Jagdeep Dhankhar, Om Birla frown upon judicial overstep

Vice President of India, Jagdeep Dhankhar, who is also the ex-officio chairman of the Rajya Sabha, and Speaker of the Lok Sabha, Om Birla, flagged the growing tendency on the part of the judiciary, as they perceived it, to wade into matters strictly in the realm of the legislature. They were addressing the 83rd Conference of All India Presiding Officers in Jaipur on Wednesday. While emphasising the need to maintain harmonious relations between the legislature and judiciary, Vice President Dhankar pointed out that the essence of democracy lay in the prevalence of the mandate of the people. The Vice President, who is a former senior advocate of the Supreme Court, asserted that the legislative sovereignty of the Parliament is inviolable as mandated by the Constitution. He also underscored the need for the Legislature, Judiciary and Executive to act in harmonious coordination in order to realise the true aspirations of the people for democracy to be sustained. Another important point made by Vice President Dhankar was that the “basic” of any “basic structure” is the prevalence of supremacy of the mandate of the people.
Vice President Dhankhar observed that just as legislatures cannot pass judicial orders, judges must also refrain from arrogating to themselves the function of law-making, which is the business of Legislatures. He characterised the apex court judgment in the Kesavananda Bharati case of 1973 as a bad precedent that sought to establish judicial supremacy by stating that the powers of the Parliament to amend the Constitution are restricted and do not extend to changing the basic structure. Jagdeep Dhankhar’s remarks also reflect his resentment of the striking down of the NJAC Act by the Supreme Court, which he had on earlier occasions, described as something without a parallel anywhere in the world. Lok Sabha Speaker, Om Birla touched briefly upon the subject and remarked that the judiciary should respect the sanctity of legislative bodies, stressing the need for all organs of constitutional democracy, to stick to their assigned roles. In his message to the Conference, Prime Minister Narendra Modi stressed upon the “We the People” component of the Constitution as the basis for good governance. There could be little doubt as to what he meant by this considering Vice President Dhankhar had recently referred more than once to this aspect of the Constitution while emphasising the supremacy of the people’s mandate. The Vice President also seemed unhappy with the passive response of the Parliament to the striking down of the NJAC Act by the apex court. Meanwhile, the Congress tried to politicise the issue as seen from Sonia Gandhi’s observations at her party conclave that the NDA government was attempting to delegitimize the judiciary, and was also using high constitutional offices, in an oblique reference to the Vice President of India. This was not taken too kindly by Vice President Dhankhar, who, as Chairman of the Rajya Sabha, frowned upon her statement, ignoring the pleas of Mallikarjun Kharge and others to keep his comments off the record. It remains to be seen how the apex court responds to these latest observations of Vice President Dhankhar and others. The last time around, the Supreme Court appeared concerned about the government’s stance on some issues, while maintaining that its verdict in the NJAC Act was the law of the land. Hopefully, all three key organs of the democratic state—the Legislature, Executive, and Judiciary will strike a healthy balance in effective functioning within their domains, while maintaining harmonious coordination. The next few months will probably see some measures in this direction.