The price of justice

Government needs to invest more in the judiciary to reduce pendency

Written by Siddhartha Dave | Updated: December 25, 2017 7:19 am

For anyone criticising the judiciary, they have to see only two things: Crumbling infrastructure and the number of cases dealt with by judges.

In democracies, elected governments often view a strong and independent judiciary with suspicion. Pieces of legislation with a significantly populist colouring, but often not quite legal, are guillotined by the scales of justice. Politicians, regardless of ideology, desire a weak and submissive judiciary which will not come in the way of fulfilling the promises made before elections. Often, the judiciary is threatened. In the 1930s, US President F.D. Roosevelt threatened to pack the country’s Supreme Court with judges who conformed to his ideology. It worked. The US Supreme Court stopped striking down socially benevolent legislations as ultra vires the Constitution. But even without resorting to such violent methods, the executive, at all times, tries to keep the judiciary in check. One such way is to keep the judiciary’s budgetary allocation to a bare minimum.