THE BEGINNING of new millennium was seen by Indians as an emergence of new opportunities, new hopes, new realities and above all better governance. We did witness sparks of everything but without any stability. There is less than two years when we would complete the first decade of the new millennium with hopes, opportunities and realities shattering.
Political opportunism has reached its nadir and all political parties are mute to people’s aspirations and frustrations. None of the political leaders, irrespective of party affiliation, has appeared to be sane in his thinking process that could help in nation building, thereby, meeting aspirations of the people at large. What we have witnessed in the recent past is that every political party has more respect for its party flag than the national tricolour. Else, we would have not found streets full of blood, be it in Ahmedabad or Jammu or Srinagar.
The so-called Indian growth story was so contagious that we did not know that it would soon culminate in price hike of foodgrains, fuel, fruits and vegetables. When an average Indian is burdened with meeting his ends, taking care of his family and health, our political masters draw strategies as how to win the impending elections by dividing the nation by resorting to every dirty trick they have in their kitty. And we, who take pride in identifying ourselves as the elite citizens of the third largest democracy watch helplessly. A few thousand politicians, bureaucrats, businessmen, journalists, musclemen and power fixers control the democracy in the name of Republic of India.
There has been no efforts on the part of political leaders to bring an element of people’s participation in the nation building process where the entire system agrees not to politicise a few issues that would give fillip to national development by rising above regional compulsions.
Could there be a way LK Advani, Sonia Gandhi, Lalu Prasad Yadav, Prakash Karat, Mulayam Singh Yadav, N Chandrababu Naidu, Ram Vilas Paswan, Mayawati, Jayalalitha and M Karunanidhi, where all of them would agree on just five issues that can be in the interest of the people of India? At least, let the new decade not go waste in putting the nation into the orbit of real people-oriented growth where no one throws a spanner.
January 29, 2011
January 19, 2011
India waits for Wikileaks to name Swiss account holders
ALLEGATIONS THAT there are billions of dollars in black money stashed away in Swiss banks by Indians might be proved if one believes the Wikileaks founder Julian Assange, who has promised to disclose the names of 2000 account holders, who have Swiss bank accounts.
It is generally believed that a number of Indian industrialists, corrupt politicians and bureaucrats have deposited around 1500 billion dollars of ill gotten money in Swiss bank accounts. In fact information about some of these big names is known to the Indian government and in a recent move, the government was forced to reveal some of these names to the Supreme Court, although the government did so under the condition that the same should not be made be made public.
The reason being that this information was classified as it was given by countries like USA and Germany under a confidential clause. However, the moot question is, if the government of India knows the names of such wrongdoers, who have looted the country and still are doing so, then why there has been no action against them?
Don’t name the corrupt in public, but atleast take action on the basis of this information and stop this loot, the people are demanding. However, it seems that many in power and those close to them are happy with the way things are going on and this could be due to obvious reasons.
Now coming to the much anticipated revelations promised by Assange, the whole of the country is waiting to know if some Indian names will also be exposed by his website. Recently, the Nira Radia tapes also exposed the unholy nexus between politicians, corporates, Indian bureaucrats and even the media and this lead to the ouster of a union cabinet minister.
It is quite possible that Wikileaks expose could also cause a similar upheaval in Indian politics and hit some bigwigs. The common man in India burdened by rising prices, lack of opportunities and general apathy of government and administration is imploring the Wikileaks silently and in the heart of hearts to come out with names of such corrupt Indians.
However, they know that even if these names are revealed, it would be tough to get these corrupt people convicted as they are not only powerful and rich but could also hold the strings of law themselves.
The entire nation knows the fate of Bofors scandal, where the government and the CBI used all its resources to ensure that the case never came to conclusion and despite clear cut evidence of wrongdoing none of the corrupt could be brought to book.
India is a country, where a person might be jailed for accepting a bribe of Rs 20 but if the amount is Rs 20 crores or Rs 200 crores, then the circle of justice just gets inverted. The bigger the crime, the lesser is the chance of getting caught and even less of being convicted.
Recently, a former CVC of India was quoted as saying that corruption is a highly paying activity with a very low risk attached to it. It is time that this risk is multiplied and those, who break the law are made to pay for it.
It is being hoped by the people of India, particularly the poor, who account 70 per cent of the population that billions of rupees that really belong to them are brought back from the Swiss banks. If the UPA government in the centre wants to redeem itself, then it should take cognizance of the Wikileaks revelations seriously, whenever the same are made.
If any Indian name is revealed by the site, then the Congress lead government should immediately order an inquiry and take action against those, who have stashed away national money in Swiss bank accounts.
This money in Swiss banks has been looted from the people of India and if it is brought back to the country, the entire foreign debt can be paid off and even after that a huge amount of spare cash would be left behind for development.
But, who will do this. Does the Indian government and politicians have the strength of character and will to change the very rules of the game and put fear into the minds of those, who have been stealing from the people of India.
We are waiting for Wikileaks to release the list.
