If I have to do something about basic structure doctrine, I should do it through my judgments: CJI

The CJI left the event soon after his address.

CJI Chandrachud had recently presided over the five-judge Constitution Bench, which heard the petitions challenging the changes made to Article 370 of the Constitution and one of the arguments of the rival side had touched upon the basic structure theory.

Union Minister for Law Arjun Singh Meghwal who spoke after the CJI, too, did not broach the topic of the doctrine.

“Basic structure ke baare mein baki log batayenge (Others will speak on the basic structure),” the minister said in his brief address.

Talking about the changes he had brought in the working of the Supreme Court ever since he took over as the CJI in November last year, CJI Chandrachud said, “My first goal… was to institutionalise the courts and move away from an ad hoc model of operation…”

“I have in the course of my 10 months as the Chief Justice realised that institutionalisation in addition to enhancing transparency also humanises the work space. The staff are able to draw boundaries between work and home, and increase their work efficiency. It has also positively changed things for those on the other side, that is, the bar.”

Talking about the Supreme Court Collegium, the CJI said, “One of the criticisms expressed about the Collegium is that we have no factual data to evaluate people whom we are considering for appointment to the Supreme Court… We are still a work in progress but we are improving. I have a centre for research and planning. It is headed by an officer from the Haryana judicial service with two very distinguished young scholars and a number of young people, interns, law researchers…We have prepared a broad platform where we have assessed every one of the top 50 judges in the country who would be considered for appointment as judges of the Supreme Court.”

The CJI said: “We have data on judgments, we have data on reportable judgments, we have data on the quality of judgments which judges are delivering.” “The idea is to make the process of recommending appointments to the Supreme Court more transparent, not transparent in terms of sharing our discussions in the public realm, you can’t obviously do that, but by laying down objective parameters for selection for both the High Courts and the Supreme Court.”

Speaking on the occasion, senior advocate and jurist Fali S Nariman said, “The doctrine of basic structure is now established and accepted by six nation states around the world – Bangladesh, Pakistan, Uganda, Israel, Malaysia and a small country called Belize in central America.”