New Delhi: The Centre has forwarded to senior advocate Arvind P. Datar over 2,000 suggestions it had received till November 14 from across the country from people of all walks of life on improvement of the collegium system of appointment of judges to the High Court and the Supreme Court.
The suggestions will be formulated under four heads, transparency, eligibility, secretariat for collegium and mechanism to deal with complaints by Mr Datar and submitted to the Constitution Bench headed by Justice J.S. Khehar on November 18.
The Bar Council of India has suggested setting up of an advisory committee to assist the collegium in selection and appointment of judges. It said the committee should comprise the Union law minister or the Attorney General or representatives of Union government, chairman of the BCI and Advocate Generals of the States and one people’s representative (any eminent person, jurist or a public leader) to be nominated by the supreme court collegium.
In an interesting suggestion, the Ahobila Mutt said all High Court and Supreme Court judges must demonstrate that they have deep knowledge of our itihaas, culture and religious practices.
Tests must be conducted by eminent religious minded historians to ensure this. The Mutt pointed out that Hindu religious freedom has been diluted by successive judgments both at High Courts and the apex court and therefore religious knowledge must be made mandatory.
Pitching for transparency in the appointment process, Common Cause has suggested that the Collegium must adopt and publicise an unambiguous Conflict of Interest Policy for persons being considered for judgeship and for members of the Collegium itself. The elite panel should also open itself for public scrutiny and to RTI compliance.
The candidates’ bio-data and assets should be in public domain. Ample opportunity should be provided for public consultation on short-listed candidates. To check cronyism, the participants pitched for making two retired CJs of the SC advisory Collegium members.
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