Courts Not Beyond Scrutiny; Must Remain Willing To Be Questioned, Criticized: CJI Surya Kant

The Chief Justice of India has said that a court cannot place itself beyond scrutiny and must remain willing to be examined, questioned and where necessary criticized.

CJI Surya Kant recently spoke at the 6th Ram Jethmalani Memorial Lecture on “Justice Seen to Be Done: Transparency and Public Trust as Pillars of the Legal System".

"Very recently the Supreme Court had occasion to consider the relationship between legitimate criticism and public confidence in the judicial institution. In our order, we reiterate it and I quote, "The judiciary as an institution is not and cannot be averse to criticism as fair, informed and constructive critic of judicial functioning is a legitimate and necessary feature of a vibrant constitutional democracy. Contributing to institutional accountability and self-correction. This lies at the heart of transparency itself. For a court cannot seek the confidence of the public by placing itself beyond scrutiny. It must remain willing to be examined, questioned and where necessary criticized," the CJI said.

CJI Kant also emphasised that judicial transparency cannot be reduced to open courtrooms or publicly pronounced orders. "Transparency for a court is not simply a matter of open doors and public hearings. Though it certainly includes these things also, it means that the reasoning behind a decision and not merely its result can be examined by anyone who cares to look including the very people the decision goes against. A court that announces its verdict but keeps its reasoning to itself has not really been transparent whatever else it may have done," he elaborated.

On the crucial distinction between public trust and public approval, CJI Kant stressed that the judiciary does not derive legitimacy from popularity or from delivering outcomes that conform to public expectations. “A Court does not earn trust by being liked.. The court earns trust when the people who lost who wanted an entirely different result still walk away believing that the process which decided against them was a fair one. That is a far harder thing to earn than approval and far more valuable also.” he said.

Touching on the problem of judgments remaining reserved for prolonged periods, particularly in matters involving personal liberty, Justice Surya Kant referred to the Supreme Court’s decision in Pila Pahan v. State of Jharkhand, wherein the court directed that reserved judgments should ordinarily be pronounced within three months and required High Court websites to publicly display the dates on which judgments were reserved and subsequently delivered. Such institutional disclosure, he observed, would ensure that judicial delay does not remain invisible to the public.

Senior Advocate Mahesh Jethmalani, who also spoke at the event, called for greater institutional transparency in the judiciary, tribunals and the Bar, arguing that transparency was essential to restoring and strengthening public trust in the legal system.

Referring to the controversy involving cash allegedly found in the outhouse of a sitting High Court judge following a fire, Jethmalani said the episode had caused “staggering damage” to the legal system. He noted that while the concerned judge had been relieved of judicial work and a three-judge committee had been constituted to inquire into the matter, the findings of the committee had not been made public.

Jethmalani said making the inquiry committee's findings public would have enhanced the image of the judiciary and raised a further concern regarding the absence of an FIR nearly a year and a half after the incident. “Almost a year and a half later, no FIR has been registered,” he said, questioning who could set the process in motion after the judge's resignation.