have had no option but to turn to the courts for succour.

In fact, legislators make numerous laws without figuring out how they can be implemented. It took court action to force buses to use cleaner fuel, seal illegal structures in Delhi, and enforce laws against sexual harassment in the workplace. If Parliament wants the judiciary to back off, all it needs to do is legislate sensibly on the concerns that are roiling society. Having abdicated its own responsibility in the name of coalition politics, the legislature has only itself to blame if the courts are rushing to fill the breach.

There is greater truth in chief justice KG Balakrishnan’s argument — made a day before Chatterjee’s comments — that it is the governance deficit that is at the root of judicial delays. The chief justice said both the bar and the judiciary would have to work together to solve the problem.

The courts are clogged largely because the government has been unable or unwilling to do its job. The government is the largest single litigant in the country, and ambiguous laws are one reason for this. Even cases involving private parties — land disputes, crime, etc — have a governmental failure at the root. With the police and the criminal investigation system hopelessly politicised, the police are no longer able to produce enough evidence to convict any of the accused. The rich and the powerful are anyway able to get justice postponed and derailed. The slow pace at which the government is computerising land records has made land-related litigation a major headache for courts.

If there is any institution in India that still evokes some respect, it is the higher judiciary. The executive and the legislature are fairly low down in the public’s list of institutions worthy of admiration. The public knows that when it comes to the crunch, their freedoms are better protected by the courts than by legislators.

Email: r_jagannathan@dnaindia.net