Opinion Supreme Court,crack your whip harder
The folk aphorisms in India often capture the essence of our peoples belief-system better than academic tomes.
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The folk aphorisms in India often capture the essence of our peoples belief-system better than academic tomes. One such aphorism is: Bhagwaan ke ghar me der hai,andher nahi. Variations of it exist in all Indian languages. When darkness persists for too long,God unfailingly answers devotees prayers with a ray of light and hope. Thus,when the gloom of corruption spread all over the sky of governance in India,and when the Prime Minister himself started behaving like Dhritarashtra,the blind and helpless king in the Mahabharata,ordinary peoples fervent prayers have been answered with a ray of hope in the form of the Supreme Courts no-nonsense activism. Heads have begun to roll. At least some scamsters,including one who was a cabinet minister until recently,have begun to breathe jail ki hawa,which is ordinary Indians lingo to connote deserving punishment. More are sure to find themselves behind bars in the coming months. The government itself has had to eat one humble pie after another in quick succession.
What seemed impossible in India is beginning to happen. All because some upright judges in the apex court,now headed by one of the best leaders it has had since its inception in 1950,have decided to stick their courageous necks out. Chief Justice S.H. Kapadia,unlike his predecessor,is not conducting himself in a manner designed to please the dual centres of power in UPA,in the hope of grabbing a cushy post-retirement job. He and many of his colleagues are simply performing their duty. This ancient nation of ours,long before the Constitution was adopted and the Supreme Court was born,has known that nothing dispels darkness more assuredly than when the dispensers of nyay (justice) perform their dharma .
How ill-advised the Prime Minister was when he chose to ignore the objections raised by Sushma Swaraj,Leader of the Opposition in the Lok Sabha,in the appointment of the Chief Vigilance Commissioner. Worse,still,he and his colleagues doggedly continued to defend their dubious decision even after the vulnerability of their stand became increasingly evident. And how even more ill-advised he was,when speaking at the Commonwealth Law Conference in Hyderabad last month,he said that the power of judicial review must never be used to erode the role of other branches of the government. Judicial restraint,he went on to say,is vitally necessary to preserve the integrity and sanctity of the constitutional scheme premised on the diffusion of sovereign power. His defiant comment was clearly directed at the Supreme Courts proactive role in the investigation of the appointment of CVC,the 2G spectrum scandal that has caused the government to lose upwards of Rs. 50,000 crore,the shocking money-laundering case of Hasan Ali Khan,and other cases. In each of these cases,the Supreme Court has cracked its whip,exposing both the scandalous immorality that has spread in the upper echelons of the government and also the Prime Ministers own lack of will and ability to stem the rot.
Dr Singh should have exercised caution before sermonising to the Supreme Court not to overstep its powers and disturb the Constitutionally architectured diffusion of sovereign power. A weak Prime Minister,does not challenge a strong Supreme Court. Even a strong Prime Minister like Indira Gandhi could not survive her impudent confrontation with the highest court. Moreover,when he is derelict in his own duty,why is he blaming the judiciary for doing its duty? Had Dr Singh put his foot down and stopped his telecom ministers irregularities,had he rejected the recommendation of P.J. Thomas name for CVC irrespective of where it came from – and it probably came from the other,higher,centre of power – and had he ordered the relevant agencies of his own government to start unearthing the illicit Indian money stashed away in secret foreign bank accounts,the Supreme Court wouldnt have come into the picture at all. Sadly,Dr Singh has never realised that in the Constitutional anatomy of our republics governance,the foot of the Prime Minister has more power than any other limb of the Indian State. As I stated in my last column (Send them all to Tihar),he still has time to exercise prime ministerial power in a way that raises his governments integrity to the same level as his own personal integrity. If he fails to do so,his name will become just a footnote in Indias history.
As far as the Supreme Court is concerned,it must continue to crack its whip – and crack it harder on every guilty person or office that has come under its radar. Which means,even those tainted former Chief Justices of India must get due punishment under the law if the allegations of corruption against them are proved. This act of self-correction,will not only act as a deterrent to the entire multi-tier judiciary,whose sacred portals have been desecrated by the all-pervasive malaise of bribe-taking,but also further raise the Supreme Courts prestige in the immortal eyes of our Constitution-makers. The Supreme Court must not hesitate to go after even more high-profile cases of corruption and cover-up such as Bofors and those involving leaders of other political parties. Indias governance and political system needs a shock treatment. The SC-administered shock will hopefully bring it to its senses.
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