It is generally believed that a number of Indian industrialists, corrupt politicians and bureaucrats have deposited around 1500 billion dollars of ill gotten money in Swiss bank accounts. In fact information about some of these big names is known to the Indian government and in a recent move, the government was forced to reveal some of these names to the Supreme Court, although the government did so under the condition that the same should not be made be made public.
The reason being that this information was classified as it was given by countries like USA and Germany under a confidential clause. However, the moot question is, if the government of India knows the names of such wrongdoers, who have looted the country and still are doing so, then why there has been no action against them?
Don’t name the corrupt in public, but atleast take action on the basis of this information and stop this loot, the people are demanding. However, it seems that many in power and those close to them are happy with the way things are going on and this could be due to obvious reasons.
Now coming to the much anticipated revelations promised by Assange, the whole of the country is waiting to know if some Indian names will also be exposed by his website. Recently, the Nira Radia tapes also exposed the unholy nexus between politicians, corporates, Indian bureaucrats and even the media and this lead to the ouster of a union cabinet minister.
It is quite possible that Wikileaks expose could also cause a similar upheaval in Indian politics and hit some bigwigs. The common man in India burdened by rising prices, lack of opportunities and general apathy of government and administration is imploring the Wikileaks silently and in the heart of hearts to come out with names of such corrupt Indians.
However, they know that even if these names are revealed, it would be tough to get these corrupt people convicted as they are not only powerful and rich but could also hold the strings of law themselves.
The entire nation knows the fate of Bofors scandal, where the government and the CBI used all its resources to ensure that the case never came to conclusion and despite clear cut evidence of wrongdoing none of the corrupt could be brought to book.
India is a country, where a person might be jailed for accepting a bribe of Rs 20 but if the amount is Rs 20 crores or Rs 200 crores, then the circle of justice just gets inverted. The bigger the crime, the lesser is the chance of getting caught and even less of being convicted.
Recently, a former CVC of India was quoted as saying that corruption is a highly paying activity with a very low risk attached to it. It is time that this risk is multiplied and those, who break the law are made to pay for it.
It is being hoped by the people of India, particularly the poor, who account 70 per cent of the population that billions of rupees that really belong to them are brought back from the Swiss banks. If the UPA government in the centre wants to redeem itself, then it should take cognizance of the Wikileaks revelations seriously, whenever the same are made.
If any Indian name is revealed by the site, then the Congress lead government should immediately order an inquiry and take action against those, who have stashed away national money in Swiss bank accounts.
This money in Swiss banks has been looted from the people of India and if it is brought back to the country, the entire foreign debt can be paid off and even after that a huge amount of spare cash would be left behind for development.
But, who will do this. Does the Indian government and politicians have the strength of character and will to change the very rules of the game and put fear into the minds of those, who have been stealing from the people of India.
We are waiting for Wikileaks to release the list.
Wikileaks info on hidden accounts likely to reveal Indians
WHERE POLITICAL stalwarts failed to deliver, a dynamic journalist, Jullian Assange has succeeded. The political parties in India have been trading charges over the money stashed in overseas tax havens like Switzerland and Germany, however none appear sincere in their approach.
Ruling UPA has time and again offered tall promises to bring back black money stashed away but never appeared genuine in approach. On the other hand opposition too seems hollow in this regard. Now as they are in opposition, they are raising this serious issue, however when they were in power for six years, they did little to catch the booty.
Julian Assange, a man who has been in limelight for leaking strategically important political and diplomatic cable across the world through his web portal, Wikileaks is once again all geared up to ruffle Indian feathers. According to recent developments, Assange has received two CDs containing 2000 names from the world of business and politics. Any time in near future, the list will be made public and is expected to create havoc in many countries, especially in India where influential people are plundering government coffers bypassing laws of the land easily.
Rudolf Elmer, a former bank employee who worked with a Swiss bank in the past has handed over CDs to Assange at the Frontline club, London on January 17, 2011. The list contains information on “high net worth individuals and corporations and many elite rich and famous people. Many leading politicians, bureaucrats, corporations and other famous personalities are supposed to face heat once data comes out in public domain.
Some reports say that anywhere around $5.7 trillion are stashed in tax havens by rich and influential Indians, the money is mostly amassed flouting law of the land and through illegal means, crime, smuggling, bribe and extortion. According to 2007 exchange rates, the money comes to voluminous Rs 285 lakh crore.
The money, if used properly can address many social issues, it can facilitate in constructing world-class roads across the country, taking power to every rural household, providing drinking water in all villages and towns, constructing houses for 30 crore families, providing Rs 8 crore to every village of the nation; and to build a school, a primary health centre and many more.
But who cares, the people who can bring about a change in the society are all engaged in tall talking and trading barb with critics. The corrupt are still roaming free, nothing concrete has happened to people like Suresh Kalmadi, Ashok Chavan, A Raja, Yeddyurappa, many generals and colonels and bureaucrats. Those who can restructure the system are napping or have become a mute spectator to all the ills happening under their nose.
