Judiciary should accept reforms, says JP

Lok Satta founder Jayaprakash Narayan has opined that the judiciary should be amenable to reforms, like all important institutions, in spite of it ‘upsetting the status quo’ to the detriment of a section of the legal fraternity.

Addressing a seminar on the ‘Rule of Law’ organised by Bezawada Bar Association (BBA) here on Friday, Mr. Narayan said some individuals might suffer loss, but if the judiciary was to repose people’s confidence, it had to accept reforms. “After all, the judiciary is not a holy cow as it is made out to be,” he observed.

Citing an example that nowhere in the world were judges of the Supreme Court sought to be appointed by the incumbents, which would be an act of ‘self-serving unconstitutional abomination’, he said: “It is reflective of the judiciary’s wish to be exempted from reforms.”

He cited the delivery of the verdict by a trial court in the murder of former Union Minister L.N. Mishra, 40 long years after the bomb blast happened, DNA analysis in the Sunanda Pushkar case taking a very long time and hundreds of rapes and murder of women that took place after the Nirbhaya incident presented a sordid picture of the Rule of Law in India, he said.

Courtesy: The Hindu