{"id":44178,"date":"2025-05-27T20:30:21","date_gmt":"2025-05-27T15:00:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/?p=44178"},"modified":"2025-05-27T20:30:36","modified_gmt":"2025-05-27T15:00:36","slug":"supreme-court-chief-justice-centric-change","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/current-affairs\/27-05-2025\/supreme-court-chief-justice-centric-change","title":{"rendered":"Supreme Court Needs to Change from Being a Chief Justice-Centric Court"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p><strong>Syllabus: GS2\/ Polity and Governance<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>Context<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Former Supreme Court Judge, Justice A.S. Oka, emphasized in a more democratic and institutionalised manner rather than being heavily centered around the Chief Justice of India (CJI).<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>The Need for Reform<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><strong>Master of the Roster Doctrine: <\/strong>As reaffirmed in <strong>Shanti Bhushan vs. Supreme Court of India (2018)<\/strong>, the CJI alone decides;\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Which bench hears which case,<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Which judges are assigned to benches,<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>When the case is listed for hearing.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Constitution Bench Control: <\/strong>Although Constitution Bench cases must consist of at least five judges, it is often the CJI who;\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Decides when such benches are constituted, and<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Frequently presides over them.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Control Over Court Administration: <\/strong>According to<strong> State of Rajasthan v. Prakash Chand (1998),<\/strong> while the Chief Justice is &#8216;<strong>first among equals&#8217; <\/strong>in judicial matters, in administrative functions he occupies a unique, dominant role. This includes;\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Control over court registry,<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Determination of work allocation, and<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Implementation of administrative decisions without formal consultation.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Strengthening the Lower Judiciary:<\/strong> Justice Oka also emphasised the need to empower the district judiciary, often termed the &#8220;backbone&#8221; of India\u2019s justice delivery system.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>Challenges emerging from this structure<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><strong>Lack of Transparency:<\/strong> Litigants and even fellow judges remain unaware of how cases are allocated or delayed.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Delay in Justice:<\/strong> Cases of constitutional or national importance have faced inordinate delays due to the discretionary power of the CJI in constituting benches.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Weakened Collegiality: <\/strong>The current structure undermines judicial equality and collective responsibility within the apex court.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>Steps taken for Increased Transparency<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><strong>In 2018,<\/strong> a <strong>public roster system<\/strong> was introduced by the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court, to improve transparency in the allocation of sensitive cases to judges.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>CJI\u2019s Office Under RTI (2019): <\/strong>In <strong>Subhash Chandra Agarwal v. Supreme Court<\/strong>, a Constitution Bench held that the office of the CJI falls under the purview of the Right to Information Act \u2014 a landmark step for judicial transparency.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>The Supreme Court uploaded <\/strong>details of the <strong>appointment process for judges<\/strong> to High Courts and the apex court, enhancing public understanding of judicial selections.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>Reforms Needed<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><strong>Committee-Based Decision-Making:<\/strong> Establishing internal committees for Bench composition, Case listing, and Administrative matters can decentralise power and bring in broader institutional input.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Transparent Listing Mechanism:<\/strong> Technology must be used to automate the listing of cases through an algorithm-based system with minimal human discretion.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Collegiality in Constitution Bench Assignments:<\/strong> A panel of senior judges could collectively decide on the composition of Constitution Benches and the timing of their hearings, rather than relying on the sole discretion of the CJI.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>Concluding remarks<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>As the ultimate guardian of constitutional rights, the Supreme Court must ensure that it remains not only independent but also institutionally robust, inclusive, and transparent.\u00a0<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Moving away from a CJI-centric model towards a more committee-based, democratic structure would strengthen judicial credibility, promote equal responsibility among judges, and reinforce the principle of justice for all.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Source: <\/strong><a href=\"https:\/\/www.thehindu.com\/news\/national\/hope-sc-champions-constitutional-liberties-justice-oka-says-on-his-last-working-day\/article69609627.ece\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\"><strong>TH<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<h3><strong>Context<\/strong><\/h3>\n<li class=\"ms-5\">Former Supreme Court Judge, Justice A.S. Oka, emphasized in a more democratic and institutionalised manner rather than being heavily centered around the Chief Justice of India (CJI).<\/li>\n<p><\/p>\n<h3><strong>Challenges emerging from this structure<\/strong><\/h3>\n<li class=\"ms-5\">In 2018, a public roster system was introduced by the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court, to improve transparency in the allocation of sensitive cases to judges.<\/li>\n<li class=\"ms-5\">CJI\u2019s Office Under RTI (2019): In Subhash Chandra Agarwal v. Supreme Court, a Constitution Bench held that the office of the CJI falls under the purview of the Right to Information Act \u2014 a landmark step for judicial transparency.<\/li>\n<li class=\"ms-5\">The Supreme Court uploaded details of the appointment process for judges to High Courts and the apex court, enhancing public understanding of judicial selections.<\/li>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/current-affairs\/27-05-2025\/supreme-court-chief-justice-centric-change\" class=\"btn btn-primary btn-sm float-end\">Read\u00a0More<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":15,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[21],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-44178","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-current-affairs"],"acf":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/44178","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/15"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=44178"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/44178\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":44215,"href":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/44178\/revisions\/44215"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=44178"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=44178"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=44178"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}