&w=1024&resize=1024,0&ssl=1 "The constitutional order based on institutional trust in the courts is rich: CJI | India news")
Institutional trust in the courts and their credibility is the basis of a thriving constitutional order, Chief Justice of India (CJI) DY Chandrachud said on Wednesday.
The CJI was speaking at the Bhutan Eminent Speakers Forum, part of the Jigme Singhay Wangchuk Lecture Series on 'Accessibility, Transparency and Judicial Legitimacy through Technology: The Indian Experience'.
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Addressing the issue of public trust, the CJI said that courts do not directly hold assets as public trusts.
However, as public officials, the duty to enforce justice rests with the courts, and judicial authorities are not directly responsible for how resources are distributed, he said.
“However, it is up to us to assess the fairness of this distribution and it should be questioned,” the CJI said.
“However, national courts need public trust and legitimacy. Institutional trust in constitutional and other national courts is the basis of a prosperous constitutional order.
“Public trust is crucial to the credibility of a judiciary that otherwise operates on the sidelines – as it should. The Supreme Court of India takes pride in being the people's court,” the CJI said, adding that the judiciary has been repeatedly managed by other branches of government in the field of contracts and natural resources. Questions have been raised about the fairness of statewide allocations such as
He stated that judges should act in a manner unencumbered by common morality when making decisions on constitutional or legal issues.
“Even at the first-instance court level, judges are expected to apply the letter and spirit of the law, with a clinical detachment from the popularity of their rulings. Therefore, the appointment or continuation of the work of judges is not determined by their universal mandate. Decisions in this regard In some sense, populist decision-making is not compatible with judicial independence,” said Chandrachud.
He also referred to the concept of Public Interest Litigation (PIL) jurisdiction in India and said it has become a unique part of the country's constitutional order, co-opted by several other jurisdictions.
The CJI said India is using technology to eliminate accessibility barriers in courts.
“Our e-court project began in 2007 as a nationwide initiative aimed at improving the efficiency of the judiciary and the justice system. We can now submit cases with one click through our e-filing platform. We are witnessing a significant decline. Physical submissions,” he said.
The CJI also mentioned hybrid court hearings and stated that they were introduced to cope with the nationwide Covid-19 lockdowns and are currently being used in Indian courts.
“Virtual courts and videoconferencing have helped overcome the enormous geographical constraints faced by litigants from small parts of the country. In addition, pregnant women and people with physical disabilities can now enter the courtroom virtually,” he said.
The CJI also said that technology is not a panacea for all social inequalities, but the country should not stay away from technology-based measures that further increase judicial accountability.
(Only the headline and image of this report may have been modified by Business Standards staff; the rest of the content is automatically generated from a syndicated feed.)
