Differences between government and judiciary doesn't mean confrontation: Law Minister Kiren Rijiju

Tribune News Service

New Delhi, March 25

Maintaining that difference of opinion between various organs of the State was inevitable in a democracy, Union Law Minister Kiren Rijiju on Saturday said it can’t be termed as a confrontation.

“We have differences, but it doesn’t mean there is confrontation. It sends the wrong message across the world. I want to make it clear that there is no problem between different organs of the State. There are signs of robust democratic actions, which are not a crisis,” the Law Minister said, inaugurating the Chief Judicial Magistrate court, Mayiladuthurai in Tamil Nadu.

Speaking in the presence of CJI DY Chandrachud, Tamil Nadu Chief Minister MK Stalin and Madras High Court Acting Chief Justice T Raja, Rijiju referred to some media reports of alleged differences between the government and the Supreme Court or the legislature and judiciary.

“We must understand that we are in a democracy. There are bound to be certain differences in terms of some outlook but you can’t have conflicting positions. This doesn’t mean confrontation. We are the largest democracy in the world.”

The Centre would support the Indian judiciary to be independent, he said, and called upon the Bench and the Bar—being two sides of the same coin—to work together to ensure that the court complex is not divided. “One can’t exist without the other,” he said.

“Everybody can’t think alike. We are not ruled by a dictatorial king, so the difference of opinion can’t be termed as a crisis in Indian democracy. We can criticise each other but when it comes to national interest, we must be one,” he said, adding that “in some States, I realised that the requirement of court and understanding of government has some shortcomings”.

There may be separation of powers between the executive and the judiciary but that did not mean they shouldn’t work together, the Law Minister asserted.

“We should work as a team to identify and ensure that challenges like pendency of cases are tackled,” he said, adding, “In India, every judge is handling 50-60 cases every day. If I had to deal with so many cases, the mental pressure would be tremendous. That is why sometimes there is constant criticism that judges are unable to deliver justice, which is not true.”

His Ministry was involved in developing a common core vocabulary where Indian languages will have certain common usages, purely technical in nature, soon, to ensure that common people receive orders in their respective languages. (With PTI inputs)

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