SC strikes down National Judicial Appointments Commission

Moneylife Digital Team 16 October 2015

The apex court also holds unconstitutional and void the 99th Constitutional Amendment to bring in NJAC for appointing judges

The Supreme Court, while maintaining that the collegium system for selecting judges will continue, has rejected the National Judicial Appointments Commission (NJAC), which was aimed to give the government more say in appointing judges.

The National Judicial Appointment Commission Act, 2014, was challenged in a batch of petitions including by the Supreme Court Advocate-on-Record Association.

Besides contending that the NJAC route for the selection and appointment of judges infringed on the independence of judiciary, the petitioners challenging the NJAC Act, 2014, said it could not have been passed in August 2014 as there was no supporting provision in the constitution. It came into effect only after 31st December assent to the constitutional amendment by President Pranab Mukherjee.

On the other hand, the government contested the maintainability of the petitions, saying that these were premature and academic as statutory provision to bring in the NJAC has not been notified and operationalised.

The government had contended that unless the NJAC was operationalised and someone's rights were affected, there was no cause of action to challenge their validity.

While the Supreme Court Advocate-on-Record Association, NGO Change India, Centre for Public Interest Litigation (CPIL), Bar Association of India and others had moved the court challenging the appointment of judges to higher judiciary through NJAC route, the Supreme Court Bar Association had come out in the favour of the replacing the collegium system of judges' selection by the NJAC.

Earlier, in April, an apex court bench of Justice Anil R Dave, Justice J Chelameswar and Justice Madan B Lokur had referred to the constitution bench the challenge to the validity of the constitution amendment and enabling law to replace the collegium system for the appointment of judges to higher judiciary.

The SC will hold further hearing on the issue on 3rd November for improving the collegium system of appointment of judges.

Comments

User

Bapoo Malcolm

1 decade ago

You cannot improve by improvising. One cannot better by battering, except batter itself. Interference does not cure, it complicates.

The NJAC would mean Law of the government, by the government,for the government. As it is, there is hardly any demarkation between the executive and the legislature, one an appendage of the other.

Police and politicians is a dastardly nexus. Throw in the judiciary and one can say good-bye to liberty as we know it. With so many in the legislatures with criminal charge sheets, can another hand in the pot not mess things further?

A better way would have been a track 2 initiative to iron out the kinks. Steam rolling flattens the pitch completely.

Indira Gandhi's 'Committed Judiciary' is an oxymoron.