Ruling UPA has time and again offered tall promises to bring back black money stashed away but never appeared genuine in approach. On the other hand opposition too seems hollow in this regard. Now as they are in opposition, they are raising this serious issue, however when they were in power for six years, they did little to catch the booty.
Julian Assange, a man who has been in limelight for leaking strategically important political and diplomatic cable across the world through his web portal, Wikileaks is once again all geared up to ruffle Indian feathers. According to recent developments, Assange has received two CDs containing 2000 names from the world of business and politics. Any time in near future, the list will be made public and is expected to create havoc in many countries, especially in India where influential people are plundering government coffers bypassing laws of the land easily.
Rudolf Elmer, a former bank employee who worked with a Swiss bank in the past has handed over CDs to Assange at the Frontline club, London on January 17, 2011. The list contains information on “high net worth individuals and corporations and many elite rich and famous people. Many leading politicians, bureaucrats, corporations and other famous personalities are supposed to face heat once data comes out in public domain.
Some reports say that anywhere around $5.7 trillion are stashed in tax havens by rich and influential Indians, the money is mostly amassed flouting law of the land and through illegal means, crime, smuggling, bribe and extortion. According to 2007 exchange rates, the money comes to voluminous Rs 285 lakh crore.
The money, if used properly can address many social issues, it can facilitate in constructing world-class roads across the country, taking power to every rural household, providing drinking water in all villages and towns, constructing houses for 30 crore families, providing Rs 8 crore to every village of the nation; and to build a school, a primary health centre and many more.
But who cares, the people who can bring about a change in the society are all engaged in tall talking and trading barb with critics. The corrupt are still roaming free, nothing concrete has happened to people like Suresh Kalmadi, Ashok Chavan, A Raja, Yeddyurappa, many generals and colonels and bureaucrats. Those who can restructure the system are napping or have become a mute spectator to all the ills happening under their nose.
January 14, 2011
Dissent and Democracy
THIS PIECE is being written about a week after a sessions court in Raipur convicted the human rights activist and physician, Dr Binayak Sen to life imprisonment on charges of sedition. Dr Sen, an alumnus of the Christian Medical College, Vellore was honoured by the college a few years ago for distinguished service by an alumni by awarding him the Paul Harrison Award. Since the sentence came in, lots of protests and criticism of the judgement has come in from various quarters. Binayak Sen’s involvement in spporting the human rights of the tribals of Chattisgarh comes out of his work as a doctor involved over decades in providing health care in the area.
Along with Dr Sen, there were two others who were sentenced. One of course was a Maoist ideologue and the other – Piyush Guha, a tendu leaf trader, who used to buy tendu leaves from Chattisgarh and sell them in West Bengal. So obscure was he that even the Maoists didn’t know, that he was supposed to be one of them; he didn’t figure on any one’s list of ‘wanted’ people, and when he was arrested, it would seem that everyone was puzzled.
The sentence raises the question of the place of dissent and divergent opinions in a democratic society. I can understand condemning and cracking down on violence. I don’t see too much difference between left wing extremism and right wing terrorism and if we are dealing with one with an iron hand, we should surely do the same with the other too..... But is even non violent dissent a crime and a threat to national security?
In 1947, when we obtained political independence from the British, the Communists had called it a jhoothi azadi- a false independence. Today, we know why. We have retained archaic British laws, colonial structures and bureaucracies and even the bearer’s uniform in the district collector’s office wears an uniform smelling to high heavens of imperialism. There is one significance difference though. The British administration was an explicitly colonising regime and so sedition was a legitimate offence for them. Sedition as an offence in the penal code of a democratic country stinks. A democracy should be so able to attract its own people to itself, that seceding from the country is the thought that is farthest from the citizen’s mind. With close to 139 districts in the country covered by the Armed Forces Special Powers Act and other such draconian laws, it seems that Indian democracy is being sustained at gun point in several parts, rather than a willing participation by the citizenry.
Coming back to the matter of the sentence handed down to Dr Binayak Sen, what can one do? The first thing to do is to acquaint oneself with the bare facts of the case and what different voices are saying. A voice that I have been hearing and finding it to be disturbing and what M J Akbar, the noted journalist and a senior of Binayak at school has articulated is that “India has become a strange democracy where Binayak Sen gets life in jail and dacoits get a life in luxury. It takes years of pressure for government to move against those looting the nation’s treasury”. Akbar makes the further telling point, “Binayak made a fundamental, mortal mistake. He was on the side of the poor. That is a non-negotiable error in our oligarchic democracy."
The Indian parliament is increasingly becoming the preserve of the rich and privileged. In an earlier era, corporate czars used to stay out of politics and curry favour with politicians by donating to party funds, under writing election expenses and similar activities. They have increasingly dispensed with that – (though of course lobbyists still exist as any one reading the news in the last weeks knows) and are entering parliament themselves, so that they can directly shape policy without go betweens and middle men. When such is the composition of our parliament, siding the poor and speaking up on their behalf will be obviously charged with sedition, no less. The only consolation that these hapless prisoners will have is that of the company of the Father of the Nation, who too in his time was charged by his colonial masters under Section 124A of the Indian Penal Code with sedition. Yesterday’s colonisers wore suits and ties; our masters of today wear crumpled dhotis. Not much has changed and perhaps not much will – in the short run.”
