The Protectors of Fundamental Rights themselves are violating the Fundamental Rights

Yesterday the Supreme Court has not only granted bail to Arnab Goswami but has also declared that the Mumbai High Court erred in denying him bail and thus it violated individual liberty. What action is being taken against the HC judge? Does he get to violate liberty yet continue to resume work as usual? At the minimum, he must be suspended from work for a period of one year and demoted. How else can we hold the judges accountable? How do we stop them from becoming rottweilers of corrupt local politicians?

 

The main problem is that the judiciary will take no action against the judiciary.  And the executive has no power to take any action on the judiciary for wrong judgments.  Even most politicians employ the system to do their dirty work. Ultimately it is a common man and the whistle blower and the honest man who suffers at the hands of the system.

 

Nobody wants to utter a single word against the judiciary not because they have trust upon them, but because of the fear of contempt proceedings. Sorry to say colonial laws are still prevailing in our society which are making us feel so helpless.

“The Protectors of Fundamental Rights themselves are violating the Fundamental rights of citizens”.

 

The judiciary is the only institution in the country which remains totally unaccountable. There is no institution with disciplinary powers over the judiciary. In order to provide for their independence, the Constitution made judges of the superior courts immune from removal except by impeachment. The Ramaswami case and subsequent attempts to impeach judges have demonstrated the total impracticality of that instrument to discipline judges. There has thereafter been persistent talk of setting up an independent National Judicial Commission, but it has been a non starter with the judiciary firmly opposing any outside body with disciplinary powers over them. However, the self disciplining mechanism suggested by the judiciary itself by way of an "In house committee" of judges to enforce a code of conduct nominally adopted by the judiciary in 1999, has also been a non starter in the face of a reluctance on the part of judges to inquire into the conduct of their own brethren. That is one of the reasons why the Parliamentary Standing Committee has rejected the government’s draft of the Judicial Inquiry amendment bill which proposes an "in house Judicial Council" of sitting judges to inquire into judicial misconduct. The bill would in fact make the removal of judges even more difficult than at present.

Compounding the problem further is the Supreme Court’s decree that no judge can be investigated for even criminal offences without the written consent of the Chief Justice of India. In the last 16 years since that judgement, no sitting judge in India has been subjected to a criminal investigation. And not because people have not tried. In a case, former Chief Justice of India refused to accord permission to register an FIR against the senior judge of Lucknow who had purchased land worth 7 Crores for 5 lacs from well known members of a land mafia in the name of his wife.

 

Independence of judiciary is "sacrosanct", and unless there are clear-cut allegations of misconduct, the gratification of any kind and extraneous influences, disciplinary proceedings should not be initiated merely on the ground that a wrong order has been passed by a judicial officer.