New Delhi: The five-member Supreme Court collegium headed by the Chief Justice of India T.S. Thakur is understood to have rejected the four contentious suggestions of the Narendra Modi government including the right to have ‘veto power’ to disapprove the recommendations of collegium for appointment of Judges.
There are more than 470 vacancies in the High Courts, which has a sanctioned strength of 1,016. So most High Courts are working at 50 per cent strength. Since there is an inordinate delay in finalising the MoP, the process of filling the vacancies is likely to be delayed further if the stalemate continues in putting in place the approved MoP.
Last week, the then Law Minister Sadananda Gowda and External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj met CJI T.S. Thakur to discuss ways to narrow down the differences. Subsequently the collegium headed by the CJI met and it is understood that it has rejected all the four suggestions made by the Modi government in the guise of ensuring transparency in appointments.
The issue that did not go well with the judiciary is that the government wanted to have ‘veto power’ to reject any candidate recommended for appointment as a judge on grounds of ‘national security’.
