Will SC judgment help the information law?

It would have been more appropriate had the Supreme Court first tried to resolve the national crisis caused due to long-pending vacancies at different levels of judiciary. The controversial issue relating to the necessity of judges who have retired from the below-the-strength high courts and Supreme Court adorning top positions in the central and state information commissions could have waited for some more time.

The immediate issue before the court was to direct the government to fill up the vacant posts of commissioners of the information commissions  set up under the Right to Information Act.

In fact, the recent two-judge bench judgment virtually revisited the Right to Information Act and has rewritten the constitutionally valid mandate by inducting retired judges in the functioning of the commissions.

A law enacted by Parliament can only be amended by the country’s top legislature, and judiciary, at best, can make certain suggestions that could be considered by the executive for making the legislation effective.

Some critics and analysts would argue that the top judiciary has sought to slip into the legislative mode by  making changes that the lawmakers, perhaps, avoided in the interests of the transparency law.

Moreover, the timing of this controversial order is also somewhat inappropriate as the lawsuits filed by registrars general of certain high courts and Supreme Court challenging certain orders passed by the transparency panels concerning the courts or judges are still pending.

Be that as it may, though the controversial judgment might have found some retired judges most suitable for dealing with a variety of issues that the people might like to know about the governance and its players, it ignores the fact that already many tribunals are run by former judges.

Then there’s another issue. A Supreme Court judge retires at 65 which is also the retirement age for chief information commissioners. How can a retired judge be appointed CIC? He can’t be, unless Parliament amends the law suitably and  tailor it to the concerns expressed by the top court.

In case  this judgment is implemented, 28 posts of chief information commissioners will be reserved for SC judges who retire at 65 years of age and HC judges who retire at 62. At least 43 posts of information commissioners will be reserved for retired judges. In all, 140 posts of information commissioners will be reserved for retired judges out of the maximum of 280 posts that can be created under the transparency law.

At a time when there’s  a grave concern for the backlog of about three crore court cases and the short-staffed judiciary which works with 31% lesser than the sanctioned strength of HC and SC judges, the top court could have taken it as an opportunity to suggest that judges on their superannuation could be accommodated as additional judges until the requisite appointments are made.

At least such a direction, though open for consideration by a larger bench, would help in mitigating the pressure on the judiciary because of the ever-growing backlog of cases.