Supreme Court judges revolt: Why all Indians must feel threatened
That the judiciary, legislature, executive, and the media are the strongest pillars of our vibrant democracy has been a common understanding ever since our Constitution came into force in 1950. But four judges reaching out to the media for grievance redressal on January 12 must make everyone in the country uncomfortable.
This development has been strange because the judiciary has been acknowledged as its own final arbitrator, and its own watchdog by the Constitution.
Is it that the apex court, empowered with the authority to scrutinise any act of the legislature or the executive, now has greater faith in media? What can we as Indians expect the country to become if the judiciary, which is supposed to protect the rights of the citizens, itself feels threatened of violation of rights and thinks that moving on the crutches of the media might be the only option left?
It is strange that the development has happened even though the Constitution mandates that the judiciary remains unaffected by the pulls and pressures exerted by other branches of the state, citizens or interest (civil society) groups. The independence of the judiciary is a basic feature of the Constitution, a right that can't be taken away by any power of the executive or the judiciary.
The judiciary has so far enjoyed the confidence of the common man despite the fact that many corrupt politicians have not been brought to book. To believe that the ongoing crisis would not erode the confidence of the people in the institution would be too naive to believe.
The senior-most judges must have weighed the other available options before going public with their problems. What the judges could have done is to have written about the issue either individually or collectively in newspaper columns. No newspaper would have denied the judges that space given the respect their position draws.
The issues could also have been first thrown open to the full house of 27 sitting judges of the apex court. If that would failed to do provide a solution, the doors of the vice-president or the president could have been knocked for intervention.
It is possible that some experts would say that after all it was a matter concerning only four of the 27 sitting judges and that it was a matter concerning only to a minority section of the apex court. But even then that matter could have been settled internally and peacefully.
The major worry is that if the Supreme Court judges could not resolve the issues as a team, which team would be able to do so.