December 12, 2010
WikiLeaks: Information in the public good
Julian Assange's fatal mistake was the interview he gave last month to a journalist. In this, he claimed to have information about a major American bank that would cause a scandal to rival the one about Enron. Assange had already taken on the establishment; now he was daring the big business as well.
But if governments vacillate in face of a challenge, big business is unforgiving.
For the latter, every threat has an existential dimension. Still, locking up Assange has not stemmed the flood; the leaks continue, like the American television series 'Dallas' to give us our daily dose of surprises.
Perhaps at some point the general public may tire of the cables, but professional diplomats across the world would be delighted by the abundance of material that this flood from Wikileaks has provided to them. Never before was it so easy to get first hand and candid information about people, places and policies in such enormous quantities.
Once, not too long back, spies would stake their lives to get just a single secret document concerning a foreign state, especially a hostile one. They would trawl the waste-paper bins outside an embassy for the shredded and discarded documents to get just one tiny link that could lead them to a whole chain. Spies stopped at nothing; from money to honey traps, all this was fair game in this battle for illicit information. Nor is it a matter of remote past, in fact the trade craft is alive and thriving even now.
Just a few weeks back the Americans discovered to their horror that a Russian spy ring, inclusive of a femme fatale, had been operating for years on the American soil. And the British are just beginning to discover that their bearded black-cab driver is actually an off duty Taliban marking his time till he makes his next bombing run on behalf of Taliban/ ISI. And why just the West, we ourselves were duped by a reverse honey trap when a female staffer at our mission in Islamabad finally confessed to being run by the Pakistanis for years.
It is true that intelligence agencies around the world continue to regard human intelligence as invaluable. But look at what the internet has done. America's contribution to the world is now threatening to turn its own world upside down. With just a single effortless click of the mouse, anyone, and that includes the Chinese hackers as well, will be able to access close to a quarter million diplomatic cables. Some of them trash the leaders they are commenting on; from the obvious ones like Berlusconi the stallion and arrogant Sarkozy to mercurial Gadaffi who prefers being nursed by a blonde bombshell from Ukraine.
As a matter of fact, a quick sampling of some of the cables only proves the point:
- Since 2007, the United States has mounted a highly secret effort, so far unsuccessful, to remove from a Pakistani research reactor highly enriched uranium that American officials fear could be diverted for use in an illicit nuclear device.
WikiLeaks hackers threaten UK government
- Saudi donors remain the chief financiers of Sunni militant groups like Al Qaeda, and the tiny Persian Gulf state of Qatar, a generous host to the American military for years, was the 'worst in the region' in counter-terrorism efforts, according to a State Department cable last December. Qatar's security service was 'hesitant to act against known terrorists out of concern for appearing to be aligned with the US and provoking reprisals', the cable said.
- Cables describe the United States' failing struggle to prevent Syria from supplying arms to Hezbollah in Lebanon, which has amassed a huge stockpile since its 2006 war with Israel. One week after President Bashar al-Assad promised a top State Department official that he would not send 'new' arms to Hezbollah, the United States complained that it had information that Syria was providing increasingly sophisticated weapons to the group.
These instances serve to prove the point that America is no longer feared; that chancelleries sometimes listen to American diplomats only to defy them. But the variety of problems that they detail also point to the complex, often deceitful and dangerous world that we are living in. The issue therefore is twofold; whether the publication of these cables will make the world a less dangerous place, and second whether the sanctity of sharing information with the foreign diplomats in general, and the Americans in particular, has been compromised forever?
The answer to the first derives from the age old battle between the censors and those who believe that societies can truly flower in an atmosphere free from fear and censorship. To the latter, freedom of expression means axiomatically the ability to share all that becomes available. And a main quality of internet is availability of information in large dollops.
The second issue concerns the confidentiality of diplomatic communication. There is no doubt that people will be on their guard at first. Some leaders may be hesitant to open up. But in the end, need overcomes all obstacles, even the risk of exposure to public scrutiny.
US probing WikiLeaks-related hacking
The loss of credibility, if any, suffered by American diplomats after these leaks will be temporary. America is still enormously powerful, and leaders around the world need it, and its representatives, not just as their sounding boards but often also as their confidants and advisers. But long after the cables have been read by the curious, they will continue to serve as instruction material to succeeding generations of new diplomats because they are a fine example of brevity and a uniformly high standard in the information they convey. It is just too bad if in the process some dramatis personae appear sans clothes.
But if governments vacillate in face of a challenge, big business is unforgiving.
For the latter, every threat has an existential dimension. Still, locking up Assange has not stemmed the flood; the leaks continue, like the American television series 'Dallas' to give us our daily dose of surprises.
