National Judicial Commission In India: The New Challenge

Art. 50 of our constitution provide - separation of powers and independent judiciary (under directive principles) and Art. 13 of the Indian constitution provide vital power to amend any new statute and empowered to Supreme Court to check the constitutional validity of particular act/statute. For much of its history the Indian judiciary has been regarded as largely fair and incorruptible. No action was taken on the bill but the system of Supreme Court appointments that it envisaged was mandated three years later by the Supreme Court itself. In Supreme Court Advocates-on-Record Association vs. Union of India (1993 (4) SCC. 441) the Court ruled that the Constitution’s provision that the President appoint Supreme Court judges in ‘‘consultation with such Judges of the Supreme Courts...as the President may deem necessary” (Article 124(2)) meant that the advice of the Supreme Court judges was binding upon the President. It also resolved that the judges involved in this ‘consultation’ would be the Chief Justice of India and the two judges next in seniority. This decision was upheld in 1998 in the Third Judges case, only slightly modified to involve the Chief Justice of India and the four judges – rather than two – next in seniority as well as all Supreme Court judges from the candidate’s High Court. The Supreme Court of India and the High Court’s set the standard for judicial conduct and competence in the country. It is vital that we create a National Judicial Commission, combining input from the elected branches of government and the judiciary, to appoint and over see the judges of the Supreme Court and High Court.