History will not pardon us: Senior SC judge to CJI on pending appointments
Mumbai: Concerned with the delay by the government in appointing two senior judges to the Supreme Court, top judge Justice Kurian Joseph has written to Chief Justice Dipak Misra saying the “very life and existence” of the apex court was under threat.
Justice Kurian wrote “history will not pardon us” if the top court did not respond to the government sitting on the Collegium’s recommendation of elevating a senior judge and a senior advocate to the top court.
The Collegium had recommended in February that senior advocate Indu Malhotra and Chief Justice of Uttarakhand KM Joseph be elected judges to the Supreme Court.
In his appeal, Justice Kurian said: “It is the first time in the history of this court where nothing is known as to what has happened to a recommendation after three months.”
He appealed that the Chief Justice set up a seven-member bench of senior judges to suo motu take up the matter of this delay, a report in The Indian Expresssaid.
The report said Justice Kurian has demanded urgent intervention by the CJI, saying “if there is no normal delivery on completion of the gestation period, what is urgently done is a caesarean section. Unless such a surgical intervention is made at an appropriate time, the child in the womb dies.”
Justice Kurian has sent the letter to the other 22 Supreme Court judges. He has said: “Government owes a duty to take a call on the recommendation as soon as the same is sent by the Collegium. Failure to discharge their duty by sitting over on the recommendations of the Collegium doing nothing, in administrative law, is abuse of power.”
Justice Kurian warned that the judiciary should be independent of the Executive. He wrote: “More than anything else, it sends a wrong message which is loud and clear to all judges down the line not to cause any displeasure to the Executive lest they should suffer. Is this not a threat to the independence of the judiciary?”
If this demand is accepted, it would mean that seven senior-most SC judges could pass an order asking the government to decide on the pending recommendations of the Collegium.