Perhaps at some point the general public may tire of the cables, but professional diplomats across the world would be delighted by the abundance of material that this flood from Wikileaks has provided to them. Never before was it so easy to get first hand and candid information about people, places and policies in such enormous quantities.
Once, not too long back, spies would stake their lives to get just a single secret document concerning a foreign state, especially a hostile one. They would trawl the waste-paper bins outside an embassy for the shredded and discarded documents to get just one tiny link that could lead them to a whole chain. Spies stopped at nothing; from money to honey traps, all this was fair game in this battle for illicit information. Nor is it a matter of remote past, in fact the trade craft is alive and thriving even now.
Just a few weeks back the Americans discovered to their horror that a Russian spy ring, inclusive of a femme fatale, had been operating for years on the American soil. And the British are just beginning to discover that their bearded black-cab driver is actually an off duty Taliban marking his time till he makes his next bombing run on behalf of Taliban/ ISI. And why just the West, we ourselves were duped by a reverse honey trap when a female staffer at our mission in Islamabad finally confessed to being run by the Pakistanis for years.
It is true that intelligence agencies around the world continue to regard human intelligence as invaluable. But look at what the internet has done. America's contribution to the world is now threatening to turn its own world upside down. With just a single effortless click of the mouse, anyone, and that includes the Chinese hackers as well, will be able to access close to a quarter million diplomatic cables. Some of them trash the leaders they are commenting on; from the obvious ones like Berlusconi the stallion and arrogant Sarkozy to mercurial Gadaffi who prefers being nursed by a blonde bombshell from Ukraine.
As a matter of fact, a quick sampling of some of the cables only proves the point:
- Since 2007, the United States has mounted a highly secret effort, so far unsuccessful, to remove from a Pakistani research reactor highly enriched uranium that American officials fear could be diverted for use in an illicit nuclear device.
WikiLeaks hackers threaten UK government
- Saudi donors remain the chief financiers of Sunni militant groups like Al Qaeda, and the tiny Persian Gulf state of Qatar, a generous host to the American military for years, was the 'worst in the region' in counter-terrorism efforts, according to a State Department cable last December. Qatar's security service was 'hesitant to act against known terrorists out of concern for appearing to be aligned with the US and provoking reprisals', the cable said.
- Cables describe the United States' failing struggle to prevent Syria from supplying arms to Hezbollah in Lebanon, which has amassed a huge stockpile since its 2006 war with Israel. One week after President Bashar al-Assad promised a top State Department official that he would not send 'new' arms to Hezbollah, the United States complained that it had information that Syria was providing increasingly sophisticated weapons to the group.
These instances serve to prove the point that America is no longer feared; that chancelleries sometimes listen to American diplomats only to defy them. But the variety of problems that they detail also point to the complex, often deceitful and dangerous world that we are living in. The issue therefore is twofold; whether the publication of these cables will make the world a less dangerous place, and second whether the sanctity of sharing information with the foreign diplomats in general, and the Americans in particular, has been compromised forever?
The answer to the first derives from the age old battle between the censors and those who believe that societies can truly flower in an atmosphere free from fear and censorship. To the latter, freedom of expression means axiomatically the ability to share all that becomes available. And a main quality of internet is availability of information in large dollops.
The second issue concerns the confidentiality of diplomatic communication. There is no doubt that people will be on their guard at first. Some leaders may be hesitant to open up. But in the end, need overcomes all obstacles, even the risk of exposure to public scrutiny.
US probing WikiLeaks-related hacking
The loss of credibility, if any, suffered by American diplomats after these leaks will be temporary. America is still enormously powerful, and leaders around the world need it, and its representatives, not just as their sounding boards but often also as their confidants and advisers. But long after the cables have been read by the curious, they will continue to serve as instruction material to succeeding generations of new diplomats because they are a fine example of brevity and a uniformly high standard in the information they convey. It is just too bad if in the process some dramatis personae appear sans clothes.
December 08, 2010
Bill on judicial accountability approved
The Union Cabinet on Tuesday approved a bill providing for a mechanism to deal with complaints against judges of the High Courts and the Supreme Court.
The Judicial Standards and Accountability Bill sets judicial standards and makes judges accountable for their lapses. It will also mandate the judges of the High Courts and the Supreme Court to declare their assets and liabilities, including those of their spouses and dependents.
The bill to replace the Judges Inquiry Act retains its basic features, contemplates setting up of a national oversight committee with which the public can lodge complaints against erring judges, including the Chief Justice of India and the Chief Justices of the High Courts.
At present, there is no legal mechanism for dealing with complaints against judges, who are governed by ‘Restatement of Values of Judicial Life,' adopted by the judiciary as a code of conduct without any statutory sanction.
The five-member committee will be headed by a retired Chief Justice of India, appointed by the President, and have a serving Judge of the Supreme Court and a serving High Court Judge, both nominated by the Chief Justice of India; the Attorney-General; and an eminent person nominated by the President. This marks a change from the earlier proposal, in which the committee was to be headed by the Vice-President and to have the Chief Justice of India, a High Court judge and two distinguished jurists not involved in regular practice of law.
