The Supreme Court on Thursday said whether judges really choose judges in India today? The Court made this comment considering the major role of the Central Government in the appointment of the Chief Election Commissioner and other Election Commissioners in India. The Supreme Court said that the Election Commissioner should be an independent person. Shouldn’t there be impartiality in the committee? We are not saying that impartiality is not being maintained, but it should also be visible.
The bench of Justice Dipankar Dutta and Justice Satish Chandra Sharma was hearing petitions challenging the Chief Election Commissioner and Other Election Commissioners (Appointment, Conditions of Service and Tenure) Act, 2023. The bench said that as you said that the judges choose the judges, then we wonder whether it is really the judges who choose the judges these days?
This comment came after Solicitor General Tushar Mehta’s statement in which he had said that only the executive and the legislature are directly accountable to the public. However, the court mentioned the criminal background of lawmakers and ministers across India.
The Election Commissioner must be an independent person
Supreme Court Said that Dr. Ambedkar had said a year before his death that democracy has failed in India. A video of this is also available. Even when the Constitution came into force in 1950, he said it was biased. Dr. Ambedkar died in 1955-56. He was sorry. He expressed a different opinion than what he said.
What he had expected from the people, it did not happen. Just give us the figures of how many states have ministers against whom cases are pending? The Supreme Court also observed that the panel selecting election commissioners consists of two members from the government side and only one member from the other side.
The bench said that whatever Dr. Ambedkar had said, everyone else has also repeated the same thing. We should have trust in the Prime Minister, but this has not happened in the last few years. That’s all I will say. Now it is a case of 2:1. Two members from the Prime Minister’s side and one from the opposition. The Election Commissioner should be an independent person. Shouldn’t there be impartiality in the committee? We are not saying that impartiality is not being maintained, but it should also be visible.
What did the Supreme Court say on the appointment of CEC?
Since the government insisted on referring the matter to a larger bench under Article 145(3) of the Constitution of India, the court reserved its decision on this question before proceeding with the petitions challenging the 2023 law.
The court said that the order has been reserved on the question whether the writ petitions should be sent to a bench of five judges. Under the 2023 law, the existing panel to appoint the Chief Election Commissioner and other election commissioners consists of the Prime Minister, the Leader of the Opposition and a Union Cabinet minister. The petitions challenging the law say it violates the constitutional requirement of an independent Election Commission by keeping the Chief Justice of India (CJI) out of the selection process.
This challenge comes from the Supreme Court’s 2023 Constitution Bench judgment in the case ‘Anoop Baranwal vs Union of India’, which directed that unless Parliament makes a law, appointments to the Election Commission will be made by a committee comprising the Prime Minister, the Leader of the Opposition and the CJI.
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