SC tells Centre to clear Collegium proposals on appointing judges

R Sedhuraman

Legal Correspondent

New Delhi, October 28

The Supreme Court on Friday directed the Centre to clear its Collegium proposals on appointment of high court judges without waiting for finalisation of the Memorandum of Procedure (MoP).

A 3-member Bench headed by Chief Justice TS Thakur told Attorney General Mukul Rohatgi that the government had no right to sit over the proposals indefinitely awaiting a fresh MoP.

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The Bench said there was no logic in the government’s MoP theory as it had anyway accepted some of the recommendations of the Collegium by appointing high court judges under the old MoP.

The Bench made the remarks while going through the Centre’s status report on the appointment of high court judges based on the proposals of the Collegium comprising five senior most judges of the SC headed by CJI Thakur. The Centre had filed the report in compliance with the court order on two PILs over the delay in judicial appointments.

A 5-member Constitution Bench headed by Justice JS Khehar that restored the Collegium system by striking down the law for setting up a National Judicial Appointments Commission (NJAC) had clarified that appointment of judges would not have to await finalisation of a fresh MoP by the Centre in consultation with the SC Collegium as the vacancies had mounted to about 50 per cent of the sanctioned strength in most of the HCs, the Bench pointed out.

Anyway the MoP under revision had been in use for more than 20 years and there was nothing wrong in following this procedure till a fresh one was put in place to ensure greater transparency and accountability in the appointment process, the Bench said. Justices DY Chandrachud and L Nageswara Rao are its other members.

Further, the Collegium at the Surpeme Court and high courts had tightened the norms for choosing and approving the candidates to be appointed as judges to ensure that only deserving lawyers were selected, the Bench said.

Pointing out that half of the courtrooms in most of the high courts were locked due to the vacancies, the Bench said the Centre appeared to be hell bent on bringing the judiciary to a grinding halt.

"You seem to be waiting for a system change and expecting us to capitulate. We won't let this happen," the Bench told the Centre. There was a time when judges had no courtrooms, but now courtrooms had no judges, it lamented.

Initially, it threatened to summon the secretary responsible for processing the proposals, but changed its mind after the Attorney General pleaded for posting the PILs for hearing after the Diwali break.

The PILs will be taken up again on November 11.

The Bench, however, clarified that it would be compelled to re-convene the Constitution Bench if the deadlock over the appointments persisted. If the government had reservation over any of the recommendations it should return the names to the Collegium for reconsideration, instead of sitting over it, it said.

Any ego clash or confrontation would be detrimental to national interest, it clarified.

Even as the MoP is stuck over the differences between the government and the Collegium over its provisions, Justice J Chelameswar has stopped attending the SC Collegium meetings demanding that its proceedings be recorded.