On receiving a complaint, the committee will forward it to a system of scrutiny panels. In the case of a complaint against a Supreme Court Judge, the scrutiny panel will consist of a former Chief Justice of India and two sitting Supreme Court judges, and in the case of a complaint against a High Court judge, the panel will have a former Chief Justice of the High Court and two of its sitting judges. The members of the Supreme Court panel will be nominated by the Chief Justice of India, and that of the High Court panels by the Chief Justice of the High Court concerned.
The scrutiny panels will have the powers of a civil court. For instance, they can call for witnesses and evidences. They will be required to give their report within three months to the oversight committee. In the case of a complaint against a Chief Justice, the oversight committee itself will conduct the scrutiny.
On receiving the report from the scrutiny panels, the oversight committee will set up a committee to further investigate the case. Like the scrutiny panels, the investigation committee will have the powers of a civil court; it will have the power to frame definite charges.
If the charges are not proved, the investigation committee can dismiss the case. Otherwise, it will give a report to the oversight committee, which can issue an advisory or warning if the charges are not too serious. If the charges are serious, the committee can request the judge concerned to resign. If the judge does not do so, the oversight committee will forward the case to the President with an advisory for his removal.
In such an event, copies of all relevant documents will be laid in Parliament and an impeachment motion moved. In the Lok Sabha, not less than 100 members will be required to move the motion, and in the Rajya Sabha not less than 50 members will be needed.
Official sources said that besides declaring their assets, judges would be required to file an annual return of assets and liabilities. All the details would be put up on the websites of the Supreme Court and the High Courts.
The bill will also require the judges not to have close association with any member of the Bar, especially those who practise in the same court.
The Judicial Standards and Accountability Bill sets judicial standards and makes judges accountable for their lapses. It will also mandate the judges of the High Courts and the Supreme Court to declare their assets and liabilities, including those of their spouses and dependents.
The bill to replace the Judges Inquiry Act retains its basic features, contemplates setting up of a national oversight committee with which the public can lodge complaints against erring judges, including the Chief Justice of India and the Chief Justices of the High Courts.
At present, there is no legal mechanism for dealing with complaints against judges, who are governed by ‘Restatement of Values of Judicial Life,' adopted by the judiciary as a code of conduct without any statutory sanction.
The five-member committee will be headed by a retired Chief Justice of India, appointed by the President, and have a serving Judge of the Supreme Court and a serving High Court Judge, both nominated by the Chief Justice of India; the Attorney-General; and an eminent person nominated by the President. This marks a change from the earlier proposal, in which the committee was to be headed by the Vice-President and to have the Chief Justice of India, a High Court judge and two distinguished jurists not involved in regular practice of law.
On receiving a complaint, the committee will forward it to a system of scrutiny panels. In the case of a complaint against a Supreme Court Judge, the scrutiny panel will consist of a former Chief Justice of India and two sitting Supreme Court judges, and in the case of a complaint against a High Court judge, the panel will have a former Chief Justice of the High Court and two of its sitting judges. The members of the Supreme Court panel will be nominated by the Chief Justice of India, and that of the High Court panels by the Chief Justice of the High Court concerned.
The scrutiny panels will have the powers of a civil court. For instance, they can call for witnesses and evidences. They will be required to give their report within three months to the oversight committee. In the case of a complaint against a Chief Justice, the oversight committee itself will conduct the scrutiny.
On receiving the report from the scrutiny panels, the oversight committee will set up a committee to further investigate the case. Like the scrutiny panels, the investigation committee will have the powers of a civil court; it will have the power to frame definite charges.
If the charges are not proved, the investigation committee can dismiss the case. Otherwise, it will give a report to the oversight committee, which can issue an advisory or warning if the charges are not too serious. If the charges are serious, the committee can request the judge concerned to resign. If the judge does not do so, the oversight committee will forward the case to the President with an advisory for his removal.
In such an event, copies of all relevant documents will be laid in Parliament and an impeachment motion moved. In the Lok Sabha, not less than 100 members will be required to move the motion, and in the Rajya Sabha not less than 50 members will be needed.
Official sources said that besides declaring their assets, judges would be required to file an annual return of assets and liabilities. All the details would be put up on the websites of the Supreme Court and the High Courts.
The bill will also require the judges not to have close association with any member of the Bar, especially those who practise in the same court.
Picking their own men
Judges know best who can be trusted to join their ranks. The judiciary, therefore, assumed “primacy” in the appointment process in 1993. If an outsider is allowed to have a say in the selection of judges, it is bound to compromise judicial independence. Such are the rather self-serving assumptions on which the judiciary has been resisting all attempts to reform the appointment system in which a “collegium” of five senior-most judges of the Supreme Court, including the Chief Justice of India, make recommendations that are binding on the government.
