Bhopal: Stating that it was a time to revisit norms, Vice President Jagdeep Dhankhar on Friday wondered as to how can the Chief Justice of India (CJI) participate in the selection of the CBI Director or any other executive appointment. He made this remark while speaking at the National Judicial Academy, Bhopal.
“To stir your minds, how can in a country like ours or in any democracy, by statutory prescription, Chief Justice of India participate in the selection of the CBI director?” Dhankhar asked the gathering.
He asked whether can there be any legal rationale for the same? “I can appreciate that the statutory prescription took shape because the Executive of the day has yielded to a judicial verdict. But time has come to revisit. This surely does not merge with democracy. How can we involve the Chief Justice of India with any executive appointment!” he said.
He further stated that executive governance by judicial decree is a “Constitutional paradox that the largest democracy on the planet cannot afford any longer.” He insisted that all institutions must operate within their constitutional bounds.
“Governments are accountable to the legislature. And periodically accountable to the electorate. But if executive governance is arrogated or outsourced, enforceability of accountability will not be there,” he said.
Any intervention in governance, from the legislature or judiciary, is “antithetical to constitutionalism”, he said, adding that Democracy thrives not on institutional isolation, but in coordinated autonomy.
Even as he called judicial review a ‘good thing’, but he stated that when it comes to amending the Constitution, the ultimate authority is Parliament.
“The judiciary’s public presence must be primarily through judgments. Judgments speak for themselves…Any other mode of expression… undermines institutional dignity,” he said.