UPA Government resorts to politics of haste
The Congress-led UPA Government has been unwise in not heeding to the Bharatiya Janata Party's demand in the Rajya Sabha to refer the Constitution (120th) Amendment Bill, 2013, to a Parliamentary Standing Committee. Since the amendment Bill proposes a very significant change in the appointment of judges to the Supreme Court and the High Courts, it should have been put through elaborate scrutiny, opinions of prominent jurists from the country and abroad ought to have been invited and the judiciary should have been consulted. The views thus collected could then have been incorporated to the optimum extent, and only thereafter the Bill should have come before the House for approval. But the Government has abruptly sought to scrap the collegium system and wishes to arrogate to itself the absolute right to appoint judges. The Government's haste in doing so is inexplicable, since the principal Opposition had said that it was not per se against a constitutional amendment to re-look at the appointment of judges. By rushing through the Bill in the Upper House, the regime has strengthened the belief that it wants to as soon as possible control the appointments. Experiences of the Emergency are still fresh in memory when some judges of the Supreme Court went out of their way to endorse changes in the law to benefit Indira Gandhi — to the extent that they thought nothing of even the suspension of Fundamental Rights. That was the era when the Government appointed and promoted judges, often superseding the inconvenient ones by their more pliant junior colleagues. Since then, changes have come about and it's not possible even for a willing judge to now tinker with Fundamental Rights. But, it is also true that the collegium system comprising senior judges needs a review. This is not just an outside opinion; many respected jurists and former judges of the apex court and the High Courts have pointed to the defects — lack of transparency and the absence of an inclusive character of the collegium, for instance.
Thankfully, the Government did not show similar obstinacy over a Bill to amend the Right to Information Act. The amendment seeks to negate an order of the Central Information Commission that national political parties fall in the ambit of the RTI Act. Much to the regime's amazement, consensus was missing. Political parties that were uncomfortable with the idea of having some of their activities questioned through RTI applications, realised that a distasteful haste in pushing through the RTI (Amendment) Bill, 2013, will reflect poorly on them and reiterate the impression many people carry that the political parties are averse to greater transparency in their functioning. This is virtually an election season, and while most parties are opposed to the CIC order, they would want the matter to be deeply debated before a final decision is arrived at. (left to itself, the Congress couldn't have cared less because it has set new records in being brazenly opaque about and unashamed by the slew of corruption scandals that has tarnished its image beyond redemption as it prepares to leave office.) A Parliamentary Standing Committee will now consider the Bill and the Government will later have the opportunity to bring it before the House for discussion and voting.