But in the last year or so, this self-perpetuating oligarchy has unraveled like never before. This is due mainly to the scandals triggered by a couple of collegium decisions. Justice A P Shah, despite his internationally acclaimed judgment decriminalising homosexuality, was found unfit to be elevated to the Supreme Court. The then CJI, K G Balakrishnan, at the same time, spared no effort to promote Justice P D Dinakaran, despite allegations of corruption, land grab, and abuse of office.
Given its secretive style of functioning, there has been no word of explanation from the collegium on why Justice S H Kapadia, who has since become CJI, opposed the candidature of Justice Shah, who has since retired. Or why it was only after the Rajya Sabha initiated impeachment proceedings against him that the collegium abandoned its efforts to promote Justice Dinakaran to the Supreme Court and instead transfered him from Karnataka to Sikkim. The credibility of the Supreme Court suffered another blow in the course of the impeachment proceedings against Dinakaran. One of its judges, V S Sirpurkar, withdrew under a cloud in September as the chairman of the statutory probe related to the impeachment motion.
The withdrawal followed allegations of bias against Justice Sirpurkar on the ground that he and Justice Dinakaran had developed a close friendship during the seven years they had worked together at the Madras high court. The last straw was the disclosure that even after both had left Chennai, Justice Dinakaran reportedly attended the wedding of Justice Sirpurkar’s daughter in Nagpur, while Justice Sirpurkar reciprocated by attending Justice Dinakaran’s daughter’s wedding in Bangalore.
If judges are facing such a trust deficit, the lack of transparency in the appointment system is surely a contributory factor. Yet, law minister Veerappa Moily never followed up on his one-year-old “vision statement”, which proposed that the executive and legislature should be involved in selecting judges. His much-touted but yet-to-be-introduced Judicial Standards and Accountability Bill is meant to deal with allegations against those already in the judiciary.
Much as it is important to strengthen accountability safeguards, Moily seems to have adopted a symptomatic line of treatment as his Bill does not address the actual ailment, namely, deficiencies in the method of recruitment. He is persisting in his folly of limiting himself to accountability even after he suffered the mortification of withdrawing his earlier Bill, which sought to exempt the courts from disclosing assets of judges under the Right To Information Act.
It is time the government mustered the courage to undo the 1993 Supreme Court judgment through which the judiciary appropriated the authority to decide judicial appointments. There is no reason to believe that the collegium misused this authority only in the cases of Shah and Dinakaran. Shah was as much a casualty as Dinakaran was a beneficiary of the give-and-take negotiations that have become endemic in the collegium.
It is clear that the collegium system is flawed as it contains no checks and balances to ensure that the judges entrusted with the responsibility of choosing successors always act in public interest. This is not to suggest, however, that India revert to the pre-1993 situation when the likes of H R Bharadwaj misused the constitutional power conferred on the executive to appoint judges in “consultation” with the judiciary.
In its game-changing 1993 verdict, the Supreme Court swung to the other extreme by interpreting “consultation” as concurrence. As a corollary, the judiciary usurped the prerogative to select candidates. Things are unlikely to be any better if the prerogative is restored to the executive. What is needed is a system that is transparent and inclusive, so that all stakeholders are allowed to have a say on who should man the crucial institution that renders justice.
Such radical reform would require a constitutional amendment, which may be a tough task for a coalition government, but it is a worthwhile cause for mobilising an all-party consensus. Lawyers and judges profiteering from the existing opacity are bound to question the wisdom of opening up the appointment system. They would, however, be hardpressed to justify India’s dubious distinction of being probably the only country in which judges choose their own successors.
When our founding fathers empowered the executive to select judges, they were following the example of the UK, the mother country in matters constitutional. The UK too has taken away judge-selection power from the executive. But it did not hand it over to the judiciary. For the past five years, new judges have been selected by an autonomous body.
Only a third of the 15 members of the UK’s Judicial Appointments Commission (JAC) are from within the judiciary. Of the remaining 10 members, two are from the bar, one from among the tribunals, and seven are statutorily required to be ‘lay persons’. The remit of the JAC – which incidentally is headed by Usha Prashar, a PIO – is to select judges “through fair and open competition, from the widest range of eligible candidates”.
If the British idea of demystifying the judiciary seems unrealistic in India, the UPA government could at least take a fresh look at the NDA’s lapsed Bill seeking to create a selection panel consisting of judges, the law minister, and an eminent person. The NDA model could be improved by expanding the panel to include representation from the legislature, bar and civil society. Another model worth emulating is the American system, under which the president nominates federal judges subject to open and rigorous questioning by the bipartisan Senate Judiciary Committee.
Whatever the shortcomings of the American and British systems, the important thing is their judges, unlike ours, are democratically selected. Democracy in the context of the judiciary is not about judges representing popular aspirations or being prone to partisanship. The lessons that can be drawn from the US and the UK demolish the assumptions on which the Indian judiciary has been running its collegium system. We can no longer be kept in the dark about why a Shah has been rejected or a Dinakaran selected.
