Constitution Day: PM Modi, CJI Ramana stress need for judiciary and government to complement each other
Modi noted while colonialism that once ruled India no more exists, the colonial mindset still prevails by which developed countries try to block development of progressive countries like India in the name of freedom of expression and other forms and lately, citing environment and carbon emissions
New Delhi: Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Chief Justice of India (CJI) NV Ramana struck a common chord on Friday when they stressed on the need for the judiciary and the government to complement each other in the realisation of constitutional goals.
Speaking at the 72nd Constitution Day event in the presence of justices and jurists, Modi said: “The government and judiciary are twins as they are born out of the same Constitution. As the nation looks towards the 100 years of Independence in the next 25 years, the government and judiciary must strive with common goals and common mind to meet the aspirations of the people through collective responsibility while keeping with separation of powers.”
He noted that while colonialism that once ruled India no more exists, the colonial mindset still prevails by which developed countries try to block development of progressive countries like India in the name of freedom of expression and other forms and lately, citing environment and carbon emissions.
“No country exists today as a manifest colony of another country, but this does not mean the colonial mindset has ended…An attempt is being made today by the developed world to block the progress of developing countries and environment is being hijacked for this purpose,” sadi Modi.
CJI Ramana, whose speech preceded the PM’s, also emphasised that all three organs of the state – executive, legislature and judiciary – are repositories of constitutional trust and it is wrong to assume that securing justice is the job of judiciary alone. “The executive and the legislature must work in conjunction with the judiciary to ensure complete justice as envisaged under the Constitution,” justice Ramana said.
At the same time, he added: “The Laxman Rekha drawn by the Constitution is sacrosanct. There are times when courts are compelled to pay attention to unresolved grievances, in the interest of justice. The intention behind such limited judicial interventions is to nudge the executive, and not to usurp its role…. Attempts to project such interventions as the targeting of one institution by another are totally misplaced.”
He maintained that motivated public interest litigation (PILs) should be discouraged, but there is enormous good done under this jurisdiction as even a letter by a common man yields to effective orders from the top court.
The CJI also spoke about the existence of colonialism in the prevailing laws and called for “Indianization of the judiciary”.
With the Prime Minister and Union law minister Kiren Rijiju in attendance, justice Ramana termed the issue of attack on judges as a matter of “grave concern”, stressing on central agencies and government to not only ensure protection of judicial officers from physical attacks but in the media as well, particularly social media.
Other judges of the Supreme Court – justices UU Lalit and Dhananjaya Y Chandrachud -- spoke underlining the significance of awareness among people about the Constitution and their rights enshrined under it, and the issue of pendency of cases was brought to the fore by attorney general KK Venugopal.
Union Law Minister Kiren Rijiju appreciated the role of judiciary during the pandemic in keeping the courts functional through virtual platform thus enabling hearing of over 15 million cases by high courts and district courts and over 150,000 cases by Supreme Court alone.
Vikas Singh, the president of Supreme Court Bar Association, the body of lawyers practising in the Supreme Court, also spoke on the occasion, highlighting the need for a law to bring transparency and regulate collegium-mandated appointments of high court and Supreme Court judges, and called for a law to ensure lawmakers convicted for heinous offences are debarred for life from contesting polls.