But in the last year or so, this self-perpetuating oligarchy has unraveled like never before. This is due mainly to the scandals triggered by a couple of collegium decisions. Justice A P Shah, despite his internationally acclaimed judgment decriminalising homosexuality, was found unfit to be elevated to the Supreme Court. The then CJI, K G Balakrishnan, at the same time, spared no effort to promote Justice P D Dinakaran, despite allegations of corruption, land grab, and abuse of office.
Given its secretive style of functioning, there has been no word of explanation from the collegium on why Justice S H Kapadia, who has since become CJI, opposed the candidature of Justice Shah, who has since retired. Or why it was only after the Rajya Sabha initiated impeachment proceedings against him that the collegium abandoned its efforts to promote Justice Dinakaran to the Supreme Court and instead transfered him from Karnataka to Sikkim. The credibility of the Supreme Court suffered another blow in the course of the impeachment proceedings against Dinakaran. One of its judges, V S Sirpurkar, withdrew under a cloud in September as the chairman of the statutory probe related to the impeachment motion.
The withdrawal followed allegations of bias against Justice Sirpurkar on the ground that he and Justice Dinakaran had developed a close friendship during the seven years they had worked together at the Madras high court. The last straw was the disclosure that even after both had left Chennai, Justice Dinakaran reportedly attended the wedding of Justice Sirpurkar’s daughter in Nagpur, while Justice Sirpurkar reciprocated by attending Justice Dinakaran’s daughter’s wedding in Bangalore.
If judges are facing such a trust deficit, the lack of transparency in the appointment system is surely a contributory factor. Yet, law minister Veerappa Moily never followed up on his one-year-old “vision statement”, which proposed that the executive and legislature should be involved in selecting judges. His much-touted but yet-to-be-introduced Judicial Standards and Accountability Bill is meant to deal with allegations against those already in the judiciary.
Much as it is important to strengthen accountability safeguards, Moily seems to have adopted a symptomatic line of treatment as his Bill does not address the actual ailment, namely, deficiencies in the method of recruitment. He is persisting in his folly of limiting himself to accountability even after he suffered the mortification of withdrawing his earlier Bill, which sought to exempt the courts from disclosing assets of judges under the Right To Information Act.
It is time the government mustered the courage to undo the 1993 Supreme Court judgment through which the judiciary appropriated the authority to decide judicial appointments. There is no reason to believe that the collegium misused this authority only in the cases of Shah and Dinakaran. Shah was as much a casualty as Dinakaran was a beneficiary of the give-and-take negotiations that have become endemic in the collegium.
It is clear that the collegium system is flawed as it contains no checks and balances to ensure that the judges entrusted with the responsibility of choosing successors always act in public interest. This is not to suggest, however, that India revert to the pre-1993 situation when the likes of H R Bharadwaj misused the constitutional power conferred on the executive to appoint judges in “consultation” with the judiciary.
In its game-changing 1993 verdict, the Supreme Court swung to the other extreme by interpreting “consultation” as concurrence. As a corollary, the judiciary usurped the prerogative to select candidates. Things are unlikely to be any better if the prerogative is restored to the executive. What is needed is a system that is transparent and inclusive, so that all stakeholders are allowed to have a say on who should man the crucial institution that renders justice.
Such radical reform would require a constitutional amendment, which may be a tough task for a coalition government, but it is a worthwhile cause for mobilising an all-party consensus. Lawyers and judges profiteering from the existing opacity are bound to question the wisdom of opening up the appointment system. They would, however, be hardpressed to justify India’s dubious distinction of being probably the only country in which judges choose their own successors.
When our founding fathers empowered the executive to select judges, they were following the example of the UK, the mother country in matters constitutional. The UK too has taken away judge-selection power from the executive. But it did not hand it over to the judiciary. For the past five years, new judges have been selected by an autonomous body.
Only a third of the 15 members of the UK’s Judicial Appointments Commission (JAC) are from within the judiciary. Of the remaining 10 members, two are from the bar, one from among the tribunals, and seven are statutorily required to be ‘lay persons’. The remit of the JAC – which incidentally is headed by Usha Prashar, a PIO – is to select judges “through fair and open competition, from the widest range of eligible candidates”.
If the British idea of demystifying the judiciary seems unrealistic in India, the UPA government could at least take a fresh look at the NDA’s lapsed Bill seeking to create a selection panel consisting of judges, the law minister, and an eminent person. The NDA model could be improved by expanding the panel to include representation from the legislature, bar and civil society. Another model worth emulating is the American system, under which the president nominates federal judges subject to open and rigorous questioning by the bipartisan Senate Judiciary Committee.
Whatever the shortcomings of the American and British systems, the important thing is their judges, unlike ours, are democratically selected. Democracy in the context of the judiciary is not about judges representing popular aspirations or being prone to partisanship. The lessons that can be drawn from the US and the UK demolish the assumptions on which the Indian judiciary has been running its collegium system. We can no longer be kept in the dark about why a Shah has been rejected or a Dinakaran selected.
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